Mindfulness Meditation

[allison]

Hi everyone,

A little backgroud:

I have been gluten-free for a year now, and my tummy and fatigue problems are doing better but I've had a whole load of new things come up recently. Really ad GERD, dizziness (recently diagnosed as vertigo, not sure if they are right), TMJ, tremors in my legs, and general shakiness.

Emotionally this is throwing me for a huge loop because I was so sick before I went gluten-free, and then after a year of feeling great I thought my problems were over. I'm finding it really difficult to feel like I"m back where I was (I'm not really, but I am in the sense that doctors still don't know what's making me feel ill--every test comes back NORMAL--which is an awful repeat of four years pre-gluten-free) and I am also in a time of my life with great change right now (moved cities, left best friends/boyfriend behind), new job etc.

So on the mindfulness meditation. I'm reading this book right now by Jon Kabat-Zinn called "Full Catastrophe Living." I'm sure many of you have heard of it (or at least now that you are hearing the name of it you are thinking to yourself, "oh, yes, full catastrophe, that sounds like my life." The book is about a program for people with chronic illness and/or stress issues who undergo an 8 week meditation program at a university hospital in Boston. It is full of incredible proclamations of how much better this program makes people feel, and to me it sounds to good to be true. It is basically just a program of doing body scans and meditation in which one focuses on the breath (I am a yoga practitioner, but I'm just not sure if I see this changing my life). So I'm wondering if anyone else has had any experience with using this coping mechanism in the past and what it was like.

Thanks!

Allison

[jesscarmel]

Hey Alison

i just responded to your message and then saw this. i have that book too and his first book. in july i went to a "Mediation in psychotherapy" conference and he spoke there. i defintly believe it helps alot and ive done it a bit but havent really commited to it yet. i do want to though. i prefer another book i bought at the conference called radical acceptance by tara brach. she also spoke and was very inspiring and amazing. for me its just been hard to find time to set aside for mediation where no one will bother me.

let me know how it goes!

Jess

[allison]

it's funny, meditation is hard because everyone/everything seems to conspire to intrude upon it. but the whole point is to let those intrusions happen and then bring your mind back to your breath. very haaaard. i've done it before at yoga retreats in rooms of a lot of people and found it even more difficult because it seems as if every person in that room is doing something to draw your attention (even though your eyes are closed).

jess, just saw your PM and will respond shortly...

allison

[Sophiekins]

Hey Allison,

I'll start by saying that while I haven't been to one of those workshops, I do meditate (at least an hour a day, usually more like 2 hrs. . .and before you say you don't have time to meditate 2 hrs a day, my trip to work involves a forty minute walk, during which I do a Buddhist walking meditation which you can do whenever you walk anywhere - even two minutes is fine) and it helps immesurably with my general emotional state and energy levels. Unfortunately, it doesn't help with the vertigo, limb tremors and general shaky physical state - the only thing that does anything at all for those symptoms is complete avoidance of gluten, oats, buckwheat, millet, corn and soy. The good news is that this really really strict diet completely eliminated the vertigo, tremors and shakes. If I were you, I'd try eliminating those one at a time in the next few weeks and see if it has any impact on the vertigo etc.

And I highly recommend Buddhist walking meditation if you have trouble with stationary meditation - it is much easier, and in turn makes stationary meditation easier.

[allison]

Sophiekins,

I have heard of the buddhist walking meditation--but don't know too much about it. Any recommended resources?

I have not been good about eliminating other possible offenders from my diet, so I will try some of those too.

Thanks!

Allison

Hey Allison,

I'll start by saying that while I haven't been to one of those workshops, I do meditate (at least an hour a day, usually more like 2 hrs. . .and before you say you don't have time to meditate 2 hrs a day, my trip to work involves a forty minute walk, during which I do a Buddhist walking meditation which you can do whenever you walk anywhere - even two minutes is fine) and it helps immesurably with my general emotional state and energy levels. Unfortunately, it doesn't help with the vertigo, limb tremors and general shaky physical state - the only thing that does anything at all for those symptoms is complete avoidance of gluten, oats, buckwheat, millet, corn and soy. The good news is that this really really strict diet completely eliminated the vertigo, tremors and shakes. If I were you, I'd try eliminating those one at a time in the next few weeks and see if it has any impact on the vertigo etc.

And I highly recommend Buddhist walking meditation if you have trouble with stationary meditation - it is much easier, and in turn makes stationary meditation easier.

[Sophiekins]

Buddhist walking meditation is simple - start by walking slowly, paying attention to how it feels to move your body. . .not just your breathing but also the feel of the surface you are walking on, the way your muscles feel as you move, the feeling of your clothes against your body, are you tense, relaxed, healthy, tired, energetic?. These are called self-sensations. Once you are aware of this, gradually start to pay attention to your surroundings (are birds singing? traffic? how does the air feel? wind? sun? rain?), locating your self-sensations at the centre, in relation to these other stimuli. If you have trouble with the self-sensations, try the external stimuli first and gradually work your way in. It is okay if you can't hold all of this in your mind at the same time at first, just start by paying attention to each one individually, which will get your mind accustomed to attending to these things, as you get better at focussing on individual stimuli you will find it easier to add in others at the same time. The goal of Buddhist walking meditation is to find yourself wholly present in yourself and in the moment - the walking acts as a physical mantra which helps you overcome the distractions of trying to centre your mind in nothingness, as a traditional stationary meditation would. I've found walking meditation very useful not only for calming myself down, but also for keeping track of my body's general health. . .when it feels off-kilter during meditation, chances are that something is wrong. Sorry I can't be more help for resources - I had a yoga teacher many years ago who included a variety of meditation techniques in her classes, which is where I learned to meditate (I was probably the only twelve-year-old who meditated regularly. . .). Feel free to PM me if you want to talk more. . .

[tarnalberry]

I think meditation *can* be a huge change in ones life, if one has the sort of life that can be positively changed by it. If you are already very good at being in the present, focusing your mind on the immediate, not having your thoughts wander to other things, or being mentally consumed by stressful thinking, then it may not make a big difference. But a lot of us have very full, stressful lives, and our brains may have difficulty sorting through all that we try to throw at them. Meditation can help simplify that. Of course, I don't know that you need expensive workshops to do it. Many local buddhist zendos ask for nothing more than a couple dollar donation for zazen.

(Oddly enough, I use pranayama in most of my life. Didn't realize it for a while, but man can it help. )

[eleep]

I'll put in a recommendation for Qi Gong exercises as well -- my acupuncturist assigned me one very simple movement called Hun Yuan Gong (which translates as something like "primordial working") -- this has made a huge difference for me in much the same way that walking mediation might -- I was actually having problems with restlessness in my sitting meditations and had been slacking off.

Qi Gong was specifically developed as a self-healing medicinal practice and I think it got to the heart of what I was struggling with in my body and mind.

eleep