Just One Look Forum Archives

Hi All,

So I've been looking for awhile and recently I've noticed an intense feeling of sadness / despair. It seems to be located in the face, behind the eyes, the mouth, the back of the head. I don't really know how to handle it, it feels so overwhelming negative. Is it enough just to keep looking at it?

Any comments appreciated.

Hello, herenow,

It seems to me that something is being brought to the surface and purged. These are old remains and sometimes they can be so intense and painful. It is difficult to know when it will go away. One day it will not be there anymore, but that does not make it easier to bear now.

Keep up the looking when and if it feels like you should. The good part is that once done, the looking comes automatically.

Do things you enjoy, rest if you can. If you feel like being alone sometimes, offer yourself that. If you feel like talking to others, do that as well. John's instructions about mindfulness training are very, very helpful, you can find them here or on the site. I find myself using mindfulness training everyday, even if in a modified form, slightly different than what John recommends. Still mindfulness, though.All the best to you!

Thank you, Dragos! We used to call this exercise Mindfulness Training, but we've seen that this can be confusing to those who are familiar with meditation practices. For this reason, we have changed the name of the exercise to "Focused Attention", which better describes its purpose and nature. This is not an exercise to develop open awareness. There are many such exercises available, and the skillful development of open awareness can be profoundly useful. But for now, our main purpose is to cultivate the skills most useful in promoting self-reliance in the difficult period following the collapse of the context of fear that has shaped every aspect and psychological mechanism of our minds.