Generating Heat with specific breathing techniques.

[Encephalon]

Edited October 15, 2009 by Blasto

[JustARandomPanda]

Thank you! I have implemented these suggestions.

[NeiChuan]

Dr. Jwing-Ming Yang is Awesome. Always super informative.

 

Thanks alot =D.

[Eternal_Student]

Just a small tidbit of info.

 

make sure your perineum and sphincter muscles are closed. don't "push" too hard on the exhale.

you can blow qi out your butt!

 

and keep the neck extremely relaxed during any pressurization of any sort, anywhere.

if the neck gets stuck, it can create some really tough energetic imbalances to sort out for your acupuncturist!

Edited October 15, 2009 by Eternal_Student

[Trunk]

There is a piece of breathing advice ...

Interesting post.

 

Upon absolute full expansion, hold that air in without holding your breath, i.,e., without closing your epiglottis. Keep your airway as open as possible and imagine your body sucking in all that oxygen. Work up to ten seconds before resuming your exhale.

It might be implied in your description already, but I find a good direction is to relax with the held-in breath. There is no pressure with the holding-in, just a very relaxed holding-in. That relaxation allows an alchemy exchange between the held-in air and your own internals... that gets cut off by the tension of a forced held-in breath. Maybe what you meant already.

 

(Of course there are also breathing methods that do use moderate force in order to massage tissues and increase circulation.)

[Encephalon]

Interesting post.

 

It might be implied in your description already, but I find a good direction is to relax with the held-in breath. There is no pressure with the holding-in, just a very relaxed holding-in. That relaxation allows an alchemy exchange between the held-in air and your own internals... that gets cut off by the tension of a forced held-in breath. Maybe what you meant already.

 

(Of course there are also breathing methods that do use moderate force in order to massage tissues and increase circulation.)

 

Yes. Good points. There are many subtleties to this practice that can't be overlooked. I prefer to think of the entire inbreath/outbreath as an infinity symbol, where you are completely relaxed throughout the entire cycle, especially at the moments in between inhalations and exhalations. This does not include the abdominal contractions of the exhale and the sphincter tug on the inhale.

 

Isn't it mindblowing that the most powerful technique known to humankind for increasing chi is about breathing and tightening your exit valve? The Tao has a sense of humor.

[growant]

How does the sphincter tug on the inhale/tightening exit valve work/how is it performed?

[Trunk]

*bump*

I prefer to think of the entire inbreath/outbreath as an infinity symbol, where you are completely relaxed throughout the entire cycle, especially at the moments in between inhalations and exhalations. This does not include the abdominal contractions of the exhale and the sphincter tug on the inhale.

[Vajrasattva]

Edited November 1, 2009 by Vajrasattva

[Trunk]

Good point and on-target to the item of confusion in this thread and elsewhere.

contraction of abs and muscles is good and needed in the beginning. BUT BE CAREFUL. one can get hurt and also obsessed with "Heat" ...

 

Heat is widely misunderstood, I think. Though there are some kinds of heat that are good signs at very advanced levels, I believe that in the beginning heat is:

- a sign of trapped heat (stress) releasing

- perpetually aroused jing, sexual heat, being considered a good thing

- a sign of pressure being used too early in training.

 

People want circulation in/from the lower tan tien and there is the somewhat crude but sometimes useful strategy to use pressure and heat to prompt circulation. While sometimes this works, it's overall a risky way and sometimes loses the beginning goals.

 

When energy is harmonized then circulation occurs of it's own and (while some initial trapped heat might come out) it supports the general beginning goals of harmonizing and calming: The energy becomes supple, kind, circulating and nourishing. Without subduing, you can not accumulate.

 

All this talk of paths of fire // water are dancing around the basic path of harmony.

 

Trunk

[lino]

[Gerard]

I will advice you to stop doing this sort of practice unless it is suited to you (not everyone is) and you are supervised by a reputable teacher. Good luck.

 

 

Edited: typo.

Edited November 1, 2009 by durkhrod chogori

[Trunk]

I've noticed the "relaxed breath retention at the apex & nadir" show up in various systems as well. It is usually complemented by some moderate kinds of breathing that focus more on moderately massaging the physical, plus a broader system of breath + movement (like yoga, qi gong, or internal martial art). The still relaxed retention is in small doses within a broader regimen, as I've seen. It's strong: over-use and you get kinda wacky for a while. Moderate use can really help.

[gendao]

[TianhuaQigong]

can not read that long,

 

if you are breath in a slow , weak , long, small , Dantian getting hot , the a good sign,

 

if you use a strong breath to push Qi, and getting hot, that is not right. could go to a wrong way.

[Encephalon]

can not read that long,

 

if you are breath in a slow , weak , long, small , Dantian getting hot , the a good sign,

 

if you use a strong breath to push Qi, and getting hot, that is not right. could go to a wrong way.

 

Yes indeed. I've posted more than once my overheating. I got hooked on how powerful the energy felt. Now, if I feel I need to warm things up, I take Master Co's advice and only breathe this way three times before the Little Orbit. But if I am out and about, doing something mundane, I breath this way just to refresh and let go of stress. Otherwise, like you say, long, slow, smooth, continuous.

[Trunk]

It's natural that some trapped heat would come out when you first got circulation going. Likely it'd be somewhat closer to neutral over time, I'm bettin'.

 

Coincidentally, I've been starting to listen to lectures by Mark Griffin, a Teacher here in the LA area that I used to sit with regularly. I just finished listening to his lecture The Five Stages of Pratyahara for the 3rd or 4th time and it goes over "following the breath" (which he calls "bellows breathing") and breath retention and then some more advanced maneuvers in the central channel and leading into advanced states, put together in a sequence. He's enlightened and a technically very clear thinker & speaker. I mean, I learned about "following the breath" in probably my first meditation class, decades ago, and this lecture clarified a lot - and gave a really smooth transition with as much clarification about breath retention. Deep, clear, detailed. Some of the more advanced steps were beyond my capacity to follow, but interesting to hear about.

 

Trunk

[Jonah]

It's natural that some trapped heat would come out when you first got circulation going. Likely it'd be somewhat closer to neutral over time, I'm bettin'.

 

Coincidentally, I've been starting to listen to lectures by Mark Griffin, a Teacher here in the LA area that I used to sit with regularly. I just finished listening to his lecture The Five Stages of Pratyahara for the 3rd or 4th time

 

It's funny how these things work. I can go for months without looking at Tao Bums and when I jump back in to see what people are doing, it is generally exactly something that I have been recently exploring on my own. It's like the teaching is out there in the collective consciousness and everyone is picking it up in their own way.

 

Trunk, in the same vein as Mark Griffin, Michael Winn has a whole series of his lectures, Chi Kung Fundamentals 3 devoted entirely to this type of breath. He calls it internal chi breathing, counterforce breathing, and "neutral breath." I practiced it for about 16 hours last weekend in the woods while hunting and it created an amazing sense of internal space. Felt like there was a massive amount of empty space inside that expanded outwards when exhaling. Very grounding, very satisfying.

 

It's funny how the fundamentals that we all are exposed to long ago keep on coming back after our monkey mind's searches for various other practices that look new and better are tamed. The simple basics always feed the many tributaries we explore.

[Spectrum]

Slowly flowww. w. the gow.

 

Transmission helps