Form of meditation of Lao tse and Chuang tse

[Daemon]

Are you

• pushing the feeling down (or away) or
• ignoring it or
• exploring it or
• accepting it or
• doing something else

while choosing to not act upon its imperative?

 

☮️

 

[wandelaar]

The favorable results of meditation are only felt afterwards, so to me meditating feels like taking an unpalatable medicine. I don't like just sitting, but I do it because of the long term results.

[Harmonious Emptiness]

3 hours ago, Michael Sternbach said:

 

That book looks very interesting. Seems like it's only available as an ebook though, which is currently NOT available. 

You can only get the kindle books from your local Amazon, so ".co.uk" if your in the UK, .com if your in the US, etc.

[Daemon]

@wandelaar

 

• How long have you been doing this?
• How long do you intend to keep on doing it? In other words, what is the long term? Is it about 60 days, 60 weeks, 60 months or 60 years?

☮️

[wandelaar]

36 minutes ago, Daemon said:

@wandelaar

 

• How long have you been doing this?
• How long do you intend to keep on doing it? In other words, what is the long term? Is it about 60 days, 60 weeks, 60 months or 60 years?

☮️

 

I meditate every day until other things get in the way and I can no longer keep it up. Than I have much trouble to start again with my daily meditation. My meditation only helps when I meditate daily, so for me it's an all-or-nothing thing. My intention is to keep it up for the rest of my life, but I know sooner or later other things will again get in the way and than I will again stop meditating. My results will than slowly ebb away until I start again. This process has been going on for many years now (20 or 30 years? I don't know how long). 

Edited May 30, 2018 by wandelaar

[moment]

(                                                                                                                                                                                                 )

Edited July 2, 2018 by moment
evolution

[Daemon]

@wandelaar

 

Would you consider substituting what you're doing for a breath modulation practice that would only require three 5 minute sessions per day plus one 20 minute session per week for 60 days? After that you would only need to use it if your then established state of peace was disturbed.

 

☮️

[wandelaar]

6 minutes ago, Daemon said:

@wandelaar

 

Would you consider substituting what you're doing for a breath modulation practice that would only require three 5 minute sessions per day plus one 20 minute session per week for 60 days? After that you would only need to use it if your then established state of peace was disturbed.

 

☮️

 

Could you give a link where I can find some more information on that?

[Daemon]

Perhaps start here

ww.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5575449/

 

Although (merely in my opinion), the best way to find out if it works for you is to try it yourself for 60 days, as previously outlined, because the scientific research is insufficiently robust (as far as I'm concerned).

 

☮️

[Michael Sternbach]

3 hours ago, Harmonious Emptiness said:

You can only get the kindle books from your local Amazon, so ".co.uk" if your in the UK, .com if your in the US, etc.

 

Thanks. Didn't work that way with my phone, but it did with my Fire kindle - where I wanted to download the book to anyway.

[wandelaar]

12 hours ago, Daemon said:

Perhaps start here

ww.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5575449/

 

Although (merely in my opinion), the best way to find out if it works for you is to try it yourself for 60 days, as previously outlined, because the scientific research is insufficiently robust (as far as I'm concerned).

 

☮️

 

I have tried out slow abdominal breathing during my visit at the dentist today. Hard to say what exactly was the effect but I was relatively relaxed. I am gonna add it to my daily meditation.

 

[Daemon]

@wandelaar

 

A couple of additional points,

• Even if you're successfully hitting your own personal resonant frequency, you'll need to do this 3 times  day for 5 minutes plus 20 minutes once per week for at least 30 days before you're likely notice a significant difference.
• Optimum times for learning this practice are on waking (after having used the bathroom), last thing before going to sleep and 5 minutes during the day at as quiet a time as possible.
• Once embedded (usually after 60 days) it can be used successfully in high-stress situations.
• In your specific case, I suggest that the middle-of-the-day session should be the first 5 minutes of your existing practice (plus perhaps use it when you start to hit your difficult midway spot).
• I have only ever taught this to people when they were hooked into a biofeedback device (so you should be aware that approximating 5/6 breathe per minute while paying attention to the heart area will probably not give you opimum results).
• This isn't usually referred to as "deep abdominal breathing" but as "resonant breathing" (or sometimes "coherent breathing").
• This is not concentration meditation (or even meditation as most people define it) and you should be fully aware, alert and able to respond (or react) to incoming stimuli. In fact, if you're doing it properly, it may improve your reaction times.

☮️

[wandelaar]

I am not going to use the full "resonant breathing" system, but only the slow abdominal breathing aspect that can more easily be added during my current meditation practice. Until now when my concentration wavered I counted my breaths, but I can just as well use slow abdominal breathing to bring my attention back. That's also more in the spirit of ancient Taoism.

[Daemon]

To be clear, I neither use (nor do I teach) "deep abdominal breathing" or any other forced breathing practice due to the extremely serious problems that often result from any and all forced breathing exercises of which I'm aware.

Deep abdominal breathing plays no part whatsoever in the entirely natural method of heart-centred (resonant) breathing that I use myself and which I sometimes share with others.

 

☮️

 

[Mudfoot]

1 hour ago, Daemon said:

@wandelaar   aproximating 5/6 breathe per minute while paying attention to the heart area will probably not give you opimum results).

