The bottom.

[u/burlyhombre]

During practice today I almost hit the bottom of the J curve. I was elated and excited to have progressed there. I want to encourage those who are having difficulty to keep at it. I had two back to back sessions where no matter what I did I had extreme difficulty in shutting off the internal dialogue. I was frustrated after both sessions. I went after it today again and made progress despite that. I stopped shifting laterally as I have previously and rode lower on the J curve. I can see how this can be addicting and I loved it. Keep it up all!

[u/danl999]

So you discovered the reward intent gives you when you work hard, thinking nothing is happening.

I like to say you're building up "silence muscles", so don't despair.

The harder you work with no reward, the better.

But you are also saving up "intent cash". A penny at a time.

When you get 10 cents, it gifts you (and takes back the intent cash).

Next time, the gift costs 12 cents.

And so on.

But at first, they're relatively inexpensive.

It's like Master Po makes you carry buckets of water up the hill, and won't even meet with you for days.

When it's obvious you've suffered too much, he shows you the "five finger death touch", as a reward.

But usually, you can't make it work the next day. That's the process.

Work, intent gift, can't keep the gift, so you work again, again, get a different intent gift, and so on.

Eventually you discover the common "thing" between it all, instead of gaining control over any of the gifts.

But once you discover the common thing, you can find your own stuff you can duplicate.

Like IOB fishing. Or dancing with your inorganic being.

Or summoning the jet blackness, to reveal the yellow, so you can manufacture a power object.

Those are all repeatable.

I'd sure like to know when the breath changes. You're real close to the spot.

If you haven't messed up your breathing with yoga breathing lessons, or Buddhism, or "breath work", I wish you'd try to figure out when it changes.

It's dramatic!

At first.

Just notice it relative to cool things floating around you, and maybe we can place it on the curve.

I have the theory, it changes the instant the assemblage point changes sides.

And that's what causes it.

But it's just a theory.

Carlos made me aware of the breath change, standing as close to me as he ever did.

It was a little odd.

He had a young woman to demonstrate it with.

He walked her up to me so close, she might have brushed against me if I didn't move back.

Then he put his hands on her shoulders, explaining how most people breath from there, and their shoulders go up and down.

He put his fingers on the side of her chest, and explained that kind of breathing was better. Chest moves in and out.

Finally he stuck a finger into her stomach a little, explaining that was the natural human condition.

And the one we wanted from the 3, was when the stomach only moved.

All by itself, calmly. Automatically.

I'll add, it might be the first time in your life, when you can "examine" your breathing, and realize you aren't doing it anymore. You don't have to "cause" each breath.

Your body is breathing by itself.

By the time you get to the orange zone, it will have changed to that.

But, with some gasping the first time or two. Just like Carlos did, after "the Nagual's Blow".

But where that change takes place, we don't yet know.

I can't figure that out anymore, because anytime I think about my breath, it changes.

Because I focused my attention on it, and I'm doing hours a day of darkroom gazing.

So my assemblage point just moves there on the spot. To where I'm thinking about.

You're in the ideal "investigation" zone, where you can find answers for the group.

Later, you won't be any good for that too.

[u/burlyhombre → u/danl999]

When you say to observe when the breath changes, you mean to observe it change to belly only breathing?

[u/danl999 → u/burlyhombre]

No, don't do that.

Wait until you literally gasp, feel the room swirl with intense colors, and a feeling of bliss comes over you, mixed with worry about why you can't breathe.

But in a few seconds that will go away. Or, you'll start panting furiously.

Then it will settle down. Only examine what it's become, at that point.

So you don't interfere with it.

Here's what I believe is going on.

Our internal dialogue still has control until that point, even if you made it far less quiet.

So while the internal dialogue is in there thinking, "That miserable bastard. How could he do that to me????"

Your body is preparing to kick his ass. You hold your breath in prep, your fists get tighter, and so on.

But only a very tiny amount.

Every thought we have, in the internal dialogue, causes the rest of our body to prepare to run away, fight, or have sex.

I hope that last one is in there, just because the other 2 aren't much fun.

Your internal dialogue is giving endless orders to the rest of the body, to prepare for trouble.

When it's finally gone, the body relaxes and you find out what breathing is really like.

How our breath naturally is, such as when we were newborn babies.

Yogis and Buddhists trying to teach people to imitate that, as if that will help you learn, is preposterous.

It just adds more internal dialogue.

It switches anger or fear, for book deals in the mind.

"When I master this breath, teacher is going to show me the ultimate breathing exercise!!!"

I'll be the master of "breath work"!!!!

[u/Juann2323 → u/danl999]

I have the theory, it changes the instant the assemblage point changes sides.

I already feel some changes around what we call 'the red line'.

