Hi everyone!

After a six months brake I resumed a concentration practice (which I've done on and off for over two years). I tried with candles, kasinas and breath, and by trial and error found that works best first staring at a brown kasina for 10-15 minutes and then close my eyes and focus on breath (for 30-45 minutes). Generally I close my eyes after the kasina disappears (I only see the white paper where the brown circle is printed on) and be able to see the light-green circle with the nimitta inside. The big circle fades but the nimitta reappears (in red) but not for long. When I focus on breath, nimitta comes again every now and then, but fades when I add my focus to it.

My concentration skills are poor, so while focusing on breath I add attention to ear tones or count breaths. Usually after the 4th breath, concentration deepens but generally some 10-15 breaths after thoughts arise. First, not fully formed thoughts (like intentions of thoughts) or images try to arise, but some breaths after, they do arise.

The question I like to ask is related to the link between breath and attention. If I focus at the nostrils the smell of roses appears for a short period of time, but I almost always end up involuntarily forcing some kind of breath pattern. If I focus my eyes on the eyebrow but still follow breath, the breath gets shallow and the mind steadier but concentration does not go deep. If instead I focus on the lower abdomen while still following breath, a nice warm sensation rises from the legs to the lower abdomen, but it doesn't grow to the torso, and the mind concentration is the shallower of the three cases.

I don't know how to avoid the interference of the mind on the breath, if it's just a matter of more hours of practice or that one have to accept that to some degree each one affects the other, or that breath have a role at the beginning but not afterwards. In my few deeper concentration experiences (mostly after awakening from a nap (after meditating)) there were no perception of breath.

Thanks for your help!

Hi Pablo,

I know that the common instruction is not to 'interfere with the breath', but I find that a little misleading.

The breath is under both conscious and unconscious control. So just 'letting it be' is more about letting your judgements about there being 'you' and 'the breath' go. I have from time to time simply watched my conscious breathing, waiting for the impulse to breath and following that for as long as it seems natural. That way it is more like I would at any other time of the day, long, short etc.

When I do that, I tend to overshot it and breath deeply and realise that the impulse has already disappeared! So I correct with a short breath, coming back in to line where i feel the impulse to be.

It can feel like that jerky type of breath that happens after crying.

After a few cycles, the concentration is building as 'you' relax into the 'breath' and get mutually absorbed. the impulse to breath rising out of the body and the choice to breath synchronise gently.

It could be otherwise said, let the idea of relaxing about who and what is in control of the breath be your concern, whatever tension arises 'I'm controlling this' or 'this isn't correct' are where the real work is getting done, calmly and gently finding for yourself a way of letting go of judgements.

Thanks Andrew,

I'll try not to be judgemental then. I was afraid that because of my years of taichi practice, I was inducing some kind of breathing pattern where it shouldn't be.

Best wishes,

Hi Pablo -

Further to what Andrew wrote, after the warm sensation begins to arise, as in:

[indent]If instead I focus on the lower abdomen while still following breath, a nice warm sensation rises from the legs to the lower abdomen, but it doesn't grow to the torso, and the mind concentration is the shallower of the three cases.[/indent]

...consider becoming aware of the eye-field. Returning attention to the closed eyes -- after the body is starting to create sensations of concentration -- can cause the brow to feel a little furroughed and can cause a feeling of mild dizziness.

I find when the eye field is engaged after the body is showing signs of early/pending first jhana (warming, boundarylessness energy, no pains), there is often a dizzy quality and a light or blobbish whiteness-in-the-darkness there. Placing attention there (at the eye field after breathing meditation for 15-25 minutes) will often "trip" the upper body to go into the pleasant energetic sensations (after which one can usually easily come up from sitting, versus feeling achy).

I hope that helps.

Hi Kate, thanks for the input.

I've seen that blobbish whiteness before, but not in meditation but while awakening from a nap. I usually lay in bed after a sit, and keep practicing concentration until I fall asleep. I wake up some 10 minutes later and appears at eye-field that whiteness you mention. Sometimes is more defined, like a circle where I can see unknown people or faces doing their daily activities, kind of remote viewing I guess (no sounds heard).

Last couple of times I went to sleep with the resolution to concentrate on the whiteness when awaken. When it appeared, I stared intensively at it, the intensity of lights grew, there was like a kind of "gap of awareness", and an OBE was triggered. Felt like take off, not more than 3 feet upwards. Then I went downwards for a while, it was fully dark, no sound, no sense of body, breath, pleasure, just a peaceful experience. There was some sense of time though (while descending and at the bottom).

I'm clueless about what was that, if it was a jhanic state, an insight "state" or a blind OBE. Any comments will be appreciated!

Well, I'll follow your advice and post what happened. Thanks again

So, one thing that helps when I return to the eye field --- and it is not the eyes' sight faculty nor is the whiteness an actual object, (yet lacking a word for non-actual lightness and non-actual sight I am using the familiar description of eye and eye-object to describe whatever this mental contact is between mental factulty and mind object (light/whiteness)) --- is that I consciously relax the brow if there is any tension there. This smoothing-of-the-muscles action often enables joining this varying lightness-to-darkness (again, these tones are not actual, but mental objects contacted by mental faculty). This joining creates, for me, the first absorption. Breathing may reduce, and this reduction in breathing becomes noticeable in instable (aparisuddho) jhana. Instable jhana may have coming-and-going of jhana at the outset.

For me, I've had only one wakeful OBE (to separate this from dreams with sense of flight) and I think it may have been MCTB's the Arising and Passing Away Event.; it was also marked by a sense of tremendous bliss, "becoming one with light/God" and gave me several years of hoping to reproduce the same event. I gave up in my late twenties, after about a dozen years of missing/longing for that seemingly amazing event.

If you read the page linked from MCTB, what do you think?

Good tip!



I read the page and Daniel's new sticky thread "Diagnosing the A&P" this weekend. I think there are several events related to that stage. But I was doubtful because of Ian's comment (IIRC) regarding the link between OBE and jhanas, plus a fabulous dream I had which pointed in the same direction. ***Edit: Ven Ajahn Chah also talks about descending down a hole in deep jhanas.***

Regarding A&P, I had first horrible night paralysis (that found latter) triggered by zhang zhuang (standing meditation) practice plus short hours of sleep (due to work) that only stopped when I found the link to the energetic practice. Once I accepted it, the energy flowed through my spine and head (with a chain saw like sound) and went down to my legs, where it felt as if my legs where sky rockets! That happened twice with a few days gap. Since then (2 years), I feel some energy flow in my spine and ocasionally climbs to the head and then descends, and in very few occasions that blind OBEs I mentioned before. Nowadays I see in meditation moiré patterns (once in 3D!) just for a split second, as well as ocher colored images or childish scary images (eg. a dead rat, a broken toy,etc), plus the body vibrations and warmth at legs & lower abdomen. Regarding prior Insight Stages (which I have not practiced intentionally) I have also seen things like the candle and plate merge with the floor, or stand up from the zafu but still feel glued to it, or the kasina expand and contract with my breath or spin like a planet, or how thoughts disappear after the breath out. Summing up, there were several unusual experiences but which didn't felt like insight lessons learned.

Regarding 1st Jhana, I once had a dream that felt much like the descending OBE, where I submerged in the ocean, everything was fully dark and then I reached the ocean floor, where there was a turtle whose shell was red (like a red botton). I touched it but then I couldn't take my hand out of it... Latter I found out what nimitta is (turtles are associated with wisdom), and so felt like it was a kind of message to start concentration practices.

Best wishes,