How does life look like after an undesired opening?

[selfpaste]

Hi all,

I hope you’re doing well

It’s been almost three months since I stopped my sitting practices, and I want to use this to reflect a bit on what happened and also to understand where to go from here.

To give you some background first: I had been practicing AYP twice daily for 2-3 years and, while I certainly did have some issues with self-pacing, where I needed to scale back, it mostly seemed to resolve itself after scaling back. While I was certainly pushing it at times, the side-effects were never super serious.

This changed last April, after a phase of more intense spiritual practice than usual and a really challenging family situation. Basically, around April I was still financially dependent on my family (I’m 25), and this was causing trouble. Honestly, I think that was a really big part of the issue, since very difficult energies were being pushed onto me (I’m being a bit vague here…) and it was hard to do anything about it.

In any case, this somehow resulted in a difficult energetic situation and I started having crown symptoms. The more challenging ones were a strange kind of fear and also just generally being in pain and difficulty processing what was happening. It was honestly something I wouldn’t want to put anyone through.

I think that now much of the emotional processing has happened now, and I’m in a better spot in that regard (and also financially). Nevertheless, it seems like the opening that happened, has not simply vanished. Instead, it seems like I’m gradually adapting do a different kind of energy flow. I do still sense some crown activation, but it seems to have lost edge in the sense that it does not cause the discomfort that it would before. It’s just there in the background.

So this is were my questions comes in. Will the newly opened energy channels gradually close with time and will my subtle nervous system go back to the way it was before, or is this irreversible? Should I take this as my new normal?

One of the reasons I ask, is that I’m still detecting some energy flows around the top of my head. While they may seem stable months after, I’m still taking it as a sign to back off spiritual things. I am just wondering: Can I expect this activation to just go away on its own or is this just how things are now?

Also I would like to generally know, how cases like mine develop in the following months, given that there is a willingness to do the grounding work?

To give you some more background: I’ve been swimming, walking and working. A few weeks ago I had a 25min daily asana practice, which I ended up stopping (haven’t started since). It seems like this care and the grounding have actually slowed the flow of prana down.

Thank you all for reading

[Christi (Tristan Dorling)]

Hi selfpaste,

It is difficult to predict what will happen next, especially as it depends very much on what you do. It also depends on how sensitive you have become and to what degree the practices have become automatic in your body.

Someone in your situation could take up spiritual practices again and be absolutely fine. Or, they could find that it is too much after a day or two and need to self-pace to zero for another month.

However, it is not an either/ or situation. If you keep up with the grounding practices then you are more likely to have fewer issues. And if you re-introduce practices gently, you are also more likely to have fewer issues. Gently can be as gentle as a minute or two of mantra meditation a day, or even a minute or two of breathing meditation. If you are stable with either of those then you could build up gradually over time.

Adding a minute or two of Spinal Breathing Pranayama will help to balance things out between the higher and lower chakras and to keep the root-to-brow connection strong.

You should be able to find a balance between simple practice and grounding work that will be OK for you. If you can’t, then stick with the grounding practices for a while longer.