In August I had already felt some depression, but it had been just a mild post-vacation syndrome. From the very first moment I knew this was different: this was much deeper, more serious, and it was related to my personal life as well as the professional. And what does one do in these cases? I don’t know what the rest of the world does, but I go on without saying a word. Perhaps there is the root of everything.
Then, as I was trying to go on with my life as if nothing had happened, Thursday, September 22nd, arrived. I woke up at around 3 a.m. and when I tried to sit up, my head was spinning. I quickly identified that sensation: vertigo, possibly caused by a knotted neck. This was the second time it happened to me, with the difference that in the first time, several months before, I was already up, walking along the hallway, and I noticed I was leaning sideways. Something was wrong with my balance. I didn’t fell, but no doubt it was a very strange and disturbing feeling. When I was back in bed I started to mull it over, thinking I had a brain tumor at the very least, but I went back to sleep after fighting for a while with my anxiety and my own negative thoughts, and when I awoke I was fine. Besides, I had recently fallen down while roll-skating and my left shoulder was quite damaged, so that had possibly been the cause. On Thursday something similar happened, only there is no physical injury now. Though, in truth, if I calmed down and observed my own body, I could perfectly feel the accumulated tension on my shoulders, my back, even the light pain in the center of my nape. Though they call it cervical pains, it seems they are not related to the cervical vertebrae at all, but rather to the muscles. Surprise, surprise: it seems it is quite important the weight of certain emotional states such as stress, anxiety and depression. The slab that is always hanging over my head.
I have to say that I believe in the existence of psychosomatic illnesses and in the fact that our emotions influence our health. I am not so certain that it is really known what types of emotions are reflected in each body region or what diseases they can provoke. I very much doubt serious studies have been done in that respect (if someone knows them, please leave me a link in the comments). But well, I made a mental note that it wasn’t a bad idea to take a look on the internet. I ended up doing it, but after I meditated two or three nights in a row, to calm myself down and loudly (mentally) call my spiritual guide to help me through all this. He doesn’t always listen. But finally, on the night of the 23rd, I felt he had come to the appointment. And he went straight to the point: when I saw him there sitting in the entrance hall to my imaginary garden, he said to me: “Are you truly ready? Then go ahead, go on to your resting place, the show is going to start”. And there I went...
I am going to base on what I wrote in my past life journal right after the meditation to tell what I saw and felt, but I am going to add what I thing convenient to clarify or expand some points.
“What does one feel when you are hanged? I guess it depends... [...] Since I remember past lives, I have been surprised by the fact I have never suffered problems in my cervical vertebrae. It seems it is quite frequent that people who have been hanged in a past life have ailments at that level. I have been hanged at least twice, as far as I know, and nothing had ever happened to me... until recently. And knowing what I know now, I rather wonder: how is it that I haven’t had them before? What did go completely unnoticed to me is what kind of emotions get reflected on that body region. I don’t think it is the same in every case, but now I know which are in mine.
I get back to the beginning. What does one feel when you are hanged? Beside fear, of course. And contempt for those who have fun looking. Well, you feel extreme impotence, and extreme frustration. I guess that regardless of how much you desire to live (or die), in that moment your survival instinct wins. Suddenly you find yourself in a very strange, unnatural, position. Something is pulling you from behind. Holding you, more exactly. And that slipknot sinks in your nape, because I suppose that is the gift of the knot, it tightens, there is no room between the rope and your neck. [I haven’t had the occasion to verify this detail, but I would love to]. At the same time your trachea closes off. I know from my other hanging that the pressure is stronger on the sides of the neck, though maybe this also depends on each particular case (you know, the technique used, the height of the scaffold, the body’s weight, etc.). In this occasion I felt the pressure more on the front half of the neck, that is to say, mainly on the throat. Instinct makes you try to inhale some air, but not a single drop gets to your lungs, and that is terribly frustrating. Your heart starts to accelerate. When I was under regression, my head was bending forward. I think that had I not worn a hood (detail of which I am not completely certain in the case of Roderic), I would have seen the ground at my feet, probably with the corresponding feeling of vertigo. Besides, I noticed how my respiratory movements stopped —literally. In the end I breathed again because there is no physical impediment, obviously, but when you are hanged, simply there are no respiratory movements, no matter how much you contract your muscles: if there is no air entering the lungs, the lungs remain the same. And asphyxia begins. Instinct also makes you fight to get rid of the rope, but you usually have your hands tied, so this causes more frustration. The good part of all this is that it is relatively brief, an if you go out of your body before the end, as many of us believe it happens, then much better. I think that this time I fought a good deal to live. I think that you don’t know how much you want to live until you are in front of death. The bad part of all this is that air is life. Without air, there is no oxygen, and without oxygen, there is no use in physical strength. So eventually you can’t even fight, and you stay there, hanging...
And so we come to the parallelisms with my present life. The truth is that I have been feeling like this for years. Hanged. Like in the Tarot card. I don’t seem to advance in those life aspects I would like to advance. My guide tells me that if I want to stop being hanged, I have to break the rope. I reply to him, full of rage and frustration: “All right, but how, if my hands are tied up?” The only thing I could do is go back in time, to make other decisions. If I don’t do this, only somebody else, from the outside, can cut the rope, but no one helps (this is another of my mantras I can’t seem to stop fighting)... or perhaps I don’t let them help me. Maybe I think I deserve to be hanged?
