An Introduction to Numerology – The One | The Stomach

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Winter. The first season.

During Winter our energies tend to gather more deeply inside. Things freeze over, the colder days cause us to contract, this can imply pressure, like the internal pressure building up inside a seed. Less daylight has meant that we are encouraged to cultivate our own inner light. We have planted the seeds of our future growth and intention. Hopefully some of these are starting to germinate. The days are growing longer and we have the sense of new beginnings. There is still a sense of waiting and perhaps needing to be patient in this time of transition but things are starting to stir.

The Seasonal Cleanse.

During Winter we go within to consolidate and reflect. Our energies gather deeper and more internally as the nights draw in and the weather becomes colder. It is natural at this time to eat more and to be less active. However once Christmas has come and gone we start to feel weighed down with the extra blankets and the extra food. Rather than feeling sluggish like we are being dragged protesting it is great to be ready for Spring so that we can meet that energy fully alive and ready for the year ahead. Come February or March depending on how quickly it warms up (not good to fast or eat a lot less when it is still cold) a spring clean is a good idea;

Let’s explore the connection between the Stomach and our emotional/psychological life.

Stomach. The First Organ.

Holistic Medicine means that there are connections between the mind and the body, between the emotional and physical, the psyche and the spirit. These are connections that were explored deeply by the ancient masters of the healing arts.

Let’s explore the connection between the Stomach and our emotional/psychological life.

Food is first taken in via the Stomach. How we feed ourselves and what we choose to feed ourselves is often difficult to determine. The Stomach energy does not discriminate. When we don’t anticipate the consequence of our actions it devours anything that excites it’s appetite. Smell is the trigger. The smell of freshly baked bread, the scent of a woman/man, pine needles, sea salt from ocean spray.

The mouth is the start of the entry into the stomach. The taste buds are first activated by smell and the stomach starts to secrete its juices. Oral fixations can develop as we try to replace the deep contentment we felt in the arms of our Mother suckling at the breast or the fact that we didn’t receive this we may substitute with smoking a cigarette or drinking alcohol. Then there’s the images that excite the appetite; a naked body, sexually suggestive and explicit language and posturing. How the right car is supposed to turn you into a sexual magnet for the opposite sex. All of these things attempting to create an appetite, desire.

Your appetite is your lust for life? What do you do to satisfy it? How much do you live by your instincts and immediate gratification and how much do you live by your intuition? When do you have to suck it to see and when is it best avoided? How do we know when to act and when not to?

We live by our vices or by our virtues, by our animal nature or by our humanity. It is well to bear in mind that to the extent we serve one thing something else in us dies.

In Chinese Medicine the Stomach is called the official in charge of the public granaries and it grants the five tastes. A granary is a building for storing grain. A grain is a small hard seed like particle. We have sayings such as ‘a grain of truth ‘or ‘going against the grain’ (interestingly this phrase is often used to suggest a lack of compliance with the present status quo when it’s original meaning is much more likely to have meant going against the natural order) We need to find our grain of truth, to gravitate down into the essence of ourselves so that we can nurture the truth, the seed of our potential, our soul.

What are we giving birth to and how do we access our potential? If we think of our inner, as yet hidden potential as the inside of a seed we know that we need the right kind of environment, the right conditions and patience and the seed will create the internal pressure to break through the outer shell. This is really about us breaking through our perceived limitations and growing towards the light.

Practically it is good to regulate sugar intake as too much sugar will lead to dispersion and a lack of grounding and focus. You are what you eat and this determines the quality of the blood through which the soul moves through the body.

Exercises, yoga sets and meditations for the one

It is good to work on the spine and our sense of grounding. It is most important, especially in yoga that the spine is kept straight for it is through the spine that the consciousness rises transforming as it moves from the lower to the higher chakras.

Alignment and Flow in Kundalini Yoga

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Alignment and Flow in Kundalini Yoga.?

