Week 5:

I got this great suggestion from Dr. Fields in reply to my Week 3 blog.

“I've found success with mantras as "breath prayers" (Richard Foster talks about those in his books on spiritual disciplines, not from an LDS perspective but you may still find them very relevant). Something like "Lord Jesus Christ have mercy on me." Other popular mantras are "thy will be done". You could use any of the short phrases you've already identified. Sticking with one for a week might be a good discipline. Easy to remember a simple phrase. Maybe you do it for a minute or two in the morning. Then you can also pick a trigger to remind you come back to it. Like picking up a pencil or every time you go through a door. Something common but not too common.”

(I actually did this for a while with “Please help me Father” a few years ago)

I think I’ll try that this week. It’s a great idea to have a “trigger activity”.

I’m going to move away from the Omvana meditation this week (though I really like it) and try something else, maybe a guided mindfulness meditation.

In preparation, I listened to this great interview with Jon Kabat- Zinn about

mindfulness on the radio program Here & Now which aired 10/22/15.

A few interesting points mentioned in the interview:

-Kabat- Zinn  developed the MBSR program for pain patients

-Shift from doing to being produces major changes in brain structure. Learn to rest in the domain of your own being, which involves wakefulness.

Are you embodied? Air on skin, breath moving in and out

We are continually distracting ourselves—devices

Use technology to extinguish other destructive aspects of technology

Put the welcome mat out and turn toward the sensations of your body (chronic pain) Befriend your pain. Transform your relationship to it so it doesn’t destroy you

We suffer from the disease of mistaking our thoughts for truth. A thought is an event in the field of awareness. Thoughts are like storms in the mind—they’re like weather patterns. Recognize them but don’t judge them. You can “surf the waves” of your thoughts.

I had to learn to “surf the waves of my negative thoughts” to effectively deal with OCD at a fairly early age. I am good at detaching myself from wild, wacky OCD thoughts and letting them come and go, but I need to learn to do that with other types of thoughts too.

Eat two raisins over 15 minutes over a period of time. Can you see the sunlight and the rain inside the raisin?

Kabat- Zinn is the author of the following:

Full- Catastrophe Living

Mindfulness for Beginners (CD & Book)

From Wikipedia article on mindfulness:

“Mindfulness and mindfulness meditation, focus on becoming aware of all incoming thoughts and feelings and accepting them, but not attaching or reacting to them.”

The Five-Aggregate Model of the Mind

A deeper understanding of the concept of mindfulness can be obtained by probing into in-depth teachings of Buddhism. For example, the Five-Aggregate Model of the Mind enables one to understand:

1. the moment-to-moment manifestation of subjective conscious experience from a first-person perspective.

2. that the present moment is experienced as a visual, tactile, olfactory, auditory, taste or as a stimulus-independent thought, and the past and the future are experienced only as thoughts in the present moment. (they are brought to the table of short- term, or working memory)

3. the need to consider two levels of analyses (namely conventional reality and absolute reality); a distinction made by Aristotle and also present in major religions. In the context of mindfulness, this distinction appears to be especially important when conducting scientific analyses and in analyzing the brain.

Monday:

I tried this mindfulness guide:

Mindfulness Meditation- Guided 10 minutes- The Honest Guys (YouTube)

Tuesday:

I lay still in bed and focused on breathing. This was harder than it might seem because naturally I take short, shallow breaths. Some meditation experts recommend breathing in through the nose for 4 seconds and then out through the mouth for 6, focusing on the “still point” between inhaling and exhaling. Focusing so much on my own breathing was difficult for me, it actually created some anxiety, so I need to work on that more—maybe just adapt it to my natural style of breathing. I need to be able to focus on breathing without trying to control it.

I also practiced just letting thoughts and emotions come into my head, acknowledging them, and just letting them go again without assigning an action or value to them. This isn’t so hard, but not reacting emotionally to your thoughts and feelings is more difficult.

I think mindfulness meditation poses an interesting challenge to someone with OCD. People with OCD are often intensely aware of their own thoughts. They seem to have a special capability for introspection and metacognition. They are also prone to an excess of disturbing or upsetting thoughts. The OCD cycle occurs when a disturbing, usually irrational thought comes into the mind, it causes an emotional overload, and the OCD sufferer deals with both by creating and repeating a ritual. Sometimes that ritual is physical, such as repeated hand washing or checking behaviors, sometimes it is purely mental, like repeating a mantra.