The thought left me a bit bewildered... but I understood it might be true. The word “self-sabotage” has been lately in my mind. I doubt I do it, as I consider I fight a good deal to achieve my goals, sometimes with too much obstinacy... as long as I know which those goals are and they keep me motivated enough (this latter is important, I think many people mistake discouragement for laziness). But I also realize that many times, when things are running really well and I feel proud of myself, something makes me back up and I return to the previous supposed disappointment and apathy. It is exactly like this Arena song, so related to Roderic (it is called “Tantalus” and I would nearly say it is the best song in all the history of music, not only of Arena’s).
This is my thanks, and this is my curse
Try as I might, the fruit on the trees
all remain beyond reach, beyond wishes
or pleading for one last chance
It is as if I don’t believe myself to be good enough to reach where I want to reach. My guide tells me that I must not be so hard on myself... as I was when I was Roderic. Because, perhaps I could have fled and rebuilt my life, but I preferred not to fight... not to fight more, I mean, the nuance is also important in this case. My current self always accused Roderic of having given up too early, though he always denied it. Now I know I never gave up. No, it was a different thing... I never was like them, I didn’t want to kill anyone innocent, but I did, and I turned myself, without any resistance, knowing where this would lead me. Was it maybe a self-imposed punishment? Did I forget so easily my assassinated family and the years of abuse because I had killed someone who stood in my way? Did I bear to be called a murderer when the real murderers went on ruling? Did I come to despise myself the same way I despised them?
Is it possible I keep thinking like this? And what can I do to change things?”
There I stopped writing, as I don’t have the answers yet. And I was very tired. I did notice something I have already noticed before. When I am depressed or anxious I always think about Katrina, but I rarely think about Roderic, when what he must have suffered was possibly much worse. Why? Because Roderic doesn’t cry nor shout like Katrina. Because he was taught that men don’t cry, they have to be strong. But he couldn’t even defend his family from their enemies. I can’t stop seeing in my mind the two graves in which he buried his wife and less than two-year-old son with his own hands. I can’t stop remembering his mother and the impotence when he couldn’t prevent her rape. Now and then I still feel the beating on my back when they wanted to chasten me (and very often shame prevents me from talking about it). And after all this, did I come to think I had become exactly that which I had loathed all my life? It was an unfair ending if you compare it to the impunity of those who made his life hell, yes. But, maybe I thought I deserved it all the same? That I had brought it all on myself, just because I had wished for the death of my lord? How much rage can someone gather inside in a situation like this?
A lot, I can assure that. Rage that I keep feeling when I feel frustrated and impotent because there are things I can’t change and prevent me from progressing. The problem is I don’t know which are outside and which are inside of me. The problem is that despite everything, I learned not to rebel, and Katrina, regardless of her youth and apparent weakness, is stronger than Roderic, and she also learned to shut up. In the meanwhile, rage keeps building up. When this morning I searched for information about psychosomatic illnesses, I wasn’t surprised to find things like these (the translation is mine):
NECK
The pain in the neck is common in people with bad posture or who are seated too much time. Besides, this pain is related to distressing emotions. Perhaps, if you observe yourself, you find that you sigh often, as if you feel some kind of guilt or sadness that you want to get out of your system.
The pain in the neck is related to guilt or feelings of carrying out commands that are not your own. It can mean that you are having problems forgiving yourself or that you are judging yourself too hard.
http://laiguana.tv/articulos/10567-emociones-cabeza-cuello-hombros-dolores-enfermedades
PAIN IN NECK AND CERVICAL VERTEBRAE
You don’t find your place in the world. You are worried about the future and where you will be in a year or ten. Your family is your greatest treasure but at the same time your greatest concern. The fear lives in you and roams freely in your body. And besides you are incapable of expressing your emotions as you would wish.
You may even have problems to communicate or make yourself be listened to. It is very common in people with pain in the neck that they don’t accept themselves (a clear example of emotional pain). You judge yourself for your past and don’t forgive certain situations that occurred or are occurring.”
http://befullness.com/dolor-emocional/
Migraines are created by people who want to be perfect and put too much pressure on themselves. There is a lot of suppressed anger.
THE NECK AND THE THROAT are fascinating because there many things happen. The neck represents the ability to be flexible in our way of thinking, in seeing the other side of the problem and understand the point of view of the other person. When problems in the neck are present, it generally means that we are being stubborn with our concept about a situation.
https://elrincondesusu.wordpress.com/2010/02/10/enfermedades-psicosomaticas/
Update 26-9-2016.
I have been suffering a bit of anxiety for a few days now, the night before yesterday I had even a bit of tachycardia after dinner, my head was aching, and I noticed a lot of tension accumulated in neck and shoulders. I have been doing Qi Gong and self-reiki, but the headache doesn't go away completely. A few days ago I also picked up a picture of Jaqen for my mobile phone that reminds me a lot of Roderic when I was in the dungeon, and then...