Stream of Consciousness

Daily Entry: October 25th, 2020

2020-10-25T23:03:15.000Z

Meditation (Day 143)

Prep (1030)

Going in feeling really good. Something about the extra stretching I'm doing this weekend? I've decided to do whole stretch routine save for the second foam-roller exercise that's purposefully done very shortly before laying down in bed. This takes roughly 40 minutes instead of the typical 20, though I get those 20 minutes back at the end of the day. The reason I decided to do this is because on weekends I often spend some extra time watching entertainment with wife, and have less time during the night.

Motivations:

Practice intentionality
Unity of mind
Subduing distractions
See how far meditation takes me
Overcoming illusion of self

Intentions for the day:

Eyes closed
Prep posture and then set intention to sit completely still
Before focusing on the meditation object, cultivate joy
Immediately notice and correct for subtle dullness (stage 5 intention)
Special call-out to identify hypnagogic thoughts as a symptom of subtle dullness
Body-scan to increase mindfulness (stage 5 exercise)
Establish a clear scope of attention and completely ignore all subtle distractions (stage 6 intention)
Move, grow, and shrink the scope of attention to improve control over attention (stage 6 exercise)
Special call-out to completely ignore posture distractions
"Don't move the third eye"

Distractions to look out for:

Body-scan
Wife
Cat
Outside
Posture
Lower back
Shoulder
Lotus
Pain
Vision
Timer
SSBM
Reflection
Planning
Meta
Labeling
American Horror Story
Politics
Hypnagogy

Post-Meditation (1155)

Not sure if cold air makes feeling the breath at the nose easier of if vividness of breath is getting really strong. Probably a bit of both. It did take extra effort to put the breath at nose into awareness when moving my scope of attention to other parts of the body.

The labeling habit is starting to fade. The new "third eye" (though I often call it the "mind's eye" so I may refer to it as that instead) vigilance seems to help with that. It also helped with keeping the thinking/emotional mind considerably quiet, and rang the alarm when there were some hypnagogic thoughts whispering. Felt an energy surge very shortly after the whisper. Seems I may be able to trust peripheral awareness to keep that energy up once the habit is set.

Very well could be a new best day. So many days now though, it's harder and harder to be sure. They've all been so good, as well.

Dream

Intention (2250 the night before)

The time has come! Not perfect sleep hygiene, but in a better place. My intent prep as I lay down has gotten nice and simple. Currently, it is:

I will reality check in my dreams
I will WBTS in the middle of the night
I will watch myself fall asleep
WILD
Visit my aunt's house
Cultivate joy

Then I relax, watching myself fall asleep.

So, let's get to it.

Wake (logged at 0740 this morning)

The "write a little bit in journal" habit has waned a bit. The cold, maybe? Perhaps now because I don't want to turn on the light (don't want to wake the wife, who's sleeping on the bed again now that's it's not super hot upstairs).

Not sure if I remembered dreams at the various points I woke up throughout the night. Feel like my mind has been in "processing" mode the past couple nights of dreams.

I think I should set the "write at least one sentence" intent, first-and-foremost when falling asleep. The compromise at the time helped build the habit, and the habit itself helps with dream recollection.

Pre-nap (1500)

Late nap. Almost forgot it entirely. Need to consider new WBTS strats now that it's colder and also I may need to get out of bed to write in journal.

I'll let nap ruminate on that a bit.

Post-nap (1518)

I'll grab and pick up my notebook at least, is what I've come up with as my "bare minimum" intent. That should tell me if I have anything to write, and I should know what to do next if I need to write elsewhere.

Body feels real good after that nap. Had a loving-kindness engulf me without any attempt on my end during the nap as well.

Misc Writing

Weekly Review

Today is weekly review day! First weekly review with new writing system, which actually makes me more inclined to write things.

I have done eye drops and eye mask for the week, which means my vision is a bit blurry right now. That's good, though, means that the eye residue that built up has dissolved a bit and my eyes will be more moisturized.

A task that got me to come here and start writing is the "Experiment for this week?" item. I may just want to continue Notion system updates. Which is to say start moving all the things into defined projects (where appropriate), and having a real "Next Actions" database instead of constantly abusing my tickler.

So, instead of a list of things to tackle that I may or may not throw to the future, I'll have a garden of projects with budding tasks. There'll also be a "No Task" project or a junk drawer for just one-off things, I suppose. The less friction there is with a project, the easier it'll be, I think.

So, then, during this weekly review, I'll take the project list part pretty seriously.

I suppose the Notion mutation experiment is itself a project.... Probably should create that as well.

Alright, so.... The people I know who read this public diary, I have set up regular intervals to chat with them. I think I'm going to stop doing it now. It'll all be in Notion now. Perhaps some blog posts will come this way, though I think I'm going to cultivate a lot of rough writing before I want to publish anything. We'll see.

Later!

Daily Entry: October 24th, 2020

2020-10-24T23:16:49.000Z

Purposefully slept in this morning. Was pretty exhausted yesterday and didn't practice good sleep hygiene by getting into bed sooner.

Dream

Intention (2325 the night before)

Watch myself fall asleep. WBTS. No wake-up time designated tonight. Thank you me, for remembering my dreams.

Wake-Back-to-Sleep (logged at 0435 this morning)

There's a dream I woke up from, but I can't remember it. A spooky optical illusion freaked me out a bit on wake up. And I couldn't breath thru my nose as much as I would've liked. Pretty sure it was just a dream fragment that I can't remember now. Not a huge loss, though sometimes fragments unlock the whole dream (or much more).

WILD time?

Wake (logged at 0850 this morning)

There were dreams but I don't remember. That's okay, it happens. Looks like I still got to work on sleep hygiene a bit. Gots to work on consistency, and also making sure I sleep well the day following a poor night of sleep. Which is ironically hard because sleep deprivation hurts impulse control, which hurts my end-of-day wind-down habits.

Pre-nap (1400)

Still haven't meditated yet today. Pretty rare now to not meditate before nap. Will meditate shortly after nap, I think. Lots of variables at play, though.

I'm falling into doing habits again, not because I've decided them, but because they're habits. In the moment, I pick them intentionally, I start the Toggl and everything, usually beforehand.

But... my reasoning for choosing to do them is more "I do this at this time" and less any higher level purpose. Mind you, I'm not saying I'm trying to avoid "wasting time". I simply want whatever I'm doing to be accomplishing its purpose the best way. In the past, this ended up being "Less YouTube, more Anime". Replace like with like, more-or-less.

Though changing ratios may also end up being a goal. That's different, though, and not in scope here. That'd be a separate project.

Post-nap (1428)

Lots of thoughts of Smash. Not just Melee, but also Ultimate.

Also, interestingly, naturally ended up thinking about living at my aunt's. Which is kinda what I'm trying to incubate.

Lower back is aggravated again. Noticing old posture habits regressing lately. Probably related. May have also been the poor sleep the other night. Might even be the not doing ab exercises yesterday (which ironically I decided against because of my body). Going to work on posture for a bit, regardless.

Higher-level choosing of the things I do is something I'll start working on, I think. I suppose, in the moment, I could work on asking the deeper "why" of anything I choose to do.

Meditation (Day 142)

Prep

Motivations:

Practice intentionality
Unity of mind
Overcoming illusion of self
See how far the stages take me
Subduing distraction

Intentions for the day:

Eyes closed
Prep posture and set intention to stay still
Before focusing on meditation object, cultivate joy
Immediately notice and correct for subtle dullness (stage 5 intention
Body-scan to increase mindfulness (stage 5 exercise)
Establish a clear scope of attention and completely ignore all subtle distractions (stage 6 intention)
Move, grow, and shrink the scope of attention to improve control over attention (stage 6 exercise)
Especially work to completely ignore posture distractions

Distractions to look out for:

Post-Meditation

Today feels pretty close to another best day. Not sure how much a feeling of more subtle distractions is me still getting better at noticing them. Especially the hypnagogic ones. Further, noticing them seems to gain me more energy, which may mean they are a symptom of subtle dullness after all.

An interesting thing that occurred at one point was the internalizing of something I thought of a while back, which was that subtle distractions were like things in my peripheral vision causing my eyes or head to move to that thing. Ignoring it would be not moving my eyes, and completely ignoring it is to be aware that there's something to notice but not processing it.

At some point it clicked and now I could keep my third eye on the breath and not have it momentarily look at the distraction. This was inconsistent, but will prove useful. Perhaps I'll make one of my goals to be "don't move the third eye"?

Misc Writing

Daily Entry: October 23rd, 2020

2020-10-23T12:10:38.000Z

Meditation (Day 141)

Prep (0830)

Going to try out filling it out in Notion instead of daily diary (as I may soon stop doing the public diary).

Motivations:

Practice intentionality
Unity of mind
See how far the stages take me
overcoming illusion of self
Subduing distractions

Intentions for the day:

Eyes closed
Prep posture and then set intention to sit still
Body scan to increase mindfulness (stage 5 exercise)
Immediately notice and correct for subtle dullness (stage 5 intention)
Clearly establish scope of attention and completely ignore all subtle distractions (stage 6 intention)
Move, grow, and shrink scope of attention (stage 6 exercise)
Especially ignore posture distractions
Before starting to focus on meditation object, cultivate joy

Distractions to look out for:

Body-scan
Posture
Lower back
Shoulder
Swallowing
Planning
Meta
Politics
American Horror Story
Reflection
Timer
Labeling
Wife
Cat
Outside

Post-Meditation (1130)

Hypnagogic thoughts again. It's really interesting how much I can observe them. Unsure about subtle dullness, but my intention to immediately notice and correct for subtle dullness definitely flares up. I think it's just a weird thing my mind does in general when it quiets down?

Still learning to completely ignore subtle distractions. I feel regular surges when a distractions pokes attention and them my intention reasserts itself. Sometimes it's wordless and sometimes its recanted in the mind. I know I'm sitting so much stiller today than before, and that it's getting consistently more still, but I'm so aware of it now that it still feels like a struggle. Which is probably good, I think, it's keep my "sit still" setup in intentional practice as I head towards mastery. Also, my posture is just so much better now. Pain is no longer worrisome, just sometimes present and a subtle distraction that's safe to learn to ignore completely.

