dwai

Nidar Singh Nihang has done a bunch of very impressive videos to show how dance forms have codified Indian martial arts — https://fb.watch/1pq8kblosL/ https://fb.watch/1pqiwNc04E/ https://fb.watch/1pqmEtOzgB/

Ok I did read but couldn’t get through it. I don’t know much about Crowley’s work, and references to Egyptian cosmology etc is confusing . I don’t get what the AUMGN is all about — seems like it’s based on a very superficial understanding of Indian cosmology and tbh comes across as incoherent to me — maybe it makes sense to those who are versed in crowley’s system. To me, AUM clearly represents reverse tracing the process of creation and dissolution, in a tonal medium, since the Vedas were originally transmitted orally. A represents expansion, U or OO represents contraction, and M represents implosion — all of which occurs in awareness, the background and stuff of which everything is made up of. Brahman, the absolute and nondual reality according to the Vedic tradition, literally means the “expanding principle”. The root sound “Brh” means expansion. So Om/AUM in reverse is Brahman (my own understanding) — or it is a map to reach Brahman.

@Nungali I’ll have to take quite some time to first read and then process/digest your quoted section — who wrote this? Huxley? Bardon?

Just posted

Dear @Moderator team Could you please look into this for me? My PPD is missing the bulk of my personal practice posts. Essentially all the sub-forums (Taiji, Nonduality and Daoist Meditation, etc) are missing.

Oh haha...I thought I had requested it, as I wanted to post some of my paintings...but I never got around to it.

Thanks 🙏🏾

For me, the step is just standing and sinking. When I first started, I'd stand and try too hard -- so all that would happen is I'd get tired. But then, I slowly learned to be patient, and just observe what is happening. When the alignments are done correctly and the mind is gently resting on the lower dantien/lower abdomen region -- a pouring sensation starts, going towards the lower dantien. There is the pouring sensation, as it starts filling the lower abdominal space. For me it started with the sensation of a mass of energy congealing in that area, slowly getting more focused - from the size of a softball to the size of a golf ball. Now it is a point within a golf ball. After a while, the sinking sensation becomes a filling sensation -- a pressure starts building throughout the body like my fascia is expanding. It feels like I'm a balloon being inflated all over. Eventually, the filling/expansion goes beyond the physical body -- several feet in all directions -- a field, like that of a magnet -- but a spherical field, which is hollow in the center...like there is an empty tube through the middle of the sphere. And there is constant flow happening. This can be then combined with other "forms" -- I use the taijiquan forms -- ward-off, rollback, press, push, etc. The movements are of the field itself, not the body per se.

Maybe some people want to maintain 31 flavors of vanilla ice cream?

Mr. Miroku or Dr. Strange? 😲

I found my missing sub-forums in Miroku's PPD (those four are mine)

Boy are they upside down! I decided to get off the roller coaster for a bit — the rat race was a bit too much for me this past year. Give the world a pandemic and they’ll hunker down and bury their heads deeper in the ground (or up their backsides) — things seemed to go from crazy to ridiculous. People that have jobs end up working more hours with crazy demands on delivering results which are often arbitrarily made up given that there IS a pandemic underway and most business is not as usual anymore.

I think you will find this difference in approach depending on the system. One very clear illustration is in that between tantra and Advaita Vedanta. In one approach within Advaita Vedanta, emotions are to be observed as the witness consciousness and they will lose their “power” (of both degeneration and transformation) on the personality that is seeking some specific goal/outcome of their practice. Since the personality and it’s story is just an appearance in YOU the Nondual Consciousness, nothing real remains to be done as you have total clarity as to what your real nature is. Tantra takes the approach that emotions are to be sat with, and transformed — not just for catharsis but from the realization that the emotion arises in YOU, the nondual consciousness. In this way, you are not the unaffected witness consciousness but all that is happening is within you alone, so are very much part of you. So by recognizing that, it becomes clear that emotion is not something that needs to be avoided or chased after, there is a release from its (earlier) grips. Both lead to the same outcome, but depending on the individual personality, one might be more applicable than the other. There isn’t (and I’m not suggesting that you are saying this at all) One correct way to approach this — all nondual approaches are valid in this regard.

The OP was about the Advaita school.

MY grandma was the gentlest and sweetest of souls. So was my grandpa But I guess we all do contain an element of danger within us

Ramana Maharshi did say that real renunciation is simply the letting go of positions -- neither crave, nor shirk away from anything. He gives a variety of ways in which renunciation occurs. http://sri-ramana-maharshi.blogspot.com/2008/10/renunciation.html There are two forms of renunciation recognized in Advaita Vedanta circles. One is the renunciation of the seeker, which is called Vividisha Sanyasa. The other is the renunciation of the Awakened/enlightened one -- which is called Vidvata Sanyasa. It is true that not everyone can or must enter into vividisha sannyasa -- those who do, certainly choose the path of the monk. But jnana is not dependent on vividisha sannyasa -- jnana is simply the unveiling of our true nature. When it happens, Vidvata Sannyasa will occur in varying degrees.

