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Rod
France
8 Posts |
 Posted - Sep 25 2015 : 10:02:23 AM
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Hi all,
I have been practicing deep meditation on and off for the past 2 years and although there have been glimmers of change I haven't noticed a great deal of progress. I have had varying levels of discipline within that period but certainly for the last 6 months I haven't missed a session of my twice daily, 20min dm.
I used to do a twice daily breath meditation and within the space of a few months my concentration was high(at least it felt so to me). My breath would more or less disappear all together. Problem was that then there was nothing to concentrate on. I ended up moving on and trying DM instead which appealed to me because of it's simplicity. I noticed a great deal positive changes during the breath meditation practice but it seems there was nothing more permanent because I feel I have gone backwards since then.
I had a phase of doing DM where it was quite pleasurable and I very much looked forward to it. This probably lasted a couple of months. I also had a phase where my head would want to lean right back almost to the point of it being painful. That phase also passed eventually. I also had a period of maybe a month where I seemed to be getting a consistent silence in my meditations. It is re-assuring that there has been something happening whilst meditating because I have noticed very little change in my everyday life.
I think I am on the right track and I have a very strong commitment to my DM now but it would be nice to hear of other people's experiences during the early stages of DM and some of the positive(or negative) changes that have been happening. I notice there seems to be a lack of this on the forum and it might be helpful to all the people just getting started for that extra bit of motivation.
Cheers. |
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BlueRaincoat
United Kingdom
1734 Posts |
Posted - Sep 25 2015 : 11:16:22 AM
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Hi Rod, welcome to the AYP forum!
You are describing some experiences during your meditations. Have you noticed any changes in daily life? Have people around you noticed any changes in you? |
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Dogboy
USA
2294 Posts |
Posted - Sep 25 2015 : 12:39:04 PM
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quote:
I had a phase of doing DM where it was quite pleasurable and I very much looked forward to it. This probably lasted a couple of months. I also had a phase where my head would want to lean right back almost to the point of it being painful. That phase also passed eventually. I also had a period of maybe a month where I seemed to be getting a consistent silence in my meditations. It is re-assuring that there has been something happening whilst meditating because I have noticed very little change in my everyday life.
I think I am on the right track and I have a very strong commitment to my DM now but it would be nice to hear of other people's experiences during the early stages of DM and some of the positive(or negative) changes that have been happening. I notice there seems to be a lack of this on the forum and it might be helpful to all the people just getting started for that extra bit of motivation.
Rod, I too had "islands of experiences" in the vast ocean of meditation in the early months, automatic yoga, elevated heart rate; once it felt as if I had turned to stone, I had become so still. In between, not much seemed to be happening. My first glimpse of Witness in daily life was during a stressful situation when I felt to be both the participant and observer (http://www.aypsite.org/forum/topic....=Participant) And then another witnessing situation, about six months in: I had a very distracting session that I ended early and laid down. Suddenly I began breathing deeply without controlling it. I began to think of all of the troubles I was facing in my life and a dam burst and I began weeping and sobbing, and witnessing myself weeping and sobbing and the spectacle of it all. Needless to say, the purification of it was deeply cathartic, and suddenly those troubles lost a lot of their punch. I still felt them, but was less attached to storing them up in my system.
You will come upon your own episodes of purification as you honor your practice, and I guarentee they will spill over into your daily life, I mean, how could they not? It may materialize as a smile to a stranger who smiles back, or the delight in watching the sheer unchecked joy of a child at play, or how your favorite song resonates in your chest as you sing aloud in the car. Your practice will lead you to witness.
Edit: link |
Edited by - Dogboy on Sep 25 2015 1:01:06 PM |
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Rod
France
8 Posts |
Posted - Sep 26 2015 : 08:27:01 AM
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Thanks for the replies guys.
To answer your question blueraincoat; I haven't noticed much change in my everyday life. I have been eating a lot less and have lost weight but that's about it. Not really the change I was looking for as I'm a skinny guy anyway:)
Cheers for sharing dogboy. I am gonna keep the faith and carry on chipping away with the DM. I also did the spinal breathing for a while as well but decided to stop until I see some real results with dm in my daily life. From memory I think Yogani recommends waiting for the rise of inner silence before doing SBP. I definitely have not yet experienced that in my daily life.
Still very keen to hear from anyone else who has experiences they wouldn't mind sharing. |
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BlueRaincoat
United Kingdom
1734 Posts |
Posted - Sep 26 2015 : 10:56:24 AM
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Hi Rod
If I were in your shoes I would take up SBP after practising DM for two years. It can speed things up a lot and you may begin to notice changes.
In answer to your question, when I first started meditating (it was after some months of asanas), I felt calmer and happier. I also noticed people wanting to be around me more. After years of yoga, i can now say that i am quite sensitive to practices (that is why i did not have to wait long before mediation had an effect). We are all different in that respect - some people need to do more/take up more powerful practices before they notice significant changes. You may be one of them. Worth taking advantage of the powerful practices AYP has to offer - making sure you self-pace of course, and adding one practice at a time.
Good luck! |
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Beehive
USA
117 Posts |
Posted - Sep 26 2015 : 2:13:38 PM
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Hi Rod... I am about at your same number of years into meditation and also did not start with DM so I'll put my experiences out there. One thing that affected my start point with meditation is that my nervous system was completely disrupted by some difficult life events so there was a lot of anxiety and depression as well as a lot of basic day to day uncertainty affecting my life. So I was approaching meditation as a way to calm down my system. At the same time I wanted to be benevolently skeptical and really look at whether the meditation was working. I didn't just want to believe something to be TRUE that wasn't.
