First thing that comes to mind: You can find some comfort in knowing that other people have been there and passed it. So it is temporary, like all things. And we have some knowledge about how to get through it. Make sure to read up on the suggestions given in MCTB and the discussions here. But the bottom line is just sitting and observing.

As for what makes it easier, in my experience metta meditation helps a lot. Also group meditation makes it possible to sit when it isn't possible otherwise.

And the attitude of "surrender" is helpful.

About the 10 day Goenka retreat. I was also in dark night (I still go back and forth) when I went to my first 10 day retreat last December. I also had anxiety and fears. They blew up during the retreat. I had an pretty bad panic attack. It was a very difficult and traumatic experience. I don't think it was entirely a good idea for me to do it at that time. 

I don't want to scare you more but 10 day in isolation is a difficult thing as it is. Moreover people in there don't have a clue about how to deal with people with anxiety. If you are feeling really scared now in the comfort of your home and with all the distractions, you can be sure that they will get more intense when you are in isolation.

If I was doing it again I would hold off the retreat. Just my two cents as someone who has been meditating for 2 years or so, deals with anxiety and has been through the dark night stuff and still goes back and forth.

I hope I didn't add to your fears. I just thought I should share my relevant experience.

My suggestion would be to work on strengthening your concentration, mindfulness and presence. Don't rush things. Be patient.

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As for hope, sure there is a lot of hope. Look at all the people here who are dealing with or have dealt with the same stuff. They understand what you are going through. Some of them have seen the other end. There is a lot of compassionate, helpful and supportive people here. Make use of it. 

There is a guy who mapped this thing about 1500 years ago. How cool is that. It is known territory. Or at least we have some idea. You just need to sit down and observe. Observe that these things are impermanent and impersonal. 

You are getting to know what suffering is. The more you see it for what it is, the easier it will become.

Important thing is you need to stop wanting to get out of it. Desire is a big hinderance. Surrender is a better attitude.

Find a meditation group in your area.

Exercise, eat well, be in good company, be kind to yourself.

Acceptance is important in the practice but make sure you're still noting.  Try and note with bare awareness first before the note and don't exclude any experiences like "analyzing", "strategizing", "doubt" etc.  You're trying to notice enough detail so that it looks like there is no self but cause and effect instead.  You can note intentions and then actions.  All forms of thinking are allowed.  Sometimes just having people be completely normal and let go of clinging is good to simplify the practice so noting isn't too mechanical.  Let your attention go where it wants to and focus more on noting it than stopping it.  When you realize that your mind wandered you're already back so there's no need to have extra aversion to a wandering mind.

Next make sure you welcome all sensations because habits will come out of your unconscious and trying to block them with more thinking/noting is more aversion. When there's no mindfulness the habitual impulses will likely guide you to the same thinking and acting behaviours you've done in the past.  Maintaining awareness (in a gentle way) and by not clinging/ruminating/fixating/obsessing you can notice that those impulses (positive or negative) extinguish on their own and don't require any repression but instead waiting and patience.  It's like waiting for it to naturally pass away while staying with the body.  You can feel if you like or dislike a thought in the body that's why in Buddhism it's treated as 6 senses instead of 5 to be mindful of.  When the impulse passes away on it's own it should feel like the brain resets into a non-reactive normal state.

In the dark night (which is really just withdrawal symptoms because we are addicted to the chemicals triggered by our thinking and perceptions of objects), it's good to block out all thinking and develop a concentration practice to reduce agitation.  You see this as a steadying move in the 7 factors to awakening.  It's a temporary action but it can reduce the clinging and you can return to the insight practice.  Have faith and belief that it will pass because these bouts feel like crap when you're in them but when they disapate on their own your new baseline habit of equanimity is becoming stronger and stronger. When you see the relief happen on it's own you can trust on patience.

So some ways to avoid trapdoors:

