Introduction to Chi-Gung video

Chi-Gung: Energy work

As I mentioned in my earlier post, Chi-Gung is the most profound science I applied in my life; hands down! I am a life long athlete that had tried every program, technique or regiment existing on the planet, and one thing for certain, I wish someone would have turned me on to Chi-Gung much earlier in life. In the attached short video, Dylan gives an articulate, short presentation providing a specific exercise known as palms raised to heavens triple burner, a moving meditation exercise for mobilizing, circulating, balancing and storing of energy. This exercise is simple but very effective, coupled with the earlier post Intro into Chi-Gung “Energy work”, will provide the new practitioner with a great foundation to work with. Watch the vid and read the article, once you put into practice you will be very grateful you did! The exercise seems a little slow and boring in comparison to many western exercises, but don’t under-estimate the power of the subtle and spiritual energy gained from Chi-gung practice.                                  

Chi-Gung is for everyone

The awesome thing about Chi-Gung, it’s for everyone! Healthy, sick, young and old, everyone can enjoy the health benefits from practice, and you do not have to belong to a specific religion or be a martial artist to do so. Set aside all the dogma and give it a try! Just thirty peaceful, meditative minutes a day and you’re on the way 🙂 Hope you enjoy, like and share the video so others can catch the opportunity too. Thanks for stopping by! Namaste, love & peace.

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Shamanistical magazine is loaded with my favorite pictures, arts, health, metaphysics, philosophy and just about anything else my discerning eye <0> canjours up… Most likely to have a close relation with materials of Shamanistical.com blogosphere.  I will throw in some personal  pictures, video, audio, arts; just a grab bag of goodies 😉 of myself, friends & associates in the mix of each magazine….attempt at originality?

The art of  good business is being a good middleman

With all this creativity and sharing going on, sooo much information out there, I thought I’d be a star and pull in some satellites with attaching energies? Birds of a feather kinda thing… I know there are some birds out there with similar interest, or maybe some cool cats 😉

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Artist shaping heavenly bodies

And the not so heavenly 🙂 View all things with a grain of salt, because it just may be shaped or reshaped by a photoshop artist. Enjoy this video presentation showing how easy it is making the not so perfect seem just a little more so.

Beach Shots

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More quick hitters with the Galaxy S4.  Jon Paul & Dylan playing around puppy beach Pier Park, doing some bad wolverine poses 🙂

Where’s the beef?

Cows have feelings too

Growing up in the heartland of America gave me a close and personal experience of the agriculture industry, especially the mass production of animals like cows, pigs, and chickens. For many years I was told that it was necessary for humans to consume animals in order to live, we needed the protein and other nutrients consumed by these animals, and it was all part of the natural process.  I spent many hours on farms, ranches, and feedlots watching these animals, and the one thing that really caught my attention was how intelligent and loving to each other these animals are and how one species, like a pig, would accept, live with,  and sometimes care for an animal of another species. It was difficult indeed, especially if you generally like animals and even made a few of them pet friends. In order to facilitate my diet I simply just put it out of my mind, every time the thought or TRUTH popped up, I justified by thinking it was the natural order of things.  Also, I knew many of my friends and their families relied on this industry for money, making it even more difficult to change one’s perspective or opinion on the subject.  Simply put, I lied to myself and anyone else opposed to the industry. Now many years later and no longer living in the midwest I have found it much easier to take an altruistic view on the subject. Also, I’m not as concerned about stepping on toe’s; not as if I am the whistle-blower on the subject, Hollywood has done much of that with movies like Fast food nation.  Anyway, it could not be avoided as I went introspectively with yoga and meditation, it was impossible for me to continue to ignore my experiences on the farms. The flood gates opened and all the dirty little secrets resurfaced. I was reminded of the neglect, abuse,  and torture of these animals, as well as the nasty feeds and injections that are used.  And don’t even get me started about the way workers of the feedlots, slaughterhouses,  and packing plants, are treated and grossly underpaid in comparison to the workers with the same jobs forty to fifty years ago. I could also write a book about examples of the bad karma experienced by many people I knew that were associated with this industry as well.  One thing for certain, it did not take much to convince me to try alternatives with my diet.

Let us set aside any moral questions at this moment and ask one question: Is it necessary to kill animals in order for humans to survive? Well, that’s easy to answer.  NO! Not only are there many vegans and vegetarians living as proof, but there are athletes that train and compete at a high levels without any animal proteins or animal bi-products (as seen in the attached video) and most likely have an advantage over those that do consume animal flesh. For myself, it was a question of dead energy (cooked animal flesh) vs live energy (raw or uncooked foods) and  raw meats just does not sound all that appetizing to me.  And of course my moral obligation as a cultivator of creation is equally important as well! I was going to post some videos of my current level of athletic training to give a visual account of my progress since going vegan but the vegan fitness stars in the attached video beat me too it 😦 Actually, I had some slight hang-ups from yoga and was not quite as far along as these guys, and more importantly I wanted to get family and friends to enjoy the benefits of the vegan diet:  more mental & physical energy, efficient digestion, low nonessential fats,  and good karma 🙂 Step it up, Go Vegan!

