(this answer is intuitive)
Here’s a passage from the book “Dreams and means on how to direct them”, by Hervey de Saint Denys (page 24):
“A philosopher of Geneva, Georges Le Sage, is said to have nearly gone mad by trying in vain to catch in his own mind in the transition from wakefulness to sleep, or rather to dreaming. (…) His fault was therefore quite simply not to have understood that this daydreaming was the dream itself at its beginning; and that by torturing his mind with incessant preoccupation, he was stopping precisely this natural and spontaneous course of ideas, without which the passage from wakefulness to sleep cannot be accomplished.”
I do know this is about the hypnagogic state… but I felt that there could be something here for you.
You’re not doing anything wrong. This is a common misconception: your mind hasn’t started going nuts because of meditation, rather, with meditation you’re just starting to pay attention to how your mind operates. Meditation literally means “to become familiar with.”
I second the zhine meditation (open eye attention on an external object) recommendation. Eventually, with enough repetition, the mind will begin to calm, as you go, sooner and for longer.
“The Tibetan Yogas of Dream and Sleep” (by Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche) discusses zhine.
I also really like Andrew’s simple open eyed awareness meditation from his “Lucid Dreaming Workbook”. Both will serve you very well.
With meditation, IMO, simpler is better.
And the benefit of open-eyed meditation to lucid dreamers is clear: in the dream we experience a full visual scene (most people do, some may not), so it’s very good to build your attention in the presence of visual sensory input.
It’s as simple as putting your attention on an external object. When you find that your attention has wandered from the object (and it will, do not beat yourself up over this!), just gently move it back to the object. Again and again and again. For just a few minutes or however long you can at first, then gradually increase the length over time. I find that it is most helpful in the beginning to put an image on a wall with a plain background that doesn’t at all grab your attention (the wall that is).
Eventually, you can graduate to just relaxing the focus of your eyes, wherever you are, and use the full image in your field of vision as your object. TYoDaS calls this “dissolving the mind in space.” I love that term :).
As a point of instruction, you are not thinking about the object, you are just very clearly aware of its presence in your sight.
Thank you both for the reassurance!! I’ll keep doing the practice and will be aware of the next time my mind shows this pattern. Will also try open-eyed
In the ancient meditation instructions, it is said that at the beginning, thoughts will arrive one on top of another, uninterrupted, like a steep mountain waterfall. Gradually, as you perfect meditation, thoughts become like the water in a deep, narrow gorge, then a great river slowly winding its way down to the sea, and finally the mind becomes like a still and placid ocean, ruffled by only the occasional ripple or wave.
No doubt, its big progress. Master Holecek says Dreams are truth tellers, and they will show us our progress along the path, along with our short comings and where we need to improve.
There is a reason the ancients referred to taming the mind as taming a wild monkey or wild elephant! Its tough to do, and takes a lot of patience and perfected practice. But it most definitely is not impossible.
This is part of the path. Its not about how many times your mind deviates, but how quickly you can recognize this deviation, and put it back on track.
If your mind is particularly windy, try just observing this, without contracting around any one thought, and letting it proliferate. Let the mind race, just don’t cling to anything that comes up. Find stability in the steadfast Awareness that is observing the mental activity.
Divorce yourself from outcomes. This is a lifelong practice, trying to get a zero thought Buddha mind every meditation is setting yourself up for failure and frustration.
Let the progress come as it will, at its own pace. And relish the small wins and milestones, taming the mind is no small feat, and every step forward is a big accomplishment.
you are so welcome!
I’m reading the book in French, and there is a lovely aspect of the French language, that I think it might also help… “Mind” is “Esprit”
