I've been taking advice from people on here on what to do with my situation. I've been meditating doing noting, and bare awareness and more recently doing Samatha meditation on the breath at the nose.

The very first time I had a panic attack I was around 16 and I freaked out because I smoked a lot of weed and I felt my heart beating which made me have a panic attack. I was always very analytical and was a deep thinker about everything, and after that I continued to smoke weed even though I had anxiety and I'd write down the strangest thoughts I had on my phone when I was high, I really was a wild thinker. Sometime after that I began to meditate due to wanting to get rid of my anxiety and I also was prescribed an SSRI around the same time. My memory is so foggy though so the exact timeline is probably a bit off.

When I was meditating I experienced weird things like lights and feelings of bliss and other strange experiences, was this the A&P? I don't know. Did I cross it when I smoked weed? idk either, weed these days is strong, and for a curious guy like me maybe it made me realize my mortality or something. I'm now I'm now in my mid 20's and my anxiety is crazy these days. I can't enjoy anything, sensations in my body make me think I'm dying or make me spin off into panic attacks in public, it's hard to look at people in the eye. I'm not taking any medication, even though the medicine is sitting here on my counter. I hate the idea of taking a drug that no one really knows how it works and having to depend on it.

Has anyone had crippling anxiety and maybe reached equanimity or Stream Entry, and how has that affected the way your anxiety manifests? I'm curious because I have the pills but the first few weeks are terrible with even worse anxiety. Also if I take the pills and one day I reach Stream Entry I'd hate to be on something that wasn't necessary and all that was necessary was a perspective shift.

Whenever I feel my anxiety coming my mind focuses on my heart and my blood pulsing through my body which makes me even more anxious thinking I'm having a heart attack. I also read something about how you shouldn't meditate on the heart which maybe this kind of is, but it really freaks me out. The only time I don't is when I'm focused on something else

How do I differentiate an anxiety/depression disorder from Dark Night? I'm terribly stressed and it can't be good for me. Do I keep meditating or meditate and take my SSRI? Is Equanimity or Stream Entry the solution? Doctors have no clue about these stages of insight so there's no one to talk to except you guys and gals.

I'd appreciate any help from anyone who can help, my life is terrible at the moment and I'd like some input from someone besides a doctor who is more than willing to prescribe an SSRI. I'll provide more details if your interested, I just wrote whatever I could think of an remember.

Thank you

It's hard to say because smoking weed can create paranoia and if it's "strong stuff" then it's hard to compare. Fear, disgust and misery is due to disenchantment to all addictions. That's what the dark night is. Equanimity is when you can tolerate the perceptions of likes and dislikes and be with a relatively quiet mind and have ease. The insight practice is a weaning practice. I've gone through anxiety fluttering in my chest, anger, disenchantment, disengagement, and indifference on the way to equanimity.

If you can avoid taking narcotics then please do so. Clear your head and then start just putting together your life and goals straight. Meditation won't cure the basic need for self-discipline and life organization. It just makes it easier. Pursuing goals is important because your brain needs to get some dopamine and serotonin the natural way to start feeling better. Even small goals like chores and grocery shopping can help get you back to feeling normal.

The goal in daily life meditation is to see how your perceptions, day-dreams, and thoughts are triggering your craving or aversion chemicals to make you act on your old habits. You want to see this stuff and not act on it and then push yourself to act on your deep values and goals.

One technique I find is very fast and blunt but if repeatedly used can work.

1. Empty your mind of all current thoughts. This is where your old conditioning is waiting to act. Emptying them weakens their hold on you. Make sure you empty your mind of Buddhist thoughts as well.
2. Act on what your deep values and goals are. Imagine the benefits of getting your bite-size daily goals complete.
3. Repeat until you actually act on what you're supposed to do. Keep thinking of the benefits.
4. Notice when you finish a goal that aversion may return. Aversion often masks as tiredness. This is when old avoidance habits enter.
5. Continue repeating 1-4 until your daily checklist of things to do is done.
6. Reward yourself with a simple fistpump. I'm against rewarding yourself with habitual enjoyments. They just condition them further.
7. Go to sleep and start with this again the next day.
8. Do this for 2 months.

Taking action in life is ALWAYS the best way. Sitting and smoking weed, watching TV, surfing the net, or even just sitting and meditating will not replace taking action. Meditation at best will reduce the aversion you have but you must use that relief to take action. The more you do skillful actions they can become new healthy habits. Usually people find that after 2 months of this it's easier to do these actions because they are already becoming a low level habit.

