First-person accounts describing emotional and psychological experiences for people researching real-world perspectives on intensive meditation practice.
RISING RISING, FALLING FALLING
This personal account describes a long-term meditator’s decision to deepen her practice through a series of silent retreats in 2016. Having previously found mindfulness-based practice helpful in recovering from an eating disorder, she initially experienced meditation as stabilising and life-enhancing.
After completing shorter vipassana and Zen-style retreats, she entered a 60-day retreat at a Burmese forest monastery practising Mahasi Sayadaw-style Satipatthana vipassana. Within days, she reports experiencing intense physical sensations, involuntary bodily movements, hallucinations, resurfacing traumatic imagery, paranoia and profound alterations in perception. She describes episodes of extreme pain followed by visual phenomena, as well as ongoing disturbances that extended beyond formal meditation sessions into sleep.
When she raised concerns with monastic teachers, she says she was encouraged to continue practising and reassured that her experiences were not unusual. As symptoms escalated and she began to fear for her mental stability, she chose to leave the retreat early. Travelling home while in what she later understood as a dissociated and traumatised state, she describes the aftermath as involving depersonalisation, emotional dysregulation, depression and suicidal thoughts, alongside persistent involuntary movements.
The author credits support from a former teacher for helping her regain a sense of safety, and references the research of Willoughby Britton on adverse contemplative experiences. She concludes that while meditation had previously been life-saving for her, intensive practice also precipitated severe distress, and she calls for more open discussion and appropriate emotional support for practitioners encountering destabilising effects.
After completing shorter vipassana and Zen-style retreats, she entered a 60-day retreat at a Burmese forest monastery practising Mahasi Sayadaw-style Satipatthana vipassana. Within days, she reports experiencing intense physical sensations, involuntary bodily movements, hallucinations, resurfacing traumatic imagery, paranoia and profound alterations in perception. She describes episodes of extreme pain followed by visual phenomena, as well as ongoing disturbances that extended beyond formal meditation sessions into sleep.
When she raised concerns with monastic teachers, she says she was encouraged to continue practising and reassured that her experiences were not unusual. As symptoms escalated and she began to fear for her mental stability, she chose to leave the retreat early. Travelling home while in what she later understood as a dissociated and traumatised state, she describes the aftermath as involving depersonalisation, emotional dysregulation, depression and suicidal thoughts, alongside persistent involuntary movements.
The author credits support from a former teacher for helping her regain a sense of safety, and references the research of Willoughby Britton on adverse contemplative experiences. She concludes that while meditation had previously been life-saving for her, intensive practice also precipitated severe distress, and she calls for more open discussion and appropriate emotional support for practitioners encountering destabilising effects.