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Swan
India
256 Posts |
 Posted - Apr 20 2018 : 12:32:03 AM
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Greetings all!!
It’s so great for me to visit the forum again in years and share my experience. Hope you all are having a great experience!
I had to leave meditation practice, and checking the forum as well few years ago, as I couldn’t continue because of headache and pressure on head due to overload. However, even though I stopped, the ball I already rolled by then got huge momentum and took me through one hell of a years long journey – about which I wanted to share few highlights and findings. Sorry for the long post, hoping it may help someone having similar issues.
1. “Seek and you will find”:
This part starts after around two years of staying away from all practices. I was getting terrible headache and pressure in forehead and nose bridge every day, where I will have to put up a fight to keep my eyes properly open and also it would make me feel a bit withdrawn – for a large part of the day. I did not seek for any medical help as I thought that it has come from meditation and should subside if I stay away from practice and live my life in a grounding way – anything not related to spiritual practice has nothing to do with it.
But after two years of dealing with it, I thought of searching about it in the internet – and I have no idea why I didn’t before. It turns out this is called ‘Tension headache’ and this is a posture related condition which is caused by tension in a chest muscle called pectoralis minor.
This stretch in the below video had a deep impact.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4iAIXnsPCcc
And did it snowball the next series of events? I don’t know.
2. Correcting the posture:
As I took care of the peck minor, the pain shifted downwards – towards the base of jaws and upper neck where the skull ends. And a lot of things kept happening. I don’t remember all and don’t remember the sequence – but here are the highlights:
a. I googled about the pain in the base of skull. I found that it is related to ‘Upper cross syndrome’ and stiff ‘Suboccipital muscles’. All the symptoms, including sore and stiff neck and back, matched and it again pointed to posture. I immediately started yoga asana to cure this. The Asanas I selected based on googling and then checking if inner guru thinks it is helping. I was sure that no matter how tough or how long it takes – only way is through this. I had to massage it as well.
b. One evening, I felt the urge to push the upper gum with my tongue. I still remember the extreme pain along with the feeling of opening though it was two years ago. It was hurting the base of my tongue, end of the skull at the back side and the base of the jaws. Looked like I was storing tension there. It remained sore for next two days but I kept pushing it once in a while as the pain felt like opening. It stopped hurting after few days.
c. In this phase, I also started running. Along with the other things, it did great help in getting my posture right. Running particularly helped in making the limbs and feet feel more alive (hard to describe – easier to feel the liveliness) in a way.
d. At some point, I found the hare pose and pigeon pose very effective.
With these stuff, my posture definitely improved and one fine day I realized that I have not had the headache in quite a while. Hurray… dunnit!!
3. Grace:
Most recently - Just following an urge, or tipped off by inner guru, I started tai chi practice and found it very calming and it is focusing on the remaining pitfalls of the physical aspect which probably causes me having such violent energy imbalances. This is my current stage as of now (last five months) where I am enjoying the blessing of slow and profound movements of tai chi, and the clarity and grace that come with it.
The emotional aspect of the journey was more daunting I guess. A few things changed slowly and gradually in my workplace and all my professional fears manifested around me – leaving me wondering how I/we ended up in a situation like that. It seemed like an endless loop of despair with no light seen at the end of the tunnel. On the other hand, we were preparing to welcome our son in our life, and even in the 30 week scan looked like he was smiling. So with my one foot in hell and one in heaven, head was really unsure how to proceed and what to expect. However, the professional issues also was put to rest quite later on, and things took unexpected positive turn after lots of effort being put into it.
Now the big question for me is, when do I start meditation again?
Initially I was having hard time to accept that I cannot meditate because of a headache, however, I made peace with this fact. I guess it helped to think that even though I am not doing meditation now, lots of cleansing work is going on and inner guru is there with me.
Two things are going on right now, the tai chi moves are triggering some action at the top of the neck (involving sub occipital I think) and I started breath meditation for very small duration. So far it’s going okay and I feel that I still have a hint of the headache if I stress on doing more and it will be there at least until the neck smoothens. Lets see… that’s my journey!
Love and peace!! 
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BlueRaincoat
United Kingdom
1730 Posts |
Posted - Apr 20 2018 : 02:34:02 AM
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Hello Swan, welcome back
Thank you for sharing.
Sounds like you have had lots of answers coming from Silence. Yes, it can take some time to implement them, but you seem to be moving in the right direction.
Hope to hear more from you as the changes unfold. It would be interesting to hear about resuming your meditation practice, when that happens.
All the best |
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Charliedog
1625 Posts |
Posted - Apr 20 2018 : 03:54:06 AM
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| Welcome back Swan! |
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Dogboy
USA
2193 Posts |
Posted - Apr 20 2018 : 08:25:09 AM
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Hello Swan
Although you left your DM practice, it seems the benefits of the practice continue for you, a confident witness and inner guru, a good sense of your “inner quality” and judgment to move forward cautiously. Breath meditation is a good way to dip your toes into practice again, give yourself plenty of time to intergrate, especially with a child on the way. Keep us posted |
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Swan
India
256 Posts |
Posted - Apr 20 2018 : 11:17:18 AM
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Thank you for the the encouragement and suggestions! Yes, it felt like inner guru has been there with me. This time I am hoping to build up the practice very slow.
Dogboy, the baby is now 1.5 years old The journey has really taken its own sweet time to unfold, has been worth it though I believe..
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jusmail
India
491 Posts |
Posted - Apr 20 2018 : 11:58:41 AM
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| Swan, welcome back. Let it not be your swan song :) |
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Swan
India
256 Posts |
Posted - Apr 21 2018 : 09:00:36 AM
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Thanks Jusmail!
I surely hope not :) |
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Fighting headache.. guess I made it?