Common treatment techniques focus on helping an OCD sufferer to step back, view a disturbing thought objectively as something like a sound coming through an open window or a passing car, and then let it go without acting on it or ritualizing it. I taught myself how to do this many years ago, so in essence I’ve been practicing a form of mindfulness mediation for some time. I could be better at it though. I’m good at acknowledging and dismissing really wacky thoughts, but some disturbing are more plausible and thus harder to dismiss. Good motivation for continuing to learn mindfulness.

Wednesday:

Mindfulness Meditation: ProfessorBrutus Acceptance of Thoughts & Feelings  (YouTube)

"Remember that your intention is not to feel better, but to get better at feeling."

“Let the breath breathe itself. Bring attitude of generous allowing and gentle acceptance to the rest of your experience. There is nothing to be fixed, no state to be achieved, simply allow your experience to be your experience.”

(ACCEPTANCE of thoughts and feelings, even if they are apparently in conflict)

Bring patience and gentle curiosity to your experience.

Thursday:

I purchased a book today called “The Joy of Meditation” by Justin F. Stone.  He approaches meditation from an Indian and Chinese viewpoint, which is something I haven’t explored much yet.

As I am sometimes inclined to do, I began with the last chapter, which is entitled “How and Why does Meditation Work?’

In this chapter, Stone talks a lot about learning and how habits are formed. He says the Sanskrit word “vasana” means “habit- energy”, or that which has become habitual, and describes the vasanas we create as “grooves on the brain.” According to Stone, the goal of meditation is to erase the old destructive vasanas so we may create new affirmative ones. Stone says, “Many sages have said that meditation is our true state. How much you are willing to change your life to abet Meditation- as Meditation will in turn change you- is entirely up to you. It is worth thinking on these things.”

Friday

Guided 10-Minute Meditation with Andy Puddicombe  (YouTube.)

Since focusing on breathing and the body seems to be so central to effective meditation, I need to find a way to do so without creating anxiety or trying to control my own breathing. Puddicombe suggests counting breaths in his guided meditation. This seems to help me to be aware of breathing without trying to impose control.

Week 4:

I decided this week to spend another week on Vishen Lakhani's 6-phase guided meditation from Omvana.com. I didn't really feel I had gotten everything I could have out of it. I felt some success with the first phase, which is compassion, but phases 2-5 were difficult because they involved recalling certain things and people from the past and envisioning the future and goal- setting. The six phases again are:

1. Compassion

2. Gratitude

3. Forgiveness

4. Future Dreaming

5. Perfect Day

6. Blessing

I decided I would actually do some pre-meditation visualization about phases 2-5 before I began my meditation, so I took them one at a time.

Phase 2: Gratitude:

According to Vishen, gratitude is the strongest link to mental wellbeing and happiness. Most of us are victims of "the gap". We have decided that to be happy we need to hit some future set of goals. Once we hit these goals, we can be happy. Once we arrive at that point, we realize that we're not really happy. We feel a need to look ahead again, set more goals, arrive at them, and THEN we'll be happy. Vishen says we should really be looking at the "reverse gap". The reverse gap is gratitude. We need to look at where we were and how far we've come. This is the way to be happy, and our brains perform best when we're happy.

People who embrace gratitude have been shown to have more energy, higher emotional intelligence, less depression, and more feelings of being socially connected. Practicing gratitude is an easy way to immediately boost happiness levels.

Vishen's phase on gratitude asks you to think about 3- 5 things you are grateful for in your personal life, your job, and about yourself. Because this was difficult for me, I ended up making a list of things in these areas and referring to it before I meditated.

Phase 3: Forgiveness:

For this phase, I also made a small list of people I need to forgive and that I would ask to forgive me. This was easier- I didn't need to think too hard to pick out people to forgive.

Forgiving becomes easier if we consider what is called "primary attribution error." PAE occurs when we attribute another person's actions to their personality, or their personal feelings toward us, rather than the situation the person acting toward us finds themselves in.  Combined with the natural human tendency to be on the alert to threats to our own safety, the primary attribution error makes it very easy to feel threatened or to take offense when none was intended. Evidence has shown that a person's actions toward another are far more influenced by situational factors than we tend to believe.

