2/13

Today was an interesting day for me. At school, we had an experiment in psych, I received a good chemistry test score, and I gave a presentation to my English class. Overall, I felt pretty well, despite only receiving around 5 to 5.5 hours of sleep. I also had time to do a relatively easy workout after school (stairs, jog and interval runs). I am excited to see my older brother tomorrow and also I'm excited to start a workout plan (something that I should have completed a long time ago). 

I first tried to meditate for my final (required) reflection two days ago, but I ended up falling asleep. So I tried again yesterday and, once again, I fell asleep. My first response was to view these occurrences as not productive, but then I considered what my body was trying to tell me. I realized that everything that happens, even what seems to be mistakes, can serve as an indicator as to what your body/mind needs. If you're stressed, you need to take a moment to relax. If you have a craving for mcDonalds, you may have an unhealthy addiction to fatty and salty foods. If you have a sore muscle, your body must be repairing it. And if you fall asleep within a minute of laying down, you probably should sleep. However, my goal was not to sleep (that can come later), but to practice MBSR. So today, I decided to mentally block myself from falling asleep. When considering where I wanted to meditate, a thought popped into my head. I realized that I didn't like the meditation experience in the same place with the same conditions and the same position. I recognize that many people find such repetitive practices to be beneficial, but I personally prefer to be more relaxed about everything. I enjoy life most when I stop letting the details into my head and just do what should be done.  By practicing a less regimented lifestyle, I make myself pay attention to living life. With a predictable and ordered life, it can be easy to stop paying attention to life and all the experiences it has to offer.(I find it somewhat amusing that I just wrote that I prefer an un-regimented lifestyle, and yet I plan on joining the armed forces. I realize that there are many ways to meet military standards while living in a less regimented way, but it is still counter-intuitive.). With these thoughts in mind, I decided that, rather than go up to my room and meditate in my usual spot, I would go into my family room and meditate there.

At the beginning of the meditation, I was in the lotus position. However, I soon decided to roll onto my right side. I was comfortable on my right side, and yet not so comfortable that I would fall asleep. I experimented with laying on my side and stomach until I decided to stay on my side. I was very relaxed and felt myself slip into a deeper state of relaxation relatively easily. My thoughts were conscious at first. However, after a short period of time, I entered the stage of half sleep that was mentioned in yoga yesterday (Pratyahara). Essentially, I withdrew from my senses and allowed distant thoughts to murmur in my mind. I have done this several times in meditation, but I did not know what the term for it was until yesterday. Pratyahara is probably my favorite part of meditation; I always return to my senses with a calm mind and a rejuvenated spirit. I imagine this state as a frog in a river. While the frog can spend a long time at the bottom of a river, he still resurfaces, just enough so he can take in a breath, barely disturbing the water. During one of these small resurfaces, I pulled myself out of the state for a moment to check the time; I had somewhere to be. I then lied myself back down on my right side and reentered the state for a couple of minutes.

I felt the effects of this meditation for some time after the meditation. I came out of it feeling awake and focused, especially impressive considering that I have not received sufficient sleep in the past couple of days. I also felt that I had a more relaxed outlook and increased self-control.  These effects have continued to now, almost 4 hours after I meditated. Granted, they are less pronounced, but they are still there. I am glad that my mind so willingly enter this meditative state and I hope it will do so in the future. 

2/10

Today, I spent my time after school doing a lower body workout in the weight room. I decided to make a workout schedule to prepare for the CFA (Candidate Fitness Assessment) that I must take in order to apply to USNA, USMA, and USAFA. I have a lot of projects that are due this Wednesdat and a lot of other projects due at later dates, so I took advantage of the weight room as a time for me to be enjoying myself in the moment. However, I will not be writing about mindfulness in the weight room, but rather I will be writing about my evening meditation session.

