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Starting Line
This article is the second in a three part series. In my first article
in this series I talked about "Energy,
Spirit and Mind" and introduced how these terms are used in Seishindo.
In this article I am going to talk about how to cultivate "ki" the energy
that is the source of all life. If this is the first article in this
series you are reading, you might want to first read my last article,
so you have a better understanding of how we think about "ki" in Seshindo.
No one has absolute knowledge (except through faith) of where ki originates
from and no one knows where our personal ki goes to after we die. Ki
springs from the depth of the universe as well as from the depth of
our soul. The way of ki is a gigantic and fascinating mystery, and one
that is well worth exploring. In studying ki we can come to a deeper
understanding of ourselves, our relationships, and the world we live
in. Our study of ki can help to liberate us as we become better attuned
to the music and poetry of our heart and soul.
Having an experiential understanding of the nature of ki leads us to
encounter a natural, creative intelligence, that far transcends the
abilities and powers of any one human being. Ki is the common denominator
we share with all of life. I believe that ki is essentially, expansive,
mutable, and supportive of life, and that it can adapt to an endless
variety of forms and functions depending on how it is received, shaped,
and utilized by our system.
I wrote above that ki is "supportive of life" and I want to explain
this a bit more here. Ki supports life when our system is able to let
it flow unimpeded, like when when our immune system spontaneously heal
wounds or illnesses. Ki also has the potential to be destructive in
nature when it's flow becomes either stagnant or blocked, as in the
case of the body being ravaged by cancer. Noguchi Sensei, the man that
developed "Noguchi Sei Tai" (a Japanese system of health management)
used to say "Illness is due to excess energy being trapped in the body.
The stronger the illness, the more energy there is trapped." One of
the main purposes of Noguchi Sei Tai is to facilitate the release of
excess energy held in the body so that the body can operate freely,
and without impediment. This is also one of the main functions of Seishindo.
When the body is stable and able to move freely, our thoughts patterns
and emotions will be stable and flowing, and health and emotional balance
will be fostered. In my first newsletter I wrote "The quality of our
life is not dependent on the circumstances we encounter. The quality
of our life is dependent on what we learn from the circumstances we
encounter." In this issue I will say, "The quality of our life is not
dependant on the quantity of ki available to us. The quality of our
life is dependent on our capacity to maintain a free flow of ki throughout
our system." Our belief system, as well as the way we facilitate the
generation and flow of ki within our system are the major determinants
of the quality of our life. Free flowing ki energizes and nourishes
the body. Blocked ki can damage us and weaken our ability to adapt.
The cultivation of free flowing ki is thus an important activity to
explore because the manner in which we cultivate, use, and expend ki,
is what determines our health and well being, and who and what we become
over time.
One of the main functions of Seishindo is to help people cultivate the
ability to be calm, fully present, and feeling one's emotions and bodily
sensations, without the need for internal dialogue. When we are at one
with our self and our experience there is no need for internal dialogue,
for there is no "other one" to talk to. Present in one's body, present
in one's brain, and aware of and connected to one's emotions and the
environment, but not requiring or engaging in internal dialogue. This
is a very special way of being. A way of being that can help us to fully
actualize our self in the world. This is a way of being that can help
us to deeply connect to our ability to respect, love, and heal, self,
other, and the world around us.
Main Course
At every moment in time the ki within your system speaks to you via
a somatic language that is as refined, systematic, and complete as your
verbal language. This transformation of ki into somatic language is
the basis of the non-cognitive wisdom that we call "intuition." Becoming
fluent in this language can help you maintain your health and well-being,
foster more heartfelt relationships, and assist you in expressing your
creative and healing gifts when working with others in various contexts.
When you do "just enough" and nothing more or less, you will create
the context for your body to be structurally balanced, flexible, and
free to move. This is the way you are designed to be, and at such times
your ki flows freely. Structurally balanced, flexible, and free to move
and change, mentally, emotionally, and physically.
We have a chemical-electrical-muscular response to events, other people,
circumstances, and the intake of energy via food, sunlight, water, and
other sources. People further react to: presently occurring events,
thoughts about possible future events, memories of past events, and
internal dialogue. To a large extent, the responses we have to the energy
we encounter and generate are dependent on:
1. The way we use our
body (structure, movement, flow).
2. Our system of beliefs,
and
3. The default neuromuscular
biochemical pathways that we have developed over time due to a tendency
towards habitual reactions.
