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My practice began generally following "Mindfulness in Plain English." I'd focus on the breath, attempting to focus on the sensations in my nostrils. Over a few months I went from about half an hour per day and built up to about two hours per day. At the same time, though, my practice became somewhat fragmented: after reading MCTB, I added noting; based on general reading on mindfulness, I added what amounts to choiceless awareness. So my sittings were somewhat of a mishmash of concentrating on the breath, attempting to broaden my awareness to include "everything," and using noting to support the latter. I didn't consciously choose between these; I basically "went with the flow" and did whichever occurred to me at the time. In conjunction with "choiceless awareness," influenced by MCTB, I tried to be aware of things appearing and moving on.
For a while I also attempted to enter the first Jhana following the short instructions linked from somewhere on this site. AFAICT, without success. My powers of concentration aren't especially well developed.
A few months ago I stopped sitting. Not entirely sure why; I'd have said I "got busy." A Buddhist friend commented that people seem to stop sitting "when they're dealing with something serious and about to make a breakthrough." Dunno about that one way or the other. During those months I've tried to be "present" and "mindful," usually by cultivating alertness rather than noting--perhaps best described as a seat-of-the pants effort to exercise choiceless awareness while going about daily activities.
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