Hallucinations vs. Visions in Meditation
Hallucinations and visions are different in their origin and purpose. Hallucinations come from brain starvation, mostly, and visions come from the deep mind, the part of self that is all selves, what we call the “heart.” What Is Heart?
Brain starvation occurs when the oxygen content in the brain cells drops. In meditation, this can occur because of over breathing, called hypocapnia. See No Hypocapnia with Heart Rhythm Meditation. This shouldn’t occur in Heart Rhythm Meditation because we time the breath by heartbeats and ensure at least 6 heartbeats in and the same number out.
If your hallucinations are caused by over-breathing, then just increase the count of heartbeats per breath and they will stop.
Maybe you’re not having hallucinations; maybe you’re actually having visions. Visions are common in Heart Rhythm Meditation because you’re touching your heart, which is loaded with messages you need to see. Some of those messages are uncomfortable, which is why they were stuffed into the unconscious long ago.
When you get one of these visions from your heart, pay attention; it comes because you heart feels you have become wise enough and mature enough to handle what it has saved for you.
Things happen to us that we can’t understand or process at the time, so we save them for later. Now that you’re meditating, you have the resources you need to integrate the past and allow your heart to unburden itself.
Such visions may be quite emotional. Heart Rhythm Meditation is not a dry method; it’s wet, for the heart is emotion. But you are doing deep work, and the healing will last. We say, “You have to feel it to heal it.”
As you handle the visions from the past, you will get more and more visions from the present and future. Your heart is “plugged in,” so it gives you information about other people in your life, about opportunities, and advice about how to improve. When I ran an engineering company, we would do Heart Rhythm Meditation together and the engineers would get answers to their technical problems. Now, when I’m writing, I get “visions” about what to write.
(There is a new mindfulness meditation studio in Los Angeles, called “Unplug.” Some of us visited there recently, and we thought the name was very clever, given their method. But if they taught Heart Rhythm Meditation, they would have to call it, “Plug In.”)
Honor your heart by valuing what it shows you. What if you assumed its visions were meaningful and important? Might they not become so, and become even more clear to guide your life?
Blessings for your wonderful heart,
Puran Bair Chancellor, The University of the Heart
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