Phase 4: Envisioning the Future:

In this phase, Vishen asks you to envision your life three years in the future. Where do you want to be then? He says we tend to overestimate what we can accomplish in one year, but we underestimate what we can accomplish in three years. A good goal should scare you a little and excite you a lot. He suggests organizing future goals into the areas of experiences, growth (new skills, languages, fitness levels, etc.) and contributions.

I've never been much of a goal- driven person, so this was hard for me. Again, I made a list to refer to before meditating. I picked some goals that were within my control and current abilities, and some that I have no idea how I will accomplish.

Phase 5: Envisioning the Perfect Day:

This phase involves envisioning what to you would be the perfect day, from sunrise to sundown. I made a list for this phase too.

Vishen is careful to point out that successful envisioning needs to involve all 5 senses. What does your perfect day smell like? What does your future taste like?  Interesting questions. I think my future tastes like waffles and bacon. Maybe country fried steak, eaten without guilt.

Wednesday was the first time I tried the guided meditation having studied my list first. It was much more rewarding to go through the phases having prepared by studying my list first. Having these things fresh in my mind made it easier to think of other things, especially for the gratitude category.

I noticed a tangible lift to my spirits and my mental state following my meditation that day. The boost to my mood lasted for an hour or more. I went for a walk in the neighborhood after that. I introduced myself to a new neighbor and chatted for a minute, retrieved a ball from the street for some school kids and talked to them for a minute, and generally felt happy. I would say it was my best meditation session yet. For someone who struggles with depression, to feel "up" for even an hour or two is very valuable.

I consider myself a religious person and have prayed all my life in a specific way, that being to address God, thank Him for blessings, ask Him for what is needed, and then to end the prayer. It's easy to fall into rote repetitions with this method since I've been doing it since I was a child.

I think my experience with this 6- phase meditation, especially Wednesday, might be a more effective way of praying. The final phase of the meditation, after you have extended compassion and forgiveness to others, thought about specific things you are grateful for, and envisioned your goals and perfect day, is to call down the blessings and affirmation of a higher power (or your own inner strength) to make these things come true! What a great way to pray!

I'm thinking of my next meditation goals in terms of what we've learned in class about expert knowledge versus amateur knowledge. I'd like to try a different guided meditation, but in searching YouTube for interesting possibilities, I got over 1,000,000 results! The possibilities for where to go next are mind- boggling.

Expert knowledge about meditation would allow me to focus on principles I want to achieve and identify patterns across a domain of information and knowledge. As a novice, my efforts are still just hit-or-miss. What's the best way to go from being a novice meditator to an expert in 4 weeks or less? Maybe I need to do more research on the principles of meditation.

I still need to find a meditation community I'm comfortable with for some feedback and learning reinforcement, although I felt like I did pretty well on my own this week.

Week 3:

Last week I decided I would begin meditating using Dr. Wayne Dyer's "I am" mantra. In order to prepare for that, I made a list of 21 action- centered "I am" mantras to use in my meditation. My list is below:

I printed it off and pinned it to the wall next to my bed. It was my intention to read through the qualities every day, eventually memorizing them and repeating them in my meditation. The idea was an immediate failure. I hated the list. In the first place, it was too long. If working memory can only hold 7 pieces of information, plus or minus two, how was I going to hold 21 "I ams" in my working memory in order to meditate on them? It occurred to me later that I would have better luck breaking them down into groups of 4-6 and maybe meditating on each group every day, or one group a week.

Even that idea didn't make me like "the list" though. I happened to show it to my mother. She thought it was "too self- critical" and I tended to agree. Thinking about the things I wanted to be causes me to focus on the things I'm not, when they're presented in this way. I have a problem with self- criticism anyway. I didn’t feel like focusing on the things I’m not would lead me to effective meditation.

The third problem is that I have a very short attention span. There's nothing about a list of words on a page that captures and keeps my attention for very long. I just couldn't meditate using this technique, at least not at first.

Abandoning my "I am" list, I decided to pursue further the idea of guided meditation. It seems the idea of meditating with the guidance of an expert is what will place me in the zone of proximal development.