Meditation continues to be super excellent. Though the progress is super awesome, the effect as it is right now is worth it.

I'm also making time for analytic meditation, which right now has purely been for work, though tomorrow (this weekend), I may try pointing it at random items of interest and see what insights come.

Dream

Intention (2306 the night before)

Lucid dream is coming. I can feel it. I will visit my aunt's house. I will WBTS. Dreams will be remembered and saved in writing.

Let's go!

Wake (logged at 0630 this morning)

I have a couple dreams in there, I know, but having trouble retrieving them now that I have pen and paper in hand.

One involved Blockbuster in some way.....

(Remembered a bunch of dream here and wrote it down immediately.)

It's amazing how finding a detail unlocks the dream sometimes. Can I find a detail for the other dream. I woke up around 0530, and heavily considered a WBTS. But knowing I would wake at 0630, I didn't want much less than an hour of sleep to go. In my mind, I made a mental WBTS note, which of course I don't remember.

There was, I think, a fragment of a dream in that mental note. Oh, well. I think maybe the lesson is quick note is better than nothing if I don't want to spend too much time in WBTS.

Special Controller at Blockbuster

I am at Blockbuster. There's a wooden stand controller adapter for a Switch game. I already have one, but am wondering if I should get a second one for the wife.

Someone else recently got a console for his 10 kinds, I assume used, and is asking about getting the wood structure adapter which didn't come with his console.

The adapter costs about as much as the console. A clerk helps grab all the pieces for construction fro the person. They're all splayed out and must be grabbed individually, even the manual.

I explore the store. There's a demo of the wooden structure with Mario Kart. It holds a steering wheel for you. This is next to a box bundle to get the game, console and structure parts together. The box is huge.

That's all I remember.

Pre-nap (1310)

Pretty tired. Sleep quantity was slightly diminished last night. Anyways, there's a meeting in 20 minutes. Let's nap!

Post-nap (1329)

Thought about:

weekend Tuesday
paid off for life

Also, some work processing that can stay in the background.

Misc Writing

Liking the new writing setup, I think. Will try out the Notion tonight. Will start it before I get to bed.

Daily Entry: October 22nd, 2020

2020-10-22T11:30:11.000Z

Meditation (Day 140)

Prep (0845)

Today, I will do the prep both off and on the cushion. Yesterday went very well with prep on cushion, but I think having something to reference to verify I remember all the things I want to prep with is also good. So pre-prep prep, as it were.

Motivations:

Practice intentionality
Subdue distractions
Unity of mind
See how far the stages take me
Overcome the illusion of self

Intentions for the day:

Eyes closed
Settle posture in prep and set the intention to sit still
Before starting to focus on meditation object, cultivate joy
Immediately notice and correct for subtle dullness (stage 5 intention)
Body-scan to increase mindfulness (stage 5 exercise)
Develop a clearly established scope of attention (stage 6 intention)
Completely ignore all subtle distractions (stage 6 intention)
Move, grow, and shrink the scope of attention throughout the body (stage 6 exercise)
Especially ignore posture distractions

Distractions to look out for:

Body-scan
Posture
Lower back
Shoulder
Swallowing
Planning
Meta
Politics
American Horror Story
Reflection
Timer
Labeling
Cardcaptor Sakura
Wife
Cat
Outside

Post-Meditation (1000)

Introspective awareness is almost like a muscle I can keep tense. It staying tense for the whole session (and really at all times) is basically the goal. There's no real extra energy required to do this, it's just not wired to stay that way yet.

Though, because it's like that more often, there are other capabilities I can exercise. I believe one of them is the peripheral introspective awareness. Which is my mind grouping the subtle distractions together. Now, watching this too closely is a mistake, I think. As then it becomes a lot like labeling. Though perhaps that's a sort of paranoia.

In any case, my endurance for ignoring subtle distractions as they show up does still wane by the end. It's interesting the parallel to gross distractions coming in at the end. But the breath is still quite vivid, as far as I can tell. I'm just not quite as capable of reminding myself to focus exclusively on the meditation object. Perhaps growing and shrinking and moving the scope of attention when I notice this is a good idea. I resisted the temptation today as I considered it itself to maybe be a distraction. Eventually, I did do it, and it seemed to help, but maybe doing sooner is better.

Dream

Intention (2243 the night before)

I will WBTS. I will write down my dreams. I will wake up at 0630. Thank you, me.

Wake-Back-to-Sleep (logged at 0357 this morning)

Feels like I was having an abstract dream. Potentially related to exercise. I believe my current hypothesis is such dreams are "processing" dreams. My mind is wiring things together and making me better at the thing.

Let's remember a narrative dream next.

Falling into Politics

I am on top of some building. I am dissing Trump with some other people. I fall off the edge of the building. Still alive, I am too injured to get up on the ground below. I can hear news narration about what happened to me.

Donald Trump is the first to find me. He tries to hide me behind MAGA merchandise that he's trying to sell. I have enough strength to put it out of the way.

Some women come and save me. One asks me if I can stand and I tell her I need help to get up. They both support me, me in the middle with my arms over each of them. I gingerly take each step as we move.

They take me to their political headquarters. They say I should run and use my run-in with Trump as political fodder. I'd rather campaign for someone. I end up talking to someone who is running.

That's all I remember.

Wake (logged at 0640 this morning)

Woke up at 0630, remembered dream, and did a WBTS at 0357! Success! There was this strange bit where I thought I remember two dreams, but looked and the first dream was already written down, but on going to write the dream above, there was no other dream written down, and I can't remember more than one dream.

Did I dream looking in the journal? I did a reality check before writing in it, but not one before that memory of me looking in it.

Pre-nap (1343)

Feel like lucid dream coming soon. Reality check habit triggering more and more. Dreams remembered nightly again, I think. WBTS back. Would be nice to have a really solid "watch myself fall asleep" experience again as well. But lucid dream doesn't have to be WILD, can be DILD.

Feeling real good. There's a synergy between past, present, and future me. There's still some habits to iron out, but I feel them coming along.

Post-nap (1405)

Interesting sensations:

Feeling of gravity pulling in different directions (as if I'm standing on my hands for example)
Not knowing where my hands are or how they are resting (they were lightly clenched in my pockets)

Tried to really see an "apple" and I don't think I did, but it was the only thing in color in the visualization.

Felt the warmth spread over my body as the nap ended, but it had trouble seeping into my feet. Could really feel my feet and toes. Control over scope of attention really improving (thanks to meditation).

Experimental (Notion Organization)

Okay, so I am going to try out saving my writing in a Notion database called "Misc Writing". I thought this would be annoying, but the idea is that the "title" of each page is a paragraph. I can then tag each paragraph with the kind of content I think it is (if it's interesting enough to tag) and then later on I can read, in chronological order, all my writing of a certain tag.

My thinking is that my blog post ideas will have their names as tags. And then I can initialize a blog post with a linked database of misc writing that filters only on that tag. Once I feel I've written enough to edit it into something more, it can become a blog post.

I can also more easily explore my old writing via tags, maybe? We'll see what happens.

This should also mean that I can just start writing a new paragraph at any given point without having to make any space for it, and just make sure I tag it.

This may be an okay way of doing the zettelkasten method (as far as my limited understanding of it goes).

It'll also be pretty easy to find the context of a sentence from its created timestamp. Hmmm... this could be quite interesting.

And I have verified that this setup copy-pastes into my diary pretty well, so neat! Note: I have tagged each paragraph here with "Experiment", "Zettelkasten", and "Notion Mutation".

I wonder how Notion handles exporting this setup.... (I'll tag this thought with "Idea" to come back to later.)

Ooh... yes. I like this. (This will not be tagged. Also, I'm going to stop noting how I'm tagging things.)

Though, now it may be time to really confront the purpose of these daily diary posts.... I really don't need to have them anymore. The few people who read this... well, the ones that matter (no offense if I don't know you) I would probably get more out of some sort of regular call with them, if I don't do that already (and I don't for at least one of you).

So weird to maybe just stop.... Well, I'm going to do this until this weekend, at least, to capture anything I do in my diary that I may want to replicate here. For instance, I tag each post still. I can do the same thing in Notion.

Lastly, I'm going to want to really verify I can export and have all my stuff from Notion. Not sure how exporting Notion databases works.

Anyways, I really need to stop writing now and stretch and go to bed.

Daily Entry: October 21st, 2020

2020-10-21T10:50:33.000Z

Meditation (Day 139)

Another prime number. Spoiled.

Prep (0815)

I did prep whilst sitting on the cushion today.

Post-Meditation (0900)

New best day! On a prime day, that's fun!

The breath was powerfully vivid after a bit of a slow ramp-up. Introspective awareness was quite vigilant. There were moments of distractions only in peripheral awareness, but it was hard to keep them there on verification. It was also hard to know if they were really there if I did check but no specific distraction came.

There was an extra ringing in my ears and a extra blue tint of light in my vision (eyes closed).

There was no hypnagogic or nonsense thoughts.

Perhaps the timing helped today? Needed to meditate early so I got in between 0815 and 0900.

Perhaps also it was doing all of prep on the cushion again? Didn't have time so I included it in the 45 minutes.

Perhaps, too, it's just the fruit of practice.

Lots of variables at play. Super exciting.

Dream

Intention (2155 the night before)

2155! I'm curious if sleep will go smoothly. I'd like to wake up early, as otherwise meditation will prove difficult until the evening.

Anyways, post-nap brought up something interesting: visualizing doesn't help incubate naps. Or, at least, it alone is not sufficient and not visualizing doesn't strictly prevent incubation.

I realized this having considered my "accidental incubation" dreams. The ones about Daysha and the aunt I haven't talked to in a while. Both occurred when I thought about them during the day and reflected a bit.

This reflection may be the dream seed.

So, then, what's important about my (other) aunt's house that I want to incubate a dream there? I haven't visited in a while, and usually I visit twice a year. I see my nieces and nephews. I'm home. And I'd like to go home for a bit.

Not going to recite reality check triggers anymore. That's something to do before the day starts to help build habit. I will still set the intention to do a reality check while dreaming, to WBTS, to visit my aunt, and to watch myself fall asleep.

Hotel Reunion

I am at a hotel. My family is there. I pick a fight with my mom over something, I forget what. I believe I have a similar fight with my sister.

