freeform

How about the sound of water?... I mean the sound it makes as it is sloshed around in a bottle or a glass for example... Ever since I was about 3 I used to love playing with water... from bath time, to water in the sink, to snow I'd melt on warm water pipes in the winter... One thing that seemed obvious to me was that water changed the sound that it made when sloshed around... and the sound was tied closely to the physical properties of the water... Of course as I grew up and started asking questions I was taught that this was unlikely, and in any even irrelevant... So I wonder - anyone notice the difference in sound the sloshed water makes?... try it with very cold water, very hot water, room-temperature water, salty water, melted snow water, water from a stream, water from a well, rain water etc... To me - the most striking difference is between cool and hot water... the sound as well as the movement (the feeling, as well as the visual aspect of light passing and refracting as it's being sloshed) Vortexing water (like when you join two bottles together) affects it too... even the shape and movement of the vortex itself is affected. I remember trying to vortex water that had been boiled then cooled... wasn't easy, the vortex would 'jam up' and stop spinning... after a couple of goes it started to produce proper vortex spirals that didn't 'jam'... both the sound the resulting water made, the taste as well as the quality of light passing through changed considerably. I also carried out some amateur experiments involving different types of water and sprouts.

Count me in.

Anything like the pic attached? Interesting - What were the sensory experiences accompanying this downwards flow? What kind of time-frame?... what happened with the 'tail bone experiences'?... did the energy rise back up when it reached the tail bone? PS - anyone that feels this is out of scope of this thread, please speak up.

Interesting. Do you have more to share on this? I'm always inspired by the Bushman spirituality... I really like Bradford Keeney too... He's meant to be quite the shaktipat master himself...

Good quality fats are very important for heart health. Fermented cod liver oil , butter oil and CoQ10 are very beneficial for your heart amongst many other benefits. You may also research arginine and nitric oxide supplements... which improve circulation and relax your blood vessels, taking the load off your heart.

Planning is very seductive to the mind... so it's funny to see that certain people spend 90% of their time planning, and when they get down to the 10% doing, it just doesn't live up to the fantasies made up during the planning stage, so they go back to planning. Microcosmic orbits, immortal fetuses, alchemy etc are all such alluring ideas - but what it always comes down to is doing your practice - which starts simple, but has the most powerful effect. Now let's see if we can get away from planning and start doing... and having fun with it! Even punishments are fun apparently!

Foundation building should always involve simple, but powerful practices. One of the best is Wall Squats. You build up to having your feet together, pressed up against the wall in front of you... and in the most relaxed way possible to lower yourself at a steady pace into a deep squat... then similarly - in a slow, controlled pace lift back up. There are many explanations online and videos on Youtube. The exercise is great - and will quickly make your energy strong, open you up physically, and move the qi throughout your body... Couple it with with some joint rotation exercises - like Intuflow - which will work to dredge up stuck energy and seal up joints leaking qi... and some standing and you'll have a very powerful foundation. Don't do too much at once - start slowly and build up. Consistent practice is the most important aspect of building a foundation. Have fun with it and enjoy doing it (rather than planning it).

Ha! trust the female perspective to reframe my rant into a simple, elegant sentence

I find people fascinating... I'm constantly surprised how anyone can find people boring... I don't necessarily find their stories or opinions on the weather fascinating, but I do find the person telling the story and sharing opinions profoundly interesting. If I was to think of myself as conscious, I'd have to think of at least some others as unconscious... that's a disservice to both myself and them. Every person can teach me more about myself than any book could. Interacting with another human is always an opportunity for growth. How could you possibly be bored!? uninterested!?... ahhhh - you must actually listen to their stories! The content of conversations is secondary... I know you think there's valuable content (talking about esoteric practices would be one, I'm sure) and boring content (american idol, the weather, office politics etc)... The value in interacting is not the content that you speak about - but what happens besides the content... How present can you be? how much of your awareness can you place on them? Can you place your awareness on them and on you simultaneously? Can you place your awareness on them and on you and on the other people in the background? Can you place your awareness on the space between you two? The space between the words you say and the words they say? Can you notice where their awareness is when they speak? Can you notice how their energy is moving? Can you notice how they respond to the changes in your own awareness? None of this has to be overly contrived... pick one thing - for example try talking and listening and feeling - with your awareness completely on them and stick to that... another time pick something else... eventually, with practice, you will find yourself spontaneously noticing the most amazing things about people... I sometimes see the pictures people make in their mind's eye... sometimes they suddenly transform into a 6yr old child... sometimes their energy expands and they're left in a thoughtless state as a result of your own awareness focusing on space. You can share a moment of profound intimacy with a cashier... if you can do that, imagine how much you could learn sharing a moment of intimacy with a 'high level' teacher! Don't see yourself as 'superior' to anyone else... don't have a preference or a need for particular content... connect on the level of being, and if you can on the level of feeling... and then see what happens. The office is not devoid of magic if you're open to seeing, feeling, hearing it.

