Reaching Deep Relaxation

[Zen Pig]

42 minutes ago, steve said:

The things that have been the most relaxing for me have been spending time in nature and meditation.

Physical exercise is very important for relaxation as is adequate and restful sleep.

wow Steve, you just let the cat out of the bag.  Now who is going to write all those books on complicated relaxation methods and guided meditation music in YouTube, or get a spot on Oprah? 

From my path so far,  it seems like the real things in life are so simple that we completely miss them looking for something more complex. 

 

[Everything]

On 1/5/2019 at 9:20 PM, Yonkon said:

I am doing something similar: I take my guitar, play 2 chords on and on, and then i am singing stuff like " i am totally relaxed, oh baby yeah" while imagining my absolute over the top relaxation fantasy. I call it music magick, i think it motivated me to write this post.  

Ah yes, exactly. You can become the visionary of your life, by re-envisioning the best possible version of every segment of your unique life experience prior to entering each segment and thus co-create in the best possible way, as you fulfill your hearts desire, unconditionally, meaning, regardless of what the condition may look like, you can imagine the best possible version of that condition. And then it will have no choice but to show itself to you in the way you have allowed it to be. How? By acting on your best possible imagined version accordingly, as you SAY that it is so, and you need no other reason than that you exist at center of all of existance, life happens through you and so you act on your highest excitement with absolutely zero insistence on any outcome whatsoever, to the best of your ability, but rather to allow the best possible outcome, untill you can take it no further. Why? Because you cannot know or predict the future ever! The best possible version of your life is there to be allowed, not forced. The art of deliberate creation and becoming the visionary of your life and the art of allowing are all the same thing, and then re-imagine and re-envision again and again, and act on your highest excitement, with absolute zero insistence on any outcome whatsoever to the best of your ability, knowing that that will always be enough! And again! as you allow the best possible version of that highest most joyous most beautiful and loving and pleasing imagined condition that you always have acces to in your imagination, which then can guide you always to the right course of action, deeds and words that are beyond into the perfection of each sound and movement, which will always yield the best possible outcome and ever more future and ever more becoming of all conditions and circumstances as all is here and now is forever. And extract the best possible outcome of each circumstance, that is always to your highest joy and best possible version of each circumstance. And again... Evermore.

 

You don't change the outward reflection of your conditions in life, because they are already perfect. The only thing we have come here to learn is to love, unconditionally. You change the alignment, the tuning, that allows you to synchronise with the most extatic version and meaning and value of each and every circumstance and condition in your life. You change what you ALLOW YOURSELF to hear/see/feel or translate through the vibrational translators of your senses, by re-envisioning the circumstances, as the visionary of your own life, you summon through you for the fullfillment of the best of your life and all that is of it, the aspects of every atom in creation, of light, that always heals every condition into the most valuable and more true version of all that it truely is and evermore ment to be the evermore becoming of.

 

It is the story that you tell. That becomes your life. And the better the story you tell of your here and now, the better the version of the here and now you can see and thus then allow the ever more ever becoming of, with absolute zero effort whatsoever, you do nothing and leave nothing undone as is the unyielding capability of your souls most highest truth and freedom to create any reflection or condition you so desire, through your most highest state of knowledge of the most highest truth of all that is here and now, as above so below. You tune in to your greater knowing that you always have acces to. Through your imagination, but you don't imagine a lesser version. Cause then you'll get that lesser version. And that's why your emotions are so valuable in helping you know what is what. Cause you may feel confused, but your emotions will always allow you to feel a feeling that is undeniable. Even the most subtle emotion of discontentment through the state of confusion can thus then be allowed to re-co-infuse your perception with the clarity that is what you seek of the lightness of freedom of the lightness of the ease and simplicity and knowledge that you seek and the clairty and wide open sky then re-awakens you ability to re-member all the fragmented aspects of all of your total consciousness as you are always here and now as all is one and all the one are the all.

 

The way you respond to the circumstances determines the outcome. The vibrational alignment trumps everything. And when you realise, you no longer have to change the reality, in order to allow yourself to allow its already best possible version as it already always exists here and now and will forevermore continue to exist in the evermore ever becoming of it. And there is no worry of the outcome, because the future is unavoidable. But how you come to the end of this story as the new story thus then begins evermore, is the only thing that truely matters for your life here and now, to live it through your here and now, where all the stories always will be allowed to become the evermore becoming of the evermore becoming of that which is what it all truely already has been, always will be and is. As all that is to come after it, will be nothing but better, than all you have ever been capable of imagining prior to your allowing of the evermore becoming of the more of it.

