Doubt about numbed legs in meditation

[voidisyinyang]

If you legs are cold do standing exercise.

 

If you want to sit - use a blanket to keep warm.

 

It's better to sit on the edge of the chair so that the perineum is under pressure from the edge of the chair - as acupoint pressure.

 

I would try this exercise:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_1sPDntOTs

 

That will be very good for leg circulation.

 

 

[Rara]

Spotless,

 

not a "zen thing" and not yoga -- taoist cultivation, gongfu, which can be translated as "achievement through great effort." Taoist cultivation is not only dissimilar but in many cases opposite in its goals and techniques to both.

 

The OP mentioned qigong, which led me to believe that he seeks to explore taoist practices. Qigong is a beginner practice. Neigong and neidan follow. I was talking about that.

My gongfu certainly goes this way. The longer I spend in something, the harder it gets...but the better I become!

[Spotless]

Qi Gong is not a beginner practice though like meditation in a sitting position - few go a distance that bring the extraordinary. If sitting is considered to be secondary it is by the hare's and not the tortoise.

 

Countless enlightened masters recount their final days leading to enlightenment - meditating 20+ hours a day for 10-20 days.

Most of them did not have a Martial Arts background.

 

A martial arts expert poor in the meditative arts is just another jock with great martial arts proficiency - it seems meditation is far more difficult for the majority to grasp and carry forward. Very few are those who have come to know the higher realms of spiritual abilities but many are those who can fight and who have learned tremendous subjugation skills that will dazzle the masses and themselves. I have never met a Navy Seal that was not very impressed with himself either.

 

I am surrounded by extreme high world class martial arts professionals of the highest caliber - the very highest. Only very few of them have progressed far at all in the meditative realms, the number who have gained the high skills of extraordinary abilities and not just the parlor tricks such as those considered by the martial artist to be Hugh Attainments - is next to zero.

 

Having the power to throw Qi or do iron crotch or metal finger is certainly an attainment - but nothing by comparison to no thought, no inertia and the many high byproducts of the fruits of meditation.

 

It is also easily seen in the high arts of Yoga - the postures are by far secondary and regarded as such. They are not easy by any means and they require great endurance in many cases but when I was practicing those for however impressive they were - they were the physical side and gained nothing over the far more important sitting meditative disciplines.

 

I never considered the physical moves to be 1/10th as important as the meditation. Now years later, I would count them to be of far less value - that does not mean I hold them in less esteem, they are simply practically insignificant for spiritual progress though nice for many things.

 

Now healing someone on the other side of the planet, speaking clearly to spirit, seeing energy not with visualization, but actually seeing it - this type of stuff appears to amaze the worlds top martial artists if they have actually witnessed it. Those few martial arts masters who have reached these levels know where there power lies - it is not in their martial arts prowess - nor in their energy throwing tricks or specialties.

 

One thing that is clearly gained in martial arts - In-body mastery. It is of great value if the far more important and apparently far more difficult meditative aspect is highly cultivated - but for the most part - the meditative aspect is considered by my most secondary while it is easily primary.

 

One can attend a martial arts competition and be throughly impressed by the athletes there - but few if any are impressive in their abilities beyond a few impressive energy tricks here and there. And great and impressive energy tricks does not mean mastery at all - it means that a certain level of stage show work has been mastered - yes it gets the Wow factor but in reality No-thought and no inertia make those things look like getting a home run at a base ball game. Home runs are no great magic but they do get people to their feet. No hitters are far more rare.

 

At Shaolin Temple and the likes of such a place - the best fighters are in high regard, those with the very highest attainments in the meditative arts are the elite.

 

I used to run up and down 3 flights of stairs with a 200 pound person on my back, run up mountains with a 90 pound pack and jog on top of the 2x4 on the wall surrounding a hockey rink and do all sorts of contortions in Yoga holding poses for painfully long times - these things were nothing compared to sitting. And in sitting - none of the "doing" that can be done was of great importance.

 

Just sitting and unfolding was and is clearly the most important factor - while Qi Gong exercises have proven to be extraordinary and of tremendous value as well, like the postures in Yoga though of much physical power. This simple yoga postures and Qi Gong movements become enormous enlightening all embracing events if cultivation of the finer energies has taken place - how one does that certainly does not require "enormous physical effort or pain". Though if you have bought into it then it may be a requirement of your path.

