Challenging experiences and difficult emotions arising in meditation is absolutely normal,
And an inevitable part of the path.
Some people,
However,
May encounter difficulties that exceed their ability to cope,
Or may have unusual experiences they need help to process or make sense of.
Such experiences might for example be unusual sensations in the body,
Marked shifts in emotionality,
Sudden shifts in worldview or in self-view,
Visual or auditory hallucinations and so on.
I categorize difficult and unusual experiences that can happen in meditation in five partly overlapping categories.
One – difficulties related to reconnection with everyday emotions.
Two – difficulties related to reconnection with past traumatic experiences.
Three – experiences that feel good but end up being problematic.
Four – experiences that are common in meditation but rarely experienced in normal life.
Five – when meditation leads one to clearly see aspects of reality that are existentially challenging.
The first category – difficulties related to reconnection with everyday emotions – is probably the one that I have most experience with,
And has been a major part of my own meditation practice.
Our past conditioning may have led us to disown,
Suppress or distort normal human emotions,
Like big boys don't cry or it's not appropriate for girls to be angry and so on.
That kind of pressure could never delete those innate emotions though,
So whenever these emotions would flare up in us,
We had to quell them in some way,
And there are a thousand ways of doing that – staying busy,
Taking drugs,
Intellectualising and many others.
Meditation temporarily take away the possibility of employing many of these strategies,
Not all of them but many of them,
And the vacuum that it creates may allow for the original emotions to reappear,
Which may lead to a knee-jerk reaction of trying to get rid of it in some other way again.
This sort of thing is one reason why quite many new meditators go,
Oh meditation is not for me,
I tried it,
I can't do it,
It doesn't make me more peaceful.
So these kinds of challenges are something I talk about quite a lot throughout,
So here I will just underscore that the most central principle in mindfulness is to be aware of what is,
Not what should be or could be.
Also I want to mention that I have found emotion-focused therapies to be helpful in dealing with these sorts of issues,
And frankly I think quite a bit more effective than just meditation alone.
The second category,
Difficulties related to past trauma,
Can manifest itself in many different ways,
For example through very strong emotional reactions,
Bodily symptoms like headaches or involuntary movements,
Triggering some sort of mental health issue,
Like depression,
Dissociation,
Psychotic symptoms and many others.
People with past trauma have a nervous system that has been overwhelmed and may easily be triggered into states such as hypervigilance,
Confusion or emotional numbing or distance.
Thus,
Extra care may be necessary in order to create a sufficient sense of safety for the heart to open up.
When meditators face these sorts of difficulties,
Psychotherapy will almost always be necessary.
I would argue that even highly accomplished meditation teachers might be severely lacking in competency and opportunity needed to deal sufficiently with some of these problems.
The third category,
Experiences that feel good but end up being problematic,
Include things like delusions,
For example falsely believing oneself to be enlightened,
Or to have acquired some superhuman skill or psychic power.
The most common problem however is probably emotional numbing.
In contrast to feeling the pain of human life,
Past wounds,
Emotional numbing or distancing can feel comfortable.
It is a quite unproductive state though and bails the full reality of now.
Because of such problems,
We have expressions such as,
If you think you're enlightened,
Go visit your family.
The fourth category,
Experiences that are common in meditation but rarely experienced in normal life,
Include things like seeing flashes of lights or visions,
Changes in bodily perceptions like feeling very light or very solid,
Or having the feeling like electricity or energy is flowing through the body,
Especially up and down the spine,
Or else one can experience heightened awareness or clarity or a greatly reduced need of sleep.
Some can fall into prolonged states of attentional absorption which might be accompanied by strong feelings of bliss.
Experiences related to this category typically have a pleasant feeling accompanying them,
But can sometimes feel so powerful and sometimes overpowering that fear might rise.
Having a competent teacher with own experiences of these sorts of things is important to get proper guidance.
But,
In general,
I can say that the usual advice is to notice and allow the phenomenon,
Not get too concerned with it and just carry on with the meditation that you were engaged in when it appeared.
The fifth category,
When meditation leads one to clearly see aspects of reality that are existentially challenging.
Surfaces within this category is what is often referred to as insights.
This does not refer only to intellectual understanding,
But an experiential realisation that lead to a deep emotional jolt and eventual transformation.
When the blinds get taken off us,
What we see might be quite existentially challenging.
A bit like it was for Neo in the movie Matrix,
After taking the red pill.
Things we took for granted about ourselves and the world might be flipped upside down.
Insights like this is often related to issues regarding the impermanence or insubstantiality of phenomena,
The unsatisfactory nature of such impermanent phenomena or regarding the sense of self,
The identification we have towards our body,
Our thoughts and opinions,
And to experiencing itself.
Insights like these can shake us to the core,
But are eventually also of tremendous benefit and value,
And is what make the transcendence of suffering possible.
If there are serious inconsistencies between nature and our internal map of nature,
We will get lost and experience trouble.
These insights update our map so that it is more in accordance with nature,
And hence we will be better equipped to navigate it.
However,
There are aspects of nature that are challenging and painful to the individual,
So having the map updated might be felt as a blow to the stomach,
And can be both disorienting and impairing while the system is integrating the new perspective and reorienting itself.
So all of this might be scary to hear about,
And it might perhaps even make you question whether you should engage in meditation at all.
For the most part,
However,
I don't think meditation actually caused these problems,
It's more that it shines light on issues already there with people,
And so make us aware of them.
Thus,
Avoiding meditation isn't really preventing the problem,
It's often just putting it off.
So meditation really is a great way of getting to know ourselves and give ourselves the possibility to sort out troublesome issues.
Out of your vulnerabilities will come your strength.