 

We are very dense beings. We cannot become more dense. We are physical human beings. One does not need to suffer, because you cannot become more dense than you already are. And you also don't need to hold on to life in order to allow yourself to live it more fully. You also do not hold on to life in order to understand it more fully. So allow yourself to become light, as a feather, and treat every condition as gentle as each and every oh so sensitive string of a guitar. And when you treat death in the same manner, than you can have an understanding of life that is truely in alignment with your soul and your highest purpose in this life, as a perfectly blended being of co-harmonized complete total hue-man being where physical and non-physical evermore walk hand in hand.

 

The point of life is to live it. And to live it, you have to allow the already perfection of it. And to allow the already perfection of it, you have to become light and playful as you observe your reality. If you have dense views that does not allow a more lighter and more playful perception of your reality, more free, then it will constantly dissapoint you, because you have commanded it so by your insistence and holding on to the views you have about that life, that only can happen through your own freedom! And so if you realise that you are choosing this state of bondage and failure and such, then simply becoming conscious of that you are doing it, and remembering that you chose it, whenever you are doing it, that you can feel through your emotional indicators of what you are doing with your energy, allowing the more freedom or not, simply instantly heals it. It's done, it's over. You can let the resistance go instantly, that which causes resistance, that which you do which causes resistance. Wei wu wei. You are now aware of your freedom that has allowed you to create all of it, and you let it go, and all that is left is your pure perfect natural well-being and freedom that is your natural and default state as a hue-man being. what is there left now but to allow the new found conscious recognition of your own freedom that has allowed you to do so? And so there is only that. The freedom, and now as you chose that, you can also choose this in your allowing of it being that simple and en-freeing.

 

And mostly when you feel bad and you recognize you are creating your life to be less than all that it truely can be, don't be hard on yourself, because that's only how you create more forgetfullness and lack of knowledge and lack of awareness. You can never be fully disconnected from your greater knowing, EVER. The bad feeling is a guidance, don't numb it or ignore it, let it show you what you are doing wrong and let it go, drop it, and don't do it anymore, unlearn it. Every habbit that becomes conscious of itself in the act is no longer a habbit but a choice. And you hearts guidance of emotional, energy motional, indicators will always be there to remind you of what you are doing with your own energy, how you are filtering the energy that comes through you from your Source of Existance, how you are aligning with the greatest and ever greater truth or less, that is of the energy that creates worlds, how you are allowing that energy or less to flow through you and the amplitude of the sensation and feeling and emotion indicating the degree of your summoning of that energy and the way you feel it as negative or positive indicating your state of dissallowing/resistance or allowing of that same energy. And as you can thus then feel this that is the only thing that truely matters, then you always have acces to the only thing that truely matters, giving you the ability to love unconditionally. And as you thus then care about how you feel, and as you thus then allow yourself to align more fully with the Energy of Source and God and All things that you call Good and Better ever more, more than anything, every possible circumstance and condition, no matter who or where you are, can be turned around, with the absolute least amount of effort, for the ever more fulfillment of your own unique and individually blessed personal life experience. And it doesn't require you to be a saint or healer or teacher. But just to allow yourself to be who it is you truely are. And celebrate the ever more becoming of the best of all that you are evermore to be the evermore becoming of. Because that is who it is you truely already are and are ment to be the evermore becoming of and you do it in your own unique way. That is always more and unique and better even than itself.

 

Can you get the flow of it? It is the art of allowing the true fullfillment of all that you truely desire evermore. For there is no other reason than that you exist but for the joy that is the everlasting fullfillment of your everlasting journey. And that is your highest reason and purpose that you are capable of comprehending in this life and you always be capable of imagining an even better one, but only if you allow the one you can imagine now to be the best as it is, always has been and always will be. Your imagination is not designed to show you the future, but designed to allow you re-envision the best of what is here and now, as all is here and now is forever. So trying to get ahead of yourself only ever causes you to stand still, and suffer the art of dissallowing your ever more greater destiny, that is who it is and what you are that is one and the same thing as your ever becoming of who it is you truely already are as all that you truely already are, always here and now, where all always is, and all time is and all the ways are that are always infinite in nature and freedom that is always of it's natural nature.

