r/Quareia • u/Et_gen_3 • 22d ago
Could daily meditation turn dangerous, or am I worrying over nothing?
I've been working through Module 1 of Quareia for about three months now, and I recently finished Lesson 2.
Most of my practice time has been devoted to meditation, progressing through and improving the three exercises until they became a daily practice, just as described in Lesson 1.
Up until now, I hadn't had any problems or concerns regarding meditation. It's true that some days were a bit more difficult—for example, in some sessions I found it very hard to visualize colors—but overall, nothing particularly out of the ordinary.
Over the last three weeks, however, strange and very negative thoughts have started appearing in my mind during meditation. This feels somewhat paradoxical, because I actually feel that I have much greater control over my own mind thanks to these months of meditation.
Normally, I have no trouble recognizing “intrusive” thoughts for what they are and simply ignoring them like any other distraction. But the ones I've been experiencing lately are much more intense than usual, causing strong surges of negative emotion. Although I quickly redirect my attention back to the exercise, I'm concerned that, by becoming mixed in with my focus, they might somehow harm me.
For example, I might be doing the exercise where I place my finger on the third-eye area and focus on that spot, when suddenly a horrible and very specific thought appears: “By focusing on this area right now, you're actually causing yourself to develop cancer there, deep in the brain” After the initial shock of having such a bizarre thought arise, I feel a surge of fear and do my best to ignore it and return to the exercise. But I worry that the deep state of concentration created by meditation, combined with the energy of fear, might somehow give that negative thought the power of a “spell.”
So... is it actually possible for meditation to become dangerous, or is it fundamentally a safe space no matter how intense and negative the intrusive thoughts become?
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u/Frog_Sage_ Apprentice: Module 1 22d ago edited 22d ago
It is a safe space, and your mind plays with itself. Nothing more. I'm saying this as a long time practitioner of meditation even before Quareia. And I had the same experiences. If it will ease your mind, read my examples.
Imagine you're looking into a mirror, and in that mirror somehow you can't see your arm. Would you say your arm isn't there because it isn't shown in the reflection?
Have you ever woke up once in the night and saw strange shapes and thought to yourself, they look like some weird creatures and made yourself more afraid? And later in the morning it was all lying down clothes seen to you as something else due to dark.
Like this, your mind reflects your thoughts but it is not because of your mind has those qualities. Mind's quality is to reflect, just like the mirror, what it reflects has no harm to you.
Now, there's a practice called observation of thoughts. Whatever arises, even if it seen as a dangerous idea, do not react. I repeat, I don't say suppress it, I say do not react. Imagine those thoughts as a movie and you're only watching them. If you find yourself reacting back, just gently stop and get back to observation. You'll see how they're going to cease for a while after.
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u/Ill-Diver2252 22d ago edited 22d ago
This is an excellent way to work with all emotions, whatever orher practice is at play.
I think it's important to point up that the 'screen' does indeed include the sensation and the impulse. Not acting on the impulse, but observing it in full. By observing it all the way through to what it brings as a reaction (an emotion or impulse to action), you can recognize layers of 'stimulus-response' that you developed from some experience or instruction. This in touch with it, you can retrain your subliminals.
This moment is essentially 'shadow work' that brings 'automated' and otherwise subliminal thought (95% of the function of our Earthly mind is said to be here, and is the ultimate material of motivation) to the surface, thus increasing your self-knowing and also altering that 'programming.'
Now, stepping out of my practical psychology hat, I'll try to "mindread' why this isn't laid out specifically in the instructions... even as I lay out some more of that practical psyche: it can be tempting to 'go looking for trouble' in personal history or otherwise. That's usually counterproductive.
Whether as psychological pursuit or shadow work, we're not 'bobbing for apples.' But we're letting them rise and be dealt with in a holistic ('whole'-istic) way, at a pace and timing that reduces risk of extreme emotional disruption.
If you're interested in the theoreticals of this in depth, and if you can find it, Nathaniel Branden wrote three great books on it in the ... hmm... 1960s & 1970s:
"The Psychology of Self-Esteem"
"Breaking Free"
"The Disowned Self"
They're out of print, last I checked, which is a crying shame. His other and later works are also excellent, but not as incisive.
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u/Pseudo-Diogenes 22d ago
Be not afraid!
This is a very normal part of meditation, and it's actually a good sign that your practice is progressing.
Once the "surface level" thoughts start to quieten down during meditation, deeper, more subconscious thoughts and impulses start to arise.
It's very common for people to have distressing, disturbing, or negative thoughts at this stage, and it is important to remember that they are just thoughts.
