Yoda

Scott reminds me of a lot of super achievers and gurus... they are too aggressive to be my best friend, but they are damn smart and really do make the world a better place.

Magnesium is the answer to agoraphobia in my family. It's cheap and easy, you should see results within 1 month. Both my wife and my daughter had developed borderline agoraphobia and they have both overcome it completely after 2 months of magnesium supplements.

Is Anatomy Trains a good book? http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/044306351...glance&n=283155 How about Trail Guide to the human body? http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/096585345...glance&n=283155 Or the Hatha Yoga Anatomy book? http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/097070060...glance&n=283155 This type of thing is must reading for me. I'll start with the Hatha Yoga as it has the most raving fans on amazon.

I just got my Anatomy of Hatha Yoga. It's not technical about nerves, meridians, nadis, fascia, organs, glands, etc as I had expected but, instead, it still is a very nice book. I'd say a better title is "the complete handbook of Hatha Yoga". Compared to all the Iyengar type books out there, it does have more detailed commentary on the hows and whys of each drill which is very helpful for a beginner type like me. It gives me just a bit more detail about each drill for me to have more awareness and sensitivity for feedback. I think it's meant for a teaching audience to help articulate what's going on for their green students. It does talk you through the breathing pattern for every drill which is important for us self-educated types. Reading it won't make you the stud Anatomist, however.

Happy Birthday 2!

Cool interview! Who's Arvis? Is she a popular teacher too?

30 is an auspicious age! You've already outlived the majority of Viking Kings, too. Good work!

He'll be a great skier too.

I've been thinking of you recently--congrats!

Yeah baby! Anatomy trains website and links are way too cool. http://www.anatomytrains.net/flash/index.html

T- I wonder if his lines overlap with the Chinese meridian system? That would be pretty cool. I've just ordered the Hatha Yoga book as that seems the most apropos for a yoga type application and I'm very interested in how stretching "works" plus it's cheap and has lots of good reviews. -Y

cool find! I'm sure the picture scales the sense of touch. I've heard that the sense of touch is like nothing compared to our sense of vision. It would be interesting to see a pie chart of the senses and how much of the brain's activity each requires.

imo, steps 3-6 are all the same: feeling good. If that takes letting go, ritual, meditation, chikung, planning, hard work, tithing, gaining merit, becoming more specific about what you want, becoming less specific about what you want, playing golf more often, having sex more often/less often/retention/no retention, visualizing your enemies dying before you, visualizing the benefits that your desires will have for others, thinking about how much your parents would approve/disapprove, etc. Do whatever it takes to feel good. This is a much bigger step than focusing desire. Thelerner had just a casual desire for his cd and feeling good and worthy about his desire is what brought it to him.

Lozen, Then you have manifested an opportunity to focus your desire and play with it for awhile to entice more money your way. -Yoda

imo, lottery winnings aren't predestined for anyone specifically. Just take what you want from life, life will make more. Traditionally, people think in terms of "supply and demand" and they assume that there's a shortage of abundance instead of Jesus' "ask and you shall recieve" model. Thelerner just bought a rare cd on dreaming and I manifested a collapsed lung and Lozen gets an Accord... say if everybody started desiring dreaming cds, more would be made. Same for popped lungs and Accords. I believe that this reasoning can be used to explain larger phenomenon as well like the vibration of the planet one is born on, etc. But is most easily tested on the small experiences like the cds and so forth and go from there. Asking for more love and peace is yummier than desiring gizmos, but no problem with that either especially if you love gizmos then you'll be in on the love vibe, just getting at it the long way around. On and off in my life I've been in the groove where I could manifest anything that I desired with just a gentle amount of thought like in the cd example. It takes a certain amount of satisfaction level to manifest like that all the time. I've been in places where I couldn't manifest a happy thing worth anything so I'm reasonably understanding of both the abundancy and scarcity paradigms. Both seem very real when they are your daily experience. Just look at kids or nature if you ever want to recharge your belief in abundance and happiness. -Yoda

Sunshine, If you buy the theory that one's own vibrational transmission manifests itself whether it's Thelerner buying a cd or Yoda getting a collapsed lung... (ie both for good or for bad) then it's impossible for one person to interfere with another and a sense of liberation arises. My friend who was on his deathbed this last year blamed his doctors, his wife, his genetics, his karma, etc for his situation. After he got tired of fighting the disease he decided that death was the best option and that dying with peace in his heart was to be his objective. Somehow he was able to release others from their responsiblity for him and very quickly he recovered 99% and his recovery continues. It came with it a discovery on a very deep level that his life is his responsibility and that he can only victimize himself. -Yoda

I've seen footage of the modern Shaolin monks, they tour Vegas and do shows in China, etc. They earn their living by performing and are very impressive. I saw one interviewed and he said that they are something of a cirque solei (sp?) type of a thing, but that they are serious about their Buddhism and meditation too.

Esther is the gal who channels Abraham.