[Yonkon]

@Everything Thank you for this massive post. When you first posted it 6 months ago it was too much for me in many ways. This is extremely dense, so i will take my time to read it often and thoroughly. Hopefully, in the next months to come, i will be able to respond.

[idiot_stimpy]

What you're searching for is your immediate existence right now. Therefore, nothing needs to be done to exist right now, and there is nothing you can do to search for your immediate existence right now.

[Yonkon]

18 hours ago, idiot_stimpy said:

What you're searching for is your immediate existence right now. Therefore, nothing needs to be done to exist right now, and there is nothing you can do to search for your immediate existence right now.

 

so basically i should sit still and accept existence as it is? Don't know if i got you right. 

[Starjumper]

I'll just focus on chi kung here, because that's what I know.

 

There are some levels and different aspects of this.  Some people want to relax from their stress right now, and some want chi kung to do it, well it can help, but it's always temporary.  Downward focus chi kung can be relaxing, like the water methods, but if you want that, take prozac, it is always temporary.  It is putting a band aid on the problem, which does not heal.

 

True relaxation comes from being peaceful, and being peaceful comes from being powerful.  Anything else is a temporary band aid.

 

Therefor the kinds of chi kung that eventually lead to peacefulness are not peaceful.

 

I'll illustrate this with an explanation about how Zhan Zhuang works on your emotional state.  What happens in Zhan Zhuang is that you are (ideally) putting your body in a state of muscular stress, at least in the beginning stages.  For example, with the low stances your thighs are under a lot of stress.  This stress tends to cause you to tense other parts of your body, like for example, your forehead, your shoulders, your neck, etc. can become tense and also stressed.  This is due to emotional connections with muscle groups.

 

The real goal is to identify where you are holding this tension in your body where it is not needed.  You need to find the tension and then focus on relaxing that part.  This leads to your whole body relaxing except for your thighs ,an  in a lot of cases your shoulders as well because you are holding your arms out.

 

Therefore Zhan Zhuang teaches you to relax physically in the face of physical stress.

 

But due to the curious connection between physical and emotional, which is kind of like the microcosm within the macrocosm, but isn't, so ...

 

Zhan Zhuang teaches you to relax emotionally in the face of emotional stress.  That is the goal, yes?

 

So, the best chi kung for cultivating power will, for a long time, get you really hyped up and unrelaxed.  It's kind of like drinking coffee and taking ginseng a lot.  It's the warrior way.  The goal, or the ability it lends, is to be able to go from relaxing peacefully in a recliner to becoming hell on wheels in a half a second if needed.

 

I've been visited by one of the more powerful beings in the spirit realm while meditating, and let me tell you.  The intensity of its calmness would scare most people.  You know it is extremely calm because it is so powerful.  It has nothing to fear.

 

Unrelaxed ultimately comes from having some kind of fear, and the fear comes from not having power over the situation at hand.

 

So, your choice, prozac or the warrior way.

 

The saying:  "It is better to be a warrior in a garden rather than a gardener in a war," touches on this same idea.

 

Edited June 27, 2019 by Starjumper

[Rara]

11 hours ago, Starjumper said:

Zhan Zhuang teaches you to relax emotionally in the face of emotional stress.  That is the goal, yes?

 

 

I second this practice, I absolutely love it.

 

@Yonkon You asked if you need a teacher for qigong. I always recommend it because then you have somebody that can correct your postures. Even for zhan zhuang, your position will move without you realising. Youtube will do in the period before you start any sort of class, just, erm, try and find something authentic. You'll find that whatever teacher you get, it will always be slightly different techniques to what you learn before hand online or whatever.

[idiot_stimpy]

23 hours ago, Yonkon said:

 

so basically i should sit still and accept existence as it is? Don't know if i got you right. 

 

Yes, it can be quite liberating.

[Yonkon]

21 minutes ago, idiot_stimpy said:

 

Yes, it can be quite liberating.

 

Nice, will do.

It's a bit off topic but i have a related question: Can i practice meditation like "sitting still" while lying down on the ground? I find it more comfortable and can focus better, but i heard that the spine must be straight and upwards because of energetic reasons.. What about that?