I explore my hotel room. Its layout is ever-changing. At oin point, deep in the closet, I find a hat I used to own but lost a long time ago. I try it on, and it fits my head snugly but comfortably.

Looking in the mirror, I see that my ponytail is too high up and looks funky with the hat on. "I'll need to fix that," I think to myself.

I go and apologize to my mom. There's a conversation. She's exploring something. I don't remember. I tell her how I often leave things where I stay, even hotels, but somehow manage to find them on revisit, even hotels. We laugh about finding the hat.

I go to see my sister. I hear her cleaning as I enter where she's staying. I realize I'm tracking footprints in and panic a bit about angering her.

That's all I remember.

Wake (logged at 0650 this morning)

Once again, woke up for WBTS, but didn't do it. Also woke up at times where I could've written something in journal, but didn't. But the urge to do so is stronger each time. That's progress as far as I'm concerned. And I retained a lot of my dream in spite of that, too! Thank you, me!

Pre-nap (1230)

Pre-naps are pretty cool. Glad I'm doing them. Lets me get some reflection in and then a nap to further process it.

Two things jump out at me today, dream-wise:

I wanted to "go home" and had a dream about visiting with family at a hotel
I set the intent to wake up at 0630 and did!

The second thing I really appreciate, but the first thing is interesting. Perhaps I'll start the nap with that in mind.

Post-nap (1248)

Have a lot. Probably want type. Anchors:

Feelings of (platonic) love
Call parents regularly?
Insight vs wisdom
Free-will vs agency
Notion organization idea for atomic, linkable notes

Experimental (Notion Organization)

Have an idea, but will maybe make time for it tomorrow.

General Thinking

My days are super full as of late. Not in a tiring way. Just in a way that I really have to know what I'm cutting to add things.

Daily Entry: October 20th, 2020

2020-10-20T12:12:10.000Z

Meditation (Day 138)

Prep (1140)

Got five minutes to prep so I'm just going to read through the stuff instead of trying to recite from memory.

Motivations:

Practice Intentionality (set specific intentions)
Unity of mind
Subduing distractions
Overcoming the illusion of self
See what next stages of meditation bring

Intentions for the day:

Prep posture as long as necessary, then set intention to sit completely still
Body-scan during the "focus on the breath throughout the body" beginning part of meditation (stage 5)
Body-scan when few distractions and when focus not as vivid as could be (stage 5)
Focus exclusively on the meditation object (stage 6)
- usually the breath at the nose
- also the body parts being scanned
Keep awareness strong so that it can stop distractions and dullness from interfering
Specifically be aware of posture and do not give it attention
Do not feed distractions with attention (even with labeling now), instead just list the ones you remember during post-meditation reflection
Increase scope of breath attention to more body parts to help subdue subtle distraction
Eyes closed today
Before starting to focus on meditation object, cultivate joy
Wordlessly return to the set intentions

Distractions to look out for:

Wife
Labeling
Outside
Cat
Posture
Body-scan
Timer
Reflection
Politics
Haunting of Bly Manor
Meta
Hypnagogy
Vision
Work
Planning

Post-Meditation (1350)

Busy day, fitting things in. No reflection right after sit. Nothing new to report on, either. I think that's fine. Not every day requires some thought. The practice still has value without it.

Dream

Intention (2332 the night before)

So, still falling asleep a bit late, but opslead over. Sleep hygiene should help with regaining dream retrieval, so that's main priority.

I fell like writing a larger intent should also help.

Let's go over the whole routine I do as I lay down:

Focus exclusively on the dream intents.

Reality check when (typically I check for dreaming here):

cat
food
water
journal
toggl
watch
conflict
call out

WBTS at some point in the night. Prep for WILD.

Capture thoughts in notes when wake-up at any point. Try at least one sentence before going back to sleep.

Then visualize.

Time for bed.

ChiRunning

I am running. Focusing on form. I am running in my underwear. My wife tells me I shouldn't do that, so I run naked. That's all I remember.

Wake (logged at 0735 this morning)

Almost WBTS, but decided to sleep. If I had done WBTS, would've remembered dream more. but I think I fell asleep back into that dream. Woke again at 0620, so that was probably the time to save the dream, but wrote it down at final wake up time of 0730 (after laying in bed for 10 minutes).

I still consider most of this solid. Recovery takes time and super strong habits will also take time.

Pre-nap (1351)

Fitting nap in tight place. Reset time! Nothing new, just keep drilling habits.

Post-nap (1415)

10-minute nap. Interesting insight: visualizing doesn't incubate. Might think on that in intent tonight.

Experimental (Notion Organization)

Not today. Maybe tomorrow. Today was full. Tomorrow shouldn't be as full.

Daily Entry: October 19th, 2020

2020-10-19T12:23:14.000Z

Meditation (Day 137)

Another prime number day, woo!

Prep (1850)

A new latest start, I think. Let's see how I feel about that.

Motivations:

Practice intentionality
Unity of mind
Overcoming the illusion of self
Subduing distractions
Seeing what the next stages bring

Intentions for the day:

Set posture during prep and then set intention to sit still
Eyes closed today
Set intention to immediately notice and correct for subtle dullness (stage 5 intent)
Body scan to increase power of mind and mindfulness (stage 5 exercise)
Set intention to have breath be vivid for the entirety of the session (stage 5 mastery)
Set the intention to focus exclusively on the meditation object (stage 6 intention)
- Breath at nose or breath at given body part (stage 6 exercise)
Do not feed distractions with attention (not even labeling anymore)
- Especially posture
Work on returning to your intentions wordlessly
Before starting to focus on meditation, cultivate joy

Distractions to look out for:

Wife
Labeling
Outside
Cat
Posture
Body-scan
Timer
Reflection
Politics
Haunting of Bly Manor
Meta
Hypnagogy
Vision
Work

Let's sit down on the cushion!

....

After a quick restroom transition.

Post-Meditation (1950)

Feel like I really struggled to keep the breath vivid. Lots of surges of energy today. Hypnagogy was present, as well. Really not sure whether or not as less distractions are let thru if I have hypnagogic-like thoughts without dullness. Whenever I check I often don't think it's there, though a check often leads to a surge of energy. I can also catch the hypnagogic thoughts.

I don't know. Feels more like dream-like metaphors coming to my brain. Which, to be fair to the part of me that thinks it's dullness, is what naps do. Though lately naps haven't been like that as much....

I'll keep playing with it.

I think that wordlessly setting intention the return to breath is either wrong or too soon, though. But that too I'll play with.

I don't think this dullness is strong if it is dullness, so I suppose that's fairly stage 5 territory.

Dream

Intention (2335 the night before)

So, incubating aunt house dream now. Otherwise, same strats different day.

Wake (logged at 0805 this morning)

No WBTS. No dreams remembered. Think I need to focus on sleep hygiene.

Experimental (Notion Organization)

Not today. Probably not tomorrow. Busy with errands using rental car, which I return tomorrow. OpsLead is over, though, so normalcy should return.

Daily Entry: October 18th, 2020

2020-10-18T12:51:58.000Z

Dream

Intention (2333 the night before)

Focus on sleep quality. Drill habits if sleep good. Remembering dreams nice, but I am not going to be upset if I don't.

Wake (logged at 0827 this morning)

I did wake at 0400 and momentarily consider WBTS, but decided to just go straight back to sleep.

There were perhaps dreams I remember at some points but right now they're completely gone (not even a memory of having remembered).

Pre-nap (1308)

Being pretty mindful today. Which is cool. Will try to reset habits today. Got some errands to run today, so let's get napping.

Post-nap (1330)

Quite a bit of hypnagogy. Decided that strawberry donut incubation not working. Will try aunt house visit for a bit. Spent a solid amount of nap exploring her house while watching my body fall further into the nap. Might be possible to WILD while doing this, not sure.

Meditation (Day 136)

Prep

Motivations:

Unity of mind
Subduing distractions
See what the next stages of meditation are like
Practing intentionality
Overcoming the illusion of self

Intentions for the day:

Eyes closed today
Prep posture until ready to set intention to sit still
Body-scan on breath throughout body (stage 5 exercise)
Body-scan when breath loses vividness (stage 5 exercise)
Set the intention to catch and immediately correct for subtle dullness (stage 5)
Set the intention to focus exclusively on the breath (stage 6)
Keep all distracting thoughts in peripheral awareness
Especially posture
Do not feed distactions with attention
Increase the scope of the breath to more body parts to help subdue distraction as necessary (stage 6 exercise)
- Decrease slowly when distractions are subdued

Distractions to look out for:

Wife
Meta
Haunting on Bly Manor
Politicis
Reflection
Timer
Fantasy
Body-scan
Posture
Outside
Vision
Labeling
Swallowing
Cardcaptor Sakura
Spiderverse
Lower back

Post-Meditation (1730)

There was some strange, hypnagogic-like thoughts. Very similar to old nap experiences. Every time they showed up, I checked for dullness, but everything seemed pretty vivid and strong.... It is possible, similar to how I hear things, that I just have nonsense thoughts that usually I don't notice.

In any case, increasing mindfulness exercises (stage 5) probably still quite worthwhile. Though, stage 6 has a variation, so I'm sure I'm increasing mindfulness in both. I am also paranoid about dullness, which may be causing dullness symptoms without dullness? One thing I'm doing is regularly checking for dullness. Similar to the introspective check-in (which itself is done in a peripheral way n;ow, kinda, I'm working on it).

Still voicing my intentions as I return to exclusive breath or remind myself to be still. Today, I tried to make those wordless. Sometimes I think I could instill the intent without the words. I'll continue to play with that.

Experimental (Notion Organization)

Should I still try to experiment with special meditations?

Perhaps it's time for a new experiment?

Maybe just organizing my Notion setup for about 15 minutes or so a day?

General Thinking

A lot of the weekend got eaten up by errands and opslead stuff. Will have to decimate the weekly review throughout the week again.

Daily Entry: October 17th, 2020

2020-10-17T12:42:56.000Z

Meditation (Day 135)

Prep (1441)

Everything delayed a bit due to an opslead page waking me up thrice in the morning. Practicing flexibility and prioritizing on purpose, though distractions are fast and loose thus far.

