Crazy Kriya occurrence, what to do in those cases?

[jaja]

Hello, everybody. I recently posted a comment in the lying meditation's thread, but I thought this might be interesting for other folks here. I've found the topic being addressed in some comments here and there, but I couldn't find a place where this was the issue.

 

What am I talking about? Well…yesterday I was practicing yoga nidra (which is helping me immensely) and at some point around the end of the session I felt tension located in my left shoulder, a tension I was not able to release. I felt some micro-contractions and, since they felt kinda good, I allowed my body to do whatever he wanted. Soon my left shoulder started doing circles and, slowly but steadily, the involuntary movements spread to my back muscles, my other shoulder and my arms. The only reason I didn't freak out was because I felt in complete control of the situation: my body was moving because I gave it permission to do so.

 

It did scapular adduction, shoulder and arm circles, intense shrugs, cervical extension, a range of odds pectoral contractions, intense pelvic tilts coupled with “crunches”…all without any command from my conscious self! It was crazy! Those movements came in waves and I felt they could last forever; I decided to end it after an hour or so. Then I went to bed and I had hard time falling asleep because my body wanted some more contraction, so I had to focus all my will into avoid that.

 

This morning I was feeling more relaxed than usual, but I could sense some extra tension in my shoulders and I realized my body needed some more of what it had yesterday. After lunch I lay on the floor and it started almost immediately.

 

Not having put a cushion under my head, I could observe some interesting things: to me it seemed my body was not only trying to release tension, but also to mobilize articulations and straightening my spine! At one point my muscles were tense in the effort of having my hole back pressed completely on the floor! This time, as soon as I thought it was enough, I focused on the spasms, stopped them, and relaxed my body with an out-breath. There was still some tension in my face, but overall I felt at peace.

 

After all that, I felt like I usually do when I finish a yoga class, except…my body did all that on its own!

 

I really like some advice here because i'm worried.

 

Should I keep doing that, from time to time? Is there any danger?

 

Since my body obviously carries a huge load of tension, should I suspend my strength training?

 

I think my experience is called “Kriya”, I've found a video of Shinzen Young talking about it from a buddhist perspective and an article related to kundalini awakening. No science paper, unfortunately.

[Emmet Louis]

After all that, I felt like I usually do when I finish a yoga class, except…my body did all that on its own!

 

I really like some advice here because i'm worried.

 

Should I keep doing that, from time to time? Is there any danger?

 

Since my body obviously carries a huge load of tension, should I suspend my strength training?

 

 

 

 

The body has in some ways a lot more intelligence then we have about itself. What we're trying to do with all the work you see people doing is foster an environment for the body to use its intelligence. Clearly you've found something that your body needs to do. Think of it how sometimes you need to just take a really deep breath or stretch the neck/back til it clicks.

There's probably no danger in just letting the experience happen as you describe the main danger in my mind would be chasing it or forcing it.

I would suspend strength training personally but I would pay more attention to relaxation and gentle movements. 

[[DW]]

Jaja - I have had this experience about a dozen times.  It's cool and interesting but IMHO don't become too fascinated by it.  I never had anything bad happen from it; in fact felt "good" afterwards.   I liked Shinzen's video (and Shinzen in general) on it when I found it ~3 years back. 

[SimonT]

Barrett Dorko is an american Physio who believes that "ideomotor activity" is one of the body's main methods of self-correcting, one that is more or less completely suppressed in most "civilised" cultures. I think there's definitely something to it:

 

http://www.barrettdorko.com/articles/analgesia_of_movement.htm

[jaja]

Thank you everybody for your inputs, I'm now a little less worried…but I'm still puzzled about what behavior encourage.

 

I started incorporating lying meditations into my daily routine because I desperately need to relax and I got benefits right from the start, but now this “spasms” are what my body is most inclined to do and they're almost the opposite of relaxation: they're contractions! Those occurrences feel pleasant and unpleasant at the same time and then, in the aftermath, I feel good overall and almost relaxed…but it doesn't really last; yoga nidra provides benefits that last much longer. I don't know if those tensions are what trigger my kriyas or, viceversa, they're the result of my body moving spasmodically. So here's my doubt: later today I'll do another lying meditation, should I follow the script or allow my body to go crazy (as it most certainly will be incline to do)?

