Mindfulness

Just read this article titled Meditation And Mindfulness Have a Dark Side We Rarely Talk About. Here is an excerpt from the article:

A 2022 study, using a sample of 953 people in the US who meditated regularly, showed that over 10 percent of participants experienced adverse effects that had a significant negative impact on their everyday life and lasted for at least one month.

According to a review of over 40 years of research that was published in 2020, the most common adverse effects are anxiety and depression. These are followed by psychotic or delusional symptoms, dissociation or depersonalisation, and fear or terror.

Research also found that adverse effects can happen to people without previous mental health problems, to those who have only had a moderate exposure to meditation and they can lead to long-lasting symptoms.

The western world has also had evidence about these adverse effects for a long time.

In 1976, Arnold Lazarus, a key figure in the cognitive-behavioural science movement, said that meditation, when used indiscriminately, could induce "serious psychiatric problems such as depression, agitation, and even schizophrenic decompensation".

There is evidence that mindfulness can benefit people's well-being. The problem is that mindfulness coaches, videos, apps, and books rarely warn people about the potential adverse effects.

This reminded me of what Meher Baba had to say about the practices like yoga, deep meditation and various forms of asceticism. I used NotebookLM to search 76 sources and summarise Baba's views on such practices.

The Results of Yoga, Deep Meditation, and Ascetic Practices on the Spiritual Path

Introduction

According to Meher Baba, various spiritual disciplines—including the yogas, deep meditation, fasting, and asceticism—have been laid down by ancient sages to help aspirants traverse the spiritual path. While these practices can yield profound inner experiences, deep peace, and advanced spiritual powers, they also contain hidden traps. Without the guidance of a Perfect Master, the results of these practices frequently become severe liabilities, capable of ensnaring the aspirant in heightened illusions, egotism, or even causing a catastrophic spiritual fall.

How These Practices Can Be an Aid

1. Uprooting Past Impressions (Sanskaras)

The true yogas (Karma Yoga, Dnyan Yoga, Raj Yoga, and Bhakti Yoga) serve as prominent signposts on the path to Truth. When followed correctly, they can help uproot the heritage of accumulated impressions (sanskaras) that bind the soul.

• In Karma Yoga, one loses the self in selfless service.
• In Dnyan Yoga, the mind is utilized to contemplation and meditation to check the expression of desires, thereby wiping out sanskaras.
• In Raj Yoga, the aspirant aims to stop the mind from thinking through intense concentration, steadily lessening the grip of sanskaras.

2. Providing Spiritual Rest and Energy

Deep meditation and yogic practices can lead to yoga samadhi (a state of trance). While temporary, this state provides the aspirant with a profound sense of peace. Baba explains that yoga samadhi allows the pilgrim to rest, much like sound sleep, giving the seeker renewed energy to proceed further along the spiritual path.

3. Developing Dispassion and Control

Ascetic practices—such as fasting, solitude, and the denial of physical desires—introduce a "negative assertion" that can help decondition the mind from its habitual attachments to the gross world. When intelligently handled, meditation conserves mental energy, increases the power of concentration, and can occasionally yield inner revelation.

How These Practices Can Become a Liability

Despite their benefits, Meher Baba repeatedly warns that these practices are fraught with profound dangers for the independent seeker.

1. The Trap of Occult Powers (Siddhis)

Intense yogic practices and penance can awaken dormant occult powers, such as the ability to walk on water, read minds, raise the dead, or halt moving trains. However, these powers (siddhis) are considered phenomenal and have nothing to do with true spirituality. They are described as "spectacles of colored glass" that merely alter the appearance of illusion. The fascination with these powers often distracts the aspirant from the true goal of God-realization.

2. The Danger of Misusing Power

The acquisition of these powers becomes a severe liability, particularly on the fourth plane of consciousness, where the aspirant wields infinite energy. If a yogi falls prey to the overpowering temptation to misuse these powers (for either selfish reasons or mere display), it triggers a cataclysmic psychic crash. This disaster completely disintegrates the soul's gained consciousness, throwing the pilgrim all the way back to the rudimentary consciousness of a stone, forcing them to restart the entire evolutionary journey.

3. Addiction to Trance (Samadhi)

The trance state achieved through yoga or deep meditation (yoga samadhi or haal) is entirely different from the permanent divine state of nirvikalpa samadhi (God-realization). In yoga samadhi, the mind is only temporarily stilled; as soon as the yogi returns to normal consciousness, their ego, intellect, and worldly desires instantly resume functioning. Meher Baba likens this state to a drug addiction or intoxication; the yogi may feel like an emperor while in the trance, but eventually suffers a "headache" of worldly strain upon waking. Consequently, some yogis become so addicted to this bliss that they remain stuck in trance for centuries, completely halting their spiritual progress.

