I’m not going to argue against focusing on your breathing, but I don’t think this is what I’m getting at. Iirc I have not had an experience of pain or meditation create the kind of reflective moment I’m talking about with the longer-term thing. It’s more like when you’ve been working at a place for a while but you suddenly look around and think “wow, I’m a ___” (doctor, teacher, etc) in a way you didn’t before. You can try to have that thought on purpose, but I think that’s different from what I’m talking about.
I don’t like the “self awareness” framing, because attention/awareness is always on specific things, and “the self” isn’t really specific. It’s not like there’s this dimension “how aware are you of your self right now”; what does that even mean?
I’m not going to argue against focusing on your breathing, but I don’t think this is what I’m getting at. Iirc I have not had an experience of pain or meditation create the kind of reflective moment I’m talking about with the longer-term thing. It’s more like when you’ve been working at a place for a while but you suddenly look around and think “wow, I’m a ___” (doctor, teacher, etc) in a way you didn’t before. You can try to have that thought on purpose, but I think that’s different from what I’m talking about.
I don’t like the “self awareness” framing, because attention/awareness is always on specific things, and “the self” isn’t really specific. It’s not like there’s this dimension “how aware are you of your self right now”; what does that even mean?