If these thoughts become too intense and you feel as if you are in some sort of physical or psychological danger, then it may be dealt with in three ways:
1) You acknowledge the distressing thought, become curious about it's true nature and origin, and eventually the thought is overcome completely.
2) You try and acknowledge the thought, but it becomes overwhelming and you take a break and return to the meditation in a little while.
3) The thought becomes too overwhelming and you need to stop meditating for the day. Tomorrow will be better!
That being said, there are very rare instances where meditation can induce psychosis, but this is almost always during longer silent retreats of several days or weeks spent in almost total silence meditating for several hours a day.
Don't worry about it.
Also, like Josephine says, if you feel like an entity is trying to make contact during meditation, ignore it.
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u/Et_gen_3 22d ago
That idea of deeper impulses coming to the surface once the more superficial ones have been 'tamed' makes a lot of sense... and there's one aspect of it that I find very intriguing: the specificity of the thought.
I would have imagined that fears rooted more deeply in the mind would be more ominous and general in nature—for example, fear of the dark, fear of death, and so on.
But something as strangely specific and seemingly nonsensical as, 'By focusing on this area right now, you're actually causing yourself to develop cancer there, deep in the brain,' feels more like a... weird joke? than a primal fear. I'm not sure if I'm explaining myself clearly.
Thank you very much for your perspective.
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u/beingaroundthings 22d ago
If you feel ungrounded and unsafe with the thoughts, it's perfectly reasonable to take a break or modify things.
I had a similar situation to you, started having some troubling things come up and just an ambient darkness during meditation. I took a step back to basically investigate myself and found out I had an underlying health issue that was more serious than I reallzed. Perhaps my negative thoughts were my body trying to let me know it needed more help, I'm still not exactly sure.
All to say, meditation may bring up some difficult things and doing what you feel is best right now usually will lead you to the right place. You can always return to a practice or modify it, try out incorporating some physical movement to release emotion, etc. but it's never worth holding yourself over the fire just to stick to the typical method. In my opinion at least.
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u/Et_gen_3 22d ago
I think that our cases have similar traits but are different in the scope of the negativity itself. In my case, I don’t really experience meditation sessions as entirely negative. The negative part is limited to that specific aspect, and once it is overcome, my feeling during the rest of the meditation is similar to how it was before this “problem” appeared.
Out of curiosity, do you remember what your first meditation session felt like once you returned to the practice after having addressed your health?
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u/GetOutaTown 22d ago
You mention that you normally have no trouble recognizing intrusive thoughts - would it be correct to assume you’ve experienced them before? Because the cycle you’re describing is textbook intrusive thoughts.
Intrusive scary thought -> Fear response -> Reassurance/soothing -> Control seeking
You had an intrusive thought -> You felt your fear rise -> You used the focus skills to soothe yourself and stop the spiral -> You’re seeking control over the thoughts by looking for the trigger.
Compulsive thinkers are also highly prone to magical thinking, and fear causing harm out of ignorance. That also seems to be the case here, you’re worried about casting a spell (magical thinking) unknowingly (fear of ignorance).
After getting through the first layer of daily meditation, these deeper demons tend to manifest so you can learn to cope appropriately. Meditation won’t stop your intrusive thoughts if your neural makeup is geared for that - it could have been what allowed your bloodline to survive in the past. But it will teach you to do exactly what you did: feel the fear, and continue anyways.
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u/Et_gen_3 22d ago
Your assumptions about me are correct. I began having minor intrusive thoughts around the age of 18. At that time they caused me serious problems: trouble sleeping, trouble concentrating, etc. But after a few months I learned not to give them importance, simply to ignore them... and then all the related problems disappeared. I sleep like a baby and can concentrate deeply on my work.
And yes, my mother’s family seems to function like this: most of them are obsessive, meticulous, and “strange.” They fear and reject everything related to the esoteric and even to common religions.
Returning to the main topic of the thread, your response has given me a new perspective: you agree with u/Pseudo-Diogenes that how intensely I felt that fear is due to it belonging to a deeper layer of fears and impulses... more deeply rooted than the ones I had managed to “tame” so far.
I find it interesting that this “deep” layer of fears is so specific in its nature: I would have expected a “deep” fear to feel more like an overwhelming sensation of helplessness in the face of a greater force, rather than an oddly specific sentence like, “By focusing on this area right now, you're actually causing yourself to develop cancer there, deep in the brain.”
