Lichi's Yoga Journal

Hi Sivason,

Im fortunate to have the opportunity to learn from this class, and to incorporate the lessons into my daily practice of meditation and use the resulting knowledge and wisdom into dreams.

So far im sleeping about 8 hours a day on average and i will remain sleeping like that probably for the next 4-5 years. Then i might reduce the ammount of hours slept to increase the ammount of hours meditated. So in these years i will try to learn as much as i can about dream yoga and lucid dreaming in general.

In this Journal i will comment about the lessons I undertake; and if i relate them with my daily practice of meditation how i relate it (maybe will include some quotations or references), mainly.

I began two days before starting this journal with basic lessons 1.

I read the lesson on paying attention to sounds and how many sounds i could count. So far im doing step one, because i found out that when i get distracted (by thoughts or sensations mainly) i forget to keep awareness on the sounds, so i just hear noise instead of recognizing each particular sound. Im living in an apartment where there is a lot of sound: a gas station near the apartment, traffic, bothering neighbors with either music, tv or other sounds, dogs, kids, and other sounds that recognizing them can be quite a interesting task. However maybe im doing step two without noticing it... adding up sounds and that's why when i get distracted is like 'having to build the sand castle again'.

I must say either if im doing step one or step two of the first lesson, after noticing the sounds and taking interest in them i became much more calm, tranquil and aware. Sounds i wanted to neglect before are now allowed to be sensed and this releases me from unnecesary tension and thus no need to be angry because of the sounds.

Last Wednesday i was in classes and did a mental exercise to guess how long it was since the class began: one hour, one hour and a half... I always guessed correctly before one hour, but never tried more than one hour, so i waited to check. However i didn't have to wait too long because as soon as it was 1 1/2 hours some people came out to the hall and started talking, not close however, like 50-70 meters away, and as soon as they came out i heard them and shortly after i noticed that it must be this hour. I felt great for being aware of this.

During the last week i have practiced meditation, but focusing on the breath mainly and feelings. I haven't read the instructions on feelings yet but i will soon. I've doing awareness on sounds closer to the last moments of the sessions, and i've been doing awareness of sounds more informally than formally, this is during my daily activities.