There's an element of really being aggressive to take control of your habits. You will only feel a lot better when you've done this for a good period of time. Without daily resolution, and repetition it won't work. All meditators no matter how advanced they are must look at habit changes as something you tweak for the rest of your life.

Make sense?

I've had very similar experiences with panic attacks and anxiety. In the past I've also been prescribed, and used SSRI's. They can be very helpful. It often takes some fiddling to get the right dosage and version of the drug. For example, for some people, a SNRI might be more effective, so hopefully your physician is on top of that.
You can certainly meditate while taking an SSRI. An SSRI doesn't have to be “forever”. It has been my experience that meditation, in the longer term, is more powerful than SSRI's. Mediation takes longer and requires effort, but is well worth it.
The prescription can give you some freedom and momentum to make some positive changes. There is no need to suffer unnecessarily.

Thank you for the reply Richard.

I do feel disenchanted with things that I used to find pleasurable. I used to love video games now even that is pointless to me. I used to love to play sports now that's pointless. The anxiety I get is mostly from sensing the fear and fearing it even more by thinking my heart's going to explode or something, even though it hasn't at this point. It's weird because when I exercise I can push hard and my heart races, but I don't get freaked out because I know it's normal for that feeling to happen when exercising.

The problem is that even though that list looks good, i've done similar things. I have decent self discipline. I force myself to workout, but the problem is the motivation. I feel stressed all day, and when I'm not I'm terribly tired and lethargic. I just want to know if gaining Stream Entry will help with this anxiety because it really stresses me out so much. Life seems so pointless.

Since your here, when doing concentration on the breath, lets say I feel a stress response like my heart pounding or my blood pulsing, do I focus on that, or do I acknowledge it and move on to the breath? I've been reading the boards and it seems as if maybe my concentration isn't developed enough to gain Stream Entry or Eguanimity consistently.

Are you currently on any medications? I'm really considering it, I've taken them before and they seem to work, but I know they're not a perfect solution. I also know they cause short term side effects and who knows about long term, although anything would be better than the anxiety I deal with all day.

Have you accessed Equanimity or perhaps Stream Entry? Do you feel drugs would help or hurt with attaining it?

Worrying about gaining stream entry is another attachment. How it works is that your amygdala gives you pleasant and unpleasant chemicals. A carrot and a stick. So if you day-dream about the carrot it's because you don't have it right now so you get a stick (cortisol). If you don't know what carrot you want you get a stick. If you have the carrot and eat it then it's gone, so you get a stick again. If you look for stream-entry you can't be thinking about it while you're meditating. It's just another carrot and stick situation. The best thing for you is to develop equanimity and if you can develop it enough to have equanimity towards ALL EXPERIENCES then you'll probably gain stream-entry. If not you can still develop insight in how thinking works and move beyond without having a "blip". You don't need stream-entry to get good results. Having strong equanimity on tap could be better than someone who superficially attained stream-entry but then savours the attainment (using the amygdala again) and starts projecting magical things with it and getting disappointed (dukkha).

Normality doesn't go away with stream entry. I haven't attained stream-entry in the classical way and I feel I'm better off than many who have. Keep doing concentration practices and insight practices and let thoughts be thoughts. You want to be normal like not in any altered states and resting with ease.

Your goal is this much more than stream-entry:

Bahiya Sutta

So don't stop thoughts (even if they are unpleasant) because stopping them has an element of aversion built in. Also don't add rumination to the thoughts. This way thoughts can pass away on their own (even if unpleasant) and they aren't built as a separate self. You want the thoughts to not pretend to experience what your consciousness/knowing faculty experiences. It's like when something happens to you the mind wants to react as if the thinking experienced it. Thinking IS an experience because of the carrot and stick chemicals it triggers.

Very simply let go of liking and disliking perceptions of objects. You may not let go all the way but the more you let go of those habits the less anxiety you'll feel.

If there's a biological problem with your anxiety then see a doctor and get meds (especially if you think there are some results from the prescription drugs you got before). You can meditate with them and eventually after years of practice you may get to the point where you'll lower the doses or let them go permanently. Without being your doctor it's hard for me to be sure on the advice. Meditation has been known to cure depression but only after extensive and skillful practice over years.