[idiot_stimpy]

1 hour ago, Yonkon said:

 

Nice, will do.

It's a bit off topic but i have a related question: Can i practice meditation like "sitting still" while lying down on the ground? I find it more comfortable and can focus better, but i heard that the spine must be straight and upwards because of energetic reasons.. What about that?

 

Of course you can. Try to remember doing it before going to sleep in bed, you should hopefully feel very relaxed. 

 

Another method could be to just rest your awareness on your body. If you feel any pain there, just watch it and you may be surprised as it disappears to be replace with relaxation.

Edited June 28, 2019 by idiot_stimpy

[windwalker]

On 1/4/2019 at 3:16 PM, Yonkon said:

Can you specify what you mean with passive approach? Google can't help me with this one.

 

A passive approach might be one that uses meditation as it's approach indirectly releasing tension from the body as the mind becomes more quiet.

 

There is a book many years back called the relaxation response.

 

One could say this is an active approach or direct.

 

One lies down and starts from the top of the head actively focusing awareness on different parts of the body tensing them holding and then releasing.

 

This is done to the whole body and overtime will promote a relaxation response.

 

"

Heart and Soul Healing

Dr. Herbert Benson’s Relaxation Response"

 

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/heart-and-soul-healing/201303/dr-herbert-benson-s-relaxation-response

Edited June 28, 2019 by windwalker

[Starjumper]

3 hours ago, Yonkon said:

 

Nice, will do.

It's a bit off topic but i have a related question: Can i practice meditation like "sitting still" while lying down on the ground? I find it more comfortable and can focus better, but i heard that the spine must be straight and upwards because of energetic reasons.. What about that?

 

There are two aspects to meditation, there is the no-mind, non-thinking aspect, and then there is the energy work aspect.  Your body position determines the energy work that is done, but energy work does not need to be done.  You can meditate standing, sitting, or reclining.

[Starjumper]

On 6/27/2019 at 6:57 AM, Yonkon said:

basically i should sit still and accept existence as it is? Don't know if i got you right.

 

To really accept all things as they are requires emotional bliss, which is what you feel during the enlightenment experience.  

 

It has nothing to do with ideas or concepts or any thing of the sort, it's all about the way you feel, your emotional state, and only your emotional state..

 

It is a temporary condition.  Being relaxed physically is a good goal, being relaxed emotionally is a higher goal.  They are related to each other.

Edited June 28, 2019 by Starjumper

[Spotless]

There are several reasons to reconsider meditation while lying down:

 

you may may wish to look at lying down practice as just that - a practice rather than meditation.

 

In lying practice it is easy to move into several planes and typically in trance ( nearly always ).

It is easy to sync with planetary wave lengths and also acclimate to the astral planes as one is used to doing both in sleep.

 

it is also setting oneself into the possible habit of falling asleep during what you might also be calling Meditation while it is not Meditation and associations with this concept will be muddled possibly for a very long time.

 

The upright positions - of the spine - whether sitting on the floor or seated or standing are far better for all aspects of getting too Meditation.

In Presence - Divine Natural Essence - one is in meditation - and this does typically take years to find/become in practice or otherwise.

 

When meditating establish your awareness in the center of the head and not forward. This will reduce or eliminate boredom and restlessness and is the “proper” seat of high subtle body development (or full central axis awareness/Presence which is a broader embodiment).

 

The later is a reference to the central axis from Perinium  to  just back from top of head very slightly (which is why you tuck in your chin ever so slightly in meditation posture.

 

Lying down practices should be considered as different from a meditation posture and in discussions of one’s experiences “meditating” - or at the very least if you are speaking with someone about your meditation experiences you need to make clear at the outset that you lay down when “meditating”. So that if asked what type of meditation you do your reply is not just Vipassana with the exclusion of “while laying down”.

Edited June 28, 2019 by Spotless

[Yonkon]

52 minutes ago, Starjumper said:

 

To really accept all things as they are requires emotional bliss, which is what you feel during the enlightenment experience.  

 

I always thought it's the other way. First you accept, then you feel bliss... 

 

 

[Starjumper]

1 hour ago, Yonkon said:

I always thought it's the other way. First you accept, then you feel bliss... 

