[This is a “back-post”; it is a work-in-progress, so it may change partially or completely, with materials added or taken away, over the next several days or weeks. This is “day 2(a)” of my stay at the Vipassana Meditation retreat. For general comments and summary, see “day 11.”]
At 4:40 PM, I find my Buddha-nature in my left nostril. But it’s a false alarm.
Really, all that’s happening is that I’m calming down. My mind is still wandering a lot. And we’re watching our respiration. I noticed that earlier today, when my mind wandered, it was mostly agitated, worrying, negative thoughts. But this afternoon, I found that my mind would wander to positive things – daydreams, happy things. And at the same time, I’m watching my breathing. In the morning, it was mostly in the right nostril. This afternoon, it has switched to the left nostril. So there must be something happy in my left nostril, QED.
I realize this is fallacious argument. Also, having happy distracted thoughts instead of negative distracted thoughts still isn’t matching the objective, I don’t think. The idea is to detach from both kinds of distracting thoughts.
All the same, it put me in a very cheerful, joyful, almost elated mood, having all these happy distracted thoughts.
