longrhythm

I will start with a disclaimer. Since shifting my focus recently from quantity to quality I have been humbled to the extent that anything I say might be no more than postulating. This is all hypothetical, I can't know any of it, only intimations. That said, here's how I look at where I come from, from where I am. I've shifted my energetic focus from the orbit to the sushumna. It feels further center, like radiating out from the core instead of tracing the core from the outside. Does that make the orbit inherently yang? Circling the center from the outside... Anyhow, I find since I've made the shift that I can run the orbit in a VERY physical way, no visualization required. I actually close the grip on my spine in the order of the orbit such that the nerves are stimulated directly in a smooth line up the back and down the front. What I've found is that running the orbit this way, although gentle, and fully experiential, causes extreme exaggeration of any imbalances. Literally, three turns will have my body out of whack the entire next day. Itchiness, soreness, not to mention emotional consequences that I've become capable enough of accepting that they don't even qualify for symptoms. What does this mean to me? It's great that I can feel the orbit in such a physical manner, and it's great to know it's so easy, like breathing! LOL. But it's clear to me that I'm just not ready to play with that. What good is stimulating my entire spine from the outside if the wiring in there is questionable, if I might be shooting off all sorts of fireworks recklessly in the rest of my body. I need to very thoroughly tend to the what before I focus on the how much, smooth out the inside before I come at it from outside. Again this all comes from a place of strong humility, but I figure if it resonates with even one person, it's worth sharing.

Thanks Carson. I totally agree with you! I only saw after reading your reply that half my original post had been cut off. It's actually really great to need to cut back, suddenly practices that were just "visualizations" have become so real that I can feel in my body just how much preparation is necessary to use them safely. It's all so wonderfully tangible. What a turning point...

My masters thesis research revealed how the yin and yang of Taoism and qigong healing energy is modeled by the 2:3 Perfect 5th music ratio as yang and the 3:4 Perfect 4th music ratio as yin. Since the music ratios are nonwestern and not modeled by symmetric math there is an inherent transduction of the sound energy into ultrasound and then ionization of increased intensity as listening continues. Healing energy is then based on the "cycle of fifths" music ratios as an infinite spiral or open loop of pure consciousness listening to itself, creating the illusion of spacetime bending into energy-matter. Very cool! So would you agree that 2:1 or 1:2, the octave, is Wuji? The thing about a perfect fourth and a perfect fifth is that they are the same thing, but from reverse perspective. In other words C to G is a 5th and G to C is a fourth. That means they both identify ONE relationship, changing only the perspective from which it is measured. I see this translating into viewing the pineal from the prostate as yang, while viewing the prostate from the pineal as yin. It's one relationship, only a fixed perspective which changes. So does that mean wuji is letting go of the fixed perspective? Is it multitasking? Is it soft vision? Good read man, thanks!

I come back to read this every couple of months. Every time I do I feel my heart clearly. I suddenly understand what it means to feel the heart open. The heart is open between beats- the thump is the closing of the dam. And my God these words just beautifully encapsulate that- Thank you so much for this. Brian

Trunk! Thanks for this idea- it's perfect. Starting using a handheld massager from Brookstone- major difference i've noted (aside from basic softening down there, increased sensation, kind of a freshly "steamed" feeling) is that during stressed moments- when I would generally struggle to work through energetic chaos to find something clear and stable- my sacrum is clear. It's an instant ground for me now, and incredibly reliable. Great great stuff! Brian

Using force to try and feel my chakras. Taking in too much air. Being greedy and lacking gentleness. Only last night I discovered I can oxygenate from bottom to top with very small breaths. Deep breathing doesn't have to be full breathing, breath can be short and deep too.

Using force to try and feel my chakras. Taking in too much air. Being greedy and lacking gentleness. Only last night I discovered I can oxygenate from bottom to top with very small breaths. Deep breathing doesn't have to be full breathing, breath can be short and deep too.

