Balance Between "do Nothing" And The Opposite

[john5170]

Recently, I really got into the "do nothing" technique when meditating, and when facing external thoughts throughout the day.

Note: I already achieved calmness with the "do nothing" method a few weeks ago, but now it stopped working.

In the past couple of days, when I "do nothing", my mind just keeps raging and doesn't calm down. I completely let go of any control to calm thoughts, and as a result, they don't calm anymore.

During my meditation, I am able to sit still and not move, however my mind still wanders.

Is there gonna be a tipping point after extreme raging when my mind just accepts the noise and calms down? or do I need to interfere since it is not working.

Maybe minimal effort just to set the mind back on track is needed?

[ajasatya]

@john5170 it happens because you turn calmness into a goal. you need to practice with no goals.

[john5170]

1 hour ago, ajasatya said:

@john5170 it happens because you turn calmness into a goal. you need to practice with no goals.

So what should be my strategy?  

1. To try to control my mind

2. To put minimal effort to set it back on track

3. To completely let go and do nothing

Now I am more at #3 and it is not working too well. I am thinking of doing #2.

[igorbozato]

Bring your attention to your body, it should slow down your thoughts. If you don't have much body awareness try this guided meditation for a few weeks: 

 

[123456789]

15 minutes ago, john5170 said:

So what should be my strategy?  

1. To try to control my mind

2. To put minimal effort to set it back on track

3. To completely let go and do nothing

Now I am more at #3 and it is not working too well. I am thinking of doing #2.

FOLLOW the INSTRUCTIONS, no matter what.

[zazed]

21 minutes ago, john5170 said:

So what should be my strategy?  

1. To try to control my mind

2. To put minimal effort to set it back on track

3. To completely let go and do nothing

None of the above. Put your awareness on the mind, intensely perceive what it is doing. Without judging, without it wanting to diminish.
Just perceive it, put the burning light of your consciousness on it. It will diminish the thoughts in the end, but whatever you do, have no desire about your thoughts going away, don't battle yourself. It's a very fine line, almost like a trick, once you get it it is easier.

Self inquiry may also help, if they are especially troubling you, ask yourself, who is thinking these thoughts? Where do they come from? Are they me?

[Gopackgo]

Alternate with concentration practice, but do nothing doesnt mean force nothing to occur. It means exert no effort to stop whats occurring. Vispassana goes in cycles. It's not meant to mean that nothing should be happening, it is meant to mean that something happening is ok and theres no need to stop the flow. What is happening is exactly what you are aiming for. Let yourself feel the feelings. You are making progress.

[ajasatya]

@john5170 just come back to your breathing. it's simple but hard.

if your mind is agitated, just be mindful. say to yourself "right now, my mind is agitated and i'm aware of it". and observe it being agitated.

[john5170]

Actually this video by Leo, says to bring the mind on track. Stage 2 actually means to calm thoughts down. So I guess that is the opposite of "Do Nothing".

 

[eskwire]

@john5170 Try a different technique, yes. Like what Leo says about stage 2 - notice a thought then let it go - rinse - repeat. Or try mindfulness.

I personally find the do nothing technique useless because I could zone out for hours on end anyway. I'm a space cadet. It's not what some people need. 

 

[Gopackgo]

Its all about concentration practice. Concentration practice is the practice of being present despite thoughts. I cant stress how important it is. It is the easiest thing you can do to incorporate meditation into your day. It is literally sitting there and being completely aware. You could argue that being able to do this is the biggest component of enlightenment. It is the easiest way to see how thought stories distract from aware being. Concentration practice, then do nothing technique to rest your eyes, then when thoughts get out of control, back to concentration practice. This was the method I did, and then one day, my mind never came out of it. Concentration feels hard, but it IS awareness. When you are concentrating on an object, start expanding the concentration to incorporate other sensations you are feeling. Aside from being an amazing practice, you will have some experiences of intense equanimity (I think these are called jhanas). Just trust me. It is the best way to implant yourself in the moment so deep that you never come out of it. Do nothing is great to cleanse the mind of all the clutter that you aren't addressing, but it doesn't mean much until you understand why you need to clear your mind of all the clutter.

