Time to rein it in again. Diverge, converge, fix this thing.
I always go to the god hypothesis and then rein it back to the most actionable point, and the most actionable point is to build a practical, gradated meditation protocol which works for me, and maybe other neurodivergent folks. The business ideas can come later.
I did realise the buddha’s four noble truths on a fundamental level, and how they pertain to a dysregulated dopamine system. And I did intuit the underlying mechanisms of meditation, and create my own very effective method in knife polishing. I also created a numerical way to monitor agitation levels, which I called dvar, and which helps me and could help others. So that is where I will focus.
On a personal level I will listen to and read the original teachings of the buddha; no interpretations. I want to hear the words of the man, and the repetitive nature of the suttas is nice to fall to sleep to. The looped words of the buddha prevent looped words of my own taking form.
So.
Dvar is dopamine variability. It is phasic dopamine. It is waves in the pool; their amplitude. High dvar is high amplitude. Choppy weather. After you’ve been out or played games too long or driven for hours. After a fight. After work.
My brain likes numbers so I find it easiest to put a number on this, and then depending on the value you can choose a meditation to gradually work your way down from agitation to calmness.
Higher agitation would require a stronger ‘latch’ to hold your attention and create a regular flow of dopamine which allows the tension to be released. I believe this is why neurodivergent folks can struggle to release emotions and process memories; we do not have the regular tick tick tick of dopamine signalling that most people are born with.
This is why a lot of us walk all the time or jiggle our legs or rock or move our tongues in our mouths or whatever - it is a natural way of self-regulating. And the religions used to give us more overt ways to self-regulate in chanting and humming and group movement, but many of us revert to science for our answers now and science’s answer is drugs which often make things worse. We have no real longitudinal data on stimulants for example; the longest study is 16 years and doesn’t really focus on much outside heart strain. I drank alcohol for longer than 16 years before it got bad.
Anyway dvar.
Yesterday I got home from an outing and was agitated. Not hugely, but I assigned myself a dvar level of 0.6 which meant that I needed a fairly strong latch to calm myself down. This took the form of some initial shaping of a blade; the part which takes a lot of full-body motion and a fair bit of time.
The first 10 minutes my mind was still noisy but 30 minutes in and it was quiet once more. I was around dvar 0.25 which meant that I was able to switch and do sitting meditation for 15 minutes, which brought me down to about dvar 0.15 - a comfortable level for the evening.
I think that managing dvar levels is the key to this whole thing.
Or rather: I *know* that it is, from my experience with aripiprazole and being a meditator in the mind of a junkie.
So this is what I will focus on. Many things that are encouraged for the general population are actually quite harmful for us. For example early morning exercise - not good. I did many 200km rides starting at 5am and they left me waking up with night sweats when winter came. HIIT is terrible for us; it spikes dvar and removes any meditative aspect. They all feel great in the moment, of course.
Keeping your phone by your bed - often frowned upon - is very helpful for me. It means if I wake up at night with something in my mind I can send a whatsapp message to myself and see it in the morning.
The key is to wake up slow, where possible, and then gradually warm up the engine before doing anything too stimulating, and the once your job is finished, to consciously cool the engine down. I am even trying to teach my 7 year old this so he avoids the same pitfalls; wish me luck.
So I’ll focus on deepening my understanding of the buddha’s teachings, while not becoming buddhist. And I’ll create an actionable, data-driven meditation protocol which other people might find helpful.
This is how I help myself and help other people for now.
For all the crazy business ideas and inherent drive, I do not enjoy business and I hate money. I would rather design a life which enables me to be present with my family and to enjoy myself, keep the noise out of my head, and just generally remain at a similar level of equanimity as now.
Yeah - this feels right.
I will also set up my room in our new house. We will give the master bedroom to the kids until they grow and have the two small rooms for us adults. It will be like being a teenager again, having our own space to retire to. I think my wife needs it too; it’s not only neurodivergent people who have a dvar value and hers has undoubtedly been pushed up by this whole aripirazole saga, not to mention 7 years of raising children.
So. Practical ways for to approach liberation in the modern age. Let’s go.
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