I suffer from an immune disorder, so this topic is of great interest to me. Thao mentioned that we are gradually losing our immune systems and something about it relating to our modern way of life.
For the last few weeks I have been toying with the idea that my weakened immune system may stem from a somewhat repressed personality. That is to say that I suppress my feelings as a way of coping with stresses, fears, anxieties, self doubt, etc.
Manninder recently posted a link to a web site which I felt reinforced my belief.. (thanks Manninder! )
The Horstmann Technique is a gentle bodywork technique that facilitates healing and wellness through the release of blockages. These blockages usually manifest as pain or stiffness, which may be physically, emotionally or spiritually based. An ancient Chinese belief is that suppressed negative experiences are held in the muscular system of the pelvic or sacral area of the body and also in the shoulders and feet. http://www.colourvibrations.com/horstmann.html
I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be. -- Douglas Adams
Somehow I think this is relevant... The research here shows yet again that that the sense of smell is closely related to our emotional wellbeing.
Smell and Schizonphrenia – reporter Karina Kelly
Can your nose smell the early signs of schizophrenia? According to researchers at the University of Melbourne it can. They’ve found that your ability to correctly identify smells on a scratch and sniff test can be an indicator of your risk of developing schizophrenia. In the past we’ve had very limited tools to predict whether someone is going to develop schizophrenia or not. All we’ve been able to use is family history and certain behaviour. Until now. Researchers at the University of Melbourne have found that our sense of smell is turning out to be very useful in predicting the development of schizophrenia. Take a teenager already at risk of developing schizophrenia. The worse they score on the scratch and sniff test, the higher their likelihood of developing schizophrenia.
...
[in schizophrenia] there’s also a breakdown in the connections between our thinking brain and the emotional part of our brain.
Which led researchers as far back as the 1960’s to notice an unusual characteristic of schizophrenics. They have difficulty identifying smells
...
Dr Warrick Brewer
The sense of smell is the only sense out of the five senses where the information passes directly from the top of our nose into the emotional centre of the brain first.
Narration:
The smell information then passes into the thinking part of our brain, the frontal lobes, where we can put a label on what we’re smelling.
Very interesting, Zark. I have noticed that when I tense up even a bit, I considerably lose my normally acute olfactory ability.
For the serious immune problem: eliminating negative experiences by introspection, changing lifestyle and doing sports, all for strengthening the body and especially the shoulder, back, pelvis and abs as much as you can will be a great step forward. You can do wonders, I have and continue. The shoulder, back and pelvic areas are especially hard to train; abs are much easier. The shoulder areas are the toughest from my experience, since each is not a single muscle, and you have to stimulate them by performing exercises in all kinds of directions.
I'd say it's not that negative experiences are mysteriously kept in the shoulder, back and pelvic areas, but rather those negative experiences are additionaly exhausting and overstressing those structurally and functionally important components of the body. I have monitored myself and can definitely say that negative experiences cause internal tension and microspasms, if I can call them so, affecting more or less the whole body, but the shoulder, back and pelvic areas are indeed affected the most because, if you think, most movements and actions involve at least one of those parts, and they have a lot of stuff to handle even without any psychologically negative experiences. All those parts are very close and/or are directly connected to the spine through various nerves, so they influence your mood directly and are issuing indirect analogous signals through the spine to the rest of the body.
It is important to remember that not only introspection and isolation from negative experiences can help remove extra tension (and thus release valuable resources to the immune system), but also simple physical development of those areas can remove negative experiences, thus breaking the negative feedback loop. By solely physical exercises, you'll be able to remove the negative experiences that are caused by already tensed and exhausted components of the body themselves.
Also, have in mind that while you may think that there's nothing wrong with your shoulders and back, for example, e.g. you are not feeling any pain, even a miniature misalignment/asymmetry of the muscles serving those areas (you could suffer from such by lack of exercise, incorrect posture, etc.) can have a huge impact on your wellbeing and should be painstakingly corrected on your own or through consultation with a specialist - most of the latter, as I have found, have good idea of the theoretical impact of problems in the shoulder, back, and other important areas, but have no idea of the practical impact and the importance of proper exercise.
Did you know that current medicine does not have an explanation for the vast majority of hypertonia (high blood pressure) in patients?
Structural problems in such major areas, even when they are correctable by simple, but careful and concentrated exercise, are not given much consideration. Add to that the wasting of human mental potential through bad education, money-worshipping, etc., and no wonder there are so many casualties of stress.
This time, I am speaking strictly from experience, as I have had a lot of difficult-to-remove problems with the shoulders and back over the years, and which a combination of mental discipline and proper physical exercise (in addition to a change of lifestyle) helped a lot.
I am still looking forward to dealing altogether with my hay fever which is due to a damaged immune system as well.
Ah, and it's time yoga gets revisited.
‘And there we are. When you push away your neighbours, your son or your daughter - if you aren’t always ready to help even those whom you don’t like, you contribute to the disintegration of your civilisation. And this is what is happening on Earth more and more, through hate and violence."
