The *Darker* side of Meditation

We always seem to post and discuss the power involved during meditation from the positive perspective..Well how about the negative and darker side this time? I'm all for meditation, and love some of the different techniques presented from certain ATS members, but noone ever mentions the dangers? Especially for 'new to meditation" people who will go inside expecting a peaceful journey/experience.

I found this website where people share their negative meditation experiences, pretty scarey! Just read a few and you'll see what I mean..


www.kundalini.se...

So what are your thoughts?

beware the trance. you give over your free will to whatever's passing you by.

Not sure you give your bodily control over to whatever passes you by, but I also believe that meditation should be taught by skilled individuals and is not somethign someone should dabble in during their spare time.

There is inherent power within our bodies that goes unutilized everyday and I believe meditation is one means of awakening atleast part of this power. The problem is that when confronted with this ability many, without instruction, do not know how to utilize ro control it.

Luke

I find I get headaches when I mediate in my bedroom, which is in front of a power line. I've stopped meditating now.

I've never tried to go beyond a run-of-the-mill meditation. I use it to fall asleep sometimes.

But I think certainly practicing more intensely without being prepared can be a nasty experience. The result can be an interminable ungrounding existence.

You have made a good point but in a world that increasingly doesn't believe that evil exists I hope your words do not fall on deaf ears.

How would I find a Guru who wasn't out to take my money or kill me? i feel like I'm ready to embark on a program of spiritual development but I have absolutely no clue how to go about searching. I don't want to look in the gas tank with a match...

hmmmmm I think if you 'open' yourself, you have to be prepared to deal with both 'dark' and 'light' influences.

I had a somewhat odd experience a week ago. Recently I've been suffering with extreme anxiety, loss of perspective and a kind of 'head in a box' sensation. Finally last week I experienced a change in mood and things are steadily getting better and brighter again.

The day the mood finally broke was when I also experienced some odd sensations. I had played some music for the first time in ages (nothing mystical, just some regular songs that take me to a very deep place inside) and was crashed out on the couch drifting. I started to experience intense joy, physically felt it in the location of the solar plexus chakra. It almost felt like an estatic pain. Soon after I started to cry and felt very unblocked and relieved afterwards.

A few hours later I went to bed, and although I knew nothing was in the room with me, I got the prickles in the back of my neck like you do when you've spooked yourself out telling ghost stories. I ended up so frightened I ran downstairs and turned all the lights on. It took me nearly 2 hours to balance myself and convince myself the light bulbs wouldn't blow while I was sat there. 30 years old and suddenly scared of the dark lol.

So far as the link you provided magestica - many of the signs listed are very familiar and I have been subject to them for many many years. Especially:

Sensitivity to sound, light, smell, and proximity of other people.

Mystical/religious experiences, revelations, and/or cosmic glimpses

Persistent anxiety or anxiety attacks, due to lack of understanding of what is going on

Insomnia, manic high spirits or deep depression. Energy loss

Total isolation due to inability to communicate inner experiences out.


Some of this I am starting to link with structural misalignments in my body. I have a congenital problem with my hips and over the years this has resulted in my body becoming very unbalanced. I am aware of certain energy blockages in my body and now with some physiotherapy am working on these

I don't meditate, but I have heard bad things can happen from some of my friends that do. I never even tried to, because I've been way to scared to try.

There is no light side to meditation its all evil orientated.

Meditation does not work for everyone, if such symptom is apparent, back off.

The reality is that the Toltec way, addresses dreams, reading through this will help to understand why...

www.quantumshaman.com...

for evil is within you and how you percieve it...
actually everything is within you and how you use it...

meditation is something i enjoy doing...
yet at times i feel a presence that does not like positive energies so i tell that potential aspect of my character to subside and love all that is...

many unanswered questions have come to me through meditation...

and i find the balance i possess was all in due part...

I have never had an experience like those mentioned while meditating, infact I cannot recall ever having a 'bad' experience. BUT, I just posted this thread because they obviously *can* happen and thought it was a good time to let those know that might be trying it for the first time. You just never know, and it's better to be fully informed of ALL the different aspects/opinions you can find before attempting certain things for the first time..right?

I'm actually assuming these situations are rare, as I've never known anyone in my lifetime to have a really bad meditation (Course my lifetime hasn't been THAT long LOL!)

