Week 1 - Day 4

Today I noticed that my throat was very swollen and it was difficult to swallow. I wasn't sure what it was really. I thought I might be getting sick but I'm showing no other signs of illness. I remembered during the first 3 days of practice when I inhaled I did so forcefully and my throat would burn on every in breath. I wondered if somehow I caused inflammation in my throat this way or if this is my immune system starting to decline due to the changes in my body. I have noticed I need a LOT more water than normal.

Later I ate and drank a lot of water and it mostly went away.

So far during the practice I have been sitting down with my back supported instead of laying down. On my third round, a bit concerned that my times were lower today (something Wim assures you is OK) I decided to lay down to see if that would help.

Times were 1:30, 1:54, 2:35.

While I'm retaining and later when I take that final in breath to end the round, I'm closing my eyes and focusing on the energy that is inside of my body. To my surprise, my awareness is able to manipulate that energy a bit. I believe this is the beginning of something great.

My ears began ringing lightly in the first round and continued to intensify as I continued into the later rounds. I found while focusing my awareness, I was able to control how much ringing was going on by focusing on my head to intensify it, or moving my awareness down towards my stomach would make it go away.

It was an interesting experience and from the hints I'm getting from other people a bit further ahead of me in the program, I believe this plays a big part in the upcoming weeks.

When I did the stretching afterwards my chest hurt during my in breath, but I believed it to be from tight muscles from yesterdays training.

After everything was finished, I felt extremely light and high which lasted longer than the previous times. I think I felt this way for a good 10-15 minutes.

Later I had my shower and felt in the zone as opposed to preoccupied with anxiety surrounding the cold water to come. I focused, shut off the hot and stood there waited for it to hit me. It's REALLY cold, too. I would be curious to see what a thermometer would read it as.

It still sucked, but this time I was able to take a lot more and played around with holding my breath while in the water. I put a good majority of it on my back but I don't think I'm at a point yet in my concentration where I could withstand turning my back completely to the cold water instead of doing half and half. I have had ice baths before after training to improve recovery time, and yet something about the way the water hits you in a shower feels different (worse) than submerging into a bath tub.

I am already very excited to check out what week two has to offer me. I have stopped my regular meditation practice during this time and I think I need to make more of an effort to resume it as I have a strong desire for going deeper inside myself.