Thank you for such an explicit post, DKervick! Our situations have much in common, just a small variation that instead of panic I feel a total futility of existence, something like that. The story about waling meditation is a real discovery, thank you so much.
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Thank you my friends for helping, sincerely. So far that is what I think I should do - Metta meditation, walking meditation, certain yoga osanas and some calming essential oils. Hopefully some time later things will get better. Thank you all once again.
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Yes, skfir, I also still have sometimes have conceptions of meaningless and futility. But what has happened to me is that have come to think in a different way about my thoughts about the world and my emotional responses to the world. Just because one sometimes believes that there is no ultimate purpose to life does not mean that one has to feel depressed about that belief. There is a source of joy inside us that can be liberated and experienced no matter what we think about the nature and purpose and direction of the external world.
We tend to assume in our ordinary, everyday culture here is that there is a natural, standard fit between emotions and views, and these cognitive-emotional connections are treated by our societies and its professional emotion managers as normative. You are classified as unhealthy if you don’t experience the normative emotions: If your dog dies, or a human dear one dies, you are supposed to feel grief, and if you don’t there is something wrong with you. If somebody hits you with a stick, you are supposed to feel anger or outrage, and if you don’t there is something wrong with you. If you learn that an asteroid is going to hit the earth tomorrow, you are supposed to feel despondency and despair, and if you don’t there is something wrong with you.
But if we are stuck in these conceptions of an unalterable link between our views and our emotions, then the only way one can get rid of one’s painful emotions is by changing one’s views. The only way you can stop feeling the pain of grief is to convince yourself that your loved one is not really dead. Or the only way you can get rid of the pain of despair is to stop believing the asteroid is going to hit the earth.
But if your dear one really is completely and totally dead, and there is no intellectual way around that, or if the asteroid really is going to hit the earth tomorrow, and there is no intellectual way around that, there is another approach: learn to stop manufacturing the standard painful emotional responses to these negative eventualities. This is different from allowing the emotion to build, but then suppressing or repressing it. It is instead not allowing the seed of the emotion to start growing at all, or at least learning how to defuse the building energy of the emotion in a natural way without repression.
Easier said then done. But that’s what the meditation techniques are all about: learning to let go, and ending the pain that comes from attachment to the world being a certain way, or developing in a certain direction toward a particular goal.
So yeah, some days I think, “maybe something really interesting and mysterious is going on in the world, an it is all evolving toward some interesting goal or purpose.” Other days I think, “Nope, the world is just a purposeless blob of fields and particles doing what fields and particles do.” Some days I think, “Maybe I am one of those people who is going to achieve some important and noteworthy thing in the world.” Other times I think, “Maybe I’ll die poor and alone somewhere without having achieved much of note.” But the second thought in each pair now doesn’t seem as depressing as it once did, and I am able to maintain cheerfulness more consistently throughout all of these intellectual and philosophical ups and downs.
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Oh yes!
Sorry to add more on, but I knew I was forgetting something! So now to second more of other’s posts 
Do try therapy. Let me add another voice in support of that. It has negative connotations I know, but I found Buddhism through therapy so it can’t be all bad! 
One technique that really helped me is called ACT (acceptance and commitment therapy) it’s very similar to what Dkervick describes above. If you can find a Buddhist therapist that is awesome! For me, my revelations didn’t come in therapy, but I know that the multiple months over multiple years of therapy helped immensely.
Expect suffering. This is kind of along the acceptance and letting go lines, but I’ve learned to not get surprised when I suffer or think that something’s wrong. This is samsara, if you’re suffering something’s going right. Otherwise I get more into this mental proliferation like “why me? this is so painful! when will it end?” One way or another it will end Ayya Khema talks a lot about this - try her books. I think it’s in Being Nobody, Going Nowhere?
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Dear Stanislav:
Thanks for your kind reply. I hope my post was not too over the boundary; I decided I’d rather post than not, and regret not saying something that might be helpful. One of my avocations is that for many years, I’ve worked for state athletic commissions as a pro/ammy MMA/kickboxing judge. It’s not entertainment; it’s weekend work I take seriously. Some of these high level male and female athletes have had symptoms as you described, related to weight cutting, overtraining, and having ingested stuff their trainers gave them that when bloodwork was done, had substances that were toxic. I noted as well that you are a high level athlete, and worried that you might be suffering due to some imbalance in the body that is leading to imbalance in the brain’s function. I know that many professional athletes, after retiring from heavy training, report better mood, better sleep, less symptomology.
Even the Buddha taught us, in some ways, that a balanced body is foundational to a balanced and mindful mental state. So, I offer my apologies for perhaps crossing a boundary of propriety, but my thoughts were offered with Metta, and for your discovering a path of purification and peace. I trust that the merit that you accumulate for your invention of magnetic advanced universal music board ( a device for allowing blind children to read music) accrues you much wellness, happiness and peace.
