What does it mean to focus feeling on breathing from the stomach

[fopylo]

I've been trying the basic meditation of focusing on the breath from the stomach. As I've understood already, thoughts are and will not go away by "pushing" them aside. I just let them be. But when I'm focusing on the feeling, I've realized I still have thoughts, very vague, about the general course of my breath and maybe some dots resembling the tingling of the feeling.

How can I focus on the feeling of my breath without having thoughts? When I let go of those thoughts by returning attention to the feeling of breathing, different thoughts arise. It's quite trippy. I feel as though I'm trying to control my attention, monitoring my breathing as a result.

Oh, and not to forget that part of that meditation is that you then focus on the tensions in each body part and 'release' it by letting it go.

Bottom line is, always when I return attention to breathing I still have thoughts, and many times discordant thoughts. I don't know how to meditate or to do this "letting go" shit

[Jordan]

All you have to do is focus on the sensation of you stomach expanding and contracting as you breath as if it is the first time you are experiencing it. You want to try to become fascinated with it and not assume you know what the next breath will be like. Try to realize how amazing and beautiful it is to be able to experience taking a breath. Over time you will eventually experience less thoughts and concepts come up as your mind rewires itself and becomes better at focusing.

When you think to yourself about what the meditation instructions are or how it is so hard not get distracted, just become aware that those thoughts have come up. Accept the thoughts are now the focus of your attention and part of the meditation, try to see or hear them as clearly as possible, then move your attention back to your stomach. You are not supposed to keep your attention in one spot the entire time. The benefit comes from realizing that your focus has been thrown off, getting a better awareness of what your mind is doing as it does it. That it is all part of the meditation.

So over time you will get less thoughts constantly coming up as you focus on your stomach but the goal is to become aware of things as they are. This includes the thoughts that are there when trying to focus so you are not doing anything wrong if you have many thoughts. What you experience is the truth of what is there.

[fopylo]

@Jordan

Thing is that my jaw area tends to tension when I focus on my breath

[Jordan]

5 minutes ago, fopylo said:

@Jordan

Thing is that my jaw area tends to tension when I focus on my breath

Ohh that happens to me too. You can try switching to a mindfulness meditation where you focus on any tension as you breath in and allow it to relax as you breath out. I often have tension in my jaw and shoulders. When i first noticed my shoulder tension, I felt them drop what seemed like 2 inches as I relaxed them. Check your jaw, face, shoulders and stomach. After you feel more relaxed try going back to your normal meditation technique. If it still really bothers you there are other meditation methods you can try too. It is important to try to be as physically comfortable as you can as you meditate even though emotional discomfort and a bit of pain is ok. 

Edited December 26, 2021 by Jordan

[fopylo]

It still does bother me. On the daily basis I obviously breath, but it's not as though I'm aware of my breath most of the day. Feeling with no thought, that means I can't have an imagined faint structure of my breathing. I need some vague thought that can at least present what I'm trying to focus on, or at least the thought of it being 'feeling from the breath".

Would like to know what you think about it

@Nahm@EmptyVase

 

[Nahm]

@fopylo

How many mornings have you meditated in a row and for how many minutes?

[Fearless_Bum]

@fopylo dude, same frustration here. I've been meditating on and off for years (I've taken a 2 weeks in between meditations at the most) and it's a similar issue. 

It's like no matter how quiet it is, in a little corner of the "mind" there's at least a song playing in the background. 

I've pretty much accepted that thoughts are present and that's okay, and that there's no need to believe in them anyway.

[Guest EmptyVase]

On 26.12.2021 at 9:24 AM, fopylo said:

How can I focus on the feeling of my breath without having thoughts?

Set the intention to do so. Focus intention-based, rather than thought-based. Intention set? Great, then it's time to relax and do nothing about it - forgetting the breath is okay, remembering the breath is okay. Thoughts are part of this divine dance.

44 minutes ago, fopylo said:

On the daily basis I obviously breath, but it's not as though I'm aware of my breath most of the day.

Thoughts and emotions are entangled with your breath. Awareness of emotional guidance leads to awareness of breath, as both are not separate from one another. Noticing how some thoughts can literally rob you from your breath, or how breathing deep from the belly relaxes your mind, shows you the power of pneuma.

