thelerner

I know , just being cantankerous- writing in old grumpy guy persona.

Here's a list of the top 6 yoga postures for back pain. http://www.goodnewsn...k-pain-pg1.html I see you do squats. When I do them, I swing my hands between my knees as I bend down, and in a relaxed arch throw them above my head as I rise, so that my elbows naturally end pointing straight up and my hands gently hit the back of my head. Then reverse it, arms circle down (away from the body), knees bend, hands flow between legs. It's a big relaxed motion. I think it stretches and relaxes my back nicely.

Here's a little more info from the ACLU 4/26/2012 What You Need to Know about H.R. 347, the "Criminalizing Protest" Law By Gabe Rottman, Legislative Counsel, ACLU Washington Legislative Office at 11:35am Last month, I wrote about a then-little known bill designated H.R. 347 and titled the "Federal Restricted Buildings and Grounds Improvement Act of 2011." The law, signed by the president in mid-March, expands an existing statute that criminalizes certain activity in and around areas that are restricted by the Secret Service. Given the approaching protests, it may be worth providing a more detail on how exactly the law works, and what protesters can expect. Preliminarily, it's important to define one particular term in the law: "restricted buildings or grounds." These are specific geographic zones that have been designated by the Secret Service, and can be located under H.R. 347 in three places: • The White House or the vice president's residence. • A building or area where any individual under Secret Service protection is visiting. • A building or area at which a National Special Security Event (or "NSSE") is taking place (more on that in a second). Under the existing statute, four types of activities were illegal with respect to these zones, and remain so under the new law: • You cannot "knowingly" enter or remain in a restricted zone without lawful authority. • You cannot "knowingly" engage in "disorderly or disruptive" conduct in or near a restricted zone. A prosecutor would have to show, however, that you intended to disrupt government business and that your conduct actually did cause a disruption. Troublingly, the term "disorderly or disruptive conduct" is undefined. • You cannot "knowingly" block the entrance or exit of one of these restricted zones. Again, however, the prosecutor would have to show that you did so with the intent to disrupt government business. • Finally, you cannot "knowingly" engage in an act of physical violence against person or property in one of these restricted zones. You'll notice that "knowingly" is in quotation marks above. This is one of the two major changes to existing law (the other is the extension of the statute to the White House and VP's residence). Previously, the law required someone to act "willfully and knowingly." This is the state of mind the government has to prove you had to establish your guilt (the "intent standard"). "Willfully and knowingly" means that you need to know you're committing a crime. "Knowingly" just means you need to be aware you're in a restricted zone, but not necessarily that it's unlawful. (Incidentally, the punishment can be relatively severe. If you commit the offense with a weapon or if you cause injury (a felony), it can carry a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison and a fine of $250,000. Otherwise, the maximum is one year in prison and a fine of up to $100,000.) There are a couple of other details worth noting to understand the full scope of the law. First, the Secret Service does not just protect the president and vice president. Rather, the agency has the responsibility for protecting the president, vice president and their immediate families; former presidents, vice presidents and certain family members; certain foreign dignitaries; major presidential and vice presidential candidates (within 120 days of an election); and other individuals as designated by a presidential executive order. If any of these individuals are temporarily visiting a location, this law kicks in. Also, lots of attention has been paid to the National Special Security Events, which include things like presidential inaugurations, nominating conventions and even large spectacles like the Super Bowl. The Department of Homeland Security has massive discretion (which in and of itself is a problem) to designate one of these events as an NSSE based on things like the expected number of attendees and the presence of dignitaries. So, what does this mean for lawful protesters? The honest answer is we simply don't know yet. These zones will hopefully occupy (no pun intended) a very small footprint at the three types of locations covered by the law. Also, these areas must be clearly identified to prevent protesters from inadvertently violating the law (or else they can't form the required intent). That said, the provision covering disruptions in or near the secure zones is of concern and could be misused to stifle lawful protest; same with the entrance/exit provision. These were already in the law, but the "knowingly" change could make them easier to abuse. Get Involved Sign the letter: Respect protestors' rights to free speech Act Now So far, we haven't seen any evidence that H.R. 347 specifically is being deployed aggressively by the Secret Service to tamp down on protests by Occupy or anyone else. That said, with the coming of spring 2012 and the November election, protest activity is undoubtedly going to grow rapidly. We'll be vigilant at the ACLU for any abuse, misuse or overuse, and we urge anyone who knows of any arrests or prosecutions under the new law to let us know.