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The reason for feeling so bad is because of lack of sleep. I always feel the same if I had not slept well. I do not know what to say giving that you do not have problems falling asleep. But if you ever do have problems falling asleep, the problem is restlessness of the mind. Just stop the restlessness and you will fall asleep. It’s not too difficult to do. But I don’t know what to say about constant waking up.
Is your mind restless in general ? Or are you having problems with daydreaming too much, imagining conversations etc. ? What problems does your mind have when awake, excluding the hell on earth part that is caused by lack of sleep ? You have not described this too much.
Everything can be fixed as long as it is a problem of the mind not of the body.
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Some relevant verses from AN 3.35 :
Having cut off all attachments,
having removed anguish in the heart,
the peaceful one sleeps well,
having attained peace of mind.
The sutta, as is to be expected, indicates that mental defilements need to be eradicated to attain peace.
But, sometimes, bodily ailments can be severe enough to drive away the energy that is required to be mindful and calm.
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We have faith that you will get better and feel better. Some combination of (as has been mentioned by many others here) medicine, counseling, and contemplative practice will definitely help you. Knowing that you have supporters, you should feel empowered to address the situation. With metta, Jon.
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Oh my… Your post is like a revelation to me. Of course you are right, that is how it is supposed to be. Not changing things, but changing your emotional response to them. Of course! Thank you.
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Yes, thank you.
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Oh please by all means… I appreciate very much every word you said, sincerely. And it is an honor to me to meet a professional sportsman.
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Yes it is - I am an artist after all. Internal dialogue, worrying about things. Of course, telling the truth I have many reason to consider life unhappy, but so does everybody. That is why the Buddha showed us the Four Noble Truths, I think. Most probably a right meditation should help.
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I really do, thank you.
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The honor is all mine. You are a highly talented individual, and your musical altruism for the benefit of visually impaired children is most admirable. I’m grateful we had the chance to meet on Sutta Central; with Metta. Stay in touch; keep with the meditation and Metta practice for oneself…as the song says, " хорошо, Всё будет хорошо" …
If it helps, here’s a link to one of Bhante Sujato’s talks on Metta. https://youtu.be/gYWAhB3BeRQ Bhante trained with Thailand’s foremost Metta teacher ( Bangkok’s Ajahn Maha Chatchai), and for me, he has captured the heart and the practice of Metta better than any other teaching I’ve heard. This practice is foundational for me, and I hope it has some deep benefit, to you too, Stanislav.
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You know Russian! Thank you heaps for the link and your kind words. And many thanks to everyone here, hopefully now things will be changing, as I know what to do.
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Besides seeing a doctor and/or therapist(s), you might try this sutta that Bhante Gunaratana has highlighted recently (and in his new book, Loving-Kindness in Plain English):
In the Discourse on the Benefits of Loving-Friendliness (METTA NISAMSA SUTTA),
see: http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an11/an11.016.piya.html
the Buddha lists 11 benefits derived from practicing metta—and I might add that many of these benefits are being confirmed by contemporary scientific research! Several of these are benefits in sleeping…
Best wishes and with metta,
Fred
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Thank you Fred, not only I read it, but also have already started practicing exercises, Metta, sitting and walking meditations. I am really afraid to say anything right now, as we have a saying in Russia that “fools are lucky”, but I am quite resolved and hopefully I will be able to report something. I just want to thank all of you people once again. No, not just once, hundreds of times, for sincere help and concern - such rare qualities today. I am very grateful. May all the best be with all of you, friends.
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Hello everyone, I think, after two months, it is time for an update. Believe or not, a miracle happened. Walking metta meditation turned out to be not just useful, but a real remedy that I couldn’t even dream of. It doesn’t improve my sleep and it is totally ok, because I kind of know how to live with that and accept this condition, but it has driven the “hell” off. Just every day it appears to be a little bit further away then the day before and it is just miraculous. The strangest thing is that the effect was noticeable after the first time I meditated!!! I couldn’t believe it and it was really strange. I had presumed that Metta meditation might have helped after some months of everyday practice, but the fact of immediate alleviation of my mental state was totally unexpected. I was afraid to speak about it here, because I though that it was merely a novelty effect and that “fools are lucky” and so on and that it would subside with time. But now two months have passed and I can say - Metta meditation works for me. Of course I have to be very careful and monitor my emotional state very carefully every day; meditate regularly every day at about the same time to nip the hell in the bud, but it works! I cannot express how grateful I am to all of you for helping me out. It is like an unexpected salvation that I couldn’t hope for. I do Metta meditation at home, I have a place I visit every week to meditate, I take Ravensara oil before bed time and all that works. I just wanted once again to send lots of Metta to all of you and lots of sincere thanks.
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