So happy meditating all

Originally posted by drunk
There is no light side to meditation its all evil orientated.

Whether you've had 2 or 20 drinks, you are going to have to do better then this..now please explain how you've come to this assumption.

I will reiterate-I am ALL for meditation, one can reach the higher aspects of their inner self, find peace, answers, have visions, the positive list is endless and the reasons to do so far outweigh the reasons not to.

So do explain Drunk, I'm very interested to see why you feel this way.
Magestica

I think I can add something that might shed light on why some people might get bad trips/experiences either from meditating or astral projection.

A bad experience in my view can result from:

1. pushing beyond your limits without preparation
2. being under the influence of drugs, alcohol, emotional/physical duress to name a few.

Metaphysical procedures should be practiced onlywhen you are healthy in mind & body.

Some may claim they are & still have a bad experience. You could be undergoing some stresses that are hidden in your subconscious even though you are handling them quite well at the conscious level.

When souls are placed into humans they are given guards to keep them there in order to fulfill their purpose on earth. If the person tries to escape from the limitations of earth life by practicing spiritual exercises then the guards can show up and give the person very frightening experiences to stop them following those paths.

One girl was thinking about becoming a healer as her friends had talked her into it. She was sitting alone beneath a tree thinking about following that spiritual path and suddenly a loud voice from an invisible being shouted �NO� at her. She became terrified and dropped all idea of following the spiritual path.

The guards showed up and tried to scare me off the spiritual path also. They are extremely tough and gross and most people would have been scared away by the things they put me through. After a while they stopped and I broke through to a higher state of awareness where nothing can shake my conviction to follow the spiritual path.

Most people hear about the positive aspects of spiritual paths but they don't hear much about the negative guards that try to keep human consciousness away from spiritual matters.

Who or what manifests the guards, Aztec?

Do you defeat them with the power of the body, the mind or the spirit?

Do they look alike to all people?

yet i call them final confrontations before being given such a gift as that of fearlessness...

The guards can appear in many forms depending on the cultures and individuals they are dealing with.


They are part of a complex system of control which exercises authority over the earth realm. They control the governments and powers of this world and basically run the place. They allow certain spiritual paths to flourish whilst destroying others. That way they can guide spiritual seekers in the directions which they want them to go, and shape the belief systems of mankind. They create wonderful astral realms to convince seekers of certain beliefs, and millions of people seek those realms even though they are just temporary creations.

They are experts at manipulating energy on many levels, and have vast amounts of advanced technology at their disposal to help them accomplish this.

When they confront an individual they will normally try to scare the person in various ways in order to weaken or test the person's spiritual convictions. Or they may possess an individual with seemingly demonic entities in order to scare that person's family or community towards religions. They do want people to follow religions because basically religions have no knowledge, only faith, hope, love etc. That way the masses can be kept out of harm's way by absorbing their lives in vague religious pursuits.

Although the guards are extremely terrifying to say the least they are only doing the work assigned to them, and are not rogue elements bent on total destruction. The destruction they do perform is completely controlled and planned well in advance, and can be compared to the way gardeners prune gardens quite severely in order to keep the gardens in order and promote the desired types of growth. And basically the type of growth the guards require is the development of human potential on the earth plane, at the expense of more spiritual pursuits.

Fighting the guards is useless because they are extremely powerful and great in number.

The way to live in peace with them is to have no fear at all, no matter what sort of terrifying manifestation they confront you with, and also show them a certain amount of respect, just as you would show respect to a gruesome guard who was guarding a temple. Once they see that nothing can frighten you then they will be amused at first, and then they may try to communicate with you in other ways which are not so frightening.

As they are only doing a job they change quite dramatically when they are not working, and transform into highly spiritual beings with immense joy and light. But just when you think the nightmare is over they'll get back to work and become quite gross again. So you need to understand their natures to some extent in order to live in peace with them.

The only rule in following the spiritual path is �Fear Nothing that you may encounter on your journey, no matter how awesome its powers and no matter how terrifying it seems to be.� That's what I was taught many years ago and it was the primary thing that helped me get through the maze and understand what these guard beings are.

We live in a multi-layered reality with many different worlds, and each world has its powers and authorities which keep order there. Just as our super-powers maintain their superiority with frightening weaponry so too do the spiritual super-powers use frightening tactics to maintain their positions of authority.

[Edited on 5-11-2003 by bigsage]