Leetsauce athlete’s smoothie

Chocolate Smoothie recipe

This particular recipe is used by a group of  vegan athlete’s that train rigorously on a daily basis. The chocolate smoothie has numerous beneficial vitamins & minerals (energies) to facilitate an extremely intense workout regiment (My main course meal everyday).  With that said,  if this recipe can provide a pro athlete with ample energy, then imagine what it can do for someone who would like to trim a little off the belly, or someone who simply wants to add a little snack treat without stressing about it. Whether youre training for competition sports or just wanting to add a new treat to your diet, I think you will enjoy  this healthy and delicious recipe.  In effort adding some diversity I like to mix up the ingredients and quantities a little, and this chocolate smoothie is no exception. For the sake of having a base to start with I will give quantities, but I rarely measure any of the ingredients anymore; a splash of this and a splash of that to get the desired taste and effect 😉  You will need a blender and a stick to fight off those sneaky buggers that come running every time they hear the blender. I hope you enjoy!

Single serving portions:

1. 1 Banana
2. 1/2 – 1  cup spring water ice (the more ice and milk the more watered down effect)
3. 1/3 cup Hemp milk ( or almond, coconut, or soy) sometimes I use all of them.
4. 1/3 cup of Almond butter
5. 1/3 cup of Organic peanut butter
6. hefty tbl spoon of unsweetened cocoa (experiment to get desired chocolate taste)
7. 1 tbl spoon of  oraganic blue agave

I throw in a splash of Vega One brand- all in one nutritional shake mix, to get a little added protein (optional of course)

Depending on my activities for the day I usually can make it the entire day off this one smoothie,  a veggie fruit juice, and water.

Your healing hands

    The attached photo’s are artwork by Alex Grey. Several years ago, I was contemplating the need for a visual reference of  the human energy network and meridians, when I stumbled across Alex’s work, I was blown away! And to this day I still haven’t found a better example to use for visualizing in meditation, or teaching on the subject.  As seen in the Christ rendition, the hands are seemingly lit up at the center of the palms. In TCM these energy gates at the palms center, play a very important role in harnessing, cultivating, moving, storage, and projecting energy.  I cannot stress enough the importance of focusing your thought into your hands, and coordinating with the flow of the breath!  Which, brings me back to the title: YOUR healing hands! Yes, you do the healing, so give focused attention to these energy gates at the center of your palms. With moving practices like Tai Chi Chuan, the body and hands will flow with the tempo of the breath.

In preparation for all meditation/healing practice, I will start by sensitizing the energy gates at the hands. I do this by pressing my  index and middle finger into the center of my hand, taking a deep breath, centering and focusing my thought at the pressure point. One deep breath into each hand is usually enough to get the energy flowing and open up these gates for the proceeding energy work. We now hold our hands out in front of the body facing each other, as if we are gently holding a large balloon.  I practice all my routines with my eyes closed. OK, so now take a deeeeep breath, slowly pull your hands apart as you inhale and slowly push them together as you exhale; should feel as if we are squashing that balloon, or a slight push/pull sensation of the hands. Keep up this routine untill you can feel the polarity at work. If you feel the push/pull with the ebb n flow, you’re ready to Go!

Now that the hands are fired up ready to go, we can experiment a little by feeling the energies all around us, both animate and inanimate, by not touching, but rather, by holding our hands near the object with the palm facing the object we are attempting to connect with. For example, we could test the continuity between your hand and a tree, or family pet, crystals, a glass of water, anything really, just have some fun in practice and over time your hands should become sensitive to the energies around and within you. Remember, you need to open the gates by the compression technique I mentioned earlier, and we should always remember to close these gates upon completion! We do this with our minds by thinking about it, and as added support, you can wave a hand in front of the palm; as if you were cutting a cord attached to the palm. Also, breath deeply and slowly into you lower abdomen while practicing! Feeeeel the subtle energy, moving your hands closer to the object exhaling and moving further away from the object as you inhale.

Not a very complicated process now is it? The real difficulty, mostly, is in the hours of stretching, meditation, accumulating, and the occasional transmutation of  illness, disease, and pain. 😦 And is why Chi-Gung healers must spend years of meditation practice and prepare their mind/bodies to deal with possible difficulties. We will discuss more on the topic of transmutation, in later post and videos. Untill then, practice, practice, practice! Oh, one more thing! I wouldn’t practice with electrical components or in electrical storms!! The human body is a very good conductor of electricity, we are mostly water. I highly recommend multiple sessions with a Chi-Gung or Prana healer! Sometimes Chiropractic firms will have acupuncturist on staff with touchless healing experience. I like to hit pain and injury with a multitude of healing efforts:  Acupuncture; Chiropractic adjustments; massage; hydrotherapy, guided meditation, nutrition, health coaching, Yoga, physical training, and even an occasional blood test 😦 to check my ph balance.

Before proceeding to video, I wanted to layout a good foundation, making it easier to follow the videos, plus I really do not want to break it down everytime I’m waving my hands over someone in practice. We will further examine the human energy channels and their associating elixer fields’ (dan-tien), or Chakras, later. Untill then, Happy healing! Mirrors within mirrors, plans within plans, believe what we will, but God has two hands 😉 Happy healing! Jon Paul