Thao
hmmm.....detoxification through water fasting.
I have done that. The after effect really feel great but at the end I succumb the pressure and temptation of old eating habits. Probably because eating mainly raw vegetables is quite boring and isolate me from other people. But I am still working towards raw food again. Have to think a strong reason and ways to prevent isolation from people.
Spiriulina is great. Eat a spoon a day.
Exercise. Few years ago, I couldn't even able to sit in lotus position during meditation. My legs would get numbs. But now, my legs didn't get numbs.
Healthy life: Raw fruits and vegetables +pure water +clean air +exercise + proper preception of life
It is that simple but require a great SELF-DISCIPLINE to do that!! I have tumble a few times while doing that!
bomohwkl wrote:Few years ago, I couldn't even able to sit in lotus position during meditation. My legs would get numbs. But now, my legs didn't get numbs.
I can't do the lotus (haven't persisted trying) but I wonder: except improved stability of the body, have you experienced any other benefits of the posture?
Healthy life: Raw fruits and vegetables +pure water +clean air +exercise + proper preception of life
There's at least one more important ingredient: spiritually worthy pursuits during study/worktime. All the proper perception, exercise, clean air, pure water, and raw fruits and vegetables in the world won't do much without that ingredient, IMHO, given that at least 8 hours of our time each day pass doing that. I'm changing jobs as a result.
have you experienced any other benefits of the posture?
sleeping position and sitting positions. I think lotus position prevent me from falling asleep easily while meditating...that's the only observed and 100% confirmed benefit. Although there might other benefits, I have yet discovered or confirmed.
bomohwkl wrote:so what are u changing into? And why that job?
It is still computer programming, but I am going to work for myself since my priorities in the field do not coincide with those of the big corporations, where I had the chance to work for a couple of years. Big corporations and smaller businesses are equally lost in pursuing technology and innovations for technology's and innovations' sake without consideration of spiritual consequences. Why that job? Because programming allows me to use and develop my mind intensively in creating (hopefully) useful things.
bomohwkl wrote:have you experienced any other benefits of sleeping position and sitting positions. I think lotus position prevent me from falling asleep easily while meditating...that's the only observed and 100% confirmed benefit. Although there might other benefits, I have yet discovered or confirmed.
I just start my 'career' in research. Have to say that the research is not so inspiring. It is becuase I am working in material technology. Although I am not directly involving myself in material technology, my main job is to discover and understand the physics behinds so that I can say whether something will work or not work and other possible limitations and suggesting ways to improve it. (It seems that I am good at that job probably becuase my strange inner desire to understand things).The problem is my job takes away significant portion of my time and mental resources from studying SELF and consciousness. However, I have now specificially dedicated certain time for spiritual development (hoping in turn my ability to understand things increase and hence my job becomes easier freeing my mental resources.)
I prefer to do research in consciousness but it seems that such places are very limited or non-existence. I might do a research in psychology in future. It is more interesting since I can see a chance to understand myself and other people.
have you experienced any other benefits of the posture?
I was just trying the proper lotus position.. a very uncomfortable position.. especially when first attempting it. Normally I do the half lotus position (where only one leg is rested on the thigh).
My thoughts are that due to it being so uncomfortable, this may in fact be beneficial as we soon adapt to this discomfort and learn overcome the pain.
Thao said we are on this world to learn how to suffer, but what do we learn from suffering? how should we suffer? Perhaps the answer is this: that we need to learn how to rise above suffering. I am quite familiar with how not to suffer: it is very tempting to wollow in self pity, to be lazy and use it as an excuse to become self centered.
Remember Thao said that as our minds develop the less of a burden our bodies become.
I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be. -- Douglas Adams
Yes, Zark, when not suffering it's so easy to focus on distractions and cheap thrills. It's (was) so easy to convince myself that I can do almost anything and still feel good. Wallowing in self-pity when suffering is just as easy. It's called lack of discipline. And we have to watch all our steps carefully so that we do not get sidetracked from mental evolution by accident.
When you have certain degree of fitness,you can do cross-legs, half-lotus and even lotus position and also you have meditated for quite for years. When you are deep in meditation, you shouldn't really feel your body except if you are falling from your erected spine (falling asleep-like me). I think if you feel uncomfortable WHILE meditating in lotus position, it means that your meditation is NOT DEEP enough. Try going deeper using your mind. If you lack of experience in meditation, then it is good to start with comfortable position and at least you know how does meditation feel like.
Just my opinion. Meditation is about focus of the mind blank without physical sensation.
Vesko wrote:when not suffering it's so easy to focus on distractions and cheap thrills...
hmmm... good point. There are many ways to respond to suffering, and some of them can be quite beneficial. For example when the pain gets bad enough, it can serve as a wake up call.. and I start cutting out all the bad distractions from my life again .. eg: processed foods (junk foods), TV, computer games, etc. Whilst at other times I am not so strong and give in to self pity..
I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be. -- Douglas Adams
)
?