Hi Metta,
I think this is very interesting, who is there to take something the wrong way?? :-) It is absolutely alright to not know something. There is no right or wrong thing to say.
I just had a chance to reply, e
There is nothing wrong with it at all, it is very liberating. I did not mean to imply that there was something wrong here, just stating an observation. Observations can be just that, observations.
I just finished my second part of the exercise just a half an hour ago:
Notes:
The usual itches on my face, and nose initially I scratch then I remember I have to be still.
Periodically I glance over to the timer. My right foot starts to fall asleep as it does. I ignore.
The foot asleep turns to pain and I try being in the pain, facing it. I then try growing it out with a limited success. I turn to conscous breathing and sometimes I am able to forget about the pain. These things repeat throughout the hour long.
The pain spreads to my lower legs both left and right. Sometimes tinges of sharp pain at my lower thigh next to my knee. I have to keep myself still. My body creaks.
When I am close to the hour up, the pain increases which is interesting since I know that the hour is almost up. Still there is a serentity here. After the hour is up, I lean back against the couch (I am on the floor). Both my legs are completely asleep so I have to gently put weight into them.
2nd Session
I gave myself a little break on this one. I sat on a zafu cushion on the floor in a half lotus position like last time but gave myself a back support by positioning myself against the back of the bedboard. This bedroom downstairs is next to the laundry room and at first the washer going was a little distracting. I put the timer which is an app on my i-phone away from close proximity. Later at 1 hour 36 minutes I reached for it and checked the time. I did this three other time. At first there was a sense of no reason to think about the end here so I got into staring at the louvered door to the closet which was directly in front of me. It took a bit for the foot to go asleep but then what followed was pain, sometimes excruciating pain. I tried the moving the pain up through my spine with some limited success. The pain the last half an hour was acute and being in it, surrendering to it and the breathing is what ended up happening. I was forced to be in every moment. I surrendered to the moment and the pain and wondered how I could be such a projection oriented person. But I also thought, I’m not doing this again!
After checking the time at different intervals, and finally with 1:54 left, I knew I was going to make it. My right knee was especially painful and I suspect that there is a little arthritis in it. I thought, this will be over and in the past, just water flowing under the bridge but there were some times that I just wanted to quit.
When finally the bells on my meditation app dinged, I was so grateful. I slowly got out of position only to have my left foot spasm. I lay on the floor for some minutes. It was very nice but then raising myself up, my right leg started to cramp, so I immediately put weight on it. Also, my back threatened to act up. When I meditate on a cushion, I always switch leg positions every fifteen minutes or so.
During the meditation, there was heavy breathing with a kind of moan going on. Also, head sensations but not unpleasant ones. As I write this (immediately afterwards) the pleasant head sensations continue, the wonderment of not wanting to be projecting. Again the animated pointillism showed up but taking a very role to the pain. Last night I watched on PBS a show about the Siberian Tigers and how a Korean man stayed in a dug out hole in the ground for months to get close to the tigers, never venturing out, living on rice and nuts and salt, putting his waste in sealed plastic bags and I thought about the Asthetics (?) of India on the show the other night about the Buddha. I was in real surrender to the pain and to the moment, no ego.
Thanks,
-Kent
