As above, so below

[al.]

'Making friends with gravity' is one of my teacher's descriptions of Taichi, particularly in regards to how one carries the body when just standing or walking about.

Through letting go of the body's tensions when standing naturally, it's as if the Earth comes up to meet you. This feeling for me has been a great way of getting to know Earth energy, and it feels very comforting.

 

Learning and feeling 'Heaven' energy seems abit more tricky. (Perhaps this is because this is where we're all ultimately headed...)

On the one hand Heaven energy can be thought of as the downward flow of Qi, or it could be thought of as the Qi we get through breathing, or it can be thought of the energy shining down on us from the sun, moon, and the stars.

Would it be correct to think of it as all three?

It seems that opening up to these two forces is a big part of qigong. It would be great to hear some thoughts on experiences of these forces from different people and practices.

WUJI= the point of balance/stillness of these two forces?

[Marblehead]

'Making friends with gravity' is one of my teacher's descriptions of Taichi, particularly in regards to how one carries the body when just standing or walking about.

Through letting go of the body's tensions when standing naturally, it's as if the Earth comes up to meet you. This feeling for me has been a great way of getting to know Earth energy, and it feels very comforting.

 

Yes, I know what you are saying here and I still have a lot of work to do.

 

I haven't even considered the heaven aspect. We need to learn to walk before we try learning how to fly.

 

Peace & Love!

[Mark Foote]

[unmike]

As I recall, the Gautamid's instruction was to experience each aspect of the body from the soles of the feet to the crown of the head as it really is, empty of self, and likewise each aspect of the body from the crown of the head to the soles of the feet.

 

In Beyond the Breath, a text on Vipassana meditation from the tradition of S.N. Goenka, Marshall Glickman makes the case that Gautama started at the top of his head and continued scanning feetward.

 

In my own meandering experience, primarily drawn from Chia system derived tantric experiences, this practice takes on an entirely new dimension once it begins to speed up from the suggested ten minutes of inch by inch examination and feels more like a plane laser is tracking down you...faster and faster until you're feeling it flash by at many hertz, totally clearly

[Starjumper]

'Making friends with gravity' is one of my teacher's descriptions of Taichi,

 

Hi, are you the same guy as my friend who posts under the name ai at the tea House?

[Spectrum]

.... As below, so Above....

 

Nice descriptions. Wonderful metaphors. Letting things fall into place. Gravity under our feet, the light of consciousness as awareness

 

It is AMAZING what information is stored within the body when we relax and let go.

 

Wuji is only 3 inches from where ever you findyourself.

Edited June 25, 2010 by Spectrum

[Raymond Wolter]

In Beyond the Breath, a text on Vipassana meditation from the tradition of S.N. Goenka, Marshall Glickman makes the case that Gautama started at the top of his head and continued scanning feetward.

 

 

 

Thanks for mentioning this book. Any other such treatments of Vipassana? I have read suttas and traditional commentaries etc. but are there books such as these on Shamata and Vipassana?

[al.]

[al.]

Hi, are you the same guy as my friend who posts under the name ai at the tea House?

nope

[Mark Foote]

This is interesting, thank you for sharing.

The idea of 'stacking up the bones' so they rest naturally upon each other is quite nice, but learning about and developing a greater appreciation for the fascia's role in the body takes it to another level. In particular, the idea that the bones are floating within the fascia and are held by forces of tensegrity brings an interesting play to noticing the forces of gravity.

I am unfamiliar with the cranial-sacral rhythm, does it correspond with the movement of the breath or are there shorter/longer cycles at play?

I've been spending time doing what i think they call the 'body-parts meditation' in samatha practice, so it's synchronous that you mention these buddhist exercises. when my focus is upon the bones in the head there is an interesting sensation of space within the main suture that divides left/right( the Du channel). Would a cranial-sacral approach look at this from a different angle to the Asian view (try to maintain balance + free flow of qi) ?

A

 

I'm familiar with that notion of bones floating in the fascial web, and I think it's a good one. For my purposes, the key piece of science is that the fascial tissue can generate nerve impulses to cause muscles to contract, and that fascia on opposite sides of the body can do just that in alternation: "reciprocal innervation", which I believe is what keeps us upright without conscious effort. It's not that any group of muscles is contracted all day long, but that the muscles work in alternation, and their activity is instigated by the stretch of fascia. I got this from John Upledger's books, at least he described the phenomena of reciprocal innervation.

 

Upledger says the cranial sacral rhythm is about a six second cycle; check out a great interview with him here:

 

Share Guide, interview with John Upledger

 

He talks about the mechanism with regard to the saggittal suture and the rhythm in the interview.

 

In one of his books, he talks about his first experience with the rhythm, where he was trying to hold the dural sack still for a surgeon; Upledger was watching a heart monitor and a respiration monitor, and neither one corresponed to the movements he was experiencing.

 

Shunryu Suzuki had an interesting description in one of his lectures:

 

"Sometimes when you think that you are doing zazen with an imperturbable mind, you ignore the body, but it is also necessary to have the opposite understanding at the same time. Your body is practicing zazen in imperturbability while your mind is moving."

 

that's at: "Whole Body Zazen" from cuke.com