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Hi everyone! I am new to these forums, but in the past I have read some of the entries here as a lurker with great interest. I am in my early 30s. I've been studying and practicing Zen for the past 12 years. I took precepts as a layperson and also the Bodhissatva vow (oops, in retrospect that one was more than I bargained for). My practice lately involves sitting for 45 minutes a handful of times per week with my sangha here in Northern California, doing trauma release exercises (TRE) with a licensed practitioner once a week, and a bunch of mundane grounding stuff. I also see Buddhist trauma-informed therapist 2x a week. Lately I have been working on my soma and getting in touch with the somatic element of experience. My upbringing was chaotic and unsafe so I had a very above-the-neck experience of self until these past few years where I established a sense of embodied safety. That journey is still ongoing and I guess a part of my interest in joining this forum was to chat with others who are also getting in touch with the soma and working with the felt sense in an embodied way. I have some questions for the forum and I'd be really interested to hear others' perspectives on the following: I have done Iyengar yoga for a number of years and I have enough sensitivity that I can feel areas of "dense" energy within the body. With time, trauma therapy, meditation, and surrender these areas are beginning to "break up" and leave. What do you make of this? I believe from a western perspective these "dense" areas might be character armoring. It feels good for the energy to begin to break up and flow but this is all very new to me, since I was dissociated for over 25 years. In particular I'm struggling with a feeling of stuck energy in my throat. Pieces break off but I'm torn between wanting this energy to leave and accepting that it can only resolve at the rate it resolves and it's not totally in my control. Does anyone have advice for gently working through energy blockages? Does anyone have a qigong master or practice group they recommend for someone in the Bay Area? I'm interested in safely cultivating qi, learning to ground and protect my own qi (I worry I am too "open"), and learning to let go of dense energy from the past. I apologize if any of these questions don't really make sense. For a long time I was too afraid to discuss qi with anyone, since I live in a western materialist culture and these ideas are not a part of my culture of origin. Anyway, thank you for reading and cheers.

After a very long hiatus, my brother convinced me to get back into running. In doing so I read a book called Born to Run by Chris McDougall. Amazing book whether you like to run or not. Among other things, the book discusses the principles of 'barefoot' running. Some take this quite literally and run barefoot in nearly all conditions. Others apply this more as minimalist running and wear running sandals or minimalist shoes (no heel rise or arch support). I've taken this to heart not only in my running but my day to day life. I've always been one to remain barefoot whenever at home and whenever possible out and about. I'm expanding that, going for long walks barefoot, running barefoot. I've now found some minimalist shoes to wear at work. I'm astonished at how good I feel. The foot was meant to feel the ground and experience physical stress to remain strong and healthy. We have been conditioned to lock our feet in cushioned boxes that cause them to weaken profoundly and take away all tactile relationship to the earth. I think there are many physical ailments that are related to our use of shoes (plantar fascitis, Achilles tendonitis, neuromas, flat feet, back pain, knee pain). Anyone else embrace this? I'm interested in your thoughts and experiences. Peace

"Are Humans Solar Powered? Are we, too, solar powered, like plants? It’s no longer a question, it’s an answer. Summary of TEDxtalk: Water, Cells, Life by Dr. Gerald Pollack, a water scientist at the University of Washington, tell us where the energy comes from that supplies our bodies with get up and go. In it, Dr. Pollack challenges the long-held explanation that the bulk of our energy comes from food, in the form of calories. He provides an entirely new and very exciting paradigm, one that will open up new dimensions of body energy for accelerated healing and vitality. And he shares his unexpected laboratory results to back his explanation up. This will surely be a seminal TEDxtalk. In it Dr. Pollack makes two unexpected and paradigm-advancing points. Hold onto your hat." http://www.greenmedinfo.com/blog/are-humans-solar-powered The links at the bottom of the article are pretty mind boggling too!

Here's something to beware of: 'spiritual bypassing': It's often said that spiritual practice requires virtues like grounding, courage, persistence, wisdom and compassion and there's why. I don't think the concept of spiritual bypassing is anything new, it's old wine in new bottles, but it is a good modern restatement of something that's always warned against but can get missed easily. As well as being symptomatic of misapplied practice these aspects can also be causes and spurs to spiritual practice too.

I'm a newbie here. I did semen retention once and got really really grounded (I think it's the right word) - (a kind of innate unreactiveness and unscattering of vision, thoughts and consciousness). Meditation - calms the mind, I guess practicing an unreactiveness to thoughts but this is abolutely nothing compared to the extreme semen retention experience I had. I see it as forced grounding of the mind. Agree? Zhan zhuang - Heat (blod) comfortable circulates, making me feel more refreshed after. Is that what you mean when you say qi? Increases my physical energy. [i call it] Preventing energy leaks along with deep breathing - which is my attempt to carry over Zhan zhuang to every-day-life. Basically relaxing the muscles fully (which is easy with deep breathing). E.g when I notice tension somewhere, I breathe deep, it relaxes. It results in feeling more refreshed. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- So as mentioned, these techniques makes me feel "refreshed" and physically energized as if I want to take a run or something. Also increases mood But that EXTREME grounding, is it exclusive to semen retention? I'm thinking that these practices builds up energy slowly and only gets harder with time, like this http://goo.gl/m4QEjq But semen retention is "hacking the system" because you are taking all your energy from previous sexual usage and using it to ground your consciousness. So you already start out with A LOT of energy! I'm interested in reading any thoughts and/or answer to the original question <3