A friend/wingman of mine told me about how RSD instructors supposedly use meditation to their advantage in game and life in general. (Meditation here meaning 'immersing yourself in the present' and 'absence of thought')

I thought I'd check the video Tyler put up about it. I was very impressed by what he had to say about it.

Apparently training your mind to become utterly tuned to the present (what is going on at the time) can help you to stop thinking 'autopilot' and start thinking 'concious decision making'. You can see how that would benefit one's sarging; you'd be able to think on your feet and be in complete control of yourself! He when as far in the video to say that meditation helped his results GREATLY.


I thought I'd try it out yesterday for the first time; I put comfortable, warm clothes on and lay on my bed with my eyes closed for 20 minutes. I focused my attention of the tip of my nose, visualising it in my head, as well as my breathing.

I felt a lot of stimuli spring up whilst I was doing that, such as needing to itch or cough. Mostly, I let them thoughts pass by and concentrated on what I was doing. Unfortunately I had a throat infection so I couldn't resist the urge to cough, but still...

Halfway through, I felt something strange; I couldn't feel my arms. I couldn't feel any sensation in them, like they were numb.

I thought I'd achieved something here but I was unsure, like I'd somehow immersed myself in what I was doing that every stimulus (like the need to itch) vanished overtime.

Sadly, it didn't really help my sarging later that night, but still...


If anyone here practices meditation, could you help me determine whether I'm doing this right? Any advice you would like to give would be much appreciated!


Cheers

Ninja

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K...1st have you done it more than once? I mean..yes, you should be able to get results right away- but not in the sense your looking for. You've built years of programming subconsciously, patterns etc. 20 minutes isn't going fix that like a magic pill..

Check your PM.

That was the first time I've engaged in meditation before actually. True, 20 minutes won't fix anything, just wanted to know if there is any advice people could give me. I'm still a little unsure about how 'achieving presence' should feel...

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You are good. Not feeling the arms is a good sign, actually, when you meditate the right way, you are not suposed to feel your body at all.

Main problem with this is that, same as you, in my case the arms are the first part of my body I stop feeling; when I realize this, it`s a thought per se, wich ruins my concentration and I start feeling my arms again.

Keep up with the meditation practice, there are a lot more benefits of it than PUA; but this is one effect.

It's kinda funny because if you monitor how 'well' you're doing, you're not doing very well

Did it again yesterday, was racked by coughs from my illness so meh. I do recall feeling a very calm, balanced sensation when I stopped feeling my arms, I think that must be the feeling of 'presence'...

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I´d recommend hypnosis aswell. Basicly the same thing as you were trying out but you have a guy whispering softly into your ears.. Some background music. and you just focus on how you feel..

No homo.

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Have actually tried that before, it's cool and stuff but then you hear it over and over again and it loses it's spark... at least that's what I think.

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Sure, but it really something you should do 1-4 times a month at max. You can also use very different tapes

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No matter what, I must live without regret

Life is good

Live it for yourself

To become good at meditation takes awhile. First advice sit up when you meditate since you dont want to fall asleep or relax. What you want to do is too clear your mind of thoughts. Focus on your breathing as you close your eyes. Breathe slowly in and out, to lower your heart rate. If you start thinking, stop and focus on the breathing again. The object is not too become clever or anything but to relax your mind at first. I will also advice you to listen too some calming music and theres lots of it on the internet. Do this in the beginning. The loss of sensation in the arms is good and you want the same for your whole body and mind. Once you handle your thoughts, then focus on your feelings. The benefits of meditation is that, like me, you wont ever get preoccupied thinking badly about yourself. For about 90% of the day I have no thoughts in my head at all, and Im completely focused on what Im doing. Most people think too much about what they have to do later or simply think too much.

Good Luck

here is a great place for learning about mindfullness

http://www.audiodharma.org/series/1/talk/1762/

I met the guy, Gil Fronsdal. One of the highlights of my life. He explains it very clear. Good luck!

Check out the book Power of Now. Pretty much the same stuff, but doesn't get too much into meditation.

It can be hard to see the practical application of meditation but it is there. Recently I've had a patch where I've lost all confidence, acting so reactionary and staying within my own head. I thought I'd learned to deal with that and never would never go through it again but it happened and I found myself so badly in that state that I didn't even feel motivated to drag myself out of it. Seriously seriously low.