I still think that list I gave you above is a good start and should deal with your motivation problem. Unless you keep thinking about the benefits of enjoying sports etc. then your mind will dwell on the negatives. I believe in a balanced version of the dharma. I don't think people have to let go of enjoyment to an extreme level nor do I believe in addiction. It has to be a balance where the meditation keeps you calm and the relief and energy of that calm can help you achieve goals. I'm sure Daniel is achieving goals right now and I'm sure he gets dopamine and serotonin no matter what level of attainment he has. In his book he says that those who achieve Arhatship can go back to entertainment etc. How can a person do that without getting some enjoyment out of it?

A good description from Kenneth Folk on Shikantaza:



So it's up to you. There's no quick fix.

I haven’t taken any medication for a while. After about 1.5 years of meditating I tapered down and stopped. I’ve been doing a daily practice for about 4.5 years. I haven’t achieved stream entry, probably equanimity.

It seems that you are thinking that the only way out of your suffering is stream entry. That hasn’t been the case at all for me. You can advance in well being and get to a point much better than where you are now. Meditation can help with that. Medication is also a useful tool for your situation.

Thank you for the concise answer, I appreciate it so much.

I understand that I shouldn't be aiming for Stream Entry, it doesn't feel like I do, but then again maybe I just need to be with the unpleasant sensations and be absolutely accepting them and completely forget about Stream Entry. It's just so tiring to be suffering in the way I am for as long as I have, but I know that's another story I'm adding to the sensations. I remember being so happy and enthusiastic when i was younger and I'd like some version of that back, although I also know that still a concept and I should stick to bare sensations. I will do my absolute best to accept everything no matter how unpleasant it seems, that seems like the only way to handle things.

It's also strange for me because when I meditate I don't experience many thoughts. Maybe because when I first attempted meditation I did everything in my power to suppress thoughts that my mind knows not to form them completely. I know now that that was not the ideal thing to do, but that's how I first understood meditation to be. Obviously at this moment I am thinking, but when I sit down and meditate there's not many thoughts. When I sit I only notice aversion to sensations, no actual discursive thoughts about sensations, more like feelings of worry or fear or aversion about the unpleasant sensations.

You're also correct about it maybe being a biological issue. It's hard to say if it really did help, nowadays my memory of the past is foggy, especially during these anxious phases. My problem with drugs is that I'd like to not depend on them if possible, as well as if there's another option, I'd like to take that, but I have trouble going out or even looking at family in the eye, so it might be an issue I need outer assistance with. The side effects don't help either, but then again these effects aren't exactly productive at all either. I might just go through the medical route for now and keep practicing and see if later on I can adjust dosage. My big concern was that somehow insight would be blocked with drugs, but from what I've read they don't seem to. Tonight I'll sleep on it and make a decision tomorrow.

I'll keep the list in mind daily, I guess I'm searching for the inner motivation that I had before everything, but I guess i just need to work on it. Hopefully I can start getting enjoyment back out of things I loved before.

Thank you for the quote, it helps. Seems as if i just need to be more accepting of the sensations no matter how bad they might feel.

Again, thank you for your response, it's greatly appreciated. I'll make my decision tomorrow on if I'll be taking medication, and your response has definitely helped.

Thank you

That's encouraging to hear. I'd rather not be dependent on drugs, but at this moment, the anxiety is just too much trouble so I'll sleep on it and make the decision tomorrow.

From what I've read Stream Entry does seem to change perspective permanently and in a positive way so I thought maybe it'd help relieve the anxiety I have. Obviously striving is not the way to go, as Richard was saying, but it's hard to not want relief when you spend all day trying to mask your terrible anxiety.

I'll continue to be as accepting of everything as I can muster and see where that goes and if I take the medication, I'll see if that helps.

Thank you for your response.

Yes being accepting of what you can't change is a huge relief to the brain. Unpleasant sensations won't go away if it's biological and the doctor can't do anything. People with chronic pain physically still like the meditation practice because it reliefs mental stress because it's one less thing that causes pain.

If you want to develop joy it comes from thinking as well. Just like with advertising when you pay attention to only the good aspects of objects the brain increases desire. Day-dreaming on purposeful healthy activities and their benefits means you control what you like and not other people with agendas. Conversely if you like something you shouldn't like you can pay attention to only the bad things until your brain creates enough aversion to give it up.

Metta practice is another option. It seems to work in not preoccupying about myself and it's nice to wish myself well and others well. You can make that into a concentration practice and it's quite healthy. Metta concentration practice, plain concentration practice, and insight practice balance each other well. Insight is good at making you lucid and awake and the concentration practices are soothing.

I feel for your story and hope that a balance of doctor's advice along with strong equanimity help make life more bearable.

