Shaktipat

[C T]

Can't feel anything at all in this Sutra chanting, actually got irritated and restless

Look on the positive side - it brought up your irritation and restlessness which would otherwise have remained festering inside, so now you have one less of each in your system! Dont you feel better already? So it was good like this..

[Raymond Wolter]

Look on the positive side - it brought up your irritation and restlessness which would otherwise have remained festering inside, so now you have one less of each in your system! Dont you feel better already? So it was good like this..

 

 

Positive? It's like I get a bout of food poisoning intentionally and throw up zillion times to cleanse my stomach. There are better ways of achieving that IMO. Btw there was no existing irritation or restlessness that you assumed this recording brought out. Like you have demonstrated before, you don't take criticism on anything faintly associated with Buddhism well. Whatever. I don't want this to turn into one of your Buddhist music is better than Hindu music thread. Thanks!

Edited June 30, 2010 by Raymond Wolter

[C T]

Positive? It's like I get a bout of food poisoning intentionally and throw up zillion times to cleanse my stomach. There are better ways of achieving that IMO. Btw there was no existing irritation or restlessness that you assumed this recording brought out. Like you have demonstrated before, you don't take criticism on anything faintly associated with Buddhism well. Whatever. I don't want this to turn into one of your Buddhist music is better than Hindu music thread. Thanks!

Man that's really a bit over the top. Such extreme sensitivity - i meant that in a light hearted way, in case you had not noticed.

 

I did not even take your comment as a criticism, and neither would anyone else, if they read your words. Did you mean it as one by any chance? I do not think so, but if you did, thats for you to deal with. And btw, you can critique Buddhism all you want. It does not offend me in the least. However, good to keep in mind it is a philosophy/religion for many people - some use it wisely, while others abuse it to no end. The ones you may offend perhaps exist in the latter group. All i am interested in when i engage with someone here is always only in the wish to get to some understanding of certain principles. Buddhism does not need crusaders, nor anyone to defend its path - and even if it did, i would be totally wrong for the job. And i love Hindu pujas, chants and kirtans, and Hindu traditional music is fab i think. Have you any other issues you want addressed?

[三江源]

.

Edited March 23, 2015 by 三江源

[freeform]

Awesome!

 

 

 

Sahasarara is the crown chakra of endless peddles. I experienced many temperature changes. Both cool bliss and hot blisses, those of both moon and sun energy. Plenty of songs and tunes, even spontaneous classical music, completely original tunes playing deeply clear and lucidly in my head. Amazingly beautiful stuff, even flute playing and drumming too. All either spontaneous during meditation or during the space between waking and sleeping as well as during sleep.

 

I definitely can feel my brain changing, sometimes popping sounds or crackling sounds in my head and feelings of swelling or tightening in my brain, all sorts of stuff. Muktananda says these are all a part of the process. Muktananda talks about many things in various books, especially in "Play of Consciousness" though.

 

 

 

Oh wonderful! What exact path do you practice?

 

Great stuff, thank you.

 

Temperature changes... spontaneous songs and music... skull popping and cracking etc... this all sounds very similar to what I and many others following our practice have experienced.

 

I practice Kunlun - you may have heard of it

 

The transmission we receive from Max, along with the practices given aim to activate this 'downwards flow'... and it's very refreshing to hear of very similar experiences from someone following a, culturally, rather different path.

 

Thank you for the book recommendation - I'll definitely have a look... You said that Muktananda claims that it's rare to have the energy start at the crown and move down... does he say anything else on this?

[markern]

[Trunk]

My experience is that the mani mantra resonates~awakens the centers from top down.

 

[markern]

My experience is that the mani mantra resonates~awakens the centers from top down.

 

 

But does it create a "kunlunish" type of energy or is it different?

[Vajrahridaya]

Look on the positive side - it brought up your irritation and restlessness which would otherwise have remained festering inside, so now you have one less of each in your system! Dont you feel better already? So it was good like this..