I find Deida's descriptions on masculine and feminine inspirational and rather limited - especially when it's to do with personality. Superimposing his descriptions of 'true' masculine and feminine with the enneagram, you get type 2 as the feminine and type 8 as the masculine... missing all the intricacies of the other numbers. As far as I can tell, Mal, you're a 9 - same as me... 9 is right in the middle - it's a very neutral type... We have some feminine aspects - like indirectness, being easy-going, unconfrontational, expanded awareness, likeable, sweet etc... which is in great contrast to the type 8 - who is very outward, confrontational, direct, outwardly emotional, narrowly focused, 'strong' and dominating. I really like Deida and his ideas are really inspiring... but I find him lacking on the application front... there are many intricacies he seems to miss... The Taoists didn't just stick to yin and yang... they have the 5 phases... 8 forces... 64 flows... Boiling it down to yin and yang is useful on a certain level, but not all levels. Certainly a good introduction into inner dynamics, but falls short when you get in-depth and personal with it.

.

.

Naah - his is a vegetarian system.

I came across this guy's work a couple of years back, and recently a little set of synchronicities has led me back to it. Are any of you familiar with his stuff? www.spiritual-technology.com

this is good

I've had it happen, yeah - although 'back in time' or 'from the future' kinda blended into eachother. Had a very egyptian, ceremonial flavour to it. There are also many 'spiritual classrooms' if you want to learn. (the giraffe was a great teacher!) Taomeow sounds like she'd accessed one such classroom too. These things just 'happened' to me and are not consistently repeatable... I suspect if I had a stable energy body that could easily detach and come back to the physical, it could be more regular and repeatable.

*nods*

Thanks for the recommendation - they're on their way. Looks like a good thing to do after a session on a back roller [Link to an explanation on Trunk's site]. I find the back roller to be intensely relaxing - as soon as it reaches the lower back my body is flooded by this over-powering relaxation reflex. (I actually find the two tennis balls in a sock to be even better than the wooden back-roller. )

*nod*

Durkhrod, do you think your post falls into any of the categories you provided?

z00se, the idea in noticing patterns of behaviour in other people is so you can learn more about yourself. The distinctions are not 'real' - they are just constructed illusions that allow you to expand your consciousness, your awareness, and the range of behaviours open to you. Illusions can only help that way when they are recognised as illusions, and when you can let them go just as easily as adopt them. This is a practice in observing - not controlling or manipulating. As soon as you start attempting control, you lose the magical innocence of observation - you take the illusionary nature of distinctions to heart and you entrench yourself further in the mundane world. You see, trying to 'control' others - (even if you think it's for their own good) sets you back considerably. Control is what we attempt constantly... in the most subtle ways... manipulation is just another way of doing this. One of the benefits of observing others is noticing subtle patterns and seeing if you can adopt them consciously. And by subtle I mean the the kind of process that happens is a split second... I have a friend who is very good at telling stories... so I watch him, noticing the process underlying the story... where his attention moves, the range of sensory representations he uses, his level of awareness of the people he's speaking to in comparison to the level of awareness on himself... there's also several rhythms of speaking, thinking, breathing and shifting of awareness... so I notice the different rhythms and how they change... Similarly I have a friend who's terrible at telling stories... so I watch for the same processes underlying that. Then I try to see if I can do both of these myself... We're trying to increase the range of behaviours and patterns available to us, not just pick what we think of as 'the best' ones (this is another form of control)... We can play with illusions when we experientially know deep down that they're just illusions... and we can let deeper parts of ourselves lead, rather than having our ego attempt to control our surroundings to try to prove that it's really real!

Definitely retardedness... or enlightenment

I once met an old lady whose greatest joy in life was collecting antiques. Over the decades she became quite an expert... because she found the enterprise so fascinating she created distinctions that you and I would only dream of. She could look at a vase and in a split second recognise the glaze, the firing technique, the decade it was most likely made in and whether it is worth any money. And not only was this with vases... everything from furniture to cutlery to jewellery. Her attention to detail and level of expertise seemed almost magical. My greatest joy is discovering more about myself and others. How we think, feel, move... So I have many distinctions on how we deal with our consciousness, awareness, emotions... how we think... how we relate with one another. Sometimes my (seemingly mundane) insights seem magical to others. Mostly they're nonsensical (imagine being shown the intricacies of the perfect golf swing by a champion golfer when all you want is to get the ball past the windmill at your local crazy golf course). My current through-the-day practice is noticing 3 different perspectives on my thoughts, emotions and moods. I sense the thought from a first person perspective - from inside me... then I sense it from a 2nd person perspective - from outside of me and then from 3rd person perspective - objectively (all possible points of view simultaneously). I watch my awareness, my thoughts, my movement and breathing and how I interact with others.

I've always been impressed with Mark Griffin ever since Trunk pointed him out years ago. It's always fascinating to hear him speak... Notice how he doesn't know what he's about to say, he just says it as it arises out of nothingness... both he and the listener discover what he says as he says it. Also as he speaks, it dissolves back to nothing, with no leftovers flavouring what he says next. His way of speaking and using his attention creates huge amounts of 'space' in the listener... it's difficult to 'think' with so much space... notice how you feel a little disoriented and can't really remember the exact content of what he says. (the value of what he says isn't in the content of what he says it's in how he communicates it). Most people when they speak, they know what they are going to say - they prepare it - their attention is on themselves rehearsing the words before they say them (good story tellers have their attention on the internal sensory representation of what they're describing)...

I'm puzzled - is James Randi being considered an authority in science? o_O Are you a subscriber to the 'you create your reality' idea?