{"id":7813,"date":"2014-12-02T12:25:37","date_gmt":"2014-12-02T20:25:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mixhart.ca\/blog\/?p=7813"},"modified":"2014-12-02T15:07:11","modified_gmt":"2014-12-02T23:07:11","slug":"warning-meditation-can-dangerous","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.mixhart.ca\/index.php\/warning-meditation-can-dangerous\/","title":{"rendered":"WARNING: Meditation Can Be Dangerous"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Pip<\/a>
Pip and Mom demonstrating our Zen vibe, 2011.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
Meditation: how can an activity so perfectly calm bring on a head injury?<\/strong><\/h5>\n

My story is so freakish that it’s embarrassing. But still, I will tell it only because I have a little extra time on my hands as I cannot work out for a few days<\/strong>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Sunday night, as usual, I retreated to the living room after my youngest daughter (Pip) was finally tucked into bed. On all evenings that I am home, meditating before bed is my normal routine. I turn off the lights and sit on my meditation cushion and turn on some meditation music (sounds of nature). Because of the cold snap (-10 C at night), I decided to sit with my back towards the warm fire place.<\/p>\n

I closed my eyes and meditated for about 15 minutes before I decided to stretch my back (up and then forward), bringing my head to the floor momentarily (eyes still closed). I never made it to the floor. CRACK! My forehead came down hard on the sharp corner of my very solid, heavy wooden coffee table. I had forgotten how close I was sitting to the coffee table and had no idea how fast I move when I’m attempting to stretch. My eyes shot open in pain and shock. I stumbled to the mirror to check out what was going on with my head. I had a small, bloody, triangle shaped indentation on my forehead which, swelled into a blue, toonie-sized lump. I iced it for about fifteen minutes as I cried in pain and shock. There is something about a head injury that makes one cry.<\/em><\/strong> Unfortunately, I hit my head on a small point which caused considerable pressure in one small area. The night was rough, instead of feeling peaceful after the meditation, I felt nauseous, faint and had (still have, after 36 h) a splitting head ache at the top of my head, all night long.<\/p>\n

I have a mild concussion and still, on day 2 post trauma, the top of my head pounds in pain off and on all day. I’ve only had one other concussion in my life. About 5 years ago, I hit the back of my head on ice while snowboarding. Sadly, this meditation head injury feels worse. I am a person who never gets headaches unless I have a nasty virus so the head pain is new. Peter is in Vancouver so I had Pip sleep with me for comfort. I panic a bit when the headache wakes me and it is a relief to have little Pip and her calm Buddhaness beside me in the middle of the night.<\/p>\n

Take care all meditators out there. Remember, that when your eyes are closed, the room is dark and you’ve been clearing your mind for a while, you can lose awareness\u00a0of your body in the room space.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Meditation: how can an activity so perfectly calm bring on a head injury? My story is so freakish that it’s embarrassing. But still, I will tell it only because I have a little extra time on my hands as I … Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7838,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"kt_blocks_editor_width":"","_kad_blocks_custom_css":"","_kad_blocks_head_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_body_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_footer_custom_js":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[121],"tags":[2679,2677,52,2678],"class_list":["post-7813","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mindfulness","tag-dangers-of-meditating","tag-head-injury","tag-meditation","tag-mild-concussion"],"aioseo_notices":[],"taxonomy_info":{"category":[{"value":121,"label":"Mindfulness"}],"post_tag":[{"value":2679,"label":"dangers of meditating"},{"value":2677,"label":"head injury"},{"value":52,"label":"meditation"},{"value":2678,"label":"mild concussion"}]},"featured_image_src_large":["https:\/\/blog.mixhart.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/12\/IMG_1922-1024x890.jpg",1024,890,true],"author_info":{"display_name":"mixhart","author_link":"https:\/\/blog.mixhart.ca\/index.php\/author\/mixhart\/"},"comment_info":4,"category_info":[{"term_id":121,"name":"Mindfulness","slug":"mindfulness","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":121,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":158,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":121,"category_count":158,"category_description":"","cat_name":"Mindfulness","category_nicename":"mindfulness","category_parent":0}],"tag_info":[{"term_id":2679,"name":"dangers of meditating","slug":"dangers-of-meditating","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":2739,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":1,"filter":"raw"},{"term_id":2677,"name":"head injury","slug":"head-injury","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":2737,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":1,"filter":"raw"},{"term_id":52,"name":"meditation","slug":"meditation","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":52,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":18,"filter":"raw"},{"term_id":2678,"name":"mild concussion","slug":"mild-concussion","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":2738,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":1,"filter":"raw"}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.mixhart.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7813","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.mixhart.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.mixhart.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.mixhart.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.mixhart.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7813"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blog.mixhart.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7813\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7849,"href":"https:\/\/blog.mixhart.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7813\/revisions\/7849"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.mixhart.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7838"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.mixhart.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7813"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.mixhart.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7813"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.mixhart.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7813"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}