My meditation journal

[Thittato]

3 rounds of Wim Hof breathing, weigth-lifting, and cold shower, today. Sweet. Maybe one of the reasons why I don't get so high from this anymore (but still very refreshed!) is because in general I have calmed down so much after I started with this practice, so the contrast with my normal baseline state is not so big anymore. That was probably why I was so obsessed about getting into deep states of meditation before as well - I needed the escape from the chronic state of stress I was walking around in.

[Thittato]

3 rounds of Wim Hof breathing and a cold shower to seal off what has been an amazing day.

This day started off with me going to the hospital where I work to get my second dose of the corona-vaccine, so finally I'm fully vaccinated. It was a fun event hanging out with my co-workers. Then I went home and rested for a good time. I was pretty tired today so I needed some down-time. Fortunately I didn't get ill from the vaccine this time. The first dose I was ill for 3 days. Felt like a flu. But the first dose was AstraZeneca, and here in my country it was taken out of the vaccine-program because of the problems with it, so for the second dose I was getting Pfizer. I wasn't exactly happy to being with about getting to different types, but in the end I just surrendered to the whole thing and now I'm fet up about thinking about it. We had some good humour about becoming these AstraZeneca/Pfizer hybrids.

So later in the evening I went climbing with some friends. We have a bouldering park near-by. I'm totally going to get more into climbing again. I used to do it as a kid, and I have always loved climbing buildings, monuments, and trees, so that is totally something I have a natural inclination for. For now, since I'm into so many things, it seems like a chill approach to just go and hang out in the park and do some chill bouldering together.

Then there was a work-meeting on skype. That was also fun. I'm really starting to love my co-workers. They are becoming like my second family in many ways.

And then fortunately the work-meeting was over in time so that I could go to the skatepark and get those last 45 min of skating before they closed. I didn't think I would make it today, but fortunately I did, and that was also totally amazing.

And now I'm feeling really ready for this skydiving course that is starting on sunday. Fully vaccinated and all.

Holy schmokes how much processing there has been around this skydiving course. Hahha.

Seems like I'm not judging myself anymore for being into so many things. Especially this experience of being in the same job for 3 years now has really given me a solid foundation in life. But I also think there is some natural intuitive intelligence driving my explorations. I felt pretty stuck in many ways before I found this skydiving course, but somehow that became like a natural next step to take to continue my process in life. Like I was searching for some new challenge and learning-experience, and then suddenly something said click (after a long process of exploring if this was the right thing to go for.)

Maybe this is a sport that I will have a long life in, or maybe it will lead to something totally different, or maybe I just need to go and do it and get it out of my system so I can go on with my normal life, or maybe I will chicken out before I even make the first jump, but whatever it will be I totally needed the process that made me sign up for this.

[Thittato]

45 min meditation this morning, and then a cold shower. I was really astounded when I woke up this morning how much anxiety that seems to be gone from my system. The cold exposure therapy that I have been doing seems to have been very efficient in getting my nervous system into balance. I wonder to what extent this will continue to last. If I can get completely rid of all my psychic imbalances then I will become a completely different person from the person I have been my whole life. It seems like that is the direction that I'm moving in. So much self-loathing and stuff that seems to be gone. I seem to be moving into a great acceptance for how I'm configured as a person and how my life has become.

A few years ago I was diagnosed both with bipolar 2 disorder and borderline personality disorder. After spending 3,5 intense years in gestalttherapy, which ended 2 years ago, I was getting to a point where I felt that a lot of my traumas had been healed and that those diagnoses were no longer relevant. But there was still quite some anxiety left in my system, even though it was at a much more tolerable level, and there was also still quite some chaotic patterns in my life left, having had such a unstable way of being in life for such a long period, so I figured I needed to just continue to stay in my job in order to be at the same place for a long time to settle down into a more stable identity. Now I have been there for 3 years, and I'm starting to like more co-workers more and more. I'm getting a really strong sense of belonging to that place. And with this last half a year of doing the Wim Hof method, it seems like the healing process has further increased.

The healing I'm experiencing is a combined effect of:

- 20 years of meditation

- 3, 5 year in therapy which ended 2 years ago (they say if you get the right type of therapy the healing process will continue to grow after therapy is ended)

- 3 years in the same job finding job stability and a sense of confidence and mastery.

- Almost half a year of focusing on the Wim Hof method.

The most important thing in all of this was psychotherapy. I'm pretty sure the good effects that it had would have continued to grow even without the Wim Hof method. But still, the Wim Hof method really does something significant in bringing my system further into balance.

