Meditation as a Domain of Mastery?

[Vipassana]

I'm getting to a point where I feel like I have to abandon one of my babies... neglect to say the least. 

After reading a book called 'The One Thing' it was clear to me that I needed atleast 4 hours of uninterrupted deliberate practice every single day to get on track to mastery. I have a longing to become masterful at both digital art & meditation. 

Is it conducive to have two different domains of mastery? Especially in the beginning phases of my life purpose? In a sense, meditation is difficult but takes very little creative energy although it provides me with alot of creative energy. The more I meditate, the more I am creatively juiced up but it is super time consuming when Im meditating 4+ hours a day. Also meditating long hours also comes with immediate ego backlashes where I get alot of inner work done but I'm more likely to procastinate on my creativity for the rest of the day. I can intuit the answer and the answer is to meditate a few hours a day and invest rest of the time into digital art but I also feel like meditation is a deep part of my life purpose & I strongly feel like life purpose & awakening doesn't have to be two seperate endeavours.

I don't meditate solely for awakening purposes, the radical transformation it has brought into my life in just a few years has permeated through each and every part of my life. My concentration has increased immensely and I am able to endure emotional labor and repetition. I know the importance of having a good skillset & I won't be able to sustain my survival if I can't afford to pay the bills so I'm facing quiet a predicament. Ideally, I would be waking up super early and accomplish 4+ hours of deliberate and uninterrupted practice for both activities but as of now, its not practical because of my bad habits & my bodies demand to sleep 6+ hours. 

I guess a good question is, what is the difference between domain of mastery & the ideal medium when it comes to daily responsibilities and activities? My ideal medium is fueled by my mastery. I want to 'teach consciousness' with my digital art instead of teaching digital art with my digital art so gaining insights and mindfulness is absolutely essential for my life purpose. 

The trade off to pursue both is that I have to abandon activities like research & development, journaling, contemplating & reading. I can still fit that into my schedulde but I won't be able to do it for long stretches of time. 

Edited July 14, 2020 by Vipassana

[Vipassana]

 Any tips on how to reconcile? I am sure you faced this in your early journey when you thought meditation was essential for awakening. @Leo Gura

[Espaim]

4 hours ago, Vipassana said:

My concentration has increased immensely and I am able to endure emotional labor and repetition.

I don't mean to hijack your thread but could you elaborate on the benefits of meditating that much? That's somewhat of a dream of mine (meditating a lot ) but I'm hesitant to go full in.

[Vipassana]

@Espaim I've pretty much experienced all of the scientifically proven benefits that come from meditation but those are only the tip of the ice berg. I don't quiet know how to articulate all the metaphysical benefits but my baseline level of consciousness has increased immensely. My sense of self is very abstract, I'm not fully conscious of who I am but I'm totally conscious of who I'm not and the more I hone in on my direct experience, I understand that I am nothing. I recognize that the only thing stopping me from being fully realized is that I am lacking purity and I know that by continuing my vipassana practice and my loving kindness practice will take me to a state where I'm pretty woke & liberated.

Meditation is deeply personal and your state of consciousness is unique to the contents of your life so you really have to establish a strong practice. Its definitely worth the experimentation for at least a couple of years & meditation alone isn't the panacea because I personally know people who have met dozens of gurus, gotten dozens of initiations, attended countless Vipassana retreats and practices dozens of technique & meditate every single day but still have underlying issues that are stopping them from awakening. You really gotta find what works for you but I doubt anybody will truly know if they quit intense meditation without having done it for atleast a few years. I'm a few years in and my experiences are bleak however I can see where this path is taking me. 

Edited July 14, 2020 by Vipassana

[Nak Khid]

8 hours ago, Vipassana said:

I'm getting to a point where I feel like I have to abandon one of my babies... neglect to say the least. 

After reading a book called 'The One Thing' it was clear to me that I needed at least 4 hours of uninterrupted deliberate practice every single day to get on track to mastery. I have a longing to become masterful at both digital art & meditation. 

Is it conducive to have two different domains of mastery? Especially in the beginning phases of my life purpose? In a sense, meditation is difficult but takes very little creative energy although it provides me with alot of creative energy. The more I meditate, the more I am creatively juiced up but it is super time consuming when Im meditating 4+ hours a day. Also meditating long hours also comes with immediate ego backlashes where I get alot of inner work done but I'm more likely to procastinate on my creativity for the rest of the day. I can intuit the answer and the answer is to meditate a few hours a day and invest rest of the time into digital art but I also feel like meditation is a deep part of my life purpose & I strongly feel like life purpose & awakening doesn't have to be two seperate endeavours.

 

You are having problems due to two things instead of one at a time.  

