But you should meditate when you're angry or upset though? It's meant to help right?
There are times when I am frantic, teary, & feel like I am losing control of my emotions. I think to myself I should meditate and it will help, but the calming meditation music just pisses me off, and the moment I shut my eyes and try to still my thoughts they just get louder and louder. I am so angry sometimes, at the world, at everyone, at being alive. I have felt since I was a child that I would do something worth while, I would help people and animals, I would have a positive impact somehow, but life just got in the way, and I was so pissed at that (I am slowly getting past this now).
Try and sit down and meditate when all this is swimming around in your head, if you can manage it then you nailed it. For me, and I suspect a lot of other people, you just hit a brick wall.
Music has always been especially emotive for me. I am a metal head, I love heavy music of all genres. I love all sorts of music really but this is what I mainly listen to. What I started to do was find the heaviest, loudest, shoutiest, craziest music I could enjoy, as I do have a threshold, and I would blast it as loud as I deemed fair for the time of day or night for my neighbours, and just rock the fuck out.
There's a saying by Victor Hugo which hits the nail right on the head for me – 'Music expresses that which cannot be put into words and that which cannot remain silent'.
I head bang and dance around like a lunatic, try my best at screaming along, I can relate to the lyrics a lot of the time but generally I can relate much deeper to the music itself. It is incredibly difficult to put into words, but the music is angry, and I resonate with it, and some sort of release happens. This may not work for everyone, I think many feel this way through strenuous exercise too. Find your outlet, no matter how silly you think it seems, if it helps you let it out and let it go, then do it. Why do we always picture meditation as sitting in the lotus position, with some dreamy music playing, as the correct way we should do it? That form definitely has it's benefits, and I do meditate this way also, but I've realised there are numerous ways to meditate, and I have had some of the biggest shifts in my mindset through engrossing my self in music. No thoughts happen, I just feel, I feel it out until I am tired, then I sit down, and realise I feel a damn sight better than I did 30 minutes ago.
I mediate to metal music sometimes. It works for me.
Here is an example if you're feeling brave!
We are repeatedly told that we should quiet our minds, and be still. The thing is you cant quiet your mind until you let shit go. We are doing it backwards. Not everyone, I know many people will be able to find peace from chaos using the traditional approach, but if you're anything like me then your emotions can be so intense at times. When you're an 'empath' (I again am not overly keen on using that word, but it will have to do) that feels and absorbs things on the level I do, when you're taking in all this unwanted crap, you have got to find a way to let it out.
I had a conversation with another Steemian recently on one of my Empathy blogs, @rok-sivante, I highly reccomend you check out his page, he was talking about transmuting energy for other people & even places. 'Empaths' often do this unknowingly, and have no idea why we feel so shitty.
Who transmutes things for us? There are lots of things I am still learning, and how to recognise when I am working in this way for others and take actions to clean and ground my energies. But sometimes I need to move that energy out of my self, I have found my way of emptying my being from such strong, unwanted, often negative dense energy, I found my transmuting tool- metal music, and really just tuning in and feeling it all out. This applies to everyone too, everyone will feel extremes of their emotions at times and not know what the shit to do with it.
If i find my self in such a state, I have to have one of these sessions and only then can I sit down and meditate the way we all traditionally believe we should be, with some calming music, sitting still, and at this point I can calm my mind, still my thoughts, and this helps me re-balance.
I urge you to find your transmuting method too, no matter how ridiculous you feel, be it splashing paint at a canvas with all your might, beating the crap into a punch bag with a rage you did not think you had, whatever your thing is, don't try and hold such intensity in and mask over it with calmness, it has got to come out. We are getting more and more afraid of 'negative' emotions and are trying harder and harder to suppress them, feeling ashamed of them, like we are not a worthy sane person if we let our selves have an outburst like that. I just don't give a shit anymore about what other people may think about it. Only the last few months I have really been doing this intentionally, and it is helping stupendously when I am feeling total despair.
Yes ideally I would love to reach a point in my life where I do not react to things so strongly, where I can process these energies better. You've all heard about 'enlightened' people who can react to everything with love. I am not there yet, and I have to stop beating my self up about not being there yet.
I really hope this is helpful to someone somewhere. I wish I had read something along these lines years ago! I spent so much time and effort trying to direct my energy into 'thinking positive', and feeling ashamed at how overwhelmed I feel at times. Thinking positive may well work wonders for some people, but we all experience and perceive the world very differently from one another sometimes, and we will each have different needs for dealing with it, mentally, physically and spiritually.
There is not A Single correct way to do anything.
(I really need to tidy these links up, if anyone can link me to some simple instructions please do)