How often to practice?

[NickAWilson]

Hello everyone,

I am set to go on a 10 day course in the ba khin tradition in April. Until then I am centering on a one hour sit each day. Sometimes it's great, other times it's not so great. I think my focus is a bit scattered. I read a lot of Shinzen Young, but get the feeling that concentrating on insight through body awareness is perhaps running before I can walk...

I have resolved just to "follow the breath". To really work on this aspect.

How often would you recommend a beginner practice? (i have a reasonable amount of free time).

Is the one hour sit good, or would 2x 1/2hrs be better to progress?

Many thanks!

...and btw, I've been reading here for a little while. Great forum!

[lente]

I'm interested in this also.

[chintan]

Personally I did not make any special preparation before I went. The more you can practice the better it would be and 2.5 hours would be quite enough. Maybe another important aspect is to build strength and flexibility of sitting long hours preferably cross legged with straight spine. There are some back strengthening exercises.

But don't worry too much - if you can't sit cross legged on a floor you can use a chair or floor cushions to support.

With Metta.

[NickAWilson]

Hi maun, thanks. I meant 2 sessions of 1/2hr each

Point well taken re a strong back. Im a long time yogi, and I've been practicing the bow pose sequence in preparation as i do have back issues already!

Do you practice several times a day?

[Namaste]

Don't focus on duration, focus on clarity.  Duration is not here, not now.  I sit whenever I feel like it ( and oftentimes when I don't ), and for however long I feel is "happening"  - why would you go any other way?  Imho, set a bare-minimum of sitting genuinely at least once a day, and let your self go from there.

It's breathing, don't make it so complex.   

[Matthew]

Nick,

Welcome to the forums.

Practice as often as time allows. Several shorter sessions or long sessions or a mix. I would recommend staying with calm abiding meditation as described in the Beginners Guide to Meditation as preparation - and I would advise little reading which is just more conditioning.

If you are comfortable with an hour sitting then I would not recommend you shorten the time. Instead I would recommend 2 x 1 hour or 3 x 1 hour, then extend the sessions towards two hours. The meditation is best focussed on the bodily sensations as you breathe, and calming the body. Do not supress nor follow thoughts - just let them be.

Namaste's advice is also good - sitting without a time limit - and you have lots of time so this would naturally lead to long periods of practice. Quality matters - but so does quantity.

This will give you a very solid foundation.

In the Dhamma,

Matthew

[Jeeprs]

I too have wrestled with this question. Being a not-very-disciplined typical westerner, it has always been easy to avoid anything that looks like work, meditation included. I have gradually overcome this. The key idea for me is 'sadhana' which means 'spiritual discipline' or 'means of accomplishment'. The monastic life revolves around sadhana, which is the daily routine of recitations and meditation. Basically the householder version is similar, but less intensive, because, being a householder, one has many other duties to attend to during the day.

So I have settled on morning and evening sadhana at the same time each day. That is the theory, anyway. I am still finding the morning session hard to meet because  - well, basically because it means getting up early. So I am still a typical undisciplined westerner.

I will do better from tomorrow.

[NickAWilson]

I should perhaps qualify "plenty of free time" --I'm married, with two small kids and 2 large dogs all of which make a lot of noise! So much so that I've even (with relatively good results I might add...) tried meditating on the sound of my smaller dog snoring

Thanks for all the great advice everyone. Much appreciated.

Intuitively Mathews comments ring the right bell, though I certainly get the point about it being breathing, nothing really complex. I too have difficulty getting up before everyone else to meditate! I generally meditate during school/work hours unless I have actual work to do...


~Nick

[thelastrich]

Maybe some ear-plugs can help you to avoid the noise.
I use them sometimes.

[Windex5]

Based on my experience I think a poor way to measure duration of a sit is how long you physically can endure sitting. The fact is that 10 seconds of actually following the breath is more useful than 45 minutes of listening to your minds tape rabble on in a strange posture. I wish someone could have really emphasized this to me when I started. You mind is supposed to just sit on the process and not on analyzing anything.

A vital part of concentration practice as far as I can tell is when you bring your mind back to the object at hand. This is all I was doing when I first started and it is a vital work!


When I first started I would sit for an hour and my mind would be lost for most of the time but I was also able to hit some Jhana shit during these long sits and that motivated my practice. When I sat for a shorter amount of time I felt dissatisfied(don't get all insight on me haha) but my concentration kicked ass because it didn't feel like I was going to sit forever.


anyway...

So now I train concentration like this:



 I have a kitchen timer , a pad and a pen.

Make a table with two rows and two columns.
Label them
 (time e.g. 10min) | Break

The break isn't when you stop meditating its how many times your mind breaks off the object.

