I practice vipassana, and my third retreat pit me against a very insane part of me, accompanied by severe muscular convulsions.
It all made me realize how little we understand about who and what we really are, and what ails us.
I wish more would find out
I'm a skeptics skeptic, but man did that shake my belief against all the various spiritual disciplines involving chi, and chakras and all that stuff I had considered total nonsense. Now I consider it at least to be some sort of poorly understood psychosomatic relationship deeply connecting the somatosensory and emotional parts of your brain.
Strange and powerful stuff. I did not anticipate that much depth to a meditation practice.
I still get a lot of weird muscle cramps in my shoulders when I start to turn on the continuous introspective awareness of my attention. It's nowhere near as bad as it was though. But I also don't sit for more than 30 min. anymore. The whole process was very cathartic but utterly bizarre.
Those faces you talked about helped me understand paychological projection, and how what i think someone did, is probably me blaming them for something they didnt do the way i understand it.
We are bizzar, and its actually really cool.
In vipassana, they tell you to ignore those faces, and scary things (also even the good) - or to Examine them in relaxed acceptance - eventually always going back to the breath, and it helpes the intensity “dissolve” and mellow out.
I found out that the twitches and pains i have are produced by a similar mechanism, and sitting long enough with my “fighting emotions” releases them and also releases the pain.
Its easier to drink a beer or smoke a joint, so i understand society’s choice.