[andai]

This is remarkable! I arrived at a very similar place in the last few days. I've been working with painful negative beliefs and memories.

This evolved from my meditation practice, I simply observe sensations in my body. (I tried meditating "normally" (focus on breath) but all this pain kept coming up!)

One of the techniques I arrived on through trial and error is simply asking the energy if it wants/needs to release itself. And then just allowing it to do so. Giving it permission as you say!

So far in every case I have tested, every bundle of pain in my body, the answer has been yes.

The hardest part is just being willing to let it do whatever it needs to do, which can be very odd and a little overwhelming sometimes. But you get used to it very quickly!

[eskaytwo]

In more formal traditions the focus on breath (or similar) is to develop concentration/samatha/samadhi. The focus on sensations is the insight/vipassana component, and often this is where the tension bubbles up to the surface. Keeping calm (equanimous) during this process can indeed be non-trivial!

It sounds like you have come to a practice very similar to a lot of the Burmese traditions of insight meditation, which is quite fascinating.

[AlecSchueler]

Could you describe what it might "need to do" and why or how it becomes overwhelming?

[andai]

Sure, so my experience is... It feels like something solid is dissolving. That's the most common experience. It goes from the sharp heavy sensation into a diffuse watery pleasant sensation.

There could be many other effects as well. There can be sharp pain. There could be dull throbbing. It can feel like stuff is moving around (especially in the gut area, which seems to respond to such a process with actual physical movement).

Basically it's pretty weird if you're not used to it.

But in my experience, the fear of what we might experience is almost always greater than what we actually do experience. Which I think applies to life in general as well.

[nikhilsimha]

usually when a sharp sensation arises in an area, there is a habitual tendency to counteract - unconsciously tense surrounding muscles or antagonistic muscles or switch posture etc.

the idea is to observe with clarity the counteraction and let the sharp sensation arise and pass without the counteraction/resistance.