I’m a very occasional meditator but I think I mostly get what you mean by Looking. But it’s 4am and I’m commenting more to report that something weird happened as result of this post. I read this earlier today, then later via Scott’s review read this page about A&P events: http://integrateddaniel.info/the-arising-and-passing-away/
Then tonight in bed I started having some strange sensations. I started seeing some of those vibrations, maybe. This part was only visual and could have been imaginary. Then I started getting a strong sense of “inadequateness” of all sensation which was quite disturbing. Again I might be been tricking myself somehow—though it kept going even when I was up and out of bed. This went on and off for a while. Then when I was in a hypnogogic state (and seeing vibrations), I started to experience strong flow of “energy”* flowing up my upper spine into the back of my head, while my upper body was tense and shaking, which lasted a few seconds. Unlike the previous stuff this was an undeniably real thing. During this time the visual that popped into my head was something like a webcomic featuring crudely drawn anthropomorphic toasters(!) with no legible dialogue, which gave the whole thing an almost comical sense of un-profundity. The sensation was perhaps somewhat enjoyable but not exactly euphoric or anything. This seems like the basic physiological description of an “A&P” event, but as mentioned, no accompanying euphoria or sense of understanding the universe or whatever.
Also, while I don’t recall having had this happen before, the “A&P” bit didn’t seem entirely unfamiliar and I wouldn’t be shocked to learn I’d experienced something similar in childhood. But I wouldn’t be surprised if not either.
Anyway I’m a little disturbed by this whole course of events (feels like I was somehow hypnotized into having strong mental sensations) and hope there won’t be any bad outcomes. Advice welcome.
* That’s a vague way to describe it but it wasn’t really like burning or electricity or anything, just some sort of “rush” of… something.
I’m a very occasional meditator but I think I mostly get what you mean by Looking. But it’s 4am and I’m commenting more to report that something weird happened as result of this post. I read this earlier today, then later via Scott’s review read this page about A&P events: http://integrateddaniel.info/the-arising-and-passing-away/
Then tonight in bed I started having some strange sensations. I started seeing some of those vibrations, maybe. This part was only visual and could have been imaginary. Then I started getting a strong sense of “inadequateness” of all sensation which was quite disturbing. Again I might be been tricking myself somehow—though it kept going even when I was up and out of bed. This went on and off for a while. Then when I was in a hypnogogic state (and seeing vibrations), I started to experience strong flow of “energy”* flowing up my upper spine into the back of my head, while my upper body was tense and shaking, which lasted a few seconds. Unlike the previous stuff this was an undeniably real thing. During this time the visual that popped into my head was something like a webcomic featuring crudely drawn anthropomorphic toasters(!) with no legible dialogue, which gave the whole thing an almost comical sense of un-profundity. The sensation was perhaps somewhat enjoyable but not exactly euphoric or anything. This seems like the basic physiological description of an “A&P” event, but as mentioned, no accompanying euphoria or sense of understanding the universe or whatever.
Also, while I don’t recall having had this happen before, the “A&P” bit didn’t seem entirely unfamiliar and I wouldn’t be shocked to learn I’d experienced something similar in childhood. But I wouldn’t be surprised if not either.
Anyway I’m a little disturbed by this whole course of events (feels like I was somehow hypnotized into having strong mental sensations) and hope there won’t be any bad outcomes. Advice welcome.
* That’s a vague way to describe it but it wasn’t really like burning or electricity or anything, just some sort of “rush” of… something.