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hoots
United Kingdom
4 Posts |
 Posted - Apr 16 2018 : 06:43:16 AM
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I've been doing SBP for a few years and before that the micro cosmic orbit. I think I might have been doing it wrong though. I can feel my energy move quite easily, so I think I've been sloppy. Instead of really being inside my spine with all my senses, it's more like "I" stay up in my head looking down and feeling the energy move through the spine. I don't really feel like I'm "in" my spinal nerve, and I never lose awareness of my body or feel deep relaxation.
Should I instead practice by trying to move my full awareness through my spinal nerve, so that all my senses pass through it and forget about being "up in my head" just looking at the nerve?
In case it's not clear, what I mean is imagine you pinch your hand gently. You can either be "in your head" and just notice "oh, I've just pinched my hand", or turn it into a meditation where you try to fully enter the sensations of being pinched, and forget about everything else. Which is the most effective thing to do for SBP? |
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Charliedog
1625 Posts |
Posted - Apr 16 2018 : 08:09:50 AM
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Wecome hoots 
If you feel the flow of energy moving through the spine or spinal nerve it is ok to follow that with gentle attention/awareness. No need to remember that you are looking down from above, but if this is naturally happening it is ok too. Keep it simple and relaxed. Experiences will change over time.
Some lessons to read on SBP start from here www.aypsite.org/41.html
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SeySorciere
Seychelles
1532 Posts |
Posted - Apr 16 2018 : 09:44:39 AM
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Dear Hoots
I asked Yogani something similar some time back and a lesson was crafted to answer it - can’t remember which one right now but basically he said it did not matter what mental construct we put on it at the beginning, it will dissolve into inner space eventually
Sey  |
Edited by - SeySorciere on Apr 16 2018 09:45:14 AM |
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Dogboy
USA
2195 Posts |
Posted - Apr 16 2018 : 09:53:38 AM
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Welcome Hoots!
quote:
Should I instead practice by trying to move my full awareness through my spinal nerve, so that all my senses pass through it and forget about being "up in my head" just looking at the nerve?
As you can already feel energy inside, tracing the shushumna as you do SBP should be quite natural for you, and thus all you need to do. SBP is setting you up for the DM that follows, and trying to "lose awareness or feel deep relaxation" is too much 'doing' and not enough 'being'. Losing awareness is more likely to occur in DM anyway, where you are easily following the mantra and surrendering to that. If you find yourself manipulating SBP or DM, try letting that go and observing that surrender and where it leads you. |
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Jim and His Karma
2111 Posts |
Posted - Apr 16 2018 : 1:57:32 PM
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Hoots, you can't imagine how much I relate to this. I've gone through a zillion "perspectives" on spinal breathing etc.. I'd list some for mirth and amusement, but it's horrifying in retrospect. As with subjects like angels dancing on pins, you can launch entire realms of thought, clarification, and modeling. It's infinite.
At a certain point (I'm hoping to spare you from having to go all the way there!) you realize this is just your mind making a Thing out of it: generating complexity for complexity's sake. It's what we do. It's what our mind IS. In the right context, it produces eurekas and art and cleverness, but it's pretty comedic to complicate a process of reestablishing our essential simplicity.
Yet we all do it. It's unavoidable. So I've found it necessary to periodically scrape off the build-up of mental crud from practices. Without being fully conscious of it, you can find yourself doing 40 things when the practice is to do one simple thing. FWIW, this is what I was trying to say here. Advanced hatha yogis can make a production of merely sitting up straight....distracting from practice, and oddly never noticing that's what they're doing. We humans are hilarious!
How do you scrape off the crud? Perpetually return - however delayed - from mental tangents (and every mental thing is a tangent, including pertinent-seeming questions and distinctions) by gently favoring practice. Yogani emphasizes this again and again. Also: periodically reread the lesson to reestablish the simplicity of it (this helps a LOT). And, most importantly, let yourself approach practices with the casual off-handed indifference you bring to tooth brushing. You don't make a production out of brushing your teeth, you don't fuss over elbow positioning, etc.. It's just something you dutifully do every day, and it doesn't pick up any mental crud....so I'd suggest that you learn from this example. |
Edited by - Jim and His Karma on Apr 16 2018 2:42:31 PM |
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lalow33
USA
966 Posts |
Posted - Apr 17 2018 : 3:13:19 PM
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| Sorry hoots, you seem to be referring to a post I made. It's nice to know what is possible, but it's not that glorious. Stuff comes and goes. You are doing quite well with continuous spinal breathing. I'm of the view point that less sensitive people are doing quite well. I'm frankly jealous. |
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hoots
United Kingdom
4 Posts |
Posted - Apr 17 2018 : 4:40:39 PM
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Thanks for all your comments. I've been experimenting with moving through the nerve instead of just feeling it from the outside. I have noticed it makes the practice more enjoyable, partly because I can now really allow each part of the nerve to relax as I pass through it. As I read in another post, I'm allowing the nerve and my mind/awareness to "melt", which is a nice way of putting it.
One thing that's helped is that (as J&HK endorses in his linked post), I've switched to sitting on my zafu on a bed with pillows rolled up to support my lumbar. I finally feel I can really relax (and I think now I have tried literally every position except standing on my head  ) I think I've found the ideal position  . I once read a Zen quote: "A tenth of an inch of difference sets heaven and earth apart" - how true, but it's more like a continual series of tenths of inches it seems.
