Trunk

I'll say it again: people vary. Gender, genetics, body type, age, energetic configuration, (astrology, if you believe in that), acquired conditioning, development (and/or injuries) from practice... For many men, not ej'ing for 100 days will be physically impossible and a dedicated attempt will only cause disharmony. For some others, it will be successful and a real boon towards their development.

I suggest that you consider a one month streaming membership into the HardLight sangha. Read the description of it carefully. Listen to more free recordings if you feel that you need to consider further before entering for a month. This guy is not just whistling Dixie. Extremely advanced, skilled, benevolent. If you choose to participate for a month and listen to streaming live meetings, I suggest that you (mostly) act as if you're in the room. Sit still during their meditations, relax & walk around when they do, etc. Meetings start 7:30p Pacific time Thursday nights and last for several hours (length varies). Consider that depending upon sometimes late meetings and/or your own processing afterward that you won't want to have anything else planned for the rest of that evening. For this style of Teaching~Studying, it is an important ritual to say, "I'm in for a month". If you have serious physical maladies and/or psychological imbalances, I would advise caution. Keith ~ later edit ~ As to my own time of participation in HardLight, as I consider it my heart swells and I get all misty - tears of gratitude, literally. From how you've responded, I think likely that you'll jump right in to great benefit. However, there is a line: I stop short of propelling recommendation - the decision should be %100 your own. Hope I'm not being melodramatic. Cheers.

If you're waiting on your spiritual work until someone is really clear on the sexual issue... you might go your whole life waiting. It's a complex subject, and people vary: the right advice for one person can be very detrimental to another. The "100 days" thing, as a blanket statement and taken out of complex context, is reckless advice. And most young people are not given a good foundational understanding about what a healthy sex life is, so they're too impressionable - and often very dedicated to their spiritual path. It's tricky. The best short pieces of "advice for everyone" I've heard is: 1. From a SunDo teacher, "just be natural" + "we're trying to build energy so, don't be excessive" but mostly just be natural. - and - 2. Someone here (hagar?, I think hagar said it) at TTBs said something like, "most important that you're relaxed and happy". The basic kunlun method is one of the best methods that this community has found, with many people here in the cyber-community searching all over for quite some years. Really the advice/warnings around it are mild: 1) relax into it and 2) don't go gonzo with it, that is - don't go too fast. It's a pretty sweet technique. Super simple. Contrary to myth, no teacher/school is perfect. (We all have our foibles.) Best to learn from what a school is providing well. (Learning to sort that out takes some practice but, like everything else, experience adds up. Live & learn.) cheers, Trunk

For all newbies: browse alchemicaltaoism.com. Because incomplete / incorrect information re: sexual practices is rampant. Lots and lots of books, some of them with pieces of the puzzle, none of them with reliable complete information. It's that bad.

Sean, To strip out some of the contentious terminology ... Is it your view, regardless of terminology, that there are not various vast high-octane energies at all? That would seem to be one possible progression (though not necessarily) from the view that you posted on kundalini. Or is it that you think that there are such energies, but that kundalini just isn't one of them? I mean, fer instance, Mark Griffin (and other teachers that I've met who teach through transmission). He can transmit to ... well, at least, to a room full of people at once - as much (and more) purity and quantity of energy as they can stand. There's a number of things that come together that make that possible... but certainly part of it is the existence of "pure energies" or whatever you want to call them. And I'd say that some of those energies are "extraordinary". Meaning, an average person might do a great deal of work to open the tissues of their body, be able to stretch in every direction with flexibility and strength and flow. Might have gotten all kinds of acupuncture and massage and be very healthy, have their channels open... but not necessarily have blatantly extraordinary light and purity blazing all around them. Keith p.s. I'm not mentioning MG as an authority~trump, and the conversation is not about authoritatively trying to pin down exactly what is going on w/ him. I'm not trying to get all nose-in-the-air by bringing his name up. Just an example, common experience. p.p.s. *shameless plug* HardLight (Mark Griffin) now has streaming audio so that you can hear the meetings and be plugged into the energy live, in real time. High-tech darshan.