 

I loved it... I noted that I have to really tail bone relax to let that energy flow up through my system and flow it did! You know, before I got connected to Buddhism on an experiential level, it used to bring up restlessness and resistance from me as well. I have my theories on this, but we don't need to bring this up here.

 

I totally agree with your synopsis though CowTao, experientially.

 

Also, you can't really be doing anything else but listening completely rapt with attention otherwise it feels way too intense. The guy is chanting in a really powerful tone, sounds like the didgeridoo in fact from Australia! I've always felt that they were kind of the same sounds, the multi-tone chanting and the didgeridoo.

[Vajrahridaya]

My experience is that the mani mantra resonates~awakens the centers from top down.

 

 

Yes, the mani mantra is bringing bodhichitta through the shashumna. They say to let the energy of bodhichitta rush down and back up and down through the central channel until all obstacles are released as this works through different dimensions in the mind/body matrix.

 

Anyway... if you hear how the masters do it with Hri/Shree at the end, they do it very fast, deep and subtle but you can hear it going in and out of them with perfect pronunciation. At least this is how ChNNR does it. It's really deep. In Buddhist Tantra they call the energy of kundalini different things, like ultimate Bodhichitta or Chundali and other things. Even the experience of Rigpa where the pranas are stilled in the central channel and there is natural opening of purity, bliss, love, compassion and insight is like the culmination experience of kundalini had from the very outset, then the process is to integrate this with everything else in life. There is an entirely different handling of the experience it seems as it generally goes from top to bottom in this tradition, or even from heart then down, then up. I've heard different things from different people involved in Buddhist Tantra or Dzogchen. I've never heard it go from tail bone up though like in other traditions. The Tibetans actually consider all the physical shaking as an imbalance and they use herbs and various practices like yoga and mudra to balance the energy and make it less volatile.

Edited June 30, 2010 by Vajrahridaya

[Trunk]

But does it create a "kunlunish" type of energy or is it different?

 

Quite different.

[Vajrasattva]

Who ever was starting to stir the mud with me.......lets get a few things straight.

 

 

So you hear it from the horses mouth directly.

 

I personally feel that Max "knows" a lot and he is great at what he does.

 

Me personally I do not subscribe to some of the things he does and the theatrics. But He is good at that. May God Bless him with more Long Life and Bliss.

 

I have no interest in speaking about Kunlun or speaking about the folks that have come to me from that system. I wish them all success no matter what path they choose. The one mistake i have seen with many people is that they start something and then they never finish. Or they do things But they never really do it correctly. So If you will do KAP. Then you do it to the fullest. If its Kunlun then do it to the fullest. What ever path you choose DO IT and enjoy it.

 

 

 

Peace

 

Santiago

[Trunk]

Yes, the mani mantra is bringing bodhichitta through the shashumna. They say to let the energy of bodhichitta rush down and back up and down through the central channel until all obstacles are released as this works through different dimensions in the mind/body matrix.

 

... Even the experience of Rigpa where the pranas are stilled in the central channel and there is natural opening of purity, bliss, love, compassion and insight ..

 

Agreed that the mani mantra works primarily along the central channel (sushumna). My experience is that the individual syllables resonate the centers from top to bottom, as I stated before. This can be done out loud or silently internally.

 

It also can be done in conjunction with a simple version of deity yoga where you have an altar to Kuan Yin (whose sound signature is the mani mantra). Ringing of a bell, offering of incense and perhaps other (flowers, water, vegetarian food) and simply being there during and after the offering. This beckons the presence of Kuan Yin and thus you have the principle of Enlightened Cause with the practice.

