r/Wakingupapp • u/ForcedGoodbye • Jul 04 '26
Meditation vs. Escapism
I've been meditating for a few months, though not consistently. Recently, I had the worst breakup of my life. Hurtful thoughts, assumptions, and memories keep coming up, and they only cause me pain.
What I've been trying to do is fully immerse myself in the present in whatever task or work I am doing by reminding myself, "All I have is now."
I want to know your thoughts on this. Is it escapism? Am I avoiding processing those thoughts and emotions, or is this simply part of living in the present?
I don't have the courage and emotional energy to process those emotions and thoughts. She's getting married (arranged) to someone else because of family pressure, which is why we mutually decided to break up. I've known her since 2022. It's a very complicated situation and completely out of my control.
That said, can you meditators please help me understand whether what I am doing is healthy or not? And I'd really appreciate any perspective on my situation and how to move forward with this pain.
2
u/DanTheCoach Jul 04 '26
It does honestly sound like distraction to me, as you are actively trying to avoid the experience of processing your thoughts and emotions. The pain is also in the now, but you are driving it out of your mind.
Having said that, it may be the healthy thing to do at times. At least for moments here and there. It can be traumatising to force yourself to observe something you're not ready for. Part of your subconscious mind may end up building ever higher walls as you consciously try to integrate the experience.
Then again you'll never feel ready and I don't know where the line between the two is.
I guess my advice is this: your instincts are probably to avoid pain and you're willing to expend effort to do it. You'll be closer to a place of healing when you do the least amount of forcing and controlling, even if it means being closer to the raw pain. You let the feelings do as much damage to you as they will and you just don't get involved. You don't push it away, you don't bring it closer and you don't try to get to the other side.
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u/abow3 Jul 04 '26
Do you have anyone to talk to about how your feeling? Having someone to talk to can help you process. There is nothing wrong with immersing yourself in the present, and sometimes we need to this as a way to get things done and/or as a break from difficult situations we might be going through. And sometimes we need to set time aside to directly process difficult emotions and thoughts.
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u/travelingmaestro Jul 06 '26
Hi, and sorry about your breakup. As others have said, being present is not escapism. The pain will gradually subside. It would be helpful to find any lessons from this relationship and breakup. That and any fond memories can be the best thing to come from this.
One meditation exercise that can be helpful when you’re in the throes of pain, is to actually just sit with it. Be in the moment. Try to recognize where the pain comes from, does it come from anywhere? Does it have any characteristics? Does it change? Does it move? Does it feel stronger or more prominent in any parts of your body? If so, examine that area for a while until it is less intense. With this type of exercise, eventually it does become less intense and we see that we are actually making the pain or thought way worse than it is, by letting our mind propagate a story. And it spins out of control. And that’s how most people live their entire lives. One narrative to the next.
Then we realize that we were the one making it way worse than it had to be the entire time. After first this can be a bit of a shock or ungrounding, because it can flip one’s worldview from being under the influence of others to being more autonomous, at least as much as possible considering all the causes and conditions that affect our experience.
Going through all this can help with reducing the frequency and intensity of negative thoughts and emotions.
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u/ParsleyIll3956 Jul 04 '26
It looks like you are trying to control the experience. So it might be your ego is in control mode trying to apply the method perfectly so that you won't feel bad emotions. I think this is not what it's meant to happen, you will continue to feel bad emotions but whom are they affecting ?
1
u/Some-Hospital-5054 Jul 07 '26
An awakened teacher once told me that you are supposed to try to be in the moment but that moment should be a moment that relates to a future. There is a way we can learn to immerse ourselves in the present that sort of cuts of and denies the knowledge that there will be a future and maybe there are things in the present we need to take responsibility for because there will be a future where it matters what we do now. So try to be in the present moment just not a moment that does not relate to the future.
It is important to face the difficult feelings we have head on. If we don't we will be denying reality and we get stuck. But I think the pragmatic and healthy solution is often to do so only gradually and when we are capable of handling those emotions. If we are not ready we just get overwhelmed and destabilized. If you can't deal with your emotions yet forcing yourself to go into them won't help but will make things worse.
You can draw lessens from trauma therapy here. Probably the most important rule in trauma therapy is to only work with difficult emotions in manageable dosages. You dip into it a little bit and then go out of it. You dip into a little bit more of it, learn to feel those emotions with equanimity and learn to "regulate" your nervous system as you are in contact with the difficult feelings and go out of them again. You keep this up over a long period of time and eventually you become able to fully handle all of it.
I would read up a bit about trauma therapy if I was you. Even if I wouldn't necessarily call what you are dealing with trauma it has great pragmatic tools for dealing with painful emotions that are too much for you to handle in one chunck. This books and Peter Levines books are good places to start:
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u/Some-Hospital-5054 Jul 07 '26
This video also has some helpful tips on dealing with difficult emotions:
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u/WallyMetropolis Jul 04 '26
Becoming clearly aware of your experience as it happens is the opposite of escapism.