Lotus Bud 1.3 Released

Lotus Bud - Meditation Timer for iPad and iPhone has an all new interface and has a bucket of new features http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/lotus-bud-meditation-timer/id441875698?ls=1&mt=8 Also checkout Lotus Bud - Mindfulness Bell for iPad and iPhone a free mindfulness bell http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/lotus-bud-mindfulness-bell/id502329366?ls=1&mt=8

Stopping

There's a certain feeling of "stopping" and dropping into meditation that feels very comfortable.  It's not the same as "getting in the zone" or have any bearing on the quality of the mind.  I feel it almost as physical sensation of stopping or ceasing in my chest and limbs.  Often my mind is still unsettled when it occurs.  It's like a precursor to the mind settling.  I'd even liken it to putting a car in gear before you pull out.  You really aren't driving at that point, you've just put it in gear.

It has a nice comfortable feel and is reassuring to feel after not practicing a while.  It's the reassurance that you may be out of practice, but you're not starting from scratch either.

Earlier in my practice it was harder to come by if it even came by at all.  I think now it's like muscle memory an a conditioning of the mind.  You remember how to meditate, even if you are rusty.  If it's been a while since you've meditated, take refuge in that.  It may be hard to get your momentum back, but your body remembers if you've got many hours on the cushion.

Lotus Bud Meditation App

I just completed my first iPhone app Lotus Bud, a meditation app for iPhone on the App Store.  Check it out and leave me feedback at  Lotus Bud's website.

Mistrust

I woke up yesterday morning with an ominous feeling and a knot in my stomach in the shape of a halfmoon under my ribcage.  While I was noticing how that was feeling in the body (and how my inclination was to ignore and avoid it), I noticed I was ready to be set off by almost anything.  I'd get waves of feeling as if I could burst into tears if someone said anything even slightly emotional to me.

I wondered what my dreams were like for me to just wake up in this state.  I was scheduled to have the first review meeting with a new client later this morning and I knew I was a little nervous about that, but I have meetings with clients on a very regular schedule so I suspected something deeper was at work.  My mindfulness weakened as it usually does while I'm absorbed with work.  At some point well after the meeting (which went fine), I noticed that the knot wasn't completely gone, but had softened.  My mental state was much better.

As I was riding the bus to the train station home, I began to drop back into my body and reflect on what had happened this morning and what might have been the setup, I realized several things:

• The knot and the emotional sensitivity was in fact about that meeting... and more...
• What was underlying it all was a fundamental mistrust of myself and my abilities
• It wasn't very hard to make a connection going back years to middle school and elementary
• Despite having very little evidence from recent history that I would cock things up, my body/heart still expected it
• It became very clear that I was causing suffering by this mistrust
• The mistrust didn't exist cognitively, it was based in the body/heart, not the thinking mind

I'm still feeling a little raw and sensitive to it, but with a completely different relationship to it.  Now the strong reactions seem to be a response to the suffering I've put up with and the cumulative effect it must have had.  Each time I touch into that sadness or worry, compassion rushes up to meet it.  I'm curious to see how such a relatively small insight might change my orientation over time.  I can't imagine that I won't be tuned in a little bit better to that sense of mistrust.

Ajahn Brahm said something to the effect that you can have the delusion that meditation is hard, or the delusion that meditation is easy, so why not choose the delusion that's more helpful.  I feel like I could benefit from some similar logic with my mistrust of myself.  Why mistrust, when I can trust.  Which is more skillful?

Letting go of Restlessness

Another of the hindrances has been rearing it's head. I've just recently realized that Restlessness has been ruling my practice.

Before, for months and months I struggled with Doubt and delusion. Before that Aversion and Ill Will, before that Sloth and Torpor. Before that Sense Desire (which is one that has been coupled with the Restlessness and before with the Doubt as well.) Even though each one of them ebbs and flows it's been pretty remarkable to see how for months and even years one can be so overarching, and then in a matter of a few weeks, there is some recognition of it and then lightening.

