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p16:

gloss: "'patiently relax' (maybe sometimes: diaphragm first)" / or "global (re-)balancing"

Relax completely, including the breathing muscles; focus on relaxing the diaphragm, and all other breathing muscles, and everything, in that priority order, except, minimally, for anything needed posturally, for whatever posture you're in (e.g. seated, standing). (Alignment with gravity, if possible, can also reduce use of postural muscles---) but, let yourself drift slowly towards contortion, if the body is atttracted into contorted positions. Eyes can be open or closed.

Breathing may come to feel faster or deeper at times, and that's ok. Gently, indirectly incline towards breathing less (but see caveat below) in rate and depth/volume, and smoothly, balanced-ly, indirectly because the driver comes from the relaxed diaphragm (and other breathing muscles). You might breath solely using the diaphragm and that's fine. Generally, let autogenic breathing (versus volitional breathing) fully take over.

Let attention, etc. drift to the diaphragm, etc., as per above; let it find you; don't force or push it there, etc.; try for karmically free action.

Finally, let meditation or non-meditation happen in background; drifting in and out of reverie is okay.

in that priority order

Overall, overall, [sic] top priority is not (just) muscular/​respiratory but also mental/​emotional/​attentional/​"awareness-al" relaxation (--> perhaps, wellbeing/​ease/​balance, rather), including as much "omni-directional 'anti-'relaxation (energy, tone, arousal, alertness, doing, attending, aware-ing, letting-go-ing, surrendering, breath...)," as/​when needed to facilitate that relaxation (well not "anti-" because synergistic; or, say, "balancing" though that's too separating and still oppositional, and etc.... situationally-complementary?). (So, let go of the diaphragm thing if it gets weird, and just consider breathing as a whole gestalt; or, let go of breathing entirely, except perhaps intermittently or as needed, and just explore relaxation as a whole gestalt, etc.)

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say, versus "global wayfinding" --> (instead:) "global balancing, in the now" / "global momentary balancing" / global moment-by-moment-continuous balancing". sort of finer-/​finest-grain, subtler-/​subtlest-grain (or whatever) main practice p2 with emphasis on right here and now in each each-simultaneity-within-as-moment-all-at-the-same-time-ish-ness-ish [sic] vs moment-by-moment (not to over-reify "moments" or time or etc.) and/​rather for sure minimally-and-balanced-disparate-local-sequential and correcting for some of the "getting somewhere in the future and not here"-ness problematicness of the "global wayfinding" metaphor

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  • (It's ok to drift into and out of or allow or help out weird theta and delta states, sleepy and drowsy states, hypnogogia, retreat from the sense doors, stuff like that. Being seated without use of a backrest can be the perfect balance between relaxed and alert while that kind of stuff is going on, on and off. Don't be afraid to lean back or watch youtube or lay down, too, as always.)
  • Scratch notes: "autonomic safety pendulation" ; "respiratory safety pendulation" ; alertness/​arousal/​calmness balancing ; "deep autonomic liminally true cognitive preflective reflective" with respect to all of that
  • Breath might get fast, jerky, might want to squeeze or stop a bunch, including throat, jaw, tongue stuff. Consciousness might want to get really weird. Sort of want to manage when not felt safe and sort of ease into and allow when safe. Sort of self-ish unravels from within, from the inside out when safe enough to open up and to find one's way in.
    • Every little bit (with some considerable consolidation/compression) of a particular subclass of deliberate control of the breath will naturally "come up," over time.
  • Caveat: Rabbithole stuff: Above I said incline towards breathing less, albeit the driver comes from (a) relaxing diaphgragm, or (b) relaxing breathing as a whole, or (c) ("just") relaxing as a whole. But, it's important that breathing less comes from relaxation, so it's maybe a bit more accurate to say that, long run(!), generally breathing less (volume and rate) is a sign of having been doing relaxation right. If you focus directly on breathing less, it might at times paradoxically lead to overbreathing (though short-term, and every so often, there will be periods of increased rate and volume, anyway, because of untangling), but, anyway, if you do sort of top-down-ish breath less, this might unbalanced the breathing system a little, CO2-wise, leading to you taking more "extra" breaths or have extra pauses, for 1-5 hours later, and it can also even lead to increased microarousals during sleep, leading to less refreshing sleep. So, if it does seem like you're getting extra breaths, then move more towards "just relaxation," which will be more balanced. But, also, breathing less and even a very, very, very self-gentle and short(!) breath holds can also help with relaxation, sort of a positive cycle. So it's a judgment call, in the beginning, as you're getting a sense of things. FINALLY, important, there's a normal, too, automatic extra deep breath several times an hour (five-ish?); try not to confuse those normal ones (if you start to notice them because you're paying more attention) with very slightly disregulated breathing (which will fade, all things being equal, if you gently adjust what you're doing each time, of course, as things self-rebalance). Anyway. Oh, also, at least under the purview of all this, gently try to avoid air hunger, like, you want breathing to become so bottom-up-naturally untangled responsive and automatic and smooth and relaxed and supple that rate and depth increase as needed to avoid air hunger and nevertheless, long run, breathing generally becomes slower and shallower over time.
  • Sort of a general thing, cf. "only when safe to look then naturally look" ; something like: "You notice you are safe, when felt/deemed it’s safe, and when it’s safe to notice you are safe, deeper and deeper, wider and wider."
  • As per usual, re e.g. "focusing on the diaphragm," try to do this in a way that accumulates as little layering, karma as possible, ideally none, so like perfectly participatorily timed and flowing and sequenced. But also you just do the best you can and that's enough, etc., etc.
  • (Increasing boundaries of zone of legitimate, credible, non-reactive safety through tacitly negotiated perfect-unique-fit-titrated safe looking.)
  • Seemingly paradoxically, a bit, relaxation and alertness can synergize. It’s safe to be relaxed if we can relaxed-ly appropriately respond to the demands of the environment within appropriate timescales. Therefore, some stress or tension is under-arousal, not over-arousal. Part of relaxing is finding one’s way to the appropriate level of arousal, alertness, poised-ness, readiness, without forcing it. This may involve surrendering and going into weird delta and theta states, thus, part of why it gets so tangly. Relaxation and alertness are sort of separate axes with a lot of crosstalk but are also can vary independently. Solving the relaxation / readiness synergy puzzle. (Involves finding relatively globally legitimate autonomic/practical solutions to extant and possible problems.)
  • scratch: relaxation is sort of appropriate evaluation of safety and stakes and immediate, proximal, and distal environmental demands at the physiological level
  • "nowhere to go" ; also see: naturalization

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(Inspired by:

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