Yaza - Late Night Sitting

[Huz]

I recently watched this video

I am wondering has anyone on here developed a practice of Yaza, a zen technique. It involves breaking your sleep cycle in the middle of the night to do a sit. Apparently it is massively effective at boosting you meditation practice. If you haven't seen this technique then watch the video. Getting back to the point, has anyone on here started this practice - if so can you leave any feedback of how it has affected you.

[Sri McDonald Trump Maharaj]

A guy in the comments mentioned he did it and that it was amazing but whatever, he slept like 4 hours then woke up an sat for an hour then went back to sleep. I've meditated while I have been VERY VERY TIRED during the mornings and the evenings and it has some interessting effects. When I was super sleep deprived and felt like shit and did 90 minute sits it was like WTF. Feeling like shit BUT after a while every 3-5 minutes I would sense purification so much. It was like champange bubbles bursting over my bubbles. But I have never done what he talks about and I'm very interested now that you mention it.

I have an idea! Let's do it tonight! Sleep for 3,5-4 hours then sit for an hour then go back to sleep and tomorrow we'll have a little chat. Are you interessted in doing that? 

And also is anyone else interessted in  doing this kind of shit tonight and reporting it here?

Edited June 30, 2016 by Sri McDonald Trump Maharaj

[Toby]

@Sri McDonald Trump Maharaj I'm in. 40min.

[cetus]

@Huz88 I've done it a handful of times. Sometimes it's a great meditation. Sometimes all your doing is fighting falling asleep. Other times lucid dreams or a mix of all. I would suggest to try it more than one time to get the full picture. Good luck

[Huz]

@Sri McDonald Trump Maharaj I am in brothers! Let's do it. I got to bed at around 12 and wake at 7. So will wake up at like 3am. I say lets do it for a week or more to get better idea of what it is like ?

[cetus]

@Huz88 I just watched the video. Yea, it is often weaving throughout different levels of consciousness and observing what is happening. I wanted to add: after the meditation as your falling back to sleep, observe that too. If you don't fall into a deep sleep immediately, it can get very interesting. I personally get about 7.5- 8hr. sleep a night. I would sleep for at least 4- 5 hr. than get up so that at least half of the sleep was behind me. Than go back to bed for another 2 or so.  I did go to sleep a little earlier those nights. Experiment to see what time to get up works best for you and your sleep cycles.

[Sri McDonald Trump Maharaj]

1 hour ago, Huz88 said:

@Sri McDonald Trump Maharaj I am in brothers! Let's do it. I got to bed at around 12 and wake at 7. So will wake up at like 3am. I say lets do it for a week or more to get better idea of what it is like ?

I'm really exited to try this out but I might not be able to pull it off tonight... I can sense that the prostate inflamation I had a few weeks ago is comming back again and sitting down has gotten a problem again and I'm not interested in doing a lying meditation right after 3 hours of sleep, lol. But I'm going to see if I can make a sitting work tonight, 

I'm such a fucking hypocrite... You could make one of those memes with a guy who looks mean and has a cap on the side with the message:                    "Suggests that people should go and do a late night sitting and report how it went the day after, dosn't partake."  

[Sri McDonald Trump Maharaj]

56 minutes ago, Piotr said:

@Sri McDonald Trump Maharaj I hope you'll feel better... Speaking of memes.. You can always be like him:

LOL! I found some other pillows so I think I should be capable to do a 1 hour SDS anyways. Thank you and I'll see you tomorrow!

Edited June 30, 2016 by Sri McDonald Trump Maharaj

[Huz]

47 minutes ago, Sri McDonald Trump Maharaj said:

LOL! I found some other pillows so I think I should be capable to do a 1 hour SDS anyways. Thank you and I'll see you tomorrow!

haha, does that mean we have lift off?

[Allinthemind]

Interested to see how you all get on with it. Break your sleep to meditate? Is that why the guy in the video has bags under his eyes?

[cetus]

http://www.howsleepworks.com/types_cycles.html

[Sri McDonald Trump Maharaj]

15 minutes ago, Huz88 said:

haha, does that mean we have lift off?

[Huz]

@Sri McDonald Trump Maharaj Sweet dream aha 

[Emerald]

13 hours ago, Huz88 said:

I recently watched this video

I am wondering has anyone on here developed a practice of Yaza, a zen technique. It involves breaking your sleep cycle in the middle of the night to do a sit. Apparently it is massively effective at boosting you meditation practice. If you haven't seen this technique then watch the video. Getting back to the point, has anyone on here started this practice - if so can you leave any feedback of how it has affected you.