 

I think it might be useful to provide al little bit of context by stating my goal(s). I'm interested in Health (especially mental health) and I started my journey with meditation, I didn't have a proper goal at the time, but I liked the idea of Enlightenment; then I stumbled upon some issues that made me focus more on my body and think about what I'd like to achieve: I wanna learn to full relax my body and deepen my concentration, all this in order to reach the first jhana. Then, I'll think about what do next.

[SimonT]

In my opinion, based on my experience, you should completely separate the two into distinct practices. When practicing stillness, practice stillness, resist urges to move as much as possible *by relaxing*. As a totally separate practice/experiment, lie down and allow your body to move however you feel it wants to move, and work out for yourself what the different effects of this practice could be. If you want to achieve jhana, you will need to learn to stay very, very still. Doing a lot of movement outside of the times you practice your stillness, will likely help with the stillness when the time comes to practice stillness.

[jaja]

@Simon

 

I think I'll follow your advice, thank you. Since you seem to know a bit about jhanas: a couple of years ago I was very close to attain it, but then my practice went off the rails; I sensed relaxation was a key component as much as concentration, am I right? I'm asking because with my current experience I can now see how most of the benefits the practice brought me at the time well linked to a lack of excessive muscular (and therefore mental) tension.

[Kit_L]

@ jaja: Dave and Simon have given you excellent suggestions, IMHO. Avoid the "fascinations" like the plague, I was once told.
 
Read THIS. The key sentence is:
 

The likelihood of you experiencing a jhana is inversely proportional to the amount of desire that you have for it.

 

This is not meant to be any kind of discouragement, either; please read the whole article.

 

Any kind of 'spiritual work' is a juggling act, that continues: on the one hand, you orient your activities with a small hope that something useful might happen; on the other, even to be hopeful of an outcome, there's attachment. 
 
This is why many traditions recommend, "Just practise". Aitken Roshi once said, "The entry of grace is an accident. Practise makes you accident prone".
 
This seems like a useful stance.

[jaja]

Excuse me for my absence, but I've been struggling with some challenges lately, so I couldn't spend much time online. I want to tank you all again for the inputs and post an update on my situation. It's been a couple of weeks since the first “kriyas” manifestation and I've encountered some major issues that (hopefully) led me to a pretty important insight on what's going on in my body.

 

Despite all your words I still wasn't comfortable with my body acting that weird because, although it clearly needed to behave like that, I felt like there was something “wrong” causing the spasms; I so decided to not allow free movements until I could talk to a doctor about them. I still wanted to practice meditation and relaxation though, but here's where problems started to arise: I couldn't let my body relax without triggering the spasms! Suddenly the benefits I had been collected thanks to lying meditations were gone and my body was as tense as it could be, so much that I felt “tied” while practicing yoga and/or stretching any muscle.

 

There was something different from the muscular tension I was accustomed to: this time it seemed to me it had more to do with my nerves; that got me worried and — obviously — the more I worried, the worst my conditions got. On Monday 7th I was feeling really bad: I had pain in my sternum, shoulders, face, legs and occasionally I could feel electricity in my left arm and frontal lobe. The day after I got a flu, which oddly helped me relaxing a bit and alleviating the discomfort, but I knew it was not over, yet.

 

Finally I talked to my physician, he told me that certainly my problem was caused by too much stress and my spasms could be due to a lack of magnesium. Too many “could” for my tastes, but at least I got reassured I don't have a neurological damage (yet), so — aside from taking magnesium supplements — my top priority became to learn again how to relax. Here's the problem: lying relaxations seems to no longer work and I don't know any other method to release tension aside from physical exercise. Yes…I need to release tension, but…how and where it gets stored in the first place? Is there a way to prevent an overcharge like the one I'm experiencing now?

 

While thinking about those things, I decided to do an Ayurvedic massage session and it turned out to be the best decision. It released about the 80% of the unnecessary tension I was holding, but I could feel it wasn't enough to solve my problem. It was enough to get back on my meditation path, though, so at least I have that. The woman who treated me with massage told me I was extraordinary tense in my shoulders, especially in my left upper-trapezius — which is precisely the epicenter of my spasms. I already knew that and I have the habit of stretching that muscle, but since I was experiencing pain all over my body I never really focused my attention on that area. Until I found this video. At the minute 4:30 it is explained that an over-contracted trap could make the body ache in various areas just like I experienced. Moreover, the over-contraction is linked to the forward head posture, which is one of my problems.