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A workshop for teachers and those with some experience of Kundalini Yoga
“If you don’t have rhythm you can’t be virtuous” YB.
As Kundalini yogis it is assumed that we have become conscious that we have resistance to change, otherwise we would not recognize the need for a regular yoga practice! This resistance to change is because when we change our patterns we release the energy that is behind them and has been maintaining them – the fear, the anger, the grief etc. This is more or less uncomfortable. What actually happens is we have an experience in which we discover that we are not who we thought we were. This is something we we have a lot of subconscious resistance to and even more so students who are new to Kundalini Yoga. Our posture represents the sum total of our beliefs and attitudes crystallized in our physical form and this is what gets broken down as we work through the kriya.
We know that the unique configurations in Kundalini Yoga kriyas are very powerful to affect this change. Why is this?
When we take a dharmic form we change our energy by aligning ourselves with universal form and flow.
As a teacher you are proposing a form and there is a lot of resistance to your proposal because the more fully and accurately your students maintain the posture, ‘the angles and triangles’, the deeper the experience they will have and the greater the meaning they will take from it.
Your platform to excel as a teacher is based on your personal experience of correct alignment of each asana and your overview of the kriya. With this in place you naturally start to use a language that confidently reminds the students mind and body to be in service of their soul. This, along with your virtue (“if you don’t have rhythm you can’t be virtuous”) determines your effectiveness as a teacher.
In this workshop we will cover basic principles for approaching any asana; (a) alignment (b) graceful entry and exit (c) rhythm (d) the rebound effect – using gravity to gain height and lightness of being (e) maintaining dynamism in the organs and meridians.
We will make an in depth study of several key asanas, meditation postures, warm up exercises and at least one kriya.?
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At the end of the day we will put together a warm up, a kriya and a meditation to demonstrate the connection between posture, organ and meridian in the overall effectiveness of your class or workshop.
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Enquiries to Amrit; 07961 104 036. info@mewithinme.com

The problems of these times

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Problems of these times

Chronic illness, including changes happening at a cellular level (for example cancer is the uncontrolled division of abnormal cells), auto immune disease (the system that would normally protect you starts attacking you), hormonal imbalances leading to disturbed sleep patterns and mood swings including irritability and anger, sugar cravings, high/low blood pressure, PMS, low/high libido, addictions/obsessions/compulsions, depression, disorientation, feelings of helplessness, alienation, loss of meaning, diffusion of identity, errors of judgement and withdrawal. This is coming from several unparalleld changes:

(1) Information Overload

Including increase in complexity of tasks and conflicting messages. Exposed to masses of information all trying to form/mould you (including e.g.; advertising/social structure/history competing to engineer us). Not easy to know what is relevant/no clear way to filter out useless. All of this is causing a bottleneck of stress and inability to process. Also a constant bombardment of discordant vibrations.

(2)?We are living in a time of great paradox

  • Fast pace and less time.
  • More global and yet demands to be individualise; to be unique.
  • A breakdown of extended communities, especially the extended family that would often live together, and so a need for other communities to establish. Often crowded cities have the most single people living alone and feeling isolated.
  • Fewer boundaries and yet more demand for political separation/clear demarcation of policies as a consequence; diffusion of identity makes some look towards ‘leaders’ to give them a voice.?

(3) An emphasis on the technological and material side of bringing increased complexity, deferred responsibility and lack of human contact.

(4) Success is measured by our stamina and constant peak performance.

(5) Illusion of Choice.

All knowledge and information is available at the touch of a button but to choose wisely assumes that we have a reference point from which to assess our real needs and determine our values.

What?s happening in technology puts particular demands on us

We need faster processing power.

More information storage capacity

Greater Complexity; because there are multi levels, for example within an organization there is less predictability. There is also greater accountability through greater tracking. This means that karmic consequences are more immediate.

More networking and less boundaries. Communication is global which changes the power relationships.?