 

That is purely mental, and therefore partial.  Just think about it, if you feel emotional bliss then everything is wonderful, you accept everything as it is, you love everything, and there is no thinking, no concepts.  No one will ever get near that mentally, other than as a concept, and any concept, plus a dollar, will get you a cup of coffee in some places, that's what concepts are worth.

Edited June 28, 2019 by Starjumper

[Everything]

On 26-6-2019 at 7:36 PM, idiot_stimpy said:

What you're searching for is your immediate existence right now. Therefore, nothing needs to be done to exist right now, and there is nothing you can do to search for your immediate existence right now.

Yeah, but you are a physical being. You cannot perceive what you are not the energy of. So the only way, to come to the true fullness of all that you TRUELY ARE BEING ALWAYS RIGHT HERE AND NOW IN YOUR EVERMORE BECOMING? 

Is to feel better. Why? Because when you feel better, you will eventually feel good. And when you feel good. Then your energy is in alignment with your true nature. And when your energy is in alignment with your true nature. THEN YOU CAN PERCEIVE YOUR TRUE NATURE. 

[idiot_stimpy]

https://youtu.be/cZ6cdIaUZCA

Edited June 30, 2019 by idiot_stimpy

[silent thunder]

I've found spending time in a truly pitch dark, no visible light environment induces, or is a condition conducive to deep relaxation not experiencable for me in other manners.  When not even my skin is forced to process and perceive light upon it, something deeply primal in awareness shifts in response.  There's a bouyancy and a weightlessness to it...  an effortlessness that isn't experienced when light is constantly cascading...

 

We now have so much light in the cities... it's literally incessant.  Simply closing ones eyes does not and cannot induce lightlessness.  Some years ago, I was overcome by an unsought and unignorable compulsion to experience lightlessness again.  I'd encountered it a few times before, when exploring old buildings and some caves in the Midwest.  After playing with it again, I come to realize why it's a standard operating procedure for many inner shamanic paths and lineages.  True Dark I experience as palpable, resonant, bouyant and freeing.  unfolding...

 

I recommend it highly.  It's akin to weightlessly floating and drinking cool neutral bouyancy where i wasn't aware i had a thirst that only this could slake.

 

We seldom, if ever, get to experience the relaxation of not having to process some level of light, through our lids, on our skin (which may seem odd at first notion, but for me, after time in a truly lightless environment, the lack of visible light is palpable).  Even out camping away from the manmade lights, a moonlit night is filled with enough light that it does not require a flashlight to go for walks. My son now loves to accompany me on my night walks in the woods without flashlights.

 

But in the cities... pfft... light is literally inescapable, and most of it is partial spectrum, (not going into that rant here, as just thinking of it, induces tension lol).  Some years back I developed an unsought compulsion... a deep, unignorable craving arose and would not abate within me, for pitch dark... lightlessness, so that even my skin would not have to process light.  Lacking a cave, I found a way to create a lightless environment in my home in which to sit and it's become something of a deeply refreshing oasis.  Akin to drifting weightless on a calm lake at night.

 

My experience of the relaxation induced by lightlessness is akin to the relaxation experienced after extreme exertion and tension.  Often after tensing up purposefully either in forms or exertion, upon releasing, I experience deeper relaxation than if I had simply tried to let go of present tension and manufacture relaxation from the get go.

 

Some folks I imagine, may have not experienced the liquid bliss of lightlessness since the womb. 

I highly recommend it. 

 

[liminal_luke]

3 minutes ago, silent thunder said:

I've found spending time in a truly pitch dark, no visible light environment induces, or is a condition conducive to deep relaxation not experiencable for me in other manners.  When not even my skin is forced to process and perceive light upon it, something deeply primal in awareness shifts in response.  There's a bouyancy and a weightlessness to it...  an effortlessness that isn't experienced when light is constantly cascading...

 

 

Darkness rocks!  I´m on a mission to create a totally lightless sleeping environment.  The blackout curtain material I bought on Amazon works as far as it goes but light is still seeping in here and there and I´m an all or nothing guy when it comes to darkness -- even a hint of light is too much.

 

Your remark about light on the skin mirrors my own experience.  Sleeping masks that cover the eyes do little good if I "know" that light is still hitting my skin.  

 

The beauty of darkness to induce relaxation is that it´s so easy.  Well, finding/creating darkness isn´t always easy...but once the darkness is there the relaxation comes on it´s own -- no effort required.  Relaxation ought to be easy and in the dark it is.