For Asian Arts, I'd say less human drama, but plenty of drama none the less (PS. That is a painting made my grandfather)

Granthis don’t really have much to do with emotions, but rather to attachments. Consciousness doesn’t ride on prana. Prana is a phenomenon that is illuminated in the light to consciousness. Prana and the mind have a relation, since the mind is fueled by prana. The more still and clear your mind is, the more pure and balanced your prana is (and vice versa). The mind is not consciousness, nor is the mind conscious. It simply is a mechanism via which consciousness functions.

This is a most apropos song for this inquiry —

You can make a paste of slaked lime and turmeric and apply it on your knee.

In the Hindu tantric tradition, there is a concept of transmission of power via touch or a glance -- known as Shaktipat. There is also the concept of lineage transmission in Daoist traditions wherein the master will plant a seed or transfer the lineage to the student via touch. If you are at liberty to share, please do share your experiences. I'll start with my own. My teacher initiated me when I met him for the first time by placing his index finger on my forehead (third eye region). He asked me to inhale 3 times from there into my lower dan tien after he disconnected his finger. After I did, there was a flow from my third eye to my lower dantien and the room started "swimming". I felt a little light-headed and sat down for a couple of minutes. After that, when I reached home, in the night, a huge pressure started to build in my forehead. The only way to relieve it was via meditation and doing Taiji forms. So ended up meditating on and off for 3 days multiple times a day. Then for another 12 days, I would go into very spontaneous and intense meditative states and start performing Taijiquan forms 'automatically'. After the initial 15 days or so, where I was experiencing great bliss and large releases of energy, I started to feel like there was fine silk under my skin, covering my entire body. And a very clear separation happened in my consciousness -- with a permanent witness (which was there for a few years before I met my teacher too) forming, that would observe all happenings/activities - physical, mental, energetic. This witness awareness was completely at peace, at ease and unaffected by the ups and downs. If something happened in 'regular life' to shake things up in terms of equanimity and equilibrium, this other mind (my teacher calls it the Spiritual mind) would simply swallow the happening up -- and then life would continue to unfold spontaneously. Along with that, my practice deepened too. I started waking up between 3:30 and 4:30 every morning but would be in a state of hypnagogia. The mind was awake but the body asleep. I'd find vortices opening up over my being, pulling stuff out, cleansing, etc, etc. Beings would visit me and I would have spiritual conversations with them. Sometimes some would come to challenge me, but I seemed to know inherently how to deal with those challenges... Martially, abilities started to manifest exactly how my teacher told me they would. He had said to me, "It seems very difficult to comprehend now...but when you walk through that door, you'll look back and think...is that all there was to it?" I attended class twice a week with my teacher and each time he'd give me something new to work on, and it would manifest tangibly usually a week or so after he taught me. For example, he told me about how there was energy all around us, and that we could simply connect with it and harmonize with it...not needing to expend our own energy to do things like healing/martial techniques, etc. One day, as I was practicing in my family room, the room seemed to be filled with grayish-white smoke or fog. I thought my eyes were playing a trick..but there it was...a heavy fog up to my chest and all over, but most apparent from the ground up to my chest height. When I told my teacher about it the next time I met him, he said with a smile, "that's what I was telling you about..." I had also embarked on picking up Advaita Vedanta studies which I had put aside several years ago as unintelligible. This time when I picked it up and started my studies again, everything seemed to make perfect sense. That same spiritual mind recognized the truth in the teachings and realization followed realization...like a cascading chain reaction. But there were no fireworks...like a rapidly progressing series of little 'a-aha moments' (I think the zen Buddhists call these flashes kensho). In fact, anything spiritual that I picked up made perfect sense -- stuff that seemed crazy or simply stupid to me before! Along with these little realizations, little by little, old behavior patterns started falling away...and a sense of freedom started to grow. Eventually, there arose the realization that there was nothing that needed to be done...only just remain as I am...undoing happening on its own. That realization was such a relief and was so hysterically funny to me, that I sat and laughed like a madman. And every time I'd think about it, I'd burst into laughter

find out who you really are, and you will find ‘the truth’

Chop water, carry wood?

Was it Carlos Castaneda who wrote about the “agreement” we make with ourself to behave in certain ways. From a karmic perspective, It is not “conscious” but there certainly are tendencies we gravitate towards, that in turn attract certain situations and circumstances. But there is also an element of “choice”, though if we don’t have sufficient clarity of mind, those choices don’t appear to be choices. In my experience, when we develop equanimity and recognize ourself as the witness consciousness, many dark and rotten secrets about our own psyche come to light. Depending on the degree of detachment we have developed, we can then observe and release those tendencies.

Something most beautiful I’ve heard said is “you cant help but love everyone as they are not apart from your Self, but you can dislike someone when they are exhibiting an unlikeable behavior...” who was it that said, “love the sinner but dislike the sin” (was it Jesus or Gandhi?) Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa said “love all, but the one who’s being bad, love from a distance”