 

My speculative theory is that Kit's lying meditations taught my body-mind how to relax and let go, but I have a deeply hold habit of tension in my left upper trap, so deeply hold I couldn't get to relax it with yoga nidra, even if the rest of my body was completely soft. Therefore those “Kriyas” (curiously involving the entirety of my trapezius) originated in order to get rid of the problem, but the tension is so strong they could last for hours and end up to actually inflame the area they wanna heal. Does this make sense?

 

Anyway at least now I know what to do: soften those muscles and try to correct my head posture. Are there any resource I can use? Something like an “Overcome Neck Pain” program? Because just stretching the upper-traps is not going to work; few more massaging sessions could, though.

 

Any thought about this?

 

PS: I started jogging, hoping it could be useful to release extra tension.

PPS: what do you think about this method as a quick aid?

[Kit_L]

Jogging might release some tension (as in excess energy) but will not help your traps. In other threads I think you've been given good advice already: work on your hip flexors and pec. minor. The only reason the belt that Tanya is using has this softening effect on the traps is it pulls the shoulders back and does the work that traps are presently doing (pec. minor pulls them forwards) so the more efficient, and eventually permanent, method is to work on hip flexors (to reduce pelvic tilt) and pec. minor (to reduce the need to pull the shoulders back). Your avatar image shows the problem perfectly: this head position requires a lot of effort to support. Effort creates tension. Systemic tension leads to more effort than is required; now you are in a vicious feedback loop.

 

And I am going to differ with the good Doctor, too: I will bet the cost of a decent meal that the 'epicentre' of your problem is not the upper fibres of trapezius, but levator scapulae. We have literally the world's best stretches for this (they are in all editions of Overcome neck & back pain ("ONBP"), but I have not videod it; that, Overcome neck pain, is the next program). 

 

Don't catastrophise your present situation: in the modern world, excess tension is the norm (though not desirable). And muscular tension will not damage you unless it persists without change in one place for months or years. No doctor of any kind can help you with this, apart from prescribing diazepam, which does work wonderfully, but is psychologically addictive, because being relaxed feels so good. Diazepam is a muscle relaxant; it is the drug of choice in all operations (once the brain is disconnected from the neural system, there is no muscular tension, and this aids surgery). Diazepam's touted anti-anxiety effects (D. is described in MIMS as an "anti-anxiolytic") comes from the fact that taking it lowers muscular tension within 20 minutes, and the brain experiences this as a move from anxiety/tension to relaxation.

 

Let me expand on this for a moment: it was being told by a back pain surgeon that "muscular tension does no causal work in modern medical theory" that changed my research direction permanently. In other words, this eminent surgeon was telling me that I will not find "tension" as a cause of any medical problem of the sort medicine treats. And he was right: I searched Medline and Ozline, with no results. I was a PhD researcher at the time, and had been asked to present a paper on the "hidden causes of neck and back pain" (this paper eventually became ONBP). My research question was the relationship between multiply existing causes in complex systems; back pain the key case study.

 

What he told me helped me realise that I had exposed the elephant in the room, and the book is the result. Tension is what kills us, eventually—and this is why I push the reduction of tension in daily life so hard. But the momentary experience of it should not be experienced as a negative—it is only by experiencing this that you are now realising what is the deep cause of your problems. If you want to change that pain and discomfort, you can. Tension is eminently treatable, but only you can do it. Any body work, like massage, will help, if the practitioner is skilful. Stop thinking about it and do the work that has been recommended to you. No amount of worrying or getting second (and third) opinions or perspectives will change the fact that you hold excess tension in both the body and the mind. Only you can change this.

 

If kriyas affect you while doing lying meditation, let them do their thing; your arms are not going to fly off! And do the stretches that have been recommended, and then get on with your life. These experiences are a phase, and the discomfort is a necessary dimension to pass through. You will pass through this, if you act, rather than think/worry.

[zenwoof]

Stop thinking about it and do the work that has been recommended to you. No amount of worrying or getting second (and third) opinions or perspectives will change the fact that you hold excess tension in both the body and the mind. Only you can change this.

 

This. IMO it all boils down to that (stop thinking so much) ^^ every day do something that relieves tension of the mind (meditate, yoga nidra, etc.) & of the body (stretch, movement, massage, etc.). Sleep, nutritious food, rinse wash repeat until you die lol

[jaja]

It was refreshing to read your words, Kit, especially the part about “acting rather than thinking”: it's so easy for me to forget it!

 

I'll keep working on my hip flexors and I'll add some pec. minor stretches as you suggested, thank you.