To add a tad to Yoda's excellent response, Nope and yup, respectively. Michael Winn's write-up on this topic.

Direct download link mp3. Plato is rowdy & colorful as usual.

Disagreed. Huge difference. It emerges, contacts, the human system at the base of the spine, and initially rises. There follows a period of integration (tends to be wrathful and harrowing) of the new energy into the human form, after which there is more flexibility in its expression (up/down, etc.). For an additional source of information on kundalini, check out various of the Hard Light podcasts. (Like we need another source, now. This thread has gone totally higgledy-piggledy. )

Harder to read when you guys always quote the whole freakin' previous post! Please just quote small pertinent snippets. * / end grumble *

When I was in my 20's I was hanging out with the whole family of one of my friends. They & I were all sitting in the living room and they were relaxed, joking, and laughing for what seemed like several (wonderful) hours and I realized that their family had been doing this all during the years growing up. I was in awe, dumb-struck.

Hey Ron. Welcome. Nice avatar.

I stand by my previous statement. No disrespect meant towards Yogani and his generally excellent writing.

~ side note ~ Wha???Kundalini does not = sex energy. Kundalini is a vast primordial energy that enters the human form near the base of the spine, below the sexual center. It's just that it happens to pass through the sexual area, very near-by, on it's way up. They are not identical. For instance, just because one feels sexy, that does not mean that "kundalini is awakened" nor that one is manipulating kundalini.

I'd warn against some esoteric gadget in a business environment. More likely that that will create enstrangement from others + ensuing hostile vibes. One woman I still remember with warmth from 20 yrs ago in a corporate environment always kept a jar of candy (that others were free to help themselves from) on her desk. Real. Worked. A modern meditation teacher way back when encouraged that you make personal "dharma friends", have your meditation time, etc., but at work to shift to a no-nonesense no-fluffy-esoteric-stuff mode for the work environment. That's one pt of view to consider. T.

ipod has rejuvenated my musical life as well. (I'm finally shopping for my first cell phone this month! )

I have a few thoughts on this... from an energy exchange perspective and what we're looking for in a mate. Basically, we're looking for someone that we resonate with and can easily exchange male/female energy with. It's easiest to blend like-with-like. Now, you get a deep layer of energy from each of your parents, it's in the deeper channels, deep layer. I'd say an especially strong contribution from your mother: umbilical cord, then breast feeding. It's not only physical vitality that you get from your parents, but also some kind of psychological record along with it, impressions, history. Now, say you see ... well, not "see" so much as energetically "feel" a woman that resonates with the energy that your mum gave you. That's a kind of feminine energy that you sense you can easily receive deeply into your system and (potentially) do some deep alchemy with (cause you already did when you were gestating in your mother's womb). A woman like that "hits your umbilical gong", goooonnnnnngggg, with a deep resonance. To work through, past, transcend, resolve, these sorts of issues is real, long term, work. That is, to gradually shift your pattern beyond your vital-inheritance to a substantial degree. Hope this helps. Hope I've been somewhat clear, somewhat cognitively challenged today. Trunk

Congrats!

Good article. Timely.

May we all wise up in 2009! SLxCxw5GnPM

I would suggest that the last thing you need right now is another meditative practice. ideas, all physical: - see a doctor of chinese medicine - aerobic exercise, anything: swimming, biking, walking, jogging. - get a massage a couple of times a week for a few weeks

* hee-hee * you said a lot without saying anything. you're in.

Check out the stuff listed in Lin's Links. courtesy of alchemicaltaoism.com.

Welcome~!

Good clip.

To me, "dark night" means that you're closing in on a major shit-tangle in your subconscious. Often in the beginning a person cleans up and progresses through quickly any number of areas that are maybe a mess - but an easy-to-get-to and cleans-up-fairly-quickly mess. Most everyone has something dug in somewhere that is hard to get to and overwhelming: a major shit-tangle. And, I would suggest, often there ain't just one. Welcome to the path!