 

Also, as we've talked about before, it is not only a matter of running energy through sushumna but concentrating and refining it at the special locations where sushumna intersects the centers: the places I've called the deep-centers, where the bindus are. (Reference essay.) With regards to this mantra, the method to do that is to visualize each syllable of the mantra at each deep-center. As small as you can while still keeping the visualization clear. (Also you can make the visualized syllable luminous, bright, also spin it if you want to.) This provides a handle for you to focus your attention on, and energy (qi) is drawn towards your attention (yi) and illuminates the bindus. And as the bindus illumine they resonate with The Clear Light.

 

The refinement of the centers occurs in steps: from 1) simple physical areas to 2) energetically active to 3) connected to The Primordial through the bindus. The sound syllables of the mantra take it from 1 to 2 and the concentration~refinement takes it from 2 to 3. The presence of the deity facilitates the whole process.

 

If I'm not mistaken, this is the skeletal fundamental outline of "secret mantra", "secret" in this case meaning "most subtle". As contrasted with "obvious" which would for instance be chanting the mantra out loud in a group and perhaps not being aware of the deeper subtle refinement that the mantra can be used for. Same mantra, everyone knows it, just a deeper progression of work.

 

I'm curious as to Vajrahridaya's feedback re: all of this vis-a-vis a more traditional perspective. The above is something that I've pieced together partly from related reading and largely from personal experience. I do know that the traditional Tibetan deity yoga practices are way more complex, but I think I've gotten some key essentials here. Also curious as to Vajrasattva's feedback as well as anyone else who has experience, as well as those that don't.

 

- Trunk

 

 

~ later edit ~

The problem with going to the central channel and bindus directly is that no one can find them (or not find them with enough specificity, repeatedly, with focus such that results are really produced). The central channel is stillness, and the bindus are very refined... not illumined~activated in most. Plus, even though everyone has heard the word "chakras", very few know how to actually energetically activate them (beyond just stirring up their physical energies). So the sound syllables of the mantra are a tool to awaken them energetically, then on to connecting to Primordial as I described above.

 

 

[JustARandomPanda]

before I got connected to Buddhism on an experiential level, it used to bring up restlessness and resistance from me as well. I have my theories on this, but we don't need to bring this up here.

 

I'd be interested in hearing about your experience with it.

[Trunk]

One of the key teaching phrases in Tsongkhapa's Six Yogas of Naropa is "enter, abide, and dissolve".

 

With most channels you wanna open, circulate, fill, nourish - run energy through and it's all good. The central channel has special dynamics that has to do with it's special connection to Big Non-Stuff. Energy goes in there, stays there, dissolves~refines and Turns Into Nothing.

[C T]

.... and Turns Into Nothing.

Hi Trunk,

 

Would appreciate an expansion on this. This may put some questions in people's minds i think.

 

Cheers.

[三江源]

.

Edited March 23, 2015 by 三江源

[freeform]

Thank you Markern, Trunk and Vaj.

 

Trunk, "it is not only a matter of running energy through sushumna but concentrating and refining it at the special locations where sushumna intersects the centers"

 

I have a problem with this - in fact its based on something you mention later - "The central channel has special dynamics that has to do with it's special connection to Big Non-Stuff." When I'm at the 'depth' of the central channel - 'doing' anything (wanting a particular outcome) becomes meaningless... things do 'happen', but in no way am I able to direct them... all I can do (on a good day) is go there and find out what happens. I spontaneously drop into the core channel - there's a profound shift in how awareness and focus work at that depth - the normal 'rules' don't apply there...

 

There are two experiences - one of 'core channel and I' and one of 'I am core channel'

 

so there's a core channel state, and a core channel structure... do others find this?

 

Affecting the core channel always happens indirectly. Affecting it in specific ways whilst in the core channel state is impossible (like trying to build a cube in a two dimensional world)... do others find this?

 

I'm very interested in opinions based on direct experience.

If you do have something to add that is based on a book or someone else's experience that's also useful, but please let us know.

 

thanks

[ShaktiMama]

Thank you Markern, Trunk and Vaj.