This is a post that would likely belong in a personal practice journal, but since I don't have one, I'll post here. I hope it's of value to others anyway. I chose the name longrhythm because it's an optimistic way of saying I'm a slow learner. That means when something clicks it's extra important that I note it down, cause it takes too long to learn the same lesson twice. I felt something instinctual about semen retention long before I learned of it's esoteric existence. Here's my story and what I've learned from it. A few years back I dated a girl who drove my yang energy crazy. I didn't control myself at all. I was emotionally needy, insecure, volatile, reactive, and could only control my bedroom pace after a preliminary ejaculation, if at all. At some point I came up with the idea on my own that my ability to control my ejaculation was parallel to my ability to control my behavior and emotional state. I felt the desire to begin retaining my semen instinctually. I never could though, it was by then habit for me to rescind all self control to her. After we broke up I became addicted to ejaculation. I would cum by any means necessary at least four times a day. I became depressed and depleted. I started showing physical symptoms- weight loss, sunken eyes. The worst of which was a psycho-somatic itching- where I'd scratch til I had hives and then til I bled. Two dermatology visits confirmed it was all in my head. After starting my practices, I met a new girl. I was dedicated and successfully retained through ninety percent of our lovemaking, with little to no temptation to ejaculate, regardless of the circumstance of the moment. I was emotionally strong. I was physically fit and healthy. After five or six months, I started to cave to temptation. I started to take her invitations. I started ejaculating more often than not, thinking that since I was holding off that it was by choice, when I was ready, making it OK. Next thing I know, the itching comes back. Suddenly I'm insecure about her modeling and music career. I'm low on energy and losing interest in the things I like to do. My stabilizing muscles are getting lazy and my posture suffers. The relationship suffers. I'm sure there's a point where jing in the body is right where it should be. At the height of my retention there were times where I would build up painful pressure, and release was the only relief, so there's certainly two extremes here. But what I'm learning is how elusive that right balance really is. And how slippery a slope it can be to slide right back into that addiction to ejaculating. I've started to map a distinct spectrum of wellness, incorporating both mental and physical states, that correlates directly to the level of jing I maintain in the body, and starting to see where I lie on that spectrum rather clearly. I'm looking forward to grasping the point of balance, and allowing my life to flow from there. And I'm immensely grateful to this community for helping me along my search, and providing me a place to realize my progress. Brian

don't you think?

Picture any tensegrity model- the photo you attached is perfect. The legs and spine don't touch- they're like three of the bars in the model you posted. The muscles along the bottom of the pelvis are the cables that attach those three bars. So the strength of the pc is essentially whats transferring the support of the legs to the base of the spine. Everything above that depends on it. Brian

After a 20/20 hindsight evaluation of a tough period of my life, and a subsequent review of NLP, I realized that the background on my phone said "patient focus" and that had contributed to my lack of social functioning and 3.9 GPA 45 classes and two years into Berklee. Recently the background on my phone has been a photo of a drawing I did, of the Taoist Koan, Man on a vine hanging from a cliff, Tigers above and below respectively past and future, Mice gnawing at the vine above his hand showing the inevitability of the passage of time, Man using free hand to pick a strawberry off the cliff. Longevity practices to me are geared towards enjoying that strawberry as long as possible before the mice break the vine and my internal magnetism is called to task. I wanna stay whole. Brian

A wonderful shift just occurred for me in my practice. Being part of this group is such a privilege, having so many different ideas floating around in my head has led me to take so many different approaches, helped me find so many new things that work, and writing my thoughts down for others to see has reinforced my efforts strongly. Near the beginning of my practice I was struggling to see inside myself. My cavity was pitch black, totally foreign. Many of the emotions I was attempting to work with were foreign to my concious mind, and so I was grabbing in the dark. Visualizing form then, at that early stage, was an act of seeking. At some point as I began to light things up a bit, to become more sensitive, I was able to identify the presence of my grandparents in my kidneys and liver. This was a big acheivement. I couldn't identify any of my other yin organs in a similar manner, so shortly after I stopped addressing my organs as presences. I shifted into visualizing as an act of referencing. For a while my practice stagnated, I was going through motions, picturing things and forcing feeling from my mind regardless of what it was I was actually working with in my body. Inspired by an article recently posted here, I sat down with only the intention of allowing the presences of each of my organs to communicate with one another. I changed the role of my mind in the process from director to facilitator. What a shift! Suddenly practicing has moved back to a process of exploration, of subtler observation. I think my visualization was useful up to a point, but once the lights started to come on, it had become masturbatory. Referencing only the parts that were easy to picture, I was working only with the fully operational parts, ignoring any weakness. As I understand my Taoist practices are geared towards acheiving health and then healthy growth and development, which means I must constantly seek out the dark corners to illuminate and incorporate them. Just wanted to share, I've remembered the difference between visualizing and observing. I'm going back to observing. Blessings, Brian

Eat the chi! anybody have any interesting notions of the quality of energy for different types of emotions? Yin or yang energy for negative or positive? Yin is negative isn't it? Textures? I'm curious. And absolutely eat the chi! Brian

Tensegrity applied to the coccyx and femurs explains perfectly why a strong pc muscle aids in walking, squatting and posture.

I've recently found that I can run up and down my core channel with no sense of effort or blockage. With the orbit it feels too large and clumsy, in the spine it's much narrower and FAST. I recently came across the quote for which this post is named in some meditation notes of Ken Wilber, and found it very empowering, the same quote translating for body, thoughts, and desires. My previous alchemical approach of "converting" negative emotion, was always somewhat forced and clumsy, and while regular practice certainly improves my baseline, it does to help me in times when I feel overwhelmed by some negative emotion, usually a fast process, which has an immediate impact, and also usually at times when sitting and meditating is not so much an option. What I've found is that by dis-identifying this way from my emotions, and carrying them as opposed to being them, I'm driven into my core channel, inside my spine, where no matter what I'm feeling in my organs or thinking in my head, it's nice and quiet. It feels like being in a cozy quiet room while a storm goes by outside. And now from this place, those storms of negative emotion, they've become the best way to highlight the quiet of my core. Contrast defines it. So in a strange way I'm almost craving stimulation of those negative feelings, as opportunities to get inside my core and look out at them unfased. It's a wonderful twist on things. Brian

