Having trouble getting any results whatsoever...

Hello Culebra!

I hope someone else can respond with a better answer than I will provide as I am a new student to the concepts as well. However I will say that a week ago I was exactly like you! I couldnt concentrate for a second without thinkin about what I was going to do tomorrow or similar random thoughts. Now I am still not very good at it but I can see some improvement already! So basically what I am saying is just keep at it. Try to focus on one thing and one thing only. I like to try and focus on the ROPE method but sometimes I find that very difficult so I try to just zone in and focus on my heartbeats and everytime a thought enters my mind I try to stop it and go right back to concentrating on my heartbeat. With practice it will come! This is NOT an easy task what-so-ever. It requires lots of WORK and BELIEF! Just do not give up! Keep at it every night and you will soon see improvement! I hope I was some help for you. Best of wishes!

Khafre

- In the pursuit of knowlege -

Hi,

Perhaps you should try to set up a smaller goal, just a couple of minutes or so. Then after a while you can increase the time and be able to concentrate for longer periods. Don't expect everyting to work the first couple of times you try it, it needs practice and patience.

Your dreams can also help you. Try to remember them and see if you can spot something that can relate to your daily activites.

Hey, thanks for the comments. Yea, i usually try to force myself to concentrate whenever i meditate, but it just never works at the moment. However i've seen progression whenever i actually try that method as ironic as that sounds, i guess i just need more practice. I try it with everything i do, no matter what it is, not just meditation, and I can see some results, but honestly i was just trying to find out if anyone else had any other techniques they'd share as this one is somewhat exhausting and repetitive.

Thanks

Behind every thoughtform there is causality. What is the reason you are thinking of this or that which is breaking your concentration?

I actually have A.D.D. but after exploring awareness and really, I mean REALLY finding it, it is something A.D.D. can't even touch...

What I figured out was that awareness is beyond anything of the intellect or the logic of our minds. It's behind all the layers of thoughts in your head.

I struggled alot, but I realised I did alot of things that create more egos. So after doing what I had to do to change, it just clicked. I became more aware. I actually found out what awareness truely was.

If you can accept that all the junk running through your head a mile a minute is nothing but impressions you are falsely interpreting, then you can get an idea of what I'm getting at!

Do not attack awareness problems using the intellectual centre or motor centres. Turn them off and find that peacefull calm space in between thoughts. Start with little increments of time and then increase them.
This is how I dd it.

Hi Culebra,

Yes, I think, it is just about sufficient practice, like they do in sports, really.
Top athletes can do almost effortlessy things hardly possible for people without their kind of training.

Maybe you can check if you get tense physically during your efforts, because this can cause exhaustion. I find that it can take time to learn how to apply the efforts in the right way and not tense up anything. When I try to concentrate, be aware, for me it's hard not to tense up my jaws, and eyes, some people tense up their forehead, etc.

If it gets boring, you can try different kinds of Meditation (more in Meditation course), watch your breathing without controlling its rhythm, observe all your inner states without interfering with them, etc.
If you work physically, you can try to be conscious of every small movement you do, every muscle in action, etc.

All the best!

Wow, Apakhana i had never really thought of it like that but as wierd as it sounds i know exactly what you mean.

Vadim, yes i have the feeling that's all i need i'm just gonna try that.

Thanks guys

Hi Culebra,

Here are a couple of techniques that worked really well for me that I thought I would share. Basically this is from the first step of the Bardon system.

To practice at home:

You just sit down, relax and close your eyes. Don't try to stop the thoughts coming, just observe them. Don't value them or worry about them, don't try to block anything. BUT try to remember them. After five minutes stop and write down as many thoughts as you can remember. Then throw the piece(s) of paper away and forget about it. Do this twice, once in the morning and once in the evening.

Next day extend the practice to six minutes, then the day after go for seven minutes, and so on until you get to 10 minutes.

What you will hopefully find is that the process of watching and trying to remember your thoughts will naturally slow them down so that as the practice sessions get longer the list of thoughts gets shorter. After a week of this it should be a lot easier then to hold one single thought for several minutes, and even to begin to be able to hold a state of no thought for a short period of time.

To practice at work or school:

When you have a task to do, choose a length of time you think you can cope with and start the task by mentally saying to yourself "I now concentrate on " whatever the task is " for the next " however many you decided " minutes". You can really reinforce this by repeating it mentally three times before starting the task. If you get distracted, when the distraction has gone repeat the process again before getting back to the task. This way you can hopefully use the jobs at work or lessons at school as exercises in concentration.

Please note that I haven't done the meditation course here so apologies in advance if I'm just going over old ground.

hi,
bit late with my post, lol. one of the first steps in meditiation is actually becoming aware of just how 'busy' our mind actually is. so, in reality , is a sign of 'progress'. with diligent practice, things would become more calm & clear. like an expanse of water in a moonlight lake. :-) .

milarepa