I like Kap's 'Secret Smile' more then the organ based Healing Tao Inner Smile which is less organ/sound based and more a emotion/orbit technique. Both are good. When I'm good I'll do it every time I'm in the bathroom. Santiago has a good explanation of it on a thread.

Hmnnnn, I've farted better poems then that Michael <get off my lawn> thelerner

MJ may not be the demon right wingers make it out to be, indeed it's probably a benign medicine for some conditions, but putting smoke into fluffy white lungs isn't a good idea. I'd add (imo) heavy long term use is a very bad idea. my 2 cents.

I don't know about increasing chi, but its tremendously helpful for my flexibility, both in the sauna and later that day. The added flexibility helps me sit longer. I think its good for you, but wouldn't advise people 'fry' themselves trying to absorb more chi .

San Fran is great. Giant China town, we caught a few groups of early morning Tai chi players. The Golden Gate Bridge Park is beautiful; huge with great walking trails, there's a beautiful formal Japanese garden ($ to enter) that borders it. A few hours south is Big Sur, great hiking, old world forests, fantastic restaurants and great views from the death defying highway that runs by the ocean.

hmmn, that works well, but leaves me thirsty I'd also add like a hand mudra, repeatedly doing a mantra has a Pavlovian effect. By repeatedly doing it in a meditative state, it throws you into that state quicker. I've been doing some mantra meditations lately and it seems to repress thoughts quicker then most emptiness style meditations. Also if you follow systems of 'kotodama'- sacred sounds, beyond religious significance the vowels effect different areas of your body for release or accentuating. For example, hAAAaah is a universal heart sound in many traditions, EEeeeeee pretty clearly resonates in the throat, etc.,

I'd let him sleep. His writings are Confusioning enough .

In some cases I can. Low lighting, subject is against light colored background. For me the eye focus Zanshin is speaking of is wide focus. For example holding your hands up at the periphery of where your eyes can see them. Wiggle your fingers of both hands, head level, arms out, just at the edge of your sight. Stay there for a bit, you can still notice what's infront of you, but you're not paying attention to it. That 'wide' stare is used in some martial arts and esoteric practices. Glenn Morris writes about it in his book 'Pathnotes ...'.

Good point, screw Monsanto. There is some serious government/university work being done on unlocking the true benefits of GM. And that research has to kept funded, legal and above ground.

Frankly I don't think U, right now, can find bliss. To find it U will have to change & change is hard. Change takes time, Change requires patience. The search for bliss 'right now' is the search for a drug. It won't last long, U have no foundation. Get a foundation, start where you are. 3 different people have mentioned Ajahn Brahms; he's big on bliss or Jhana states but getting there takes work. The good news is most of the work is subtraction, less thinking, less noise, less reaction. You get there by changing U.

I suspect you'll have to give up some skepticism and all of your impatience to get there. You have to look at several paths (your skepticism can help here) then surrender to it, letting go of impatience and your goal and walk its path. These days I'm reading Ajahn Brahm's 'Mindfulness, Bliss and Beyond, A meditator's Handbook', he also has many audio lectures available here http://diydharma.org/search/node/ajahn%20brahm. He's a pretty savvy teacher, who makes it clear that bliss states are not so far away. You could do worse then listening to a few of them.