 

[Thittato]

No practice yesterday. Today: A cold shower, so far. I was quite knocked out yesterday. I think it was the 2. vaccine dose I was getting on wednesday. I didn't get many symptoms, except feeling very tired, and some kind of sickening feeling that everything was a little bit disgusting, and some intense nightmares. But it was far from as bad as the first dose of AstraZeneca I had 3 months ago. That was like having a flu for 3 days. This second dose of vaccine I was given which was Pfizer felt more like microdosing on bat plague. Anyways, now it seems like I'm back to my normal self again.

[Thittato]

And then 3 rounds of Wim Hof breathing was completed for today. Ah, so nice.

[Thittato]

3 rounds of Wim Hof breathing and cold shower today as well. So nice! The worst part in the cold shower is the middle of my upper side of the back. Whenever that place has been fully immersed and it is no longer uncomfortable, then I'm fully relaxed.

[Thittato]

10 sun salutations, cold shower, and 3 rounds of Wim Hof breathing, this morning. So nice ?

[Thittato]

10 sun salutations, cold shower, and 3 rounds of Wim Hof breathing today as well. Grounding.

[Thittato]

Sauna-session today. 4 sessions in the sauna, each one finished by a cold shower. Love it!

[Thittato]

3 rounds of Wim Hof breathing, 10 sun salutations and a cold shower, today.  So grateful for this method.

[Thittato]

Cold shower and 10 sun salutations today. Busy days.

[Thittato]

10 sun salutations and a cold shower this morning. Awesome!

[Thittato]

First attempt at jumping out of an airplane, which failed :-(

So I’ve been at the skydiving course since sunday, and it has been pretty challenging so far, so I haven’t written anything about it here, but now is the time. On tuesday we were done with all examination and ready for jumping, but the weather didn’t allow any jumping until today. I was pretty glad for this because I had some major anxiety being triggered. I was asking the instructors if it was possible to do a tandem jump first were you jump attached to someone else and you have no responsibilty - like you are a passenger. So because of my anxiety I was asking if this could be a good middle way to get exposed to the experience first before jumping alone. When you jump alone the first time you have two instructors helping you out of the plane and to stabilize in free-fall until free-fall is finished and you pull out your canopy, and then you are on your own and you have to steer your canopy to the landing area. You also have to keep track of the altitude and you have to do some test pulls (« dummy pulls») in free fall and adjust your posture guided by hand-signals given by the instructors next to you in free-fall. I thought this was too much responsibility for me in my first jump because this anxiety was triggered, so I’ve been reading on some skydiving forums that many people recommend doing a tandem at first because of the sensory overload you get. I was asking my instructors about this and it was possible to arrange it, but they all thought I was able to just follow the program as everyone else. So I worked alot on my anxiety because I got time for it since the weather conditions were such that we couldn’t jump until today. So gradually I figured I was ready for just following the program. But today when we were up in the air and the door opened up there was just a huuuuuuge ‘NO’ in every parts of my being, so I had to tide down and land with the airplane again. Now I’m kind of disappointed at myself for not being able to do it, and at the same time I’m angry at the instructors for not really listening to me when I said I wanted to do a tandem first - but at the same time I’m not even sure I would have been able to do a tandem either. So now I’m down at the ground trying to figure out if I should do a tandem, or if I should just give up on the whole thing and realize that I’ve met some physical boundary that I’m not able to cross. It sucks to fall out of my group like this because the 9 others on the course (including my buddy I travelled with) all where able to do it and now they are continuing to prepare for their second and third jumps for the day and they are having a huge bonding experience around their success which I’m not part of. Yeah it sucks pretty bad. But it was impossible doing it with the level of freak out that I felt. My buddy didn’t feel any panic when he was on the way up. Another thing that has bugged me has been that it was impossible to write about this process here in my journal because I have felt so much anxiety around it, and I just wanted it to be a success story that I could finally write about after actually making the jump.

Maybe I was attracted to this thing out of a need to challenge myself, and now I’ve met my boundery and seen that it wont be possible to actually do what it takes to become a skydiver. Or maybe I just need to calm down and make a new try when I’m ready again.

It would at least have been awesome to at least make one tandem jump since I’ve invested so much in this, and then at least I can cross it off my bucket list. I wont be the same as actually doing 20 jumps and getting the A-license, but it sucks quite a bit having had this mental masturbation going on for months without it actually leading to anything. But you know, at some point you have a boundary and I guess if I have had this huge and intense fascination now for these months, and I meet my boundary and I cannot explore this fascination beyond only being an observer to this sport, well, then I guess that will eventually be fine as well.