• Maintain awareness without examining it. Notice any aversion connected to the intention to pay attention.  That's a clue that there's some aversion to thinking you don't want.  Paying attention should be an understanding that the consciousness (knowing part of the mind) is already automatically registering experience (including thinking) so nudging awareness to the objects of investigation should be gentle and have little strain.
• Everything has the flavour of the impermanence (emptiness is another way of saying the same thing).
• Everything is cause and effect including your meditation practice.
• Allow fast thinking to arise and don't cling/repress/ruminate etc on it.  Thinking has to be allowed otherwise it's just a temporary concentration practice.  With time and practice seeing thinking as it's happening is easier.
• Do not view appearances as being deficient (eg. have preferences but don't hold/cling/repress/ruminate on them)
• When you're not clinging to preferences the thoughts that naturally happen simultaneously arise and pass away.  This is what makes thinking okay but at the same time not hurt.  Thinking is so highly manipulated in meditation because when it goes negative we start having aversion to thinking.
• If you welcome thinking impulses and elaborate and add on to the skillful ones and let drop the unskillful ones then there's less need to rein in thinking like reining in a horse. Everything is letting go if you don't cling to anything.  Studying Right Effort should be useful here and is very similar to classic cognitive therapy.  When you look at the word effort it should be more about consistency than forcing and straining. Gentle consistent effort.
• When welcoming impulses try and relax the body because fight or flight responses tend to tense the body and the tense body can continue to feed negative thoughts.  This is because vedana (pleasant, neutral and especially unpleasant sensations) triggers craving or aversion which in turn triggers clinging/complaining thinking/fixation/obsession/rumination.  To explain clinging look at how the mind quickly dislikes a situation with perception..."this is bad", but then it goes into a story "this is bad because, because, because etc".  That "because" in the repetative stories is clinging.  The brain can cling all day if you keep feeding it.  Instead of repressing it you can just stop feeding more becauses and the last impulse will die on it's own.
• As you put into place these practices (which is less a doing and more a letting be) you should eventually see equanimity and eventually develop a strong habit of it.
• Summary: Don't repress, don't cling, relax muscles, and don't measure/rehearse/examine/self-reference over awareness or the practice instructions.

I've been through the dark night and it's just temporary waves of withdrawal symptoms but you should look into those negative feelings until you see some freedom hidden in there.  You're becoming less addicted to your habits.

Hopefully that helps you!

Metta,

Richard

Thank you both so incredibly much. Just hearing back from someone makes all the difference in world. I feel so much more confident. I will reconsider whether going on retreat is something that I am up to at this point. After I read both of your posts, I sat down and just followed the breath for a little while. It was relaxed and calm and the fear from earlier seemed to have definetley dissipated. Sorry about my freak out earlier, I suppose it was a long time coming. Thank you again to both of you, just knowing that this experience is in a sense normal and inevitable and that other people here have dealt with it helps so much. 

Hey Will,

I don't have time to read through the whole thread right now, so I'm sorry if I'm just repeating things here.

It's important to realize that anxiety and emotions always have a reason for existing.  My personal theory on the dark night is that meditation increases concentration, but it does not resolve problems.  So what happens is, as the mind becomes more focused, even very small problems that you used to forget about very quickly are focused on and this creates rumination that leads to powerful and terrifying emotional states.  The advice on this forum - to stick with sensations no matter what - is a kind of brute force way of dealing with things.

There is an easier way through, though.  My advice would be that, the moment you notice any kind of desperation in your desire to get out of an emotion, you distract yourself.  Go play some games, go for a walk, do something physical.  F orget about the sensations completely.  Then, once you've calmed down a bit and aren't obsessing, examine what caused the emotion to find the cause.  There is always a cause!  After you understand the cause with a clear mind, try to notice when the cascade effect is starting again in the future and take your atention off of it.  The dark night is rumination, so break ruminations as soon as they happen.

Now, at a specific time you set aside (this is important - call it you self-therapy time or something - don't do this throughout the day, just at the special time) perposefully bring up these issues and visualize yourself accepting the most negative outcomes you can imagine.  It's important to realize that the fear DOES have a cause.  Don't just say you have no idea where it's coming from, that's just giving your mind an excuse to suppress things.  If you can't think of anything, assume you're afraid of terrible pain and death, and imagine yourself calming walking to a firing squad or getting into a car accident.  If this makes you agitated, stop for a moment, take a few deep breaths, and try again.

This works, please try it.  There's no need to blindly stare at horrible sensations.  The key to getting through any anxiety is to learn to trust yourself and feel confident that you can deal with the things your imagination presents to you.  Right now you are afraid of your imagination, and you are afraid of the sensations themselves.  By visualizing yourself actively dealing with the worst you can imagine, it will allow you to let go into spontenaity because you will trust yourself.  This is the direct path to mental stability.

Lots of good advice here already.

Notice that the sensations of fear can't hurt you. This is a really important thing to just check out.

Consider opening your eyes, sitting in the room, noticing the room and your body in it, and just notice that the part of the room where your body is has some sensations of fear and that is ok, as it can't actually do anything bad at all, so you will be ok.

The room is safe.
The body is safe.
The sensations of fear are totally safe, totally non-toxic, just more qualities of what is going on, like colors, like the textures of a small part of the space in the room, that is all.

Being an adrenaline junkie (remember, I work in a trauma center ER), I actually find Fear really thrilling and enjoyable, like a good horror movie, like a good roller coaster.

Try to appreciate that perspective, as, just like a horror movie and a good roller coaster, nothing is actually happening that is going to hurt you, so you can enjoy the thrill, the charge, the juice of that fear and really get into it if you wish to and be just fine.

Thinks to play around with and think about and enjoy the adventure of,

Daniel