 

Jocks may require this path - and jocks is not a dirty word - some people are very physically based - about 3% of the population naturally look at the rest of us as lazy - because they look through a lens that portrays us a such and because they are centered within a physical preponderance. Another 3% are able easily to work on the physical level with enjoyment easily so about 6% of the population shares this centering.

[liminal_luke]

Spotless,

 

I think qigong is a "beginner´s practice" when seen against the backdrop of deeper Taoist alchemical work, in the same way that the postures of hatha yoga are a "beginner´s practice" when seen against the backdrop of  yogic meditation -- the scope of what´s being attempted is simply different, and less profound, by definition. 

 

It´s not that hatha yoga postures, or qigong, or martial arts, for that matter, are easy.  To really be adept at any of those disciplines is certainly not easy.  And they can be very worthwhile pursuits.  But, as you point out, what can be accomplished with yoga postures or martial arts pales in comparison to meditation.  In a similar way, there´s a world beyond qigong that make attainments at that level seem relatively small.

 

Liminal

Edited May 4, 2015 by liminal_luke

[Taomeow]

TM, what type of pain does your gongfu incorporate/require?

 

Physical, mental, emotional, metaphysical. 

 

OK, to elaborate:

 

Physical -- it is held that the blockages and toxicities and in some traditions even karma can be released through extreme and painful physical effort (provided the body is not subjected to artificial distortions and incorrect usage, I can't stress it enough.  This pain must come from within -- the stored pain, not the pain of doing something physical excessively or unphysiologically.)   In a sitting practice, e.g., it is the pain that is experienced in full lotus with your eyes closed and your meditative focus (whatever it is -- wuwei, breath, alchemical work, whatever) unwavering.  If you sit with your eyes open and your awareness on outer pursuits, you will not feel it, lotus can be fully external, a physical endeavor brought into a comfort zone without making a dent in cultivation, by sheer physical habituation of the muscles.  But combine it with closed eyes and deep unwavering, un-wandering intent, and it is inevitable sooner or later.  With practice you hit "later" more and more, and for cultivation to take place, you have to push past this point.  Someday it may become completely painless if you sit like that for the rest of your life.  This will signify that you don't need to sit anymore, oddly enough.  Painless sitting is relaxation.  It is not cultivation.  This is the simple truth of gongfu.  Not to say that relaxation is not useful -- it is very, very useful in our overstrung times and mores -- but it cultivates nothing, it's routine maintenance, is all.

 

Mental -- there will be doubts, there will be distractions, inertia, self-doubt, teacher-doubt, practice-doubt, more inertia, boredom, self-deprecation, fears of your inadequacy, of the practice's inadequacy, I'm wasting my time, I am not getting what I was after, I'd rather skip today, I'm tired, sleepy, hungry, I have better things to do, you get the picture -- an inner strife to overcome.  If there isn't any, it's worse -- it means one is numb and disconnected and knows not his or her own mind at all.  So he or she is doing this too soon.  Mental pain is not a beginner thing.  Beginners (including all the perennial beginners) are usually cocky.

 

Emotional -- this can hit with the "dark night of the soul."  No master worth his or her salt has ever avoided this (and no shaman I should add, it's pretty universal, to be wounded and feel the wound completely in order to know how to heal -- if you were whole from the start, you have nothing to cultivate).  Overcome and persevere -- that's gongfu.  Numb out and suppress -- that's failure.

 

Metaphysical -- all of the above, but not personal.  Extended to all living creatures but experienced as your own.  Don't numb out is the task, don't crumble, don't rationalize away, don't intellectualize away, don't philosophize away.  Become the relief is the way.   

Edited May 4, 2015 by Taomeow

[dwai]

Stand up!

 

Your English is fine, don't worry about it :-)

my feet used to "go to sleep" too, after long meditations (north of 45 minutes). But I think your advice is sound - doing proper standing meditation/practice results in the energy channels opening in the legs and more qi flow there. After that, when we do seated meditation, the circulation seems to be better in the lower body.  Albeit, seated meditation allows to focus on lower dan tien and up more. It's a good idea to combine both, ime. First stand and then sit. My teacher says we don't have to sit cross legged even...sitting on a chair and meditating is also just as well...and less stressful on the legs.

[Taomeow]

Forgot to add.  Some people shouldn't start with a sitting practice at all.  I'm a believer in the way it was traditionally taught when they trained future masters beginning at the age of 6-8.  Lots and lots of moving routines, progressively more challenging, to prepare the body.  A sitting routine added only a few years later.   Advanced internal work -- only a few years after that.  

