For me, P, I moved through what I see as a process of internalizing new information........ habits........ self care through experiencing different pieces of information and education I needed in order to wrap my head around what meditation was and what it was supposed to do FOR me.
I couldn't just sit and meditate during BIG struggle in my life. I tried. I had help.I was directed and instructed and....I just got angry at what seemed like elite people meditating while refusing to share important inforamation making it possible for me to meditate too.
I hope you can avoid the frustrating layer of anger I THEN had to work through, on top of not understanding.
When I studied how the brain works..... how it process.... shuts down when in danger and switches to survival fight or flight reptilian brain..... I applied that and it helped me understand WHY meditation can shift us OUT of survival mode.
Reading how to approach meditation through books like Peace Is Every Step, by Thich Nhat Hanh..... I could see another piece of the puzzle, what it was and why it could work for me. Everyone sees their own path. Everyone will find what makes sense to them.
Understanding human survival depends on shutting down access to higher thinking...
we die wondering what THAT IS if we see a bit of tiger stripe in the jungle and fail to just MOVE out of harms way. Looks like a stripe to me... hmmm....lets look a little closer then CHOMP! The tiger eats well.
Or, we notice we're 50 feet down a path after seeing a snake. Once we go back and inspect the snake,we see it's a stick appearing to be a snake. We laugh and try to go about our walk..... but our Sympathetic Nervous system has been activated and we've been biochemically hijacked.... we're stuck in fight or flight till it wears off or we move ourselvs OUT of that state.
Trying to think our way out only makes it more difficult, IME. It adds frutration and shame and more fear, IME.
We can't wish and hope and mourne it's loss..... once our amygdala has been activated.... we're in fight or flight and it's a matter of learning how to activate our parasympathetic nervous system (PNS) which is responsible for shutting off the fight or flight mode.
We learn to activate it in many ways...... humming is one thing I find I've done allll my life..... really hummed my way through, but it turned out it's one way to self sooth AND activate the PNS. My body was working to calm itself, even if I didn't consciously understand.
Deep gargling does the same.
Splashing cold water on the face isn't just an old wive's tale in movies..... it works. I try to turn every shower cold and stand in it for 10 seconds, bc it helps.
Pushing on doorjambs with everything we have can help engage our PNS.... esp if we focus on taking deep breaths in and letting them out slowly. I do this when I'm so upset I CAN'T quiet my mind long enough to focus on breathing.... the fight or flight brain NEEDS to ACT NOW. Remember, it believes a threat, as big as a tiger, is chasing us. It's main goal is to get us OUT of danger. It doesn't care if we're harming ourselves with worry chemicals or inability to use our logic, creative problem solving brain...it just cares we don't get eaten by a tiger.
Walking backwards around a trash can helps some people while they focus on breathe. Not me, but some people find it helpful.
Walking slowly, heal to toe, thinking about my foot kissing the earth with every point of contact... is helpful to me. Not some people, but to me, yes.
I pick and choose and find what works and what doesn't.
The meditation part..... sitting and breathing. That wasn't what I thought it would be at all, btw.
It turned out to be something alltogeher different than what I'd built up in my mind.
I was asked to focus on the place in my body where I held the discomfort or pain or pressure inside my body. Usually it was my chest or throat..... I held in my emotions and they were trying to blow themselves OUT of my body...... and I put my hands on that place, named what I felt...... pain? Pressure? Sharp? Dull? Throbbing? I named it and gave it a number from 1-10 and I put my hands on it and breathed into it. For the sake of explanation..... say..... 4 seconds IN breathe, hold for 4 seconds and out 4 seconds. You can find all sorts of breathing and meditating if you look. It;s confusing to me, so having someone lead me through it really helped.
Aftr about 10 breaths I checked my discomfort or pain...... if it was improving I put my hands back over it, closed my eyes and breathed into it another 10 times, then checked it again and repeated till it was GONE, or stopped getting better.
If it was still there, I'd shift my focus to a neutral part of my body... usually the shins for me, then breathe into that for a while, same thing.... long regular breathing. At a point I'd be asked to open my eyes and notice the shapes and colors around me. The noices. The space in front of me.....beside me...... above me.....beneath me. So. Much.Space.
I was invited to breathe that space INTO my pain or discomfort and picture creating spaciousness around the discomfort... say.... with pink cotton candy or whatever you want to picture and use to hold the space you create...breathe in spaciousness around the pain and create more space and more......
then check the discomfort again.
And, to my amazemnt, every time I did this, the space I created HELD..... didn't leave. It remained and I began leaning how to practice the main principles of this without working so hard, or forgetting and beating myself up over it.
The main things were to:
Drop ALL judgement.Just.... STOP assigning judgment to EVERYTHING.
Replace the judgment with curiosity. Just get very curious what was BEHIND whatever came up......let it be what it was and wait to see why it was there, bc there's always something behind it if choose not to react or judge....but lean into what's there and trust we'll keep ourselves safe no matter what.
Most importantly... and this was a struggle......give ourselves unlimited self compassion.....like we're dealing with an infant we wish to protect and care for..... unending self compassion.
This where I learned to feel better and it will be different for you, but I want you to understand it's not just one way for everyone. It wasn't anything like I thought it had to be...... there is no one right way. You will find what works for you.
Finding the place in my body where I held the pain and pressure wasn't about breathing or meditating....but it was how meditation began for me.
NOticing what I was feeling and where...... was the beginning of understanding how stress entered and took up residence in my body...how the dis-ease took root and began growing into poor health, inability to focus or take on new information.
I'd lose my peripheral vision at some point.... and didn't realize it! I realized it during therapy sessions where noticing my peripheral vision came up...... and was restored....and scared me all the time, bc I was startled all the darned time by things I thought I saw every day,but didn't. Driving was a huge fearful thing, till I got my peripheral vision back... my neck stopped getting cranked around and stressed. I stopped fearing what was beside and behind me....and felt normal behind the wheel of the car again.
Practicing the little pieces meant I'd have larger epiphanies later....unexpectedly..... and see the pieces and the puzzle and fit things together unexpectedly.
I hope you find your pieces soon, P.
And breathe. Just breathe when you're stressed.
Lighter
