fatigue

["David Yeh" <ldreamr@...>]

Hi, I have an issue that has me a bit stumped. I've been trying to 
study this from various angles, but I am at the point where some 
input from others might be helpful.

In the mental arena, I'm at the very first level of Step One. I 
find that I can follow what happens in my mind fairly easily. 
However, what happens in my mind tends to remain somewhat agitated 
or fast, rather than the "slow thoughts" Rawn described somewhere. 
When it does slow down, I start to drift into a brain-fog state of 
semi-sleepiness.

When I delved into this further, I became aware that for much of my 
life my physical body has been fairly depleted of energy. In order 
to compensate for constant lack of sleep (caused by early school 
hours and poor diet, I suspect), I learned to develop a constant 
level of mental and physical tension in order to stay awake. It's 
like gradually squeezing a sponge more and more tightly to get more 
water out of it.

The problem, of course, is that now that I am learning to relax my 
mind, the sleepiness is surfacing. It seems simple at first -- get 
more sleep! However, I am not convinced it is entirely about sleep, 
as I've gotten plenty of sleep over the past few days and the 
sleepiness still lingers. There was another period a few years ago 
when I was sleeping a *lot* every day, and my body felt relaxed and 
heavy when I woke up, but paradoxically I would often be almost as 
sleepy as when I went to sleep. What I have been experiencing 
recently feels similar.

It could be an issue of vital-energy; I'm considering taking up some 
energy-building practice like qigong to build that up.

There are some emotional issues involved, but I am sort of confused, 
since they seem like chicken-or-egg things. For instance, one issue 
I have is that I dislike fully inhabiting my body. But do I dislike 
being in my body because I have so little energy and therefore it is 
difficult to use it well, or do I have difficulty using it well 
because I dislike it?

So I guess I have two basic questions:

(1) Generally, what are people's perspectives on my problem, and do 
you have any advice?

(2) Regarding the thought control meditation in IIH: I feel as if I 
am certainly "participating" on some level, but I am essentially 
able to watch my thoughts whiz by without doing anything about 
them. I can watch myself tense up or skip among different 
thoughts. Sometimes my mind settles down only to speed back up 
again. I *think* I'm meeting the goal Bardon described, but I am 
not sure about the quality of my results, ie my mind doesn't seem 
entirely relaxed so might I be doing something wrong? I am 
evidently participating to the extent that I tense up to keep myself 
awake, but if I am aware, in a detached way, of this habitual mental 
*reflex*, does that qualify as a distraction? And, more generally, 
should I be setting the mental work aside until I regain the ability 
to relax mentally without falling asleep, or should I proceed, 
or ... ?


Thanks for your help.

David