what was your thought stream doing while noticing your breath? The point is not entirely to get good at breathing, but to notice everything else as well.
The thought stream was...concentrating on my breath? Going back to it when it wavered, per the instructions?
(BTW, I seem to have two slightly differently-named accounts. I was accidentally logged into the other when I posted the previous comment. It dates from LW 1.0.)
The breath isn’t a solid sensation, it’s made up of many smaller sensations. Some instructions suggest investigating the “start”, “middle” or “end” of the breath. Try to find the very specific part of that and generally the instructions suggest that you won’t find it because there is no such thing. Owing in the direction of impermanence.
There is a possible meditation method that makes/assumes “permanent” the breath and then practices concentration on the breath as an assumed permanent object. This is important because with increased concentration skill we can then investigate (investigate = insight practice, not concentration practice) and discover the breath is not quite “real” in the permanent bounded conceptual entity that we want it to be when we study it.
There is a possible method of studying the thought stream and the way it changes when the breath changes. This can be seen in simple ways by holding the breath, breathing very quickly, but also noticing the way the breath changes when talking about significant or important matters. Or the way the breath takes shape when angry or anxious. Or excited. There is an interesting breath movement that I see (personal experience here) in theraputic contexts that looks something like a big sigh out. It seems to be that when people are working with an issue and are ready to let go of the issue they breathe out. (in my personal experience) there’s something weird and interesting in the way that the breath ends a thought stream like that.
From a Pranayama book (translated as “breath of life”) was a suggestion that the thought stream is like a bird tethered to a post via a string. The mind can float around but is always pulled back to where the breath is.
Studying the breath happens either at the nose/mouth or at the chest region of the body, this happens to also be the physical location where a large number of emotional reactions are experienced through bodily sensations (book: “the body keeps score” is excellent). With intimate knowledge of the breath comes intimate knowledge of the subtle emotions floating around. That includes many of the tiny reactions that (personal experience) I might feel when I react to some experience in the world. If I want to better shape my experience, interfacing with my own body-based emotional reactions is pretty handy.
There are holotropic breathwork experiences, there are Wim Hoff breathing methods. There are a lot of breath based meditation concepts to explore.
Dan Brown in “pointing out the great way” adds to follow the in breath, and the out breath and in between shift the attention to the body sensations, so that there are no distractions to carry the mind away (as informed by a branch of Tibetan tradition)
(personal stuff:)
When I watch my breath, I notice when my posture is out, when there’s even so much as a sheet of extra weight on my chest. When I’m leaning to the side.
I notice when I run, I can breath clearer.
I can notice when I’m getting distracted from the task at hand.
I notice when I’m overwhelmed with juggling too many things because of the way that adrenaline-feel in my body changes my breathing pattern.
I notice when I’m playing favourites (read: have a crush) with someone because my breathing does (something or other that I don’t have pinned to specifics).
I (recently) notice other people’s breath, and if I’m in contact with their body can read their emotions very accurately. I’d claim to be able to tell when someone is lying, but that’s not quite it. I would claim to be able to read someone’s mind but it’s more like, “I can tell when someone changes their mind” based on the way their breathing changes, I can’t read actual content (however for example: if we are in the same place and there’s a sudden loud noise I can tell somewhat what their internal reactions are based on their breathing change)
Now what?
There’s a lot of options of interesting things of value from studying the breath. Good books are “The Mind Illuminated” or “The Attention Revolution”.
I would suggest you are not done. You sure did finish discovering a boring corner of meditation, don’t stay there. There’s plenty of valuable things to learn about the inside of the mind.
I would suggest that LW’ers are pretty good and can hurry up with the instructions. Definitely read a book about it because the ability to pick up a map, and follow it—will come easy to LW’ers.
The breath isn’t a solid sensation, it’s made up of many smaller sensations. Some instructions suggest investigating the “start”, “middle” or “end” of the breath. Try to find the very specific part of that and generally the instructions suggest that you won’t find it because there is no such thing. Owing in the direction of impermanence.
Well, that’s where my experience departs from what everyone who writes about this says it’s going to be. My breath still exists, I still exist, everything still exists, and looking closely enough to see that they are made of parts does not dispel the wholes, any more than seeing that my computer screen is made of pixels dispels the text that I can see on it. Everything persists in adding up to normality.
I can notice when I’m getting distracted from the task at hand.
I notice when I’m overwhelmed with juggling too many things because of the way that adrenaline-feel in my body changes my breathing pattern.
I notice this sort of thing too.
