Issue with Equanimity

[Orb]

It's been a challenge to remain in equanimity no matter what feelings arise. 

 

When I wake up in the morning the body feels like a dried up sponge and thoughts are all over the place, it feels very unconscious. Then ill drink tea and take some kratom and the body begins to stabilize and I feel "normal" again, when I drink tea and take kratom, im able to meditate and relax, and there's an un-centered feeling which is really nice. But when I don't drink it when I wake up early in the morning, there's this contracted feeling all over the body. So unless I drink caffeine and take kratom the body feels gross honestly. 

 

Like right now after drinking tea and kratom, I can meditate all day, do TRE, and journal. But I can only do them well when im under the influence. 

 

Im not sure how to feel alignment when im not under the influence of substances. Ive tried to meditate or pray but there's no sensation of pleasure when withdrawing from substances. 

 

Its like im in this seesaw where for most of the day there is no center and the body feels loose/empty, then when the substances wear off there's intense contraction and mindless thinking.

[Orb]

I feel like a fraud because I can only feel the equanimity once ive had my tea and kratom, when I don't there's withdrawal, so it feels like there isn't any real progress on the path. Like yesterday all day there was little to no judgement, but this morning when I didn't drink tea there was a lot of judgment and snobbiness towards my mom. 

Edited June 13, 2023 by Orb

[bnyland]

It's easy to feel equanimous when there's no perceived suffering, right? That's why real equanimity is especially tested in difficult conditions.

You have 2 choices:

- the hard path: disidentify your bodily sensations and resulting mind states/thoughts from your identity, which means that even if the body/mind is perceived to not feel alright , that's not who you are, so while not ideal, you could live with these sensations for the rest of your life, and use the ups and downs as teachers

- the harder path: getting clean of your addictions. I used kratom for about 5.5 years, and took me about 6-8 months to feel 'normal' again after giving it up. I learned people used kratom to get rid of opiate addictions, I only used it recreationally in the beginning, until I realized I was addicted. At one point I was using valium/diazepam to make the withdrawal symptoms easier to manage 🙂 I feel lucky that I never got addicted to valium, I can go for months/for ever without taking it, especially since giving up caffeine and my sleep is amazing now.

 

Today I'm in day 5 of quitting caffeine and it seems to be much easier than quitting kratom. While the kratom effects are obvious, caffeine in my case is quite insidious, in that after a few days with no caffeine, thoughts appear of "surely it's not as bad as I thought", "millions/billions of people drink it everyday and they're alright", and next thing I know I'm back to 4 cups a day and poor sleep...

 

Both kratom and caffeine affect the body in multiple ways, the most important seemed to me the dopamine effect. Caffeine apparently puts your body in fight-or-flight mode which can feel amazing for the modern person, but after a long time (ab)using it the additional stress catches up to you. If you need motivation quitting caffeine, look up various caffeine quitting videos on youtube...

[Orb]

@bnyland congrats on getting off of the substances!!! 

 

I must say there's billions of humans and everyone has a unique way of functioning. It's interesting how some people can use substances in moderation and be mostly functional and then others just can't do substances at all. 

 

I think this body mind functions best without any substances messing with the brain chemistry.