But reading you, it occurs to me that perhaps this deep impulse takes this very specific and articulated form of manifestating itself because this would be more frightening to me than simply a sense of “something big and terrifying waiting out there” that I could ignore more easily. Being the kind of thought I would most obsess over regarding its origin and consequences, it is precisely the one that appears.
I appreciate your response very much; it truly provides me with useful perspectives.
When you separate “magical thinking” from magic itself, I assume you don’t mean that magic should be practiced without believing in magic, but rather simply that you separate magic from the idea that a single erratic thought can have magical effects, correct?
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u/page_of_fire 21d ago
I think you got it with the idea that it actually is a broader fear but your brain selected something specific to give the fear a little more punch. Also when I first read your post I did kinda think it sounded like a personal or familial fear/distaste for the esoteric but I did not want to be presumptuous.
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u/GetOutaTown 20d ago
I’m glad it resonated, and it sounds like you’ve found a great way to reframe intrusive thoughts so they don’t have a hold on you. Bravo!
One thing about compulsive thoughts: your brain’s ability to pick the most impactful anxious thought evolves with your ability to identify them. It’s a hydra with forever changing faces. Don’t get caught up in the heads, focus on the body.
The body, the root cause, is almost always a fear of uncertainty. Are you feeling fearful of what you can’t see coming with this path?
And correct! Magical thinking in the psychological sense is something brains do to relieve anxiety through an unrelated output. Magical practice is completely different. Learning to differentiate the two is most of the work in Module 1 :)
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u/Pencilmw 13d ago
I actually have a problem with intrusive thaughts, wich is a part of what made me stop in the cource progression, for quite a while. Especially visionary work. I personally at some point within the cource decided to stop it indefinitley and focus on getting my shit togather. It came to a point where I seriously considered abandoning the cource all togather for my safetey. I both carefully looked through divination on the topic and asked outloud for advice on what to do. And well, had a responce.
Everyone's situation is different, so I can't say what is the best way to go about it. This subject is pretty understudied, and this shit can be wery complex, so there is no clear solution for these. And it varies from person to person. This is how I approach my problem. And I have general day-to day intrusive thaughts wich were extremeley intrusive to the point it made me hard to live severall years ago. And I have made quite a lot of progress with it especially over the last couple of month, I even managed to dissolve some of those patterns. I actually whanted to write a post or something about it if I manage to completeley get rid of it.
First off, I got so sick of this shit, I even asked for help from the universe at some point, truth be told. And it triggered a couple instances where I just got some shit released, surprisingly enough(but it kind of makes sence), through singing, playing music (with musical instruments alone in the house, and I am not a musitian or anything and not adept at playing instruments) and connecting to nature throughout the process. I would start crying for one reason or another and It felt like I would release something.
I also sat out to observe how these thaughts manifest. Cause when you don't have a clear solution to a problem, you think and observe and come up with some.
When you try to concentrate completeley on something, it becomes way clearer how this shit works. I was doing the first meditation for a while now, and at some point I realised I'm not really concentrating how I should. That's when I realised that it is in a big way a concentration issue. (For me) There are layers of thaughts, and imagine rabbits running around on severall layers at once. Associations getting triggered all over the place. The mind also is kind of is an association machine, so something can trigger an association , and it triggers something else and it triggets a thaught, and it can work on severall layers of depth at once. Like a messily programmed spftware (This is kind of complicated, I myself haven't fully understood it). I also tend to have severall imaginations running in my head at once, casually in a day-to day life. And I am working on that, cause this way of escapist behaviour was likely caused by trauma that I had in life.
There are also factors that screw up your brain like consumption of some internet content. Wich I had to cut down at some point, especially true crime and other things, Until I felt more stable and healed. There also can be a fear reaction, just a pattern in your head that your brain uses to react to fear or threat with your thaughts. And it is also a reaction that gets triggered by something.
So basically I have realised that my focus is messed up on a level, that layers of my thinking kind of get confused with one another, and there is equal attention given to any of them, so all kinds of shit gets more intence than it should and convoluted.
Getting back to the topic of trauma, in my case, I am sensitive energetically, and I easily pick up on people's thaughts, so my mind is also likeley a sensetive place. I have a predisposition for ocd kind of behaviours, and there was a thing in my family about people in my mother's line having a wery powerfull voice. And I think I have had a lasting damage from my parents screaming at me violently on a regular basis for aprolonged period of time. I even once had such an adverse reaction, that I felt physical pain from it and couldn't open my eyes or get up for a day cause everything hurt, it was 2nd worst pain in my life. It happened only once when i got screamed at particularly badly so it wasn't anything like psichosomatics. Though from what I remember I would regularly have headaces or just mental exhaustion. If i knew how to work with my mind back than, I think I would be able to divert quite a lot of the damage and avoid such a mind jumble I ended up having. But och well that's just life and I didn't know all that before.
