Dream

I know my dream involved my niece and nephew... somehow. It also involved my new retainer, in which I somehow (physically impossibly) put my retainer in backwards and upon realizing it, fixed them, but found they were painfully tight on my teeth. I became worried that they would no longer work.

Meditation (Day 51)

Still some minor wanderings with maybe forgetting (not entirely sure, breath seems to be strongly in background and often helps bring me back), but again very strong day. Regularly getting into this intense feeling of focus. A feeling that I have explicitly wanted to control (it's something I invoked often in college, but have seen very rarely in my career).

I believe I keep finding the right posture fairly late into the session. It's possible I'm leaning a bit forward, which is irritating my lower back. My legs are less prone to falling asleep, though I've been avoiding pushing my lotus lately (knees have started acting up a bit). Got to make sure to listen to my body to avoid any long-term recovery shenanigans.

Extracurricular Stuffs

Saturday is wife's day, so my main goal is to use the downtime I have to organize my various action items I shoved into the weekend. Want to do some amount of them, but not have them take up too much of tomorrow so I can focus on some small project.

Really, though, I'd want to set myself up for success throughout the week with some 15 minutes per day. In fact, don't even want to commit too much time today/tomorrow, I don't think. Meditation has taught me the value of starting at 15 minutes per day and increasing that time allotment weekly.

Weekends have enough stuff in them that I can't really fit a large chunk of extracurricular. I'm including breaks in that "enough stuff", but breaks are important and good. There's also my weekly review and typically a large chunk of action items, of which I can maybe do a few.

So, what weekends are for, in regards to extracurricular, is maybe starting a 15-minute habit towards... something, and also working out how I fit that into the day-to-day. I can also maybe increase an already existing habit by 5 minutes.

So, then, what's a habit I want to form? I had a blogging thing going on, and really it still exists, but I'm back to thinking aloud here, because there isn't a blog I want to write right now. Once there is, I go back to devoting this time to that. Which means I've done a good job with making time for writing, I think.

One habit I want to form is to make more Anki cards out of things I want to memorize. Specifically, there's some work things I want to memorize (I keep it on the work laptop and don't have an Anki account to sync that data to, so it can include "internal-use only" items). These are coding-specific things that I keep putting off. I could also build some coding-specific cards over the weekend that are not work-related, to keep work and weekend seperate.

This maybe the "project" I want to start this weekend: 15-minutes of Anki card curation. I don't even have to add the card to my system (don't want to add too many at a time), but it should be constructed such that adding it to Anki is super fast. The general idea is to memorize the structures and I/Os of things (frameworks, APIs, etc.).

It's also not a bad idea to use some weekend time to think about a blog post I want to write. Not deciding on one maybe why I'm not writing one.

....

I'll add it to my weekly review list.

Once again, had a dream that I tried to meditate on but lost it.... Need to practice writing it down or saying it aloud or something.

No extracurricular stuff today. But this weekend I should be back at it in some form. And next week no appointments or anything, so I should be able to make time on workdays. And the following week I have off, so we'll see what I decide to do.

Meditation (Day 50)

Today I had to put off meditation as I had an orthodontist appointment that I needed to start walking to at 0630. Set a timer during the walk and did 45 minutes of walking meditaiton, which went pretty well, but I used it to only further my resolve to make sure I meditated later.

Upon getting home, I stretched, and then joined the meditation meeting we have at work everyday. It was 25 minutes of meditation, and I continued another 20 minutes thereafter.

Some minor hiccups in regularly invoking introspective attention, but overall it was solid. If it's still like this on Sunday, I'll probably consider stage 3 mastered enough to work more on stage 4 from the beginning of the meditation and fall back to stage 3 practice when necessary.

Posture was mostly very comfortable. Was a bit worried yesterday, as I had some growing knee and back pain that lingered throughout the day, but I believe both of them were not serious pain but soreness, and I seem pretty recovered today, even after another urban hike to the orthodontist.

Will probably take it easy this weekend, though, and not run again until Tuesday (will go for some long walks, I think, though, still).

Because of the urban hike involved in going to my orthodontist yesterday, and the fact that I'll be doing it again tomorrow, I will not run today. My body is a bit annoyed with all the challenges I've been presenting it as it is.