You need to focus on the mediation only for a month or more with a set endpoint
This is best done in a monastery with experienced Thereveda  or Zen monks in retreat not the SN Goeneka
Creativity is a distraction to that.    You should not do it unless you have the fiance logistics to do it resolved and might have to wait until funds are saved.
You could attempt it by yourself but it will be a lot harder and a lot more distractions possible  

After you do this then you will be able to assess the situation.  You may decide this is your path. 
You can always return to the digital art. 
On the other hand  by the end of this you may decide digital art is the path and mediation on secondary. 
If that is the case you can still mediate but keep it shorter with occasional longer sessions, spending more time on the art 

You know what the solution is, one thing at at time.   For a while give up one, then for a while give up the other
Then you will know what the balance should be 

 

Edited July 15, 2020 by Nak Khid

[electroBeam]

I'm in the exact same position as you, and I can't really advise you on what you should do, but I feel an urge to explain my experience in life and maybe that will give you some insight.

 

So for the past 3 years recently, I went through a sort of bi-polar issue with my career and spirituality. every month I would go hard core at spirituality, meditating 1 hour a day, just reading spiritual books in my free time, etc. The other month I would completely drop meditation, spirituality and just focus on my career (as a startup entrepreneur) reading books about business, attending conferences, practising technical skills, etc.

Didn't know what was going on at the time. Still don't really.

The reason why this happened is because we've got 2 sources of control: the mind and the heart. We've got what our logical mind thinks we should do, then we've got our heart that tells us what we should do. The logical mind is less scary to follow and is more reasonable, but doesn't grow you. The heart feels a lot better, grows you more, but is a hell of a lot more scary. And during that bi-polar career session, I oscillated between going all in on following my heart, and then going all in on following my mind.

Now that oscillation has dissolved, and I'm at the point where I'm just following my heart.

The thing is, if you want to pursue mastery in meditation, you're only gonna do that if you truly see the value and benefit it doing so. Sure you've felt scientifically proven benefits, you've felt mystical experiences before, but how do those things square with survival? That's the trick. Are you capable of abandoning your job and going homeless if it meant you would attain a higher level of mystical experience? I'm not saying you go homeless, I want you to feel how that scenario feels. Do you feel the fear? Do you feel the thoughts saying "but that's just stupid! We need to eat and survive! Mystical experiences are intangible and abstract and don't help me survive concretely"? That's the wisdom you need. Can you see that meditation and spirituality is better than survival? Can you see that spirituality is better than eating food?

Your digital art has the upper hand by default, because it gives you money. Its a well worn path that's guaranteed to give you a salary. But what about meditating in a cave all day? How the fuck does that give you a salary, house, etc?

You can sort of try to bodge things up by making some fantastical idea about using digital art to create consciousness videos... but ask yourself, is this really what you want to do? Or are you just choosing to do this because its less scary? If you had 100 million in the bank right now, be honest, would you make videos about consciousness? Or would you just fucken meditate? Just dive into nirvana? Teaching consciousness is something you feel like doing AFTER being a master of spirituality, but beforehand its usually just fuelled by fear. Survival requirements. 

You've also gotta understand that these fantastical ideas about you marrying up spirituality with digital art, or your career, are actually a limiting perspective that will prevent you from seeing the world in radically different ways... ways that are required to truly master spirituality. 

To truly choose meditation as a domain of mastery, you need to see the value in pursuing meditation over your survival needs. That means if someone had a gun to your head and said you can either choose to meditate, or do digital art but not both, you need to have the wisdom to choose meditation. 

Where does that wisdom come from? A non dual mindset and radically different perspective. You need to be at least partially conscious right now that the present moment is the only thing in existence, that you're not truly the little self and body, and that the universe isn't materialistic or dualistic. If you don't truly feel, or are unaware of these things experientially, then you're going to have a hard time choosing meditation as a domain of mastery. 

 

Anyway that's my experience, having spent 10 000s of hours contemplating this issue myself since I was a kid. Do what you will with it. 

[herghly]

I'm not sure if you are doing any shadow work alongside meditation. If you are not I'd highly suggest. Leo has a good book on his booklist and I can also recommend a few.  From what I've noticed it's often people's shadow that holds them back from awakening. 

Try your best to take an integral point of development 

Waking Up

Cleaning Up

Showing Up

Growing Up

 

[Vipassana]

@Nak Khid thank you for your response. I agree with many of the things you mentioned. One thing at a time is definitely the right approach. I am dependent on my family for survival so I will not be able to sit for a longer retreats unless its a goenka one, I have been building my way up to a 20-30 day sit so I can get a good taste. I would still consider myself a newbie in meditation and haven't even tapped into 1% of whats possible. I think I am not thinking long term & this surge of wanting to meditate half of the day is coming from being home all day due to covid & being stuck in my bad habits. Many days of the quarantine, i meditated 7-8 hours and still had sufficient time to work on my creative endeavours but that wont be the case when I'm back to school. Its something I really need to contemplate. I already have a daily habit of meditating 3 hours a day regardless of any circumstances. I guess my deep desire is to take the big leap and commit an extended amount of time just for meditation... as you said, creativity does interfere. 

