Fifth meditation

6 min read

I am now aware. I am aware of myself and breathing, the sensations on my nostrils and between my toes. A new world has opened up to me and there is no going back. This is the fifth meditation retreat.

Every other gimmick failed, but vipassana opened my horizons. It showed me what is, versus what I want things to be. It showed me, me, in the latest and truest form. Vipassana showed me joy and gratitude. It showed me God.

But now vipassana showed me pain. A host of pain. Pain that I have hidden for years. A decade. Perhaps my whole lifetime. I can’t tell because the pain doesn’t say. It is pain that has tried to define me behind the scenes unbeknownst to me. It came as a shock to find out that this is me: I am suffering. I am in pain. I am miserable.

Surely this can’t be true? I didn’t think that I’d have any trauma. How would I? But this was a big fat lie told by my thoughts over the years. Perhaps there was a small voice somewhere trying to scream but I didnt’t hear it.

Honestly, it’s quite uncomfortable to be me right now. Who knew? (I didn’t…) I made sure I ate, slept, exercised, socialised, experienced, and worked well. I did everything right, except I didn’t listen to my needs and emotions. I never knew how until the first vipassana retreat and the following shock. I only had book knowledge. I didn’t know how to love myself, let alone how to love someone else. That’s the saddest part.

The pain has come in several shapes. At first it was a vague pressure that had no origin, no name. I wasn’t even aware of it. It could have been there already in the childhood for all I know.

Then after who knows how many romantic breakups, the pain grew into hedgehog spikes. He hurt me everywhere and I didn’t know who would listen to me and share my pains. I wasn’t alone but I felt lonely, and I told myself this is nothing. I am a man and I can take it.

Soon I gave my heart yet again to someone who didn’t care for me. She was utterly depressed but I had already let my standards crumble. When she broke up with me I told myself that I am not going to cry! Not this time, I won’t. And I didn’t. Then spikes morphed into medusa tentacles, and spread everywhere. Those tentacles strangled my lungs and I couldn’t breathe.

I was at my end. Who would take care of my heart? Who would want me? I guess no-one. They all leave me after all. I am worthless. Then I went to therapy. She helped me untangle some of my unhealthy cognitions, but not like vipassana that untangled the knots naturally.

The spikes and tentacles are now gone. Now it feels like mild pressure if I am not aware of him but otherwise he manifests as a fuzzy hole. If I don’t pay attention to him, he throws a tantrum. Therefore I make sure I keep myself aware so he doesn’t get out of hand.

When I am at my rock bottom, I feel like I want to violently scratch him off my chest like an Alien about to burst inside of my rib cage. But he won’t bulge. He covertly bends my shoulders inward in an attempt to cover my chest. He doesn’t want to be seen.

I don’t know exactly how long the pain has been there. It seems I’ve been numbing him for years. I’ve been shoving off anxiety, loneliness, depression, sadness, grief - the whole shabang - into that one little place in my heart.

My breathing is shallow and I don’t seem to be able to catch a breath. I have to force a deep breath, and even that doesn’t satisfy. So I just sit there, noticing my breathing as it is. That’s apparently part of vipassana. That kind of sucks that I can’t do much with it. I’ve tried breathing techniques but they satisfy only temporarily. The root cause remains.

The pain rests on my chest, the heart chakra. It’s constant and unchanging, like a somatic tinnitus. He makes me often very exhausted. I feel him all the time, even during sleep and unconscious. My partner hears him when I breathe in a saw pattern and sometimes make deep sighs.

So my brain knew, all this time, but decided to keep him hidden. It must have been really hard for me back then. So he is trauma that doesn’t talk. The place is wholly empty nothingness, like a black hole, and there are no memories. Yet I can intentionally think of a memory and the pain reacts to it with tears. Otherwise he stays silent.

I remember countless moments when the pain lied to me. I hurt now, so therefore it is their fault! I yelled, or It is this situation or thing that causes my pain! I thought. These were all big fat lies. The pain was always there, not because of “them”. It was always me… It was merely my attention that shifted in that area of the chest that gave me this notion, but the pain was there regardless. I reacted so, so many times. I even shouted at my mother, very badly.

Luckily for me to get past my trauma, I need to be aware and make friends with him. I need not have memories tied with it in particular. I need to just be with him. He is a young me that still lives inside of me, and he needs that attention he didn’t get before: I am here now. We will be okay.

There are some rare moments during meditation when I don’t experience the pain. That is when I laugh. I laugh because I know it is a fleeting moment, and I can enjoy that space just for a while there. Slowly I observe how he creeps back to me.

I have welcomed the pain and let him reside in my home. He’s got fat and comfortable and he doesn’t want to leave. For some reason I also don’t want him to leave. I’ve got used to living with him. Misery loves company. What would be life without him? To be happy?

I’ve noticed during my meditations that it’s a delicate balance to stay in that one place of the mind that you could call joy. It is difficult to allow yourself to be joyful. I am rewiring the brain with vipassana.

However, it is not so much “me” doing it, but the law of nature, Dhamma. All I do is stay out of its way and let it do its thing. I failed but Dhamma won’t. In other words, you could say that I am turning to God, instead of trying things my way. I failed. God won’t.

All mind states are ephemeral and they leave as fast they arrive. This is Anicca, impermanence. There is nothing to grapple on. Therefore, I know even my pain changes, even though I can’t perceive that change. That gives me hope.