My meditation journal

[Thittato]

Finished the last 15 min of todays meditation with a good session of walking-meditation. Surrendering into vulnerability and sadness.

[Thittato]

45 min meditation today. I'm feeling less vulnerable today. Still not super-interested in my meditation, but I was almost penetrating through the subtle resistance and boredom I had going. Feeling more normal again today after this failed romance. Feels like I have moved on now. It was inspiring to be back at my job tonight, whereas the two first days (this was the third) I felt really tired. Feeling closer connection with my co-workers. Getting back into my purpose.

[Artsu]

On 05/08/2020 at 6:31 AM, Thittato said:

 

Hehe....

Thanks for dropping by!

Hmmm..... When I took the Myers Briggs test some years ago I became ENFP

The tests are very inaccurate.

Not that my accuracy is close to 100%, but it's hopefully better than most tests.

[Thittato]

45 min meditation today. I finally pierced through this subtle resistance, boredom and dis-interest in meditation which have been going on lately (among the obviously much more challenging sensations which have also been going on). It was a feeling that finally my meditation got back into gear again. Later I also did a session of weight-lifting. Man Maker with dumbbells, and Double Kettlebell Snatch, are my favourite exercises. They are both full-body exercises. Perhaps it is because of my interest in yoga that I like full-body exercises so much. I'm going to do a session of yoga in the comming days as well. Seems like Man Maker, Double Kettlebell Snatch and Vinyasa Flow Yoga is a really excellent combination for superb physical fitness.

[Thittato]

45 min meditation today as well. Now I’m starting to get really fed up with this meditation routine, and I’m starting to look forward to the end of this month when this 3-month project will be over.

[Thittato]

45 min meditation today as well. Good flow again, but I think I will shorten my meditation down to 30 min per day after this month is over. After meditation I did weight-lifting. Burpees, Man Makers and Double Kettlebell Snatch. So inspired by these exercises.

[Thittato]

45 min meditation today. Meditation gave me some help, but I’ve felt tormented this whole day. I’m pretty dark about this second wave of corona looming on the horizon while fall is getting closer and I have booted myself into a failed romance which has ripped up in a lot of loneliness and hopelessness. I guess I need to take in the totality of what is going to take some work in the coming days / weeks. 

[Thittato]

Didn't sit yesterday, so I compensated today by doubling my sitting-time. First I sat for 1 hour, then I did weight-lifting, and then 1 hour with yin-yoga and then 30 min meditation. Pretty awesome session. I'm still a bit fed up with this 45 min of meditation per day commitment, so I'm looking forward to this month is over and I'm finished with this commitment. Only 12 days left.

[Thittato]

Totally awesome day at work this evening. Such a great flow. I was working with a bi-polar patient that I like very much. We have pretty awesome therapist / client chemistry. The most awesome moment was when she was lying in a reclining chair and I was doing a guided relaxation for her by playing guitar and singing mantras. She is so high in her mania right now that she talks non-stop all day long, but this was the only moment when she was quiet and she thought it was beautiful to listen to and she had tears in her eyes. She said it was a healing experience. With her it is a mutual experience of really appreciating someone. I see her, and she sees me. Pretty damn cool. Among all the challenging situations at my work, moments like these are what really makes it worth it. Feels like I'm back in my purpose again and that I have forgotten about this woman. I will find someone who is far better.

[Thittato]

45 min meditation today as well. Today it was finally deeply satisfying again.

[Thittato]

45 min today as well. A deep, rich, and fullfilling experience.

[Thittato]

Also did weight-lifting and running today. When this 3 month meditation project is over I think I'm going to go into a huge fitness-project. My goal is just to continue to build stability, self-esteem, inspiration, and life-quality. So fun that a clear project for the fall is beginning to appear. Meditation-Summer and Fitness-Fall. I almost did a session of yoga as well today after the running, but then when I started to calm down after the running I figured it was nice to not exaggerate and rather chill out instead. But maybe my fitness-project can be built around weight-lifting, running and yoga. I want to become as atletic as I can possibly get. But I think the primary focus should be weight-lifting, with yoga and running being supplements.

[Thittato]

45 min meditation today as well. My meditation was deep, soft, nice and mellow. Interesting how I was getting tired of my meditation only a few days ago, and now I’ve had three days in a row where it has been very fullfilling.

[Thittato]

45 min meditation today as well. Still good, but a bit more distracted today. I wasn't quite getting into gear, but I was surfing on the same momentum I've had these days.

[Thittato]

45 min meditation today as well. Today there was more suffering again. Much anger. My stepmom celebrated her 60th birthday on saturday. I was there, and that triggered a lot of shit in me. Basically my dad manipulated me to live with him when I was 12 and I was falling out with my mom. He used every means he could to turn me against her, instead of being a wise adult trying to soften the situation between us. I felt very unsafe living with my dad, because, among other things, he used to drink a lot (he still does but perhaps he has gotten a little softer over the years), but I was too proud to go back to live with my mom and since she didn't either have any good tools to resolve conflicts, I didn't find any other choice but to continue to live with my dad. Not long after I moved in with him, he found a new girlfriend, who had 4 kids who also came from a troubled home, so I got smashed in together with these troubled kids into a lot of chaos. There has been a lot of alcohol and/or drug-abuse among all of them, and they are all sort of a very gross type of blue-collar working-class people. With my spiritual, artistic and intellectual interests, and being a very sensitive and shy kid, it was very chaotic being grouped together with all these hooligans. Sounds pretty arrogant, hahha, I know, but damn it, they really are a bunch of hooligans. I just have to see it for what it is so that I can better understand my conflicted experience about that whole trauma-soup.