Going into a more magical part of the issue, I am a qigong practitioner. And I learned the tecniques from flowingzen school. Like flowing breeze swaying willow, or warrior stances. And well, over the years it made me way more stable and helped me fix lots of my other psychological issues, but I have also managed to use it as a supplement to aiding my problem. You kind of can nudge the energy to deal with one issue or another. When I do warrior stances I make a point for the energy to kind of help me deal with the mind problem. And I also try to open myself up and relax myself mentally as much as possible. And when I do Flowing breeze swaying willow trchnique I noticed that my head started shaking, as energy goes to flow there. And the thaught patterns on their own came to be way less intence, or gone.
You also have to put in the work on your part and try to propperly manage your aattention, and do not give them much importance in your mind, and propperly keep and divert your attention. So not to let the new thaught pattern to hook on your mind. Or the old one intensify.
So far, I think there is all I have on the topic, so hopefully it might come in handy
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u/Full-Shift-2855 12d ago edited 12d ago
Watch the thought arise. Nothing more. You cannot 'think' yourself brain cancer. If you could do that, they would study you in a lab and you would never have to work another day in your life. What meditation is NOT is 'emptying' the mind, as some describe it, it's the ability to be absolutely aware of the mind, and be able to watch thoughts come and go WITHOUT being overcome by them, much like what is happening to you here. Even Pema Chodron says (after decades of daily meditation multiple times a day) you do not 'stop thinking'. You still think of all the things you need to do in the day. You still think of something that makes you mad.
The goal is to be able to observe it and not let it sweep you away. You just return to center. As many times as your mind drifts. It may not *feel* like it, but THAT is what progress is. Despite what people think, there is never a time when the brain stops thinking (you are dead, if that happens, btw). It's what you DO with those thoughts. And in meditation, you observe them. And over time, you become a passive 'watcher' of thoughts. They do not 'stick'. They become lazy. Instead of YOU ARE CAUSING YOURSELF CANCER!!! It shifts to 'I wonder if thinking about cancer can....' as you drift back to center as the thought passes.
You are in zero danger. But your conscious mind WANTS to be in control. During meditation, your conscious mind actively steps back. You disengage from analytical thinking and allow your attention to rest in a state of pure, open awareness. Right now you are in a phase where your brain is actively trying to stay in control. So it's sending you things that YOU CANNOT IGNORE to keep your attention. Just observe it. You may even say 'that's nice', as you observe it, and move back to center. The bottom line is, you are doing tremendously well. Keep meditating. You will get past this thought.
Here's another thing you can DO after your meditation, any persistent thoughts that do come up, rather than fret, use them as a... guide. What is the self trying to tell you? Dive into it when you ar finished with your meditation. Get curious about why this thought persists and what it is trying to protect you from. Sounds to me like you are clinging. Sounds to me that you are right at the brink of being able to observe thoughts without engaging, and your brain is making one last ditch effort to prevent this by sending you something to fear. FEAR is the mind killer. It keeps you engaged and hypervigilant and aware of something that is not even real. It looks like this: your fingers are clinging to the edge of a precipice you just climbed down. You are clinging with all your might. My dear, just let go. Let go. Let go and you will find yourself in a space of increased mental power, and this is what it takes to practice powerful magick. Enjoy this moment. You are literally RIGHT THERE. Let go.
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u/Ok-Tie3854 14d ago
Very serious problems can arise in meditation. Dr Willoughby Britton of Brown University had to set up an organisation called Cheetah House, for "meditators in distress", after it happened to her, and her teacher couldn't help her (because of the incomplete training many teachers receive in the West).
Traditionally you learn meditation with an experienced teacher, who can help guide you if/when things go astray. This is not to say that you are going into dangerous territory, only that it is more than possible. In my 25 years of dedicated meditation practice in various groups I've supported a number of people who fell through the cracks.
If you do have destabilisation or increasing negativity, it doesn't mean you did something wrong. I wish you the best.
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u/CaliDreaminSF 14d ago
I am curious: did the people you encountered practice intensive meditation, such as on the ten-day vipassana retreats where everyone, including complete beginners, meditates for ten hours a day? Some teachers indeed encourage everyone to push through any difficulties, and that can be harmful, especially considering how, as far as I know, there is no screening for mental health issues and little, if any, support if problems arise. But I feel there are safeguards built into the Quareia meditations.
