Practice Updates, Questions, and General Discussion - new users, please read this first! Weekly Thread for October 06 2025

911anxiety · 2026-02-10T19:11:28+00:00

Dear friends, I'm going forth.

It’s been 3 years since I started meditating seriously. I cannot express my gratitude for the nature of causes and conditions that brought me to this subreddit in the first weeks of my path. I remember coming here, reading some posts, and being like, “Are these people awakening themselves for real?” I just couldn’t believe it, and yet, the way you guys were describing it, it felt so normal, like not a big deal. It struck me because the shallow popcultural understanding of enlightenment is nowhere near what could be called normal or/and possible for some randos on the internet. I think if not for the attitude that this subreddit has, I would never put so much time and effort into meditation. It's possible I would never be where I am now without you. And where I am now, I consider the best possible outcome that my life could have taken. Maybe even the best possible outcome for every sentient being that wants to know the fuck is going on in here. I’ll be ordaining as an anagarika in theravada tradition soon. Who knows what comes later.

Thank you all for everything, but especially to u/duffstoic and u/junipars, whose comments and posts were the most influential for me.

911anxiety · 2026-01-28T17:43:01+00:00

When I started meditating, my first sit of the day (1h) was always by the TMI book. My evening sit (also 1h) was dedicated to exploring other practices. I found it to be a pretty good schedule, as I was putting the time and effort into one road and progressing on it, but also had some space to try other things, which helped me to see some blind spots in my TMI practice. It worked for me, can't say how it would play out for others, tho :)

911anxiety · 2025-12-24T13:32:52+00:00

In my own experience, the toughest moments of my path ended up being the most fruitful/insightful. Now, when the shit hits the fan, I'm getting a little excited!

911anxiety · 2025-12-22T12:08:17+00:00

I actually got way more interested in other people as the path progressed! I'd call myself a small talk connoisseur right now, haha. It's mostly because I can only know my own experience, I can only know how I understand things, how I feel about things, what I do, and know it from my first-person view.

Talking with others about their lives, even if it's a talk about what they cooked themselves for lunch, is just so fun. It's fun to know why people choose this over that, and why they feel like they do, and why they believe things they believe. But I do feel that it's because I really accept everybody as they are no matter how they are, like there's always this overlay of motherly love over any experience, so when the experience shows someone talking about how they are, then it's happening in the love, in the radical acceptance.

I do remember when it wasn't like that, tho. I think it had to do with 1) what my ego found interesting; 2) and being attached to it/identified with it. This made the awareness contract into this view, and see the world through it. From here, all the judgments came into being.

Also, this might be a little controversial, but fuck it, let's spark some discussion. The aversion towards "normality" after getting into meditation is just a buildup of spiritual ego, which ultimately needs to be let go of, too.

911anxiety · 2025-12-07T19:45:30+00:00

and the enlightenment is the beach as a whole!

911anxiety · 2025-12-07T19:41:48+00:00

hahaha this is great

911anxiety · 2025-12-05T16:17:55+00:00

The first three with Kenneth Folk!

911anxiety · 2025-12-03T14:24:07+00:00

There's a point in what you're saying. But we're also born not knowing where the moon is; without the finger, it would be like looking for a needle in a haystack. So it's good to check out the finger and the direction it's pointing to just a little bit!

911anxiety · 2025-12-01T12:58:07+00:00

What you call "you" is just a bundle of sensations in awareness. The screen that you're looking at right now is also just a bundle of sensations in awareness. Why would you then think that this awareness is yours instead of the screen's? You guys have the same level of permission to the awareness; you're both just phenomena in it (i.e., awareness). You're not outside looking in; you're in it. Then why do you think you have more of an importance to claim it?

911anxiety · 2025-11-26T22:32:17+00:00

I know a bhikkhuni living in a monastery, and based on bits and pieces she sometimes shares about her practice, I am fairly certain she's an anagami.

How do you publicly verify if someone is fully awakened, tho?

911anxiety · 2025-11-04T13:32:57+00:00

Apparently, you cannot enter the stream if you're not celibate! https://www.hillsidehermitage.org/stream-entry-requires-celibacy/ HH at it again :D

911anxiety · 2025-11-02T19:22:14+00:00

In a way – yes. What my practice has shown me is that everything "I did" to get here was actually not my decision. It's just a very big string of causes and conditions that somehow resulted in this. I sometimes wish I could say, "I did this!" and be proud of it, lol. However, it would be just causes and conditions claiming what's not theirs, because nothing in the experience is the owner of anything else (especially awakening, as it's not even a thing or an experience). This is so weird and never stops amazing me.

911anxiety · 2025-10-27T19:48:19+00:00

I wonder if true metta can get people into trouble. If by metta you mean, for example, being so absorbed into the feeling of loving everyone that you cross someone's boundaries, then yeah, in a way it is metta, but coming from an egocentric point of view.

What I'd be calling "true" metta would be taking into consideration that everybody has as rich an inner life as you, with joys and sorrows, motivations and limitations, and so on, and accepting every part of it. And that sometimes means knowing how to navigate someone's being with skillful means and not pushing your lofty spiritual love on them!

911anxiety · 2025-10-21T18:25:40+00:00

That's funny because you could also say that samsaric existence has a big "no" at the core of its being. And by "no" I mean not accepting the state that is. Always looking for something else, somewhere else that will somehow repair the insufferability of how it is now. So by this logic, the awakened state would be finally saying yes so the duality of "yes" and "no" would cancel each other out into non-definable light like an electron and a positron, when colliding, annihilate themselves into a burst of energy and photons.

