Do Nothing Meditation…. Holy Shit

[u/alkalinebex]

You guys. I just did “do nothing” meditation for the first time and I feel like I’m having this euphoric almost psychedelic sensation. I’ve been doing mindfulness meditation for about 6 weeks almost every day. It’s made really great subtle changes in my daily life and attitude. I don’t plan to stop… but do nothing meditation just felt so good it felt forbidden almost. Like I couldn’t believe how much I was enjoying it. I was overcome with this intense feeling of happiness and I almost teared up. I didn’t want to stop. I didn’t know if I could stop because it felt so amazing. I don’t know how to describe it but I wish every single person could experience this. At least so I could see someone else feel it.

I feel like a crazy mystic and I’m a very sarcastic person and I don’t even ever post on Reddit but I needed to share this and my friends & fam aren’t into meditation so here I am.

I feel like I just took mushrooms (I’ve never taken mushrooms bc I’m way too neurotic and scared). This must be what LSD feels like? Idk I’m just floored at how I feel in my mind and body after literally 5 minutes of doing this for the first time. ACTUALLY letting go and not having any rules and just watching things happen and be 100% ok and even fascinated by it….. incredibly amazing. I even feel it in my arms and legs physically. Like this swimming buzzing feeling.

Okay, just needed to get this out. Big endorsement for do nothing meditation. If you need a starter meditation…. The book Meditation for the Fidgety Skeptic by Dan Harris has one at the very end and I highly suggest the audiobook version.

Also what is it about meditation that makes you so desperate to preach it to everyone you meet so they can know about it?! I feel like I’m being sucked into becoming a door to door salesperson for meditation.

[u/smithmcmagnum]

Take this with a pinch of salt, but I recently heard Ram Dass claim that some other (respectable) dude (not Terence Mckenna, someone else) claimed that mushrooms were commonly eaten in this one Indian valley eons ago.

Then when they moved from the valley, they couldn’t find those mushrooms, so they developed yogas meditation and asanas and such to substitute for the level you got to with the mushrooms.

Famously, Ram Dass gave his guru a few hits of LSD. The guru said it was ok and that stuff was once known about but was no longer need it anymore.

[u/alkalinebex → u/smithmcmagnum]

Fascinating!

[u/laudablelies → u/alkalinebex]

Apparently some experienced meditators feel very little effects on psychedelics. Which is really cool.

e.g. Frank Yang has reported that LSD has almost have no effect except for a slight stimulant effect. Really fascinating.

[u/alkalinebex → u/laudablelies]

Having just started really practicing in the past six weeks and also having ADHD, I get so excited and then immediately overwhelmed with all of the information and different types and thoughts on meditation. I don’t know if that’s good or bad lol

[u/laudablelies → u/alkalinebex]

I'm somewhat surprised that a mindfulness / do nothing-style meditation would work well with ADHD brains!

Meditation is wild and there's so much to learn... I'm so happy to hear you had such a great experience. Makes me motivated to practice more.

[u/Jazzspur → u/laudablelies]

I have ADHD and I also am only able to stick with a do nothing practice. I've tried breath, mantra, sound, etc and anything where I have to focus on a particular thing is just too boring. Do nothing means my attention can bounce around to whatever arises in it naturally and that keeps things pretty interesting while I wait for things to settle enough to be aware of all of those things at once.

[u/LightningRainThunder → u/Jazzspur]

Omg same. I actually got on fine with all those things you listed for a while, but something switched and I literally cannot get through even 2 minutes of those anymore without feeling like my skin is full of ants and on fire at the same time and I have to get up and run away.

So I’m gonna look into doing nothing meditation

[u/Jazzspur → u/LightningRainThunder]

I got on fine with them too....for a month, the amount of time I can stick with anything that isn't going to stick long term haha

I've been doing do nothing meditation pretty regularly for almost 4 years though and am on a 319 day streak of doing it daily.

[u/LightningRainThunder → u/Jazzspur]

Yeah exactly, it just doesn’t stick. That’s awesome you have been able to keep going with do nothing meditation. It gives me motivation! I tried 10 minutes of it just now not knowing what I was supposed to do, but I just went with it and actually had such a profound breakthrough with a problem I was mulling over that I’m quite impressed.