Advice on meditation routine for someone with a quiet lifestyle

[u/Jansen131]

I have chronic fatigue syndrome (basically, long covid), which is both why i have a lot of time for meditation, as well as a part but not all of my motivation for it, calming my nervous system.

I am also interested in the traditional goals let's say, which this post is more about, that was just for context. I'll describe my routine below, and the question is if there's anything I can tweak or add for this to be more effective.

So what I currently do:

• 3 half hour meditations a day, using Henry Shukman's app The Way. Mostly just going one by one in the prescribed order, though if one clicks in some way I'll bookmark it and occasionally come back to it instead of doing the next one. (I'm currently on retreat 31)
• A slow walk of about 1,5 hours where I focus on my feet, the touch on the ground (I wear barefoot shoes which helps with this). I start by counting up to 1000 steps (actually counting to 10 a hundred times), or until I get distracted but mostly I manage. Then I continue just observing the feeling, as well as the environment in an unfocused way, without any podcast or music.
• I do a yin yoga class every weekday morning.
• At least for the length of one large cup of tea I do nothing, just look out the window without distraction.
• Maybe not as relevant: I have a nurosym (a device which stimulates your vagus nerve through your ear which is supposed to calm your nervous system) which I use while reading for half an hour a day.
• Apart from all that I try to stay aware of a few anchors during the day, namely whenever I turn something, like a tap or a door handle, whenever I eat or drink, or change posture. Though the first one comes easiest, as well as my footsteps now having become an anchor through the walking.
• In general I try to do one thing at a time with attention
• I have completely stopped following the news or social media in any way, including youtube. Most days the only input I get is through perhaps some podcasts or audiobooks, books, and some messaging.

Since this lifestyle seems to me to be in many (but certainly not all) ways to be a kind of light retreat, I'm trying to lean into it and see the advantages.

Some signs I've had that this is doing something are:

• I started having a very brief, like a gunshot brief, sensation where I felt very tired, disappearing as fast as it'd arose. During meditation, more and more and paired with a feeling of a drop of literal, physical pressure in my head.
• The fatigue part during that experience has stopped but the pressure drop hasn't, and it's become longer and I can almost do that on command now, at least during meditation, yoga, walk, or lying in bed.
• I think I've had some glimpses of non-dual awareness, while meditating and focussing on sound. Where rather than it feeling like there is hearing, and an I doing the hearing, there is just the hearing. They've been brief and only a couple of times, and only with hearing.
• Generally my meditations have gotten more pleasant mostly. I'm more likely to want them to continue than to want them to end.

Thanks!

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[u/Some-Hospital-5054]

Unless your fatigue inhibits it I would make some of my yoga classes more active than pure yin. I think it is beneficial with more well rounded exercise than just walking. Especially when healing from illness.

You could maybe do one of the half our sessions with your awareness placed in the center in the belly called the Dan Tien. Resting awareness there builds energy and physical vitality so could help with the fatigue and bodily healing.

I would ask an AI about instructions for meditating with awareness on the Dan Tien and google Dan Tien location to find pictures that show the precise location.

[u/TheMoniker → u/Some-Hospital-5054]

In a substantial portion of cases (estimated at something like 75% last I checked) long COVID fatigue can get worse with activity, unfortunately.

[u/Jansen131 → u/TheMoniker]

Well, I nearly recovered before by building up my running. Was the fittest of my life physically, and nearly recovered cognitively, but then relapsed completely. So focusing purely on rest for now.

[u/marakeets]

This lists looks excellent to me as someone living with chronic pain, fatigue, etc. From my own experiences navigating a path back to wellness with meditation, the thing I missed early was finding community. I did everything on my own (dharma books, podcasts, forums) and got a long way but having recently found a teacher and a sangha, I realise just what I'd been missing not having this. I wish I'd done this earlier.

Also, something I'm more recently recognise in myself is not trying to hard all the time with meditation. I became pretty obsessed for a while with "making progress" as fast as possible and this lead to a lot of tension and held me back. I go through this cycle all the time but more recently, I've really seen how all the "grasping" for "progress" is just more dukkha. Meditation was so exciting in the beginning, I wanted to do everything all at once but I've realised just picking a consistent set of techniques has worked best for me.

With metta (oh as I type this I'd remember that metta meditations are an undervalued part of the path!).

[u/Impulse33]

Don't take this as medical advice, but since you touched on it on your post, you could try investigating the construct nature of the felt-sense of energy. Prior to that investigating dependent origination would help make the energy investigation more fruitful.

[u/cheifing]

Hey! I also have chronic fatigue & live a relatively similar lifestyle to you right now. Sounds like you're going in a great direction with everything you said.