Pollutants and radiation puts an increased demand on our endocrine and hormonal systems. All of this leads to an increased sensitivity and load on the C.N.S?(central nervous system)

The end of the Piscean Age and the begining of the Age of Aquarius

Now that we are transitioning out of the Piscean age and into the age of Aquarius we are becoming aware that;

Info and knowledge are not enough we need wisdom. Knowledge becomes wisdom when it becomes your personal experience. We need to reconcile & integrate the spiritual side of life with the material side so that we can find value & meaning.?

The breakup of communities and the unpredictable nature of the times means we are more fearful and insecure. The antidote is more love and unity.

Our actions either directly or indirectly affect many others.?We cannot live as though we are in isolation.

What Is Needed?

Technological complexity will continue unabated so to increase stamina and constantly performing at our peak we need to go inward and regenerate.

Less predictability means we need to become more intuitive so that we find ourselves in the right place at the right time successfully engaged in the right activity.

To appreciate change and learning as lifelong and continuous. Learning how to learn. The many levels and subtleties to learning requires flexibility and adaptability; mentally, emotionally and physically. This means being prepared to let all preconceptions die to discover something new.

Clarity comes from embedded core values and a vertical axis to keep the spiritual alive. A reference point acts as an directive to know when to act and when not to. It is like a rudder to guide and steer us in the right direction whether seas are choppy or calm.

We need an integration of the spiritual side of life with the material side. We need a spiritual fitness to give meaning. We over identify with the ego mind which makes us forget our relative value and limitations.?

Intellect is not enough we need in-tell-igence. An abundance of knowledge will no longer represent empowerment.?It gives the illusion that so much is possible, the illusion of control. In fact it adds to the confusion. Guidance comes from embedded ?core values? that open up our capacity to relate intuitively via a sense of the infinite to the unity of the uni-verse.

The coming age will be governed by increased sensitivity and whether we can live with this. People will numb out more. ‘Cold Depression’ will become more widespread. We need the capacity to read the context & relate universally to have a healthy sense of proportion and perspective.

Read about the solution in the post; mantra, shabd and the yoga of sound

How is growing up different for men and women

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Differences between men and women in the transition from child to adult

Problems for men

The male has extra challenges at birth. Yogic teachings say that ‘acid bath? numbs the right hemisphere of the brain. This can be balanced during pregnancy, in child raising, and by the maturing adult?s decision to give birth to his intuitive and sensitive nature. Secondly, he faces more of a polarity during his separation from the Mother, especially between the ages of 7-14.

The man commonly projects the image of the ideal woman in an attempt to resolve his separation anxiety. In addition he has resented at times being told what to do by his Mother. This ?backlash? accounts in no small part for the over emphasis on the woman as a sex object to be manipulated and controlled. This is of course exploited and exacerbated by the media.

If the mother is unaware of the process of separation that the son must confront or if there are no good male role models this can set up a cycle for faliure in future relationships. This is made worse if he is dominated or over mothered.

There is a more gradual maturation of creative potential within the young man with the adult trying to appear mature before they are. Yogi Bhajan advised against sexual activity until the man is 24 years old saying that the testicles are not fully mature until this time.

Problems for women

For the female there is less polarity & separation. Both the Mother and her daughter have arc lines, from nipple to nipple and across the heart chakra, which maintains their connection. The main problem comes if the mother did not want a girl, then the self-esteem of the child is affected.

The girl matures earlier than the boy in most cases which also accounts in part for a higher percentage of success rates in pre-secondary schooling. 14 – 21 can be a difficult transition time for women as their physical form is changing and they often become self conscious. Promiscuity may become a pattern in an attempt to feel loved; Woman must differentiate between need and love. Between her nieve instinct and her awakening intuition. Her intuition helps her to tell the difference between his ego (and lies) and his essence.