 

Resist the impulses from the quickie-mart culture.  I want enlightenment yesterday kind of impulses.  Consumerist spirituality. 

Edited May 4, 2015 by Taomeow

[Spotless]

Physical, mental, emotional, metaphysical. 

 

OK, to elaborate:

 

Physical -- it is held that the blockages and toxicities and in some traditions even karma can be released through extreme and painful physical effort (provided the body is not subjected to artificial distortions and incorrect usage, I can't stress it enough.  This pain must come from within -- the stored pain, not the pain of doing something physical excessively or unphysiologically.)   In a sitting practice, e.g., it is the pain that is experienced in full lotus with your eyes closed and your meditative focus (whatever it is -- wuwei, breath, alchemical work, whatever) unwavering.  If you sit with your eyes open and your awareness on outer pursuits, you will not feel it, lotus can be fully external, a physical endeavor brought into a comfort zone without making a dent in cultivation, by sheer physical habituation of the muscles.  But combine it with closed eyes and deep unwavering, un-wandering intent, and it is inevitable sooner or later.  With practice you hit "later" more and more, and for cultivation to take place, you have to push past this point.  Someday it may become completely painless if you sit like that for the rest of your life.  This will signify that you don't need to sit anymore, oddly enough.  Painless sitting is relaxation.  It is not cultivation.  This is the simple truth of gongfu.  Not to say that relaxation is not useful -- it is very, very useful in our overstrung times and mores -- but it cultivates nothing, it's routine maintenance, is all.

 

Mental -- there will be doubts, there will be distractions, inertia, self-doubt, teacher-doubt, practice-doubt, more inertia, boredom, self-deprecation, fears of your inadequacy, of the practice's inadequacy, I'm wasting my time, I am not getting what I was after, I'd rather skip today, I'm tired, sleepy, hungry, I have better things to do, you get the picture -- an inner strife to overcome.  If there isn't any, it's worse -- it means one is numb and disconnected and knows not his or her own mind at all.  So he or she is doing this too soon.  Mental pain is not a beginner thing.  Beginners (including all the perennial beginners) are usually cocky.

 

Emotional -- this can hit with the "dark night of the soul."  No master worth his or her salt has ever avoided this (and no shaman I should add, it's pretty universal, to be wounded and feel the wound completely in order to know how to heal -- if you were whole from the start, you have nothing to cultivate).  Overcome and persevere -- that's gongfu.  Numb out and suppress -- that's failure.

 

Metaphysical -- all of the above, but not personal.  Extended to all living creatures but experienced as your own.  Don't numb out is the task, don't crumble, don't rationalize away, don't intellectualize away, don't philosophize away.  Become the relief is the way.   

 

Basically quite true, but the definition of pain is at issue.

One can be going through enormous cultivation and discomfort but not in what I would term pain.

The effort to push past unconscious energy, popping in the neck, cracks all along the spine, the self doubts, tears, etc - this is good work, but I have not associated it with pain and things like legs that have gone to sleep or abuse of my body such as forcing myself to sit in perfect stillness past cramps and frozen limbs or a busting bladder (though I can usaully go a day without getting up for that).

 

Good cultivation requires the need to be in-body and present and not in trance - always sitting with the cultivation - relaxing is the furthest from my experience though certainly it is far more simple now than in years past. I have never viewed meditation as relaxing - it was interesting to hear it put that way - it would not have dawned on me.

 

It does take work to push through all the different energies and blocks - not fun but I have never associated the work with pain (this may be because I am male - often women sob loudly in meditation while it is rare among males).

And postures and movements do help to push past the energy blocks, raging hormones and collateral crap that comes up.

It is a complete cluster fuck - but past the first few hours it is very different work - and it is nearly always very different even in the beginning. Once you get past 2 or three hours ( usually less than that) the energy is very different, it is a bit like running very hard for a very long time and suddenly you are hyper aware and in slo-mo and the effort is gone and you are no longer running, you are flowing.

 

One very great asset of postures whether they are yogic or Qi Gong - meditation is much easier after such work, particularly the unconscious energy which pushes one to stop or want to sleep. For Women this usually hits at around 20 minutes and pops one out of the body into the no cultivation zone, for Men this usually hits around 35-40 minutes in. A great many beginners make these timeframes their meditation practice and they never make it past this hard stuff into the fruits.

 

You can definitely meditate 20 minutes a day and get some modicum of results - you also get something from vitamin water - it's just not much.

