Day Forty Two

I had the same few problems as Ma' today. Boredom, and out-of-gas. When you think boredom is a static state of no energy, no direction...look closer and find -- it's annoyance; anger. Displeasure at the present moment. Greed for something better. Look closer, and it's a desperation for something more stimuli-ful. It jumps onto food, water, bathroom, rest...If you're lucky enough to really not need any of those things, you get an opportunity to push the envelope on this. Boredom manifests behind my sternum; where I think my esophogus is located. Perhaps top of my diaphragm, but sometimes too high...In any event - interestingly -- that where all my high-energy feelings go -- anxiety, anger, anticipation, desire. Disappointment, tension, impatience, love, tenderness. Boredom is incredibly subtle; it also engages some tension in your arms and legs.

Boredom is an opportunity. It arises when we have no other strong or inviting stimuli - our attachments - like heartbeat, the anterior torso buzzing, buzzing in our face & palate, even our breath. It arises when things are slower, quieter, and more subtle. It's an opportunity for us to get closer, deeper, finer. A new challenge then arises - to not get attached to the quiet, and be annoyed when we are pulled out from fine to gross by a more gross object. Annoyance has lots of little quiet symptoms: hunger, thirst, urgency and tiredness are just some of them. Coiledness is another, and gerthenhert is another. Annoyance can sometimes be combatted by Kegels.

*Out-of-gas is the flip of hte same coin. Get closer. Keep assessing. If the channel of looking is low energy, see if we're ready for wide open-range awareness.

*Sometimes, it really does take an effort to think. When it does, keep the effort on awareness in the body.

*Today, we'd have spontaneous Mahasi-speak. Remembering, thoughtlets, thoughtlings. Seeing thoughts and the desire to think. Not so fine on our physical observation, though I did stay close much of the time. Phillip Pullman stories pulled so effortless - like a doggy daemon onto a golden monkey's paw.

*
~Thought is a fully formed conception.
~Thoughtling is a thought that's about to happen. You can sense some kind of baby animal lifting its head out of the sand, some kind of burrowing animal pushing up faint outlines into a blanket, starting to rise up. SOmetimes you're fast enough that you see the thoughtling before you see its face; you don't know what the thought was going to be, or you know what it was going to be about before you had it. That's a thoughtling.
~Thoughtlets are little flickered non-ideas - more fully formed than thoughtlings, but not as powerful or engaging as thoughts. If you do not find the strength to resist the temptation to think, even a small and colorless thoughtlet can grab you. They work in conjunction with boredom. Because when you're bored, your mind may be even too spaced or tired to form full thoughts. Instead, it gets hooked onto a passing train of thoughtlings.