And I still experience periods of heart-brokenness about this failed romance I just recently had. So that was also feeding into what triggered me, because it reminds me so much, in a condensed version, of a very difficult romance I had from I was 15 to I was 19 that was part of all this chaos I was growing up in. I'm sure I was projecting a lot of this old experience into the new experience when I was dating this recent lady.

But now that I'm writing this I'm really glad that I actually went and celebrated my stepmom, because mentally I was already re-living this period of my life because that romance triggered up so much feelings from that period in my life, so as sort of a psychotherapeutic experience, it was actually perfect to further increase this type of exposure therapy by exposing myself to all these chaotic relationships. I felt like a victim afterwards, but now, thanks to writing about it, it becomes clear that I'm working on some deep shit that it was good to trigger up again.

Needless to say, I also have a lot of love for these people. They are part of who I am. We don't have any active conflicts, and there is always a lot of appreciation shown when we meet.. After over 20 years of history together with them, they have become my brothers and sisters.

So on to this next thing that is a very important part of my personal development: Strength training.

Finally I got my new dumbbells today. I gave away the two 4 kg ones to a friend of mine who is also starting with strength training, and now I have a new set of 8 kilos. Together with my set of 12 kg kettlebells, they are all the weight-lifting equipment that I'm focusing on these days. I've found some very very excellent exercises that I use them for, and I'm very very enthusiastic about this project. Together with meditation, weight-lifting is certainly what I need to boost my self-esteem and my masculinity. I cannot be this tall, sensitive and thin guy anymore, I have to put on just a little bit more weight and muscles so that I just look a little bit more robust - both for my own inner feeling, and for how people perceive me.

I was writing that I was going to really take off totally with fitness as a new project beginning next month, but actually I don't think I need to take it that far. I just need to continue as I do already. I've only been back with weight-lifting for about a month, and already I feel much more robust, and this is just the beginning, so I can just continue like this. No need to go all mental about it.

So here is a picture of my really excellent and simple weight-lifting equipment, hahaha. I feel so much joy when I look at these weights. They are my new power-amulets. Speaking of which, what I gave my stepmom as a birthday gift was actually an amethyst crystal that I've had for some months and that I appreciated a lot. I see that as a symbolic ritual in turning suffering into beauty through the spiritual transformation that happens through meditation practice. I could have given her some meaningless shit, but I actually gave her something that means a lot to me. And crystals are an excellent metaphor for the beautiful state of mind that meditation can produce when the flow is good.

[Thittato]

45 min meditation today as well. Very good and powerful sit. Only 6 days left of this 3 month project.

[Thittato]

45 min meditation today as well. Very good sit. Then weight-lifting after the sit. 2nd weight-lifting session of the week. I have a very good routine going now with that weight-lifting that I will keep up for a while before I start adding more repetitions - got to adjust to this program first.

Edited August 27, 2020 by Thittato

[Thittato]

45 min meditation today. Feels like I'm generally much more in process again. Todays session begins with pretty heavy emotional turmoil, but then I manage to "burn through" it, and feels empowered at the end of the sit.

[Thittato]

Hmmmmm. Back into wallowing in my family-background. I thought I was over this stuff. I wonder what I can do to get over it. Obviously this failed romance I just had triggered up a lot of this stuff again. It felt like for a long while I was done with all this stuff, but as soon as I develop feelings for someone a lot of it is triggered again. Even though we only met twice, we had 40 days of intense communication over chat, phone and videochat. It almost felt like I had a girlfriend again. It feels almost as if it was a short relationship, and as if now I’m single again and I have to re-orient again and get back in touch with old friends to fill up the empty whole this person left in my life. A bit over-dramatic perhaps, but I remember these cycles from actually being in relationships - it is like you zoom in on one person, and when that relationship is over you have to zoom out again, but you sort of only zoom out to get a good overview over the social landscape  (and have some fun) so that you can find a new person to zoom in on again.

I guess it will take a while to accept this loss and move on.

So far what has been the most meaningful after this has been:

- playing guitar

- weight-lifting

- my job

- re-connecting with female friends 

- connecting deeper with my co-workers

- cooking

- nature

- reading, listening to podcasts, and watching documentaries.

 

Maybe I need to just establish some kind of plan. Like how to get my life back on track by filling it up with as many positive activities as possible and try to reduce the time I spend wallowing in this stuff.

Like I should use some discipline. Like I’ve felt a new sense of mastery in my guitar-playing lately, for instance, and when that feeling is there I get filled with hope and joy, so I need to discipline myself into situations which gives me this sense of mastery and takes me away from wallowing in hopelessness and sadness.

[Thittato]

Gosh. I'm so much in process again. I've actually been working a bit with my gestalttherapist again. I've figured that when I'm hanging out with someone I really like my whole body goes into lockdown sort of, because of the trauma I experienced as a teenager when I experienced a very bad romantic situation for 4 years. Like both the romantic situation was really bad, but also the very insecure family situation I was in at this time which created a really bad platform for me to deal with these strong feelings I had for this girl. I guess it will take some work to untie this knot, but seems like we are facing it head on now.