Author: Jesse Starks

Meditation combined with note taking is a powerful way to see what our brains actually care about, and by extension, to see who we are.

Studying My Attention

Six months after starting regular meditation (10-20 minutes, a few times per week), I was catching my mind do all sorts of wacky things – e.g. randomly jerking my attention around and obsessing about various things. Traditional meditation asks us to simply observe these things – (thoughts, feelings, worries, sensations) – and let them go. This is essential to building strong meta-cognition.

So far, so good!

I was getting the hang of it… this alone was helping me feel clear.

After a while I wondered if I could find patterns in my mind. So as I began to meditate, I journaled thoughts and feelings BEFORE I let them go. Not only did this help me let go faster, but I was compiling a little mental vapor trail.

Typically, after 10-15 minutes of notes, my thoughts would settle down… and I’d fall into traditional / strict meditation.

Short-Term Wow Factor

It sounds silly, but even in the span of a 20-minute meditation, I was often surprised how my mind repeatedly obsessed about certain things. I would watch myself write the SAME thought 4 or 5 times… Maybe it was a hard work day, and there was a big problem I was trying to solve. Or maybe I was really worried about a family situation, and despite not being able to do anything, I was repeatedly thinking about it.

Oddly, watching myself in these futile-worry-loops (the name of my new cereal) helped me reflect on them, and seemed to lessen their grip on me.

Long-Term Wow Factor

Every week or so, I’d look back and summarize the previous days. Not only was I obsessing about the same things in a single meditation session, I was obsessing about them over multiple meditation sessions. This was really shocking, especially when they were things that I didn’t really care about, or couldn’t really control.

But how odd is that last sentence?

Clearly – SOMETHING “cared” about these things… but it didn’t feel like “me”.

My subconscious brain was choosing to focus on certain things, but the wiser, long-term, conscious “me” was not in agreement. Whether you call this cognitive dissonance or the conscious mind misaligned with the subconscious mind, the split was fascinating.

It gave me so much to think about and ultimately, with time, gave me leverage to change my thought patterns, values and behaviors.

(Note: this “reflexive attention”, i.e. what the brain pays attention to without our control, is a major highlight in our Self-Investigation Model)

Summary

Meditation combined with journaling is an extremely powerful way to see what our brains actually care about, and by extension, to see who we are.

What our brains value might not necessarily be the same as what higher-consciousness “us” values. Studying this difference can be surprising and powerful.

Not a Meditation Substitute

Please note this technique is not meant to replace traditional meditation, which discourages “doing” anything (including notes), while meditating. This stricter form is necessary especially when learning, since constantly stopping defeats the primary goal of meditation (to let everything go). This journaling technique is something to explore atop a strong meditation foundation.

Technique

For what it’s worth – this worked for me:

• Train with a traditional mindfulness meditation practice. See here. 10-20 minutes per session, 3-5 times per week. I typically did this in the evening, to clear my mind and calm myself before bed. I trained for about six months.
• After a period of training and familiarity with regular meditation, layer in journaling sessions. As you begin to meditate, record quick bullets of thoughts and feelings that arise in a notepad before letting them go. Try to record the important stuff only. In other words if you have an itch or think about your dirty laundry for 1 second, skip that stuff.
• Reflect on your notes each week. Ask the standard questions: How important is X? Do I want to be thinking about X all the time? WHY do I care about X in the first place? Am I gaining anything by thinking about X so much?
• Similar to weekly reviews, review your weekly notes each month or every few months. Look for themes. See how your thought patterns and values are aligning over time.

Final Thoughts

As I uncovered significant feelings and thoughts with this practice, I often journaled about them separately (outside of meditation), for several hours or days afterward. This helped me wrestle with things I really cared about, and make important life decisions.

My life positively changed throughout this period.

The same monitoring and value alignment process continues today, even if more subtly…

I meditate and journal less frequently, though I still find it invaluable. I’ve developed a hunch for when it will help. At minimum I meditate / journal a few times per month.

Regardless of how often one does this long-term, my near-daily practice for a couple years taught me a ton, and helped reorient my life in many ways.

Discuss

This is posted to reddit for voting and discussion.

Meditation + Journaling
byu/JesseNof1 inSelfInvestigation