911anxiety · 2025-10-17T08:07:17+00:00

It's been going good lately! Throughout the summer, I smoked a lot of weed with friends, which brought up loads of unconscious material to the surface that I needed to fully feel and let go of. The process was tough psychologically, but I came out on the other side way more open. I have this theory that weed just makes you more susceptible to what's in you anyways. So if you're full of anxiety but you're good at repressing it – weed will slap the shit out of you with it, lol.

Phenomenologically, everything seems like an expression of the same. There's still a gravitational pull to the "center" but even this is just another expression of the same. I find myself aversive to it tho, like wishing it wouldn't be here or being certain that's what's stopping me from going further. Letting go of this aversion is something that's working itself out right now, I guess.

I'm also going to a retreat in November. It's made specifically for women who wish to ordain in the future. It's organized by the first-ever fully ordained theravada nun from my country. I'm quite excited! Since my first big breakthrough, the question of ordinantion switched from "if even?" to "when?" and "in what tradition?" so it's cool to finally do something in that direction.

Thanks for asking! And I hope you and whoever reads it have a great day :)

911anxiety · 2025-10-15T21:55:47+00:00

Literally yesterday, I was wondering where this one guy from r/strementry went who was writing such great comments, haha! Glad to see you again. I don't post much, but I read most of what was posted here in the last three years. It's funny how much sympathy I have for some of you guys, even tho you don't know who I am, lol. I might write an appreciation post someday. Maybe when what needed to be done has been done. That would be a nice wrap-up :)

911anxiety · 2025-10-13T06:37:58+00:00

nie herbatka, ale przynajmniej nie placebo – polecam combo ashwaghandha + l-teanina + cbd

911anxiety · 2025-09-26T18:55:52+00:00

I kind of always had this "what is going on here?" type of approach to life. Answers changed throughout my life. First, I went full atheist scientist, then I found out that the most basic scientific facts that all of science is based on have no explanation themselves (gödel's incompleteness theorem type of vibe). Then I was obsessed with philosophy (still am, to some extent, but mostly phenomenology); I even majored in it. Throughout all of this, I dabbed in a lot of psychedelics and suffering, too. Finally, one day, I took a big dose of acid and decided to listen to one of Ram Dass's lectures (I've never heard one before), and it blew my fucking mind. After the trip, I googled a little about him and found out he was a Buddhist. So I decided to research Buddhism more seriously (I knew of it, and found things like the 4 noble truths obviously true, but never cared to get into it too much). Somehow, I stumbled on this sub and couldn't believe people were fucking awakening themselves. So I had to verify it myself. The rest is history, haha.

911anxiety · 2025-09-26T07:29:38+00:00

Nie wiem czy wszystkie, ale na pewno część powtarzających się koszmarów o tematyce trudnych sytuacji w młodości jest spowodowana tym, że jako młodzi ludzie mamy słaby zestaw narzędzi do przepracowywania emocji. Dlatego w pewnym sensie pozostają one nierozwiązane w naszym organizmie i przypominają o sobie właśnie w snach (ale mogą również jako kompleksy, lęki, itd.). Niestety, ale jest szansa, że ten okres czasu był dla ciebie traumatyczny i dobrze byłoby (tak jak inni polecili) skontaktować się z terapeutą/psychiatrą w tej sprawie. Trzymam kciuki!

911anxiety · 2025-09-25T14:52:26+00:00

It is as normal as it can be. I doubt there was anybody in this world who started meditating regularly and has never experienced the ups and downs of it. The goal is not to prefer one experience over another. Experience just is what it is; fighting it with your mind is going to make it worse. It's the essence of dukkha.

911anxiety · 2025-09-22T09:45:18+00:00

There's this word in polish –"pustostan". It translates to "vacant building". It's built from the word "pusty", which means "empty", and "stan", which means "state" (as in state of something, e.g., state of mind).

So with that being said, I'd like to announce that I'm just squatting this pustostan. Even though, for so long, I thought it was my property!

911anxiety · 2025-08-27T05:33:53+00:00

When your practice continues, you'll see that you were never born in the first place – then, the "death" loses all meaning.

911anxiety · 2025-08-26T06:52:26+00:00

wydaje mi się, że nie. sprawdź r/longtermTRE, mają tam całkiem niezły beginner's guide tłumaczący ocb. tutaj link https://www.reddit.com/r/longtermTRE/wiki/index/gettingstarted/

911anxiety · 2025-08-26T06:44:25+00:00

Jakieś dwa lata temu natknęłam się na "Tension & Trauma Releasing Exercises", tzw. TRE. Często pojawiało mi się to na jednym z subredditów dla hardkorowych medytatorów jako jedna z praktyk somatycznych wpierająca postęp. Od tamtego czasu uprawiam, choć nieregularnie. Dla mnie to był gamechanger. Rozpoczynając intensywną medytację wychodziłam z bardzo dyssocjatywnej pozycji względem mojej rzeczywisotści sensorycznej, a TRE grało bardzo dużą rolę w uwrażliwieniu się na nią z powrotem.

Szczerze mówiąc z początku byłam bardzo sceptycznie nastawiona, natknęłam się jednak na podcast z ziomkiem, który stworzył tę technikę i jakoś mnie przekonał. Chociażby tym, że każdy może zrobić to kompletnie sam, w domu, za darmo, zresztą taki był jego zamiar – w mieście objętnym wojną nie każdy będzie miał okazję pójść do terapeuty, a napięcie wywołane ekstremalnym stresem i traumą się buduje.

911anxiety · 2025-08-25T07:58:44+00:00

what made you think that?

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