I hope this answer is useful. If something is not understood (which is common in my english writings 
) or some clarification is needed, please feel free to ask.
It is good to clarify that what I am telling here is descriptive and not prescriptive: I am not saying that the same could not be achieved in another way; I am saying that I couldn’t:
When I took MBSR in 2012 I was repeated: “practicing Mindfulness is easy; the hard part is remembering to do it”. I could not help thinking that it was the same thing that had happened to me with AF: the intermittency of my practice because “I forgot”.
And not because it was unsuccessful. In 2001 (31) and 2002 I experienced (besides the sporadic extra-ordinary states of consciousness) my mood improved, conceptual and behavioral changes and growing cracks in my ego.
But I reached a ceiling that became a plateau. Then, slowly, a downhill. I felt guilty then for not dedicating myself as I should to AF, for not asking myself HAETMOBA to achieve EAATMOBA (days, weeks), for not reading (weeks, months), for not participating in the forum (never), for suffering again from moods I thought I had overcome. But, in addition, for the privilege of having lived wonderful states (as long PCEs) and, nevertheless, not doing anything to approach them definitively to make a better world without “me”.
Necessary summary of my state between 2003 (33) and 2011 (41) -I omit details that I can include in the journal-:
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I had long left Buddhism and Logosophy (another spiritual discipline) which had radically improved my life; married to a logosophist; with two daughters; with ethical, social, existential, family and work dilemmas; I left for that reason computer science at the end of 2011, in spite of being one of the best programmers in the country in certain language, and internationally certified network administrator; I turned to secondary and private teacher with more satisfaction but a fraction of the money; I was still addictively dependent and abusing psychotropic drugs from psychiatric problems in my youth, and painkillers related to old and new physical problems.
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By 2012 I was clear on the causes of why I was not getting better with AF:
- Attachment to my ego despite the aforementioned cracks (I wanted to “be” someone or do things for which “I” was recognized, regardless of all I had already accomplished).
- Fear of losing my self despite knowing, thanks to the PCEs, how wonderful it was to live without it.
- Veiled hope that I would somehow continue after death.
They generated a dilemma that was the main source of my conflict and suffering. After enough years I noticed a recurring dynamic: periods when I returned to AF and obtained its benefits (even EEs or brief PCEs), were followed by “forgetfulness” due to the avoidance that those three causes produced in me, since ultimately AF demanded that I ceased to exist.
So, in late 2012 I tried MBSR. I practiced formally (sitting) daily for a while, then periodically, finally only informally (no sitting).
Results: my stress decreased due to deeper levels of relaxation, even during daily activities; my attentional level improved; I felt better in mood; decreased my headaches, muscle aches, stomach problems (including hiatal hernia) and panic attacks -the ones you think you are going to die from-. The disabling waist pain related to two lumbar disc herniation was much improved (one of which in 2003 -oldest daughter of 1 year- had extruded, spilling the contents of the disc onto the sciatic, confining me to bed for days, weeks or even months on several occasions, in addition to permanently numbing my left foot, causing constant pain in my leg -which I still experience-, work and family problems, etc.). As a result, I could return to previously impossible tasks -including sitting more than a limited amount of time in the PC-. Also decreased and finally eliminated my dependence on and abuse of painkillers.
Why did I accomplish this by paying attention to my breathing, observing thoughts and feelings non-judgementally, “engaging but not identifying” (as we were instructed to do)? After all, in informal meditation I also had to manage to remember these questions during the day:
- Where is the mind? [see if in the past, present or future].
- What is it doing? [see if there is attachment or if there is rejection]
- What is it saying? [see the thoughts, listen to “the voice”]
If “practicing Mindfulness is easy but the hard part is remember to do it”, why did I forget so much less than, for example, HAETMOBA? Because I could practice Mindfulness without feeling threatened, since it was not looking for “my” elimination. I think this difference was key and explains why I had not been able to succeed in trying to improve these same problems for years using AF. At best I ended up doing nothing; at worst, it was like throwing fuel on fire.
Meanwhile, Mindfulness inadvertently strengthened the process of returning more and more often to my attention and enjoying the senses more often.
I attribute to this strengthening that on October 2/12, while walking around meditating informally, I began to reflect on the similarities and differences of means and ends with respect to AF (specifically comparing it to HAETMOBA plus EAATMOBA). When I got home I resumed reading Tolle’s “The Power of Now”, just where he proposes -as one of the “gateways to the now”- to pay attention to the whole body instead of just the breath.
It was the beginning of a process that unexpectedly escalated to the 3-hour PCE I mentioned to @Kub933 in Thoughts meandering - #4 by Miguel, in which I managed to observe again and register in greater detail my perceptions of emotions, senses, inner voice, thoughts (including the aforementioned meandering in the context of the weakening and disappearance of thoughts at the beginning of the process, and in their reappearance and strengthening at the end).
In December (two months later) I wrote in my diary: “Since that experience, I’ve been living what I can describe as a new stage with respect to my general state of attention and consciousness”. I also emphasized the weakening the experience produced in my attachment to the achievements of the ego, in the fear of losing my ego, and in the hope of continuity thanks to regaining the sense of well-being, joy and felicitous feelings of the early days of AF, “which it seemed I would never experience again”.
Consequently, from then on I started to practice AF in a different way and with renewed conviction (regardless the problems that I experienced again later on, but not because of those three resistances -I must amend this: the third disappeared; the first one became much weaker; the second persisted-).