Strong Determination Sitting Posture

[John West]

I find it very difficult to find a good SDS posture because I feel very strong pain in my body after 2,5h. I usally do it on a normal chair, however, when my bodyweight is sligtly on one side, I start feeling enormous pain on one part of my butt (where my bodyweight is). I tried cross-legged, but I feel extreme pain in my knees there, even after 30 min or so. Also, my legs fall asleep quickly and last time it happened in a SDS sitting, it didn't "woke up" completely for an hour or so. I dont know if I need more mindfulness abilities to reduce the suffering or if I can do something differently so that the pain is not as intense. I think without that pain, I could sit longer (not sure about that however).

Have you any posture or other recommendations?

[karkaore]

25 minutes ago, John West said:

I find it very difficult to find a good SDS posture because I feel very strong pain in my body after 2,5h. I usally do it on a normal chair, however, when my bodyweight is sligtly on one side, I start feeling enormous pain on one part of my butt (where my bodyweight is). I tried cross-legged, but I feel extreme pain in my knees there, even after 30 min or so. Also, my legs fall asleep quickly and last time it happened in a SDS sitting, it didn't "woke up" completely for an hour or so. I dont know if I need more mindfulness abilities to reduce the suffering or if I can do something differently so that the pain is not as intense. I think without that pain, I could sit longer (not sure about that however).

Have you any posture or other recommendations?

That's the point

[lmfao]

@John West I don't meditate for as long as you lol so my advice might be useless since you could already have a better posture than me. Whenever I meditate I try to get as large a surface area of contact between the sides of my legs and the ground. This distributes my weight over a larger area and decreases pressure. 

And intense pain is part of the point of SDS lol, although intense pain which is prematurely induced by bad posture cant be good for your body in the long run. 

 

Do you mediate for 150 mins regularly? Does the long period of time of meditation feel more effective than like a 60 or 90 minute session? Because I'm considering increasing the time I meditate for. Because I think that it takes me a long time to enter the zone, and perhaps I'm ending the session just before things get good. 

Edited December 29, 2018 by lmfao

[Privet]

10 hours ago, John West said:

Have you any posture or other recommendations?

Thick cushion on your stool so that you feel like you're on the horse.

When I go above 2 hours butt hurts, use this pain with the thought that if you concentrate at it the resistance will drop after the peak. It goes in waves, every 15-20 minutes there's a sense of relief after a peak of suffering.

[John West]

First of all thank y'all.

11 hours ago, lmfao said:

Do you mediate for 150 mins regularly? Does the long period of time of meditation feel more effective than like a 60 or 90 minute session? Because I'm considering increasing the time I meditate for. Because I think that it takes me a long time to enter the zone, and perhaps I'm ending the session just before things get good. 

I do it for that long time probably once a week, whenever I have time. I combine it with the Do Nothing Technique. I really noticed that after having all kind of stuff going on in your mind (sex thoughts, other irrelevant thoughts etc.) you enter a place of just silence. Yesterday I actually had sort of an enlightenment experience for a second or so with this technique. But than my ego came back quickly. 

I dont know if these long time periods are needed, because I usally have the most intense "breakthroughs" (I'm still a newbie in spirituality, so it's not incredibly deep) after an hour or so. However, I dont know if the expectation to sit for 150 min or longer actually creates a mentality of "ok, fuck it, just sit". Because with shorter sessions I usally tend to think "it should be over soon, why does it take that long" which maybe interrupts. Try it out, work your way up (add 5 min to the clock every time) and see. But really try "do nothing", works best with this for me. And dont be frustrated, it took some time and trials until there happened something.

 

[ground]

17 hours ago, John West said:

... I feel very strong pain in my body after 2,5h. ..

2,5h is too long. Even 5 minutes can be too long if the intention or attitude is inappropriate.

[karkaore]

22 minutes ago, ground said:

2,5h is too long. Even 5 minutes can be too long if the intention or attitude is inappropriate.

this is relative

[ground]

3 minutes ago, karkaore said:

this is relative

Therefore it reads 'if the intention or attitude is inappropriate.'

[karkaore]

@ground Yes, completely agree on that. The first sentence, however. What might be too long for you can be not enough for the other.

[ground]

14 minutes ago, karkaore said:

@ground Yes, completely agree on that. The first sentence, however. What might be too long for you can be not enough for the other.

In Zen they do retreats where they sit even longer. Still also with Zennists there may be inappropriate intentions or attitudes involved. Anyway long sitting may be a nice pastime provided that it is not forced.