Zhuan Zhuang and Chakras

[KoHsuan]

Recently I have heard about so-called advanced exercise.. Standing Meditation with Chakra Meditation...

You simply stand in 4 different postures and meditate on one particular chakra at a time...

 

I did a try for one week and it just great ... you can feel that energy just pumping inside chakra BUT..

 

for me it is against all the principles of standing when you supposed to be forget about everything...

could not find anything about it on net..

 

Any thoughts??

 

PS.. heard that next stage is adding breath retention... seems like tummo breathing ( or 9 wind meditation) with different chakras but standing

[qijack]

Just my 2 cents

 

I would stay away from any practices that talk about chakras,breath retention, or mixing Zhuan Zhuang which is a traditional practice with stuff that are obviously laced with new age mumbojumbo

 

It may feel good and powerfull in the beggining but then you will start to feel the nervous disorders kick in due to your body becoming to yang and it all goes downhill from there

[Spectrum]

Recently I have heard about so-called advanced exercise.. Standing Meditation with Chakra Meditation...

You simply stand in 4 different postures and meditate on one particular chakra at a time...

 

Standing Meditation, Zhaun Zhuang, Pile Standing, Universal Post, Stand Like a Tree, Standing Stake is the primary foundation of chinese martial arts in general, and is the axis in which chinese healing arts pivot.

 

The visualization you mention is a combination of concepts. Standing Meditation being strongly chinese w/ a even some viens in chan but mostly all the lineages of the standing schools come out of china. Funny at these intersection we see Carlos Castenada writing about Tensegrity his standing postures of safety, and again anyone who knows Bucky knows synergetics was basically what the inventor of the geodesic dome was calling chi gung. <wink> We keep it fun on Tao Bums for the sake of referential clarity. <french drop>

 

Emptiness or nothing is what you think about while standing. No thought. What's between a thought? The paradox presents itself of what internal mechanisms are in action when you are acting w/o acting, for instance in jam jong pile standing. You are standing there holding a ball. Yes. What happens to the ball when you feel what you interprete as discomfort, or worse, pain. The firing mechanisms that your muscles must adopt must be observed and learned one way or another... what ways are you moving and what ways are actually POSSIBLE to mov e ?

 

These "arts" are hidden in plain view. Look at Balans. Unreal. Completely different relationship to gravity.

 

Ergonomically speaking the modern man living in metropolis is moving fractions of the possible directions that man has locked in DNA memory that has previously been a part of existance. What if escaping the matrix was litterally as easy as figuring out all the possible ways you could walk down the street and do it all at the same time? That seems almost a philosophical or religious topic though.

 

But honestly, I think once the student in the movement arts begin the inquiry processes with goals in mind they learn what helps and what inhibits forward progress. Be this learning how to golf, ski or play tennis, the movement that is conducisive to those A-HA mojoments are perfect in a sense. We are living breathing moving floating around upright biological geometric bipods facing upright looking outto vast space doing what again?

 

Dancing the dance of creation and destruction.

 

I did a try for one week and it just great ... you can feel that energy just pumping inside chakra BUT..

 

Chi Gung is like eating. Tai Chi is like digesting your food. People who engage in standing meditation and don't DO something w/ the energy are asking for future problems. Your moving chi gung is the answer here, as w/o a balanced wei dan, generating heat from limbs thru core, the nei dan (generating heat in core and moving outward) is ineffective and can cause problems. Moving chi gung is the way to succeed w/ the stillness chi gung. This way you contemplate both stillness in motion, and motion in stillness. The end result being your orbit meditation. The Yang Style of Tai Chi is great for illustrating these principles, and is itself a multi purpose art of martial and breath mind body unification cultivation. Chi gung really focuses on the health aspect and the breaths interaction w/ the body mechinism. It's really great stuff all of it. It has changed my life dearly and tenderly.

 

for me it is against all the principles of standing when you supposed to be forget about everything...

could not find anything about it on net..