The changes that take place in our body and brain are highly systematic
in nature, and these changes determine the quality of our emotional
responses, and our ability to think in a creative manner. Something
occurs, and we spontaneously feel, think, and react in a specific manner,
all of which leads to our somatic-emotional experience. For the most
part we have limited awareness and understanding of what actually changes
within our system, to cause a change in our somatic-emotional experience.
We generalize the "feeling tone" of our experience and we give these
generalized feelings rather unspecific verbal labels such as "happy"
"in love" "ill" "hungry" "depressed."
You can think of our various somatic-emotional reactions to life as
"recipes". Increase the blood pressure ever so much, restrict the flow
of blood to the extremities a certain amount, increase the speed of
your heartbeat, induce certain chemicals into the bloodstream, breathe
more shallowly, and think about what could go wrong, and you have created
the recipe for "fear." We each create these somatic-emotional recipes
outside of our conscious awareness, and without the conscious knowledge
of what the "contents" of each recipe are. Most of this activity is
coordinated by what in Seishindo we call "somatic intelligence," the
intelligence of the mobile brain within the body. The task we face when
wanting to live a balanced creative life, is to heighten our ability
to sense the components that make up our various somatic-emotional recipes,
so that we can continue to adapt and maintain a system that is expansive,
balanced, and free flowing. When our system facilitates the free flow
of ki, we maintain a state of health, well being, and creativity.
1. There is a dynamic
life force (ki) which pulsates through each of us. Most people have
developed a tendency to inhibit the flow of energy and movement created
by ki when presented with challenging situations. When the natural flow
of ki is inhibited, the natural flow of information available (images,
sounds, feelings, and "solutions") is also inhibited. Allowing a free
flow of energy and movement throughout our system facilitates a free
flow of information and thus high quality learning and adaptation.
2. Ki flows best in a
system that is balanced in structure, porous, flexible, expansive, and
well oxygenated. Therefore in Seishindo we suggest any and all physical
exercises and mindfulness training that helps you to accomplish just
such a state. This is the kind of state that increases your resilience,
adaptive and healing powers, and energy flow. Aikido, Yoga, Tai Chi,
Pilates, Gyrontonics, and various Seishindo practices are excellent
for this. The idea in all of these practices is to increase your awareness
of what is taking place in the moment, while entering into an experience
where you "stop stopping" yourself, and your thoughts and reactions
transcend the limitations of your habituated "everyday" pace and rhythm.
When we use more of all of our self and less of any one part of our
self, our system will tend to be healthy and highly responsive.
3. Breath moves ki and
delivers oxygen to the system. Oxygen and ki are highly supportive of
health, well being, and the formulations of solutions. Every thought
we have and every emotion we experience, affects the flow of breath
and thus ki, within our system. When we are able to maintain a relaxed
breathing process appropriate to the situation at hand, we maintain
a free flow of ki, our emotions tend to be balanced, and our thinking
tends to be solution oriented. There are many different disciplines
that offer various breathing exercises. Any well conceived breathing
exercise will be extremely helpful in "training" you to maintain sufficient
amounts of oxygen in your system. In my last article I presented the
Heartbeat
Breathing practice. You can find this practice here.
4. Under normal life
conditions, when a system receives a "shock" it adapts and rebalances.
Extreme life conditions such as trauma result in extreme adaptations,
and quite often the rebalancing part of our recovery does not take place.
Usually during times of trauma the person's energy, musculature, and
thought patterns "lock" part way through the cycle of experience, and
the natural and necessary rebalancing back to center, does not occur.
When we block the natural flow of ki in our system, we block the flow
of the "river of life." Meaningful and lasting change requires shifts
in the autonomic, peripheral, and enteric nervous systems, to occur.
Such change requires a provoking of the natural wisdom of the body and
its capacity to re-balance so that we release the locking of our musculature,
and a new higher level of systemwide organization can be allowed to
unfold.
The Noguchi Sei Tai exercise of "Katsugen Undo" offers an excellent
method to help release the system so that you can once again open up
to the possibilities of life, and facilitate the free flow of ki within
your system. (More on this later.)
5. The response of "dissociation"
or numbing our ability to feel can be quite helpful as an anesthetic
under conditions of pain and extreme helplessness. Such responses however
become detrimental to our overall health and well being when they are
adopted as a generalized response to potentially painful or frightening
situations. It is natural for our system to release the anesthetic of
an operation after and hour or so, as our system comes "back to life."
