Hello,
Last year I started doing Isha kriya for 15 minutes for 15 days. There was a pain in my forehead between my eyes. I got scared and stopped meditating.
I exercise regularly. I still have the pain in my forehead. Lately I am having shooting pains in head and numbness in my legs when I exercise. I am feeling very tired and scared about facing out of the regular world experiences that meditation might bring. How can I stop my pain in forehead and be healthy? I don‘t want to meditate.
—samy, canada
Dear Samy,
Isha Kriya is different from the Kriya Yoga techniques given to us by Paramhansa Yogananda. If you are interested in preparing yourself for Kriya Yoga through the Ananda Kriya Sangha, please let us know (see below). But because you are practicing a different type of kriya, then you should go to the person or organization who taught or initiated you, to ask a specific questions about any difficulties your are experiencing with your practices.
However, I can suggest a few things to help you with meditation in general. Pain in the forehead is generally caused by tension in your eyes. This tension is often brought on by trying to force your gaze inward and upward (almost like crossing the eyes) at the spiritual eye (point between the eyebrows). Instead, your eyes should be very relaxed and not forced into any awkward positions. Imagine you are looking at a light on top of a distant mountain out in front of you, but keep your eyes very relaxed.
About numbness in your legs, this is probably caused by your sitting improperly for meditation. Sitting on the floor in a cross-legged position is not always best! There are several ways to take care of this challenge, by changing your sitting position to one which works better for you. Please contact us to find out more about this also.
As for feeling tired and scared about facing the regular world with experiences that meditation might bring, one very important purpose of meditation is to bring you more calmness in daily life, to relieve stress, and to offer you deep inner peace under all circumstances. It should also awaken large sources of energy within you, to help you with tiredness. These are wonderful benefits of meditation and certainly nothing to be afraid of — life only gets better when you are meditating in the right way. If you’d like to learn more about Kriya Yoga in the way we teach it, please go to our Kriya Yoga page.