I sat on the floor of my room in the lotus position and closed my eyes. However, I realized that my eyes seemed to want to be slightly open. I felt this happen, as my room was so dark that I could not perceive a difference between eyes open and eyes closed unless if I raised my head a bit. I was beginning to settle into this position when my phone received a text. My parents were not home, so I checked it to make sure everything was fine. After this distraction, I sat down and attempted to meditate again. However, I seemed to initially have some difficulty. I continued this until my phone went off. I answered it and talked for a few minutes with a friend of mine. After that, I decided that I would not answer my phone again. I received some more texts during the meditation but I chose to ignore them. After a while, I realized that I was having a lot of difficulty entering a meditative state. I determined the reason for this was that my mind was in the future. I recognized that my mind spends too much time in the future and that I should try to bring it back into the present. I opened my eyes and checked my clock: About 10 minutes had passed. I determined that I had enough time to try again, so I told myself that my mind was calm and attempted to be in the moment. I continued this attempt until I decided to take into account my surroundings. I opened my eyes and noticed that my room was considerably lighter than it was when I had started. I determined this to be due to the adjustment of my eyes to the dark. I looked up at the ceiling, taking into account the light from the moon, reflected off of the snow and up into my room. It was dull. I looked for a recognizable color, but all I found was an indistinct blob that could only be described as simply "light." I laid down on the ground and took in this new position. I noticed the feel of the clothing on which I had set my back and the new perspective of my ceiling; It still looked dull. In this position, I felt myself become lost in thought. I recognized thoughts of the how "first-world" my life is. These were not new thoughts, but they had been absent from my conscious for a while. The rest of my thoughts were forgotten soon after finishing my meditation, leading me to believe that they were unimpressive.

When I ended my meditation, I realized that I had completely forgotten about my phone. It took me a minute, but eventually I identified the cause for the feeling that I should do something. For those of you reading who do not know my habits with technology, I am not addicted to my phone. I actually find great pleasure in leaving it in my room for hours on end while I go off to do other activities. I have absolutely no games on my phone and I prefer to use computers for web browsing when I have one easily accessible. I do not know anyone who would call me addicted to technology in any way. The reason I was drawn to my phone is that I recognize that a lot of people may need to contact me right now for projects, family business, Scouts, and personal business. I cannot neglect my duties to the people in my life, so I feel obligated to at least make sure there is no urgent business.
After I decided to ignore my phone, I still experienced difficulty entering a meditative state. However, laying down on the ground really seemed to help. I'm not sure if it relaxed me enough so that I could meditate better or if there is another reason for my experience in the supine position, but I would like to experiment with this position a couple of times in order to determine whether or not it is an effective way for me to meditate. I feel somewhat refreshed after the meditation, but what I most enjoyed was sorting out my thoughts (which actually hindered my meditation) and the feeling I had while in the supine position. It was very relaxing and I found pleasure in the unimportant thoughts that rushed through my head. It may seem weird, but it is sometime pleasant to think of dull occurrences in life.

2/9

Today, I was very tired. I just returned from teaching a leadership training course to my scout troop and, while I spent most of my time that I was not teaching relaxing, I still tired myself out this weekend so that I was drawn to my bed by an incessant call to sleep. I managed to do 45 minutes of cardio workout yesterday. I used a stationary bike because my calves were in enough pain for me to fear the risk of injury. I have spent most of today relaxing. I meditated right after finishing a large dinner.

From today's meditation, I have improved certain aspects. However, for the most part, I was distracted. This distraction was not from external sources; my family was making noise, but it did not bother me at all. Yes, it drew my attention, but in a calm manner. This is different from a week or two ago when it jerked me away from my meditation. Additionally, I managed to find a posture that is not too upright and not too relaxed. It was steady, yet calm. It was a posture that seemed as if it were made specifically for meditation. While I found improvement in these areas, I had a difficult time entering a state of mindfulness. At times, I found myself hovering by the edge of mindfulness, but never quite entering. I was distracted by thoughts. I have a lot of projects due tomorrow, so I wanted to think of a rough plan to complete them all. Also, this weekend provided a lot of different things to think about.

Overall, I was consistently looking into the future rather than being in the present. I believe that while I did not achieve a deep state of mindfulness, I did feel relaxed following my meditation. It allowed me a moment to sit back and consider everything that had happened and that was going to happen. While this was not what I intended to do, I am still grateful that I had a moment to do so. In addition to this alternative benefit, I have found that I have been happier in the past couple of days than I have been in over a month. I believe that this can be primarily contributed to internal factors. While I found some happiness in seeing a lot of friends this weekend, I realized that what is making me the happiest is how I have changed my perspective on life. I stated in an earlier blog that I had gone over my values. I believe that doing so has greatly improved my mood and my cognition. I like to think of life as being a constant cycle of highs and lows, roughly resembling a sine curve (except not as predictable). I am glad to feel like I am on a high again, and I hope it stays for a while.

  

2/4

This post was made the day after the meditation occurred.

I was feeling really bad about myself before the meditation. It was as if I had lost sight of who I am and what my beliefs are. I no longer had an idea of what my ideal self is. I have felt these thoughts approaching for a while, but I didn't see an urgent need to address them until now. I prefer to handle myself in a certain way, and I finally came to the conclusion that I have been completely neglecting this way. So, I decided to take some time to relax, think about myself and my values, and meditate.