 

Trunk, "it is not only a matter of running energy through sushumna but concentrating and refining it at the special locations where sushumna intersects the centers"

 

I have a problem with this - in fact its based on something you mention later - "The central channel has special dynamics that has to do with it's special connection to Big Non-Stuff." When I'm at the 'depth' of the central channel - 'doing' anything (wanting a particular outcome) becomes meaningless... things do 'happen', but in no way am I able to direct them... all I can do (on a good day) is go there and find out what happens. I spontaneously drop into the core channel - there's a profound shift in how awareness and focus work at that depth - the normal 'rules' don't apply there...

 

There are two experiences - one of 'core channel and I' and one of 'I am core channel'

 

so there's a core channel state, and a core channel structure... do others find this?

 

Affecting the core channel always happens indirectly. Affecting it in specific ways whilst in the core channel state is impossible (like trying to build a cube in a two dimensional world)... do others find this?

 

I'm very interested in opinions based on direct experience.

If you do have something to add that is based on a book or someone else's experience that's also useful, but please let us know.

 

thanks

 

 

 

yes... my experience for years... is that that there is no difference between me and the core channel. I can also widen it at will although that is just a sensory perception because, like inside Dr. Who's police box, it has infinite dimension within.

 

I also, during healing work/Shaktipat, will look within the person's core channel. Much is revealed and can be done.

 

s

[Birch]

"like inside Dr. Who's police box,"

 

Yah, sometimes I find myself hiding inside there like a squirrel (or one of those weirdo rock videos on You Tube - what's their name?)

 

I do feel a difference when I am "everywhere" inside myself (oooh) vs half there and floating around elsewhere.

 

Dumb question of this thread. What (if any) are the consequences of being fully "there" vs half?

[Vajrahridaya]

 

 

I'm curious as to Vajrahridaya's feedback re: all of this vis-a-vis a more traditional perspective. The above is something that I've pieced together partly from related reading and largely from personal experience. I do know that the traditional Tibetan deity yoga practices are way more complex, but I think I've gotten some key essentials here. Also curious as to Vajrasattva's feedback as well as anyone else who has experience, as well as those that don't.

 

- Trunk

 

 

~ later edit ~

The problem with going to the central channel and bindus directly is that no one can find them (or not find them with enough specificity, repeatedly, with focus such that results are really produced). The central channel is stillness, and the bindus are very refined... not illumined~activated in most. Plus, even though everyone has heard the word "chakras", very few know how to actually energetically activate them (beyond just stirring up their physical energies). So the sound syllables of the mantra are a tool to awaken them energetically, then on to connecting to Primordial as I described above.

 

 

This is all very good and beneficial. I can't really talk about specific practices. But, receiving merit and offering it through visualizations is very important in Mahayana practice.

Edited July 2, 2010 by Vajrahridaya

[Vajrahridaya]

I'd be interested in hearing about your experience with it.

 

Ok SereneB,

 

Basically the energy body as a result of Buddhist insight is different from the lineages that view reality as ultimately real basing it upon a true and final state of origin. So, to even make an energetic connection to beings of Buddhist lineage generally takes transmission and an experiential initiation into this dimension of understanding and experience. The treatment of the chakras is also dynamic and without static essence, so the energy field of a Buddhist tantric practitioner will be different.

 

The fact of emptiness rubbed me wrong. I used to translate it differently through my theist conditioning and pertaining to some self standing void, thinking that God transcended this. But, this is not what emptiness means in Buddhism as we well know. So, when I started to get a full on schooling of the truths that the Buddha taught and it's later elaborations. I fought it's insight and felt it was mean spirited or even nihilistic because the rug of which I was basing everything upon was being pulled from under me slowly. I started to have a different view of the cosmos through the debates and started understanding and experiencing the insight of infinite regress and non-origin. I started to see how certain questions could not be answered by theories of divine origin and interpretations of spiritual experience through the doctrine of divine origin we're finally seen as lacking in objectivity.

