Once I understood consciousness, its load, and how to direct attention to that load, I became confident that I could use this knowledge to enter concentration (samādhi) and enjoy the still, one-pointed mind in the various stages of meditation (and I truly mean that). Here's how I summarize the key points of Brother Alpha’s mental math method.
The goal is to overload the surface layer of the consciousness iceberg—meaning to overload Working Memory (WM)—by:
+ Choosing a difficult math problem (with many numbers, complex operations, multiple intermediate steps, and a demand for detailed understanding),
+ Adding time pressure to complete it,
+ Presenting numbers in different forms,
+ Adding colors to make them harder to remember,
+ Keeping the problem always new to avoid habituation,
+ Setting a target answer to sharpen attention.
By combining these elements, I have endless math problems to work with—and they’re always fresh. Let me walk us through one of my actual sessions as an example.
Before I begin, I set an intention: "Let’s practice, my friend—let’s go find happiness." Then I drew the image (in my iphone) and started choosing. I selected a group of numbers in the top-right corner: III 5 7, 4 IX 8, VI 2 I. I started mentally whispering them to myself, trying to memorize their numerical face, format, color, and order. After 1–2 minutes, I turned off the image and closed my eyes to start meditating.
I tried to recall and draw each number with its details—one by one—right in front of me: III, 5, 7… Not too fast or slow, while also trying to visualize their luminous forms (though I didn’t actually “see” them). During this process, I chose a math problem: the result must be 373—however I get there.
Once I’d recalled the numbers, I started multiplying pairs from largest to smallest, then planned to sum the results. I visualized IX and 8, carefully recalling and drawing their details, then multiplied them: 72. From this result, I chose the 7 (magenta) and 2 (bright yellow) from my original number set. Next, I drew 7 and VI, multiplied to get 42, and again picked 4 and 2 in the same yellow. Then 5 × 4 = 20 (I gave the 0 a dark blue color since it wasn’t in the original set), III × 2 = VI, and I = I. At one point I whimsically changed 72 into VII 2. Then I began subtracting these results from the target 373 to see what was left. I visualized 3, 7, 3—but at this point, my mind was tired. 373 was a tough number, and I started losing track of VII 2—I couldn’t recall or redraw it. WM had reached its overload limit, and the flat, still mental space appeared. I didn’t collapse like the first time I used this method—instead, I gently slipped into that space. All the numbers disappeared (because I let them go). I reached one-pointedness (I don’t know how long it took—certainly not as long as this sounds in writing. I guessed only 5–10 minutes because it felt like a long time had passed before I heard the 30-minute bell). My body started feeling light.
I used directed attention to focus my inner gaze on a small point in space just in front of me. Held it for a while and then waves of bliss arose. This kind of attention was gentle, not the strained, forceful type I used to collapse WM with the math. After a while, I shifted to a broader form of attention: my gaze still pointed forward, but not toward a single point—more like a spread-out presence across the space in front of me. With that shift, a different kind of bliss arose—similar to before, but this time the bliss felt expansive, matching the expanded attention. Later, I changed the attention again, still gazing ahead and with a broad field, but now I directed my mind toward a distant space far out in front. This was covert attention—broad and deep. While doing this, I set the intention: “infinite, boundless space”—to enter the Infinity Space realm. The bliss that came had a deep, quiet quality, matching the vastness of the space I was attending to. I continued progressing upward and downward like this a few times: partly to observe and understand the different layers of absorption, and partly to train my control over them. Brother Alpha often reminded me to train well in the Form Realm first. But honestly, I often rebel and play around with setting intentions in the Formless Realm—whenever I’m riding the high of deep absorption 😊. To be honest, I don’t know whether the spaces I experience really match their traditional names. It’s all based on my own felt sense.
Sometimes, thoughts still pop up. For instance, while I was using broad attention, a thought arose about Daniel Kahneman, the psychologist and economist, and his definition of the difference between happiness and satisfaction. That came from my subconscious, since I had read one of his interviews while researching psychology papers. Still, these little flickers of thought don’t linger. I notice them and they don’t disturb my one-pointedness or the bliss I’m enjoying. After some time, I decided to exit meditation deliberately (not because I lost absorption). I felt joyful, smiled gently, and gave thanks to the Buddhas, Bodhisattvas, Master, Brother Alpha, Dharma protectors, etc., for helping support a good session.
Previously, I’d given an example using Sudoku to explain this technique and used material stress as a metaphor for consciousness overload. That example worked but wasn’t very clear. The information from this recent session supplements and refines that analogy. The math problem I just described includes all the stressors—compression, tension, twisting, bending—to exhaust and collapse WM.
(End of Part 7/8)