I entered the meditation in a relaxed state, having just reformed the basis of my values and beliefs. I felt secure, like I knew that I was on the right track to regaining a hold of myself. I sat down in the lotus position and began my mindfulness meditation. This meditation was very good because, unlike other meditative experiences I've had, I was able to flow into the experience really fast. I sat back and simply observed, thoughts racing by. I truly felt in the moment. I meditated for about 20 to 30 minutes.

After the meditation, I felt the reformation of my values had concreted into my mind. I knew who I was and what I wanted. It was a good feeling, and I took it with me for the rest of the day. I was able to facilitate my actions and reactions so that they more closely matched my ideal vision of myself. I took these feelings to my Boy Scout meeting, where I was surprised with having to stand up and speak in front of a group of younger scouts in order to promote the troop. I was shuffled from meeting to meeting the whole time I was at Scouts. I felt that I was having a lot thrown at me, but I still remained (for the most part) true to my reestablished values. I feel like I made a lot of progress and I hope to continue to do so.

1/31

This post is being made the day after the meditation occurred.

Before the meditation, I had been working on homework. I decided to meditate once I finished my math homework. Overall, I felt pretty good. I had began to condition for track and had sore muscles from mid-distance indoor track runs. While my body was aching (lower body from exercise the day of the meditation, upper body from the day prior), my mind felt fine.

I sat gingerly in the dark on my bedroom floor, avoiding causing my muscles pain. I assumed the lotus position with my back straight and, as usual, I relaxed my body after a period of time (maybe half way through). I measured my heart rate before meditation to be 77 bpm and then I closed my eyes. I focused on my aching muscles, taking in the feeling. I then tried advancing myself through the stages of meditation as described by Mr. Dean. However, I didn't make much progress. I felt myself wavering between stages, sometimes in stage 3 (daydreaming/ideas) while sometimes going all the way down to stage 1 (noticing the body). I meditated for a total of 24 minutes, from 9:27 to 9:51 PM. Throughout the entire time, I felt like I was on a roller coaster, going up and down. I felt like I was grabbing a warm stick of butter: the harder I grabbed on, the more likely it was to go flying away.

     When I finished my meditation, I opened my eyes and set a timer to 1 minute to find my heart rate. When the timer went off, I determined it was 74 bpm, about a 3.9% decrease from before. It wasn't much, but it was something. I generally have a high heart rate, especially for a runner. I've talked with other cardio athletes who say they are from 40 to 50 bpm resting. Now, I'm not conditioned cardiovascularly at the moment, but even when I'm at rest during running season, my heart rate is generally from 60 to 70 bpm. I know it isn't genetic because my older brother was much lower when he was in high school.
     Looking back at my meditation experience, I realize that what was keeping me from remaining steadily in stage 3 (and possibly moving on from there) was my effort to control the moment. I wanted to observe the moment, but I kept pushing forward, trying to force myself to go forward in the stages. Next time, I will recognize that I will naturally transcend from the stage and that I should not push myself along in meditation. While it was not the best experience, I still felt like I received some benefits from it aside from learning what I did wrong.
      When I went to bed around midnight, I felt fine. However, later that night, I experienced disturbing dreams. The first one started off with me talking to a girl. She was very attractive (you know who she is, Rahul), but she was talking with her friend about how they smashed Torahs at their summer camp (I think it may have been a bible camp, because I know that they were Christian. This was in no way an anti-Christian dream, it was coincidence that they were Christian). When they said that that's what they did, they looked over at me as if they were trying to not offend or upset me. I could see from the strain in their faces that they had realized that they had already offended me. They tried detaching themselves from the act, explaining that they did it for their forefathers. I attempted to be calm and said "You know, that could be very offensive to some people... like me." Now, for those of you who are not Jewish, the smashing of Torahs may not seem like something that would be disturbing. But to me, it is one of the most horrific thoughts I have ever had. Imagining the holy scroll, once exalted high on the bima (elevated platform in a synagogue where the Rabbi stands and where the Torah is read), being thrust with hatred toward the crippling ground is enough to make me feel sick. Such acts against Judaism appear to me as just below the Holocaust, showing similar disgust toward a group based solely on their identity and beliefs. The thought alone is enough to instantly empty my heart of joy. It is an incredible display of antisemitism, showing the savage rage that hatred can breed. For me, the thought is near the epitome of hatred. It's disgusting, making me feel as if I have a hole in my heart. Honestly, I don't feel capable of explaining it to the extent which it deserves. In addition to this, I had nebulous dreams that followed featuring me being ignored by the same people for no apparent reason. When I woke up, I had to tell myself that they had only been dreams. They have been realities at different times in the past, but for me at that moment, they were only dreams....