Motivations:

Practicing intentionality
Subduing distractions
Overcoming the illusion of self
See what the next stages of meditation bring
Unity of mind

Intentions for the day:

Prep posture until ready to set intention to stay still
Body-scan when narrowing to breath throughout the body (stage 5)
Body-scan when breath loses vividity (stage 5)
- Immeditately notice and correct for subtle dullness
Set the intention to focus exclusively on the breath (stage 6)
- Body-scan with this intention
- Fill attention with so many places to feel the breath that distractions have no room to enter
Keep pephiral awareness strong so that it can stop distractions and dullness from interfering
Do not feed distractions with attention
Especially posture, pain, and various bodily distractions
Eyes closed today

Distractions to look out for:

Cardcaptor Sakura
Wife
Cat
Work (General)
Body-scan
Outside
Reflection
Planning
Fantasy
Politics
Vision
Posture
Pain
Lower-back
Haunting on Bly Manor
Labeling
Meta

Post-Meditation (1550)

Considering the poor sleep last night, meditation got me to a super good place. Still pretty sure stage 5 and stage 6 is accurate. Lots of subtle distractions. Solid "exclusive focus on breath" alarm as soon as a subtle distraction appears. And I'm pretty good at immediately letting the distraction go back into the periphery.

Dream

Intention (2317 the night before)

Hopefully no page tonight. Let's see what happens. Daysha showed up last night. Incubation is hard. Purposeful incubation, anyways.

Dream Fragment

Avatar: Last Airbender. On a disintegrating raft with Zuko.

Wake (logged at 0910 this morning)

Pages woke me up thrice last night. Remembered two dreams, and at least captured a fragment of one. Pretty good considering that I rushed to work and didn't write down what I could at the time.

Pre-nap (1350)

Probably really need this nap. Focus on the healing aspect of it today.

This will hopefully also be good prep for meditation.

Post-nap (14010)

Not the best I've felt after a nap, but much closer to peak energy than before nap. I'd call that a success.

Daily Entry: October 16th, 2020

2020-10-16T12:12:19.000Z

Dream

Meditation is later today, so let's write down dreams now.

Intention (2317 the night before)

Let's keep drilling those habits!

Watch myself fall asleep. WBTS. WILD. Incubate strawberry donuts.

Good night.

With Daysha at the Airport

I am at the airport with Daysha (my first dog I had, whom passed away in 2015). Need to put her in the kennel and check her into the flight. I realized I forgot a blanket and am very worried about her being too cold. I look around the locker room I'm in for a blanket I can use. Can't find anything that's good enough.

Wake (logged at 0811 this morning)

Got page as I was laying down to sleep. As such, decided against WBTS for sleep quality purposes. This practicing of flexibility is also an important habit.

I also just captured the vagaries of the dream I remember. That may be all I remember. Or, as I digitize later, I may remember more and update it to a present-tense narrative.

The original dream notes for "With Daysha at the Airport":

Daysha airport. Locker room. No blanket. Worried it'll be too cold for her.

Pre-nap (1406)

Tight schedule today. Let's get a solid nap in while I can.

Post-nap (1420)

Feeling energized! Had an energy current surge through me at one point. Had to move it was so strong.

Some philosophy and work stuff drifted thru my mind, but the main thing I remember is thinking of pumpkin donuts. Also, fixing oven.

Experimental (Special Meditation)

Did a short meditation (took advantage of the work session). Woke up late (due to being paged right before going to sleep last night) and had a meeting right after the work session, so couldn't just extend it.

I plan on doing a "proper" one at 1600 now, but am very glad to have at least done the short one. Still gives me that "hit" of focus that should prove valuable for the rest of the day.

So today's "special" was a short session in morning to get the day started, but a proper, training session of the 45 minute variety at around 1600.

Meditation (Day 134)

Prep (1610)

Not going to write these from memory today as a bit short on time.

Motivations:

Practice Intentionality (set specific intentions)
Unity of mind
Subduing distractions
Overcoming the illusion of self

Intentions for the day:

Prep posture as long as necessary, then set intention to sit completely still
Before starting to focus on meditation object, cultivate joy
Eyes closed today
Body-scan during the "focus on the breath throughout the body" beginning part of meditation (stage 5)
Body-scan when few distractions and when focus not as vivid as could be (stage 5)
Focus exclusively on the meditation object (stage 6)
- usually the breath at the nose
- also the body parts being scanned
Keep awareness strong so that it can stop distractions and dullness from interfering
Specifically be aware of posture and do not give it attention
Do not feed distractions with attention (even with labeling now), instead just list the ones you remember during post-meditation reflection
Increase scope of breath attention to more body parts to help subdue subtle distraction

Distractions to look out for:

Wife
Cat
Outside
Cardcaptor Sakura
Pain
Shoulder
Lower back
Lotus
Posture
Reflection
Fantasy
Vision
Body-scan
Dreaming?
Labeling
Meta
Swallowing
Timer
Work
Slack

Post-Meditation (1700)

Lots of subtle distractions. Still a really good meditation. Pretty sure stage 5, stage 6 still correct.

Daily Entry: October 15th, 2020

2020-10-15T12:46:33.000Z

Meditation (Day 133)

Prep (0930)

Motivations:

Unity of mind
See what the next stages are like
Practice intentionality
Overcoming the illusion of self
Subduing distractions (on and off the cushion)

Intentions for the day:

Prep pose to stable position and set intention to sit still
Body-scan while narrowing focus to the breath (stage 5)
Body-scan when breath loses vividness (stage 5)
Exclusive attention body-scan exercise (stage 6)
Resolve to settle attention exclusively to current meditation object
Keep perhiperal awareness strong to keep dullness at bay
Specifically keep posture in awareness and out of attention
Do not feed distractions with attention (even with labeling), simply list the distractions you naturally remember during reflection
Increase scope of attention to the breath sensations of more body parts to help subdue subtle distractions
Eyes closed today

Distractions to look out for:

Wife
Cat
Outside
Cardcaptor Sakura
Pain
Shoulder
Lower back
Lotus
Posture
Reflection
Fantasy
Vision
Body-scan
Dreaming?
Labeling
Meta
Swallowing
Timer
Work
Slack

Post-Meditation (1045)

I keep getting short bits of exclusive attention, I believe. Also some interesting feelings throughout the body around the times I get the exclusive attention. There's an excitement that happens that has me lose it. It's a lot like getting excited in a lucid dream and waking up.

There was a time near the end that distractions really wanted to be gross, but they stayed subtle, and I was able to better identify how certain distractions beget others.

Couldn't help but do some labeling, and funnily enough that often led to me labeling the "labeling". Double-up on the labeling distraction! Triple-up?

Feeling super great. Like, even better than usual. Though, this feeling better than usual is becoming somewhat usual.

Super exciting.

Dream

Intention (2330 the night before)

I should revisit some saved dreams soon. Maybe this weekend. See if anything jumps out at me. I wonder at what intervals I should revisit dreams. Like, is sooner better, or does length provide a valuable new perspective?

Watch myself fall asleep. Notice when the dream tries to tell me I'm dreaming. WBTS. WILD. Incubate strawberry donuts.

Good night.

Dream Fragment

Vaguely remember telling someone to avoid getting hit by cabinets as they stood up.

Wake-Back-to-Sleep (logged at 0425 this morning)

Feels like it's been a while since WBTS, but I only missed last night. My mind has wandered to the lucid dream that I played with dream powers in. I wouldn't mind doing that sort of thing again.

Almost just fell asleep again with pen and journal in hand.

WILD. Backup with DILD intention. Incubate strawberry donuts. Let's see what happens.

Wake (logged at 0720 this morning)

No dreams remembered. Not too late. Dreams may come. If not, that's okay. Did go to sleep a bit late last night. That seems to interfere, sometimes. In any case, solid habits, I think. Just keep going, and iterate on habits when appropriate.

Pre-nap (1302)

Reset and get back to work.

Post-nap (1318)

Good nap.

Experimental (Special Meditation)

Joined on the work meditation session at 1600 today. I'm pretty sure I want to do something special there, but today I just did another, shorter session today.

General Thinking

Tasks stacking up a bit, but maintaining focus has kept me from feeling overwhelmed. There's an artificial urgency that I need to let go of, I think.

Daily Entry: October 14th, 2020

2020-10-14T11:52:31.000Z

Meditation (Day 132)

Prep (1730)

Late meditation today. Had to keep rescheduling it due to opslead. That I was prioritizing it, but then letting it slip did let me maintain a good headspace. I used some "exclusive attention" skill-building techniques during regular work. Decide what I'm doing on purpose, even if really a sudden distraction came along. Certain distractions are defined as more important than what I am doing.

Motivations:

Practice intentionality
Exclusive attention
See what the higher stages are like
Unity of mind
Overcoming the illusion of self

Intentions for the day:

Eyes closed today (reading on the "inner light" and how it happens to those who meditate with eyes closed makes me want to at least alternate if not switch entirely)
Prep posture until ready to set intention to sit still, then set that intention
Body-scan as part of movement to exclusive focus on breath
Body-scan as practicing exclusive focus on breath
Keep awareness strong so it can stop distractions and dullness from interfering
Specifically be aware of posture and do not give it attention
Do not feed distractions with attention (even with labeling now), instead just list the ones you remember during post-meditation reflection
Increase scope of breath attention to more body parts to help subdue subtle distractions

Distractions to look out for:

Cardcaptor Sakura
Wife
Cat
Outside
Pain
Shoulder
Lower back
Posture
Memories
Reflection
Work (general)
Slack
Swallowing
Timer

Let's sit down and meditate!

Post-Meditation (1930)

My confidence about being in stage 5/stage 6 territory grows. Closed eyes was also quite interesting. There was this strange bluish light. Not sure if induced after reading about the "inner light". Will play with it further for a bit, I think.

I am very paranoid about dullness, which I think is maybe fine as I settle into exclusionary attention. Got to make sure I'm not shutting out awareness but merely keeping things in peripheral awareness. I regularly checked the vividness of the breath, and also checked whether or not introspection was in awareness or peripheral awareness (not quite the right way to put it, but I'll find the right words as time comes).

