Multiple points-of-view following breath

[nfgodinho]

Hi,

I find it very difficult to have my attention travel up and down the spine with breathing. I always feel the need to decide on the point-of-view from which I mentally look at. The problem arises when somehow I cannot maintain the same point-of-view for the whole path.

When I "look" to my spine as if I was looking from behind my back it works quite well for the lower part. But when I go up it becomes kind of awkward and I feel like I am no longer looking at something IN my body. It's like I am looking at a projection of my body.

On the other side when my attention is inside my head I can confortably "look" at it as if I was using my real eyes.

The bottom line is: I keep having the need to switch between points-of-view in order to maintain the feeling that I am "looking" at a point in me rather than "looking" at a third-person's spinal path. I feel this necessity creates interruptions in the imaginary geometric space I create to follow the breathing. I should be able to ignore it, but I can't.

Is it ok? Should I accept it instead of trying to merge the whole path in an unified uninterrupted experience? Anyone else has felt this multiple point-of-view issue? Is pranayama still being effective? Because I don't feel absolutely nothing and sense no difference in my meditation since I added pranayama.

Thanks,
Nuno

[david_obsidian]

Hello Nuno,

I think I understand your question.

>> Next, with each rising inhalation of the breath, allow your
attention to travel upward inside a tiny thread

there is a certain amount of vagueness in the idea of 'allow your attention to travel upward inside ...'

For me,  this has always been better as a feeling-attention rather than a visualizing attention.

I would suggest feeling those areas rather than mentally looking at them.  Have you tried this?

-David

[nfgodinho]

Hi David,

I think I understand what you mean by feeling. But another thread suggests that it is easier trying to visualize a white light going up and down. This approach intensifies the visual side of the experience. Actually I still find it very hard to imagine a light going up and down. It feels like its either the light our the spine

But I will definitely try to do as you say for a couple of days to see if it works for me.

Thank you!

Bye,
Nuno

[Anthem]

Hi Nuno,

I think I may have wrote the other thread you are referring to about adding in the white light visual. To be honest, my basic starting point with pranayama was as David suggested, to feel the sensation physically going up and down the spine, I still do this in every session. In that other post I was suggesting adding in the white light on top of this. It's important to be careful here as you can over do it with this white light stuff and if it is confusing then don't bother with it.

When I started I had a very difficult time feeling the spine as I brought my attention up and down. As time went on and after a lot of twice a day practice sessions, I started feeling more and more of my spine and more often. I had days when I couldn't feel much but overall there was a steady progress over several months.

I still have days when I "feel" or see less and others where there is more, the important thing is to continue practicing because that is the foundation for both progress and achieving any milestones along the way. If you look back at a long period of time like several weeks or months, you will be able to see steady upward progress. If you look too closely for progress on a daily basis you will be more aware of the "two steps forward, one step backwards" adage.

Hope that helps,

Anthem11

[nfgodinho]

Hi David,

I just had the most pleasant surprise. I think I was doing it in a wrong way because I kept trying to follow a path on the surface of the skin in my back, starting from the base of the spine and not from the perineum.

When trying to follow your suggestion I found myself starting from the perineum and moving up in a path inside my body. This felt much more natural and easy. I feel this must be closer to the right thing too. I'll try it some more.

Am I right? Do you follow a path on the interior of the body or on the surface of the skin? Because if I follow on the surface then it's a little odd to start from the perineum because I'd have to first go to the back and only then start going up, correct?

Thanks
Nuno

[nfgodinho]

Hi Andrew,

I understand. As you can read in my previous post I guess I found a way around my problem. I'll try it like this and then I'll give another try to your white light technique. Thanks

Bye,
Nuno