1/30

Today has been rather enjoyable for me. I did not have very much homework this evening, so I started training for the CFA (Candidate Fitness Assessment) and conditioning for track in the weight room after school. In addition, I had time to socialize leisurely with several friends via text messages and phone calls. Before I sat down on the floor in my bedroom to meditate, I considered two things: what Mr. Dean had told us in class today, and what Mr. Russell said in his comment on my 1/29 blog post. I decided to focus on experiencing and observing the presence, using the perspective given by Mr. Russell on how to deal with a noisy household. Additionally, I decided not to use a timer, but rather stop when I felt the time was right.

I sat down on the floor in my bedroom, assuming the lotus position in my dark room. I closed my eyes at 9:25PM, starting upright and observing how I felt physically. Because I had worked out a few hours before, I considered this observation of my physical well-being to be important. In addition to focusing on how I felt (temperature, blood, muscles, etc), I also considered how my body perceived different senses. It was difficult for me to avoid passing judgement and simply observe what my body sensed, but for the most part I found some success. Then, my mind began to wonder. Again, I tried to only observe the thoughts, nothing more. However, I found it difficult to do so. Perhaps I was mentally stimulated prior to meditating because I really wanted to direct my thoughts and pass judgement on the ones that appeared in my mind. When I felt myself attempting to control the experience, I did as Mr. Dean said and went back to a previous step, observing my body and how it felt. Then, I would allow myself to advance back to the next step. I went back and forth between steps for a while, achieving intervals of observing the experience, interrupted by moments when my mind tried to take control. During this time, I decided to lean forward because I felt my back begin to ache a bit. In addition, my foot went numb because I was accidentally blocking blood flow to it. I moved my foot to a different position in order to allow blood flow. At the beginning, I opened my eyes for several seconds to test how meditating with my eyes open would be. However, I determined that I would have a better experience with my eyes closed. 15 minutes into the meditation, while I was emerging from a deeper meditative state, I looked at the clock to check the time. I then felt a draw back to my meditative state and decided to continue meditating. The overall experience lasted about 25 minutes. I believe that I may have forced myself to stop meditating at an earlier time than I would have liked, but I believe that I still had a beneficial experience. While my meditative state fluctuated from shallow to deep, I believe I experienced a decent amount of deep meditation.

This meditative experience was much better than my most recent ones. I think that Mr. Russell's and Mr. Dean's advice really helped me be more successful in meditating. I did a rough measure of my heart rate before and after the experience and noticed a slight decrease in heart rate. However, I would like to actually find my heart's BPM before and after the experience so I have solid empirical evidence of the effects of MBSR. I hope that next time I will be able to go even deeper into my meditative state and spend more time in deeper meditation.

1/29

I approached my meditation with a bit of stress and distraction. I have a lot of work I need to complete today and I'm likely going to be working later than I would like in order to complete it. Naturally, working late produces a stressful reaction, so I decided that I could focus on reducing this feeling.

I meditated for 17.5 minutes a bit before 10PM. I sat in the lotus position on the ground in my bedroom. I relaxed for some of the time, but for most of it I had good posture. I decided to first focus on my breathing and then I shifted that focus to my posture. From good posture, I moved my body around, swaying from side to side and moving my upper body in circles. I paid attention to the muscles that allowed me to sway: both the ones causing the swaying and the ones facilitating my balance. I chose to do this rather than attempt to let my mind wander due to the distractions present. Essentially, there was a lot of noise from various sources and I determined that I would have the most success if I was engaging in something physical to keep my attention away from my ears. If I was a very experienced meditator, I would have went forward with my plan to simply observe my thoughts as they came to me. However, I knew that the distractions would have minimized my experience today with mindfulness meditation, so I decided to devote my energy into being mindful of my physical movement. While I felt my initial reaction of irritation to the distractions, I decided to filter these reactions. I decided that it was not worth being irritated with these distractions and that I should simply let my irritation go. I decided that allowing such trivial things would not be conducive to my health, and that my goal of greater control over myself could be advanced through this practice.

Overall, I felt like I made progress today. The distractions actually proved to contribute to my goals. I felt like focusing solely on the practice of control over my mind was a healthy exercise, and I would like to expand on it in further meditation exercises. In addition, I found the focus on my posture to be interesting. I enjoyed the increased mindfulness of my body. However, I would like to research further into the benefits of this before I substitute mindfulness practices over this. I'm glad that this session helped me with my goals, and I hope each following experience does, as well.