Breath was almost always vivid except for the really confusing bit with the eyes seeing a bluish light and I felt like breath was losing vividness but it was all a bit different. May have been a stage 6 milestone, may have been hypnagogy (though it didn't seem like it). Did a stage 5 body-scan and things returned to normal... which either fixed dullness or pulled me out of exclusive attention.

Which is all to say I'm in interesting territory and it's fine to make mistakes and stuff. I'm learning, after all!

General Thinking

I'll digitize the dream journal stuff below tomorrow.

....

Changed my mind. Doing it now before bed.

Dream

Intention (2300 the night before)

I am starting to suspect that parts of the mind that provide the dream content to me are trying to help the mind responsible for lucidity.

Lots of me noticing things are strange. Even a dream that had me check my watch twice for non-dream reasons.

There isn't much to act on here, I don't think. I believe it's a sign of progress and to keep at it.

Watch myself fall asleep. WBTS. WILD. Incubate strawberry donuts. Wake up at 0710.

Invalid ID and No Passport ;_;

I am at an airport. I have landed for my layover, before I get on my flight to Japan. The TSA agent looks at my driver's license and sees a bunch wrong with it.

While he's going over the ID, I notice another one in my wallet. But it both looks like the old style and says it's from the future. I wonder when I got a joke ID.

"This is the wrong date, your name is misspelled, and somehow I'm the person who signed off on this ID... in 1991?" he rattles off.

"Then it's your fault," I say indignantly. He clips my ID, making it void.

Despair waves over me. Then I really I only need my passport anyways. Then I realize I forgot it. Another wave. I think I'm crying, "It's fine, I just won't go to Japan."

Dream Fragment

I'm racing some people to the exit. I think it's a train station. I'm very confused on how to escape the maze-like structure.

Wake (logged at 0740 this morning)

I vaguely remember a chance for WBTS, but just went back to sleep.

Again, the dream I remembered seems to have tried to tell me I was dreaming (the second ID in wallet).

Pre-nap (1428)

Late nap, but I can fit it in!

Just going to go straight to nap. Nothing special to consider today, I don't think.

Post-nap (1450)

Skipped on wake-up.

Daily Entry: October 13th, 2020

2020-10-13T12:12:42.000Z

Meditation (Day 131)

Prime number day, woo!

Prep

Motivations:

unity of mind
practice intentionality
subduing distractions
seeing what adept meditation feels like/is
overcoming the illusion of self

Intentions for the day:

Prep posture as long as necessary, then set intention to sit completely still
Before starting to focus on meditation object, cultivate joy
Body-scan during the "focus on the breath throughout the body" beginning part of meditation (stage 5)
Body-scan when few distractions and when focus not as vivid as could be (stage 5)
Focus exclusively on the meditation object (stage 6)
- usually the breath at the nose
- also the body parts being scanned
Keep awareness strong so that it can stop distractions and dullness from interfering
Specifically be aware of posture and do not give it attention
Do not feed distractions with attention (even with labeling now), instead just list the ones you remember during post-meditation reflection
Increase the scope of breath attention to more body parts to help subdue subtle distraction

Distractions to look out for:

Cardcaptor Sakura
Body-scan
Cat
Wife
Dreaming?
Fantasy
Lovecraft Country
Memories
Reflection
Meta
Outside
Planning
Posture
Shoulder
Swallowing
Vision
Blinking
Wisdom
Work

Post-Meditation (1030)

Today (and for the week) meditation is during primary opslead, so I have to have phone nearby and let slack messages ping. And read them in case I need to act immediately. Slack messages did reach me, but I did not need to act on them. I made sure to keep the breath in conscious awareness, and returned to the session as soon as I could.

Not ideal, but acceptable for the temporality of the week.

Still feels like I'm gaining on learning to focus exclusively, but there's still a lot of leakiness.

Dream

Intention (2310 the night before)

Flexibility may be required this coming week. OpsLead and all that. Priorities are sleep, first-and-foremost, then habits that increase dream recollection and lucid dreams.

Until I get paged at night, however, I will continue my habits as is.

Watch myself fall asleep. WBTS. WILD. Incubate strawberry donuts. Wake up at 0720.

Bed time.

Driving a Bed

I feel like I have had several dreams to process this one already. In my head, I was rehearsing the dream, but now it seems I've lost most of it.

There is a large chunk at the beginning missing but what I remember is:

A highway has been built over a particularly busy bit of road. From what I can tell, they did a good job. I am driving my bed down the road. I turn onto the highway when given the green light at the new intersection that I am quite impressed with.

It gets dark very quickly. I realize the highway doesn't have enough lighting and there's no lights to use on my bed. I remember being chewed out for driving this bed in the dark.

Now, I am going downhill, driving next to a car. I realize I have no breaks either. There's construction ahead. I tell the other driver I'm going off road to avoid a crash. They seem appreciative.

I go off road. It is pitch black. There is this gravel texture vibrating through the bed. And then there's nothing. I'm falling. There is a sudden stop.

A large thud.

A loud crack.

The pitch black gains a static, glitchy filter.

Am I dying?

Am I dead?

I wake up.

A lingering tickle encompasses my body. I play the dream over in my head, including a beginning I forgot. It'd be good to write the dream and do WBTS, I think. But I fall asleep. I feel like I fall asleep and dream an abstract dream that processes this one.

Wake-Back-to-Sleep (logged at 0620 this morning)

A late WBTS. I wrote down the above dream and am now going to try to sleep. WILDs take too long (at this point in my capability, anyways), so going to try incubation.

Strange Session

I am having a therapist appointment. I am in a dream bedroom connected to a meeting room where various folk are having an unrelated meeting. I am having an appointment with a therapist I haven't had before. In my mind, it's some sort of substitute setup.

A friend of mine comes out of the meeting room and crosses through the bedroom on his way to the exit (the only way out of the meeting room is through the bedroom). He tries to start a conversation, but I tell him I'm in therapy.

When he leaves, I wonder how he walked past the wire connecting my laptop to the TV in the room. The laptop is on the bed I'm laying on and the TV is on the wall across the path he walked. I don't linger on the thought.

I switch to head phones as more people leave.

Eventually, my friend comes back. He needs to tell me something. I look at my watch: 425. "5 minutes," I tell him. That's not good enough, it seems. I look at my watch again. 90. I realize I'm looking at my heartbeat. I see the little dot moving around the number. "4 minutes, 20 seconds," I change my answer.

But my friend is telling me that our rental on the unit has expired and we need to leave. I end my therapy early.

Wake (logged at 0730 this morning)

I accidentally did a reality check and didn't realize its implications! Looked at that watch three times! So silly. It did kinda come across as the dream trying to tell me I'm dreaming, in retrospect. Especially how the friend kept trying to tell me something.

Perhaps I should set an intention to listen for my mind telling me I'm dreaming.

Pre-nap (1340)

Opslead stuff may interrupt nap. Not going to go too deep on nap stuff today. Want to carve more time for work.

Post-nap (1402)

Nap continues to be good. Visuals were almost convincing today. Some interesting hypnagogy, but don't want to dwell. Just want to reward it enough to encourage it coming again during a better time to assess.

General Thinking

No real experiments this week, as I'm opslead. Though if I change my mind, we'll see. Going to try to make sure I prioritize maintenance ASAP if an opslead page interupts the normal flow.

Daily Entry: October 12th, 2020

2020-10-12T12:02:31.000Z

Yesterday's dreams will be digitized today.

....

Yesterday's dreams have been digitized.

Meditation (Day 130)

Prep (0930)

Trying to write the motivations and intentions from memory before looking at them. Feels like a solid idea.

Motivations:

Practice Intentionality (set specific intentions)
Unity of mind
Subduing distractions
Overcoming the illusion of self

Intentions for the day:

Posture prep as long as necessary (until ready to stay still for the rest of the session)
Body-scan when breath loses vividity (and also as part of narrowing attention to breath at nose)
Set intention to focus exclusively on the breath at the nose
Increase scope of breath attention to more body parts to help subdue subtle distractions
Keep awareness strong so that it can stop distractions and dullness from interfering
Specifically be aware of posture and do not give it attention
Set the intention to stay completely still
Do not feed distractions with attention (even with labeling now), instead just list the ones you remember during post-meditation reflection

Expected distractions:

Wife
Cat
Outside
Crazy Ex-Girlfriend
Cardcaptor Sakura
Memories
Reflection
Planning
Meta
Posture
Shoulder
Lower back
Body-scan
Dreaming?
Fantasy
Work
Timer

Post-Meditation (1035)

Another best day. At this point I feel almost certain that stage 4 is in my version of mastered. Stage 5 may be, as well, even. The breath was basically always vivid. My hesitation to label either was all the distractions I was noticing, but with stage 6 intentions I'm already overcoming them (though still there are a lot). And as the book noted, it's not that I'm having more distractions, it's that I'm noticing more of them.

But wow, I also feel great. It's like when I started meditation 130 days ago. It's even following me around throughout the day. Exclusive focus is super neat.

Dream

Intention (2310 the night before)

The color of the walls were the color of strawberry donut frosting. Maybe I'm close? Let's try again.

Watch myself fall asleep. WBTS. WILD.

Wake up at 0720.

Sleep time.

Wake-Back-to-Sleep (logged at 0400 this morning)

I woke up convinced it'd be well-past 0700 already.

Wonder why I felt that way. No early-REM dreams coming to me. I have iterated through various tags, which sometimes helps jog them into consciousness.

Very hypnagogic right now. Almost just fell into a dream, it felt like. Can't remember it, either, though it felt like for a second I remembered a dream.

"Strawberry Fields Forever" is a song that keeps coming to me, I think it's in the strawberry incubation attempts. Pretty certain, in fact, as sometimes I sing "Strawberry donuts forever".

Well, I think I may be able to WILD in this state. So, let's try.

Wake (logged at 0711 this morning)

I awoke with a dream fragment but by the time I got to my journal it was already gone. I'll learn better capture methods as these continue to happen, I'm sure.

The hypnagogy this morning is strong. Lots of nonsense. One unrelated thought with no context after another. Perhaps this was what my dreams were like last night. (Future note [1557]: I have a feeling it is useful for finding random connections between sub-minds. Something certainly feels powerful about it.)

