At times in intensive spiritual training, or in extreme or accidental circumstances, powerful altered states and energetic processes can emerge.
We may become frightened by altered states, so that as they arise we resist and judge them: “My body is dissolving.” “I have prickles all over.” “I’m burning up.” “I’m too cold.” “The sounds are too loud.” “My senses are too intense.” “I cannot tolerate the many inner pains or waves of energy.” Through fear, aversion, and misunderstanding, we can struggle with them for a long time, trying to avoid them, change them, get through them, or make them go away, and this very resistance will keep us caught in them.
Yet just as in beginning meditation we can learn to touch the pains and tension of the physical body with a healing and compassionate attention without resistance or grasping, so too the frightening and difficult altered states that arise can be met with the same compassionate and balance attention. Just as in the beginning practice we learn to notice the seductive voices of the waiting mind without getting entangled, so too must we bring that balance awareness to the sweet and powerful seduction of rapture, lights, and visionary experiences.
Our grasping or resistance to any experience stops our practice in that spot, stops our opening to the truth. One student had great fear of the sense of empty space that came to her in meditation, thinking she would lose herself, go crazy, or be unable to function. She spent two years resisting it, until in one guided meditation she finally let herself open to the fear and the space. It was marvelous. Her mind quieted, her heart softened, and her meditation opened to a new level of peace and ease.
As we encounter new experiences with a mindful and wise attention, we discover that one of three things will happen to our new experience: it will go away, it will stay the same, or it will get more intense. Whichever happens does not really matter. When we expand our practice to notice whatever states arise and our reactions to them, we can make them all a part of the dance. A great support for this perspective in practice is the tool we have worked with in naming the demons. Now we can consciously name the altered states as well, “rapture, rapture,” or “vision, vision,” as a way of acknowledging what is present, noticing it, and calling it by its true name. The moment we can say its name and create space for this experience to arise and pass, thee comes a sense of trust in the process. We are reconnected with the understanding that seeks not to capture an experience, we open to what Alan Watts once called “the wisdom of insecurity,” the wisdom of the ages.
A path with heart brings us to experience the phenomenal world in all of its infinite richness, to see, hear, smell, taste, touch, and think, and to find freedom and greatness of heart in the center of it all. Because each of us as a human flower will open in our own unique way in our own particular cycles, we need not direct the specific energies of our body and heart. Our path is neither to desire them nor fear them. The true path is one of letting go.
When we cultivate spaciousness, faith, and a broad perspective, we can move through all states and discover in them a timeless wisdom and a deep and loving heart.
This excerpt is taken from the book, “A Path With Heart: A Guide Though the Perils and Promises of Spiritual Life”