Lots of metta

Hi Gerry,

Are you still smoking weed ? If yes, what does it feel like when you're high ?
Are the anxiety/fear symptoms more amplified or suppressed?
Is the high pleasant or unpleasant ?

Without these answers it's hard to tell whether you're in the DN territory. Most probably you're experiencing common baseline modifications that result from prolonged use or dependency of marijuana.

I have no doubt that following the noble eightfold path as taught by the Buddha is the best medicine for any mind.
I promise you that it won't be easy. It will be hell sometimes. In the hardest times you may even wish that you were rather dead. At the time it wont seem apparent but what is generally scorned upon as DN is a very deep cleansing process and there's literally no other way around it. Just keep walking along and as more time goes by you'll realize it's the best thing that could have happened to you. In time you will attain to the higher possibilities, if you keep practicing steadily and allow the changes to happen as they do.

The problems you're having are really minor in comparison of the results you can get. You will be thankful for having these problems because they lead you to the practice. The only thing that's needed is commitment to practice diligently and holistically.

If you plant a seed in a garden and you do not fertilize the plant, or provide it with protection from extreme weather/pests then there's still a possibility that it will produce fruits just by watering alone. On the other hand, if you plant a seed and take full care of the plant, the soil, it's nourishment, it's diseases, it's environment, it's safety, etc then it is very likely that you will get a much better harvest and a stronger plant.

Similarly, the seed of Dhamma can be cultivated just my meditation alone. Not every gardener likes to do the things I mentioned above. Not every gardener becomes a master gardener. It is upto you to use your discernment and follow your heart. There are many missing links between the modern, pragmatic approach of Buddhism and the traditional approach which seems to have worked for millenias. It is upto you and trial and error to see what fits you best, what gives you results and in the end what soothes you.

If you're looking at meditation as a casual activity which will make you feel good and give you a sense of mental peace that the medicines do (with side effects), then I'm not really sure. Even if it alleviates your symptoms, it wont be permanent. You could try a combination of yoga/pranayama etc. Indulge in harmless things that you find interesting such as drawing, music, sports, etc and get a tight hold of yourself. Cultivate harmless joy from development of generosity, kindness, virtue, etc. If you really need to, then take the medicines but dont depend on them.

Lastly, don't see stream entry as a goal or an attainment that will dramatically alter your life. This way your mind will always avoid the present and dream about a future where things will be perfect. Peace can be found only in the present moment, with complete acceptance (equanimity) of what is here right now. Stream entry is just a label filled with words from someone else's experience.

I don't smoke weed anymore. I tried it this weekend to see what it was like and it was terribly anxiety inducing, although I somewhat kept it together by looking down the whole time. The high is unpleasant, but pleasant in a strange way, more unpleasant than not which is why I avoid it.

I'm anxious all the time though, even when I'm weeks and weeks sober. My life just feels so abrasive, I feel overly sensitive to sensations and my mind makes sensations seem like they're death or disease. I accept the sensations but they come back strong when I'm not meditating. Recently I've been getting headaches from all the tension in my body, it's hard to look at people in the eye, I always feel these terrible sensations in my body when I try and do something productive.

The reason I sought out buddhism many years ago was because of the angst and anxiety I was experiencing. Maybe I cross the A&P one of the times I smoked weed, maybe not. I've had strange experiences on weed so I personally wouldn't bet against something of that sort happening. With my type of analytical mind, I can see how weed was probably the catalyst for my anxiety, or maybe I was predestined or who knows. All I know is that all day I feel the suffering, the only time I dont is when I'm asleep or distracted somehow from my body feelings.

Maybe I just have an anxiety disorder and not DN, maybe anxiety disorder and DN, maybe only DN, who knows. What I do know is that I've lost so many friends and opportunities for years because of this. I've been patient by changing other aspects of my life like diet and exercise and meditation, but they just don't take the edge off of this anxiety.

Regardless I will continue my practice and do positive things in spite of this anxiety, but for me, the anxiety is really a big issue so medicine seems like it can jumpstart me in the right direction. I hate the idea of taking a drug to help me feel good, but at this point I've wasted years in my room trying to figure it out on my own and to this day there's not been a clear resolution. I've tried practically EVERYTHING, and I mean EVERYTHING to try and solve this, but I guess acceptance is the best option for me.

I do wish they made a pill for realization though, just so I can compare my anxiety now and when I take the pill to see how my perspective on things and my anxiety differs, but that's not an option so for now I'll do what I can.

