hi
i'm new to this group and to yoga. i recently started a hatha yoga
class, mostly for exercise although i'm not adverse to addressing any
consciousness issues that might come up. anyway, it's an intro class
but it has been really intense for me. after the first couple of
classes a few strange things happened. i started having these weird
thoughts, that seemed really violent although there was absolutely no
desire to mimic the thoughts or participate. these thoughts lasted a
couple of weeks and really disturbed me because they seemed really out
of my usual thought patterns. then the day of my birthday a few hours
after my yoga class i was at the market and my partner and child were
in the market building, going to the bathroom. this tall thin man came
up to my face, and said "hey" and when i looked at him, his eyes glowed
red, not like a lightbulb or led red, but a deep kind of red. he turned
and disappeared into the crowd. as soon as i put it into words, it
seemed really like i was crazy. then a week later during my yoga class,
we were doing the "dead man" posture and suddenly i was enveloped in a
blue dome. even weirder than that, was my yoga teacher saying "YES!!!!"
at the moment it happened, like he saw it. or maybe everyone in the
class had blue domes. i dont' know. i'm afraid to talk to anybody about
it for fear that they'll treat me differently etc. i really dig the
class, and i don't want to feel like i can't go. i have no idea if the
two previous things are related to doing yoga, i'm pretty sure the blue
dome thing was. does anybody have any insights into what might be going
on? other than affirmations of lunacy. i can come up with those myself.

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If I suppose your post is for real, I would wonder why you didn't ask
your yoga teacher why he said "yes".

Jared

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why wouldn't my post be real. i'm not trolling.
nobody speaks in the class at all, i would never interupt like that.
and i just had something really strange happen to me, i wasn't about to
draw attention to myself having just had that happen to me - it was
pretty fantastical, i wasn't even really sure that it happened, or that
he had said yes like i had heard. maybe i will get up the nerve to talk
to him about it.

i have been trying to find stuff through google, but there's so much
stuff to sift through, i was hoping somebody could point me in a
direction to poke around for more stuff.


omjaroo wrote:
> If I suppose your post is for real, I would wonder why you didn't ask
> your yoga teacher why he said "yes".
>
> Jared

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>why wouldn't my post be real.
Because you were trolling?

>i'm not trolling.
OK :-)

>nobody speaks in the class at all, i would never interupt like that.
Why not? What are you afraid of?

>and i just had something really strange happen to me, i wasn't about to
>draw attention to myself having just had that happen to me
Why not? If you had something important happen, that you didn't
understand ,then you needed attention, didn't you?

> it was pretty fantastical, i wasn't even really sure that it happened, or 
that
>he had said yes like i had heard.
All the more reason to ask for and get "clarification"

>maybe i will get up the nerve to talk to him about it.
The alternative is to wallow in your fear and ignorance :-(

>i have been trying to find stuff through google, but there's so much
>stuff to sift through, i was hoping somebody could point me in a
>direction to poke around for more stuff.

Yes you are correct, there is lot's of stuff. And yes there are those
here who will be happy to help you sort through it and point you in the
direction of helpful material. But you need to have enough courage to
ask. I suggest you start with your "in person" yoga teacher.

And in the mean time, let's consider the "violent" thoughts you refered
to. Would you share them?

Jared

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On Wed, 02 Nov 2005 17:18:03 -0800, zebby <zebtronica@gmail.com> wrote:

> hi
> i'm new to this group and to yoga. i recently started a hatha yoga
> class, mostly for exercise although i'm not adverse to addressing any
> consciousness issues that might come up. anyway, it's an intro class
> but it has been really intense for me. after the first couple of
> classes a few strange things happened. i started having these weird
> thoughts, that seemed really violent although there was absolutely no
> desire to mimic the thoughts or participate. these thoughts lasted a
> couple of weeks and really disturbed me because they seemed really out
> of my usual thought patterns. then the day of my birthday a few hours
> after my yoga class i was at the market and my partner and child were
> in the market building, going to the bathroom. this tall thin man came
> up to my face, and said "hey" and when i looked at him, his eyes glowed
> red, not like a lightbulb or led red, but a deep kind of red. he turned
> and disappeared into the crowd. as soon as i put it into words, it
> seemed really like i was crazy. then a week later during my yoga class,
> we were doing the "dead man" posture and suddenly i was enveloped in a
> blue dome. even weirder than that, was my yoga teacher saying "YES!!!!"
> at the moment it happened, like he saw it. or maybe everyone in the
> class had blue domes. i dont' know. i'm afraid to talk to anybody about
> it for fear that they'll treat me differently etc. i really dig the
> class, and i don't want to feel like i can't go. i have no idea if the
> two previous things are related to doing yoga, i'm pretty sure the blue
> dome thing was. does anybody have any insights into what might be going
> on? other than affirmations of lunacy. i can come up with those myself.
>

Hi Zebby,

I'm not a psychologist, but it seems possible to me that you may have
undiagnosed schizophrenia and something about yoga is bringing it out.
It's hard to say what is within the range of "normal" experience, since
there is a pretty big range. All I can tell you is that I've been doing
yoga for 37 years and have not experienced these effects.