The eternal soul

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Despite all of our efforts to keep healthy the body is complex and paradoxical. After the loss of our premature baby boy at 15 hours old it was revealed that my wife had liver disease from an unknown cause and needed a new one. Life’s big challenges, and a regular kundalini yoga practice, remind us that we are not our body or our mind, or the emotional ups and downs of life. We are a soul with a destiny and our soul lives on after we die. Since you won’t be needing your body when you die carry a donor card to remind you of the unique opportunity you have to bring life back to those that our still living once your soul is ready to move on.

In the Sikh faith we use the expression ‘ Cherdi Kala’ which means always be in elevated spirits. Your soul is always elevated, undiminishable as it is. It cannot be improved upon or healed, or negatively effected by anything that happens to us. It is just waiting, calmly and patiently for us to return to it.

Why meditate in the early morning?

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This morning I decided to write down a few reasons (not all) for an early morning yoga and mediation practice. It is most important not to have any attachment or expectation about this. The Aquarian Age is motivated by inspiration not by dogma and rules.

Why meditate in the early morning??

Sadhana means spiritual discipline and in the Kundalini Yoga tradition this is generally taken to mean a daily early morning practice (though it could mean a practice at another time of the day). A commitment made by the mind and body to serve the soul. “A time each day to notice the patterns that lead us away from higher consciousness and to transcend those patterns”

Every 72 hours all of the cells of the body change. Our motivation waxes and wanes, our physical strength and capacity fluctuates but through all the change we have the chance to maintain a regular practice.

In the Kundalini Upanishads 2.5 hours was understood as one tenth of your day (they lived by cycles of nature rather than the 24 hour clock!). It was determined that if you give one tenth of your day to your higher consciousness, your whole day is covered by the energy return.

Before sunrise, typically between 4 and 5 am is a great time to get up (or anyway to have done some kind of practice before around 7.30 – 8 am). The stillness and the cleaner air makes it a great time to breath deeply, cleanse the body and mind and meet the day on your terms. If we get up when it is still dark we need to switch on our own inner light and face our shadow self. The birds start to sing their joyful songs and so we also have an opportunity to uplift ourselves.

The collective ego mind of the world is mostly asleep so there is less psychic interference (after sunrise the mind is less controllable as the energy of the sun is more scattered. The angle of the sun at 60 degrees is ideal)

Metabolism is slower (body temp is coolest at 4 am), and the atmosphere is cooler, therefore there is less heat and less agitation in the mind and body.

If you also have a cold shower whilst you body temperature is at it’s lowest it will not only set you up for yoga with a clearer mind you will improve the bodies circulation. When the body is hit with cold water when it’s temperature is already lower the circulation has to work harder. Blood is forced from the organs to the periphery so that although you may feel cold at first you will feel warm once you start to towel dry. It is more difficult to meditate deeply if your circulation is still in patterns dictated by sleep and feeling drowsy.

In the early morning hours known as Amrit Vela (the time when nectar rains down) the mind is more receptive to thoughts and you have more clarity to assess them. It is a time when, if in bed, we tend to dream more. This is the REM (rapid eye movement) sleep which is lighter. The body is more restless than when in the deeper periods of sleep that came earlier so whilst when you wake up early you think that you maybe tired later the converse is usually true, especially if you increase the energy you get from meditating with others. Some people claim that it’s important to dream and to attempt to analyse our dreams but sleep can also be dream disturbed (which is often simply a psychic detoxification) Good quality sleep is when we ‘sleep like a log’ and awake refreshed with occasional dreams that are genuinely insightful and profound (not that often!).

The Chinese Body Clock shows that the Lungs are at their strongest between 3 and 5 AM therefore activating them through deep and rhythmic breathing during this time is beneficial. Between 5 and 7 am is the time of the colon so it’s good to get the bowels moving early! So that between 7 and 9 we start to build an appetite for breakfast which is the time of the stomach. The colon is also our shock absorber – the dumping ground physically and psychically so subconscious fears that are stuck in the lower 3 chakras can be addressed well at this time.