The other day though I was walking through town and started analysing what was actually going through my head. I was constantly judging people and assuming what they were thinking about me. I was judging girls I walked past and then wondering if they thought I was hot. I was judging guys on them being cool or hard and worrying if I was being aggressive by looking towards them. I realised all this was making me miserable. I cleared my head, letting any thought or judgements I was making about people or what they thought of me drift away. I totally stopped associating emotions with people I saw. I was just letting my brain absorb what my eyes were taking in without letting my inner monologue annotate. I stopped letting my mind put its spin on things. Within 5 minutes all the feeling of depression had gone. Another 5 minutes later and I was feeling really cheerful. I started noticing girls that I would genuinely only be drawn to, rather than sizing up every girl that went past. Little things I saw on the street started to amuse me or make me laugh. I know I said earlier that I was trying to detach emotions from what I was seeing but after shutting my mind down my true self started coming through. I was being amused by things that truly amused me, as opposed to what my mind felt should amuse me.

It is very hard to accurately describe the mindset but it was very similar to the feeling of meditating when you are just letting any thoughts drift past, clearing your mind.

This was just walking around town and not interacting with anyone so it is very easy to keep that state. It does however apply to interactions with other people, which is much harder. I found that, even around good friends, I was inside my head all the time, thinking what to say, laughing and what my mind said I should find funny rather than what genuinely amused me. I've enjoyed interactions with other people a lot more since using that new mindset, it's more difficult with the variable in an interaction but definitely worth working on.

tl;dr Meditation helps train your brain to not spin on stimuli, preventing mental friction and allow your true self to come through

It definately helps to quiet your mind and to not think so much.

A meditation I do is all about allowing and feeling the sensations and feelings in your body and just allowing them to be there. When thoughts come up you say "thankyou" or "thankyou I don't need you right now" and refocus back on your body. It helps you to have emotions come up and just be with them when you go out into the world.

It's a process though. Some times I do it I just can't turn off my thoughts, other times i'm totally quiet and relaxed.

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I've done self-hypnosis and I'm meditating currently. I'm not really an expert on meditation but I'm quite sure you're supposed to feel as much of your body as possible. Self-hypnosis is the one where you go numb with senses to everything except for what you hear.
In meditation you do the opposite, you need to feel as much of your body as possible, see, hear, smell, taste.

I usually do all 5 at the same time (have in mind that I do both sitting and walking meditation so the method for lighting on the sense might vary):
1) Feeling your body is easy, I can touch something at all times. But besides touching, feel your breaths and every muscle movement you make. Baoding balls anyone? If I'm walking then I can feel my legs working, neck turning, sweating, touching some interesting building texture, faster breathing, cold wind against my skin...
2) Seeing the shapes, the depth, see the colors, the lights, shadows, how things move... How things interacts to one another, including people. So much can be seen and observed, it's our main sense.
3) Hearing: I usually play some chill music or music specifically designed for meditation that I got. If not, then Baoding balls produce enchanting sound or I can just hear environment noises if I'm doing a walking meditation like: traffic, birds, leaves rustling, soles on my shoes making contact with the ground etc etc. If you pay attention there is whole orchestra of sounds.
4) For smelling I use indian incense sticks.
5) For tasting, you can shew a mint.

So when you use all 5 senses at the same time, there is not time for thoughts really. If I happen to have a thought I just focus on my senses and it's gone in a fraction of a second. Do you know how I notice that I'm thinking? I'm not in the moment and using my senses. SNAP! Thought is gone. Just enjoy the surrounding and this beautiful world.

This kind of meditation translates well into everyday communication with people with the difference that you have to turn on the brain a bit so you don't end up being a slobbering idiot (lol). This is all to teach you to use your brain just when you need it and be in the moment and out of your head at all the other times.

Hope that helped.

I like the way you talked about combining all the senses IAmMaynardJamesKeenan. So you just do it without any guidance? (like a cd).

I do a program by GP Walsh called Just Allow It and it guides you through little steps and building up similar to what I wrote in my last post, that's where I learnt it from.

I am able to use it at times when i'm getting intense emotions coming up and it helps alot.

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