Yeah, I think you’re right. I just feel unclear or unfocused even though I actually perceive everything pretty clearly and reasonably focused. It was kind of weird to notice that. :)
I haven’t had those waves of pain after I noticed that most of the unclarity was illusory. The waves might have had something to do with being unsatisfied with unclarity and having a very clear perception of this dissatisfaction. My theory is that all this goes into a feedback loop if you don’t know that the objects of focus are actually supposed to seem unclear.
My mind cannot produce mental images (trust me, I’ve tried) so I don’t have visual hallucinations but I had this funny abstract thing. I perceived what I knew to be mathematical constructs yet they had no content or representation. It was a very strange feeling doing math with empty symbols that still brimmed with possibilities.
After getting my mind to calm down about not perceiving clearly I got a big boost in attentional width. I was perceiving vibrations effortlessly in all the senses and thoughts. I guess most of them were vibrating under 10Hz… I’m still pretty bad at getting the precise frequencies down. It was like bathing in a sea of vibration and the surprising thing was that it actually wasn’t surprising at all. It was like these vibrations have always been there and I just haven’t been paying attention to them. It was actually somewhat boring just sitting there attending to a colorless and clear perception of everything.
On the second time I achieved a wider attentional width I decided to take a look at the attender himself. That is I tried to see how I see all these mental objects as mine. It would seem that the “self” is a process that draws in attention when a new mental object presents itself. It then accesses statistics that tell how much attraction and aversion this kind of object deserves. It also carries a measure of uncertainty. Sometimes the data aren’t reliable and attention is needed to sort things out. Towards the end of the process the mental object is labeled desirable or undesirable and actions are taken to hold on to the object or to get rid of it. Statistics are updated depending on the success of the actions. The process thus reinforces itself and the statistics get more rigid on each iteration. Sometimes the process just tells you that you’re liking this thing and already trying to get it without asking much of an input. Attention can however interfere and decide to reject attractive objects or accept unattractive objects. As a result the statistics get more flexible and next time more thought is given to similar mental objects. I’m also guessing that emotions and more primitive reactions act to skew the statistics depending on the mental object. I may also be over-interpreting my meditation experiences. :P
Yeah, I think you’re right. I just feel unclear or unfocused even though I actually perceive everything pretty clearly and reasonably focused. It was kind of weird to notice that. :)
I haven’t had those waves of pain after I noticed that most of the unclarity was illusory. The waves might have had something to do with being unsatisfied with unclarity and having a very clear perception of this dissatisfaction. My theory is that all this goes into a feedback loop if you don’t know that the objects of focus are actually supposed to seem unclear.
My mind cannot produce mental images (trust me, I’ve tried) so I don’t have visual hallucinations but I had this funny abstract thing. I perceived what I knew to be mathematical constructs yet they had no content or representation. It was a very strange feeling doing math with empty symbols that still brimmed with possibilities.
After getting my mind to calm down about not perceiving clearly I got a big boost in attentional width. I was perceiving vibrations effortlessly in all the senses and thoughts. I guess most of them were vibrating under 10Hz… I’m still pretty bad at getting the precise frequencies down. It was like bathing in a sea of vibration and the surprising thing was that it actually wasn’t surprising at all. It was like these vibrations have always been there and I just haven’t been paying attention to them. It was actually somewhat boring just sitting there attending to a colorless and clear perception of everything.
On the second time I achieved a wider attentional width I decided to take a look at the attender himself. That is I tried to see how I see all these mental objects as mine. It would seem that the “self” is a process that draws in attention when a new mental object presents itself. It then accesses statistics that tell how much attraction and aversion this kind of object deserves. It also carries a measure of uncertainty. Sometimes the data aren’t reliable and attention is needed to sort things out. Towards the end of the process the mental object is labeled desirable or undesirable and actions are taken to hold on to the object or to get rid of it. Statistics are updated depending on the success of the actions. The process thus reinforces itself and the statistics get more rigid on each iteration. Sometimes the process just tells you that you’re liking this thing and already trying to get it without asking much of an input. Attention can however interfere and decide to reject attractive objects or accept unattractive objects. As a result the statistics get more flexible and next time more thought is given to similar mental objects. I’m also guessing that emotions and more primitive reactions act to skew the statistics depending on the mental object. I may also be over-interpreting my meditation experiences. :P