Interesting experiences with the meditation. It seems that sometimes
when I reach a certain depth of relaxation something in my head doesn’t want me
to go there and I get a panic attack. However, the mindfulness stuff is helping
in that I now manage to divorce myself from the attack and just watch it pass.
Sometimes when I feel one coming I can stop it.
Interesting yes, but is this doing me any good?
I do often feel calmer and more in control afterwards and,
if I don’t let the anxiety go too far I can kill it with a session. I felt I
was getting somewhere until yesterday when the phone rang three times during a
session and instigated a panic attack each time. Afterwards I felt really low –
everything was black. But, standing back from that, this period wasn’t long
lasting.
Certainly this meditation and mindfulness seems to be
shaking something loose in my skull. For example, some unpleasant memories have
been surfacing. I’m also more aware of my own thought processes and can quickly
detect the slide into negativity.
Sometimes wonder if this is like belting a malfunctioning
engine with a hammer. Yeah, sometimes it will work, but it’s hardly ideal. I’m
shaking things up but there is no guarantee that the shape they then fall into
will be a good one … except… I have to take into account my own will and desire
to push my mind into a certain shape. Surely this factor is why so many people
get a good result from meditation?
4 comments:
nothing to do with the "relaxing substances" burnt whilst musing?
Have you read any of Sam Harris' work?
Just a thought...
http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/meditation-and-the-nature-of-the-self
Hi Neal,
Just my thoughts on what you wrote, iced with my personal experiences thus far with meditation. Usually when I get to that certain depth of meditation where I get the feeling that something in my head doesn't want me to be there, it's an indicator for me that I'm about to uncover or come face to face with a big "something" that I need to be aware of. And I'd definitely agree that mindfulness helps to maintain calm (especially when you reach that moment in meditation where you do find out whatever the lurking root thought/issue is). To use a Polity analogy, it's as if the two horns of the runcible of meditation are mindfulness (to keep you aware of what is really going on) and the capacity to remain non-attached to the goings-on, and when the two are properly aligned, you get a Skaidon warp of mental clarity and integration.
I've also myself wondered if meditation and the places it brings me to inside my own psyche are like belting a malfunctioning engine with a hammer and I've arrived at the conclusion that while it may feel like that, it's really more like shining an increasingly bright and cleansing light on all the dark corners of my mind that I normally would try to avoid dealing with. At first what you see might be unpleasant, but with time you come to accept and even welcome integrating with those things that used to look like Prador scuttling around in the shadows. I'd definitely recommend sticking with the meditation. Your benefits from it will only increase as time goes on.
-Ian
Ian, I'm not into substances at all any more.
Yodinator, no I haven't. I'll maybe add that to my shopping list.
Raziel, yes, I do hope that the meditation is doing something good. I guess I'm at the point mentally where just about any change is something. I am getting some bad moments, but mostly good ones. A good one yesterday was discovering how effective the simple mindfulness stretching exercises are.
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