 

[Spotless]

Spotless,

 

I think qigong is a "beginner´s practice" when seen against the backdrop of deeper Taoist alchemical work, in the same way that the postures of hatha yoga are a "bginner´s practice" when seen against the backdrop of yogic meditation -- the scope of what´s being attempted is simply different, and less profound, by definition.

 

It´s not that hatha yoga postures, or qigong, or martial arts, for that matter, are easy. To really be adept at any of those disciplines is certainly not easy. And they can be very worthwhile pursuits. But, as you point out, what can be accomplished with yoga postures or martial arts pales in comparison to meditation. In a similar way, there´s a world beyond qigong that make attainments at that level seem relatively small.

 

Liminal

My experience with Qi Gong is extremely profound but I have wondered how it would have been had I not brought to the practice 38 previous years of what most would consider intense practice.

What I experience with Qi Gong and the secret teaching that I have received and worked with now for some 4 years nearly everyday are utterly profound and the internal changes are of a magnitude that is only paralleled by kundalini and a few other massive changes and expansion. It has been difficult to clarify what to attribute to Qi Gong and past work but I have very high regard for Qi Gong within my framework. I no longer receive the same benefit from meditation that I did in the past though my body enjoys it and sometimes sitting simply overtakes me and I sit. In fact I have to be careful at stoplights - I sometimes close my eyes in the exquisite energy and horns wake me to get moving.

 

The simplist exercises in Qi Gong - though generally not of the basic forms but still extremely simple movements - are incredible.

I want to do them almost imperceptibly slow yet the immense power and light is immediate and surrounds me. This may be my bias and not the experience of "only a Qi Gong" practice - I do not know.

 

What you have mentioned above about Hatha rings true - I started with Hatha only briefly but moved on to Raja and it was entirely different.

Edited May 5, 2015 by Spotless

[Rara]

A martial arts expert poor in the meditative arts is just another jock with great martial arts proficiency - it seems meditation is far more difficult for the majority to grasp and carry forward. Very few are those who have come to know the higher realms of spiritual abilities but many are those who can fight and who have learned tremendous subjugation skills that will dazzle the masses and themselves. I have never met a Navy Seal that was not very impressed with himself either.

 

This is very true. I am on the verge of leaving my wing chun school because it all seems all about justifying what we do now. One up on other schools...it's a germ that goes around "my wing chun is better than your wing chun because bollocks, bollocks and more bollocks"

 

I don't know exactly what I will be doing next,but I agree that the meditative mind should be central to ones practice and hardly any self-defence schools provide this.

[Spotless]

Regarding starting as a beginner first with movement exercises and later with meditation:

 

Perhaps as a youngster - very young - but children do so well with meditation I do not see why one would want to not start with this basis.

 

One of the singular biggest problems with 100% of all the energy arts is the relatively sudden increase in energy / power.

And one of the singularly biggest problems with 100% of all energy arts students and masters - is the idea that you can outrun meditation and high cultivation with a mastery of the arts first and meditation later.

 

This often leads to insanity, heart related problems such as stroke and heart attack and the actual inability to master neutrality which is so critical to the highest aspects.

 

100% of the process is better with more meditation than people put into it - typically way way way way way more. And frequent meditation longer than 1 hour. Breaking past the barriers of unconscious energy and leaving ones body is very important.

 

At some point in the progression - perhaps in the progression where it "really gets serious" and one is well into the higher vibrations - dropping the stream of noise from ones mind ("Your" media stream - all your pet interests, all the discs in your head, every single cause), dropping alcohol, stimulants, over eating, late night eating, meat eating (at most very very moderate consumption) and vegan is preferable - the difference is obvious - these things and habits will be required. If you "hit" these stages you will drop them and you will find you do not drop them with any sort of self control - you drop them because they fall away from your desire.

 

Quite suddenly alcohol does not work - it is disruptive and the energy is a downer and dispersant. Meat acts in the same way - it is at once coarse and "oily" in energy and has a thud energy about it - small amounts are used as a tool for balance possibly at times but not as every day food sources - just as alchohol may be mixed in a medicine.

 

Those fun political arguements fall away also - they are no longer fun - they are no longer anything but buzz, a sort of brown noise.

 

This might sound like a deadened sparse dry life - it is not in the least - these lower and lowering energies are fun and great and enjoyable in their place but that place at some point is no longer in the vibrations you will at some point hopefully reach. Not because of dogma, not because of requirement - it is because extraordinarily fine and precise engines don't run on bird shit.

