Yogani, I totally agree in spirit. I’m all about the Barber! 
And I do intuitively understand that the ever-widening column of spinal nerve will eventually subsume all the sub-structures, making the distinctions moot.
But I reached a point where I really had to tweak, to protect my practice and my health. The work I did on the issue surely distracted and disrupted my sadhana somewhat, but the maneuver I finally came up with is pretty gentle and innocuous, so I have no regrets.
I’d like to stress that what I’m talking about isn’t “Taoist”. It is, again, at the gap between Yoga and Taoist practice. It mostly seems Taoist because I’ve lapsed into using the term “front channel”. Again, the term “grounding” is the exact same thing, and is more yogic. Yogis understand the need for grounding, and use asana, walking, and pranayama for that. In my case, those tools were not up to the job…or, shall we say, could not keep up with the quantities of energy elicited by AYP.
Beyond the background theory and explanation, this is really a very gentle move (though must of course be self-paced). So if it truly works as a powerful way to ground (as appears true from my experience and that of several respondents), this may be a way for practitioners to raise the overdoing bar in cases where that overdoing stems from energy trapped in the head (which is pretty common, I think). And that’d be a good thing, no?
Great discussion, thanks !
Jim,
I may be off base here, but I have a few suggestions. One would be a standing qi gong or Tai Chi practice. Spinal breathing while standing?
Also Keith’s essays on the front channel at www.alchemicaltaoism.com offer a great view on “opening” that are useful no matter what under the hood model is being used.
Bill
Done qi gong (a perfect one for this issue shown me by Michael Winn). Worked a little, but far better in combination with throat dilation and with Chinese herbs. in fact, the dilation and herbs are so much more effective that the qi dong isn’t really necessary. And, yeah, I’ve done spinal breathing in all sorts of inappropriate situations. I’ve really poured it on with this issue (I’ve not outlined all the dead-ends I’ve gone through), and I suspect what I’ve come up with is as good as I’m going to find.
But I didn’t know about that web site, will surf now. thanks!
Jim,
There is a North Native American practice in emergencies to bury a person in a pit up to her neck for several hours and let the Earth heal her or give her assistance or wisdom. She is never left alone and the idea is that Earth’s energy is the highest energy available to us.
I happen to have been initiated into quechua shamanism in Argentina and among many practices, there is a precise protocol when healing someone with stones (cuya). After using a mother stone for taking out heavy energy (hucha) from someone, it is required to bury all night the stone on earth then it will be ready for future use. In fact after this step, the healer has to make a specific whirling dance (gira) then falling on the ground to release whatever hucha got stuck in his vessel while transfering it to the cuya. The earth will then process all this heavy energy to make it light energy (sami) and re-sending through sacred mountains (apus) to sky.
What I mean is the only way to clean a mother stone is by burying it in the ground many hours. That kind of healing tool can NOT be cleaned by water, salt or other classical grounding technique because it can drain in no time SO much heavy energy when healing someone.
You might want to picture your body as a healing stone who has collected so many energies from others not meant to reside in you.
Just dig a big hole in the earth, bury yourself and stay there a few hours !
Albert
Hi Jim, :o
I have been reading in Reiki Tummo that you are supposed to take the kundalini up through the crown chakra to a location above your head where the other higher chakras exist. The kundalini then mixes with Divine Energy and showers golden and white energy back onto the body.
Could it be that your kundalini is just bottled up? Have you tried passing it up through your crown? Have you ever done a top-down visualization/meditation of bringing in Divine White light down into your crown from above?
Have you ever tried this grounding exercise: ?
http://www.mysticalwonders.org/group/download.php?id=53
TI
TI, AYP cautions against premature crown opening, so I"ve steered clear of any practice there.
Albert, I’ll start shoveling this afternoon, though I’m afraid Mrs. Shansky, my next door neighbor, may grow alarmed, and her semi-feral cats will have a field day licking the perspiration off my undefended forehead.
Hi Jim,
I believe I read somewhere that Yogani states that you can test the crown.
http://www.aypsite.org/287.html
What I don’t understand is why, in other practices like Reiki Tummo, Chakra Meditation, Taoism etc the main idea is that opening the crown lets in divine, cosmic or spiritual energy, which is a higher/finer form of energy that also cleanses blockages.
WHEN YOU SMILE IT OPENS THE CROWN.
If you shake a coke bottle when the cap is on, and then release the cap, BANG! Big mess.
If you shake a coke bottle when the cap is off or has a hole in it, yes, there is much less pressure in the bottle, and not so big of a mess.
Jim, how long has your kundalini been active? Are you stable but just building up pressure? Have you tested the crown?
TI
Read the lessons (at link above) for Yogani’s rationale, which makes great sense. AYP, fwiw, doesn’t totally leave the crown cold and untouched. The practices nourish the crown for sure, and gently prod it. Just nothing violent. A smile would be an example of the former rather than the latter! The issue is that the final, dramatic full crown opening should happen when nadis are nice and clear and the neurological system is capable of handling lots and lots of energy SAFELY.
My kundalini first awoke 2 years and 361 days ago (yup, was Valentine’s day). As it has slowly grown more and more continuous, overall energy has been increasing, but pressure is not increasing. Per my reply in another thread today, I’m keeping pace with handling the energy increase. But only just barely. I’m feeling totally fine, no pressure, but there’s not much headroom. And surrendering to it amplifies it.
As for testing crown, I’m not actually all that interested. My interests right now are 1. increasing my energetic headroom, and 2. more and more settling into the wondrous conclusion that nearly everything we do and have ever done was nothing more nor less than the sublimation of deep-seated yearning toward God’s love (tragic, as, per the dishwashing soap commercial, we’re SOAKING in it). Including the idiot driver honking his horn at me, for whom my speedy acceleration is God.