I am pretty sure I am using meditation as a semi escape from my bad habits. 3 hours of disciplined sit is plenty to build my practice. I really need to take responsibility for my bad habits and replace them with better habits. There are many books I need to be reading, doing hatha yoga, building a conscious buisness plan, researching and developing etc before my mind will enjoy sitting in a corner like a cat.

My real aim is to be able to meditate 4 hours & I feel like that would set me on a good track for the long term & I know I can accomplish this because time is an illusion. When I started, 15 minutes used to be unbearable. 

Edited July 17, 2020 by Vipassana

[Vipassana]

@electroBeam Really enjoyed reading your response man. Thank you so much. I will respond soon. 

[Vipassana]

@herghly wow dude. No I havent been doing any shadow work. I just figured meditation was a panacea when dealing with the shadow self, especially when many of my meditation sits are being still and not reacting to the mind-body tantrums ? but I now realize that isnt the case because I've spent a few months journaling daily & digging through my shadow self which gave me alot of results. 

[Nak Khid]

22 hours ago, Vipassana said:

@Nak Khid

I am pretty sure I am using meditation as a semi escape from my bad habits.

when  you mediate do thoughts of the bad habits come up?

[Vipassana]

@Nak Khid Nah man not at all. My thoughts are very scattered & I really don't focus on them. The only ones I focus on are the ones that have a alluring quality because they are so insightful and creative but even those I let go after I become aware. Why do you ask? 

[Nak Khid]

22 minutes ago, Vipassana said:

@Nak Khid Nah man not at all. My thoughts are very scattered & I really don't focus on them. The only ones I focus on are the ones that have a alluring quality because they are so insightful and creative but even those I let go after I become aware. Why do you ask? 

There are two main forms of mediation in Theravada. Samatha  which is concentration meditations where you become tranquil by shutting things out by focusing on something, such as the breathing or in other traditions chanting or thinking a word or phrase repetitiously. 

Vipassana is not focusing on one thing. It is being aware of the moment, all thoughts , feelings, physical sensations and taking note of them.
You call each one out (mentally) "yes I I see you" then you let is pass

So if you focus on thoughts that are alluring that might fit into Samantha but in Vipassana you are not supposed to cling to anything including pleasant thoughts or sensations.   So everything comes and goes.   You notice a pain in your back, you notice boredom, you notice a feeling of peacefulness, you notice a bad memory, you notice a good memory, you notice the urge to do a bad habit. 

So if the thought of a doing a bad habit comes up you note it and then let it pass and it may come and go several times.

So does the meditation resolve the bad habit?   Not necessarily. It could make you more aware of a problem but it might not solve it. 
You might need some therapy techniques to control it, some things that might be out of the Vipassana 
Monks have it easier.  They out themselves in a situation where a lot of the temptations are removed.  In Thailand they allow you to be a monk for short periods like a few months a year (but say goodbye to the hair) 
Anyway the Goeneka based retreats also do that but you are doing a lot of meditation already and could try living like that for a while.  If you don;t like it you could quit and return to your digital art.  
However as for the bad habits (what are they?) you said you are "using meditation as a semi escape from my bad habits" so the best thing for you may not be deserving between mediation and digital art  but addressing those bad habits directly.  You may need somebody to help you who specializes in that.  In the mean time some self hypnosis techniques can be powerful.  The subconscious is in a better wave state just before sleep and just after.
Try this for a minimum of four days either right before you go to sleep or add to it at the end. Should not take long. In a question and command form
"Can I stop____________and__________and____________  ?     
(put the habits here) 
and then "Yes, stop___________and___________and" 
Mark 40 lines end point on a piece of paper. 
 So write "Can I stop smoking and drinking? Yes, stop smoking and drinking" 40 times and as you do it say it out loud (normal volume) 
Then you go to sleep.  Wake up and do it again write after you wake up. 
You will start to see result then continue doing it, a month to make it stick so you don't slide back. 
This should be done gung ho commitment. You can also add to it a meditation where you focus on this thought. 
These should be real bad habit not asceticism of thing that most people would not say are bad habits. 
the subconscious mind is like a dog and responds to repetition.  Speak it and writing at at the same time also reinforces it. 
Shinzen, the will known Zen Buddhist  who trained in monasteries had to get some conventional therapy for some bad habits. 
Being an expert meditator was not enough.   And a therapist or therapeutic hypnotist and also be somewhat of an accountability partner. 
IF you try the above , you mark each day you do it on a calendar. Those are links in a chain.  
After a month you may feel like you defeated your habits but three month later, you are getting some urges, you have been around the wring people.  Then you must remove yourself from the environment and go back to this technique or with an expert who specializes. 
You are looking at two things meditation and art.  But there is a third thing, the habits and that needs direct attention because that can destroy the other two eventually.