4. Ego Inflation and Hypocrisy

Ascetic practices often breed a dangerous spiritual ego. Meher Baba points out that adopting outward signs of renunciation—such as wearing ochre robes, growing long matted hair, smearing the body with ashes, or sitting naked in the snow—can falsely court respect from the public. This public homage nourishes a superiority complex, turning the aspirant into a hypocrite who outwardly poses as a saint but inwardly remains plagued by worldly desires. Baba emphasized that it is easier to sit naked on a snowbound peak of the Himalayas doing meditation than to live with him and obey him implicitly.

5. The Creation of New Bindings

Independent efforts to annihilate the ego through intense austerities often backfire. Penance, mechanical fasting, and rigid yogic disciplines can actually create new bindings. Trying to escape from actions merely results in the action of inactivity, which strengthens the knots of entanglement. Furthermore, premature or unguided awakening of the kundalini through yogic exercises can lead to self-deception and cannot take the aspirant to the ultimate goal.

Conclusion

Ultimately, while yoga, deep meditation, and asceticism can elevate an aspirant to great heights, they cannot permanently destroy the deep-seated legacy of past sanskaras. The ego cannot annihilate itself simply through its own efforts or mechanical disciplines. To transcend these profound liabilities, Meher Baba asserts that the aspirant must rely on pure love and complete surrender to a Perfect Master, whose grace alone can safely remove the final veils of illusion.

An Omen

Look at the table closely. It has a fine crack down the middle. Let's suppose someone is sitting at the table on New Year's Eve with his partner and he leans on it in such a way that this was the cause of the crack (very loud and sudden). What might such a crack portend? This is a dining table where people sit and eat their meals together. In the immediate aftermath of the crack, the man's partner accuses him of stupidity and he storms off not setting a good tone for the coming year. This is a scenario of setting for a coming novel. In terms of plot development what might such an occurrence logically portend given that it occurred significantly on New Year's Eve and in such a significant household location?

The Symbolism of the Fracture

The crack in this specific table is not merely a piece of broken furniture; it is the physical manifestation of a "schism" in the domestic foundation. Because this occurred on New Year's Eve—a threshold moment of superstition and looking forward—the crack functions as a terminal omen for the relationship's structural integrity.

The dining table is the altar of the home. It is where sustenance is shared and where the "family" is enacted daily. A crack running down the center, caused by the weight of one partner leaning on it, logically portends a year defined by the failure of support and the widening of a divide.

Plot Development: The Year of the "Divided Kingdom"

The narrative arc should follow the trajectory of the crack itself. The incident effectively ends the relationship on New Year's Eve, but the physical separation of the couple will likely take the next twelve months to catch up to the reality of the broken table.

1. The Immediate Aftermath: The Superficial Repair

Because the table is ornate and likely expensive (evident in the scrollwork and glass), they will not throw it away immediately. They will attempt to repair it. This mirrors their relationship dynamic in January and February. They will apply "glue" to the situation—apologies for the storming off, perhaps a professional repairman for the table—but the visual scar remains. The plot focuses on their attempt to live "as normal" over a visible wound. They are eating their meals over a fault line.

2. The Rejection of the Hearth

As the story progresses into spring, the table becomes a source of subconscious anxiety. The crack makes the surface uneven. A wine glass might wobble if placed on the fissure; a tablecloth might be used to hide it, symbolizing the secrets they start keeping.

The logical development is that they stop using the table. The man, remembering the accusation of "stupidity," will subconsciously avoid sitting there to avoid triggering the memory of his clumsiness and her contempt. They begin eating separately—him at the kitchen island, her on the sofa. The "hearth" goes cold. The crack has successfully displaced the ritual of communion.

3. The Causality of "Leaning"

The most crucial plot point is the cause of the break. He "leaned" on it. In a relationship, leaning represents a need for support. He put his weight on the structure of their life, and it snapped. Her reaction was not concern ("Are you hurt?"), but judgment ("You are stupid").

This portends that later in the novel, when he faces a genuine crisis (job loss, illness, moral dilemma) and "leans" on her for emotional support, she will fail him again. She will view his need as a liability. The table breaking was the foreshadowing that the relationship cannot bear his weight.

The Climax

The story culminates the following New Year's Eve. The table, perhaps weakened by the initial crack and the changing seasons (wood expanding/contracting), finally gives way completely or is the site of the final argument. The crack that started as a fine line eventually bifurcates the table entirely, leaving them with two useless halves—a perfect mirror of their separated lives as they finally admit the household is dissolved.