When I face my existential fears and narratives about experience, they dissolve into cold sensations at the back of the head. why?

[-_sometimes]

Hello friends, I hope you are all well

 

For a long time, not long after leaving my lifelong religion, I have had existential fears and dread expressed through a subtle 'feeling' in my realm of awareness, that permeates my underlying experience. It is extremely uncomfortable and very suggestive in nature, the feeling creates narratives about my experience, frames them in certain ways, and they are always negative. Often it is just a general uncomfortable atmosphere where just being alive is an uneasy experience.

 

Thanks to intensive mindfulness practice over the past few years I have recently been able to feel these sensation more closely, and well, very often the sensations disappear just by looking at them and refraining from indulging in the narrative or not attaching myself at all to their appearance. Once I notice the sensation for what it is, I get this cold rush up the sides and back of my head, sometimes quite intense and vibrating. 

 

To be honest, I'm just really curious as to what the relation is. Because it happens every time I get through any sort of weirdness that passes through this mind, whether it the aforementioned uncomfortable feeling, or some remnant of a recent bad psychedelic trip, or a narrative about my place in the world, if I just let it be, what was previously believed to be real is seen as an appearance and immediately the cold rush up the back of the neck and sides of the head. Any thoughts? Apologies if this is a decidedly pointless post, I'm just curious xD

[Nungali]

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Edited January 12, 2020 by Nungali
site wierdness ; I never went to this thread before but there is a post from me from another thread entered here ? ? ?

[thelerner]

You're confronting something most of us have.  Once you start quieting the mind, the stuff underneath seems louder.  The garbage thoughts, wants and aversions, fantasies, that were always going on are brought to the surface.  Its frightening until one habituates to quiet them down, ie deal with'em or ignore them. 

 

Psychedelics can make the phenomena even worse.  Perhaps the answer is grounding.  Walking, just sitting, working out.. getting out of your head.  

 

<<addon>>  long Vispassana mindfulness retreats are kinda like the marathon of the meditation world.  If people have trained they do a whole lotta good, but for some its too much.  It create breakdowns.  I wonder if Vispassana has answers and good advice on handling it afterwards.  Google it, see if they have advice for when mindfulness takes the wrong turn. 

Edited January 12, 2020 by thelerner

[dwai]

They are all appearances. Stay with pure present awareness and let all thoughts, emotions and feelings rise and fall away.
 

Let what comes come, let what goes, go. 

[Apech]

16 hours ago, -_sometimes said:

Hello friends, I hope you are all well

 

For a long time, not long after leaving my lifelong religion, I have had existential fears and dread expressed through a subtle 'feeling' in my realm of awareness, that permeates my underlying experience. It is extremely uncomfortable and very suggestive in nature, the feeling creates narratives about my experience, frames them in certain ways, and they are always negative. Often it is just a general uncomfortable atmosphere where just being alive is an uneasy experience.

 

Existential angst or anxiety is based on unformulated conflicts in energy - a tightness or narrowness i.e. constriction or knots in energy.  We all have this - but in many people it's covered up until a low energy state or bad experience lifts the cover and they emerge.  This cover is our civilised selves, or our ordinary social selves where we present a persona to the world based on self concepts (about being a certain type of person) - while in our unexamined mind there may be many 'dark' things which we have not assimilated.  The 'voice' of this collective of unassimilated experience runs a commentary on our experience as you suggest - a narrative.  This creates a general feeling of unease.

 

I think your observations are very good and correct.

 

 

16 hours ago, -_sometimes said:

Thanks to intensive mindfulness practice over the past few years I have recently been able to feel these sensation more closely, and well, very often the sensations disappear just by looking at them and refraining from indulging in the narrative or not attaching myself at all to their appearance. Once I notice the sensation for what it is, I get this cold rush up the sides and back of my head, sometimes quite intense and vibrating. 

 

Again very correct in my opinion.  The energy conflicts self-resolve on examination.  This is the true meaning of the term 'nirodha' in yoga - as in 'yogas citta vritti nirodha' (from memory - hope I got that right  ).  Mindfulness has allowed you to de-stress  those energy knots or to not identify with them and they self release.  This produces a flushing energy in the body usually experienced as a shiver or cold stream - this as you say can be quite extreme accompanied by twitching or even violent body movements sometimes.  Kriyas (?) and shaking are a common thing with meditators.

 

16 hours ago, -_sometimes said:

To be honest, I'm just really curious as to what the relation is. Because it happens every time I get through any sort of weirdness that passes through this mind, whether it the aforementioned uncomfortable feeling, or some remnant of a recent bad psychedelic trip, or a narrative about my place in the world, if I just let it be, what was previously believed to be real is seen as an appearance and immediately the cold rush up the back of the neck and sides of the head. Any thoughts? Apologies if this is a decidedly pointless post, I'm just curious xD

 

Do you get feelings/visions around space or emptiness - maybe a kind of dark clarity?

[moment]

Being an observer with lessening narrative, heck that is great! Letting things pass through without the why is probably better in most cases. Always be on the lookout for new ways to ground yourself.

Edited January 12, 2020 by moment

[-_sometimes]

Thank you for your post it was very helpful, validating if you will xD

 

3 hours ago, Apech said:

Do you get feelings/visions around space or emptiness - maybe a kind of dark clarity?

 

Could you expand on this a little more, if you don't mind?

[Apech]

28 minutes ago, -_sometimes said:

Thank you for your post it was very helpful, validating if you will xD

 

 

Could you expand on this a little more, if you don't mind?

 

The cold rush could be accompanied by insight.  Just wondering what happens to you.

[-_sometimes]

20 minutes ago, Apech said:

 

The cold rush could be accompanied by insight.  Just wondering what happens to you.

 

My experience feels more empty, there is more 'voidness' to it, the more I allow this to happen, but I have never really had any sudden flashes of insight. Progress for me existentially has been a slow, gradual process, letting go of trying and experience feeling more atmospheric and magical as time goes on, but since I haven't really studied the stages of insight I wouldn't really know  

[Apech]

2 hours ago, -_sometimes said:

 

My experience feels more empty, there is more 'voidness' to it, the more I allow this to happen, but I have never really had any sudden flashes of insight. Progress for me existentially has been a slow, gradual process, letting go of trying and experience feeling more atmospheric and magical as time goes on, but since I haven't really studied the stages of insight I wouldn't really know  

 

 

Voidness was what I was getting at.