Tistepiste

Hey Thanks so much. What a strange coincidence also, because what you're saying about IFS is something I stumbled on just a few days prior to your post, for the first time. I'll look into it.

Dear all, I want to share experience with somatic therapy. In August a friend of mine triggered my anxiety and consequently my OCD. Two days later I started a 2 week meditation retreat. I followed all instructions thoroughly. But during this retreat whatever I did, feeling of immense anxiety was produced by my body every few seconds. I had interview with monk every 2 days who told me I was doing everything correctly and even saying I had a talent in meditation. I was meditating 14 hrs a day. I stayed close to the fear. The deeper I went into meditation the closer I went to the fear. When I went into deep meditative state I saw that I was getting impaled by a structure that felt like a tree that penetrated my body and anchored itself in my stomach area. I watched it. It disappeared only to reappear 5 seconds later. I told this to the teacher but he said no need to worry because the form of the fear changed every day. This was a mistake the form of the fear didn't change. I just become more subtle so of course it changed to my perception, I saw it more and more clear, but the fear itself didn't change form. After 10 days something shifted when I went out of extreme meditation mode and talked to myself like an adult. Like wtf is going on. This helped release part of the fear. But when I went back home I was overwhelmed with panick attacks, dissociation and deep, deep fear response. I had to fight the hardest to stop the OCD compulsions as a reaction to the fear but I was 95% succesfull in that. Although stopping the compulsions didnt seem to help with dissipating the fear. Fast forward 1.5 months later. Still in an immense fear system I started somatic therapy. This is where things changed. What I learned: - My fear was stuck because it couldn't get released in a proper, healthy way. - I hadn't talked about this specific trigger with friends because I didn't want to follow the road of anxiety and the urge of my OCD compulsion to talk about it. Because: I thought this would strengthen the loop ("don't give your OCD attention") or re-trigger me (because this is a very very vulnerable state to express, and anything can enter deep in my body when exposed, or create a new obsession). But the result of that was that my fear didn't find a way out. So it was stuck like a bird in a cage, singing louder and louder because it got exhausted and hungry for being seen. What helped me was moving into the fear and really actually really feel it together with a trained therapist. And let it all out. Let the emotions really flow. There was anger, and sadness, and a little bit of grief that all came up. But first a lot of resistance. My body was moving in spasms. I felt like gollem from the Lord of the rings. As if that creature was stuck inside me. These spasms were my body locking the anxiety in its place. I was told to make sounds. "Get out!" I screamed louder and louder and angrily and angrily and then a deep feeling of sadness overcame me and then finally my body sensations starters to move inside me. Finally it started to flow again instead of being stuck in this fear state. My body is now largely out of the fear state although there's some remnants left. (Which I'm sure we can work on next session) But a lot of blockage released. So lesson to myself - you don't have to keep staying with the fear like that. If it stays longer then a few days then new means need to be looked into; --Being vulnerable with people (this way the energy has a way out, in a safe space, it feels seen while at the same time possibly challenged) --Focus purely on the sensations and actually follow the resistance. Don't just look at it from a distance but become the resistance itself. Become the emotion and actually move with it. Become it. And then leave it. The last one is what didn't help in meditation. I was observing the fear. But this didn't help with getting out of its stuck position.

Love the analogy!

@Cathal interesting. Any goal you want to achieve? Any consciousness state you wish to attain? Or why are you drawn to this lifestyle?

Howmany hours a day do you do sitting and walking meditation? Do you have interviews with a teacher about your progress?

Very cool; I've been thinking about it myself. - what meditation "technique" do you do? Is it Vipassana?

@Hojo You mean 30 years old to 32 years old? Why? I guess because the older you become the more comfortable you become in your patterns? And in twenties you still kind of confused with all that's happening? Beginnen thirties is typically a period where people explore their identity "Who am I"

@Oppositionless I had the same experience on my first retreat! I am hesitant to answer on this question because I don't want to influence your perception. As it is purely subjective. I would say, my understanding increases with each retreat. The unconditional love awakening is the understanding of the rising and passing away. Your nervous system understands "things come and goes". There's more after that indeed. But those things are not perse pleasant. You are in essence reconditioning your system to go from reactive mode to observing mode. And reduce / destroy attachement to any "thing" whether it is pleasant or unpleasant. Every retreat is different. My second one was way harder than my first one since my anxiety and OCD got triggered. It was very unpleasant but also very fruitful in the sense the it showed me on a deep level how my current patterns were not helping me and just create more trauma. I'm also still at the beginning of the path. But I wouldn't say my retreats got more intense. I would say they got more profound in the sense that I recognize quicker what's happening and can tap out of distractions more quickly. The attachment decreases and actual quality of meditation increases.