There’s a lot of options of interesting things of value from studying the breath. Good books are “The Mind Illuminated” or “The Attention Revolution”.
I’ve read State Star Codex’s review of TMI, and I think that will do me. TAR might be interesting to me for the material on lucid dreaming. The rest looks like the same old.
Been there, done that. Never noticed any result from it. Now what?
what was your thought stream doing while noticing your breath? The point is not entirely to get good at breathing, but to notice everything else as well.
The thought stream was...concentrating on my breath? Going back to it when it wavered, per the instructions?
(BTW, I seem to have two slightly differently-named accounts. I was accidentally logged into the other when I posted the previous comment. It dates from LW 1.0.)
[meditation technical stuff]
The breath isn’t a solid sensation, it’s made up of many smaller sensations. Some instructions suggest investigating the “start”, “middle” or “end” of the breath. Try to find the very specific part of that and generally the instructions suggest that you won’t find it because there is no such thing. Owing in the direction of impermanence.
There is a possible meditation method that makes/assumes “permanent” the breath and then practices concentration on the breath as an assumed permanent object. This is important because with increased concentration skill we can then investigate (investigate = insight practice, not concentration practice) and discover the breath is not quite “real” in the permanent bounded conceptual entity that we want it to be when we study it.
There is a possible method of studying the thought stream and the way it changes when the breath changes. This can be seen in simple ways by holding the breath, breathing very quickly, but also noticing the way the breath changes when talking about significant or important matters. Or the way the breath takes shape when angry or anxious. Or excited. There is an interesting breath movement that I see (personal experience here) in theraputic contexts that looks something like a big sigh out. It seems to be that when people are working with an issue and are ready to let go of the issue they breathe out. (in my personal experience) there’s something weird and interesting in the way that the breath ends a thought stream like that.
From a Pranayama book (translated as “breath of life”) was a suggestion that the thought stream is like a bird tethered to a post via a string. The mind can float around but is always pulled back to where the breath is.
Studying the breath happens either at the nose/mouth or at the chest region of the body, this happens to also be the physical location where a large number of emotional reactions are experienced through bodily sensations (book: “the body keeps score” is excellent). With intimate knowledge of the breath comes intimate knowledge of the subtle emotions floating around. That includes many of the tiny reactions that (personal experience) I might feel when I react to some experience in the world. If I want to better shape my experience, interfacing with my own body-based emotional reactions is pretty handy.
There are holotropic breathwork experiences, there are Wim Hoff breathing methods. There are a lot of breath based meditation concepts to explore.
Dan Brown in “pointing out the great way” adds to follow the in breath, and the out breath and in between shift the attention to the body sensations, so that there are no distractions to carry the mind away (as informed by a branch of Tibetan tradition)
(personal stuff:)
When I watch my breath, I notice when my posture is out, when there’s even so much as a sheet of extra weight on my chest. When I’m leaning to the side.
I notice when I run, I can breath clearer.
I can notice when I’m getting distracted from the task at hand.
I notice when I’m overwhelmed with juggling too many things because of the way that adrenaline-feel in my body changes my breathing pattern.
I notice when I’m playing favourites (read: have a crush) with someone because my breathing does (something or other that I don’t have pinned to specifics).
I (recently) notice other people’s breath, and if I’m in contact with their body can read their emotions very accurately. I’d claim to be able to tell when someone is lying, but that’s not quite it. I would claim to be able to read someone’s mind but it’s more like, “I can tell when someone changes their mind” based on the way their breathing changes, I can’t read actual content (however for example: if we are in the same place and there’s a sudden loud noise I can tell somewhat what their internal reactions are based on their breathing change)
There’s a lot of options of interesting things of value from studying the breath. Good books are “The Mind Illuminated” or “The Attention Revolution”.
I would suggest you are not done. You sure did finish discovering a boring corner of meditation, don’t stay there. There’s plenty of valuable things to learn about the inside of the mind.
I would suggest that LW’ers are pretty good and can hurry up with the instructions. Definitely read a book about it because the ability to pick up a map, and follow it—will come easy to LW’ers.
Well, that’s where my experience departs from what everyone who writes about this says it’s going to be. My breath still exists, I still exist, everything still exists, and looking closely enough to see that they are made of parts does not dispel the wholes, any more than seeing that my computer screen is made of pixels dispels the text that I can see on it. Everything persists in adding up to normality.
I notice this sort of thing too.
I’ve read State Star Codex’s review of TMI, and I think that will do me. TAR might be interesting to me for the material on lucid dreaming. The rest looks like the same old.