 

This all rubbed me wrong because since the time I started to really embrace spirituality I did so through the concept of God and built everything upon that with immense focus. So when that basic card was pulled, my entire house of cards came tumbling down and I've had to re-arrange everything, even on an energetic level as my understanding of the goal of the spiritual life now has a different basis to build from. This is far more difficult than it sounds. So, it's much better to start off with "right view" from the get go. Like I've said before... there are stories of Hindu yogi's immediately dying to be reborn with a new karmic shell upon having the realization and experience of the meaning of the Buddhas teachings on emptiness. I was almost one of those Hindu Yogi's because I had dug those roots of divine identity deep and to have them shook up and changed so intensely was detrimental to the physical body as it's focus was based on an entirely different energetic pathway in the sub-regions of my being.

 

This is why the Buddha put "right view" of dependent origination and emptiness at the very beginning of the 8 fold path, because it is exceedingly important and cannot be reconciled with paths that internally interpret the cosmos as having a divine origin, super-all embracing God that emanates and destroys the cosmos based upon his/her/it's will, etc.

 

This doesn't mean the cosmos is not beautiful or one cannot embrace it's infinite potentiality, and it's not a nihilistic approach at all. It's just more deeply objective of an outlook that doesn't make experiential excuses anymore for a deeply rooted static identity, nor the intellectual excuse of, "It's God's will" and is thus more a view based on recognizing endless relativity and objectivity due to seeing more deeply through ones own spiritual conditioning.

 

The above is the highly abridged and simple version. Spiritual autobiography is in the works. LOL!

[ralis]

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is why the Buddha put "right view" of dependent origination and emptiness at the very beginning of the 8 fold path, because it is exceedingly important and cannot be reconciled with paths that internally interpret the cosmos as having a divine origin, super-all embracing God that emanates and destroys the cosmos based upon his/her/it's will, etc.

 

 

 

 

You need to understand that "right view" is only a Buddhist view and is only relative to a Buddhist. To project this view onto the entire cosmos is incorrect. Further, you use reverse logic to substantiate a position that is at best untenable. Buddhism is not above any other belief system. It is just another belief system.

 

 

ralis

[Tao99]

[

Edited July 9, 2010 by Tao99

[Vajrahridaya]

As shown below many translators agree on Lao Tzu's Chapter 4 as follows:

 

Tao Teh Ching by Lao Tzu

Chapter 04 Sentence 5

Beck I do not know its source. It seems to have existed before the Lord.

 

Blackney Whose offspring it may be I do not know: It is like a preface to God.

 

Chan I do not know whose son it is. It seems to have existed before the Lord.

 

LaFargue I don't know of anything whose offspring it might be - it appears to precede God.

 

Legge I do not know whose son it is. It might appear to have been before God.

 

LinYutan I do not know whose Son it it, An image of what existed before God.

 

Mitchell I don't know who gave birth to it. It is older than God.

 

Muller It is the child of I-don't-know-who. And prior to the primeval Lord-on-high.

 

Walker But I do not know whose child it is - It came even before God.

 

----------------------------------------------------

 

From this I must conclude that Lao Tzu did not throw out the old belief in God, I think it was Shangdi. Here he is stating that the Tao - the Great Natural Way - flows through God itself, who also finds it as it's progenitor. Thus, I must conclude that Taoism is closer to Eternalism then to Buddhism, and that Taoism and Buddhism will always be two different sides of the coin, two polar opposites. Oh well. What ya gonna do. To each their own.

 

Hmn... interesting. Thank you. Yes... everyone needs what they need in order to make progression or evolution in the spiritual sense. Buddhism as well uses the focus of an "other power" (specifically in pureland paths) as a universal meditative focus, but of course empties it of inherent existence in the end... called, "emptying the basis", through deep critical analysis and experiential analysis that can't really be described as you have to utilize experiential understanding of inter-dependent origination/emptiness in a jhanic state or state of samadhi.

Edited July 3, 2010 by Vajrahridaya