Forum: Dharma Overground Discussion Forum

As opposed to Dissolution, that is.

I went from a long (for me) gung-ho period of much more intense daily practice than I've previously engaged in to a daylong retreat where I had the pleasure of running into some of the expectations I appear to have been carrying around, as well as the idea that, if it took that much effort to try to truely commit to a full day of practice (and I came out the door feeling like I had been mentally beat up,) then to describe the effort require to make actuall progress as "thoroughly ass-kicking" might be insufficient.

At this point I havn't manage to practice well in days. I've got some on and off free floating fear that I havn't been able to notice when sitting, and often 1/4 into practice I'll find myself staring out a window, or standing in the kitchen with a vague reccolection of a "what's the point" floating by that I didn't manage to notice in time.

I suppose the question is: What to do?
And I suppose the answer is: Just keep trying and see if I can notice the fear and disallusionment when it arrises and see what it's actually composed of.

That being said, any advice on this kind of thing? Sneaky stuff that gets you off the cushion before you can notice it? Or team attacks where you catch part of what arrises, but the rest sneaks by and suddenly you're on the phone ordering a pizza?

Thanks!
Nick

hi nick,

1- yeah its a lot of effort. you'll get used to it.

2- what was your daylong retreat like? what happened?

3- presuming you are following the mahasi method, you should be verbally noting in your mind. those moments of free floating fear, distraction, and disillusionment are golden opportunities, regardless of where you are on the maps. dont miss them, stay on them, and that means note like crazy. label it and move on. all the way to ordering pizza if you have to, but for the sake of your concentration it is *probably* better that you remain seated or in formal body usage (like walking back and forth) or whatever.

i have a friend who taught himself to do walking meditation by having a cup of coffee to sip from waiting for him at every round. hearing about that made my day and i'll pass the technique on to you.

Thanks for the encouragment!

1 - I think it was a moment where I went from "Of course it will be hard." to "Oh Sh*T, this is hard!" and it kinda took me by suprise.

2- The daylong was a beginners sort of thing where we did 30 minute intervals of sitting and walking from 9 -5, which was the longest period I've done anything for. Definitly alot of frustration and expectations during the first 1/2 of the day, but during the second half of the day there was a period of walking where I felt like I was really just noting stuff and leaving it alone, which made it more obvious that previously I was clubbing stuff I found distracting out of the way with the noting.
Id say that my speed and accuracy improved quite a bit over the course of the day, as I was noting things come up that I had never noticed before, and I was noting closer to when they occured rather than after the fact. Part of that could also be that there were people around, and people come with a whole slew of things to note.
Also, at lunch, there was a good instruction to "Try to really notice taste. How big is it? How long is it? Where is it?..." which I hadn't considered before. At the time I was able to note that taste was a series of discontinuous, speedy pinpricks of sensation in the toungue(maybe) as well as accompanying "taste", each interspersed with tiny blips of sound of chewing, feeling of chewing, and all sorts of other stuff. I hadn't thought to use food in this way before so it was totally interesting.
(cont.)

3 - Yup, I'm trying to do the mahasi way. I think I need to get my precision and speed up a bit so I can catch the fear and whatnot. I tried making a firm resolution to "note as accuratly and quickly as possible for the whole meditation period" this morning and that seemed to keep me from bolting from my seat. Back to the basics for me, I think.

Thanks for the walking suggestion! Worse comes to worse I can turn bolting from the cushion into walking if I catch it. I havn't given walking much of a chance, but it seems pretty full of stuff to pay attention to. The coffee totally mixes it up too because you'll go from noting one set of notables to another and have to pay close attention.

Thanks again, it's awesome to have some encouragement to keep it up!
Sorry for the brain dump
Nick