I downloaded the Omvana phone app for Vishen Lakhiani's 6-phase meditation. The six phases again are:

1. Compassion

2. Gratitude

3. Forgiveness

4. Future Dreaming

5. Perfect Day

6. Blessing

Each phase is a guided meditation with Vishen walking you through each step. You begin with phase one on the first day, the second day you do phase one and two, etc., until you are doing all six phases every day. Being that it's Friday evening, I have gone through phase five.

I like Vishen's voice and his manner. He's easy to listen to. It seems to be much easier for me to concentrate and keep my attention with someone guiding me.

I felt immediate success with phase one. It begins with relaxation exercises to place you in a meditative state. You start by focusing on your breathing, and then on various parts of your body from your head to your feet. You then begin thinking about compassion, visualizing warmth and white light. The white light of compassion first touches your head, then envelops you, your house, your neighborhood, your city, your country and then your whole world. You repeat a suggested phrase such as, "may you be free of pain and sorrow, may joy and peace fill your heart" and extend that good wish gradually to everyone around you until the good wish fills the world.

The succeeding steps were more difficult for me. Phase two asks you to think about 3- 5 things you are grateful for in your personal life, your job, and about yourself. I had a hard time with this.

Focusing on forgiving and being forgiven in step 3 wasn't so hard, but I wondered if repeating "I forgive you and ask you to forgive me" with a certain person in mind would really bring about such feelings. I'm skeptical.

Phase 4, future dreaming, asks you to envision your future. Phase 5 asks you to envision the perfect day. I had a really hard time doing these "on the fly" during the course of the meditation. Perhaps I'll have to take some extended time pondering over these phases and even write something out, or at least have it firmly implanted in my mind. I've always had a difficult time envisioning my own future.

The other challenge this week was simply staying motivated to do even the simple guided meditation I’d chosen. I’ve pretty much pursued meditation solo at this point, but I’m really starting to see the value in having a social connection—a community of learners, or at least a community of practitioners to share meditation experiences and challenges with and (hopefully) gain encouragement from. I definitely need to ask a friend or someone else to follow up with me every few days to see how I’m doing. I thought perhaps my initial question posted on Facebook a few weeks ago would garner some un- prompted follow- up from friends, but such has not been the case.

My goal this coming week will be to find and engage myself with a meditation community, probably online, and one “real” person that will help me progress toward my goal by following up with me. I’ll probably try another guided meditation of some kind, and see if I can find a short book or two at the library.

Mantras

One of the suggestions I received was that I start learning to meditate by choosing and beginning to use a mantra. According to Wikipedia, the origin of the word mantra is Sanskrit. It consists of the root  man- meaning “to think” and the suffix -tra, designating tools or instruments, hence a literal translation would be "instrument of thought" (“Mantra”, n.d.)

There is no generally accepted definition of the word mantra because its meaning is different across a wide variety of spiritual and meditative practices. In popular culture, the word “om” or the phrase “om mani padme hum”, repeated while in a meditative stance, is often what comes to mind when the word is mentioned. In reality, a mantra could be any “sacred utterance, numinous sound, or a syllable, word, phonemes, or group of words (that has) psychological and spiritual power…

A mantra may or may not have syntactic structure or literal meaning; the spiritual value of a mantra comes when it is audible, visible, or present in thought. In more sophisticated forms, they are melodic phrases with spiritual interpretations such as human longing for truth, reality, light, immortality, peace, love, knowledge and action.”  (“Mantra”, n.d.)

While I’m not particularly attracted to the idea of repeated chanting of “om” or some other phrase, or of chanting aloud in general, I do like the idea that a mantra can be melodic and somehow related to music. I think music is very powerful in its effect on the human mind. Music is very important in my life.

Thinking about mantras brings to mind something my mother mentioned to me earlier this year. She had watched a PBS program featuring the late Dr. Wayne Dyer in which he talks about meditation and mantras. Dyer is definitely a proponent of meditation. On his blog, (www.drwaynedyer.com/blog/sounds-i-love)

he states, “ Mediation is a vital practice to access conscious contact with your highest self. He suggests a mantra based on the name God called himself when he spoke to Moses in the book of Exodus in the Old Testament. That name is “I am that I am.”

