Can samatha style meditations help prevent or cope with dark nights?

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Jim Smith, modified 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 1:56 AM
Created 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 1:48 AM

Can samatha style meditations help prevent or cope with dark nights?

Posts: 1633 Join Date: 1/17/15 Recent Posts
Can samatha (serenity) style meditations help prevent or cope with dark nights?

Jim Smith:

I think part of the purpose of samatha / jhana is to produce a serene state to counteract the more disturbing aspects of vipassana to help cope with or prevent dark nights.  I am trying some a different way of observing the mind and I am finding it useful to come back to jhana practice to "relax". When you begin to see that anything you can observe is not me or mine and you can't know about anything unless you observe it so there is nothing that can be me or mine, and therefore there can be no you and you see this in your own observation of your own mind - it can be a bit disturbing - so it's nice to have a samatha practice to come back to restore tranquility.

The new thing I was trying is this recommended by Sterling:
https://www.lionsroar.com/how-to-meditate-dzogchen-ponlop-rinpoche-on-mahamudra/

and that was pleasant enough, but the first few pages of "The Untethered Soul" also recommended by Sterling  ... uh ... surprised me. I don't know why it didn't have anything new to me just helped me see it is a bit of differnt way that made a lot of difference in how I practiced it.



There are samatha practices other than the jhana that can produce a relaxed tranquil state so, the difficulty of the jhanas should not be an obstacle.

I am interested in what other think about this.

Thanks
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Linda ”Polly Ester” Ö, modified 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 2:02 AM
Created 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 2:02 AM

RE: Can samatha style meditations help prevent or cope with dark nights?

Posts: 7134 Join Date: 12/8/18 Recent Posts
Sure. Unless the dn manifests as being far too agitated to get into jhanas in the first place.
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Jim Smith, modified 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 2:13 AM
Created 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 2:02 AM

RE: Can samatha style meditations help prevent or cope with dark nights?

Posts: 1633 Join Date: 1/17/15 Recent Posts
Jim Smith:
The new thing I was trying is this recommended by Sterling:
https://www.lionsroar.com/how-to-meditate-dzogchen-ponlop-rinpoche-on-mahamudra/

and that was pleasant enough, but the first few pages of "The Untethered Soul" also recommended by Sterling  ... uh ... surprised me. I don't know why it didn't have anything new to me just helped me see it in a bit of different way that made a difference in how I practiced it.


The article on Dzogchen meditation at lionsroar.com incudes in the meditation instructions periodic returns to more of a samatha style after periods of vipassana style:

https://www.lionsroar.com/how-to-meditate-dzogchen-ponlop-rinpoche-on-mahamudra/
"Once again, sit quietly until you feel a sense of calmness."

This seems like a good example of how and why samatha and vipassana should be used together as part of the same practice.
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Milo, modified 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 2:25 AM
Created 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 2:21 AM

RE: Can samatha style meditations help prevent or cope with dark nights?

Posts: 371 Join Date: 11/13/18 Recent Posts
In my experience, yes, it's a smoother ride than dry insight. I want to second what Linda said though:, if you are in DN and not too experienced yet, you might find it hard to enter jhanas. I've found it helpful to go systematically through the hindrances model and formally bring up and 'let go' of subconcious blocks that have built up as a pre-samatha exercise in these cases.

On another note, my most productive meditation sessions have often been when I balanced concentration and insight in a fluid meditation rather than treating them as categorically seperate things.
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Jim Smith, modified 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 3:34 AM
Created 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 3:30 AM

RE: Can samatha style meditations help prevent or cope with dark nights?

Posts: 1633 Join Date: 1/17/15 Recent Posts
There are other forms of samatha meditation besides the jhana. I suppose different people have different ways of entering the jhanas but the way I do it is a relaxing kind of meditation so if I can't get the jhanas going I am still relaxing and becoming tranquil. 
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Linda ”Polly Ester” Ö, modified 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 4:21 AM
Created 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 4:16 AM

RE: Can samatha style meditations help prevent or cope with dark nights?

Posts: 7134 Join Date: 12/8/18 Recent Posts
That’s great. My point still stands, though, because dn can manifest in ways that make it impossible to just relax. Being able to relax is preferred, but if that just doesn’t happen, dry vipassana can be a way to make use of the agitation rather than just being frustrated about it.
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Jim Smith, modified 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 4:45 AM
Created 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 4:33 AM

RE: Can samatha style meditations help prevent or cope with dark nights?

Posts: 1633 Join Date: 1/17/15 Recent Posts
I don't know what people experience in dark nights. I do understand people can be in a state where it is not possible to just relax. I experienced that myself from time to time.