Hi Jim,
I just stumbled on a practice I find very effective in drawing the energy down the front, at least to the dan tien per automacy, and with a push it’s easy to get it down through your feet. I read it in a magazine, tried it and found it working immediately. And it is so simple… I wonder if you recognize it or get the same effect as I do?
The brain likes “cross movements” it is explained in the article, so you just take your right hand up and hold it in front of you, and then move it in an eight figure (eternity figure) while watching the thumb all the time.
After a while (I just do it until I feel effect) do the same with your left hand, and if you manage - the last part is both thumbs simultaneously. (Must admit I didn’t understand the last part of doing both at once - same pattern or opposite? And if opposite, where are your eyes supposed to focus??? sigh magazines… So I just skip the last part! It workes fine any way!)
I found it surprisingly easy to get energy down from the head to the navel area with this method. What’s your experience with it?
Jim, don’t underestimate the power in a smile.
Jim, do you have any posts about your first experience with kundalini? For example, what were you doing at the time? What did you experience? Did you know what it was? I would be very interested to read your initial experiences.
emc: There is a practice in Qi Gong that is very similar to that exercise. You hold both hands out like you are rotating a large ball in front of your abdomen, crossing over the hands as it turns. I think it balances the yin and yang and strenthens the connections between the left and right brain. I wonder what would happen if you also did kechari at the same time…
TI
EMC, thanks very much for thinking of me (there are lots of possible little moves out there…it’s kind of remarkable!) but things are really opening up right now re: grounding, and I don’t want to add on anything else at this moment. If they jam up again or I otherwise plateau, I will definitely try it, and report back! Thanks again!
Tibetan Ice, the first AYP lesson I ever read was the one about engaging mula banda and connecting to sambavi mudra. Never did that before. After reading one paragraph… “pow”. The connection was made, and it felt like puberty. The immediatecy probably resulted from 1. years of lots and lots of asana, service and tapas “priming” me, 2. unusual natural awareness of my energetic body since childhood, 3. never imagining that brow-to-root connection before, and 4. Yogani’s bhakti-permeated, highly contagious prose. Best description I can give is highly cliched…though I only came to learn it was a cliche after I’d experienced it and then started reading up: it felt like every cell in my body was in a state of continuous orgasm. It certainly felt sublime, but I wasn’t in this for kicks, so I quickly realized it was as much a distraction as a blessing, hence http://www.aypsite.org/258.html
Hi Jim
Oh, that was you! I remember reading that lesson a few months ago and thinking to myself that the perspective presented was quite unique and unconventional.
That is wonderful to hear about your initial experience. Thank you!
I truly believe that the only way to relieve kundalini pressure is to push it through the crown, or, open the crown and pull down cosmic or divine energy to mix and cool down kundalini. I’ve read that in Reiki Tummo, kundalini combines with divine or cosmic energy a few feet above the head. The two energies mix and the resultant shower of sparkles is then absorbed by the body, granting health, joy, peace and more blessings.
Also, meditating on the heart is supposed to grant access to cosmic love: http://www.yoga-age.com/modern/kun4.html#_VPID_48
When I asked Jesus about you, Jesus created a vision of a donkey. Then, he jumped on the donkey while holding and twirling a lasso in the air, as if he wanted to ride off and lasso something. However, the donkey just sat there and didn’t move. What exactly this means? I’ll leave that up to you. I just report what I see… 
I realize it is entirely up to you, what you do. It is your body, your exsitence and your path and it is only you who is responsible for your well being. I wish you the best with your success at grounding.
TI
I have friends who would definitely agree with the donkey imagery for me! Jesus really nailed it…
Thanks, TI. As I said above, it’s opening up. And since the thing I like about AYP is its discouragement of tinkering, so to speak, I’m very happy to just let it all be and do my practices, so long as there’s nothing to be alarmed about (e.g. low energetic headroom).
Here’s a great one. If I’d stumbled upon this first, I might not have needed that other stuff. Or perhaps the other stuff prepared me. Hard to know. Anyway…here’s another thing to try. Again, self pace, and only tinker with this stuff if you’re in the position I was in…doing very little practice, yet still right on the edge of overdoing.
Breathe into/out of the area about three inches beneath the navel (i.e. just above the pubic bone). Touch tip of tongue to roof of mouth while you do this, but don’t tense the tongue. Don’t control the pace of the breathing, and don’t pause the breath. Breathe as close to naturally as possible, but direct attention to that point. No straining. Resist the urge to add things onto this, or to modify it, or even to “think about it” too much. Keep it simple. Once it becomes something you can do without concentrating, do it while walking, and put all attention into the soles of the feet and their interface with the ground.
To keep focus on the feet is what Bernie recommended as well. You are always where your feet are. Keep focus on them and you’ll both be grounded and never leave yourself.
I found another very fast way to get energies from head to drop down: Listen to hard rock! 
I put on a record with ‘System of a down’ and down the system went… 
The problem with rock music is that the energy you loose is used feeding the astral entities that goes with that music, as well as the musician. If someone do not have a primary source of light, then they have to get it by “stealing” it from other sources. There is no such thing as a rock musician with a raised kundalini, except he be a black magician.
I prefere to starve them.
Well… I prefer sharing my light! If I have too much I’d just love it if it went to someone in need! (By the way, if you read the lyrics of that particular group, I think you will find that they are quite aware in the middle of all the dark!)
I disagree. 
I agree.