Day 48 & Caught up in the Mind-Stream

Day 48 Record Keeping SRHI = 64
Day 16 Fixed Meditation SRHI = 47
Day 15 Dynamic Meditation SRHI = 36
Goodnight sleep, ok wakeup. Incredibly depressed yesterday

I’ve been reading and skimming an immense number of books on Buddhism. What I’ve realized is that there is a lot that’s similar with my “Dynamic Meditation” habit and their equanimity training. 

One book I read yesterday suggested that great turbulence of the mind arises when you are into your training. And another book said this turbulence comes when  you are about to tame your  mind.

That is a relief because yesterday was a tumultuous sea of emotions. Anger, frustration, hopelessness, utter dispair. I felt so depressed, and it kept coming - every time I’d bounce back to counter, it would come right afterwards. And I got so tired. I couldn’t get into that mental state to choose…I was just swept away in the mind-stream rather than hovering on top of it.

I’m keeping up with the practice today - redoubling my efforts. This is the most important thing I’ve ever done - it’s direct training on things that have stopped me in all habits in the past - that feeling that you are just about to give up instead of knowing you are just about to succeed.

Day 38 & The Mind-Stream

Day 38 Record Keeping SRHI = 59
Day 6 Fixed Meditation SRHI = 29
Day 5 Dynamic Meditation SRHI = 61
Decent night sleep, bleary wakeup

Again a huge jump in Dynamic Meditation SRHI. In my fixed meditation I try to bring up negative feelings in order to practice changing them. I found it very difficult to deliberately bring them up - I would automatically divert them into more positive ones.

This brings up another point - if that is working so well in a moment to moment level, is there any point in doing Fixed Meditation? I’ll really have to think about that.

The way I visualize some of my Dynamic Meditation is like thoughts flowing. There are divergences in that flow where I get sidetrack my negative emotions, but I’m practicing redirecting them back into the larger flow rather than what happened before - the whole flow would become soured and negative - it would totally shift course.

The Dharmic religions have a term for this - the mind-stream. Buddhist literature is incredibly technical in nature, so truly understanding their philosophies behind it are quite difficult for me, even with my background in Asian religious studies.

What I do understand is that they viewed this equanimity training - what I’m calling “dynamic meditation” - as highly technical. There’s jargon for every part of the process and terms for each specific concept. This is exactly what I need - I’m sick of reading the basics of meditation, what I need is this advanced stuff explained to me simply. I want to know their suggestions, their concepts, and their training techniques. But I’m thinking that this doesn’t exist and I’m going to have to wade right in.