Hi all,

I have a question about the jhanas being potentially ungrounding/destabilizing.  In general, my experience is that they cause me to be more grounded but as I get into higher and harder jhanas i feel a lot of shakti/energy in the form of spatial disorientation, out-of-body sensations, kundalini,  even vertigo etc.  Specifically, I sometimes naturally experience some sort of astral projection, moving up an elevator shaft and later coming back down.  I am fairly well versed in techniques for grounding and I try to do something to that end if I do have such effects during a jhana meditation. 

Has anyone experienced any negative side effects of not regrounding after jhanas?  My main concern is on a sort of energetic level that if I go too "high up" and don't bring everything back down with me I'll have some sort of negative mental or physical side effects.

Thanks, 
Noah

I'd say do whatcha gotta do to feel "safe". If you like grounding do so. People tend to add a layer of fear onto everything that is new or they are not comfortable with. I certainly do, but then I get used to what is happening and then I get excited and that too screws up where I can explore just as much as the fear.
If you have read MCTB you know about the Dark night...any practice can get you to this and it can be destabilizing....if you are already in it well then practice well and get past it...
Good Luck,
~D

What he said. Energetics, traveling, strong concentration, rapture: all likely A&P.

Destabilization afterwards, very likely Dark Night.

Stock and standard progression.

Noah,

I'm interested in your grounding techniques.  Could you describe some of them?

Thanks,

Eric

Fatty food. I could be wrong, but I think I heard Tarin say that Daniel said (uh-oh, the legend begins...) to eat something like pizza. So I've eaten heavy fatty food: pasta, baba ghanoush, fried xyz...

Grounding techniques usually involve simple visualization, see for example this site

Caveat: visualizing can just cause more siddhi/jhana stuff if you aren't careful, which is obviously the opposite of what you want when grounding.

Best grounding technique IMO is beer and meatloaf.

Thanks for the responses,

Eric B: Grounding can take a ton of different forms for me.  As others mentioned in this thread, fatty foods and small amounts of alcohol can have a good effect as can exercise and sex in moderation.  Staying in horse stance for long periods and energy stirring to stimulate the lower dan tien (ala Qi Gong) have also been effective in the past for grounding.  I breathe into my diaphragm as my concentration technique so that also connects with the body for grounding.

Daniel & Dream Walker: I would place myself teetering on the edge of Reobs & Low Eq (popping into eq is always a super obvious stage for me).