Hello everybody! I just wanted to share my meditational experience today and ask for an opinion, since I am very new both to meditating and Buddhism and know practically nothing. The idea is I work out at the gym and every time have a cardio session on a treadmill. Around four weeks ago I found out that it was, surprisingly, possible for me to try to meditate while walking the treadmill. So every time I was on the mill I tried to calm down, feel friendliness, get rid of noisy thoughts and relax. Today, all of a sudden, something unbelievable happened! I was on the mill, trying to concentrate and feel friendliness and tranquility. I don’t know how to properly explain verbally what happened next, but something like all of a sudden I had a feeling that both tranquility and friendliness were somehow right in front of me, with each breath I felt them raising inside my mind and gradually I felt an unbelievable joy and even kind of a bliss. I had never felt anything like that before and the thing is those feelings didn’t have any external source or reason, they were just born inside. I read in some suttas that the first jhana was characterised by both joy and rapture, born from seclusion. But in my case there was no any seclusion - just an ordinary cardio hall at an ordinary gym, full of people. Perhaps anybody could give me a clue about what happened to me? It was such a wonderful feeling, I haven’t experienced anything like that ever.
to my understanding by seclusion mental seclusion is meant, when influence of external irritants is brought down to a minimum, where they stop stimulating the mind
may i ask out of curiosity how long the experience lasted and what made it subside?
the experience started approximately on the 8th-10th minute and lasted until the 23rd minute, after that I had to stop the exercise, because I kept heart rate quite high. After I finished the exercise the experience was still there and even now I feel… how to say… quite good mentally!
Great to hear about your experience! This is what a good meditation is supposed to feel like.
Basically, as I understand it, when the mind withdraws from the sensual world it feels an ever greater sense of ease and satisfaction and staying with that pleasure without disturbing it (mainly out of fear or exitement) takes you into jhana (because the mind is automatically drawn towards pleasure). As far as I know, you can only enter jhana when the body is still but you can still take it a long way in walking meditation.
One thing you might notice, is that when you want to experience that pleasure again, it’s nowhere to be found. Only when you eventually start letting go of everything, including the desire for that pleasant feeling, does it happen all by itself.
Thank you raivo, it really was something very new and I am very glad it happened. Thank you for the advice and explanations. I mean… It is all in general so unexpected. If just about two months ago somebody would tell me that I would try to meditate and will read suttas I would never believe. Just life changing moments sometimes may come really without any expectations.
Sadhu Sadhu Sadhu