Lonny ([info]theclon) wrote in [info]buddhists,
@ 2008-05-13 19:25:00
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Hello I have been apart of this community for about a week now, but this is my first post.

    Recently I have decided to engage in a more rigorous practice (at least for me) and have increased my meditation substantially. I have been using some guided meditations(pod-casts) to keep me motivated and on the right track. One of the guided meditations taught of the six realms and how to meditate on them. It also spoke a lot of also working on posture. I am in my 6th day of this and have felt alot of emotions being released during my meditation, sometimes to the point of my body shaking. Has anyone else experienced this? Also when I am sleeping my dreams have become very vivid and hard to handle (i guess you could call these 'bad' dreams). I wake up in the morning and feel like I have very disturbing things going on in my subconscious that are working themselves out slowly through my meditation.

Has anyone hit these (i guess you could say negative) points? Are these things that i will eventually work through? or am i doing something wrong?

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[info]mindfulness
2008-05-14 03:34 am UTC (link)
Tibetan Buddhist nun Pema Chodron has written about experiencing difficulties like this. She wrote something about meditative awareness making us more aware of things we'd normally shy away from and suppress. I can't remember which book of hers she wrote about this. It's been some time since I read them. She did write that this is more often experienced when someone starts meditation.

I've felt a much more vivid awareness of my feelings relating to my post traumatic stress during meditation. These were difficult to face and not become destructively attached to. They're still difficult but with time they have become easier. I just remember teachings and pay attention to the thoughts and their impermanence becomes apparent eventually.

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[info]elaine4queen
2008-05-14 05:40 pm UTC (link)
you could do a lot worse than read some pema chodron, she is a good hand to hold. just choose whichever title resonates with you and take it from there.

i have had a whole range of experiences during meditation - from mundane and annoying, to a horrible nothing feeling, to ecstatic meditation, to weeping from grief. better out than in, i say. as long as you can handle it, then keep it up and you will see a varied landscape emerging. but don't deliberately push yourself to deal with negative things, or your practice will become 'about' that, if you see what i mean.

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[info]samiraalthores
2008-05-14 12:07 pm UTC (link)
Sounds like you're doing it right. Releasing feelings/thoughts are part of the practice.

My only suggestion is that if you are particularly disturbed, try meditating without the guidances - just with some soft music or nature sounds in the background or even silence. See what happens.

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[info]fivebells
2008-05-14 03:17 pm UTC (link)
Sounds about par for the course, but

get a teacher!

This kind of practice can lead to serious imbalances — it can release one set of emotional reactions which arose in defense against the results of a different set of emotional reactions. Then the reactions which haven't yet been released can operate with much greater freedom, and that can get messy. So it's best to practice under the guidance of an experienced teacher. I did similar practices without a teacher for a long time, and I've been OK, but I think I was lucky. And in conventional terms, one might say that my life while I was doing these practices was not very successful and rather painful.

The series I practiced first developed the capacity to remain in attention during the operation of powerful emotional reactions, then moved on to the six realms. I think that made the six realms easier. If you want to try that, you might listen to one of these two series of talks.

Before that there was a long series of meditations on death and impermanence, which also seems important. If you haven't done such meditations, you might want to look into that, too.

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[info]fivebells
2008-05-14 03:20 pm UTC (link)
my life while I was doinglearning these practices

They are still an essential component of practice, just no longer the focus.

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[info]theclon
2008-05-14 11:08 pm UTC (link)
You know whats funny, the series you recommended were the exact same ones I was using for guidance (the monsters under the bed series). I agree with you that I should get a teacher, but at the same time I am still not sure what sect of buddhism speaks to me the strongest. When i decide that i think i will be ready to find a teacher within that sect. But yes i do need some kind of support.

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[info]fivebells
2008-05-15 12:27 am UTC (link)
Hah! Lama McLeod seems to be encouraging us renegades!

I haven't listened to the Monsters Under The Bed series. I'll have to give it a try, some time. It'd be interesting to hear how he approaches the six realms, now.

It's possible to talk to a teacher about practice without subscribing to their sect. I've talked to various flavors of Zen, Theravadin and Tibetan teachers along the way. It's necessary to learn to distinguish the fundamentals from the sectarian embellishments (but Ken's talks tend to make that very clear) and make a little effort talk to people in the language of their sect, but they all have fundamentally similar practices, and good teachers will be happy to help a practitioner regardless of the sectarian basis of their practice. I've found that a teacher's character is overwhelmingly more important than their sect.

A couple of times I've written to Ken to ask him if he knows any good teachers in my area and his suggestions have been good. Both times, he recommended Theravadin teachers.

Also, I think his book makes a good companion to his talks. It seems as though his style of teaching has evolved in some important ways since he wrote Wake Up To Your Life — maybe become a bit gentler — but it's useful because it shows how the individual practices can fit into a more thorough program.

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[info]longtail
2008-05-14 04:58 pm UTC (link)
Yes, I have experianced this. You're doing it right, though as the poster above me said, if at any point you're feeling particularly disturbed, you might want to look into finding a teacher. While the release is very beneficial, it can be a lot to take on at once sometimes without support, especially if you've suffer from excessive anger, depression, or abuse or trauma in the past.

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[info]elaine4queen
2008-05-14 05:41 pm UTC (link)
also, if you have not experienced meditating in a group you really should, it is different to meditating alone.

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[info]ocha_no_hanashi
2008-05-14 06:27 pm UTC (link)
Well at least you're aware of it.

Meditation doesn't always bring serene peace.

There is a lot of wrath from within, too.

When you have emotions arise from within, examine where they come from, how they imprint in your mind and how they inevitably pass away if you don't attach to them.

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[info]dharma_ben
2008-05-14 10:59 pm UTC (link)
I've experienced the entire gamut of emotions during meditation. You just learn to sit with them. Watching them closely, you begin to see how ephemeral they are.

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[info]theclon
2008-05-14 11:13 pm UTC (link)
WoW! I am so impressed with all the answers I recieved. Thank all of you for your insights and support. Its good to hear that I am doing something right. I am aware that these emotions will come and go durring meditation, i guess the part that threw me the most was how insane my dream states got. I am normally a very visual person with my imagination and my dreams are often very vivid and bring weird questions too me, and meditation had amplified that feeling.

I also plan on finding a teacher sooner than later. I dont wanna cause incorrect patterns in my practice. I have learned that rule threw other areas in my life and how hard it is to reverse bad habits in learning a new skill.

Once again thank you.

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