|
|
This week was an
"off" period for me, with very little time to devote specifically to
the WH, for which my apologies to everyone, especially Piet.
The most interesting
aspect of my week regarding the WH involved my Wednesday night
meditation,
which I based on reading from Ayya Khema's book, Who Is
Myself? I read the chapter on the practicing the 1st
Jhana (or "absorption") and felt that my experience with the WH gave
me the tools to give it a try.
The 1st Jhana is
expected to give an extremely relaxed and deep meditation with a
feeling of joy
& delight suffusing throughout the body. Here is my verbatim
description of
my meditation:
"I looked toward
the felt sense of place as an avenue into deep concentration. It came
fairly
easily, and with very little mental jibber-jabber. Several times I
dropped into
a sudden lurch, but have little memory of what was passing through. My
back
& shoulders were extremely relaxed, with the "dropping down"
feeling in my upper torso. The deep concentration ended abruptly after
about 25
minutes, and for the next 20 minutes I was much closer to the surface,
although
very relaxed with little jibber-jabber. I was relaxed throughout the
rest of
the evening and slept well. I didn't fully experience the 1st jhana,
but got
close. Instead of joy & delight, I felt a sense of well-being and
distance
from the surrounding world."
Regarding the WH, I
think practice with the deep meditation of the Jhanas would be a good
way of
allowing the WH to show more clearly. I know that I felt the effects of
the
Jhana meditation for several hours!
... from Rod