Feels good to finally write something about it here at least. I guess it is a journey where I will learn something new about myself one way or another no matter what the end-result will be. So in the end I will integrate this whole exploration into something that I needed to explore and something that I learned a lot from no matter whether I become a skydiver or not.

It is not so bad just being honest about how the whole thing has been so far.

[Thittato]

Finally I did my first jump! :-D

Holy moly! This has been FUCKING INTENSE!

I met a really awesome guy yesterday who wanted to do a tandem jump with me. I told him how I failed with my first jump, and he made it sure that he would really love to help to get me over this barrier, so we could do a tandem-jump together so that I would experience the full experience of jumping out of a plane at 12500 feet, but not having to have any responsibility except just going along with his procedure. He even coached me to turn towards the fun and pleasant excitement before we entered the air-plane, so that I could sit during the plane-ride and nourish those feelings instead of the feelings of horror. Again, I almost pulled out of it when we were crawling towards the exit, trying to resist the forward movement weakly by trying to brake with my feet as he pulled forward, but he said condidently and friendly "this is going to be all fine." and I felt secure in just surrendering to his leadership and just accept what was going to happen. Then he said take a big deep breath and hold your breath, and we tipped out, in and then OUT and left the airplane. Holy fucking shit what a feeling that was accelerating into free-fall. The adrenaline pumped sky-high, and it was like being sucked into space and just like holy fucking wooooooooosh. And then in 2-3 seconds we reached stability in free-fall and the adrenaline calmed down and it was just SO FUCKING AWESOME lying there in the worlds most comfortable and huge air-pillow and just enjoy the most beautiful panoramic view I've ever seen. Interesting how one can stabilize both physically, mentally and emotionally in such a situation. It was just super-super-awesome, and the sense of victory over finally having gone over the edge, was just insaaaaaaane. To a little degree I question the level of consent that was in this process, but I had already made it clear that I had surrendered my will to his and that this was an experience I was desperate to have. I was entering the airplane on my own will and I enjoyed the air-ride until the door to jump out of went up, so lots of people on this course say that they freak out quite a bit when they have to move towards the door so the instructors helps us to just go along with the procedure - many of us sort of like freeze up and don't know in or out about anything in that short intense moment. Anyways, so I pulled the shoot, and that was also pretty fucking intense, and then it was such a relief when it opened totally fine and uncomplicated and I was just screaming "Yes, Yes, Yes, Thank you! Thank you!" He did two 360's, one in each direction, and then we started to gradually fly towards the landing area. I gave him a huge hug when we landed, and later today we are going to have a little chat about that experience. The skydiving community is like a big and supportive family welcoming new members and trying to help us go through the various rites of passage to become independent skydivers. I'm not entirely sure I will need anything more than just this one experience. I'm supposedly going to through 20 jumps in the process of learning to become an independent skydiver, but I failed at level 1 and have to re-do the first jump. Some schools recommend doing a tandem-jump first to expose yourself to the experience so that the sensory overload doesn't get too intense. I regret I didn't do a tandem-jump before I came here, but I think I would have freaked out if I just booked some random tandem-jump at some random dropzone. So if this is all that I get out of it, I'm already happy. It seems like I was really obsessed about this as an idea when I got a kick out of exploring skydiving on youtube for so long, but I might have already gotten my need to explore this in real life fullfilled. I mean, like, it is pretty fucking intense. Waaaaaaay more intense than I expected. I asked for a daddy who could pull me through this, and that is what I got. Hahhaha.

So now I will just give it some time and see how I integrate this experience. Do I want more of it, or am I saturated for a long time? Time will tell :-)

I just came back to the dropzone from a walk in nature, and the feeling of satisfaction in my being is really really deep.

Edited May 30, 2021 by Thittato

[Thittato]

And then I went and did 3 rounds of Wim Hof breathing and a cold shower, to further process this skydiving experience, and to continue to stay well-connected to my daily practice. Sooooo gooood <3

[Thittato]

Holy fucking fuck how high I've been today!

So me and my friend who I'm at this course with went in the evening to cool down in a beautiful creek just near by. It was surprisingly cold, pretty close to ice-bathing, but after the initial shock it felt like we could stay there forever, and holy fucking moses how beautiful the forest became as my mind was quiting down and the sensual experience increased due to the cold water. This was like on top of the insanely fucking awesome skydiving experience that kicked off this day. And the friendship I have with my friend - it is just getting more and more beautiful because of the bonding experience we are sharing on this course. We are sharing the same room - and we never seem to get tired of each other. So now I just had to round off the day with doing 3 more rounds of Wim Hof breathing. Everything is just too fucking awesome right now. I feel so utterly and completely fullfilled.

