Negative effects of meditation bleeding into everyday life.

j m m, modified 9 Years ago at 12/21/14 7:19 AM
Created 9 Years ago at 12/21/14 7:07 AM

Negative effects of meditation bleeding into everyday life.

Posts: 10 Join Date: 1/17/14 Recent Posts
Hi,This is goingto be a long post!
First an overview of my practice. I've been practicing for about 4 years, constantly cycling through periods of more intense practice and then pratically none and back again. More intense for me would be 3 to 4 hours a day including at least 45mins yoga while pratically none would be still almost everyday doing something maybe yoga or 20 minutes meditation. As well as time as passed I find myself bringing myself deliberatly into the present moment more and more often during everyday life. I found meditation through yoga which I was practicing at home using videos from youtube (I was suffering from extreme social anxiety at the time and could barely leave my house, this has improved massively but my social anxiety isstill a major issue for me.) After the first week of practicing yoga every day with a few minutes sivassana at the end I started getting very unplesant sensations in my chest area which forced me to stop practing until they subsided which took about a week. Started yoga again same thing. So I went googling for answers and found theDharmaOverground and got an answer from someone to jus focus on the unpleasant sensations and see what happened. Which helpedĀ  and they disapearred( this was under another account that I lost thepassword for). A week later the sensations were back however and have been ever since in one form or another. I've become much better at perceiving the sensations more clearly as time has gone by. The most constant is an tightness/pain/tension in my left stomach or chest but this sensation can be in the middle or right hand side occasionally. When these 'dissolve/breakup' either a sob burst out or there is a feeling of cool energy rushing down my body to my legs which is mildly pleasant, actually these are the only pleasant experiences I have ever had in the four years meditating. There is also never been a time since where these sensations haven't been present. At different times there can be sensation like these in anypart of my body recently a lot in my neck and shoulder areas. They come in many shapes and forms but are always unpleasant to very painful even overwhelming at times. While I feel I have become much better at working with these sensations it makes it very hard to build up my concentratration for example on the breath because the are so much stronger than the breath however my concentration has improved very slowly over the four years( no jhana yet ). I've tried many different practices over the years and have failed to stick to one. At the moment I am following the pratices of Thanissaro Bhikku as his discriptions seems to match up with my experiences. I work through his guided meditationbut I have never been able to get to a place where there IĀ  was able to relax all my body, even though I have made some progress.
Now to where I am presently. The sensations which seem to me to be almost like trapped emotions have become more broadly dispersed over my body( I can feel them in multible parts at the same time) and this has caused the suffering to ratchet up. When I spend time meditating on the sensation sometimes my body starts to shake there can be lots of bodily twitchs etc but mostly is the overwhelming urge to cry which I can't do as I can't let go..It's like my mind is a vice around the feeling and I can't leave go no matter how hard I try. But little by little I feel like I've been 'purifying/letting go' in bits and peaces. The problem is as soon as I start to build up my meditation times which I feel is necessary to have a breakthrough negative effects start to bleed through into everday life and become worse the more I meditate. My anxiety increases, I find it difficult to sleep, I feel upset all the time, more depressed etc. When I layoff the meditation these subside slowly. But I feel over the longterm meditation has been very benificial to me and I really need to have that breakthrough/breakdown...I haven't cried tears in so many years I can't rememeber when it was. Even when a sob burst out there is no tears.So here is my questions
Basically what to do...Ihave a few weeks that I can dedicate to meditation but I am worried about the consequences even though I believe that if I can just make it through through this 'blockage' which seems to have such a control over my life that almost anything would be worth it it.
Am I doing the right practice?
Should I slow down or intensify mypractice?
Where am I on the maps?
I don't remember an A + P experience but I have had many Dark night experiences e.g just a few days ago I felt like I was in Disgust...I felt sick to my stomach but I knew it was related to my meditation practice..this is the second time this has happened. I was apble to move past it much easier this time around though. I have also done many drugs in the past including lots of psychedelics. By the way I have personally found psychedelics to be very effective at pushing through blockages which makes me remember that I did actually cry a few tears a couple of years ago while meditation while on mushrooms. I felt great the next few days but I could only release a tiny amount. and the my mind/bodyjust wouldn't let go.
Any advice welcome.
Metta
dhammarelax, modified 9 Years ago at 12/21/14 2:57 PM
Created 9 Years ago at 12/21/14 2:57 PM

RE: Negative effects of meditation bleeding into everyday life.

Posts: 15 Join Date: 11/29/14 Recent Posts
Why dont you try some metta meditation, you can find the instructtions here: http://talks.dhammasukha.org/metta-basic-mm-u.html

Breadcrumb