Counters to unpleasant vibrations and other "bad" energy states

A couple of days ago I realized that I could generate harsh vibration states on demand simply by focusing my sense of self on the middle of my head. The harsh vibrations feel very similar to being overstimulated or just tired and "grumpy". It doesn't feel like a "self" in the typical ignorant way, but rather an experiencing of reality from the middle-of-head perspective. I'm curious if others can experience this.

In any case, the antidote for this particular case seems to simply move the sense of self to the abdomen along of the lines of comments from Nik, Antero, and others on this site.

With this door way open, I am now very curious about others insights as to how this trick functions.

Does the same thing happen if you just put "attention" on the center of the head (setting aside the concept of self or awareness being located somewhere for the sake of experiment)? There's a spot in the middle of the brain that seems particularly easily activated by attention to it (for example imagine stroking it with an imaginary finger and see if that feels similar). I find attention to various physical body parts tends to set off energetic stuff. For example if I do very close attention to the movement of the diaphrag/ribs/chest as they go in and out while breathing it immediately sets off tremors in the chest area. If I put my attention on the root chakra, it immediately warms and releases energy. Personally I don't think it "means anything," more that it's just a physiological phenomena that comes from all the weird neural rewiring caused by kundalini awakening and years of meditating.

Thoughts?

That said, if you have that sensitivity and ability, you can play around with all kinds of yogic practices and such, which can be beneficial and fun. You can also use it to make your roommates think you are having seizures.

I don't have much insight into how or why the trick functions, but i've found that with some concentration, you can also "breathe through" that area in the abdomen, thus sustaining the effect. What you do is to make it feel as if your breath is entering the body at that point.

Bringing attention to the spot feels similar but not quite as harsh. To make it feel really harsh I have a move some sort of energy contraction to that place and it seems analogous to a sense of self.

If I stroke that spot with a virtual finger I get instant aggressive serpent spine kriyas.

Okay, the "breathing through" is fascinating. Breathing through the middle of my head is instantly extremely unpleasant.

Breathing through the abdomen is an instant cure.

What is the connection between visualized breathing and visualized self?

You can actually find the breath. It's a physical thing, an actually existent object.

I would say that the breath has very very deep connections to attention, and even using it in this imagined way, you still draw on some of that. I've used it with experimenting with transforming tensions into clarity/coolness in order to stabilize attention at the heart and spread the clar)ity/coolness (which is something to the tune of seeing tensions as empty and luminous and letting them go)

And just cuz I find the energy stuff a bit intriguing, might it be useful to be open to the not-unpleasant qualities. Perhaps it's a more or less like what villum said, except with an emphasis on not transforming anything. Rather if one rests attention gently on a physical sensation (even a strong one like the pain that follows stubbing your toe, burning your hand, etc), the empty and luminous qualities become apparent. I tend to think of this as just an opening to and recognition of, rather than "transforming it" from some will or intention of my own. It releases itself, transforms itself, etc. Do you find that to be true?

Having played around with this "transformation" thing for a while, i agree that the "transforming" is not something done from intent, and that the open and luminous qualities do become apparant when awareness gets subtle and gentle enough. Sorry for derailing the thread. As far as i've been able to tell, this kind of release is not what happens in the abdomen spot, which seems more like the energy just leaving attention without the open and luminous thing being apparent at all.

These harsh vibrations tend to dominate experience and are quite a barrier to being fully engaged in social settings. I would rather cut off their arising than open to the experience.

"These harsh vibrations tend to dominate experience and are quite a barrier to being fully engaged in social settings. I would rather cut off their arising than open to the experience.
- Orasis"

Selfing is always is unpleasant, which is good for this way we can recognize it and move the other way. For me this generic formula has worked nicely:

1. Identify the process of selfing. It can be experienced as unwholesome emotions, contraction of the attention, restlessness, attachment, discursive thoughts, vibration etc. depending on your level of practice.

2. Become the worlds foremost authority on this phenomenon. Noting works very well for this. Mofidy your noting style to be able to distinguish the phenomenon in question from other inputs. Make sure you see the cause and effect clearly. Consistently keep the noting going throughout the day.

3. When you have familiarized yourself to the process, open up to those sensasions completely and apply full body mindfulness to them. Use Direct Mode approach to feel them fully and ground them in the body. By this time the system has found this phenomenon to be unnecessary and harmful and sooner or later it is dropped.

4. Keep watch for the next layer of selfing and repeat the process.

"These harsh vibrations tend to dominate experience and are quite a barrier to being fully engaged in social settings. I would rather cut off their arising than open to the experience."

can I throw in this question (fully realizing you guys may come from a quite different practice style than I have, and there are many approaches to practice that work very well). it's been my experience that the when I reject an element of experience and want a moment of experience to be other than it is that in itself is a contraction, aversion, etc. And so perpetuates the sense of harshness, unpleasantness, self as separate. It seems that by opening and allowing the contraction tends to vanish, the unpleasantness dissolves. I do not mean by this that then a vibration in my head becomes a good thing I like. I mean that it either ceases all together or is seen to be a meaningless physical sensation that is just part of the array of physical sensations that are manifesting in the moment, as empty and radiant as any other sensory phenomena.

"I do not mean by this that then a vibration in my head becomes a good thing I like. I mean that it either ceases all together or is seen to be a meaningless physical sensation that is just part of the array of physical sensations that are manifesting in the moment, as empty and radiant as any other sensory phenomena.
- giragirasol"

IMO it is just a matter of approach:

Developmental approach = Increase the baseline of your capacity for being awake
Non-dual approach = Be awake now

Why settle for one, when you can have both?

No reason to "settle" at all I think. I find what works for me at any given point is a bit intuitive and not the same all the time. Always interesting to see what others are working on, as it offers other possibilities (which may or may not feel useful to me at the moment, or at another time).

Interesting thread!

Hopefully this connects sufficiently and isn't too tangential. Encountering points in the body which seem to emanate harsh vibes connected to the more mental components of selfing seems like a common experience of contemplatives. One thing I've found useful in relating to these energy-points is indeed breathing/visualization. In my explorations I have found different locations in the body which seem to be especially associated with certain qualities of true nature. For instance, in the upper part of the head near the fontanelle (and also in the third eye region) a center connected with "clarity", and in the lower abdomen, one associated with "vitality" or the vibrant free flowing quality of phenomena, and in the heart, associated with sheer openness.

Since a bodily point emanating harsh vibes always seems to me somewhat unclear, closed, and blocked, I've found it really helpful to use yogic breathing to spread the qualities of openness, clarity and unblocked free-flowing vitality from their respective centers to the harsh point in question. I conceive of this as a sort of yogic/energetic shamatha practice, expressing a yogic/energetic "clear seeing" insight which recognizes the nature of phenomena to be open, clear and vibrant. Thus there is in this practice both the acknowledgement of True Nature, open clear and vibrant, and the completely illusory phantom nature of solid separate self which actually always displays this True Nature (i.e., nonduality), as well as an acknowledgement of gradual cultivation (i.e., development) of the capacity to discern True Nature in phenomena which at first appear to contradict it (by seeming closed, dull, blocked, dead, fixed, etc, which they never actually are.)