[Thittato]

3 rounds of Wim Hof breathing this morning, and then a cold shower. So nice. I still feel inspired from yesterday. Not as high today, yet, but just calm and satisfied.

[Thittato]

Went to the cold forrest river to do a morning bath this morning. So nice. It is so cold that it feels like ice-bathing. Then I went and did 3 rounds of Wim Hof breathing. Love it. 

Don’t think there will be anymore skydiving for me for this time. One jump was enough. It was perfect to do it together in tandem that person that I did it with. We have spoken alot about it afterwards. I feel saturated now. The tension that was seeking release has been released. If I want a «career» as a skydiver, I will have to go back to the training at a later point. Maybe I will do one more tandem later in the summer, and then I could do the training again next summer if I wanted to, and then I would know much more about what I’m going to. Or maybe it won’t happen at all, and that is also fine.

Thank God that at least I was able to get pulled through one skydive hahhhah.....

[Thittato]

Cold shower this morning. I’m travelling home from the course now. It was starting to become unbearable being the only one in the group who didn’t follow the normal progression. Everyone else was succeeding with their jumps and gaining a lot of self-esteem and mastery. I’m very sensitive, so this whole group-dynamic, combined with all the natural fears that skydiving brings up, and all the drills and training. It was just too much all of it. But the one tandem-jump that I did was a huge success. So I think I will just go home and process all this, and then do another tandem-jump later this summer. It still feels like this is something I would like to learn, so I will just have to take a bit slower route than the guys I was at this course with. Perhaps a few more tandem-jumps, and then I can do a new course again being more familiar with what I’m going to. When everything is so new to me I start to worry about everything and then both social anxiety and «jumping out of an air plane» anxiety kicks in really hard and I start to spiral downwards. Holy schmokes that was a lot to take in all at once. I’m glad I’ve been talking to a lot of people about this process. Many people has had a lot of fear in the beginning of their skydiving careers. I don’t think this is meant to be some crazy initiation ritual where either you belong to the group or not, but that is what it started to feel like, and I was putting way to much pressure on myself, and everything was just too much. Fortunately it was enjoyable as well. We had many fun evenings drinking beer together, and I spoke with a lot of awesome people who were visiting, and they all have such an awesome passion for skydiving. It was really interesting to observe this group of people from the inside, and even though I started to feel like the kid in class with «special needs,» everybody was very supportive and encouraging. So a lot of my own shit was triggered - like how I can feel like an outsider even though I’m included in the group. Seemed like to a large extent I could just relax in this feeling and still connect with people, but now enough is enough of this crazy pressure I’ve been under during this course. I will just process it all, lower my shoulders again, and probably go at it with fresh motivation again some time later in the future.

[Thittato]

Two cold showers today. Pretty nice. Back home again. Spending a lot of time processing all the impressions from the skydiving course. I’m pretty sure I will have to give it a new go soon enough. But it was wrong of me to travel to this course without having done a tandem-jump first. I was too impatient. The whole experience is such a rollercoaster. First the intense fear of jumping out of an air-plane, and then the sensory overload during free-fall. Many people say they are totally overstimulated during their first jump. I’m not going to jump out into the unknown like that, being unfamiliar with my free-fall skills and the gear and how to steer my canopy. I was totally ecstatic from all the beauty I experienced during my tandem-jump. This wild combination of fear and ecstacy combined with all the different technical phases one is going through in such a short period of time - not for me! I need to acclimatize to the landscape by doing more tandem-jumps first. I don’t identify with being bipolar anymore, after sucessfully going through therapy, but I think having had that diagnosis before is a clear indication that my highs and lows goes through a wider spectrum than most people, and this intense emotional rollercoaster that I experienced during this course - well, it didn’t feel safe to just jump into it alone and having to figure it out on my own while in this mixed state of intense feelings pulling me in all sorts of directions.

But my attraction towards skydiving is as great as ever. I think it is similar to the one I had to ice bathing. There is a tension there that I’m attracted to that will initially lead to great ecstacy, but then my job is to expose myself to it again and again so that it starts to level out and become more of a normalized experience.

The attraction also has to do with fear. I have never experienced fearing something as intensely as this, and then as soon as we were out of the plane there was great joy. I’m very currious about challenging my sense of fear this way.