@Silke,
Thank you for the realistic introduction. You are a brilliant writer, Silke.
I feel I must proffer a counter-position to the mythology of the recurring needle-.
I follow careful recipies for obtaining particular states. I lay them out alone over days like Michelangelo did in the sunlight. Like a kind of architecture of ecstacy. It does do the job over time.
Here are the basics in no particular order:
1) Diet: No meat. Mainly vegetables without sunlight for convenience and for the sake of the hermitage.
B) Exercise: Walking alone at least two hours but up to three and that at least every other day. In solitude is where I divide days and their shadows and particles etc.
iiv) Cleanliness: Which produces lightness of being and clarity and keeps me close to the houses of the gods.
5) Reading daily. If possible something stimulating like Schopenhaeur's metaphysics.
I keep General order like a psycho-militant and to maintain myself as an ideal instead of a silly human animal. I am forced into solitude in order to prevent an outbreak of fashionableness among the many, or a contagion of violent revolution etc.
They don't trip like I do. It's about sublime sobriety and higher power and golden silences (with occasional mini-vacations down the rabbit hole to keep me motivated).
I look forward to more of you Silke.
Oh, and welcome aboard!