Grief, meditation, and cannabis
Posted: Sun Dec 18, 2022 9:48 pm
6 days ago I had to put my dog and best friend of six amazing years, Sierra, to sleep because of bone cancer. I've been doing a lot to let myself experience the grief of losing her while moving through it, and I couldn't resist the temptation to record that process with the Muse S.
I wanted to share a visualization of grief and mourning I captured during centering prayer (Christian meditation), measured with the Muse S the day after I said goodbye to Sierra. I've been working hard to grieve well since the bone cancer won, and centering prayer has been an important part of that process, and this was definitely an important moment.
The chaotic portion towards the beginning of the first scan while meditating/praying is while I was getting choked up and crying a little, even felt like I sensed her spirit, but stayed seated, still, and silent in the meditation. The brainwave patterns leveled out to what is more typical of the practice after I began linking my "sacred word" (word used as part of the practice the reorients attention with intention) and a vagus nerve breathing strategy I've learned.
The breathing technique is 3-4 seconds inhale and 7-8 out to relax the nervous system. Worked like a charm and led to one of the most powerful and meaningful times of prayer I've had in a long time. Centering prayer, as I've been researching this year, is a great way to heal our unspoken, sometimes even unknown, inner selves and a safe container for hurts and wounds.
High beta and high gamma waves during the grief portion suggest a highly focused, intense, active, and highly self-referential state of thinking and feeling, in some studies even reflective of soldiers returning from active combat... As one might expect to see on the scan when being flooded with emotional loaded memories and realizations that the subject of those memories are, from this point forward, only memories.
After I was able to calm, all brainwaves returned to typical patterns for me in the practice. There were small moments where grief re-emerged later on and gamma and beta spiked later on, but the power was much lower, as was the emotional charge.
Wanted to share this meaningful moment and the interesting results.
If you would be interested in learning more about centering prayer or collaborating by sharing the results of a practice meaningful to you, let me know!
Blessings,
Brendan
I wanted to share a visualization of grief and mourning I captured during centering prayer (Christian meditation), measured with the Muse S the day after I said goodbye to Sierra. I've been working hard to grieve well since the bone cancer won, and centering prayer has been an important part of that process, and this was definitely an important moment.
The chaotic portion towards the beginning of the first scan while meditating/praying is while I was getting choked up and crying a little, even felt like I sensed her spirit, but stayed seated, still, and silent in the meditation. The brainwave patterns leveled out to what is more typical of the practice after I began linking my "sacred word" (word used as part of the practice the reorients attention with intention) and a vagus nerve breathing strategy I've learned.
The breathing technique is 3-4 seconds inhale and 7-8 out to relax the nervous system. Worked like a charm and led to one of the most powerful and meaningful times of prayer I've had in a long time. Centering prayer, as I've been researching this year, is a great way to heal our unspoken, sometimes even unknown, inner selves and a safe container for hurts and wounds.
High beta and high gamma waves during the grief portion suggest a highly focused, intense, active, and highly self-referential state of thinking and feeling, in some studies even reflective of soldiers returning from active combat... As one might expect to see on the scan when being flooded with emotional loaded memories and realizations that the subject of those memories are, from this point forward, only memories.
After I was able to calm, all brainwaves returned to typical patterns for me in the practice. There were small moments where grief re-emerged later on and gamma and beta spiked later on, but the power was much lower, as was the emotional charge.
- Grieving Sierra Centering Prayer - 1of3 -.jpg (192.38 KiB) Viewed 1927 times
- Grieving Sierra Centering Prayer - 2of3 -.jpg (175.38 KiB) Viewed 1927 times
- Grieving Sierra Centering Prayer - 3of3 -.jpg (172.01 KiB) Viewed 1927 times
Wanted to share this meaningful moment and the interesting results.
If you would be interested in learning more about centering prayer or collaborating by sharing the results of a practice meaningful to you, let me know!
Blessings,
Brendan