Meditation Inconsistencies, Ups And Downs And Causes.

[cactus]

Hi.

Have been meditating for about 9 months now. It has really opened my eyes up to amazing possibilities and I see the world much more clearly now. I started meditating for 20 minutes a day for about 2 months, and then I did 60 minutes a day to this day.

In the start it kind of felt like the old person I was were melted away. It was remarkable. My priorities shifted and I started focusing on school and self actualization. The funny thing is I started enjoying doing it. Meditation became very important to me.

What I though was weird though is that the effects of meditation suddenly disappeared. Wasn't meditation supposed to be about growth(?), I thought. I didnt stop my practice but it was hard to stay motivated. Someone told me not to cling to the results because it would just make me suffer and the meditation would not work. Is this true?

Is this up and down experience common for all meditators? I had amazing effects for 6 months but the last 3 months my meditation stopped working like it used to. If it is true that it will go back up, how long time can it take for it to happen?

 

Greetings, Cactus.

[Guest]

@cactus It's pretty common. Also, some counter-intuitive invitation to you from me...stop meditating for two weeks or one month.

Why do you even meditate, cactus? You are a cactus after all.

[cetus]

Meditation is just one part of the whole tree.

[ZenDog]

2 hours ago, cactus said:

Hi.

Have been meditating for about 9 months now. It has really opened my eyes up to amazing possibilities and I see the world much more clearly now. I started meditating for 20 minutes a day for about 2 months, and then I did 60 minutes a day to this day.

In the start it kind of felt like the old person I was were melted away. It was remarkable. My priorities shifted and I started focusing on school and self actualization. The funny thing is I started enjoying doing it. Meditation became very important to me.

What I though was weird though is that the effects of meditation suddenly disappeared. Wasn't meditation supposed to be about growth(?), I thought. I didnt stop my practice but it was hard to stay motivated. Someone told me not to cling to the results because it would just make me suffer and the meditation would not work. Is this true?

Is this up and down experience common for all meditators? I had amazing effects for 6 months but the last 3 months my meditation stopped working like it used to. If it is true that it will go back up, how long time can it take for it to happen?

 

Greetings, Cactus.

Experiencing kind of the same thing at the moment. Mindfulness meditation made all my senses crystal clear. Now the brain fog is coming back.

[cactus]

12 minutes ago, ZenDog said:

Experiencing kind of the same thing at the moment. Mindfulness meditation made all my senses crystal clear. Now the brain fog is coming back.

Switching meditation helped for me a bit. Went from insight to samatha and widened my focus. Actually tried walking meditation 5 minutes ago. Feeling pretty at ease right now

 

Edited March 4, 2016 by cactus

[99th_monkey]

why are you meditating? 

[Guivs]

First of all, I'd like to congratulate you for having stuck to practicing meditation even though you did not feel its benefits any longer:)

The thing is, feelings of ups and downs, sensations, are all dependent arisings from conditions and what you need to realize is that there is no need to get attached to them because they are impermanent and no independent entities. 

Please continue to meditate, but with no goals in mind of becoming blissful and feeling joy. Just sit and experience your whole body sitting without clinging nor rejecting sensations and emotions arising. Do not care about them, just experience your body sitting, not even parts of your body, but the totality of it. 

At the beginning, you will feel that the sitting experience might be just a sense of discomfort, but has you do not give any importance to it, you will see that those discomforts will fluctuate in intensity and are transient. 

In any case, the role of meditation is not to get in an eternal blissful state, but rather to realize that we do not need to attach to those states of mind

As an analogy, imagine you are sitting and your body is itching. At the moment your body is itching, you think "I want to scratch", this is the attachement that you need to get rid of:) But if you say "I hitch, but I will not move", it's already too late, because you have already attached to it. 

It is really subtle, and I'm far from being accomplished in any way or form, but I hope that helps

Have a great day !