I agree with mrtiger. If you're in a conspiracy mindscape, every action will be seen as part of conspiracy, bad things happens because some rich powerful super genius Illuminati figure having carefully crafted a plot to make it so. To me its a modern carry over from the age old tribal belief that evil witchcraft was responsible for all sickness and bad luck in the village. A theory is only as good as its predictive model. Certainly many in the hardcore conspiracy world have been predicting apocalypse this year or next for decades. Personally I think the future is hard to predict. There are big wild cards like technology that change the game and events often pivot on leaders, people are biased toward recent trends and don't realize that they peak and reverse themselves. Certainly predictions from the late 60's and 70's were pretty bleak, with running out oil, mass starvation and total Mad Max scenario's. So in 10 years, what will happen? Who will be responsible? Personally, I don't know. The usual changes, some good some bad, maybe more good because we've been in a worldwide recession and historically they come and go, hopefully this one is going. I don't think there's a cabal responsible, rather big trends are created by resources and human psychology. This combination creates the flow of history though leaders act as fulcrums accentuating the forces of history.

I have mixed feelings about it. We've been hugely modifying food for a millenia, just not in a lab. It's a tool, used well it can increase vitamin levels in food, preventing many diseases and blindness, increase protein, provide better yields. It is a Frankenstein technique, but the rewards of doing it well for humanity are great. We should be careful not to throw out the baby with the bath water due to fear. If that means only allowing non profits who'll carefully regulate and distribute gains to society, I'm okay with that approach. It'd nice to see cuts in military going towards intelligent Genetic Modification, cause I get the feeling food and water may be at the heart of next couple conflicts.

Morning bad, coffee Good. grunt, grunt, Beyond its taste and stimulant effect, its loaded with antioxidants and some good bioflavinoids. Çoffee drinkers seem to have protection against some nerve diseases like Parkinsons. I think individual metabolisms probably over ride generic yes' and no's. It's definitely a stimulant, can be harsh on adrenals and the stomach and some people can't handle it.

hell, just find an empty one and declare it yours. Squatters rights!!~

I tend to agree with you, especially on Tummo. Still there may be levels that are way deeper then hypnotists go accessible to hard core meditators. Deepak Chopra had an interesting take on placebos. He said when people were administered a certain neural drug, the placebo affect stopped. I think its on this audio or one of the series http://diydharma.org...1-deepak-chopra I believe his point was that within the placebo affect the mind was telling the body to produce the chemical it needed and the drug interfered. The body may have the ability to produce its own powerful drugs naturally, it's a matter of learning to access it, which might be a very individualistic skill.

and we're not there. pics http://www.reuters.com/news/pictures/slideshow?articleId=USRTR378WX#a=1 maybe next year. this years midwest regional was bigger and better then ever though.

It's not too expensive or wasn't. 3 years ago it was $300, for 7 or 8 days or mind blowing adventure its not that bad. For a week plus, it's a bargain, if you can make the week, burn out is high. While you're required to be totally self sufficient, the reality is I mooched like hell. Drinks, food, anything. I've tried to make up by being better organized and sharing at the regionals. Speaking of other events, in a month or two there will be the after burn party in Chicago, located on the top floor of a large industrial building, 8 hours of fun. For anyone interested here is my writeup of going to a burning man: http://thetaobums.co...arning-to-burn/ I've got a couple more write ups of regionals buried in my Personal Discussion page.

Just found Runesoup.com. Here is hip answer to the question: What I Would Say To Your Slightly Older Kids Read more: http://runesoup.com/2011/08/what-i-would-say-to-your-slightly-older-kids/#ixzz258qR8dR6

Lotta free lectures and daily classes at burning man, from physics to psychedelics. Hundreds of themed camps that share what ever the hell it is they're about. Part of it is creating and teaching your passion and piece of utopia.

No black holes suck. Gravity is just lazy.

To me the bad thing is maybe one person in 50,000 seriously practices elemental magick. Here you have 2 people who are involved in it and they immediately bicker. They share a highly uncommon interest, both have expertise in the matter from similar traditions yet couldn't get on the right footing. I'm sorry Templetao was given a timeout. He wrote to me a PM earlier saying it was too bad they couldn't have started the conversation better. That's the problem with forum communication, we lack nuance, its easy to jump to conclusion and take offense, when in real life, we'd see the person, get a whole lot more feedback and find the mutual understanding. I've learned from Templetao and DNB's postings. When this blows over (and it will) I hope they can discuss there passion here together cause that's what the bums is about.