I see what your saying about Stream Entry, everyone experiences it differently, maybe I've subtly been striving too much and not accepting enough.

Experimenting with binaural beats and meditation I inadvertently crossed the A&P while I was in 7th grade in a foster home. In my sophomore year of highschool I had whatIwouldcall crippling anxiety. Last year I found MCTB for the second time and decided to try the exercises more seriously. I touched on equanimity without realizing it shortly thereafter, and realized my DN yogi status a couple months later.

Here I am, at 19, a much happier DN yogi gunning for stream entry. When I meditate with enough effort I reach almost stable equanimity and notice a marked reduction in generalized anxiety. I would guess that Stream Entry could seriously reduce your anxiety. I can say for certain that looking for that One Factor that caused your anxiety (or depression) is a hopeless chicken-egg conundrum. A mental disturbance will cause a body disturbance will cause a mental disturbance ... which will tend to exponentially compound into anxiety or depression. Have you tried Reichian body-based therapy? It's essentially the yoga of the West; we have a good thread going on it here. Have you tried nootropics? L-theanine, aniracetam, picamilon, uridine stack? Have you tried focus on positive practices like lovingkindness?

I decided to instead change my diet. All day I''ve been eating nothing but healthy foods like fruits and vegetables and my body feels better. It just sucks that I can't eat the same foods I once used to eat and be ok.

It's been so long for me, and I had no clue what to look for, so I can't say if an A&P occured or how it did. I'd be open to say that I'm not in the Dark Night, I really would, but I've been meditating on the breath for awhile and sometime in between then and now, my attention just got shitty, and I notice my body all day long, and not in a pleasant way. I suppose I just need to be with the sensations and be Equanimous towards them. I do feel better than a few years back though, I'm healthier and feel better, but it's just so frustrating to be stuck here when my old self was so outgoing and fun, but that's the way it seems to go for everyone, some more harsh than others.

I've reached what seems like Low Equanimity where everything seems so expansive and the body feels super calm and the attention is a wide awareness. Funny because I reached it by just watching the sensations and being neutral towards them, but it frustates me to finish practice and the calm only last at most an hour, but I guess I need to work on be even more Equanimous.

I'm also aiming for Stream Entry, but I'm going at it much more relaxed these days. If you don't mind me asking, what kind of practice do you do? Lately I've been doing choiceless awareness if I'm too anxious, concentration on the breath and noting and watching troublesome sensations and noting for when I'm confused, seems to work these days.

I've tried Theanine and its cool, but I get too relaxed on it, it's weird. I can never be satisfied, but everything bothers me sensations wise so I guess that par for the course.

Anywho, no more whining. I'll continue to make my body feel better and continue meditating and accepting these sensations.

Thank you for your reply

I try to get in enough vipassana noting/mindfulness every day to keep my baseline in low EQ. I usually throw in concentration on breath or choiceless awareness. I've also been tacking on Reichian exercises for the past couple months. The results have been encouraging so far.

If you bolster your everyday mindfulness you'll find it easier to stay in low EQ.

Your romance with MJ is over. You've found that she's no more the one you fell for. It's never going to be the same again. Out of habit you will want to keep going back, but you've to know that you'll only get more hurt and hold back. Just forget all about about all your marijuana and possibly other psychedelic experiences. Whenever they come in and say "This is how it should be" just ignore them with the attitude of "I'll find out for myself".

The pain in our lives is proportionate to the pleasure. This theme is also evident in mental problems like bipolar disorder. Normal people are all "bipolar" to the extent that it is considered normal. See the life of any person whose life is well documented and you'll notice an almost equal amount of joy and misery.

Forget about the past and take responsibility for the present. Practice 15-30 mins of Forgiveness meditation daily, coupled with 30+ mins of concentration and 5+ mins of metta.

Dont think too much, let it all be. It doesn't matter whether you're in DN or not.

Go on a 10 day Vipassana retreat and see what results you get. Dissolution is a very evident stage which is a bridge between A&P and DN. The mental stuff you're experiencing are knots deep in the mind, which can be slowly and surely untangled with right practice.

Really?
Really?
From reading what you have written I would recommend contacting a competent professional. Perhaps someone with experience in therapy and meditation. You could try contacting Ron Crouch. He is a psychologist and meditation teacher. (I have no association to him).
Good luck,
~D

You're right. I've been too caught up in the content of my life and I haven't been accepting and allowing to the bare sensations. I will stick to that. I was just so anxious that day, I had just come back from a weekend of partying so my body was wrecked ( going to fix that aspect of my life). I'll continue practice and continue to take care of myself, I feel much better today than when I posted, I just need to remind myself that it gets tough and to stick it out.