I've noticed recently why I look younger now than I did before I started my study of qigong and human anatomy. In a drivers license I had when I was 21, my face is extremely asymmetrical. My mouth is flatlined, but parallel to the floor, essentially balancing me the way my eyes and ears should, and everything else is on different planes. In a drive

I've regained a LOT of control over my sacrum, but one thing I notice, everything is done with flexion. The pelvic floor can only pull the tailbone in, and whats more, after 20 some years of sitting on my tailbone, often with poor posture, my sacrum is already pulled in to a large degree. To really put it simply, I'm walking around with my tail between my legs. NO MORE. I want full control. I want to be able to wag. Who knows about the extensor coccygis? From my understanding it's generally dismissed as connective tissue, likely because it's in a state of complete atrophy from total neglect. I haven't been able to find much in the way of anatomy or images. Anyone who's got some info please please please share it. Thanks, Brian

so let me note that my liver is taxed, my kidneys are overabundant. I'm feeling very gentle right now, knowing I'll be angry for it in the morning. I won't know why so let this be a reminder. Also, something I've put together tonight. Pushing back at C7 fixes the spine at an angle from the arms (of which the collarbone and shoulder blades are a part). Mainaining a fixture of that creates two more limbs that measure weight, just as the legs do. As Pavel says, pushing away is stronger than pushing against, and when you think like a four legger on two legs, your body changes composition. Kind of made me feel the dragon over tiger thing in a whole new way. Once the lumbar and hips are related and the cervical and shoulders are related the thoracic is the joining faction between the dragon and the tiger. What section of the spine are the kidneys supposed to surround? Brian

Also, The triple burner joins the lungs and heart, the spleen and liver, and the kidneys and sex organs into three different groups. Organize the spine accordingly. I've been using my spine to house my MCO which is why it's been flying lately. Here's what I've been looking for, acupressure according to this innervation chart will help me use the MCO to plant my Shen using my nervous system directly in an organ before practicing healing. http://www.wingmakers.co.nz/spine%5B1%5D.gif I will alternate between left and right hand to descend one vertebrae at a time from C1 and feel the connections.

So my orbit has been flying lately, enough that I might need to change my handle. I've been running it at any idle moment, as well as letting it run itself as punctuation during fusion and healing practices. Since I tend to close my day with this, I also let it run a while in bed while lying on my back, then turn to my side and limit it to the little orbit when I want to fall asleep. Tonight I was at the part where I'm on my back, and my perspective as I watched the orbit run was fixed at my pineal. So I was sitting between my ears watching a point of energy head down yin, away from me, then up yang, back to me. And I just sat there watching it go away and back over and over. And then I realized that the part of me that was sitting between my ears watching was just stagnant energy, that might as well be moving along too. So I started to try and chip away at it, bringing a little more of my observer along with the observed every time, and I sort of felt something shift, but I can tell this will be a challenge. I tried to situate my observer at each point along the orbit for several rotations, the poles are far easier, but it still has an effect at each one. Save for hui yin though I pretty much feel always somewhere in my head watching it. Anyway it was years of meditating on ego and observer that eventually brought me to taoist alchemy, and it seems like tonight those two ways of approaching have merged together. I'm excited to see what happens as I continue to chip at the fixed perspectives I take when moving energy. Anyone know where I can get one of those practice journals? P.S.- I only tonight linked the midpoint between the ears and the pineal, and seeing how hearing is linked to the kidneys, I wanted to note a correlation between the lower dantian, between the kidneys, and the pineal gland, between the ears. Probably gone too heady now, overanalyzing, and since the whole point is that I clear that up I'll stop here. Later Brian

Hi everybody- I've been poking around as a guest for a while and finally had the motive to register so I'm glad to be on board. I've been meditating for about 7 years now, only came into Taoist concepts in the last year. Before that everything was spiritual for me, upper half. Had a Kundalini rising that made me shit myself, spent years agonizing without knowing why. Finally came into the concept of soul, and been working through the orbit to reconcile the top and bottom since then. I've seen some great breakthroughs, and I've learned some lessons over and over, but one thing for sure I feel my main path near, and I'm glad to be part of a community with similar inclinations. I Look forward to exchanging with you all. Brian

Since beginning my practice of non-ejaculatory orgasm, I have had several experiences of what seems like backup- for lack of a better word- in my lower abdomen. Often I'll still experience blue-balls, and during periods of high activity the pressure will climb up the front, engorging my abdomen from the bottom up to a point where it's painful. Has anybody else experienced this? Is there a circulation issue, something about the orbit, or any alchemical reference at all to blue-balls that you know of? Please share. Thanks, Brian