Aum Sri Sai Ram,
Please advise and help. I am not trying to focus on my midbrow slightly above and between my eyes, but I feel that tingling, tickling sensation there that opens my nasals and makes me smile. I feel it especially when I am chanting stotrams. It is an autonomous sensation that something during my chanting is too strong that I also feel itchy, and that sensation makes my limbs feel loose. What is it? Why do I feel this without concentrating?
Thank you
—Phalguni Dave, USA
Dear Dave,
Oh, how beautiful! This tingling sensation in the forehead while meditating is the inner raising of energy to your spiritual eye, stimulated by your sincere devotional chanting. It stimulates superconsciousness in you, divine contact, and inner happiness. You are experiencing the yogi’s inner beauty and blessing. Enjoy!
This tingling sensation in the forehead and stimulation of the kutashta can be felt in many different ways, all of them special: as a tingling sensation, a pressure (even strong), coolness, warmth, itching, various physical sensations. And yes, it makes you smile. Upward flowing energy always makes us feel up.
When the tingling sensation comes again, you may imagine that the Divine Mother (or your Guru or Krishna or whoever you pray to) is dancing on your forehead, blessing you.
Each time you feel a vibration in the forehead during meditation, enjoy it deeply and feel that it is in direct contact with the Divine. By concentrating on the experience and giving it value, you will deepen its beauty, intensity, and effect.
You may feel other physical sensations during your meditation. Stay focused at the point between the eyebrows and try not to get too distracted by the various sensations that naturally occur as the body rests and the mind begins to calm down.
Other sensations may include a feeling as if you were floating upwards. This may happen as the bodily energy flows upward. If this happens, just give yourself over to it and go more and more into this feeling.
When or if this happens, you may experiment a little. See if continuing to chant the stotram helps to increase the experience or if it is better to just let go of that chant, deeply enter into that upward current and into the spiritual eye. In this case, you may simply look upward toward that sensation and pray to God. If in time, it should increase and get stronger – great, but make sure you are a very grounded person. It is good to move the body, to sweat, and to feel robust and strong. Otherwise, it might make you feel ungrounded, unpractical, and distracted in the outer world. Balance and grounding are always needed.
All the best!
God bless you with a happy inner journey,
Jayadev
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