Edited May 5, 2015 by Spotless

[liminal_luke]

Spotless,

 

Sounds like you are getting neigong-type benefits from your qigong practice.  Perhaps, because of your previous practice, when you do qigong it is neigong.  We are all so different.  Respect.

 

Liminal

[Rara]

Spotless, I can see that all being correct. I can't speak from experience but as an "external" martial artist (with internal being brought in by me mainly because of a keen acknowledgement for its uses) I can honestly say that none of us are free from personal grudges, anxieties, parent-issues etc etc.

 

Anyway, all this learning is all a part of the process It's all sorting itself out.

[Dream]

If you legs are cold do standing exercise.

 

If you want to sit - use a blanket to keep warm.

 

It's better to sit on the edge of the chair so that the perineum is under pressure from the edge of the chair - as acupoint pressure.

 

I would try this exercise:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_1sPDntOTs

 

That will be very good for leg circulation.

 

Im used to sit on the edge of the chair, a kungfu teacher said that, i didnt know why.

What about the breathing in that exercise?

 

I don't know why the conversation about martial arts started. I've been training a few western martial arts for 13 years (and im very good at it) and they have absolutely no relationship with meditation nor energy works. 

 

 

 

 my feet used to "go to sleep" too, after long meditations (north of 45 minutes). But I think your advice is sound - doing proper standing meditation/practice results in the energy channels opening in the legs and more qi flow there. After that, when we do seated meditation, the circulation seems to be better in the lower body.  Albeit, seated meditation allows to focus on lower dan tien and up more. It's a good idea to combine both, ime. First stand and then sit. My teacher says we don't have to sit cross legged even...sitting on a chair and meditating is also just as well...and less stressful on the legs.

 

Good thank you... my next question will be about this... 

 

 

 

It does take work to push through all the different energies and blocks - not fun but I have never associated the work with pain (this may be because I am male - often women sob loudly in meditation while it is rare among males).

And postures and movements do help to push past the energy blocks, raging hormones and collateral crap that comes up.

It is a complete cluster fuck - but past the first few hours it is very different work - and it is nearly always very different even in the beginning. Once you get past 2 or three hours ( usually less than that) the energy is very different, it is a bit like running very hard for a very long time and suddenly you are hyper aware and in slo-mo and the effort is gone and you are no longer running, you are flowing.

 

I understand this, but if i can't do it more than 30 minutes because of my legs, 2 hours could be worst.

[Dream]

thank you all

 

My 2 questions beside this are

 

1) If i can't find a qiqong teacher is it possible to learn from books or this kind of information ?

2) How i feel the chi/energy ? Some people say "imagine, thing about it, etc etc" What this really works in this way? The explanation i liked most was to (i'm not sure how to say this in english) put the attention into the path of the energy

 

Greetings

[Spotless]

thank you all

 

My 2 questions beside this are

 

1) If i can't find a qiqong teacher is it possible to learn from books or this kind of information ?

2) How i feel the chi/energy ? Some people say "imagine, thing about it, etc etc" What this really works in this way? The explanation i liked most was to (i'm not sure how to say this in english) put the attention into the path of the energy

 

Greetings

 

I am certain there are good video programs out there and skype is becoming more and more prevelant - do not shy away from skype. Also - you can film yourself and see what you are doing incorrectly - it is amazing how far "off" some students are and they just cannot see it.

 

I used to ski race and we regularly saw video of ourselves in order to see problems in our technique.

[z00se]

Inline with what Spotless said, i have been for meditation retreats by myself. I used to be right into fitness, gym running and swimming most days. When i went for 10 day retreats doing nothing but meditations and very short walks all day long is that i had excess energy from not burning it in exercise and feeling it in meditation.

 

So what do you do? Scream, shout, fidget, but then there becomes nothing else to do other than take a deep breath and continue on where you left off before the tantrum. Day after day you become better at it. Then there is no tantrum. Then anything. Even several flies, flying around your tent in the middle of the forrest, landing on your face, crawling around your face and inside your lips on a 48C degree day when you're dripping with sweat bother you, you just watch and blow them to the outside of your lips Hours and hours on end.

 

There is no easy way, there is only one way and that is through practice. And when you stop practicing it gets hard again. But having reached a certain point at some time in your life, that point is easier to reach again.... you know the way.

 

It is like weight training, but for the mind..

[Dream]

Thank you all

 

Do you recommend some book, video, etc?

 

Greetings