According to Dyer, when we use the phrase “I am” as a mantra, it has an immediate affirming quality and connects us to Deity or a higher power. It helps us to feel accepted for who we are, connect to God, and enables us to move forward with our “divinely- inspired desires.”  You then follow the “I am” with a variety of positive adjectives that describe your current good qualities, or qualities you would like to possess.

Over time, use of the “I am” mantra allows you to break the cycle of “I am nots” that we are conditioned to allow to dominate our thinking. “I am not smart.” I am not a good person.” “I am not lovable.” “I am not a good potential spouse or provider.” “I am not attractive.” All of these are common negative statements that we allow to creep into and dominate our thinking.

I’m very attracted to really making the “I am” mantra work for me because I myself am often dominated by negative thinking. I tend to disbelieve positive things that are said about me and even positive things I might believe about myself. I’ll admit to casually trying the “I am” meditation a few times earlier this year without much success. There’s always a voice of doubt in the back of my mind that says “yeah, right!” That being the case, perhaps a nonsensical mantra might work better for me.

The other danger in using the “I am” meditation in my case relates to a couple of things I learned in this week’s reading. One relates to entity vs. incremental theories of motivation. Entity theory says that intellectual ability is highly stable and cannot be changed much either by effort or lack thereof. Incremental theory says that intellectual abilities are modifiable through experience and effort. If meditation and mantras are to be used as mechanisms of change, then I think it’s important to avoid structuring a mantra in such a way that it reinforces “entity theory thinking.” For example, my saying “I am smart” as part of my mantra is useless because I know I’m smart—I’ve been smart my whole life. It doesn’t motivate any change. It doesn’t make me aspire to be something better than I am.

This also ties into the Scientific American article we read this week entitled “The Secret to Raising Smart Kids.” The article stresses that placing too much attention and praise on a child’s talent, intelligence, or innate ability can actually be counterproductive to achievement. Instead, it’s better to teach children a “growth mind- set” which focuses on effort, persistence, and the acceptance of failure as part of real achievement. So my “I am” mantra should stress descriptors that inspire action, effort, and persistence, and forgiveness of failure rather than just focusing on my already- established innate qualities.

I’m going to write some action- based “I am” mantras out rather than just hoping they spring to mind when I try to mediate with them:

I am energetic

I am committed

I am dedicated

I am persistent

I am driven

I am hungry

I am vibrant

I am teachable

I am a teacher

I am a student

I am trustworthy

I am motivated

I am a finisher

I am focused

I am animated

I am strong

I am healthy

I am imperfect but I am improving

I think I will start meditating with these “I am” statements this week, printing them out and reading them at first before I internalize them.

Another interesting idea came to me last week that relates to mediation, and I suppose to mantras as well. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter –day Saints (LDS or Mormon Church) held its bi-annual general conference in Salt Lake City. I belong to that faith and consider myself a religious person. One of the Speakers, Devin G. Durrant, gave a talk in which he described what he called “Ponderizing”.

As Durrant describes it, “Ponderizing” is choosing a verse of scripture each week and placing it where you will see it every day. Then, you read or think of the verse several times each day and ponder the meaning of its words and key phrases throughout the week. It’s a combination of 80% extended pondering and 20% memorization. Durrant states the primary goal of ponderizing is “to provide an uplifting place for your thoughts to go.”

“Ponderizing” sounds like a meditation technique to me, with the passages of scripture functioning as a mantra. I shall have to try that as well.

9/28/15

As an assignment for my learning theory class, we're required to learn a skill. I've decided the skill I will learn is meditation.

A little background: I've struggled with an overactive mind and racing thoughts since childhood. I've never been formally diagnosed, but it's probably a symptom of OCD. Depression and anxiety are often symptoms that go along with that, and I've had problems with them as well. I've had counseling off and on over the years and my counselors usually recommend meditation. I've even tried it a time or two in their offices, just to "go along" with them. My father, who has a PhD. in child development and family relations, has also suggested meditation. However, I've never had the patience or the commitment to really learn the skill. I've also found myself skeptical about any real benefit it could be to me. I've said to myself, "how hard can it be to sit quietly and think of nothing? What good could it possibly do?"

Now, with a class grade on the line and fresh motivation (my acceptance to graduate school) to train my mind to focus, concentrate, and think more productively, I'm going to try this meditation thing again.

