The Dark Side of Meditation No One Seems to Be Talking About
Meditation is a set of techniques designed to promote heightened awareness and focused attention. It is about reconnecting with all five senses of our body and the immediate experiences of life. Meditation is a consciousness-altering technique that has been shown to have numerous psychological benefits.
The word ‘meditation’ comes from the Latin root ‘meditatum,’ which means ‘to ponder.’ Meditation in the classical tradition has an acceptable application, which is the transformation of the person to realize oneself in a state of total transcendence and freedom from all the existential constraints.
Meditation is a technique for resting the mind leading to peace, happiness, bliss, and self-realization. Meditation techniques are found in most, if not all, of the world’s major religious traditions.
The Buddhist monks used to meditate to achieve physical, emotional, and mental peace but now it has become a part of mainstream society. As people tend to work in more stressful and anxious environments, meditation exercises have come to their rescue. But does meditation always help? The answer is no!
The Less Positive Side of Meditation
The beneficial aspect of meditation can be seen via brain scans that show the enhancement in the insular cortex, a region that involves controlling emotions and perceptions. Hence, techniques like mindful breathing can help us become more in tune with our own feelings, which ultimately aids our ability to make good decisions. Other techniques, such as self-awareness through observation, helps us to pay keen attention to our own thoughts, without being judgmental in various worldly scenarios. Over a period of time, activities like these can increase one’s emotional capacity and help in overcoming extreme emotional reactions.
Ideally, these activities should help a person’s well-being but it can happen only if they occur in well-balanced and harmonious proportions. If one surpasses the optimal level, then these techniques can lead to harmful consequences.
If you have been meditating every day, you would be aware of how sometimes you feel exhausted. That feeling, in turn, can be terrifying. I used to meditate, and it did help me cope with the various types of stress that you face on a daily basis.
But, I also felt as if I was drifting away from the good parts of my life. Things that used to entice me were now lifeless. It’s similar to how you feel standing inside a warm room with a fireplace and watching the snow fall through a windowpane. You are at ease, but there is no excitement. You’re warm, but you’re missing out on the excitement of playing in the snow.
There is a lot of content that sells mindfulness as a magic pill—the miracle cure that will change your life—and it could change your life for the better or for the worse. You might learn how to make decisions without allowing emotions to cloud your judgment.
But do you want to live a life where you don’t feel anything? A life in which, instead of separating the wheat from the chaff, you separate the wheat with the chaff and discard what makes you human, your emotions?
Like any journey or venture, there are ups and downs, and so is the case with leading a mindful life. In the journey of being relieved and leading a stress-free life, people tend to meditate, exercise, and practice mindful activities that spike one’s anxiety and apprehension. “It’s natural for meditation, to arouse anxiety in some people, and this can be a valuable part of a healing process,” says Tara Brach, a clinical psychologist and author of Radical Acceptance. Or, we can simply put it as transformation can be painful, getting out of your comfort zone and doing something that creates radical changes in your soul can be hard to deal with, especially for people that are mentally challenged.
Famous Persons Who Were Affected by the Dark Side
A number of Western Buddhists are aware that meditation is not without difficulties; they have even named the emotional difficulties that arise from their meditative practice the “dark night.”
The dark side of meditation has not only affected ordinary people—even some of the more well-known personalities have been touched by the psycho-spiritual depression.
7 Reasons Meditation Isn’t Helping
According to research, the following are some of the reasons meditation can affect you negatively:
- Overdoing meditation
- Choosing unguided meditation technique
- Loss of interest in meditation
- Unable to recover from a traumatic experience
- When there is too much negativity around
- Relationship issues within family or spouse
- Improper sleep patterns
Here are some potential downsides:
1. Increased Sensitivity:
- Emotional Overwhelm: Regular meditation can heighten your sensitivity to emotions, both positive and negative. This can sometimes lead to feeling overwhelmed by strong emotions.
- Sensory Overload: Increased sensory sensitivity can make everyday experiences, such as noise or light, more intense.
2. Ego Dissolution:
- Loss of Identity: Deep meditation can lead to a dissolution of the ego, which can be disorienting for some individuals.
- Difficulty Connecting with Others: A diminished sense of self can make it harder to form and maintain relationships.
3. Mental Health Challenges:
- Psychosis: In rare cases, prolonged and intense meditation can trigger psychotic episodes, especially in individuals with underlying mental health conditions.
- Anxiety and Depression: If not practiced correctly, meditation can exacerbate feelings of anxiety and depression.
4. Physical Discomfort:
- Physical Pain: Long meditation sessions can lead to physical discomfort, such as back pain or leg cramps.
- Sleep Disturbances: Irregular meditation practices can disrupt sleep patterns.
5. Spiritual Bypassing:
- Neglecting Practical Issues: Meditation can sometimes be used as a way to avoid dealing with real-world problems.
- Spiritual Arrogance: A deep meditative state can lead to a sense of spiritual superiority, which can alienate others.
How to Meditate Mindfully:
- Start Slowly: Begin with short meditation sessions and gradually increase the duration.
- Mindful Guidance: Seek guidance from experienced meditation teachers.
- Balance: Combine meditation with other practices, such as physical exercise and social interaction.
- Listen to Your Body: If you experience discomfort, take a break.
- Seek Professional Help: If you experience negative side effects, consult a mental health professional.
Stop Hyping Meditation As a Cure-All
Meditation is a great technique for attention enhancement and to create a locus of control. It can help one to be calmer and more focused in life.
Meditation, from Buddhist monks to becoming part of the mainstream culture, has come a long way that now celebrities such as Oprah and Deepak Chopra offer a 21-day class with an ad that promotes meditation as the cure to all problems from sleep deprivation to heart diseases.
The significant thing people need to comprehend is that meditation-related anxiety is real and it can have detrimental consequences.
As one size doesn’t fit all, similarly there is no one magic formula, trick, or technique of meditation that can lead to a healthy life. Hands-on experience says that different people require different methods of contemplative practice.
“Just like finding the right exercise for someone who is physically challenged, it’s possible to find a style of meditation practice that serves someone with symptoms of trauma,” says Dr. Tara Brach, an American psychologist.
“We’ve had an overwhelming number of people contacting the lab and saying, “I can’t feel anything, I don’t feel any love for my family. What do I do?”
Dr. Britton says that many people experience a sense of numbness, that is they can no longer feel extreme joy and have encapsulated dissociation from life.
These experiences explain why we should abstain from selling meditation as a cure for all, or as an anxiety-reliever.
When Meditation Becomes Distressing
When darkness falls Britton set out to investigate meditation-related experiences, specifically those that were described as challenging, difficult, distressing, functionally impairing, or requiring additional support. Her study, published in the Public Library of Science One journal last spring, looked at nearly 100 interviews with meditation teachers, experts, and practitioners of Western Buddhist practices—including Theravada, Zen, and Tibetan traditions—many of whom reported challenging meditation experiences.
The majority (88 percent) of the meditators in the study reported that these experiences had an impact on their lives beyond their meditation sessions. A whopping 73 percent indicated moderate to severe impairment (meditating prompted a reaction or result that kept them from living their normal, daily lives), 17 percent reported feeling suicidal, and another 17 percent required inpatient hospitalization for psychosis.