There's still a chance they'll come, though. But even if not: my habits were solid, and now a day I don't remember a dream is rare. That's solid! In isolation, I don't consider an inability to remember a dream a problem.

Also, I've been waking up at or before the intended time, and doing so quite joyfully. Which was an explicitly higher priority thing, that I don't seem to have to compromise on given my growing note-taking-at-night habits.

Pre-nap (1500)

Late nap with some diet Dr Pepper caffeine processing through my system. What might happen? I find meditation is on the mind lately, during these pre-nap bits. Makes sense. Leveled up recently, I'm pretty sure. This maybe deserves its own place for thinking.

Anyways, as per usual, practice habits, but prioritize good nap.

Dream Fragment (1520)

Computer glitching out like it used to. Causing me great frustration.

Post-nap (1521)

Main wisdom takeaway before any other reflection: "Kids are not taught to process their emotions. To communicate them. To understand them in a way that they can store them. And so as adults they don't remember them. The damage this causes is double: the damage of the unprocessed emotion has not been treated, and the damage is hard to locate because there is no thread of understanding to find it."

This quote, which I have expanded, came to me as I explored a past childhood home in my mind. The exploration uncovered memories. One was that of getting Ocarina of Time as a Christmas present, and the temper tantrum that exploded shortly before Christmas (as I was convinced I wouldn't get it, and was furious my parents wouldn't let me buy it with my own money).

I tried to feel the emotion again, but I could not. Then, it was as if I spoke the above quote to my own child.

There are other things I remember, but I am deciding they do not need to be written.

Daily Entry: October 11th, 2020

2020-10-11T12:14:15.000Z

Meditation (Day 129)

Prep (0930)

I'm doing a new thing today with prep. I'll do every part of prep except for posture stuff off the cushion. Then, as soon as I sit on cushion, I'll start timer as usual, but I can start with posture. This means either giving posture more time (good) or having more meditating on the focus object (also good).

This also means that I can check against my written notes right after doing a prep stage. I have it set up in notion to hide my notes below a fold. I'll first recite what I think the prep is, then check the prep, and update the template as appropriate.

The prep document will also be a good place for generic notes. Hence a template and not a static page in Notion.

Though perhaps making all these places where I do general thinking along a theme a static page makes more sense? Could very quickly see what yesterday me had to say....

Worth considering, actually.

Intentions for the day will live there, and be copied here after I have decided on them. Should stay the same, mostly, but now they won't be hanging there when I init this document in the morning.

Practice Intentionality (set specific intentions)
Unity of mind
Subduing distractions
Overcoming the illusion of self

Intentions for the day:

Stay in posture part of prep until you're prepared to set the intention to stay still
Body-scan during the "focus on the breath throughout the body" beginning part of meditation (stage 5)
Body-scan when few distractions and when focus not as vivid as could be (stage 5)
Set the intention to focus attention exclusively on the meditation object (the breath)
Keep awareness strong so that it can stop distractions and dullness from interfering
Specifically be aware of posture and do not give it attention
Set the intention to stay completely still
Do not feed distractions with attention (even with labeling now), instead just list the ones you remember during post-meditation reflection

Post-Meditation (1100)

Cardcaptor Sakura opening theme has now broken record for most meditations stuck in head. It was very rare for a song to show up more than two days in a row, this one has been around for a least a week. Think I'll actually memorize it, as I read that's a good way to get a song out of your head (apparently, the loop is stuck sometimes because the brain doesn't know how to end it and so will pattern match an earlier part of the song, basically it's the song that never ends rules). Though, also, new intention to subdue subtle distractions may help a lot.

Today is, once again, new best day. I believe it is due to new (stage 6) intention: "focus exclusively on the breath". This intention made sure that distractions were subtle at worst. Though, still lots of subtle distractions. It's a mind-training exercise. Intention alone does a lot, but training is going to be the main thing. But I noticed a "focus exclusively on the breath" alarm basically right as a subtle distraction budded.

The breath was very vivid. The session did not feel longer like I anticipated, but I believe that is due to the novelty of what I was doing, and also a lot more narration to return to the breath. I may work on having an alarm without the narration, but typically narration is a good bit of beginning scaffolding.

Very excited to read the rest of stage 6 (and also stage 7) and make Anki notes out of key takeaways.

If today is repeatable, stage 4 mastery will be checked on Sunday, October 18th (2020).

Dream

It occurs to me that although I log my dreams before meditation (usually), I don't digitize them and then put them into this document until much later. As such, better to put it below meditation.

Intention (2305 the night before)

Watch myself fall asleep. Incubate the donuts.

Try to summon donuts if I'm mindful in the dream. WBTS. WILD.

Still feeling good! Lots of stuff to play with.

Let's also wake up at 0720.

I'm in the Middle

I believe I am a member of the Malcolm in the Middle family. Our mischeif has just put Hal in terrible danger. He has inhaled nitrous and is at the bottom of a creek in a vehicle.

We are getting chewed out by Lois.

There's more to the narrative, but I can't get at it. That's all I remember.

Wake-Back-to-Sleep (logged at 0350 this morning)

Remembered an early REM dream. A bit, anyways.

Incubating donuts and watching myself fall asleep (WILD attempt).

Dream Fragment

Conserving resources in a war-ravaged landscape.

Strawberry Pink Walls

I am on a bus. People are complaining about the new driver. "Apparently today is her 18th birthday," someone says. She keeps forgetting to stop at her stops. My stop is coming up. I pull the cord to signal. She stops the bus, but doesn't let me out.

"Aren't you going to let me out?" She tells me no and I jump out of the bus. I may have jumped through a closed window, but it didn't break or anything.

I'm visiting the area for some reason. It feels like a work trip, but I never go to work.

I am on a bus again. I have opinions about this bus route. I tell the driver they should stop at this stop that's along the route that the bus doesn't stop at because there's a left turn fairly soon after it. The driver ignores my advice.

It turns out I was telling the driver this so that a person would get off at this more convenient stop, and then the person who got on at the next stop wouldn't cause a fight (these two people were angry at each other). A minor interaction occurs, and one of them get off the bus early.

I'm trying to get to my friend's new house, but I'm having trouble. I call to ask for directions. It becomes a video call, and a 3D fly-over view shows me where she lives. No bus routes to get there.

But now I'm there and getting a tour. I can only see things from an isometric view, fixed angle, but I can see thru the wall to the inside. Kinda like the Sims.

The walls are pink. Something seems particularly relevant about them. I ask what color they are, but my friend consistently gives the wrong answer. I realize now as I write this down that it was the same pink as the strawberry donut frosting.

I am home now, but it's a dream home. I "remember" taking a flight home. I go to take a shower, but wife using it. I join her.

Wake (logged at 0728 this morning)

I laid still and said some common dream tags when I woke up. Eventually, I found a dream I remembered, though it had none of the tags I went over at the time (does have some dream tags I've made before, though).

Also, the color of strawberry donuts showed up and I was calling it out. That's interesting. Going to tag that dream as "incubated" and "tricky".

Pre-nap (1345)

No lucid dream last night, but maybe the pink walls were close to causing a DILD? It was hard to keep the mind focused both times falling asleep. Really solid that WBTS happened, though.

Anyways, let's nap.

Post-nap (1415)

Cardcaptor Sakura theme still playing. Something about focusing on the breath triggers it now. I'll work on it.

Visualized an endless blue sea today. This was a trick I used back in the day to avoid visualizing something that would cause me to move in real life (and thus wake me up). For example, if I visualized walking, I would trip, go to catch myself, and wake myself up doing that movement in real life. But swimming in an endless blue (in all directions) avoided this.

Perhaps this could be worked into my WILD technique?

Napping continues to melt away all the things.

I also did some analysis on Japanese studying:

should just go ahead and watch some shows without subtitles (that I don't care about) and do my best (神庭って)
should go through that textbook I have (みんなの日本語)

Experimental

No special meditation today. Though trying out stage 6 stuff was pretty new and interesting, and seemed to last with me throughout the day (in a good way).

General Thinking

Once again I come upon "~~Call~~ Think about Babuska, grandparents, people who're gone"....

I have had this physical card since August 22nd, 2014. On the back I noted its creation. I also noted the day Babuska died, on February 17th, 2015. And on the 21st I crossed out "Call" and wrote "Think about" above (adding grandparents and people who're gone to then end).

I called her every week for about 16 weeks. I called her plenty before, but this reminder made it a consistent weekly thing.

One of the calls, she told me how she wasn't going to be around much longer. She did this a lot, actually. Every time I told she'd be around another 20 years at least. This time she pushed back a bit. "I'm ready to go," I think she said. Tears started flowing, no control. My voice cracked. I told her how it made me feel, and she was understanding but still firm.

She had a way in saying "I love you" that was all hers. It was like she was singing it, with extra height and emphasis on the "love". She managed to say it that way even on her death bed.

I know she wasn't perfect, though my experience with her was only positive. All of her kids didn't seem to like her very much. But still, you know, I have this pure love for her. And I'm glad I have this physical card to remind me to think of her. Maybe instead of adding those generics, each person I want to think about should get their own. Perhaps there's something strong about the physicality of it.

Today's dreams will be digitized tomorrow.

Daily Entry: October 10th, 2020

2020-10-10T12:55:28.000Z

Dream

Intention (2337 the night before)

Got some tingles on reading what stage 6 of meditation is: "Subduing Subtle Distractions." That's an exciting prospect. I'm going to read through stages 6 & 7 and go and revisit stages 4 & 5 in case there's some stuff I missed or didn't understand in my stage 2 context.

That's all a bit of distraction, though. It's intent time! It's a bit late, so some sleep-in is acceptable. Also, opslead next week, good to get extra sleep when possible.

So, then, WBTS and incubation and DILDs and WILDs.

I'd like to continue practice watching myself fall asleep, both here and now and then WILD after WBTS.

Feeling real good. Thanks me-at-the-moment for working in harmony with past and future!

Wake-Back-to-Sleep (logged at 0445 this morning)

Don't remember any early REM dreams. I think one of them may have been stretching or exercise related.

Watched myself falling asleep to a pretty late stage, but definitely not as late as I've managed in the past. Will try to WILD, still.

Going to try mind-chanting "strawberry donuts" as I fall back to sleep.