I thought I would begin my journey with some research. I first went to Google. Doesn't everyone go to Google these days? It led me to this great article on the Forbes magazine website entitled "7 ways meditation can actually change the brain."

http://www.forbes.com/sites/alicegwalton/2015/02/09/7-ways-meditation-can-actually-change-the-brain/

Having read it, I was actually quite intrigued and excited about how meditation could change my brain and improve my life!

My next stop was Wikipedia, where I read the entry on meditation. I was intrigued by these quotes:

            "Meditation in the broad sense of a type of discipline, found in various forms            in many cultures, by which the practitioner attempts to get beyond the      reflexive, "thinking" mind (sometimes called "discursive thinking" or "logic")            into a deeper, more devout, or more relaxed state. ("Meditation", n.d.)

I'm very attracted to the idea of trying to get past my own logic or "discursive thinking" since it's been often stated by friends and family that it "hangs me up" more often than it should. It's even an obstacle to my learning how to meditate in the first place. After all, how do you know if you’re having any success learning something that’s inside the mind? A behaviorist would say learning to meditate successfully is not scientifically or objectively measurable. I could really fake the whole thing, but I’m really hoping to learn something that will improve my life.

More from Wikipedia:

            “Scholars have noted that "the term 'meditation' as it has entered       contemporary usage" is parallel to the term "contemplation" in Christianity,   but in many cases, practices similar to modern forms of meditation were        simply called 'prayer'. Christian, Judaic and Islamic forms of meditation are       typically devotional, scriptural or thematic, while Asian forms of meditation   are often more purely technical.” ("Meditation", n.d.)

            "In the West, meditation is sometimes thought of in two broad categories:      concentrative meditation and mindfulness meditation. These two categories           are discussed in the following two paragraphs, with concentrative meditation           being used interchangeably with focused attention and mindfulness            meditation being used interchangeably with open monitoring,

            Direction of mental attention... A practitioner can focus intensively on one      particular object (so-called concentrative meditation), on all mental events            that enter the field of awareness (so-called mindfulness meditation), or both            specific focal points and the field of awareness.

            One style, Focused Attention (FA) meditation, entails the voluntary focusing of attention on a chosen object. The other style, Open Monitoring (OM)       meditation, involves non-reactive monitoring of the content of experience      from moment to moment." ("Meditation", n.d.)

The following day, I spent a few minutes in bed before getting up trying to listen to, and focus on my own breathing.

This year I've put a renewed focus on exercise. I've never really mastered running and I haven't done it for years, but this week I ran a few times. It led me to think about the way meditation and running might work together. Running forces me to be mindful about things like breathing and what's going on with my body.

My next step in researching meditation was to post the following question on my Facebook page:

“For one of my grad school classes, I'm researching meditation. Do any of you meditate regularly, and if so, is there a particular technique you use? What were some things that helped you learn how to meditate?”

My old high school friend Darren Lamb was one of the responses. He teaches a 1-hour introductory meditation class. I think this might be a good way to begin, since social cognitive theory says learning is often best accomplished in a social context, even though meditation is a highly individual activity.

From Darren Lamb's Facebook post: “On the first Sunday of every month i teach a free class at the Gracie Jiu Jitsu academy in Sugarhouse. Classes start at 4:00. If you go to www.theworstbuddhist.com you can find all the info in the very top post.”

Some other friends replied with suggestions for beginning books, authors, websites and materials on mediation.

            Beginner Books & Materials on Meditation:

            Pema Chodron

            8 Minute Meditation Expanded: Victor Davich

            Kelly Howell

            Kenji Kumara

            Miracle of Mindfulness: Thich Nhat Hanh

            Search Inside Yourself: Chade- Meng Tan

            Guided Meditations for Busy People (CD) Bodhipaksa

            Headspace.com

            15-minute mind hack: Vishen Lakhiani

Another high school friend, Jeannette Maw, suggested I watch a YouTube video on meditation called "15-Minute Mind Hack by Vishen Lakhiani, which I did. In this video, he explains and demonstrates a 6-phase meditation with the following phases:

There is also a phone app at his website, omvana.com.

I ran out of time to do any further research or experimentation on meditation this week, but I think for next week I will download Vishen's app and try his 6-phase meditation every day. The beauty of it is that it is effective even if you have only a few minutes each day to do it. That seems like it would fit well into my busy schedule right now.