It is also natural to release the dissociative patterns learned when
feeling helpless or in pain, so that we can enter back into a life of
pain AND pleasure, sorrow AND joy. We need to discover a path for entering
back into the flow of life so we can regain access to the full range
of emotions that are available to a healthy emotionally balanced individual.
When the sensation of flowing ki is anesthetized we lose our ability
to feel into the ebb and flow of our experience. Heartfelt supportive
relationships are of great benefit here in helping us to trust that
it can be safe to feel again.
6. Whatever we avoid,
whatever we are unable to feel and bring our awareness into, does not
change. When our system does not change, our ki becomes stagnant, and
our life force is weakened. When working to re-claim parts of ourselves
we have lost contact with we will do well to begin by gently feeling
each and every part of ourselves, so that we can eventually come to
know that we are whole. Every part of our self is worthy of loving attention
and when we bring loving attention to injured or neglected parts of
our self, we foster the flow of ki, a softening of the body, and the
opening of our heart. Various mindfulness exercises such as meditation,
Tai Chi, Yoga, and Aikido, can be very helpful in this regard.
The challenge of living a heartfelt healthy life is threefold:
1) Gain conscious
awareness of how you generate your somatic-emotional experience.
2) Recognize the
ingredients of the somatic-emotional "recipes" you generate as a result
of your experience.
3) Change the recipes
you create, and thus change your relationship to your experience and
your life "story".
If you are able to change the habituated and highly specific somatic-emotional
reactions you have to events you will transform the way you express
your emotions, think, and react.
In order to assist each person in being able to change their consciousness
we have developed various practices which I explain one by one in our
newsletters. These practices are designed to make the transparent aspects
of your experience more obvious. The practices help you to notice and
effect changes in various aspects of your experience that were previously
outside of your conscious awareness. By taking part in these practices
you will learn how to intuit and react to the seed somatic-emotional
experience that forms the foundation of your verbal explication of life.
In order to cultivate ki, cultivate mindfulness. In order to cultivate
mindfulness cultivate a love for all that lives, and all that you are
and aren't.
Over a period of time by performing mindfulness practices, you will
also be more likely to understand how to help others change their experience
as well.
Practice
In regard to the Seishindo Practices in general, and the theories espoused
in the Seishindo newsletters I feel that it is important to say several
things.
1. Each person's life
is rich and complex and I am not wanting to convey that any one practice
or exercise is "the answer" in regard to living life more fully.
2. When I espouse various
theories relating to ki flow, I make such statements fully knowing that
we do not live in a vacuum and thus the manner in which we relate to
our environment and those around us, is always of paramount importance
as well. The degree to which we experience happiness in life is only
meaningful in relation to the happiness we share with others.
3. Living one's life
with greater awareness and mindfulness is a gift onto itself. This is
the gift that I am hoping to offer in regard to the practices and theories
I espouse.
4. These are many valuable
paths for achieving what you want in life. What I present in this article
is simply one of many ways.
A practice that relates to what you have been reading is entitled "Katsugen
Undo". Roughly translated from the Japanese, Katsugen Undo means "Natural
movement that renews life at its root."
The basics for this exercise are taken from Haruchika Noguchi Sensei
and “Noguchi Sei Tai”. “Sei Tai” basically means “properly ordered body.”
Noguchi sensei used to say that the purpose of Katsugen Undo is to create
an orderly way to unconsciously move the body, while affecting those
parts of the body that we cannot move voluntarily.
When we hold onto excess energy we inhibit our self from rebalancing,
and thus we inhibit our ability to remain physically, mentally, and
emotionally healthy. In terms of what we are exploring together, the
above means that we often tend to create a body structure and a concurrent
potential for movement that constricts the flow of ki. The greater your
ability to facilitate the flow of ki, the greater your ability to facilitate
a healthy state of calmness and well being.
In order to access Katsugen
Undo practice, please go here.
Would you like to read more?
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About the author:
Charlie Badenhop, the originator of Seishindo, a licensed instructor
of Aikido, a long term practitioner of Self-relations therapy, Ericksonian
Hypnosis, and the Japanese healing art of Sei Tai. Has students throughout
the world. Charlie's workshops on Somatic Intelligence have been part
of Stephen Gilligan's Trance Camp summer workshop series since 1999.
Contact Charlie at seishin@seishindo.org
and subscribe to his free newsletter "Pure heart, simple mind" at http://www.seishindo.org/newsletter.html.
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