user20185: I've been practising mindfulness meditation for about three weeks now. I started with ten minute sessions but soon increased it to a half hour and then either a full hour or two haf hours with a five minute break. I felt that my practise was making me more peaceful, less angry, calmer and generally happier. I would achieve what access concentration quite easily and yesterday I felt an experience that I found rather similar to the descriptions of the Buddhist first jhana.
Immediately after that experience, it seemed to me like my mind had almost, and very suddenly, let go of the progress that I had made and I suddenly returned to my former angry restless self. I am again suddenly consumed by angry thoughts about a trivial event that happened many months ago. I don't feel the peace that meditation used to bring anymore and today I really struggled even to finish a half hour sitting. I don't seem to be able to release distractions or thoughts anymore and can't stay with my object of meditation.
What's going on? What do I have to do to restore my mindfulness?

user43: The root of distraction, anger, and restlessness is attachment to some idea or some value that you assign to something. You identify with this value and think it makes you who you are. This habit of holding to such fragments is called I-making. You need to learn to let go of who you think you are. When you let go of rigid opinions - you let go of the basis of disturbing emotions. You lose shape and become nobody. Then your meditation can be perfect whether you sit or walk.

user471: Some good advice given by Ajaan Fuang in "Awareness Itself":

§ "When the meditation goes well, don't get excited. When it doesn't
go well, don't get depressed. Simply be observant to see why it's
good, why it's bad. If you can be observant like this, it won't be
long before your meditation becomes a skill."
§ "Everything depends on your powers of observation. If they're crude
and sloppy, you'll get nothing but crude and sloppy results. And your
meditation will have no hope of making progress.

And also others:

§ A young nurse practiced meditation with Ajaan Fuang several days
running, and finally asked him one day, "Why wasn't today's session as
good as yesterday's?"
He answered: "Meditating is like wearing clothes. Today you wear
white, tomorrow red, yellow, blue, whatever. You have to keep
changing. You can't wear the same set of clothes all the time. So
whatever color you're wearing, just be aware of it. Don't get
depressed or excited about it."
§ A few months later the same nurse was sitting in meditation when a
sense of peace and clarity in her mind became so intense that she felt
she would never have a bad mood infiltrate her mind again. But sure
enough, bad moods eventually came back as before. When she mentioned
this to Ajaan Fuang, he said, "Looking after the mind is like raising
a child. There will have to be bad days along with the good. If you
want only the good, you're in for trouble. So you have to play
neutral: Don't fall in with the good or the bad."
§ A student came to complain to Ajaan Fuang that she had been
meditating for years, and still hadn't gotten anything out of it. His
immediate response: "You don't meditate to 'get' anything. You
meditate to let go."
§ The seamstress, after practicing meditation with Ajaan Fuang for
several months, told him that her mind seemed more of a mess than it
was before she began meditating. "Of course it does," he told her.
"It's like your house. If you polish the floor every day, you won't be
able to stand the least little bit of dust on it. The cleaner the
house, the more easily you'll see the dirt. If you don't keep
polishing the mind, you can let it go out and sleep in the mud without
any qualms at all. But once you get it to sleep on a polished floor,
then if there's even a speck of dust, you'll have to sweep it away.
You won't be able to stand the mess."
§ "Persistence in the practice is a matter of the mind, and not of
your posture. In other words, whatever you do, keep your mindfulness
constant and don't let it lapse. No matter what your activity, make
sure the mind sticks with its meditation work."
§ "Meditating isn't a
matter of making the mind empty, you know. The mind has to have work
to do. If you make it empty, then anything — good or bad — can pop
into it. It's like leaving the front door to your home open. Anything
at all can come strolling right in."


user20120: All of those things are coming back because you haven't really fixed anything.  So many people use meditation as a vacation.  They run themselves ragged in their day to day lives only to use the cushion as a kind of karmic hospital.  This is palliative practice and just like a vacation from your job or your terrible marriage, spending a week in the zendo or Tahiti isn't going to do a damn thing for your mind.  Meditating this way isn't any different from popping pills or smoking a blunt.  Sure, your problems melt away for a time, but you aren't addressing the crap that made you want to melt them away in the first place.
We sit to prepare our minds for insight.  Anything else that happens - jhana, bliss, IDK talking to devas - all that is wholly ancillary.  Rather than try to preserve those feeling of bliss, wholeness, and peace, instead turn that bright and less blemished mind to your own personal obstacles.  There are entire suites of insight, whole canons of material that you can investigate from Zen koans to vipassana objects, etc.  Gaining direct knowledge into those things are what's going to stop those bad habits from reemerging.  Simply sitting isn't going to cut it.  Bliss doesn't change anything.
And for what it's worth, you're just starting.  Of course you are going to hit a roadblock.  I've been doing this stuff for the better part of two decades and I still have good practice days and bad ones.  Keep at it.  It'll come back.

