I've been practicing and managed to access first jhana, but I haven't found a solution to one obstacle that often frustrates my meditation: [earworms](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earworm) .
(Earworms are musical fragments that play repetitively in the head, and which I experience the majority of the time. Outside of meditation I have tried to control earworms using various anecdotal techniques, but the best I have ever been able to do is replace one earworm with another.)
When I sit to meditate and I have an earworm going I find it impossible to break free of it. The problem is that whatever part of my mind is playing the earworm seems to be running on a separate thread from my attention. Without an earworm running I can focus on breathing and then feeling and everything else fades into the background. With the earworm running everything fades into the background and then the earworm grabs *more* attention. It's like trying to fall asleep with a fire alarm going off, and the closer you get to sleep the louder the alarm gets.
I've tried running white noise machines and focusing on the white noise, but the earworm seems to be independent of outside audio stimulus other than music. Is there some music-like sound that is still conducive to vipassana?
Asked by Lysander
(123 rep)
Nov 4, 2022, 05:14 PM
Last activity: Nov 16, 2022, 11:55 AM
Last activity: Nov 16, 2022, 11:55 AM