WILDs Be Mild

So, I can kinda watch myself fall asleep into dreaming. The problem is that I dream about trying to fall asleep. This happened twice.

Though, in the second dream, the dream continued for a bit.

There is a pun I say. I am a woman. Maybe Batgirl.

There is some naughty shenanigans in conveniently empty bits of the city.

Maybe Not So Mild

So, this dream I know is a dream, but I'm still falling for the logic of it. The wife is with me, and I am fully convinced I'm sharing the dream with her. I do not remember realizing it's a dream, I think I know from the beginning. (Successful WILD?)

I both have little control and do not ever think I have control in the dream. There is a central room we keep returning to, often on accident via dream teleportation.

We are exploring a city. There is some naughty shenanigans in conveniently empty bits of the city.

At one point we go looking for a naughty store. After a long bit of walking, we end up in a really dark room. I realize where we are and the lights turn on. It's the room we keep returning to.

The wife is visibly frustrated. "Why are you doing this?" she asks me.

"I'm not doing it on purpose, and you may be doing it," I plead. We calm down and explore the room.

I think about it and deduce that we must have entered through the fridge. Our brown tabby cat, Yoda, shows up. So does my aunt. She brings one of her cats, but it isn't the black and white one or the pure black one, but a dream-only cat that looks a lot like Yoda.

At some point I wonder how much longer the dream could last.

That's all I remember.

AirBnb Why

I am staying at an airbnb. I thought it would be a normal hotel, and am a bit angry, because I no longer trust AirBnb. There are various little things funky about the place, but it's hard to recall. The owner/manager seems to at least live in the place and is renting out a room, which makes me feel better.

Wake (logged at 0735 this morning)

This morning confirmed something for me that I had a feeling was true, but wasn't sure: I can in fact fail to recall a lucid dream. That I remembered it was luck.

Also, the lucid dream fell into a different place than the previous ones. Similar to how I can know I'm awake but not be "lucid" in the waking world, I can know it's a dream and not be "lucid".

Not sure what I should do with this realization. Need more data.

Still, pretty cool. Liking how things are going.

Dream Fragment (recollected at 0957)

At some point, I look at my rubber coated stretching staff and notice the gold icon is back and more vibrant than ever.

Pre-nap (1445)

It's a bit pre-mature, but I have a feeling that lucid dreams are about to become much more frequent. And also perhaps much more... tricky? Realizing I'm in a dream may stop being novel and lead to something I'd call "pseudo-lucidity". Yeah, I know it's a dream, but I'm not mindful of it or of much of anything.

I think it's too soon to start addressing this issue. It may not be a real or common problem. But I want to note it. This way, if it is a problem, I decide to start working with it sooner.

Oh, also, reality checks are really building as a habit. Cool.

Nap time (1450).

Post-nap (1505)

Breath on nose still vivid. Working on playing out a scene that maybe helps incubation. Visualized and went through the process of baking strawberry donuts. I am also considering trying to remember to summon strawberry donuts when I know I'm dreaming. A mindfulness check, if you will.

Meditation (Day 128)

Intentions for the day:

Stay in posture part of prep until you're prepared to set the intention to stay still
Body-scan during the "focus on the breath throughout the body" beginning part of meditation
Stage 4 intention (vigilance on keeping introspective awareness continuous)
Fall back to stage 3 if necessary
Note where the breath was when you label a distraction (attention, awareness, or forgotten)
Try to catch a distraction as it enters awareness and/or attention
Body-scan when few distractions and when focus not as vivid as could be

Post-Meditation (1115)

I am able to recall much more of my distractions. Which looks like I'm getting distracted more, though it is still much less. Today a gross distraction snuck in.

I'm playing with and expanding my (limited) understanding of the mind-system model whilst on the cushion now. I believe it will further cement stage 4, leading to a real mastery. Body-scanning is happening again, and the breath is quite vivid for a long time, though I still don't have stamina for the whole session (though regaining the vividness with a body-scan does not seem to induce dullness).

Cascading distractions don't happen, but they can still come in clusters. Which is distinctly different but similar. I'm learning to handle this in a slightly different way than cascading distractions. Though I'm also exploring the mind for the different cause. It's a fun new thing to notice, that I'm sure I confused with cascading distractions before.

Today's a power-of-two day! That's fun. It's a power of 2 after a prime number, to boot!

Not a best day but still a great day. It's also putting me in a good place for the rest of the day, as per usual.

General Thinking

Today was mostly a get overflow stuff done day. Did a pretty good job of it. Also, some interesting thinking has arisen from dream journal.

Daily Entry: October 9th, 2020

2020-10-09T12:20:53.000Z

Dream

Intention (2255 the night before)

Have some catching up to do, work-wise. Sleep more important than detail, but would still like to try WBTS and "at least one sentence" compromise.

Two lucid dreams in a row would be rad.

Strawberry donuts incubation time!

Wake-Back-to-Sleep (logged at 0350 this morning)

No early dreams remembered, I don't think.

I want to:

lucid dream
incubate strawberry donut
wake up at 0650

Wake (logged at 0650 this morning)

No dreams remembered, but did wake up at desired time. Thinking a lot of Legend of Korra for some reason. Perhaps I had some processing dreams.

It's not too late to remember, either. The dreams sometimes come to me during morning routine.

Also, still stoked about journal habit.

Scattered Fragments

The wife triggered a dream recollection (thanks the wife!).

I am in a large, communal kitchen. I am very hungry, but there is only steak to eat. I start cooking a steak on a cast iron. After it is finished cooking, I decide against eating it and give it to a passerby. I may have taken a bite and decided I really didn't want it, I'm not sure.

I am running down a highway road, in a tunnel. Cars are approaching, but I'm not obstructing traffic yet. Eventually, I see a walkable area and get out of traffic. This may have been a different dream.

Pre-nap (1206)

Drill dream habits, have good nap.

Post-nap (1223)

Something interesting came to me, but it melted away with everything else as I relaxed. Perhaps it will come back.

Meditation (Day 127)

Today's another prime number day, woo!

Intentions for the day:

Stay in posture part of prep until you're prepared to set the intention to stay still
Body-scan during the "focus on the breath throughout the body" beginning part of meditation
Stage 4 intention (vigilance on keeping introspective awareness continuous)
Fall back to stage 3 if necessary
Note where the breath was when you label a distraction (attention, awareness, or forgotten)
Try to catch a distraction as it enters awareness and/or attention
Body-scan when few distractions and when focus not as vivid as could be

Post-Meditation (1000)

Super powerful day. Nothing super new to note. I'm reading more Mind Illuminated and am reflecting using the Mind-System model of the mind.

Will be reading mind illuminated until I've read through stage 7, so there'll be new info for me to make use of.

Experimental

Meeting and then a happy hour during the normally scheduled special meditation. Will try on weekend.

General Thinking

Already up too late here.... I think my form is leading to good dividends, in various places! Maybe I'll talk more about that over the weekend.

Daily Entry: October 8th, 2020

2020-10-08T11:18:59.000Z

Dream

Intention (2215 the night before)

Keep on drilling the writing in journal habit. It's really starting to come along. Hoping to write in journal at various wake-ups throughout the night.

Still incubating a strawberry donut dream. Seems I accidentally incubated a dream of an aunt. So, incubation is possible! Maybe I should reflect on how that happened.

DILDs and WILDs are also possible, I know. Just gotta keep trying.

Wake-Back-to-Sleep (logged at 0430 this morning)

There's a vague dream in my mind, I think. But I can't access it. When I lay back down, maybe it'll come back to me.

Nope.

Anyways, I want to:

wake up at 0700
WILD
incubate strawberry donut dream

Back to sleep.

Dream Powers Activate

I am on a bus. It's my stop, so I get off. I run into friends from college Vineet and Greg. Vineet is throwing golf balls. Bouncing them off of Greg. I stop one from going into the street. This is how I run into them.

"Golf ball doesn't bounce off people so good, but if you miss, it might bounce off right into the street," I say. I keep the golf ball and Vineet and Greg walk away and Vineet pulls out more to throw at Greg. I put the golf ball in my mouth only to realize I shouldn't be doing that.

I get lost while walking around. It's night time and I can't see very well. At one point, I get to a precarious cliff with stairs that lead down to a road far below. The stairs look solid, and there are hand rails on each side to not fall. But I don't trust it and go a different way. I think about how weird the cliff is, in the middle of the city, as it doesn't seem hilly otherwise.

I am in a store. I go to buy something at the front desk. At the front desk, no one is there. I am still suspcious from earlier events. There is a monitor behind the front desk. Looking at it, I see it blinking. There's white text on a black background. I can't read the text, but I can tell it keeps changing.

"I'm dreaming." Everything shutters. It's kinda like the dream will collapse, but I'm confident it will not. I go to the door to leave the store. "Take me where I need to go," I tell it.

I go thru it and... I'm on the other side of the store front desk. At first, I think I've been trolled, but the building isn't a store anymore. It's a dream home, and I go to dream bed to tell the wife I'm lucid dreaming.

The conversation is incoherent, but makes sense to me at the time. I think in the moment how this must be what talking to me is like when I'm sleep talking. There's a phone I'm talking on as well, with my friend. Eventually my friend is just there. Sometimes he's my friend, and sometimes he's my cousin.

At some point, fed up with friend's presence, I tell him to leave. He goes to leave in a robotic manner, but stops at the door. I tell him more forcefully to leave, but I don't expect him to. I expect him to come face me in a slightly creepy way and he does. I punch him and he catches my fist. I convince him to leave by leaving with him. It's still night outside.

No one around anymore. I go up to a metal barrier and press my hand against it. I push and my hand slides through the metal. My hand feels cold, and also stings a bit.

I raise my hand like Superman. "Fly," I say. Nothing happens at first while I stand there motionless. Then, slowly, I start to float upwards. I get to a height that makes me nervous and I will myself down. To avoid falling too fast, I fall like a feather.

It's morning, and I'm with friend/cousin again. There's a person here to take him away. I decide to go with him. "I was going to take you, too, anyway," the driver says when I tell him.

The car I get in is cluttered with junk. I push it all out and sit comfortably in the back with friend/cousin.