20185: <p>I've been practising mindfulness meditation for about three weeks now. I started with ten minute sessions but soon increased it to a half hour and then either a full hour or two haf hours with a five minute break. I felt that my practise was making me more peaceful, less angry, calmer and generally happier. I would achieve what access concentration quite easily and yesterday I felt an experience that I found rather similar to the descriptions of the Buddhist first jhana.</p>
<p>Immediately after that experience, it seemed to me like my mind had almost, and very suddenly, let go of the progress that I had made and I suddenly returned to my former angry restless self. I am again suddenly consumed by angry thoughts about a trivial event that happened many months ago. I don't feel the peace that meditation used to bring anymore and today I really struggled even to finish a half hour sitting. I don't seem to be able to release distractions or thoughts anymore and can't stay with my object of meditation.</p>
<p>What's going on? What do I have to do to restore my mindfulness?</p>
 43: <p>The root of distraction, anger, and restlessness is attachment to some idea or some value that you assign to something. You identify with this value and think it makes you who you are. This habit of holding to such fragments is called I-making. You need to learn to let go of who you think you are. When you let go of rigid opinions - you let go of the basis of disturbing emotions. You lose shape and become nobody. Then your meditation can be perfect whether you sit or walk.</p>
 471: <p>Some good advice given by Ajaan Fuang in &quot;<a href="https://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/thai/fuang/itself.html#med" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Awareness Itself</a>&quot;:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>§ &quot;When the meditation goes well, don't get excited. When it doesn't
go well, don't get depressed. Simply be observant to see why it's
good, why it's bad. If you can be observant like this, it won't be
long before your meditation becomes a skill.&quot;</p>
<p>§ &quot;Everything depends on your powers of observation. If they're crude
and sloppy, you'll get nothing but crude and sloppy results. And your
meditation will have no hope of making progress.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>And also others:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>§ A young nurse practiced meditation with Ajaan Fuang several days
running, and finally asked him one day, &quot;Why wasn't today's session as
good as yesterday's?&quot;</p>
<p>He answered: &quot;Meditating is like wearing clothes. Today you wear
white, tomorrow red, yellow, blue, whatever. You have to keep
changing. You can't wear the same set of clothes all the time. So
whatever color you're wearing, just be aware of it. Don't get
depressed or excited about it.&quot;</p>
<p>§ A few months later the same nurse was sitting in meditation when a
sense of peace and clarity in her mind became so intense that she felt
she would never have a bad mood infiltrate her mind again. But sure
enough, bad moods eventually came back as before. When she mentioned
this to Ajaan Fuang, he said, &quot;Looking after the mind is like raising
a child. There will have to be bad days along with the good. If you
want only the good, you're in for trouble. So you have to play
neutral: Don't fall in with the good or the bad.&quot;</p>
<p>§ A student came to complain to Ajaan Fuang that she had been
meditating for years, and still hadn't gotten anything out of it. His
immediate response: &quot;You don't meditate to 'get' anything. You
meditate to let go.&quot;</p>
<p>§ The seamstress, after practicing meditation with Ajaan Fuang for
several months, told him that her mind seemed more of a mess than it
was before she began meditating. &quot;Of course it does,&quot; he told her.
&quot;It's like your house. If you polish the floor every day, you won't be
able to stand the least little bit of dust on it. The cleaner the
house, the more easily you'll see the dirt. If you don't keep
polishing the mind, you can let it go out and sleep in the mud without
any qualms at all. But once you get it to sleep on a polished floor,
then if there's even a speck of dust, you'll have to sweep it away.
You won't be able to stand the mess.&quot;</p>
<p>§ &quot;Persistence in the practice is a matter of the mind, and not of
your posture. In other words, whatever you do, keep your mindfulness
constant and don't let it lapse. No matter what your activity, make
sure the mind sticks with its meditation work.&quot;</p>
<p>§ &quot;Meditating isn't a
matter of making the mind empty, you know. The mind has to have work
to do. If you make it empty, then anything — good or bad — can pop
into it. It's like leaving the front door to your home open. Anything
at all can come strolling right in.&quot;</p>
</blockquote>
 20120: <p>All of those things are coming back because you haven't really fixed anything.  So many people use meditation as a vacation.  They run themselves ragged in their day to day lives only to use the cushion as a kind of karmic hospital.  This is palliative practice and just like a vacation from your job or your terrible marriage, spending a week in the zendo or Tahiti isn't going to do a damn thing for your mind.  Meditating this way isn't any different from popping pills or smoking a blunt.  Sure, your problems melt away for a time, but you aren't addressing the crap that made you want to melt them away in the first place.</p>
<p>We sit to prepare our minds for insight.  Anything else that happens - jhana, bliss, IDK talking to devas - all that is wholly ancillary.  Rather than try to preserve those feeling of bliss, wholeness, and peace, instead turn that bright and less blemished mind to your own personal obstacles.  There are entire suites of insight, whole canons of material that you can investigate from Zen koans to vipassana objects, etc.  Gaining direct knowledge into those things are what's going to stop those bad habits from reemerging.  Simply sitting isn't going to cut it.  Bliss doesn't change anything.</p>
<p>And for what it's worth, you're just starting.  Of course you are going to hit a roadblock.  I've been doing this stuff for the better part of two decades and I still have good practice days and bad ones.  Keep at it.  It'll come back.</p>
