Re: requesting help with chapter 1 of IIH

["Alan" <fish_studios@...>]

Dear Maria:

For me, I think what helped the most was the one-pointedness 
exercise. Instead of taking a topic of my choosing, I would take the 
first thought that came to mind. So, sometimes, I would sit for a 
minute without any thoughts until one came.

But I think the most effective thing that really gave a break 
through, was letting go. At first I thought of the exercise as one 
where I was struggling against my mind to keep out all thoughts, to 
suppress them. Whereas, it's really about achieving a state of 
mind. You are trying to elevate your mind to a different wave length 
than what it normally operates on. One where you are still. Truly 
still.

So to help, I started to focus on my breathing when I started the 
exercise. Close my eyes, relax my body, and concentrate on my 
breathing. Deliberate, but normal breaths. Then after a while, when 
I felt relaxed, I let that concentration go and just left my mind 
OPEN rather than CLOSED. I think that's the key. Don't think so 
much that the exercise is about shutting out thoughts, but rather 
that its about letting go of thoughts. It's not a struggle, but a 
(what's the best word...) peaceful exercise. Now, after performing 
the exercise, I feel relaxed and mentally rejuvinated.

Of course, this approach can be applied to all of the exercises, but 
I found it to be almost a requirement to perform this one correctly.

Something else that might help as well: I do my studies in my room 
where the computer is running, so there is a slight background hum 
from the fans that are running in the computer. Blocked out mostly 
during my mundane daily work, I really noticed it when I started to 
do this exercise. I also found out that it helped me to have 
something like that there to focus on, as it allowed me to sort of 
test if I had relaxed enough. If during the exercise, I could hear 
the fans, then I wasn't performing it correctly. Because when I did 
it correctly, I couldn't hear the fans.

Just some things to chew on I suppose. All will go well.

-- Alan


--- In BardonPraxis@yahoogroups.com, "mariaclearwater333" 
<mariaclearwater333@y...> wrote:
> Hi everybody
> I am new to this group. For a very long time now (years), I am 
> working every day very diligently on chapter 1 and wasn't able to 
> stay for 10 minutes without thoughts. I feel quite desperate and am 
> reaching out for your help. What helped you? How did you get to the 
> place of having control over your thoughts?
> 
> I am very thankful for specific help: Maria