How I decreased my reactivity levels

I went through my year from hell in 2024. At age 45, I had meditated on and off since my late teens, read books on meditation, including Eckhart Tolle, and done a few Vipassana retreats. But I had lost my way. I was taking excessive amounts of recreational drugs, as well as drinking and smoking. My morals had slipped somewhat, and I was ignorant to the impact of my behaviours on others.

When my ex-partner and I reunited during that time, things were great for the first few months, but the old problems I hoped to avoid this time around returned with renewed vigour. Our relationship became full of conflict, defensiveness, and drug and alcohol fuelled arguments. To add to this, my good friend who we lived with joined in on the perceived attack, and they both bullied me together. I was reactive to their attacks, and although I didn’t want them to, they upset me deeply. I tried very hard not to react; I remember each day vowing that I would not react, but it kept happening. When I was treated unfairly and yelled at for something minor, I would yell back. We had one too many explosive yelling matches and I told my partner I was moving out, with or without him.

Once we moved out of my friend’s place, I felt like I had PTSD, but I was still under perceived attack from my partner’s unconscious insults and negative behaviours. I reached a point where I decided that I must, again, leave the relationship.

The idea struck me that before I leave, I ought to first try to introduce a form of continual meditation practice into my life, to see if it changed anything. I decided I would do this whenever I remembered and not get annoyed at myself if I didn’t – anything was better than nothing. I did this in the form of Anapana (a Pali term for concentrating the mind on the breath and the associated sensations on the area below the nose and above the upper lip). Whenever we were interacting with each other, I focussed my attention on this area. Almost immediately, I noticed that the emotional turmoil drew my attention from that area and into my body where the emotions were arising as physical sensations. The last Vipassana I had sat was 10 years previous, so I had forgotten or perhaps overlooked completely this piece of crucial information; that emotions arise in the body first and are then translated by the mind into negative thoughts. It was a revelation discovering this on an experiential level.

The impact was a complete change in my life and my relationship. It was an earth-shattering awakening for me at the time. I went from a state of continual suffering and reactivity to a state of peaceful existence and non-reactivity. I felt compassion for my partner and my friend, who were still suffering themselves and thus unconsciously making others around them suffer. I felt a genuine gratitude for their unconscious state, as they were able to make me suffer so much that I had stumbled across this new state of being. Without them I may not have had the motivation. I chose not to engage with many of the destructive comments my partner made, and didn’t take any offence to the insults. I started to love myself and have compassion for myself. I gave up drugs and alcohol, stopped eating meat, and took myself for nice walks along the beach.

This state lasted for three months, at which point I let expectations of my partner changing his behaviour dominate my thoughts. I asked him for one day a week alcohol-free, and when I was inevitably let down and then lied to about it, my traumatised mind returned to power. Jealousy, disappointment, helplessness, anger, mistrust, all took over. I booked myself into a Vipassana, and within the first 3 days, had returned my state of peace.  

Stumbling across this alternative state of being through my own experience has been better for me personally than following instructions provided by a teacher. However, without the background of my meditation experience I may not have ever discovered this state of being. This forms a sort of tension, where people who are suffering may not be open to being taught meditation, however they are in a position where their life situation is ripe for an awakening through introduction of a continual practice.

Let me know your thoughts!