Body Distortion
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Every now and then when I am in asana my body "falls asleep".It always starts with my arms.My left arm starts to feel like my right arm,and my right arm starts to feel like my left arm.Then my body will fall asleep.It feels weird at first,like a force taking over my body,but then I get used to it and it is very relaxing.
Does anyone have experience with something like this?
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When I meditate, often after about fifteen minutes my legs start to go "numb."
In my posture, one leg sits over the other. Usually the bottom one goes numb first, and sometimes gives the sensation that the other is free floating. At other times, it is as if the two legs have become one. Though I cannot recall ever thinking one limb is the other, there has been slight... 'confusion' as to which which is which.
The effect is more pronounced recently, but that is most likely due to the winter chill (most of my meditation is done outside).
Recently, I had an experience where it spread into my hands, and began moving up my arms. This was after a rather odd break of having a cup of coffee thrown at me :X
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When I fall asleep i start to lose track of the proportions of my body, I feel huge, then small, it's weird.
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Totally. All of the above. When I'm still enough, my tactile senses seem to lose their reference points. My brain gets confused about which way is left, right, up, down, how big my body is, how small it is, etc. Sometimes I feel like I'm upside down or leaning this way or that- but I know I'm not because I balance my timer on the top of my head when I do asana. Eventually the sensations go away and I basically become numb. I imagine this is a primary use of asana.
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@saintbryan said
"Totally. All of the above. When I'm still enough, my tactile senses seem to lose their reference points. My brain gets confused about which way is left, right, up, down, how big my body is, how small it is, etc. Sometimes I feel like I'm upside down or leaning this way or that- but I know I'm not because I balance my timer on the top of my head when I do asana. Eventually the sensations go away and I basically become numb. I imagine this is a primary use of asana."
Indeed. Asana is useful mostly for its ability to get us beyond our normal tactile sensations which reinforce our sense of being in the body.
"When all the knots that strangle the heart are loosened, the mortal becomes immortal - here in this very life. As the skin of a snake is discarded, so does the normal self die; but the True Self, freed from identification with the body, merges in Heru-Ra-Ha: infinite life, eternal light." - adapted from the Upanisahds
IAO131