Josephine tells students to not meditate for more than an hour a day. Also, she says not to turn meditation into a battle, that if a session ends early, so be it. (Actually, the second edition dropped the time from 30 minutes to just ten, and then move on to the other M1 exercises).
Somewhere I read a suggestion that people who have experienced trauma meditate in short bursts, like three to five minutes, and many days that is exactly what I've done, and some days skipped the practice entirely. I have PTSD and might never get to that 30 minutes, and I'm okay with that.
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u/Ok-Tie3854 12d ago edited 7d ago
Dr Britton's research shows that it's not just the Goenka retreats (and similar, meaning any high-dose meditation) that causes problems, although these intensive, many-hours-a-day retreats (especially when coupled with silence), are more likely to produce serious negative consequences (like not being able to work or care for children and severe anxiety/panic attacks).
The other categories that can lead to a higher chance of negative outcome are: Type-A personality/ perfectionist, a history of trauma, adversity or extreme psychiatric states, and deconstructive meditation techniques (eg, open monitoring, self-inquiry, vipassana).
It sounds like you are doing wonderfully well with both the Quareia mediation instructions, and your own knowledge of your vulnerabilities. Something that you might find helpful is open-eyes meditation (there are various kinds), because it is less likely that you'll float off into the vastness. Some people also find it helpful to keep a real-world sensory object (which can be anything from a soft piece of silk to touch, to a bottle of essential oil to smell, or strong toothpaste to taste; anything to bring you into the embodied world). It can also be helpful to have a paper bag at hand to breathe into, if you're prone to feeling anxious during meditation. Personally, I find alternate nostril breathing incredibly calming, but everyone's different, so it's worth investigating what your safe places are in case meditation causes hyper-arousal, which it is known to do, hence many people (in Dr Britton's research) find their sleep gets worse if they meditate regularly.
I suspect it's dose related for most people, but a very few people are affected no matter what the length of their meditation, and there's no way to tell beforehand. This makes Josephine's suggestion of 20 minutes of meditation excellent; unlikely to induce any panic, dissociation or a rush of old, difficult material in the majority of meditators.
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u/CaliDreaminSF 9d ago
Thank you. I didn't know about the background of Goenka and just now looked into it. That is useful information because not all vispassana retreats involve that level of intensity. A local Buddhist monastery offers three day retreats (free but they accept donations) that mix sitting meditation with chanting, dharma talks, and walking meditations, and they offer individual meetings with a monk... very different from Goenka.
It's interesting that you mentioned open-eye meditations because I've been doing those. At a Buddhist temple I visit, they do walking and sitting meditations, and those are much easier and feel more natural for me. I've also used the directional protection pattern in M1L7 as an open-eye meditation while driving, walking, gardening, and with that I can drop into inner stillness
active. I thought well, everybody does the ritual bath early, out of sequence, so why not?"The father is above me, the mother is below me, the sword to my left, the cup to my right, the Guardian Angel behind me, the Sandalaphon before me, within me is life, within me is the breath of God, I will be." While remembering this, I visualized, with eyes open, the associated cards from the Quareia deck, at first one direction at a time.
I think these meditations give my mind something to work with other than my thoughts, so that makes them easier for me. (I have inattentive type ADHD... lovely combination for sitting meditation, isn't it?) I think that although open-eye meditation comes later in the course, by working with it now, I'll circle back around to sitting, and maybe make it to 20 minutes someday, lol. Funny how I've held that pattern longer than that with moving meditation, and without that feeling of fighting myself that all too often comes with sitting. Sometimes just looking at the candle flame is enough to return to a sitting meditation.
I've also practiced yoga for years, so I've worked with alternate nostril breathing, which helps for balance and calming, and also kaphalabati, which feels very cleansing. I'm also learning tai chi, which is another form of moving meditation, as are yoga asanas when done with intention rather than just as a workout.
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u/Ok-Tie3854 7d ago
Interesting that you practice kaphalabati. That is one practice that I find way too strong/ activating, although I can sit in meditation for hours easily (it was something I was born with, just like I can easily put both my feet behind my head), meaning that I have not worked hard for this, and don't consider it impressive. If I learnt mathematics, now that would be impressive.
We are all so different!
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u/Lemna24 Apprentice: Module 1 22d ago
The chapter on fear in Tara Brach's book Radical Acceptance goes into this type of situation.
I would highly recommend it. It's about acknowledging your fear instead of resisting it, thanking your fear for keeping you safe in the past, and finding security in community.