Pietro, I've seen my transitioned grandmother, so I've not had a problem with the concept of channeling. But I was a hardcore Buddhist when I was first introduced to her, so her material sounded too nice and not enough hellfire and brimstone of samsara for me. But I'm an intellectual type and was willing to explore it and eventually I felt that Abraham's explanation of causality had great explanatory power than even the most accessible Buddhist teachers that I have studied. As teachers, they embody the spirit better than Esther does but her articulations are superior--I'd say two decimal places worth of accuracy. Even if you don't believe in channeling, just pretend that she got hit on the head at a young age and has some unusual ideas to consider. On their website, they have an introductory CD you can download for free to see if it's the kind of thing that you dig. My favorite books she's written are the Sara and Seth kid stories, I think there are three books. But you can also find her recent books in any bookstore in the US to flip through. I've got plenty of tapes, and would be happy to mail them your way. The big test of her theory came with Mrs. Yoda, but it could be done much easier with a co-worker or somebody you don't spend much time with. Just imagine that person being shitty for a few days and see how they treat you and then imagine them being angelic for a few days and see what happens. Don't see the best in people for their sake, see the best in people for your sake! -Yoda

I'm cycling through magnesium awareness right now. Mrs Yoda seems to have developed a heart arrhythmia (sp?) and anxiety in the middle of the night, cramps, and lack of general cheerfulness over the last several months. The real doctor couldn't figure it out so Dr. Yoda went to work. Turns out that magnesium deficiency was the culprit. If anyone is stressed out, anxious, high blood pressure, high pulse rate, muscle cramps, and exhaustion you might keep mg in mind. Try this experiment: take a half teaspoon of potassium salt substitute and mix it w/ water and drink it during an anxious spell. (don't take too much potassium--it is seriously dangerous) If it makes you feel better within 30 minutes, you most likely have a mg deficiency. (Mg is needed to stabilize potassium levels). Due to the confusing relation between caffeine, alcohol, potassium, calcium, stress and the very disparate symptoms of Mg deficiency, it has taken me several months to figure out the cure. I kept thinking it was a potassium thing. The researchers suggest that there is an unfavorable mineral ratio in the current American diet and that many/most people in the developed world may have borderline Mg deficiencies and symptoms. I'm going to try taking Mg for a few months to see if I can see any improvement in general peacefulness and relaxation. Good article by a researcher here: http://www.mgwater.com/conseq.shtml

So I figured that if Mrs. Yoda has a magnesium deficiency and I eat the same sort of thing, then I must have one too. Maybe not, though. I've been taking magnesium for a few weeks and just recently taking magnesium gave me quite a case of hiccups which I had to take cough syrup for about a day until they passed. Also, I thought that the first symptom of getting too much magnesium is runny poo-s, but my experience seems to indicate differently. "The Magnesium Factor" says that genetics has a lot to do with it, too. I love the relaxation of taking Natural Calm, so I'll take a week off and hopefully will be able to pick it up again in reduced amounts or I'll try one of their mg/calcium blends to keep things more balanced.

That's why affirmations and revving up desire are secondary to relaxation and bliss in importance. A friend of mine was recently dying and really desired strongly to live and it didn't help one bit. Only when he resigned himself peacefully to death did his health problems disapear. We all know stories like that. To be a megastar like Bill Gates or Michael Jordan, you need to redline the desire but even they need to keep the fun as the primary ingredient.

Michael, No charge, totally kid friendly, possibly no agenda, perhaps a bit of practice depending on the crowd. See ya in a couple of years! That's also exactly why too much energy practice with not enough meditation can be very challenging, and why I'm not not totally gungho on extreme retention, standing, and sungazing at the moment. That's what happened to the badass high energy practitioners like RJ and Yudelove, imo. When I was sungazing, my power to manifest was high but my manifestations were as stable as Einsteinium. I'm now a believer in the slow boat... keeping the yang of desire and ambition in balance with the yin of bliss and allowing. Corporate trainers, coaches, self-improvement books all emphasize the former so you really have to make a point of making sure you are getting the latter.

That's the idea! My pal bought the first chunk of land and has established a killer vibe already. There's another chunk that will be available in another year or so I can add on to what he's done. After that, there are many more acres owned by a very elderly man, etc. Obviously, getting over 100 acres will require plenty of synchronicity and savoirfaire and anyone is welcome to visit and check out the vibe and just visit regularly or actually buy in if so moved. But we'll have an annual taobums retreat for sure! -Yoda

In terms of the use of affirmations, what I've learned from Abraham/Silva/Advancedyogapractices.com is that you are best off making the affirmations in an alpha/meditative state. Check out samyama at ayp. Meditation is more valuable than affirmations, though, as life elicits affirmations and desires out of each of us naturally. In recent years my goals have been to improve my marriage and to find a good practice routine. While those goals are never 100% complete, I feel that I have achieved those two goals. My third goal is to create an empire: 100 acres of retreat center that will lure pals, bumz, locals, artists, teachers, etc to my backyard. I've recently "officially" started the pursuit of this objective. It'll take a 50% increase in my income to do achieve phase 1. I intend to achieve this within 2 years. After nailing phase 1 (20 acres) I'll work on my ambition to be a comedian. First goal to be a funny one, second goal to be a profitable one. Fundamentally, I don't care how long all this will take as long as I'm having fun with it. Also it is to be accomplished not at the expense of the first two goals. I want those to progress first and foremost. -Yoda