Thank you so much for your advice, maybe all this pain will lead to an equal amount of pleasure in the future, if not it's ok, I'm sure I'll learn a lesson in the end.

I get sleepy on Theanine, makes me kinda groggy especially if I don't have coffee with it.

I know I haven't tried everything, I was just stuck in the drama of the story. Looking back at what I wrote I feel really silly.

Yeah maybe I'll contact a therapist, idk, I just got too stuck in the stories, I need to remind myself to just allow sensations and thoughts and to continue doing positive things as well as keep practicing. It's not like my life hasn't improved in the last few months, I just had a bad day and got way too stuck in the stories, need to remind myself not to everytime I do.

Thanks for your reply.

So, no medication so far. Anxiety has been pretty bad last 2-ish days, so I've been lax in meditation, but I took a good 8 days or so of meditating most of the day during Spring Break. Getting back into cardio exercise on a regular schedule does seem to help though.

One thing I've noticed is that if I focus on the physical sensations of anxiety they get worse, but i feel like if I take the background space as the object of attention instead, the anxiety feeling is still somewhat there, but it dissipates. It seems as if I am very aversive to the anxiety sensations in the body especially when looking them square in the eye (hypochondria type aversions that spiral off into worse case scenario although I can objectively see these thoughts.)

Am I correct in taking the background as more of an object, or should I tough it out and observe the sensations directly even though they get worse. Keep the sensations of anxiety in the foreground seem to really stress me out, so I have an intuitive feeling to widen the attention and not fixate on the sensations, but I'm looking for any advice from all directions so please leave a comment if you think you can help out. I'll add in more details if necessary.

Thank You

Actually, to make progress you need to dive right INTO the sensation. Like zoom in ALL the way, and really FEEL it. All this while maintaining a sense of detachment or equanimity (stop generating any aversion/dislike), as in looking at it from a 3rd person perspective as it is, rather than 1st person how you want it to be.
It often gets worse before it starts to dissolve.

The goal of Vipassana meditation is to free the mind from greed, hatred and delusion in order to glimpse reality as it is, and not really to "feel better", which is a byproduct of the practice.

IMHO a 10 day retreat is the bare minimum time needed to really get a hold of the process. It gives you the jump start that otherwise can take really really long to cultivate on your own. No amount of reading or contemplating can substitute the insights that come with a dedicated 10 day constant practice.

Ok, that's what I was doing on my Spring Break, following the breath, then watching any sensations that presented themselves most obviously. So physical anxiety type sensations are ok to look at directly? It feels like when I get the anxiety my heart starts pounding harder and since it's the most obvious sensation I look at it and don't stop until either it gets worse and a new sensation arises or it goes away which it doesn't do a lot of the time.

Do I basically have to watch the stress reactions until I get so dispassionate about them that my mind no longer finds them an issue? These stress reactions happen on their own with no real basis for arising, just kinda happens which in turn makes it even more stressful due to, I'm guessing conditioning or just natural aversion towards them. Reading that previous sentence shows me intellectually that the sensations are suffering, and not me, as well as impermanent since they don't last forever, but is that something that I need to intentionally notice, or do those insights happen on an experiential level by bare awareness of these sensations?

Also,sometimes when I'm watching the breath the sensation of stress arise, can I watch the sensation with the breath still in mind? I feel like I can concentrate better that way, but if I need to focus 100% on the sensation I can try it. Also keeping the breath in mind sort of keeps me a bit calmer when the stress reactions happen and I observe them, but I'm willing to do ( or not do) whatever it takes to let my mind be more equanimous, just that that's how I learned meditation, by watching the breath at the nostrils.

I'd love to do a 10 day retreat but my life situation isn't exactly at a place where I can do that. You don't think that 2 hours of practice a day can lead me to equanimity, or is it just much faster in a 10 day retreat? I feel that I've touched Low Equanimity a few times by observing the sensation just as they are until they became not a problem for me, I might have even reached a higher stage at one point. While I was doing Choiceless Awareness and just attending to whatever showed up, my mind felt like it was super wide, wider than I think I've ever experienced, but the range of how wide it was a bit overwhelming and it kind of felt like my head was being pulled upwards and that freaked me out and scared me out of the state. Not sure if it was a higher stage of Equanimity or not, but the feeling of something big happening scared me out of it.