Again, today I think extracurricular stuff will not happen, because I didn't get much work in yesterday due to the orthodontist appointment, and tomorrow I have another one, so got to get as much work as I can in today.

Meditation (Day 49)

Hit that solid posture again today. Decided against switching positions halfway through (though I wasn't pushing the half lotus today, so my leg didn't slowly lose feeling throughout the meditation). Though, at 5 minutes remaining there was enough pain in some problematic places, that I finished the meditation lying down, which was fine, more or less.

Got an early body scan in, but then my mind was restless for the rest so I couldn't fit another one in. However, the "focus on the breath" habit continues to become more consistent and gave me a strong feeling of focus once I settled into meditation. This feeling remained even with the constant stream of distractions.

Stage 3 mastery is something I'll be certain about fairly soon.

Have an orthodontist appointment that'll eat up a lot of my day today, so no extracurricular stuff, I don't think. We'll see, though. I'll keep the tag for now, and will remove it tomorrow if I don't make time for it.

Meditation (Day 48)

Hit a really solid posture for a significant chunk of today's meditation. Hit that "delicious stillness" where there's a strong desire to not move.

The "focus on the breath" thought when the mind starts to wander is cementing into a habit. Pretty amazing, actually. Several times I was also just strongly in stage 4, I'm pretty sure, where distractions were kept out of attention by continuous introspective awareness and thus only drifted in and out of awareness.

For some reason, the Lion King (the 2D one specifically) drifted in and out as a regular distraction today. "Can you feel the love tonight" was a particularly tenacious distraction. Interestingly, though song distractions are the hardest to keep away, they're the easiest to notice very quickly and kinda help keep me in the present. The tenacious frequency also sort of good practice for letting the distraction come, let it be, and let it go.

Mind felt intensely focused today for a significant chunk of the session. I managed to get two body scans in (one in the first half of the session and one in the second half). After the second one, distractions started overwhelming me, and I didn't feel I could do a third.

I wonder if the strengthening of mindfulness via full-body scans means learning to deal with a greater frequency of distractions. It seems quite possible. Yes, I'm strengthening the mind, and part of the exercise is strengthening control of the scope of attention, but it's also about just giving the mind more resources to work with. So, if control doesn't improve as fast as the power of the mind, it means I have to train more to get the new level of distractions under control.

It makes sense to me, though if that is the case it's curious that the book did not mention this....

Dream

Had a dream that I narrated to myself upon waking up. But I went back to sleep and now it's completely gone.

How should I go about practicing recording it properly? Perhaps I should do what I do with "leaving the house". I have an item in my morning routine to "Practice leaving the house" wherein I go to pretend to put my shoes on, but before touching shoes, I stop and point at the various things I want to do before touching my shoes:

• do I want/need to wear a mask?
• do I want to put sunscreen on?
• what else do I need to bring?

Perhaps I can lay in bed and do a similar thing? Perhaps I could use naps to practice? I already have hypnagogic meanderings that I forget by the time I end the nap. They happen much more consistently than dreams, and also I get multiple chances per nap. It's probably a good idea....

Meditation (Day 47)

Prime number, woo!

I believe I need to fix my posture again, though it's something I can find given enough time. By the end of today's meditation, I found a really solid position. I think I've gotten into the habit of leaning too far forward and curving my back too far back. Was tiring out my lower back.

Anyways, the experiment I referenced yesterday worked well today. To more consistently cultivate the habit of invoking introspective attention regularly (before forgetting the breath), I've decided to think "focus on the breath" during the pause between the out-breath and the in-breath. The goal isn't to always do this, mind you, it's to do it mindlessly.

Why?

It's something I've noticed is very useful during walking meditation. To keep track of which foot to focus on, I needed to say "right" or "left" for the foot when it was time to switch to it. This is because my usual "right" or "left" placement was when my foot landed, not when it was about to be in motion. But in motion is when you want to focus on that foot.

It took a long time to get used to this, to the point that it became a habit when not focusing on the feet to narrate the "left" and "right" while walking. This means I have something consistent to notice when I'm distracted or being mindless when I want to be mindful. But this only applies while walking.