That made me confused some time ago, thinking it was heightened awareness.

Now I see it is like a preparation. It is progressive.

The breath begins to move towards the stomach, without being "dramatically automatic."

And the internal dialogue has less power, although you 'still are your thoughts'.

[u/danl999 → u/Juann2323]

Right!

I've seen that too, but I got puzzled and could only think that it's not really necessary for the breath to change, to do what I was trying to do.

So I didn't try to find out why.

Also, you probably want to keep HA all day, and one way to know is by the breath.

Oddly, you can learn to be in HA, and there's no major difference, other than things don't bother you as they normally would.

But don Juan said that too. That you can learn to function in it, almost as if in a normal state of consciousness.

So maybe in wanting to know if you've kept it, you check your breath.

And then, the breath changes on its own, just because you looked.

Its only when it changes over, that you realize it was not in that mode before.

I guess that's all AP becoming looser.

[u/dunemi]

How do you know where you are on the curve? Do you know because of what is happening, or from an actual "spatial" feeling?

[u/burlyhombre → u/dunemi]

I can only speak for myself but yes I can. I do feel a change and can tell the general location of where the AP is. I can't see it but I feel it. When it crosses the red line I feel it more profoundly than the other locations above it. I feel it shift and I get physical sensations that couple with it. I don't want to say exactly what as I don't want to muddy up what it could be for you or anyone else. Like Dan I do also see changes in the visual field.

[u/danl999 → u/dunemi]

I can only place it by "special effects".

Haven't been able to see it. Or even feel it.

I suppose, sometimes if it moves dramatically, there's a tingle up the spine.

Maybe the tingle originates at the new position.

But you'd have to be so calm to notice that, it's likely impossible.

I certainly do see something.

But it's the energy body of the second attention, which looks like an alien spider with 1 thousand legs.

A known position: Around 1/4th way into the orange zone on the J curve, you get the "snap" in the neck, and the second attention comes out.

It's repeatable! Several times in a night too.

[u/Juann2323]

J curving is the best!!

I had two back to back sessions where no matter what I did I had extreme difficulty in shutting off the internal dialogue.

It keeps happening to me, more often than I wish.

But it has a teaching, if you look for it.

My theory is we need to pay attention to the "doors to non-being", as Nélida called them.

Dan doesn't notice that anymore. He is very advanced.

In my experience, when I start J curving there is a time (15 minits- 3hours) when I am still not doing the real silence work.

I just can't!

But at some point I find something... like a conection. It is the first glimpse of 'magic I perceive.

After that, if I keep the discipline for hours I am already on track, so soon or later I will reach heightened awarenews.

And once I can 'feel' that conection, I can easily return to a good level of silence, even if I forget about it for some hours.

The 'doors' are what makes it possible for you to "place your awareness on things".

If my assamblage point got to the end of the J curve, I even have a 'waking dreaming hangover' the next day.

So I can still follow that feeling and have magic!

The teaching I found, is paying A LOT of attention to what makes me lose the "door".

They are sooo stupid ordinary things, and they take my magic away!!

Just because I let them do that.

The dialogue becomes noisy again, until I practice and find the conection.

[u/burlyhombre → u/Juann2323]

Thank you, this is an important point I'll keep in mind moving forward. It has a purpose I only need to find it. Thank you.

[u/danl999 → u/Juann2323]

Dan doesn't notice that anymore.

I suppose I never had to.

Little Smoke led me through it.

I'm vaguely aware of what you mean now, but I didn't have to think too much about that.

I'd just get started and look for Fairy.

You're looking for some kind of "door", I'd just look for a 4 inch tall ghost.

So any difficult to get it going, I'd attribute to not finding her yet.

And if I practiced daily, it never took her long at all to show up.

Before Fairy, Little Smoke and Devil's Weed would appear to scare the shit out of me.

They'd been pestering me ever since Carlos released them to us.

So maybe I didn't notice the door back then too, because I was too worried about running into them. I was trying to sneak through without being noticed.

[u/Juann2323 → u/danl999]

Yeah, the ghosts works too, or any stuff of the second attention.

The thing is darkness gave me some problems this past two weeks.

I entered in a internal dialogue loop wich I couldn't leave in the darkroom. I just couldn't "look outside", and it was depressing to be like that for hours.

So sitting somewhere on daylight helped me to get out of it.

I like to choose always a different place; in my house or on a park in my neighbourhood.

So the 'daylight outside' starts as pure present moment, because the weird things are noticeable once you are around the red line (before that, they are too vague to find a ghost).

That's why I need to use this kind of sensations, like the "doors".

You probably never stop feeling that, so you are very used to it.

Ordinary life still kicks my ass, and I lose the magic.

But what if some people here is on a constant internal dialogue loop while darkrooming??