I might be in Re-Observation, or in another DN stage, who knows, but I'll keep practicing everyday since I know progress can quickly slide backwards and I'd like to not be stuck here (even though I know desire to exit the stage is also an attachment that needs to be let go of)

Oh and on a side note, when you passes through the DN, which I assume you did, did you notice that exercise helped? Seems as if it really has helped me, but I'm wondering if others have benefited as I have.

Thank you for the reply, and sorry for all of the questions but this past week plus of practice has brought up a lot of questions.

I have dealt with severe anxiety in the past. The understanding of death, the disenchantment with everything, and the anxiety which you describe, are all familiar experiences to me.

I am currently trying to tackle anxiety head on, so maybe we can stay in contact and share ideas.

Here are things which I have done in the past and still do in the present which I am absolutely certain help with my anxiety:

• Exercise. This is #1 in my trick book. I will bet you 100$ that if you do 30 minutes of cardio every day for two weeks, your anxiety will improve dramatically. That's not a lot, right?
• Walking in nature. This really tones down any excessive excitement, including anxiety.
• Feeling in the company of people you like. This may or may not be possible for you, depending on several factors.

I have also changed my diet significantly. Nowadays I never eat junk food. Everything I eat is cooked fresh and healthy. I find that the displeasure of eating badly is too strong for me to do anything different, but I actually have a bowel condition of some sort.

If you are experimenting with dieting, I can recomend that you start with a Paleo diet. I recomend the book "It starts with food" by Dallas and Melissa Hartwig. Very informative. Eventually you might also want to give a ketogenic diet a try. There are some posts on that in this forum.

As for using meditation... I have had different views on the matter at different times. I guess my current point of view could be put in the following way:

• Meditation has sometimes helped decreasing anxiety. Sometimes I would just pay attention to the breath, and I would calm down and go deep somewhere relaxed.
• But sometimes meditation has brought about an onset of anxiety! This has happened on various occasions, and in several different ways.
• However, nowadays I can stay relatively cool while experiencing anxiety so strong that it would have caused me to go run under the covers a few years back. I attribute this to meditation.

So while I wouldn't go so far as to recommend it outright, it can certainly be of some benefit, sometimes. That is my experience.

Other people claim it can bring an end to all kinds of anxiety and so on. That is not my experience (yet?). One thing I know for sure: meditation puts me in contact HEAD ON with the existential understanding of death --- the fleeting and unreliable nature of things. I continue doing meditation because it seems to practice certain skills which I value and wish to develop (concentration, mindfulness, equanimity, etc), but also in the hope that it will bring some resolution to my existential angst. But that didn't happen yet.

OK, that's it for the past. Now, I have done a 1 month retreat back in February-March, which was supposed to be longer, but had to be aborted because meditation brought on severe anxiety.

I came to the understanding, while meditating during several anxiety attacks, that the anxiety had something to do with the way I was breathing.

(This is highly experimental, bleeding-edge sort of thing for me, so all of the following could be highly innacurate.)

This has led me to a long internet search, and I eventually came to the practice of Butekyo, which is a form of breathing training meant to change (improve?) the way you breathe.

One nice thing about Butekyo is that it includes a fairly objective measurement of where you stand in relation to the practice. This is called the "control pause", and is measured by counting the ammount of time which you can comfortably hold your breath after a normal exhalation.

So here is a risky prediction on my part: I predict that your control pause is abnormally low, especially so during moments of high anxiety. In fact I would say no more than 10 seconds (my healthy friends have it in the 20-30s range). Would you care to measure it to see if my prediction was correct?

Here are instructions on how to measure your CP. Mine is currently 5 seconds. When I started measuring it was about 1 second!

Remember it is important that you must feel no effort or lack of breath after doing the breath hold. If you feel a lack of breath before you do it, that counts as zero

Anyway, I am currently exploring the Butekyo method and I should have more to report on that in a couple of months. Of course, it may still turn out to be a disappointment, so this is not a recommendation per se. But if you are interested, I have some nice ebooks explaining the method which I can send to you. (my email is bruno (dot) loff (at) gmail (dot) com)

In any case, take care and get well!

Not sure if this will help you, but I know Kenneth Folk suggests starting to get into the habit of noting your current anxiety level (say on a scale of 1 to 10) regularly during the day - but to start probably just first thing in the morning.

I think the idea is that this will not only help you better keep track of how you are feeling over time (possibly helping to begin to identify specific triggers) but will also make you start to 'objectify' how you are feeling and thereby gain some distance between 'you' and the sensations which make up the experience of anxiety so that they don't seem so overwhelming.