We need of course to manage our need for sleep so there will be times when we need to rest more. If it’s possible to wake up without an alarm this is ideal but a certain training is usually needed to set a rhythm which is why a group sadhana is ideal.

 

 

 

Heart transplants – food for thought

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In Western medicine the heart is viewed as a muscular pump that sometimes malfunctions but it is also the organ which reveals our spirit and lust for life.

In the first day after a bereavement people are 21 times more likely to get a heart attack, men are twice as likely to die of a sudden heart attack with a mistress than with their wife and they are now so many cases of personality changes after heart transplants that doctors are counselling for this. There are many stories of heart transplant recipients receiving new memories with their hearts; of falling in love with the old flame of their donor, taking up the hobbies of their donor, of developing new tastes that coincide, even of changing their sexual preferences from men to women.

The Process of Creation

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Most people have the process of creation reversed. They believe that if they?have?a thing, for example more time, money, a relationship, they can?do?something, which will allow them to?be?? happy, contented, etc. This is?have-do-be.

The problem is the process of creation is the reverse;?be ? do ? have. If you want to?have?a different outcome then you need to generate a different way of?being.?The middle step of what to?do?is a how question. This is the one that trips us up with the first approach ? we look at others and ask questions like ?how come that?s possible for them and not for me, what am I doing wrong?? and many others that show that we cannot maintain a state of being that allows us to remain sensitive, non-judgemental and response to our environment. The second approach takes the second step out of the equation, for example if you are happy you do certain things because you are happy, as opposed to doing things because you hope they will make you happy and then wondering what you missed when you don’t get the result you hoped for. This gives weight to the new age anthem ‘whatever you are being you are creating’ A jump is then made from this to saying ?you create your own reality?. This is the carrot of the new age culture that puts us back on the treadmill of have-do-be because the reality we are encouraged to envisage is related to something that we haven?t got now, and is limited by our focus on the carrot!

Now listen up, this is important.

We are asking the wrong question.

The real question to ask is why am I not in a state of gratitude, contentment, peace etc now?

There are many responses to this question and they are all called complaints!…

If only? which causes us to a greater or lesser extent to feel victimised, and it?doesn’t?matter much how much money or status you have?(just in case you still thought that was the governing criteria for being happy!)

The teachings inherent in Kundalini Yoga and meditation, which bring Hatha and Raj yoga together, give us access to another way of being. This path requires loyalty and training but through it the state of contentment and peace alluded to here become a stable state;

The technology of the yoga of sound, part 1

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Sat Nam,

In the previous article,?I wrote about some of the problems that are unique to the modern age and indicated that Shabd Guru (the sound that is a teacher; Sha = ego, bd = to cut) has a central role to play in healing these maladies.

I would like to share a bit more about the technology so that we can delve deeper…

The ancient yogis considered that there were 2 caves; the bij (seed) gupha = cave for bringing in new life; male & female sexual organs for procreation and gian gupha = cave of wisdom; tongue & mouth used as a merger with the divine where the tongue represents the penis and the mouth the vagina

There are 84 pts ? 32 pairs of points (64) on the hard palate nearer to teeth. 20 pairs in a ?U? shape on the central part of palate. When stimulated by the tongue ?these points are like a keyboard input to a computer? The computer is the hypothalamus.
The hypothalamus is connected to the pituitary which is the master endocrine gland together they play a key role in regulating hunger, drinking, sleep, moods, emotional behaviour & sexuality. So Shabd Guru stimulates the hypothalamus to change the chemistry of the brain so that it becomes a more highly receptive instrument. It also helps the mental, emotional and physical bodies to integrate more gracefully and harmoniously. In fact there are;

4 areas affected by sound and breathe combination via neuro-endocrine link:

~ ?the autonomic nerves , sympathetic and parasympathetic, that control states of excitement, relaxation and high performance

~ the senses and c.n.s. through the neuro-chemical ocean of the body that connects all the cells

~ endocrine system that produces hormones and controls our moods and the feeling of vitality and energy

~ the immune system?