Also, instead of trying to quiet your mind and getting frustrated, ask yourself, what is the underlying content of this thought. If it is just a thought that is reoccurring, acknowledge the thought and then be done with it. If it is an emotion you don't want to feel, let the emotion completely fill you. Be the emotion.

[Prabhaker]

On 4/23/2017 at 10:57 PM, john5170 said:

In the past couple of days, when I "do nothing", my mind just keeps raging and doesn't calm down. I completely let go of any control to calm thoughts, and as a result, they don't calm anymore.

When you begin to meditate, when you begin to feel a certain silence, you begin to feel the disturbance more. Against that silence, the disturbance is felt more keenly. Now you have something to judge against, to compare against.

So whenever someone begins meditation, he will become aware of many things of which he was not previously aware, and because of that awareness he will suffer. This is how things are, and one has to pass through them. 

Spirituality means not escaping from suffering but living with it: living with it, not escaping! And if you live with it, you will become more and more aware. If you want to escape, then you will have to leave awareness. Then, somehow, you will have to become unconscious.

[john5170]

On 4/29/2017 at 8:44 PM, Gopackgo said:

Its all about concentration practice. Concentration practice is the practice of being present despite thoughts.

Can you point me to some video guide about concentration? By Leo or anyone.

 

On 4/30/2017 at 0:04 AM, Prabhaker said:

one has to pass through them

Thanks, great reply. You are right about the silence. So how to pass through them if every shake now is a disturbance?  let go of awareness?

[Prabhaker]

16 minutes ago, john5170 said:

So how to pass through them if every shake now is a disturbance?

Sometimes there will be anger, sometimes there will be a desire, sometimes there will be an ambition, but they cannot disturb your watchfulness. They will come and they will go without leaving a trace on your mirror–like purity. But you have only to remember one thing: not to start fighting with them, smashing them, destroying them, throwing them away. It comes very naturally to the mind that if something wrong is happening, jump on it and destroy it. This is the only thing you have to be aware of, because this is what never allows a man to get beyond the mind. 

Watch the mind and see where it is, what it is. You will feel thoughts floating and there will be intervals. And if you watch long, you will see that intervals are more than the thoughts, because each thought has to be separate from another thought; in fact, each word has to be separate from another word. The deeper you go, you will find more and more gaps, bigger and bigger gaps. A thought floats, then comes a gap where no thought exists; then another thought comes, another gap follows.

If you are unconscious you cannot see the gaps; you jump from one thought to another, you never see the gap. If you become aware you will see more and more gaps. If you become perfectly aware, then miles of gaps will be revealed to you. And in those gaps, meditation happens.

[Gopackgo]

1 hour ago, john5170 said:

Can you point me to some video guide about concentration? By Leo or anyone.

 

Thanks, great reply. You are right about the silence. So how to pass through them if every shake now is a disturbance?  let go of awareness?

Leo does have a really good video. To do concentration practice you will hold soft gaze on an object. The way I did it, was to close my eyes, and put my focus on my breath. When I was focused on my breath (the only way I can describe this is by saying when the gentle shift of meditation occured) I would open my eyes and focus on the object. I would continue to hold concentration on my breath, and incorporate the the object. The challenge is keeping yourself from day dreaming or getting sucked into thoughts. When you catch yourself drifting from the object or breath, you gently bring your attention back to the external object and think "aha! I'm happy I caught that." What I would do is continue to do this, and when I started to feel like my mind was drifting a lot, I would close my eyes and bring my attention back to only breath. 

