Nonduality and Mindfulness — Two Great Traditions that Go Great Together

[ThatMan]

Originally Posted by JustASimpleGuy

It varies? Calm abiding seems to feel longer but mainly because when the timer goes off it feels like I just started. Choiceless awareness sometimes seems to go by as quickly within the sitting as when the timer goes off.

I think the difference is in one I'm attending breathe and the other I'm not attending anything.

Yes, I noticed that sometimes 30 minutes feel just like a moment and sometimes they feel like hours and hours, but there's no waiting, I don't notice the passing of the time in both cases, when I stop I notice the flow of time.

Do you enter in the hypnagogic state? I think I have a natural ability to do it and with every new session of meditation, I can do this more and more.I just finished a two hours session of meditation ( more or less ) and it felt like a moment for me, I witnessed many things because I kept entering and leaving the hypnagogic state on and on, I think at least 10 times.You know, when you return from this state, your awareness returns too so you know that you have been "gone" somewhere else, that's how it feels for me.

Yesterday I did an experiment, I asked a question and then I started to meditate, few moments later I entered in the hypnagogic state and I heard the answer, it was "Yes", I thought that it was just a passing thought in my mind, then I repeated the same experiment and I heard the same answer, it was the voice of energy, it actually said "Yes".I tried this today and it did not really work, I heard a glimpse of a very peaceful voice saying "Yes" and then nothing.I don't know the answer of this question, it's a question that someone else ( from real life ) can answer but I wanted to see what my subconscious mind says, it's funny, it said "Yes" all the time.

Originally Posted by ThatMan

Do you enter in the hypnagogic state?

Not unless I doze off. That's rare but it can happen if for whatever reason I'm very tired. A bad on-call week can do it. Getting paged a few times a night really messes with the sleep cycle, and especially if it's multiple nights. LOL!

Choiceless awareness is interesting. Neuroscientific investigation in a lab setting with Buddhist monks using fMRI and EEG show gamma oscillation (40-90 Hz) and highly synchronized across widespread regions of the brain. When an external stimulus is introduced it phase locks onto one of the oscillations.

My experience of this is when in that state it's like hyper awareness. For instance where I previously lived I meditated in an upstairs bedroom I used as a home office. The heating system had two zones and the upstairs thermostat was in that room. Normally when the thermostat turned that zone on I would barely notice the click, but when in that deep state of meditation it would literally send a jolt through my body. Where I now live the same thing happens when the hot water starts circulating through the baseboard radiators.

These are more pronounced than other things that come into the field of awareness, I think because they are a very sudden and distinct higher pitched sounds, however the elevated state of awareness applies to anything and everything.

Here's Richie Davidson explaining that particular aspect of resting in awareness (choiceless awareness)

https://youtu.be/5TeWvf-nfpA?t=1497

[ThatMan]

Originally Posted by JustASimpleGuy

Not unless I doze off. That's rare but it can happen if for whatever reason I'm very tired. A bad on-call week can do it. Getting paged a few times a night really messes with the sleep cycle, and especially if it's multiple nights. LOL!

Choiceless awareness is interesting. Neuroscientific investigation in a lab setting with Buddhist monks using fMRI and EEG show gamma oscillation (40-90 Hz) and highly synchronized across widespread regions of the brain. When an external stimulus is introduced it phase locks onto one of the oscillations.

My experience of this is when in that state it's like hyper awareness. For instance where I previously lived I meditated in an upstairs bedroom I used as a home office. The heating system had two zones and the upstairs thermostat was in that room. Normally when the thermostat turned that zone on I would barely notice the click, but when in that deep state of meditation it would literally send a jolt through my body. Where I now live the same thing happens when the hot water starts circulating through the baseboard radiators.

These are more pronounced than other things that come into the field of awareness, I think because they are a very sudden and distinct higher pitched sounds, however the elevated state of awareness applies to anything and everything.

Here's Richie Davidson explaining that particular aspect of resting in awareness (choiceless awareness)

https://youtu.be/5TeWvf-nfpA?t=1497

Too me it happens all the time, it's like I become part of a movie that plays in my own mind, I see images and hear voices, I interact with the "beings" that are there.I lose all my conscious awareness, this is why when I "return" back it feels that I was gone somewhere else.It's a trance, I had no idea that it's actually called the hypnagogic state.

Science is barely understanding things that the people of the past knew them for thousands of years.

That's really cool, do use the lotus posture? I don't use the lotus posture, I noticed that recently I became able to meditate from any kind of posture, I thought that I need to fully relax my body but the mind is the one who needs to be "silenced".

I suffer from tinnitus so I hear a continuous noise, it's funny, that when I meditate, it's like listening a guided meditation that does not contain the human voice, only the music.

It's funny, but you gave me a video that I've already seen half of it

Originally Posted by ThatMan

Too me it happens all the time, it's like I become part of a movie that plays in my own mind, I see images and hear voices, I interact with the "beings" that are there.I lose all my conscious awareness, this is why when I "return" back it feels that I was gone somewhere else.It's a trance, I had no idea that it's actually called the hypnagogic state.

So you're not aware in that state but only when you return, correct? You might want to check out dreamviews forum. It's a really good forum for lucid dreaming, and one technique is Dream Yoga. I'd say you either want to remain awake and aware or get beyond the hypnagogic hallucinations and into lucid dreaming with the intentions behind Dream Yoga. There was one member who was very experienced and actually offered courses for forum members. Not sure he's still there as I gave up on lucid dreaming because it was messing with my sleep cycle.

Originally Posted by ThatMan

That's really cool, do use the lotus posture? I don't use the lotus posture, I noticed that recently I became able to meditate from any kind of posture, I thought that I need to fully relax my body but the mind is the one who needs to be "silenced".

I sit in a chair. I had arthroscopic surgery on my right knee in 1986 for a bad tear of the meniscus cartilage in 1982. I avoid putting to much stress on that knee.

Originally Posted by ThatMan

It's funny, but you gave me a video that I've already seen half of it

I stumbled across that video five or so year ago. That's where I got the idea to start mixing resting in awareness into my practice. Jon Kabat-Zinn is the American guru of mindfulness.