Reverse Meditation: How To Use Your Pain and Most Difficult Emotions as the Doorway to Inner Freedom

Author Holecek (Dreams of Light) has practiced meditation for 45 years and recognizes that it can sometimes pull practitioners away from dealing with challenging moments and unwanted experiences. He describes this book as an owner’s guide to life’s difficulties and encourages readers to use it as a repair manual. According to the author, one should not employ avoidance strategies or evasion tactics, actions he labels “contractions.” Instead, individuals should welcome unwanted experiences in order to properly address them. Divided into two parts, the book’s first section provides an overview of various contractors, including self-consciousness, anger, aggression, fear, and panic. These contractions generate negative thoughts and often become habitual or stratified; as a result, they are difficult to alter. The second section offers meditative practices that help tackle these contractions. Exercises are scaffolded, starting with basic referential body/breath meditation, then moving to open awareness, and finally, reverse meditation techniques. A brief summary of concepts presented in section one and a glossary of Sanskrit and other terms might be helpful, especially for neophytes.