--Don

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ok, that's exactly the reason why i wouldn't ask my yoga teacher,
because of these kinds of reactions to peoples experiences and
perceptions. i respect that you come from an extensive practice of yoga
but i think it's unfortunate for both of us that you responded with the
mental illness card, particularily when i mentioned that i could come
up with that myself.

however, i must acknowledge  your concern, because it does seem genuine
and i'd like to reassure that I am capable of seeking out professional
help if indeed there is a reason for it. i have access to these kinds
of resources where many people in the world do not.

have you ever read foucaults madness and civilization? it's an
interesting analysis of when/where/how the categorization and
institutionalization of "crazy" people came about - when historically
they have been part of the community, as village fools, and as medicine
men and gurus. it's worth a read, because it demonstrates the western
notion of mental health, and why those ideas came about.

zebby

Don wrote:
> On Wed, 02 Nov 2005 17:18:03 -0800, zebby <zebtronica@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>
> Hi Zebby,
>
> I'm not a psychologist, but it seems possible to me that you may have
> undiagnosed schizophrenia and something about yoga is bringing it out.
> It's hard to say what is within the range of "normal" experience, since
> there is a pretty big range. All I can tell you is that I've been doing
> yoga for 37 years and have not experienced these effects.
>
> --Don

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my fear is mostly one of ostracization. i am not new to the experience
of it, but find it unpleasant. i like being connected to my community,
and with people and for the most part, i am. except of course when i
have some experience like this, that is not aligned with my north
american upbringing. (although - my grandma was into yoga so it's
always been in the periphery - but my parents are very grounded in
their ideas of reality, and so i grew up with those notions ingrained
in me)

anyway, the violent images i saw were of people close to me, their
deaths by another person.
i see alot of things in metaphors already, i'm quite involved with
meaning making processes in my career, so it is quite possible that
some pop psychology would work in this instance. perhaps it is
unrelated to doing yoga, perhaps i was just realizing my fear of losing
them etc. and that is fine with me if that's what it is.  i have no
real explanation of the other two events. my partner mentioned that the
man with red eyes could have been a performance artist wearing red
contacts. i agree, this is a possibility.
the blue dome however, i have no explanation for so maybe we can start
there.

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On Thu, 03 Nov 2005 06:16:01 -0800, zebby <zebtronica@gmail.com> wrote:

[trim]
> have you ever read foucaults madness and civilization? it's an
> interesting analysis of when/where/how the categorization and
> institutionalization of "crazy" people came about - when historically
> they have been part of the community, as village fools, and as medicine
> men and gurus. it's worth a read, because it demonstrates the western
> notion of mental health, and why those ideas came about.
>
Nope, I haven't read it. I'd like to mention, though, that a good friend
of mine has schizophrenia and I certainly don't consider him "crazy."

--Don

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zebby wrote:
> hi
> i'm new to this group and to yoga. i recently started a hatha yoga
> class, mostly for exercise although i'm not adverse to addressing any
> consciousness issues that might come up. anyway, it's an intro class
> but it has been really intense for me. after the first couple of
> classes a few strange things happened. i started having these weird
> thoughts, that seemed really violent although there was absolutely no
> desire to mimic the thoughts or participate. these thoughts lasted a
> couple of weeks and really disturbed me because they seemed really out
> of my usual thought patterns. then the day of my birthday a few hours
> after my yoga class i was at the market and my partner and child were
> in the market building, going to the bathroom. this tall thin man came
> up to my face, and said "hey" and when i looked at him, his eyes glowed
> red, not like a lightbulb or led red, but a deep kind of red. he turned
> and disappeared into the crowd. as soon as i put it into words, it
> seemed really like i was crazy. then a week later during my yoga class,
> we were doing the "dead man" posture and suddenly i was enveloped in a
> blue dome. even weirder than that, was my yoga teacher saying "YES!!!!"
> at the moment it happened, like he saw it. or maybe everyone in the
> class had blue domes. i dont' know. i'm afraid to talk to anybody about
> it for fear that they'll treat me differently etc. i really dig the
> class, and i don't want to feel like i can't go. i have no idea if the
> two previous things are related to doing yoga, i'm pretty sure the blue
> dome thing was. does anybody have any insights into what might be going
> on? other than affirmations of lunacy. i can come up with those myself.

Hi Zebby,
A friend of mine had similar stuff come up when he first started yoga.
His were mostly about commiting violent assaults on perfect strangers.
So it is not unheard of.

people store all sorts of emotions, tensions etc in the body.
You could check out the writings of Alexander Lowen or Arthur Janov if
you are not familiar with the concept.
Yoga postures can bring ingored sentiments into consciousness.
Sometimes this will happen after practice, sometimes this can happen
while in the pose itself. It is not likely to happen while in a pose
during a class unless you feel very secure and safe with the intructor
and group of people there. .. an instructor who is afraid of feelings
is not going to create an atmosphere that will allow them to surface in
class.

The blue dome..Hmmm could be a lot of things, could just be one of
those fun and interesting happenings that occur in yoga.  How did you
feel during the experience?

off hand, it sounds to me as if you were being in the egg, sometime
after conception but before implantation.

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i wasn't really feeling anything emotionally charged, other than a kind
of "hmmm that is an odd blue dome over me" and it broke when my teacher
said "YES!" -- it slipped away.
i wasn't scared by it - it seemed pretty ok to have happened. it was
only really in retrospect that i was like "that was rather odd and
disconcerting".

i did a little reading on the internet about chakras and some colours
associated with them but the sites seem to describe them as small round
ball like things that have specific places in your body. this
definately enveloped most if not all of my body.

the being in the egg thing sounds kind of neat and comfortingly benign.

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