[Nahm]

@fopylo

Hope asking isn’t taken in any uncomfortable way. Sounds like you’re holding expectations upon meditation. Let those go to. 

[Thought Art]

@fopylo I personally found that using the Head Space App to be really useful for developing this skillset. Though, it requires up keep. It has helped me a-lot. 

I usually get up in the morning, drink a hot herbal tea to get the jing warmed up. Sit for 15-20 minutes then do a 20 minute Qigong set.

My daily morning meditation uses the skillset learned from training with this for a year or 2. This app got me from not being able to sit for 3 minutes to sitting for hours. 

 

Edited January 19, 2022 by Thought Art

[BipolarGrowth]

Breathing from the stomach is as simple as taking a deep breath and paying attention to how that brings up bodily sensations near the stomach.

 

Stop worrying about if thoughts are there or not. That will likely only make things worse. Just return to the breath. Let the thoughts do their thing. Your job is to be with the breath. 

[fopylo]

@Nahm I meditate like once every 2-3 days and it's not always in the morning, for about 20 minutes

Edited January 19, 2022 by fopylo

[fopylo]

13 hours ago, EmptyVase said:

Set the intention to do so. Focus intention-based, rather than thought-based.

@EmptyVase

I don't know if I completely understood.

13 hours ago, EmptyVase said:

Awareness of emotional guidance leads to awareness of breath

I don't know how much I can confirm that. Then, what is felt exactly when feeling the breath, since breath is a thought?

 

13 hours ago, EmptyVase said:

Noticing how some thoughts can literally rob you from your breath, or how breathing deep from the belly relaxes your mind

Breath is a thought. This is exactly the trap I'm talking about. I'm thinking the breath in order to confirm its existence (I need to imagine it in some way in order to go with it/ know the breath)

[Nahm]

3 hours ago, fopylo said:

@Nahm I meditate like once every 2-3 days and it's not always in the morning, for about 20 minutes

Meditate every morning. If angry, and can’t relax into meditation, express it in some way. Use the scale and express each emotion upwards. Talk to someone, write, maybe a journal here on the forum or whatever works for you to let it out / get it off your chest. 

 

[Guest EmptyVase]

29 minutes ago, fopylo said:

Then, what is felt exactly when feeling the breath, since breath is a thought?

You already feel your breath 'exactly'. Nothing special about it. 

You do not feel something specific about your breath. Breath is breath.

However, you can get specific about how your breathing pattern changes when certain thoughts and emotions appear in your direct experience. That's where you really feel how your breath is connected to thoughts and emotions.

34 minutes ago, fopylo said:

Breath is a thought. This is exactly the trap I'm talking about. I'm thinking the breath in order to confirm its existence (I need to imagine it in some way in order to go with it/ know the breath)

The trap here is that you mistake actuality for thought.

Breath is a thought. But also, the thought of breath points to the actuality of the breath.

With that pointer in mind, breath is not a thought, but a pointer to your direct experience. The thought that breath is a thought is also a thought.

39 minutes ago, fopylo said:

I don't know if I completely understood.

When you focus intention-based, you set the intention, and then let it go alltogether. You open yourself up to receive whatever intention you set.

When you focus thought based, you set the intention, and keep thinking about it, and keep thinking about it, and keep thinking about it, and you think about when it will finally manifest in your direct experience, rather than letting it come to you.

[fopylo]

 

On 1/19/2022 at 1:45 AM, EmptyVase said:

@BipolarGrowth Thanks, I'll try

On 1/19/2022 at 1:45 AM, EmptyVase said:

On 1/19/2022 at 1:45 AM, EmptyVase said:

 

[fopylo]

On 1/19/2022 at 3:48 PM, Nahm said:

Meditate every morning. If angry, and can’t relax into meditation, express it in some way. Use the scale and express each emotion upwards. Talk to someone, write, maybe a journal here on the forum or whatever works for you to let it out / get it off your chest. 

@Nahm

Look, it's really difficult. I much prefer to sleep than wake up earlier than everyone else. I really don't feel like using some kind of method to express myself, I'm just too tired. Even if I'd do one of these methods I can't be doing it for 20 minutes as I don't have much time in the morning.

