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RE: My new practice log

RE: My new practice log
Answer
10/14/14 10:53 PM as a reply to Not Tao.
Interesting stuff, I went through some of your A/F post as well and I can relate a lot to where you were. For instance, last night, I was feeling pretty good until I went down to sit, then a minor thought from the short list of things that causes me to react came up. This led to some tension in the body, and my practice was to just feel that tension as much as possible while ignoring thought. It seemed to just get worse and turn into a spiral of tension that was there for no reason any more.

A good 70% of the thoughts and emotions that cause me trouble are related to fear of negative feelings continuing. Fear about negative emotions themselves has been a major difficulty.

Would you say the following is a good summary of your core practice:
When a negative emotion comes up, look for the fundamental reason driving that (even if it is subtle). Then, remind yourself, perhaps using internal thought at first, and over time relying on intuition, that this is not a reason worth being unhappy for. To assist with this, you compare it to a PCE.

So, my one question is, which came first, the chicken or the egg? That is, how could you follow the latter part of this method if you hadn't been able to use the method to land at a PCE yet?

RE: My new practice log
Answer
10/15/14 6:44 PM as a reply to Elijah Smith.
Indeed.  The egg is never without it's chicken.  The chicken is never without it's eggs...