I went to meditation class for the first time in a long time yesterday and I'm very glad I went. It was a body-scan meditation, and the discussion afterwards was centered around the mind-body connection. Specifically, how we (People with depression/anxiety) live mostly above our shoulders and ignore signals that don't originate inside of our own heads.

The class was at 7, The meditation was about an hour, and the actual body-scan started about 20 minutes in at the toes and feet, sweeping up the body. I had gone the whole day, an entire working day of running around the hospital, without realizing I was having a gout flare. It suddenly made sense why I had been feeling panicky, on edge and withdrawn all day. It turns out that if you ignore the sensation of railroad spikes being driven into your heels long enough, it can make you kind of cranky.

Back to basics with meditation again. I've recognized a pattern I think. Step 1. Habitually meditate with breath observation and body-scan. Step 2. Get bored of body awareness because I have a lot of unpleasant things I am bodily aware of, and I'm not at peace with them. Step 3. Move on to weird, abstract, 'transcendental' meditation because I think I'm 'above that pedestrian body stuff.' Step 4. Feel like meditation isn't doing anything for me. Repeat.