Now, I could do some sort of "in" and "out" sort of thing, but in all honesty it's a lot of work to quiet that part even when focusing, and I don't want something as hard as "right" and "left" to overcome again, as useful as it is.

So, the goal is that when I get distracted, I hear the "focus on the breath" during that pause. It worked pretty well today, and because I'm explicitly building a goal of quieting it when actually focused, it wasn't itself distracting when the breath was a focus (though I did need to explicitly stop myself from thinking it).

I believe I did not forget the breath today because of it, and by the end of the session I was pretty solidly in stage 4 territory (keep introspective awareness continuous, and immediately notice and correct for gross distraction and strong dullness).

Extracurricular Thinking

The above thinking may become its own blog post.... I'll think about how I want to store the above writing so I can edit and play with it.

Hectic day today. Various fires to put out where I could maybe have been of help (not sure if I was at all).

There will be no extracurricular work today, I think. I still have various morning things I skipped to do (including spaced-repetition).

Still have work to do, though.

Meditation (Day 46)

Meditation went well. Lots of fighting distractions and stuff still. Still came out of it feeling good, still having leg issues. Might go back to switching to other leg at half-way point. A bit sore from exercise yesterday, so that had new issues. Think I have an idea on how to make stage 3 more consistent. Perhaps I'll play with the idea tomorrow and report about it then.

This time I can't remember if I had remembered my dream upon waking up. Like, feels like maybe? Not going to tag this post with "dream" though.

Meditation (Day 45)

Took my time sitting down to meditate this morning. Ended up chatting with friends and family online for a bit beforehand. The meditation went solid though. I stuck with my plan to stay in first position for 30 minutes before switching. Tomorrow I'll increase that to 31 minutes. Not feeling any damage in legs from it, and circulation came back real fast on moving, so it's likely just a pinched nerve, and not an actual loss of circulation, and the solution to that is to just sit through it and it'll slowly get better day-to-day. Still going to increase the timing slowly, because there's no real rush.

There was a bit of mind-wandering and forgetting, but overall stage 3 was solid today. Regularly invoked introspective attention and looked at my mind. Lots of songs playing in my head today, which is ironic, because for the first week of meditation I expected this to be a problem but it wasn't at all. Songs are easier to catch and typically stay in the background, though.

Ended up doing two body scans today. The second one may have been tried with too many distractions going on, but both felt like they went well. My main worry is that I might use the scan as an attempt to fight boredom or keep myself too busy to be distracted. But I don't think I'm falling into that trap. Got a lot of solid chunks of time with vivid and intense perception of the breath. Can really feel it at my nose on inhale. Got a nice chill to it. Once that feeling sets in, my breath will often be the sensation that lets me know my directed attention has wandered, which is neat.

I'm going to pretty confidently keep stage 3 unmarked as "mastered" in my weekly review today. Again, though, next week could be different, and I feel pretty comfortable dipping my toes into stage 5 training (increasing mindfulness via full-body scans).

Extracurricular Stuffs

Sunday is my day, so I should be able to make some time for something today. What that something is, I'm not sure yet. Lots of stuff to consider.

Dream

Did dream last night. Tried out narrating it when I was awake. This did not help me remember. Need to log the narration as I'm doing it. Have journal next to bed. Might try that. Might try recording into phone.

Meditation (Day 44)

I went into the meditation with the intention to keep the same pose the entire 45 mintues, but I gave in to agitation due to worry with 16 minutes left, and reversed form. I think I'll do a "1-minute increase at a time" strategy from here. It took me 29 minutes before I gave in, so I'll do 30 minutes tomorrow. So-on and so-forth until 45 minutes.

The main thing is just getting over the worry that I might be doing permanent damage. As long as my legs feel fine the rest of the day, then a 1-minute increase is fine.

Today wasn't as easy as two days ago, but it wasn't as hard as yesterday. Forgot the breath a couple times, I think, though again the breath usually brings me back, so possibly it is still in conscious awareness, just not the focus of attention. I did eventually get a solid frequency of invoking introspective attention, and even got some vigilance in with introspective awareness.

Today was also the return of feeling the need to meditate. Like, there's this mind fog that makes me tired and slows me down, and meditation clears it right up.

