Help!

Kunga

Help! I stop breathing when I try to meditate.

Does anyone else experience this? I've mentioned it before at my sangha and people look at me like I'm crazy. But the moment I genuinely place my awareness on my breath it simply stops being able to occur naturally. Then I essentially hold my breath until I have to breath and I repeat this process over and over again (its quite painful and difficult). This worries me. A friend of mine (who does not meditate) suggested that its better to just let the body do what it does naturally. I feel conflicted and i've even started to question the effectiveness of meditation for myself.

Cinorjer

When you focus on your breath, it stops being an automatic body process and becomes a voluntary activity controlled by your conscious. That is, until lack of oxygen or too much oxygen triggers an override. So to focus on your breath does exactly what you experience for all of us. But you're not supposed to stop breathing when you take over conscious control.

So when you focus you are going into manual control, so start controlling it. Breath in, breath out, slowly, without straining. When your focus shifts to something else, your natural automatic response will take over.

Yishai

Pretty much rephrasing what @Cinorjer said.

If you are trying to concentrate on your breath yet let it be involuntary, that could definitely cause problems! By turning our attention to breathing it becomes automatic.

You need to manually breathe (like when the doctor says take a deep breath, hold it, let it out slowly... that's manual. So just manually do normal breaths). This helps because you can focus on the whole process of breathing by being one with the process, not just observing the process.

Once you become deep enough into meditation (your focus shifts to something else), the body will continue breathing on its own. Don't get caught up in this manual/automatic and when it switches. It's not important.

Even further into meditation, people lose the sensation of breathing. But this is getting ahead of ourselves.

For now, just breathe!(manually of course)

Kunga

Wow this is insightful I don't know why I've never heard this before... probably because it is so obvious for most people!! I will work with this, thank you so much.

Yishai

By turning our attention to breathing it becomes manual* lol, sorry for that mistake.

Also, don't make your breathing like relaxation breathing (deep breaths, holding, etc.). If anything it may make you light headed. Just try to emulate how you would normally breathe. You'll eventually find the natural volume to breathe and the pace. Just go with the flow and don't become attached to anything.

Talisman

Help!
I need Somebody
Help!
No not anybody
Help!
I need someone
HEEEEEEELP!

When I was younger,
so much younger than todaaay
I never needed
anybody's
HELP in anyway

Help me get my feet back on the
GROUND
Cuz I do appreciate you being
ROUND

Oh PLEEASE PLEEASE
HELP ME
HELP ME
HELP
MEEEEEE

Yishai

@Talisman
Having fun? :P

Kwantum_Kev

A technique that I learned when first learning to meditate, and one that was very helpful, was Prana breathing. There are several links to information on the web about it, and chances are you have already heard or experienced some variation of it if you are in a sangha.

My little 'variation' on it, and one that seemed to really help me, was to think of the motion of my diaphragm and chest as a 'wave' motion - to draw the breath in from the diaphragm, then let the wave roll up my chest until it reached the very top of lungs, then - starting with the abdomen again - I let the wave subside, letting my diaphragm fall, then my lower lungs, then the top, etc. Then I start the process over.

In this way, I am not so much focusing on drawing the breath in and out - the action of pushing my diaphragm up draws the air in automatically, just as letting it fall pushes it back out.

This might be something for you to try out to see if it helps. In any case, keep up the good work. Sounds like you are on the path, and reaching out for help and advice is a sure way to get to where you want to be.

Namaste'

Kwan Kev

Talisman

@yishai
What's more fun than the beatles?