I agree! So much. I have done Four Vipassana retreats. I Just finished one. Basically, what I realized; all these retreats have script of what they need to teach. A bit like going to the church. e.g; "This is the only way" "Body is repulsive" "You can be a buddhist and a christian" "See for yourself" etc. etc. And the enumeration states, yes. The thing is: The meditation technique they teach and space they create works! Wonders! I have reached depths I never thought I could ever reach. I have had the experience of complete dissolution of the body, accompanied by feelings of infinite; and I really mean infinite love. It was in-sane and I could see my body paticles exploding out of my body. And a deep hole was left in the middle of my stomach with an infinite depth of pure love. I also had the insight of no-self. Suddenly it was the most logical thing in the world and it hit me when I just woke up. For months i was in the present effortlessly. The tricky thing is: It is in essence just meditation. No self. Rising and Passing. That is inherent to any human being. And not attached to the Buddhist dogma. "No Self" can be seen and experienced from a variety of methods. As well as the Rising and Passing. I feel like they discovered a way to reach it, and they built a whole religion around it. The things that Buddhism says are sometimes disturbing. E.g - "Women cannot reach the state of the Buddha because they are inferior" - They are against rites and rituals. But when someone is going to hell; because of "bad deeds", a picture of "hell" (with "cauldrons and fire"), is shown right before they pass away. But if you build a small altar with flowers and gold and what not the picture changes into the "deva realm". So are your bad deeds are eliminated because of adding "flowers" to your grave. Anyway. I love this retreats and I have immense respect for these organisations and Buddhist monks. I have had the privileges to be taught by them, and they really helped me understand the technique. It is all donation based and they dedicate their life to it. So no bad words about them at all, but the religion part can be misleading. Since you can get stuck in the dogma and not explore other things. That said, Vipassana meditation is tricky; so it needs a dogmatic approach for you to not be distracted. E.g; Things happen that you believe to be real but can actually just be imagination. I have had meditation states where for four hours there was a movie playing in my mind and I believed it. I thought I saw my past lifes, and I thought the universe was communicating with me through these beautiful drawings that it was showing me. That felt real and I thought it was showing me the secret to life. But I told this to the monk, and he told me I was just following a mind object along. If a mind object is coming up (eg image), and you dont recognize it for what it is (an image), it grows and grows and leads its own story. Even though you feel that you are not creating it (Cause youre not consciously creating it), the mind is creating it and it is bullshit. When you recognize that and label it as "imagination", it dissappears instantly and you are back the observing the four basic elements. Fire, water, air, earth. That's all what you should observe. And not go along with thought stories. This is where their expertise is infinite. And this is the fruit of those retreats. I needed four retreats to recognize all of my traps. Even though I have reached profound states, I realized in a sense it is because I was "lucky" I reached them and because I take the practice very seriously; so even though I believe some things to be true when they are not, I am still moving "forward" in the consciousness states, but I don't actually knew what was really happening. Now I start to understand. Deeply. Thanks to this retreats. But also thanks to my hesitance to follow the dogma blindly.

What do you advice to people meditation with psychotic tendencies? Are they able to do serious practice after taking a more healthy approach to mediation? Do you think schizophrenia and these other types of severe mental disorders, probably stemming from the mind unable to process things, could be triggered due to unhealthy approach to discovering spirituality, and be cancelled out if someone is more grounded and understands what they are doing

@Carl-Richard Shit, you made me question myself if I am bipolar type 1

My OCD is trying to help me. By finding answers. Obsessively. Because he thinks it is a matter of life. It helps me by looking everywhere it can to find answers. He can't stop looking without being sure the answer is not missed or skipped. The problem is, there's no other agency telling the OCD that it is ok. That I don't need answers. Having answers = learning Having answers = closure Having answers = peace My OCD can side track, focus on things that are not relevant at all to the current confusion. I think it needs a good talk with uncle Iroh, and a cup of tea

If I'm being totally honest from what I've seen it seems like you're not getting any "unique" information apart from the most generic associations. So basically just visualizations / thoughts based on what you read or happen to think about. There's nothing unique or surprising about what you say

That's literally what I've been thinking about doing since a few months. And talked about yesterday with a friend. Calisthenics and jiu jitsu

@Pure What's my name?