I'll give this a try. I watched the video through again. I've done sits where it's been late and I've been sleepy. But I've never interrupted sleep for the sole purpose of meditating. So, it should be interesting. 

[cetus]

@Huz88 I just finished up a 50 min. sit after 4 hr, of sleep. That was interesting. Many different levels. Twice I felt my head node down and I caught myself. I would than consciously return to the task at hand and it would get deep than. I had a couple experiences of imagery happen. One of them I was watching a tree and the sky exchanging ---something?. Hard to explain that one. At another point I put out an intention to follow awareness down to deeper levels. Hard to explain that one too. I guess I would say it seemed like it wanted to show me something. That was very interesting. I'll have to try doing that again to see where it leads. A couple times I had the odd sensation that my head was turned to the left, It wasn't. *I focused on breath with eyes closed and was listening to an Om youtube that I like using headphones. That's my report.

Edited July 1, 2016 by cetus56

[Huz]

@cetus56 Good stuff. Did you notice any signficant differences from meditating during the day? How do you feel now? 

With me I started a 45min med at 2:30 am after sleeping for around 3 hours. Was surprisingly easy to get up - felt less resistance to actually getting up in the morning lol. I found it easy to keep awake during and no nodding off in the sit. What I noticed was how smooth and quick it was for me to get into a deep state of meditation. During the day it can takes like 30 mins for me ( if my monkey mind is racing then it wont) to breathe about 3-5 times a minute (roughly speaking - an estimate). But last night it was virtually instant - took like 5-10 mins by my guess. My mind was virtually switched off and meaning I could deal with the pain way easier towards the end. I felt very concentrated but very relaxed at the same time, and super present. I reckon from this method it would be easier to induce Samadhi experiences so going to stick with it. I didn't have any visualisations. When I woke in the morning I felt quite the opposite and unrelaxed, insecurities, monkey mind have come up so I guess we are on to something here lol.

Edited July 1, 2016 by Huz88

[Toby]

I certainly will do it again out of curiosity. Was tired during it. Didn't even make it to 40min. Very tired next morning, but also somehow more present/alive. Dreams were more colourful (compared to last days), more witnessing, less entanglement during dream. But this could have also other reasons.

[Sri McDonald Trump Maharaj]

This is amazing! Like really! got like 2 hours of sleep then I did my Shikantaza/do nothing for an hour, I didn't make it a strong determination sit but it still was REALLY fucking powerful. In a sense it was kinda hard but on the other hand it was like the most effortless meditation I've ever had and I got kind of hyper conscious really fast.

Another cool thing that happend during the meditation was that I litteraly felt that the body got deeper into rest during my meditation. Now comes the even more cool part... After I finnished my sit I didn't really sleep much. It was like I was awere of lying in bed and watching the body getting deeper and deeper into some kind of resting/sleeping state.

I've had about 5 hours or less of "real" sleep and I'm not sleep deprived at all. I feel so mindful and alert now. I have to do this tomorrow again.

I think that we've just discovered something really powerful tonight and I'm so glad we did this. Who is up for another one?  

[Huz]

@Sri McDonald Trump Maharaj Oh my god yeah!! I forgot to mention that about sleeping after the sit. It was so weird, it was exactly how you described it. I didn't really sleep much, my eyes were wide open but I was so relaxed that it felt like sleep but aware of the sights!! We had pretty similar experiences lol 

i am doing this indefinitely ?

????

Edited July 1, 2016 by Huz88

[cetus]

@Huz88 I would say more imagery than daytime. After both head nods there was heightened clarity and focus. When I watched the video he talks about exploring deeper levels of awareness. I remembered that when the meditation was really still and silent and it suddenly seemed like I started to drop deeper. I felt as if I was moving downward and some illuminated visual things were flashing by me. I couldn't really make out what they were. I had the impression it was leading somewhere, than suddenly it just stopped . I may have caused it stop because it was so different. Maybe I mentally bailed out? But that in itself did seem very interesting and something to explore again. I should have just let go and let it happen. Oh well, next time maybe. I'm glad to hear you had a great experience. It was well worth it. I'm glad we all got together and did this. Nice!