I think before I was a practicing a bit mechanically whereas now I try to savour it more. Being more relaxed helps (not that I wasn't trying before...) It also makes DM more effective since it begins the process of surrendering (@J&HK - that's a word I spent years trying to understand - I know what you mean). |
Edited by - hoots on Apr 17 2018 4:57:02 PM |
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Jim and His Karma
2111 Posts |
Posted - Apr 17 2018 : 5:17:40 PM
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Yeah, "Letting go" is probably better than surrendering. The latter has lots of grabby connotations probably best avoided.
Glad the unrigorous meditation posture is working for you. FYI, I never used siddhasana. To this day I meditate in regular cross-legs, in spite of lots of asana experience (this doesn't make me an AYP heretic - Yogani's clear that the heart of the practice is the meditation, and the rest are optional add-ons to be pursued if you feel moved to do so). Not sure you need that zafu, either.
The point of my post is that every sort of "framing" and conceptualization you apply is kludge you'll need to clean off later. And "savouring" is just more kludge (though, yeah, it's more refined, which is why it's working better than more mechanical conceptualizations). Sorry to be a pain, but this, as I said, is a part of practice: periodic scraping away the built-up conceptualization, and I'm explaining how I handled that.
"Savouring" is a choice, a conceptualization, a complication. You'll keep doing this sort of thing, but try to catch on early that that's what you're doing. Notice the pattern, and respond by letting go, letting go, letting go. Save time. Cut to that sooner. This part of it doesn't need to take decades!
Do you savour your tooth-brushing?
Anytime you find yourself conceptualizing any aspect of these practices (or your experience of them) in a way that's more complicated than how you'd conceptualize toothbrushing, spot what you're doing, and....let go. Just brush! :)
Beware of forums like these, too. Good specific advice is found here, but an online (or offline!) forum will infinitely feed your thirst for conceptualization. Good if you want to learn gardening, but it can be a problem with this realm. I've never found myself yearning for a toothbrushing forum! :)
Ok, enough pontification from me. Good luck and enjoy. |
Edited by - Jim and His Karma on Apr 17 2018 5:26:57 PM |
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hoots
United Kingdom
4 Posts |
Posted - Apr 18 2018 : 4:45:39 PM
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| Hmm I might be able to see what you mean, but I'm not certain. When I brush my teeth I barely pay attention. If I try to meditate like that then my thoughts just do their thing and I might as well not bother. On the other hand I think you mean that savouring is a "doing" which you're cautioning against. This morning I was just moving my awareness, aware of its silence and stillness even as I moved it up and down the nerve. That seemed to be enough. Is that what you mean? |
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Jim and His Karma
2111 Posts |
Posted - Apr 18 2018 : 5:31:19 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by hoots
Hmm I might be able to see what you mean, but I'm not certain. When I brush my teeth I barely pay attention. If I try to meditate like that then my thoughts just do their thing and I might as well not bother.
Oh, let your thoughts do their thing! That would be great!!! The practice says nothing about your thoughts! Just keep returning to mantra, that's the extent of meditation practice. Let your thoughts and your spine and all other aspects do absolutely whatever they do. Let!
quote:
This morning I was just moving my awareness, aware of its silence and stillness even as I moved it up and down the nerve. That seemed to be enough. Is that what you mean?
You don't need to monitor yourself, nor gauge your awareness. None of this is necessary.
Follow the practice. If you start feeling jittery, re-read the lesson (it'll help, promise). Re-reading the lesson is better than asking in the forum, IMO. Good luck. |
Edited by - Jim and His Karma on Apr 18 2018 5:31:46 PM |
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kensbikes100
USA
192 Posts |
Posted - Jul 02 2018 : 7:47:25 PM
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Jim, I find practicing disciplined asana (B.K.S. Iyengar's style of Hatha yoga) helps build the strength I need to meditate with the least sensed impediment in my spine. The best example is Iyengar's explanation of how to stand up straight, to perform tadasana. The basic asana principles in that, when I apply them to siddhasana, help to spontaneously create something like maha mudra which seems to enable energy flow to be controlled by my intention to enable prana to rise. In both pranayama and the subsequent DM, this helps me to get into a samadhi interval toward the end of the session.
i think it is valuable to practice good posture in pranayama and DM. Spiritual enhancement is a wonderful thing, but I don't think I can feel "hmm, I think I'm 20% better than 5 years ago ... " What I can feel is more smoothness, joy, success, and achievement in areas I value in my life. If adding aspects of Hatha to AYP is helping me, I think it's good to do.
Besides, I find the isometrics of maintaining aligned siddhasana for 20 to 30 minutes twice a day improves my posture, muscle tone, flexibility, and core strength and stability. That can't all be wrong.
What started for me as automatic yoga when I started DM has become a habit I follow nearly every sitting session. It also helps improve my asana base as I expand my capability on the mat. |
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Jim and His Karma
2111 Posts |
Posted - Jul 07 2018 : 01:41:42 AM
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If you baked cookies for poor kids while meditating, that might be a useful, noble, and rewarding enterprise. But it wouldn’t be meditation.
Virtually all life activities involve an exertion of control and will. Meditation is a rare exception. It’s about letting go. Ceding control. Surrendering. THY will be done.
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Edited by - Jim and His Karma on Jul 07 2018 01:43:21 AM |
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Being "in" the spinal nerve or looking at it?