Thank you for your reply Bruno

I completely agree about the cardio exercising, it REALLY does help out. I was in the habit of playing basketball every other day and it was great. While I did get tired and fatigued at points, I was so tired that when I went home I was too tired to even be anxious, plus something about exerting yourself and feeling the sensations that one might consider scary during meditation while doing something healthy desensitizes the mind of these scary sensations.

I also tend to eat healthy nowadays too. Much of what I've been learning about nutrition has helped me in making smarter choices such as in avoiding processed foods, too much meat and chicken and consuming too much sugar and instead eating natural fruits, vegetables and legumes (my family loves them).

I find that I seem to have no other safer alternative that to just keep watching what comes as it is, and breathing as well as taking care of myself. My other option, which I strongly am aversive towards, is antidepressant medication which I've tried in the past. Seems to have worked somewhat, but the side effects just turn me off from it like weight gain, (not to get too personal) sexual side affects (inability to orgasm)(again, sorry for the personal info), and plus I just don't remember much from that period. I dont know if it was the medication or the marijuana I used to smoke (don't smoke anymore) that has messed up my memory of it, but I know, in my heart, that antidepressants probably aren't the best answer. Maybe therapy would help, although I'm not really troubled by anything in particular, just aversive towards sensations in my field of attention plus I don't enjoy things as I used to.

If I may ask, have you achieved path? I've heard that it took Kenneth Folk until arahatship to get rid of his anxiety for which he took antidepressant and anti-anxiety medications for, which gets me to compare my situation to his. I've seen Daniel Ingram mention that Stream Entry does serve to "chill one out", although hearing Ken's story kind of makes me wary of just how much it calms you down as well as if the next DN's are harder or easier. Maybe Equanimity will chill me out. I seem to have reached some stage/s of it, but not consistently which frustrates as well as motivates me.

And for the breathing, I can relate. Sometimes when I notice how I'm breathing, I notice that I'm holding it at the in portion of the breath or just not breathing and tensing muscles of my chest and abdomen. Breathing out does help relax although holding the out-breath intentionally can also be an issue.

I did Buteyko test with the relaxed breath in and out then the nose pinch, and I felt the first signs within 2-5 seconds(did multiple tests) although I can hold it much longer. Should I hold it, or just sense for the first signs of wanting to breathe. Felt a little anxious-y when I felt that needed to breathe, but I could hold it if I want to. I can see how this method could be an improvement in anxiety as the out-breath relaxes the body while the in-breath excites it and if you naturally can stay in the out breath it can lead to a more relaxed state. Seems like they say that cardio exercise tends to improve this ability to hold so I'll definitely continue that.

Thank you for the link. I'll keep trying the tests to see if I improve throughout the weeks as well as continuing my cardio.

I'll try this out.
I do try and detach the sensations of anxiety as much as I can, although they can overwhelm and affect my ability to talk and do other things at times purely from how they physiologically affect the body.

Hi,

You might want to give something like the following a try.

Forgiveness meditation:
http://www.dhammasukha.org/forgiveness-meditation.html

FasterEFT:
http://www.fastereft.com/

Or even Trents long ago advice here:
http://dharmaoverground.org/web/guest/discussion/-/message_boards/message/1433369#_19_message_1433941

Basically they are all methods for coming to terms with and dealing with all the conscious and subconcious junk that's haunting around in your head. Something, somewhere is causing your anxiety, perhaps this could be a method to help you figure out what. In my opinion all of the above methods are slightly different paths towards the same goal, perhaps others disagree.

Maybe an approach like this could be helpful for you, maybe not, either way, good luck.

Metta, Simon

It probably is subconscious. I was actually thinking of Metta Practice as I came back from exercising. Can Metta be effective? Is it a type of affirmation or something else? I've seen Daniel Ingram mention Metta in his Magick writing, maybe I should forget about overly focusing on pure insight and resolve to better myself until I'm well enough to handle this, or maybe do both at the same time.

Hi Gerry,

The forgiveness meditation I linked in my previous post is a type of metta, but it is metta with a very specific goal, namely that of coming to terms with past emotional issues. FastEFT does the exact same thing using a different method, but when you start looking at them closely they are more similar than different, they work by finding the stuff in your mind that is causing trouble and letting go of it.

I'm a big fan of "regular" metta practices as well, but I doubt they will help much with your anxiety issues.

Simon