You will start to build up your tolerance, and when you feel ready, you can try broadening your attention of concentration. You can start to add in body scans. To do this, I would hold focus on breath and the object, and then relax my body one muscle at a time (you probably already do this when you begin do nothing meditation anyways). I would specifically look for areas that would tighten up from sitting or just from habit. I would notice tense areas and "become the muscle" and feel it relax on an out breath. I would repeat this 2-3 times and move to the surrounding muscles. A problem spot for my was my lower back. I would start at the butt, and move up the back vertebrae by vertebrae, then shoulder etc. The tricky part is to be mindful of the muscles you just did before tightening back up. What this does, is makes you super mindful of what is going on in your body, while staying focused on breath and the object. As you can imagine, once you get good at this, it is directly applicable to life, and you will start to notice in your daily life, that you can start mindfully relaxing your body by noticing your breath in any situation. It's really fucking awesome. Dont freak out when you start to notice all the trippy visual effects (jhanas) that occur when you are super focused and you begin to relax your body and go deeper. Just ask yourself: "if this is what I am seeing when I am really focused and lucid, what is going on when I am not focused." and "Why would people refer to meditation as altered consciousness if I am much more clear in this state."

When you have that down, you can start integrating other sensations, like temperature on skin, wind blowing, and especially sounds you are hearing. The reason I like this progression is because 1) it trains you to spread attention around on all the things you never think about. This is awareness as an attribute. 2) It shows you the staggering breadth of your attention. This is awareness as in what you are as an unlimited being, 3) It plants you so deep in the moment that maybe one day you will realize that you have never existed outside of the moment, and ARE in fact THE moment, and 4) by spreading your attention around, it saps attention from thought. You may not be able to control your thoughts, but as you start integrating your sweet new skills into your life, they will start to decrease and you will have techniques to redirect the massive amount of attention that most people spend in their mental dreamland. The benefits of this are the gift that keeps on giving. You will start to notice that you are able to concentrate on things and your mind will literally lock on, and feel like a muscle getting stronger. God I love meditation.

Concentration practice, in my humble opinion, is the practice of awareness learning what it really is, and what it is capable of. I'm a big fan of it, especially when combined with do nothing methods. Really, either way, you are doing the same motion mentally in either. You are learning not to get sucked into your thoughts so you can get some separation from them. You will find that they synergize well. Here are Actualized Industries Inc. Org., we are all about synergizing.

Finally, I know it sounds like a lot, but you will be surprised to see that your attention is almost like a bubble. As it becomes more confident, it can easily incorporate more and more, until it is almost effortless to be a mindfull mf. When that happens, you will question what you have been doing with your life, and why we don't teach meditation to our children in school. Feel free to do this in any order, as is best for you, I do recommend incorporating sound earlier. This method is different than some others, but I believe in it. Just remember that there's no rush, and no reason to get discouraged. Make it your own. Let me know if you have any questions.

 

Also, sorry, a secret of the pros: instead of focusing on the act of breathing, focus instead on the cool sensation of breath going in and out your nose, and then trace that sensation all the way to your lungs. It takes your mind off of the mechanical movement, and breathing will just take care of itself. 

Edited May 1, 2017 by Gopackgo

[john5170]

@Gopackgo Wow thanks for the response.

I think my problem is concentration. Even reading your response I got distracted 3 or 4 times. Maybe I have ADD, who knows.

[Guest Young Padawan]

I think that you just need to let go of everything, even meditation and calmness.

The problem here is that you set a goal that's not intuitive to you.

Meditation should be a tool, not a goal.

[Gopackgo]

10 hours ago, john5170 said:

@Gopackgo Wow thanks for the response.

I think my problem is concentration. Even reading your response I got distracted 3 or 4 times. Maybe I have ADD, who knows.

I thought I had ADD before too. ADD is a belief. It was discovered before they knew that you can change your brain structure. The brain is not as rigid as people think, but they like to say it is because it gives the excuse for not being able change.

@Mahmoud Bishr Kebbeh  isn't wrong, it really is about being. The best way to meditate is to just be happy and not be too serious about it's structure. Still, for me, learning to relax my body, breathe, and concentrate was a prerequisite to that in some ways. It never felt like a chore though. I love it.

[WelcometoReality]

@john5170 the mind is trying to get your attention. It will calm down, no worries.