Fear and sadness

[Minko]

Dear John

Thank you for your amazing book. I am reading it and your approach resonates with me deeply. Its been really exciting to find someone who has such an evolved outlook. I am recovering from ME and although a lot of progress had been made, I feel there is a final block that I cant seem to grasp. While I was severely ill and horizontal for a long time, I went through a huge transformation by having to be with myself with no distraction. I thought I had lost my identity by losing all the outer things that defined me, but discovered an essence that was simply 'me' no matter what I was doing. I also became more and more familiar with my inner world, my 'self' so to speak. Particularly the things that make me happy. It sounds so simple but its such a powerful thing to realise what truly makes you happy and shed the things you wanted to believe were right but werent. I gained a sense of myself as an integrated person, and it all became more familiar. I meditated a lot and learnt to relax deeply.

However, as the journey unfolds, I wonder if my meditation process was simply a moment of peace and escape rather than an actual healing of something. Now that I am more free of physical symptoms and can see the wood for the trees and see what symptoms remain, I am very aware that adrenalin is a very big issue for me. When I read about the chakras in the book, it is definitely the solar plexus area that is most prominent for me. There is something in there that is always active. The emotions vary from fear to sadness. And sometimes excitement, though it is more like anticipation. Its as if there is either pain inside that area or agitation and fear. I am aware of deep sadness in me and I find sad music very therapeutic. I am a musician and songwriter too so I am able to channel this partly in my own music. However, I dont want to be locked in this state forever. I sense strongly that these emotions and the accompanying adrenalin eat up a lot of my energy and leave me totally exhausted. Often I wake up and feel as its been active all night and I dont feel I have had any sleep.

Admittedly there are stressful things going on in my life, relationships issues and also the challenge of rebuilding my life after a long period of illness. But it seems there could always be something stressful and I want to discover if it could be my emotional patterns that are creating this perspective or even creating stressful situations. I dont feel I am completely resisting emotions because I really try and tune in, but I think I must be resisting because it doesnt move or change. Plus I dont always know exactly what emotions are going on or how to disentangle them. It all seems to be end up as one physical symptom, adrenalin and exhaustion and emotional pain/fear in my solar plexus.

Talking of resistance, it feels quite scary to write this down. I think I am afraid to admit how overwhleming it all is, or to depress anyone with my problems. But thank you so much for reading this and for creating this forum. Warmest wishes.

[John Ruskan]

Thank you for a lovely sharing. With a sensitivity such as this, I'm sure you will eventually find your way. Serious disease is to be viewed as the result of the build-up of inner negativity, but also the disease is the releasing of the negativity. It appears that you have been through a major transformational experience, which even brought a valuable shift of consciousness. The transformational clearing is still continuing, and now you are moving to a deeper emotional realization of the negativity within. It's just a matter of settling back into a dedicated personal practice and staying with it.

Fear and sadness sound like core feelings. As you make a continued effort to process these, at some point, shifting will occur. The problem, as you point out, is that there is usually a time factor that we are not comfortable with. Transformational work requires time, and it may be one of the purposes of this lifetime for you to integrate the sadness and fear. You can't be impatient; devote this lifetime to these major core issues. I appreciated your reference to sad music being therapeutic, and it made me smile in recognition that my own compositions (with my Venus in Capricorn) are usually sad and dark, and I indeed find them therapeutic and still tend to feel they are the most authentic form of expression for me. I don't worry about this; this is what I do best, so I do it. I'm not expecting or anticipating change.

The adrenalin is more of a reactive emotional response to the core feelings. You can be hooked on it, but try to see that you don’t have to react with fight or flight - just be present. Process the adrenalin if it continues. Settle into the core feelings with the process and check to make sure you are applying all the steps. It sounds like there is an active subconscious which affects your sleep. Try to become more conscious of what happens in sleep. Write down sleep-dream experience and process that in normal consciousness. Use your art as part of your practice, along with meditative yoga and conscious breathwork. Relax into it all. Witness. You're on your way.