Yesterday evening was the fifth session of the MBSR course that I'm attending.  I'd missed the fourth session because of my wife's birthday, but I did jot down some thoughts last week in the blog post "Learning MBSR: ... body scan, Damasio on identity, and informal practice".  There were seven of us attending tonight's session, so two were missing.  We began with a straight 45 minute sitting meditation - slightly "marines" when my usual practice is 20 minutes.  The experience of "swimming out" into a longer group practice echoes back for me to a series of meditation retreats I went to in my 20's.  Memories, not so much visual or verbal, more a sense in my body of poignancy, happiness, strength, youthfulness, openness.  Strange.

I wrote last week about the third evening of this eight session MBSR course.  The fourth session was yesterday evening and I missed it.  It was my wife's birthday and I'd told the course teacher when I enrolled that I wouldn't get to this fourth meeting ... or to the seventh meeting when I'll also be away.  It's not ideal.  My practice has been poorer this last week, both because I've been particularly busy and also because I haven't been back to get the weekly commitment boost that tends to come from attending the class.  I've still practised mindfulness meditations every day, but it's felt more like a routine to be squeezed in than a particularly rich exploration over these last several days. 

I wrote in the last blog post about the first part of the second full day at Glassie.  Later on in the afternoon we moved into a more "bumpy" phase of the group.  Often in these more difficult interactions there is the richest learning for everyone involved if one has the courage and openness to digest what happened.  Irvin Yalom, in his research on process groups, found that best outcomes were associated both with a great deal of caring, empathy & emotional "holding" and also with a great deal of "chewing over" and trying to understand what was brought up by events in the groups.  Interestingly, and in contrast, best outcomes were associated with a medium level - not too much & not too little - conflict & challenge.

Again it's a little before 6.30am.  Pitch black outside.  I wrote yesterday morning about the first evening of this group.  We then went on to the first full day.