I look at the GPS map showing the path we're taking. We turn left on a road, as instructed, but the map says we'll turn around and come back to this road. We might as well have gone straight. Taking a detour for no reason.. Seems inefficient.

Friend/cousin gestures his hand to tell me I should fast-forward this bit. I don't know how long the dream will last, so I heartily agree. I make the same gesture, and everything fast-forwards. We arrive at a mansion and I return the flow of time to normal.

There's two sets of steps leading up to two entrances, a main one and a side one. Up the side one is a butler who basically looks like Alfred (from Batman). Up the main one is the master of the estate. He's a black man with smooth skin, but solid grey, long, and curly hair. I look back at the butler and now he's also black. I try to fly up the stairs but I fail. One of them tell me I can't fly here. I'm not sure if they're preventing me or telling me I lack the skill.

I'm in the mansion now, and I find myself thinking about the feeling of being in a dream. It's hard, when awake, to really know if dreaming is mostly indistinguishable from the waking experience. I often have memories in third-person, regardless of dream. When napping I'm mostly visualizing, not experiencing sight from my eyes. But here and now it occurs to me to think about it.

It is, in fact, like waking life. I am seeing through my eyes and moving my body. I knew this to be true intellectually, but still had doubts until this check. I am very pleased with having done this check.

We are at the mansion to practice music. There's a violin, but I don't remember if I play it. The music I never hear, I don't think. Next thing I know the dream is now nothing but an abstract digital document that is the history of our music practice.

One section is a collapsed folder of data. The title is "lucid dream." I can feel the dream ending. I wake up. I reality check and write the dream down.

Super cool dream. Took me 40 minutes to write it down.

Wake (logged at 0810 this morning)

I have a couple more dreams, but need to get the day started. Will write two anchor sentences and see if I can remember more of the dream later.

Superheroes out for a swim.

Abandoned by "Special Agent" con artist.

Really happy with habits and results of last night!

Pre-nap (1330)

Liking habits. Only thing is want tow wake up sooner in the morning (at least as early as 0700). Not sure how much night writing is decreasing quantity or quality of sleep, though.

In any case, drilling journal habits with nap, but focusing on nap being nap otherwise (aka restful is main priority).

Post-nap (1350)

Naps feel very healing. Mind already still feeling powerful from meditation, but this is like a quick recharge from 95% to 100% for mind, and then also various little aches in the body go away.

Mind went to a lot of places, but nothing much worth saving in writing.

Meditation (Day 126)

Intentions for the day:

Stay in posture part of prep until you're prepared to set the intention to stay still
Body-scan during the "focus on the breath throughout the body" beginning part of meditation
Stage 4 intention (vigilance on keeping introspective awareness continuous)
Fall back to stage 3 if necessary
Note where the breath was when you label a distraction (attention, awareness, or forgotten)
Try to catch a distraction as it enters awareness and/or attention
Body-scan when few distractions and when focus not as vivid as could be

Post-Meditation (1050)

Once again, I believe today is a new best day. Really have the "brain is focused to the point of fire" feeling right now. Feels great.

Only "gross" distraction was body scan. Though, I may have not been as strict as my current rule. The fuzziness makes distractions hard to place. Was the distraction processing in background and I caught it as it entered attention, or did the breath go to awareness. It's hard. I use the vividness of breath to guide me, but that may not be a silver bullet.

No pain today. I think I'll work on my lotus flexibility when sitting in front of TV (been working on that habit) and do the setup I did today everyday. Special meditations I can practice posture that requires greater flexibility.

I may "check off" stage 4 as mastered this weekend, but really that means I work more in stage 5, but that stage 4 has some stuff to perfect that could be another few weeks or so. I believe that stage 5 work will help refine stage 4, however.

Today was the closest I got to staying completely still. Further, there was almost no aggravation anywhere the entire sit.

Experimental

Special meditation today was more spotting distractions and really seeing my mind work. Less focus on vividness of breath, though it did end up quite vidid.

General Thinking

I had something I wanted to write here today, but I have since forgotten.... In any case, want to wake up a little bit before 0700 to get a super solid start to the day in.

Daily Entry: October 7th, 2020

2020-10-07T11:33:51.000Z

Calendar says today going to be busy.

Dream

Intention (2215 the night before)

WBTS would be nice. Dreams have been hard to remember lately. Not waiting too long. Just buried or something. Hoping as I keep trying that I get better at remembering.

Just keep drilling healthy habits.

Strawberry donuts will be in my dreams eventually.

Wake-Back-to-Sleep (logged at 0300 this morning)

There's a problem my brain is trying to solve, that I don't need to solve, that must be from the dream I was having but don't remember.

Something about picking the right next number. Using some sort of indexing algorithm.

In any case, would like to try a WILD now.

Aunt Lydia and Misc

I am riding my bike to my parents. Their place is not the compound, but a place only in dreams. I am sneakily doing something I forgot, so as not to get my parents' attention. From the dining room, I hear talking. My aunt Lydia's voice is something I make out.

Now we're sitting in the living room. I'm talking with Lydia about something. At some point I tell her how weird this is, as I was just talking about her.

I think at another point I talk to my dad. Don't remember what it was. First dream with dad without conflict? Strongest call out in dream? Feels like I was close to realizing it was a dream.

That' all I remember.

Wake (logged at 0750 this morning)

Slept in a bit. Had trouble keeping mind on incubation topic or trying to WILD. Remembered one dream, though, and wrote it down before going back to bed, to boot! That's gradual progress right there.

Red Vines Samples

Remembering dream (0840). I am at grocery store. There is an open bag of red vines in the refrigerated area. I decide to take a sample of these instead of grabbing an unopened bag for purchase. I realize this isn't right and take the bag to buy. It further occurs to me that the already-open bag is not hygenic.

Dream Family Shenanigans

Another (0840)! I am at a dream-property. There's a large, outdoor covered area for parking, and three, 3-story town homes.

A family member owns the properties and lives in the middle. At some point, my sister enters the neighbor's house, though I warn her that that's breaking and entering.

I follow her to get her to leave.

Speech Anxiety

Another (0840)! I am at my friend's parents'. My friend is also there. He had to give a speech, but failed. He asked to stop halfway through, took a break, and came back and finished.

I tell him that I broke down into tears giving a speech. Tell him that I know the feeling.

Pre-nap (1215)

Not enough time for proper pre-nap.

Laying down now.

Post-nap (1230)

No post-nap writing, straight to side-project stuff before straight to work.

Meditation (Day 125)

Intentions for the day:

Stay in posture part of prep until you're prepared to set the intention to stay still
Body-scan during the "focus on the breath throughout the body" beginning part of meditation
Stage 4 intention (vigilance on keeping introspective awareness continuous)
Fall back to stage 3 if necessary
Note where the breath was when you label a distraction (attention, awareness, or forgotten)
Try to catch a distraction as it enters awareness and/or attention
Body-scan when few distractions and when focus not as vivid as could be

Post-Meditation

Nothing huge to note today. Good meditation. Lots of distractions coming at me. Feel I still did a pretty good job. Did need to use all my ways of settling the mind (counting breath, visualizing breath as graph, echoing breath in mind).

Experimental

No special meditation today. Meeting during planned time, and after that meeting I was exhausted. Flexibility is important.

General Thinking

I've made a general thinking area in Notion now, as well. The idea is that anything that goes here will go there, and like my meditation thinking, I can easily copy it to a post with a topic centered on whatever I wrote about. This bit of writing, for instance, may go into a post I have called "Why Daily Entries?"

Daily Entry: October 6th, 2020

2020-10-06T12:15:19.000Z

Will note in general thinking when I fill in yesterday's dream journal writings.

Dream

Intention (2245 the night before)

Some small tweaks to intent today. Going harder on incubating donuts. Also, going to set an intention to wake up at 0700. WBTS will stay in "nice-to-have" land.

Have some morning errands tomorrow and need some efficiency in the morning. Waking up on time would help immensely.

Bed time!

Wake (logged at 0710 this morning)

A little after 0700, but pretty good. Some dreams, but really hard to put into words. Lovecraft Country related, I think.

Time to start the day! Gots to be fast to get meditation in before errands.

Pre-nap (1235)

Yesterday's nap felt really good. I'm thinking maybe put off "incubating" nap topics for a long while. If want to do sooner, should make time for analytical meditation, instead.

So, let's relax and heal and try to be conscious of hypnagogy.

Post-nap (1258)

Relaxing and healing. Short bits of hypnagogic vision. Centralization project in FE (work idea). Wisdom that I have forgotten.

Not going to write everything. Have a meeting to get to.

Meditation (Day 124)

Intentions for the day:

Stay in posture part of prep until you're prepared to set the intention to stay still
Stage 4 intention (vigilance on keeping introspective awareness continuous)
Fall back to stage 3 if necessary
Note where the breath was when you label a distraction (attention, awareness, or forgotten)
Try to catch a distraction as it enters awareness and/or attention
Body-scan (one time) when few distractions and when focus not as vivid as could be

Post-Meditation

I am very close to being able to consistently sit still the whole meditation. The only thing that stopped me this time, was I pushed my lotus a bit far and lost circulation very quickly. Even then, I stayed in that position well past normal (and it was amazing to break past the first bit of pain). The second bit of pain was too big a wall to climb, though.

I think, also, that my weight isn't evenly distributed in my half-lotus. It's something I can try to set up during posture prep. Also, really make a groove in the cushion so I'm not losing circulation from pressure on the butt.

Gross distractions still happening, but they're not the same as before. Cascading distractions (where one gross distraction opens the floodgates) aren't really happening at all, I've noticed. Stage 4 mastery is very near, I feel it.

I've made body-scan part of the 3rd step of focusing on the meditation object. The 4 steps being:

Focus on the present
Focus on the body
Focus on the sensations of breath throughout the body
Focus on the sensation of breath at the nose

This means it isn't a gross distraction at the time, though if I lose vividness later, I plan on doing it again. Also, it isn't so tiring that I struggle with dullness the rest of the session. I think this is a solid tweak to my process.

Experimental

So, morning meditations are the goal again, and 1600 short meditation sessions are also a goal (to try the other types of meditation, or to focus on something other than the breath).

General Thinking

Yesterday's post updated with dreams.

Having naps be naps again is very energizing. Going to stick with these kinds of naps for a while.