But with dark nights, is that something that comes on suddenly and intensely? If not, or in those cases when it doesn't, couldn't someone recognize they are becoming upset and then stop vipassana and do samatha until they are tranquil and then go back to vipassana?

Because that is what the instructions in the link for the Dzogchen meditation seem to be saying. And that is what I found myself doing which prompted me to start this thread.


Would it help prevent or reduce the severity of some dark nights if more people were aware of this as an option - to do a bit of samatha if vipassana is becoming too intense?

Should people who teach forms of vipassana that produce dark nights encourage their students to also do samatha when they feel the need for it?
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Linda ”Polly Ester” Ö, modified 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 5:08 AM
Created 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 5:03 AM

RE: Can samatha style meditations help prevent or cope with dark nights?

Posts: 7134 Join Date: 12/8/18 Recent Posts
There seem to be differing opinions as to the effectiveness of shamatha for preventing darknight challenges. I would guess that it depends on the infividual conditioning whether or not it works for a person. I’m all for allowing people to try what they feel is needed. Personally, I seem to have intuitively mixed methods without applying any of them very systematically, and it seems to have been working so far. However, now I find that I need to backtrack what I have been doing intuitively and learn what is what.

I think there is a danger to assuming that a specific recipe would work for anyone. At the same time, withholding recipes and scaring people off from experimenting involves dangers too, I believe. So yeah, letting people know the alternatives is probably beneficial, as long as the person doesn’t restlessly try one thing after the other and never settles for anything.

I find it somewhat tricky to know when the timing is right to try a different approach and when it’s just my restlessness tempting me and derailing me from real progress.

I think it might also be a good idea to bear in mind that people use the wording ”dark night” very differently. Some, like Shinzen Young, want to reserve the term for severe cases of spiritually generated poor mental health, specifically depersonalization disorder or derealization disorder. Others, like Daniel Ingram, prefer to normalize the term and include a much wider spectrum of challenges. In the latter case, dn is an integrated part of the path, so avoiding it altogether doesn’t make any sense.
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Nick O, modified 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 9:31 AM
Created 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 9:28 AM

RE: Can samatha style meditations help prevent or cope with dark nights?

Posts: 317 Join Date: 11/5/17 Recent Posts
Without cultivating enough piti and sukha one may enter hell states when hard hitting insight occurs. As my teacher says, "there is no "dark night" in Buddhism." However, he adds, "You still have to go through the dukkha nanas, but would you rather observe a cow patty from afar, or face down in it?"

After running through a few rough insight cycles early this year I realized, not to sound like a broken record, that after working diligently to cultivate joyful Sati on and off cushion, the nasty symptoms of the DN phase in cycles were greatly lessened.

The most successful meditators are those who can perfect that balance of smamatha/vipassana, dry/wet, joy/curiosity. And as unpopular as ideas of "hardwiring happiness" or the fetter model are on this forum, it's becoming more and more difficult to see a reason for them not to be the highest or dare I say most "Noble" goals worth shooting for (EDIT: But only as an immediate goal in this present moment, again and again and again emoticon )   

      
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Jim Smith, modified 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 2:49 PM
Created 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 2:46 PM

RE: Can samatha style meditations help prevent or cope with dark nights?

Posts: 1633 Join Date: 1/17/15 Recent Posts
Nick O:
 And as unpopular as ideas of "hardwiring happiness" 


I don't know why that would be unpopular, neuroplasticity is fairly well accepted phenomenon. Studies have shown the meditation influences brain tissue.

Global and Regional Alterations of Hippocampal Anatomy in Long-Term Meditation Practitioners
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4084509/

The effect of meditation on brain structure: cortical thickness mapping and diffusion tensor imaging
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3541490/

Meditation experience is associated with increased cortical thickness
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1361002/
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Jim Smith, modified 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 4:03 PM
Created 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 4:02 PM

RE: Can samatha style meditations help prevent or cope with dark nights?

Posts: 1633 Join Date: 1/17/15 Recent Posts
Nick O:
. And as unpopular as ideas of "hardwiring happiness" 

I am trying to figure out if it is possible to rewire the brain for emptiness.
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Nick O, modified 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 5:40 PM
Created 4 Years ago at 8/16/19 5:40 PM

RE: Can samatha style meditations help prevent or cope with dark nights?

Posts: 317 Join Date: 11/5/17 Recent Posts
Jim Smith:
Nick O:
. And as unpopular as ideas of "hardwiring happiness" 

I am trying to figure out if it is possible to rewire the brain for emptiness.

emoticon Sorry, that may have been a little bit of a harsh assessment.

Must we get that brain satisfied enough to drop the attachments to realize emptiness? 

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