Decided against trying the body-scanning mind-exercise today, though. Maybe tomorrow. I'm thinking I won't mark stage 3 as mastered this week (I decide on mastery every weekly review). But wouldn't be surprised if I marked it as mastered next week.

Again, lots of stuff improving, and I'm still feeling the positive results of meditation. Don't see me giving up on meditation any time soon, which is really cool.

Extracurricular Stuffs

So, it being a weekend, I will absolutely not do any work-related extracurriculars. Today being wife-day, I might not do any extracurriculars at all. Or rather, I have until my wife is ready to go grocery shopping, which could be any minute now.

I may just organize my projects area a bit in Notion (which is where I organize extracurricular work, e.g. I wrote the meditation blog post there).

New tag today: extracurricular. This is better than "side-projects", which isn't something I'm doing, as-of-late. If I were to do side-projects, it'd fall in the time bucket where I fit extracurricular stuff.

Meditation (Day 43)

Another prime number, woo. So spoiled. Next one is 47, I think?

Today was very hard. Definitely forgot the breath, though it's strange because the breath is likely to remind me that my mind has wandered. Which is neat. Perhaps a sign that it has stayed in awareness? In any case, lots of fighting, and a fair bit of physically fidgeting. A stark contrast to a couple days ago where I basically sat completely still the entire session.

To be fair, I am experimenting with a variety of things, including but not limited to:

• how I invoke introspective attention regularly
• how I rest my neck on my shoulders
• how I rest my shoulders
• how I keep my back straight
• how I position my legs

Further, my success with running harder has made my legs complain a lot more during meditation, and I'm not sure how seriously I should take it. Don't want to damage my knees or anything.

I don't think I have anything to worry about, though, I haven't felt any worrying pain outside the session. The pain melts right off during my 5 minutes of walking post-sit.

I might just see what happens if I maintain the pose for the duration of the sit. Let my leg fall asleep and everything. Though, at the same time, I am noticing my flexibility improve at a significant rate... maybe just wait until that plateaus and allow myself to reposition at specific intervals. Maybe every 10 minutes for now (instead of 22.5 minutes that I have allowed recently).

Though I just looked it up and maybe it's just fine? I'll try to sit still the whole time tomorrow.

See? Lots of things to play with. Though it's all improving, and the meditation is worth it, even when it's hard. I don't feel like I've lost practice even though I didn't do as well today as most of the week.

Extracurricular Stuffs

Looked over what I put together yesterday. Made some minor edits, but I think I'll need some other eyeballs on it. Which is perfect because there's a meeting in like 14 minutes.

Since I shuffled meditation a bit, book reading has stopped (used to be something I did after making oatmeal but whilst waiting for it to expand in the hot water).

Going to need to practice my intention to read and find a consistent place for it....

Dream

I did in fact wake up and meditate this morning while laying in bed. And there was a dream I remembered. But I didn't focus on it and now... it's gone. There's some vague recollection of family. But that's it.

Meditation (Day 42)

Best number today (though, I mean, I'm not a huge fan of Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but 42 is a fun concept).

Definitenly forgot the breath at least once. Possibly twice. The first one was getting lost in thought about a recent Twilight Zone episode. The other was getting lost in thought about how to practice Super Smash Bros. Melee.

But, other than that, really solid. Struggled to maintain stage 3 (invoking introspective attention before forgetting breath) in first half, but broke past the barrier and had some stage 4 (continuous intraspective awareness) in second half. Felt confident enough to do a body scan to increase mindfulness (stage 5).

Still feels like I've leveled up a few days ago. Don't "need" the meditation, and as such come out even sharper than I did when I "needed" it. Perhaps this feeling will become the new normal and I'll feel the need for meditation again, though now the extra value is providing plenty of drive.

Extracurricular Intention

Still playing with words here. As my extra work for the day may not always be a blog post, nor will it always be outside of work, "blog" and "side-projects" don't always feel applicable. Today, I think I can make some time for some work writing. I will try making that time between 1630 and 1700.

I also have 5 minutes left of this little writing block to look at it a bit.

Extracurricular Results

Ended up making good progress, and lengthening the 5 minutes above to 25 mintutes. No longer need to fit it into 1630.