Because that needs a biofeedback gadget. 

But a male of average hight will statistically be likely to top on five breaths, a female on six. 

 

And relaxed abdominal breathing will probably be the optimal technique. 

[wandelaar]

In the video on "resonant breathing" I looked at, slow abdominal breathing was advised, but I can no longer find it.

 

Edit: Found it!

 

https://research.alcoholstudies.rutgers.edu/resonance-frequency-breathing-practice-video-0

Edited May 31, 2018 by wandelaar

[Daemon]

6 hours ago, Mudfoot said:

Because that needs a biofeedback gadget. 

But a male of average hight will statistically be likely to top on five breaths, a female on six. 

 

And relaxed abdominal breathing will probably be the optimal technique. 

 

 

If only it was so simple.

Unfortunately, in practice, it's complex and these approximations don't work well enough (merely in my experience) without biofeedback because of individual variations

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Normal_distribution

 

Another issue is that an individual's resonant frequency isn't fixed (even within the duration of a single practice  session) and it also varies dependent upon factors such as external stressors, amount of exercise, quality of sleep, etc.

On top of that, even if you can hit your resonant frequency within +/- 0.1 breaths per minute (by chance), discursive thinking during practice will inhibit the more refined stages of this practice from occurring (this inhibition can be measured with the right instrumentation), so (in practice) instrumental physiological monitoring is  required (unless you want to spend hundreds or thousands of hours experimenting upon yourself in an attempt to develop sufficient physiological sensitivity to discover what it's like to have the ability to enter what the Taoists seem to refer to as wu wei at will).

 

☮️

 

Edited May 31, 2018 by Daemon

[Mudfoot]

5 hours ago, Daemon said:

 

If only it was so simple.

 

It never is. It is just a valid starting point for the practitioner without gadgets (most of us). 

 

It is also mechanical, that is, you are not using your mind in an optimal way. 

You can divide the method in two separate parts, which both affect the HRV. 

The RSA is one, correct focus is the other one. Which leads to the question of which focus is the most optimal. 

[Mudfoot]

@Daemon Have you ever tried to see if you can correllate the reading on the biofeedback equipment with manual pulse check.

I don't mean tcm pulse, just feeling if the rsa kicks in and if it becomes optimally synced? 

 

My employer doesn't want to supply me with proper equipment, I might have to do some more lobbying on this.... 

[Daemon]

What I find works best (for me and for those with whom I've shared this) is to pay attention to the heart area and to relax into breathing slightly more slowly and deeply into this area. I find it counterproductive to use a protocol that's any more complicated than that.

Some protocols that I've encountered recommend "generating a positive feeling" but I consider that to be forcing rather than natural and, in my experience, that inhibits some of the more extended and profound benefits (also, as far as I'm aware, from the Taoist perspective, there's nothing in these texts that suggests that these ancient sages forced themselves to feel something in particular).

As an aside, I've also noticed that despite placing the attention on the heart area (rather than forcing diaphragmatic breathing), diaphragmatic breathing tends to develop (if it's not already present).

So, I believe that this simple protocol's entirely consistent with the Taoist texts (and if it isn't, it doesn't matter to me).

It's also seems possible that, under the right conditions, including physical proximity, that there's a synergistic entraining effect, which may be the basis of the profundity of our group practice to which I've previously refereed. In other words, doing this with a group of others can lead to even more enlightening experiences.

If you want be to learn this without biofeedback assistance then I'd advise 3 x 10 minutes per day + 20 minutes once per week for 60 days, if you haven't noticed a fairly significant positive difference by then, it's probably time to invest in some technology.

You can maximise your chance of hitting the groove by finding somewhere (preferably outdoors) that's beautiful to practice Failing that, using certain indoor public spaces (e.g. cultural centres, art galleries, theatre cafés, etc. ) can be helpful and may even be as synergistic as joining or forming a specific practice group.

 

☮️

 

Edited June 1, 2018 by Daemon

[Mudfoot]

11 minutes ago, Daemon said:

 

As an aside, I've also noticed that despite placing the attention on the heart area (rather than forcing diaphragmatic breathing), diaphragmatic breathing tends to develop (if it's not already present).

So, I believe that this simple protocol's entirely consistent with the Taoist texts (and if it isn't, it doesn't matter to me).

 

Relaxed focus in the LDT area will also do this, I would post a link to this if I was close to a computer. 

[Daemon]

I'm entirely familiar with that practice (and its application to martial arts). However, that's not what I'm discussing.

I'm discussing heart-centred breathing, not gut-centred breathing.

 

☮️

[Mudfoot]

And I was discussing how to enhance your internal coherence with the help of breathing, not martial or spiritual applications. 

[Daemon]

Thank you for your clarification. That being the case, I will leave you to your own devices.

 

Good bye to you.

 

☮️

 

[Rara]

On 18/05/2018 at 5:25 PM, Starjumper said:

 

In one place he mentions empty the head and fill the belly (1), also remove desires and replace them with ... something (2).  I'm not real uppity on the TTC.

 

 

For the record, here's a thread on this

 

https://www.thedaobums.com/topic/31557-lao-tzu-and-the-belly/