I've been slowly coming out of a doubtful period (mostly in my own abilities) which has kept me away from my sitting except for retreat and sitting with a group (for a while it's even kept me away from that). But my personal daily meditation has been pretty non-existent for the better part of a year, if not longer. Over the last few weeks though as I've been picking back up my strong desire to immerse myself more in the practice. I mistook most of my difficulty to be the remnants of Doubt, just bogging me down. But really what I didn't recognize was that the Doubt wasn't what was dominant anymore and in fact had pretty much subsided weeks ago. What was really operating was Restlessness.

When I recognized this it's still taken a few weeks to soften, but I've had a couple of good long sits since then, even if the Restlessness has kept them from being as frequent as I would like.

Just now I got up from an hour and twenty five minutes of meditation. The only movement I made was to straighten my back when I noticed that my energy had waned. I didn't set a timer and my only resolve was that I wouldn't get up until my concentration had stabilized.

I'm looking forward to sitting some more soon, and just want to convert that restless energy into Right Effort.

Reflections on Doubt

I've been having such a hard time with the practice for the last few months. My intention to keep up with the Sattipathana practice throughout the year has completely fallen off. I haven't been even keeping a regular sitting practice other than the weekly and monthly groups I sit with. That's not to say that there hasn't been a lot of mindful investigation, but really just a lack of the formal sitting and walking practice.

Lots of doubt (in which practice to focus on, not on the results of the practice) being pervasive. It's remained as my hidden hindrance as of late.

I'm on my way to trying to correct that. There is a certain amount of angst surrounding the fact that I haven't been sitting. Disappointment in myself, etc, etc.

Tomorrow I'm leaving for a weeklong loving kindness retreat, and then going directly to a family vacation. Should allow me some time to reflect on my practice.

The loving kindness practice seems to be what I keep coming back to, although I still want to be doing straight up mindfulness practice. I can see the part of me that just sees that as the "cooler" practice, although I know loving kindness just keeps on showing itself as what I really need right now.

Reflections on the Parts of the Body

[4] "Furthermore...just as if a sack with openings at both ends were full of various kinds of grain — wheat, rice, mung beans, kidney beans, sesame seeds, husked rice — and a man with good eyesight, pouring it out, were to reflect, 'This is wheat. This is rice. These are mung beans. These are kidney beans. These are sesame seeds. This is husked rice,' in the same way, monks, a monk reflects on this very body from the soles of the feet on up, from the crown of the head on down, surrounded by skin and full of various kinds of unclean things: 'In this body there are head hairs, body hairs, nails, teeth, skin, flesh, tendons, bones, bone marrow, kidneys, heart, liver, pleura, spleen, lungs, large intestines, small intestines, gorge, feces, bile, phlegm, pus, blood, sweat, fat, tears, skin-oil, saliva, mucus, fluid in the joints, urine.'

"In this way he remains focused internally on the body in & of itself, or focused externally... unsustained by anything in the world. This is how a monk remains focused on the body in & of itself.

This is my work for about the next month or so. Essentially my job is to mentally disect the parts of the body and become familiar with the characteristics and become aware of them as distinct elements of the body as much as possible.

This serves a couple of purposes. First is just mindfulness of the body, which will help with identifying feeling tone (several weeks down the road). Separating out the parts and defining what's what builds sensitivity and subtleness of the practice, since many of these are hard to identify just by trying to set your mind to noticing something like bile. It's like someone starting out wine tasting as a hobby. At first there's a large broad sense of, this is what red tastes like, this is what white tastes like. But as the person refines their palete, then the distinctions become stronger because their senses and mind have become more sensitive.

Second, the contemplation of the body in such a analytical way helps with subduing sensual and bodily desire, simultaneous developing a certain amount of admiration for the human body and how intricate and amazing it is, and also disenchantment from the trappings and attachment and identification to it. This is especially the case with the supposition that seems to come so naturally, that somehow body is self.