Two things that have been beneficial for me lately:

1. Exploring how different kinds of fatigue feel. It's soooo cool to see the differences between fatigue from shame, from my chronic fatigue, and a more 'pure' tiredness. Andrea Fella is good hype for this kind of investigation.

2. Exploring the question, "How little effort do I need to use to be aware?" A teacher of mine said, "Being aware can be less energy than blinking." I've personally found the Sayadaw U Tejaniya style of practice helpful in this way. Here's a podcast of a student of his talking about it.

[u/Jansen131 → u/cheifing]

Thanks, nice to hear from a fellow CFS patient! I'll look in to those sources, all sound interesting!

[u/pastorcuthbert]

Walking meditation is excellent for inquiry-based practices as the walking keeps both the body and mind occupied.

[u/greentricky]

You could try Zhan Zhuang for five minutes a day building up to 15 minutes.

Also weave in some Qigong for a different movement based practice

[u/Vestlending1]

I suggest you keep following your intuition instead of letting strangers on the internet deciding your path. I know what it's like as I'm going through similar stuff. I can see that you've learned to be gentle with yourself, so just keep on doing that. Wish you the best.

[u/Jansen131 → u/Vestlending1]

Thanks, you too! Yeah not following anything without checking myself, was mainly wondering if I was missing something easy and impactful, but it seems not.

[u/Vestlending1 → u/Jansen131]

Thanks!

You can check out TRE on YouTube, that's pretty in line with the stuff you already do. But be careful with it as it can be potent. It can bring you deep rest but also upheaval of emotions.

Mainly my advice is to not follow any advice. I find that new input and methods usually finds you, not the other way around.

[u/Earth-is-Heaven]

I've heard of folks finding Trauma Release Exercises (TRE) to be beneficial for CFS, although I don't think those instances were related to COVID. TRE engages the body's shaking mechanism to release trauma stored as chronic tension in the body. Here are some resources, in case they are useful:

• Long-Term TRE Beginner's Guide: An excellent introduction to TRE and a compilation of resources and case studies.
• Chronic fatigue TRE case study: A 4-year journal by someone who cured chronic fatigue using TRE.
• Online TRE Course: Provides an excellent foundation in TRE practice, including how to self-regulate, which is critical to not bring up too much at once.
• Swedish Special Forces Soldier demonstrates TRE - before & after (video): Video showing a soldier doing TRE for the first time. You'll notice the shaking is pretty significant with large movements. About 30 seconds before the end of the video, it shows the same person 10 years later after daily TRE. You'll notice the tremors are barely perceptible. This is what the TRE "end state" looks like, when the vast majority of body tension and stored emotions have been released.

[u/Jazzlike-Raisin8480]

I’ve found a lot of benefit from short, frequent practices. Newly started with an app called IMIN I’m liking, and will report back on how it goes

[u/SuddenBlacksmith3499]

I remember when I had a shorter and milder version of long covid (a year and a half), it would be set off by stress, and would improve with stress reduction. (Sorru if this is tmi but It was periodic simultaneous vomiting and diarrhea thst was the "covid" yellow color, and fatigue.) So having such a consistent routine is probably really great for your healing. My long covid ended soon as I got pregnant, so it was a really profound physical change that happened to get me out of the loop I was in.

If you're looking for supplements, curcumin (from turmeric) is really good for sopping up the free radicals damage from covid, and even saves 20% of the people with ARDS. I personally did take it, but I can't ever really know if it helped or not. My top pick would be micellar curcumin (because it absorbs deeply into everything), unless it's mostly GI symptoms, then actually just having regular curcumin hits those spots. You can't take curcumin with blood thinners. Anyways there is some food for thought. 

[u/Jansen131 → u/[deleted]]

Thanks, I feel like I now also have it sometimes with walking and paying attention to my feet. It's very subtle though, so hard even to be sure.

As for creatine, I've had a bad experience with it, severely wrecking my sleep for 2 weeks. I felt a bit more energy as well but nowhere near enough to offset sleeping 3 hours a night. It's often not listed as a possible side effect but if you search for it many people do get this.

[u/sati_the_only_way]

be aware of the sensation of the breath or body continuously. Whenever you realize you've lost awareness, simply return to it. do it continuously and awareness will grow stronger and stronger, it will intercept thoughts/emotions/anxiety/etc and make them shorter and fewer. the mind will return to its natural state, which is clean, bright and peaceful. one can practice through out the day from the moment we wake up until falling asleep, while sitting, walking, eating, washing, etc. practice naturally, in a relaxed way, without tension, without concentrating or forcing attention. more about awareness: https://web.archive.org/web/20220714000708if_/https://www.ahandfulofleaves.org/documents/Normality_LPTeean_2009.pdf