Lexicon
Dullness
The foggy, sinking state that is not sleep but is not attention either.
- Published
- 12 Sep 2026
Dullness is the most common obstacle in practice and the hardest to notice, because it feels pleasant. The signs are specific: the object of attention becomes vague, the body feels heavy, and time seems to pass in jumps.
The remedy is not more effort but more light and more posture: open the eyes, sit up, face a window, or stand. If dullness persists, it is usually a sleep problem rather than a practice problem, and the useful intervention is earlier nights rather than more sessions.
→Practices that use this term
- Slow walking indoors 8 minutes
- Alternate-nostril breathing 12 minutes
- Thirty-minute full body scan 30 minutes
- Extended exhale 8 minutes
- Hand to shoulder: a half-body scan 12 minutes
↔See also
- Restlessness — The agitated quality that makes sitting still feel unacceptable.
- Seated posture — Any arrangement that keeps the belly uncompressed and the spine upright without effort.
- Open awareness — Attention without a chosen object, resting on whatever arrives.