So basically you pick a time interval and record how many times your mind gets lost in the tape loop. This allows you to test yourself. Can I go for an 10 minutes, how about 30 seconds? Pick an interval of time after experimentation. If you can go a minute that is something to be really proud of . Anyway using this method you have data(as subjective as data can get but I'll take it) concerning your practice. If you see your breaks increase a ton after a half an hour of practice then you know where your limit is.


p.s. didn't mean to offend by assuming you were a beginner. Good luck. Concentration practice changed my life.

[Andrew]

Hi Windex,

At first I balked at the way you had approached this, but then the I read your "ps" and I could feel your heart was in what you are doing. It is very disciplined, and actually really unique (from the exposure I have to meditation). Do you do the sessions end-on-end or take a break?, i.e. record one in the morning, then one in the evening? It seems to be the former, which is really dedicated. 

I'm feeling you are really TRAINING there, like an athlete! WOW. It reminds me of a guitarist I know who trains himself to play at over 300 beats a minute. I'm usually happy to have just picked up the guitar!

love Andy

[NickAWilson]

I quite like Windex's method as well. I'm not sure it would work for me, but I might give it some thought and adaptation. I am a beginner. But I don't take offence easily these days anyhow

I find I sit better with an interval timer. I'm a little worried about getting into the habit of having a bell chime each 15mins in a 1hr sit in case I get dependent upon it and then my iphone breaks! Or maybe they don't do that on the 10 day course I'm heading toward... but it does work. Though I tend to lose focus more easily in the final quarter of an hour as I know it's nearly done...

Do any of you use interval timers? (the app i use for meditation is called "zen timer" for anyone that is interested).

Oh, and likewise with ear plugs.. I'm a little nervous on becoming dependent upon them and then not having any..

[Morning Dew]

I use the Zen Timer and i find it fantastic
Love the Zen timer connect via face book. So cool to see all the folk meditating. Btw, my user name is Papa.

It is not important whether you will become dependent on your iPhone timer or the ear plugs. What is of great importance is to be actualy aware of the conditioned self being afraid of becoming dependent on this or that  

Take it easy on yourself, be gentle with yourself. I would suggest you to start with calm-abiding Shamatha for a few month to relax into the body.

Friendly Che

[thelastrich]

Oh, and likewise with ear plugs.. I'm a little nervous on becoming dependent upon them and then not having any..

It's only for noisy places. Sometimes when there is more noise that I would expected, I use the two kind at the same time. First I plug the ear-plug, and then put on the anti-noise earmuffs.
With that I feel more noise trough my legs coming from the floor than trough my ears coming from the air.

If you don't have them, you simply need to find a more quiet place 

I also use always a seiza bench, (crossed legs doesn't fit me) and if anytime I find myself without one of my benches, I can make a new one, or I can use another thing with some stuff under it, like a chair and books, or a table supported by a pipe, or a rock... Even I can move some dust to fit a nice seat.

[Morning Dew]

thelastrich mate, I too use earplugs at times. Just so you know, if you use the same one too often you can cause ear infections. I actually started feeling pain inside both of my ears after using the plugs for a week or so. I stopped now with that not to cause an infection.
http://www.eardoc.info/news/more-on-ear-infection-and-relation-to-ear-plugs/

Very early in the morning and evening hours are the quietest to practice, unless you have some crazy hours building site next door    (screwed karma mate, sorry).

I still cling too much to noise sometimes, making me restless. It is maybe time to start using the noise as the primary meditation object instead of the breath.

Che

[NickAWilson]

I'm sitting seiza also, but on a zafu) not ideal but not invested in a bench yet. Cross legged causes all kinds of nastiness for me..

I've worn ear plugs at night for over 10yrs. Mrs W is a champion snorer!

I'll give it a try one time. Early mornings and late evening really are the best times for sure. I just can't quite crack that early morning habit!

oh and btw, the pain in your ear may just be caused by wax being pushed down by the plug. try some olive oil for a few days to loosen it all up in there. I've never had an infection and I use the same plugs for 2-3mts sometimes without changing them (sounds yucky, but the plugs are not dirty so...)

[thelastrich]

I'm sitting seiza also, but on a zafu) not ideal but not invested in a bench yet.

I made it in home with some wood that were going to end in trash.
Che told here about that:
http://www.vipassanaforum.net/forum/index.php/topic,1294.msg10001.html#msg10001

 

About the size, I changed it for me... Average 20cm tall, and 20 degrees of inclination, that is more suitable for me.

Edit: I used hinges so I can get it into a bag.

[NickAWilson]

I'm impressed! I can't do stuff like that. I do tech just great though...

[Matthew]

Here is the bench I made:

http://www.vipassanaforum.net/forum/index.php/topic,646.msg5100.html#msg5100