Just a taster about the potential of Shabd Guru.

Thanks for listening, Amrit

Problems of the Age?

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Chronic illness, including changes happening at a cellular level (for example cancer is the uncontrolled division of abnormal cells), auto immune disease (the system that would normally protect you starts attacking you), hormonal imbalances leading to sleep disturbances and mood swings including irritability and anger, sugar cravings, high/low blood pressure, PMS, low/high libido, addictions/obsessions/compulsions, depression, disorientation, feelings of helplessness, alienation, loss of meaning, diffusion of identity, errors of judgement and withdrawal.

Coming From

(1) Information Overload including increase in complexity of tasks and conflicting messages. Exposed to masses of information all trying to form / mould you (including e.g.; advertising / social structure / history competing to engineer us). Not easy to know what is relevant / no clear way to filter out useless. All of this is causing a bottleneck of stress and inability to process. Also a constant bombardment of discordant vibrations.

(2) We are living in a time of great paradox: Fast Pace and Less Time. More Global and more Individual and a breakdown of community. Fewer boundaries and more demand for political separation.

(3) Emphasis on the technological and Material side of Life bringing increased complexity, deferred responsibility and lack of human contact.

(4) Success is Measured by our Stamina and Constant Peak Performance.

(5) Illusion of Choice. All knowledge and information is available at the touch of a button but to choose wisely assumes that we have a reference point from which to assess our real needs and determine our values.

What?s happening in technology puts particular demands on us

We need faster processing power

More information storage capacity

Greater Complexity; because there are multi levels, for example within an organization there is less predictability. There is also greater accountability through greater tracking. This means that karmic consequences are more immediate.

More networking and less boundaries. Communication is global which changes the power relationships.

All of this leads to an Increased Sensitivity and Load on C.N.S. (central nervous system). Pollutants and radiation puts an increased demand on our endocrine and hormonal systems.

Now that we are transitioning out of the Piscean Age and into the Age of Aquarius we are becoming aware that;

Info and knowledge are not enough we need wisdom. Knowledge becomes wisdom when it becomes your personal experience. We need to reconcile & integrate the spiritual side of life with the material side so that we can find value & meaning.

The breakup of communities and the unpredictable nature of the times means we are more fearful and insecure. The antidote is more love and unity.

Our actions either directly or indirectly affect many others. We cannot live as though we are in isolation.

WHAT IS NEEDED?

Technological complexity will continue unabated so to increase stamina and constantly performing at our peak we need to go inward and regenerate.

Less predictability means we need to become more intuitive so that we find ourselves in the right place at the right time successfully engaged in the right activity.

To appreciate change and learning as lifelong and continuous. Learning how to learn. The many levels and subtleties to learning requires flexibility and adaptability; mentally, emotionally and physically. This means being prepared to let all preconceptions die to discover something new.

Clarity comes from embedded core values and a vertical axis to keep the spiritual alive. A reference point acts as an directive to know when to act and when not to. It is like a rudder to guide and steer us in the right direction when seas are choppy and calm.

We need an integration of the spiritual side of life with the material side. We need a spiritual fitness to give meaning. We over identify with the ego mind which makes us forget our relative value and limitations.

Intellect is not enough we need in-tell-igence. An abundance of knowledge will no longer represent empowerment. It gives the illusion that so much is possible, the illusion of control. In fact it adds to the confusion. Guidance comes from embedded ?core values? that open up our capacity to relate intuitively via a sense of the infinite to the unity of the uni-verse.

The coming age will be governed by increased sensitivity and whether we can live with this. People will numb out more. ‘Cold Depression’ will become more widespread. We need the capacity to read the context & relate universally to have a healthy sense of proportion and perspective.

We will introduce Shabd Guru as the solution (Sha means to cut and bd is the ego). It is the sound that is a teacher.