[fopylo]

On 1/19/2022 at 4:12 PM, EmptyVase said:

You already feel your breath 'exactly'.

@EmptyVase

Always? I'm not aware of my breath (don't feel my breath) most of the day..

On 1/19/2022 at 4:12 PM, EmptyVase said:

However, you can get specific about how your breathing pattern changes when certain thoughts and emotions appear in your direct experience. That's where you really feel how your breath is connected to thoughts and emotions.

But are you saying that the emotion which is felt, this feeling, is actually the feeling of the breath itself? Aren't you feeling your thoughts? Or perhaps your body sensations? What exactly are you feeling?

 

On 1/19/2022 at 4:12 PM, EmptyVase said:

With that pointer in mind, breath is not a thought, but a pointer to your direct experience.

It is still a thought though, even if the imagined breath points to the actuality of it. The trap continues of mistaking thought for actuality.

 

On 1/19/2022 at 4:12 PM, EmptyVase said:

When you focus intention-based, you set the intention, and then let it go alltogether. You open yourself up to receive whatever intention you set.

So you say to decide on it one time, like set myself to do it and then to just go with it and forget about it? As long as you set yourself up to it, this is the important thing, which can replace the thinking about the intention you say, yes?

[Nahm]

@fopylo

Ok.

Expression & meditation aren’t methods. Sounds like you’re conceptualizing them, and doing them inconsistently, and then concluding they don’t really ‘work’ and or you’re not doing them ‘right’.  They are relaxation & alignment (better feeling, natural) in and of themself. Like how eating equals full / not hungry. Expression & meditation, like eating, and not to produce a future change, but are for the direct experience. 

Sounds like the same discordant thoughts are arising, and are being suppressed with thinking about meditation, the breath, etc, and how these ‘methods’ are supposed to ‘fix’ this, but aren’t working. These discordant thoughts seems to be used to mask & suppress the prior discordant thoughts. If so, understand the jealousy, anger & frustration by expressing it, vs suppressing it and focusing on thoughts about meditation. 

Notice / consider for a moment, what you’re doing, the task at hand, camp, etc… notice the much bigger picture. There is a tremendous opportunity to appreciate & feel the selflessness of it. But I could see where being young, the natural tendency is to return again & again to the more selfish desires & thoughts, and thus feel the resistance. Not saying there’s anything wrong with that at all, just that it could be insightful, maybe clarifying in a way, and allowing of better feeling. 

[fopylo]

3 hours ago, Nahm said:

Expression & meditation aren’t methods. Sounds like you’re conceptualizing them

@Nahm

Hmm.. very interesting. It's very interesting how I'm starting to understand better the trap of mistaking thought for actuality. It gets me to question more what is real. So many thought, and many pointers (which are also thoughts) to be believed are the actuality. Gets me to question what is actual. It seems that by definition you can't explain actuality with language and thoughts. I'm literally living within concepts, perhaps that is what is meant by 'life is a dream'...

3 hours ago, Nahm said:

They are relaxation & alignment (better feeling, natural) in and of themself.

Then how does the breath play in all of that? What is the relationship between the breath, feeling and emotions?

 

3 hours ago, Nahm said:

Expression & meditation, like eating, are not to produce a future change, but are for the direct experience. 

Good to know

 

3 hours ago, Nahm said:

Sounds like the same discordant thoughts are arising, and are being suppressed with thinking about meditation, the breath, etc, and how these ‘methods’ are supposed to ‘fix’ this, but aren’t working. These discordant thoughts seems to be used to mask & suppress the prior discordant thoughts.

You got it 100% right for me. This is the problem of spirituality - concepts about how to live the awesome life which are believed. Eventually, you need to let go of spirituality itself, to actuality live life like a normal fucking human being.

 

3 hours ago, Nahm said:

If so, understand the jealousy, anger & frustration by expressing it

I don't know how to express some of the emotions because I don't quite understand exactly what I'm feeling all the time. Still have attachment to thoughts about what I'm experiencing. And there's also conceptualization working when using the scale.

Anyway, for been more intuitive, isn't meditation the answer, for becoming more intuitive about my emotions? - So that I can then use the emotional scale more effectively?