It is kind of funny to me to look back on that "benevolent skepticism" now.... but the part of that that I think could be interesting for you is that it was an early start of knowing that "the guru is in you", which continues to be perhaps the most important part of what meditation has done for me. I can trust that the things I want - clarity, calmness, peacefulness, insight, etc.... are desires that come from me and the way to them comes from me too. It meant I was setting up an intention for what I wanted and then looking gently to see if I thought it was doing that for me. Lo and behold it did! And so much more. So I guess I'd say, this intention and gently looking/evaluating was helpful to me and maybe it will be for you. It helped in the initial phase to narrow in the focus on the vast array of things I'd read that meditation can do. And for me, I wasn't just going to "sit there" for an hour or so a day it it didn't do something for me!
The scenery I experience during meditation is very minimal, buzzing ears, body tingles, feeling like my body is an infrared heat map where the energy spreads to different parts. Times of great stillness, times of constantly wandering off to thought. I've had brief extreme things happen, like when I read you should LISTEN inside for the mantra to come up. I did listen and did it ever show up! The most joyful energy zoomed up my spine! It lasted for the briefest time and has never returned again..... . So, really mostly DM is just very quiet time that I for the most part enjoy and find energizes me, My focus now is on getting the feeling of actively surrendering to/with I AM, feeling my whole attention there.
Off the cushion is a different story. My most basic expectation of just calming my system has for sure happened. No more jumping when the phone rings, no more crying spells, greatly decreased general nervousness. And fairly quickly I noticed a space between feeling an emotion and needing to act on it. That is very useful when your life and body are a little upended. It wasn't magical (actually it was kind of magical) - everything wasn't instantly perfect but the bit of separation from intense emotion was very noticeable and made a difficult time bearable and I could feel my nervous system open.
The nervous system opening was definitely enhanced by Spinal Breathing. I loved SB from the first. Even tho it was and still can be, clunky for me - like a lot of things going on at once. The sensation of it is wonderful. Both centering and enlivening at the same time. Just like DM, it is just a good, pleasantly sensuous experience on the cushion but it greatly enhanced my day to day. Right after I started SBP I had this incredibly experience of feeling like my vision filled with love when I was out walking in a park. I saw a branch, really a bare branch, that was the most incredibly beautiful thing I'd ever seen, I loved EVERYTHING about it. I had similar experiences with my children, just filled with a magnetic feeling of love and light. I could feel love just settle deeply in my body and fill me with a certain knowingness of the rightness of the world. I'm assuming because of the timing that this was related to spinal breathing.
There was a couple months of those dramatic experience. But now it is much more quiet. I think intermittently,like you say "I feel I have gone backwards". I've wanted to stop. I miss the big "scenery" I think it is all over. But then, I know it isn't. The charge of bhakti is still very much there. And recently I've become very interested in inquiry - the idea of which bored me earlier. So I think this is my inner guru again. It shows up often - leading me by desire and curiosity to the next step. Reminding me again and again to listen, have faith, keep going, cultivate gratitude. All that. And still, all interspersed with days of real challenge.
I am quite curious to see how it continues to grow and unfold. I can definitely say it has added unqualified richness to my life. I hope you find the same.
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Edited by - Beehive on Sep 26 2015 2:35:08 PM |
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Bodhi Tree
2972 Posts |
Posted - Sep 26 2015 : 2:58:00 PM
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Thank you, Beehive.  |
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BlueRaincoat
United Kingdom
1734 Posts |
Posted - Sep 26 2015 : 3:38:06 PM
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Charliedog
1625 Posts |
Posted - Sep 27 2015 : 12:18:58 AM
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Thank you for sharing Beehive  |
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kumar ul islam
United Kingdom
791 Posts |
Posted - Sep 27 2015 : 10:37:04 AM
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| thankyou beehive |
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Rod
France
8 Posts |
Posted - Sep 28 2015 : 06:07:41 AM
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Thanks for sharing that beehive. I can really relate to a lot of the things you're saying. Sounds like you've had some similar experiences "on the cushion". I guess the things that have happened to me during meditation is what has kept me going. Kind of a confirmation that saying "i am" is at least having some kind of effect, allowing me to have faith that others will follow in time.
I was considering increasing the dm time by 5mins and observing the effects to speed things up a bit. Anyone out there tried doing dm for longer periods?
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sunyata
USA
1513 Posts |
Posted - Sep 28 2015 : 09:08:59 AM
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| Beehive |
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BlueRaincoat
United Kingdom
1734 Posts |
Posted - Sep 28 2015 : 09:27:59 AM
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quote:
Originally posted by Rod
I was considering increasing the dm time by 5mins and observing the effects to speed things up a bit. Anyone out there tried doing dm for longer periods?
Lesson 193 - Q&A – Extending practice time safely is a useful one to read if you want to meditate for longer. |
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SeySorciere
Seychelles
1571 Posts |
Posted - Sep 29 2015 : 01:09:02 AM
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Dear Rod,
I would reiterate what Blueraincoat has said and advice that you add SBP to your practices. You do not have to wait for inner silence - that is true for the case of samyama.
There will always be periods of doubt where there appears to be "no progress". I just went through months of that and then lo-behold, I suddenly realised that I was not "perceiving" the Witness anymore because I had become the Witness. For the moment at least, it will probably change again.
Best of luck
Sey |
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