An interesting SD sit this weekend.....

[PsiloPutty]

Did the first hour with Do-Nothing, the second hour with mantra repetition, and planned to just wing it after that . At about the 1:45 mark, I was a complete blank screen. No thoughts, no sense of presence, no identity. I was like a lump of coal that could sit there forever and ever. After a couple minutes of that, I felt a strange feeling of sadness and hopeless desperation creeping in like a fog, but it was from a memory that was taking shape, rather than my own mood/feelings at the time.

The memory that took shape so vividly was a day when I must have been 18 or 19. I hadn't thought of this day in 25 years, yet recalled everything. I'd come home from work to eat my lunch, and I only had a short time before I had to go back to the store. It was, I think, the lowest time in my life. I was abjectly lost. Severe depression was a theme of my life in those late teen years. I was dangerously close to latching onto and following the call of suicide that came to me, and that day at lunch was the closest I'd come to simply giving in and doing it. My mother, my sweet mother, she knew I was down and wanted so badly to make her baby OK. She had no idea, though, the thoughts that I was entertaining. She made me a toasted cheese sandwich with tomato soup, and as I told her how good it tasted, I thought that this could be my last meal. I had a pheasant gun at the time, and knew that ending my suffering was a trigger pull away. I thought how all my co-workers would wonder why I hadn't come back from lunch. I stared at my soup and thought all this as I chewed.

Sitting in meditation, never stopping my mantra, I relived this entire memory, but from a detached position. It was like I experienced the whole thing again, but from an observer's POV. I sat and cried. Silent tears running down my face and neck and chest in the darkness. The tears were an observer's sympathy and compassion for that poor boy. He was so inconsolable, so tragically lost. My whole body shook for probably 5 minutes. 

I calmed down and went on to finish the sit, but felt like I moved past some aspect of my ego and shadow that was hanging out in my subconscious. I feel lighter. Thanks for reading, and I hope you're having a good Monday.   

 

[phoenix666]

wow, sounds like a deep, healing experience :3 deep wounds can't but heal in the presence of compassion and self-love <3

[PsiloPutty]

My love-friend, you are right! I focused love on the memory when it was done. Have you read "Be Love Now" by Ram Dass? It'd be right up your spiritual alley.