 

This is a primary teaching of Taoist meditation strategy for the student. Standing w/o standing. Usuaully pulsing in any one is avoided as the goal of the meditation is the circulation of your chi for the purpose of cultivation. The focus if need be is on the breath, and eventually on nothing at all. relinguish the attentions need to attract thought to a center point. By Releasing the central attentions need to focus on any one thought, thus freeing it from thought all together, your peripheral states of awareness naturally fill the space between the circumfrential edges and the field in which the periphery forms. THe primary exercises in the type of Taoist meditation i have sought has been single point and empti point meditations in which stillness of mind is the primary "goal", which is no goal at all, because no thought is wasted in it's effort.

 

Any thoughts??

 

God I hope not. <group hug?>

 

PS.. heard that next stage is adding breath retention... seems like tummo breathing ( or 9 wind meditation) with different chakras but standing

 

Avoid this until you have familiarized yourself w/ the process of wuji. Wuji itself may produce a variety of "effects" but avoid "guiding" any of these sensations. Just breath naturally. The practice of placing the tongue on the roof of the mouth on the inhale is universal. Release the tongue on the exhal. The practice of placing the awareness on the dan tien is enough w/ the operation of the breath that wuji posture induces. The fundamental postural changes that wuji will help you undergo can be life changing. You won't need to make up visulizations, your body will drop into the zone quiet easily thoughts still movement and intent meet across the medium of your breath. The goal of the first two years of chi gung is the clear out your primary meridians. This is Wei Dan. After that time you usually reach a state of optimal heath and can proceed to cultivate further in various directions.

 

Best of wishes to your seeking and gunging. Proceed w/ caution and do not "force" anything. Stillness and Observation are the primary means by which students of the Taoist lineages of meditation proceed.

 

Spectrum

[Trunk]

Standing Meditation with Chakra Meditation...

Works for me.

 

I've been impressed, lately, that standing - ime - covers so territory. When I was working on the joints a lot, I recognized how important the joints were in standing. Now that I'm doing more chanting~chakra~egg stuff, I find that that is so much about what standing is about. Whatever parts of you are between heaven & earth, whatever layer/s your alchemy is presenting at that time, it'll be part of standing.

 

* wow! I've gotten to be the contrarian, lately. Fun. *

 

I did a try for one week and it just great ... you can feel that energy just pumping inside chakra BUT..

 

for me it is against all the principles of standing when you supposed to be forget about everything...

could not find anything about it on net..

If it feels harmonious and progressive...

 

PS.. heard that next stage is adding breath retention... seems like tummo breathing ( or 9 wind meditation) with different chakras but standing

Curious. Which system? (Link?) Edited August 9, 2007 by Trunk

[rex]

"Standing Meditation with Chakra Meditation..."

Works for me.

The 'Yi Swallows Chi' method you mentoned ages ago is used in standing postures in one hard qigong system I know of.

[Trunk]

The 'Yi Swallows Chi' method you mentoned ages ago is used in standing postures in one hard qigong system I know of.

Surprise. Delight. Relief. Edited August 9, 2007 by Trunk

[Spectrum]

Suggested Ref Links for Yi Swallows Chi? Searching Archives.

[Trunk]

Suggested Ref Links for Yi Swallows Chi? Searching Archives.

This page at AlchemicalTaoism.com. It's the last page in the IS1 section.

[KoHsuan]

 

Curious. Which system? (Link?)

 

 

Information from guy who spent long time in remote temple in Vietnam.. not taoist.. more chan..

He admitted himself that school is highly extreme and not without casualties but really effective....

[doc benway]

Standing meditation is not limited to "no thought." My shi-ye has taught me two standing techniques that involve guiding qi with the mind of intent. He didn't teach me these techniques until about 1 year after beginning my sitting practice. There is some similarity to sitting in that the yi quides the qi. One is a technique for building strength in the body, the other flexibility. Both are designed for martial development. Neither is specifically related to chakras or to the meridians or microcosmic or macrocosmic orbits.