Greetings from Dark Night-ville

[WonderSeeker]

Hi all! So... this is what it's like? After a bright and energetic A&P, which lasted from September to early November, I find myself in the infamous Dark Night stages of meditation. Luckily, no extreme emotional stuff has arisen (yet). For those wondering, words I'd use to describe it are creepy, empty, haunted, strange, disappearing, dying, and dissatisfactory. It's kind of like the embodiment of the word "Halloween."

The following are recurring themes. First, I keep envisioning scenarios about me or other people getting killed or hurt in gruesome ways. (These thoughts aren't scary or bad, just a bit jarring.) Next, the amount of rapture as contrasted with normal practice is off-the-charts, with spatial and light/color distortions being the most common. I've also been having these random insight dumps, but am having trouble integrating them. Lucid dreaming and resentment of others for no good reason have become common. The feeling of 'no-self' is stronger than ever.

For those of you seasoned meditators, what advice do you have for these stages? Are there ways in which I can speed-up the Dark Night, or should I just continue my practice like normal? Is there anything in particular I should be doing or "looking for?" Thank you!

[Tarzan]

Have you read Daniel Ingram's book? He has lots of material on it and advice aswell. Other Theradavada Buddhism have descriptions of dark night (would be called dukkha or knowledges of suffering).

But basically as I recall: keep at your practice, don't do anything rash and stupid (like quit your job fly to India and find a cozy cave or smth). Alone time, at peace doing nothing helps to take your attention to whatever you're going to and do its thing. 

As for whatever meditation practice it is mentioned that your awareness and attention tends to be very vague and peripheral. If you have noticed a weird switch in your awareness aswell then it might be further confirmation that you are at dark night.

 

[Tarzan]

@Preety_India

In Theradavada Buddhism tradition they basically have a map of meditation progression, A&P or arising and passing away is the feel-good stage so-to-speak, effortless attention/awareness.

[WonderSeeker]

@Tarzan I'm reading through Ingram's descriptions of the Dark Night every day; they're really good! It's just difficult to pin things down since it's my first time going through it. It feels as though awareness is lagging behind experience, if that makes any sense. Very up and down, like a roller-coaster. Heh.