Published by
New Atlanteans (Canada),
2008
ISBN: 978-1-8975-1016-2
© Antonov V.V., 2008
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Basic Methods
Basic methods are those which allow one to attain such level of purification and development of energy structures of the organism, which would enable one to feel God, to learn how to attain Samadhi (the emotional states of intense Bliss that occur during contacts of the consciousness with the Holy Spirit).
These preparatory methods ensure further growth of the refined consciousness and develop its power — in order to come at the subsequent highest stages of work to the final Victory — Mergence with the Creator in His Abode.
In Hindu and Buddhist traditions these methods are known as Raja Yoga. Their variations were developed in Chinese Taoism and Muslim Sufism. They existed on the territory of Russia before its “christening”, which is clear from the high spiritual status of those who developed here spiritually [11, 14]. But the only spiritual practice of this level that is widely known in Christianity is the Jesus Prayer.
Raja Yoga is based on working with the chakras, main meridians and the cocoon. The purpose of this work is to “cleanse” them to transparency and to develop them — in order to connect through them with the Divine level of subtlety.
Hence it becomes obvious that techniques of “coloring” the chakras practiced in some schools are harmful, and using them is a consequence of tremendous spiritual incompetence of the leaders of those schools. For the subtlest color is white with tender goldish hue, and any other color is obviously farther from the level of the subtlety of the Creator.
Another typical mistake that people may make when working with the chakras is placing the emphasis on the development of the ajna chakra and its “window” (“trikutta”), which, ostensibly, results in the attainment of clairvoyance. This tendency has a long history and originates in the incorrect interpretation of Krishna’s words in the Bhagavad Gita [11] (8:10), where He recommends channeling energy through the head. But from the next verses of Gita (8:12) it is clear that He meant the energy of Atman. However, in numerous schools, whose leaders have not cognized Atman yet, attempts are made to perform this with regular bioenergies; this results in activation of one of the coarsest (originally) chakras and as a consequence in coarsening of the entire consciousness. Such people develop, in particular, a “piercing”, sharp, unpleasant gaze. A tendency like this halts them for a long time in their spiritual development.
But the clairvoyance, which some seekers gain as a result of such practice, is of no real value, because it enables them to see only emotional auras around the heads of other people and is good only for “spying” upon their emotional states.
The truly significant clairvoyance is exercised by the structures of the lower bubble of perception (see below). Possessing it enables one to see energies of different levels of coarseness-subtlety scale in multidimensional space. As a result of gaining this kind of clairvoyance, one becomes able to observe directly various subtlest Manifestations of the non-incarnate Consciousness of God.
Work on the development of the chakras and other fine structures of the organism is incompatible with taking alcohol (even in the form of kvass or alcohol-containing milk products), since alcohol destroys those subtle structures. Breaking this rule causes serious diseases.
* * *
Work with fine energy structures as well as meditative trainings cannot be effective if the room in which they are performed is illuminated with fluorescent lighting, since it produces a coarse energy impact on the organism.
One also must not wear synthetic clothes, because they block a significant part of the spectrum of bioenergies and distort the energy processes inside the body. (The latter instruction does not relate to raincoats, which we put on only in case of rain).
Watches and other metal objects should be taken off during the classes: bioenergetic work makes watches magnetize and go out of order, while all metal objects create energy interference.
We have already talked about the incompatibility of psycho-energetic trainings with eating “killed” food. If this rule is not obeyed the energy structures of the organism get constructed of coarse energies.
Practice at this stage of work is better performed in a group. The size of the practice room should correspond to the size of the group. Too big of a hall would be unfavorable, since the group energy will get dissipated in it.
* * *
The first serious information (of that which is known to us) about the role and functioning of the chakras and about the methods of working with them was presented in the books of our School. The fantasies of Aurobindo Ghosh regarding this subject, which were set out in his books, are completely baseless; they deceived many readers, while there was a shortage of written esoteric information in Russia before Perestroika.
Let us get down to specific information about working at this stage of spiritual advancement. The suggested exercises have been published several times. They have been tested by many years of teaching them to great numbers of people and proved to be highly effective.
It is good to start each practice session with emotional attunement and purification of the energy of the surrounding space. For this purpose there exists a wonderful technique known as the Cross of Buddha. It is performed in the following way.
For the best performance of this exercise we have to accept the so-called student posture: we sit down on the heels holding the spine straight, toes looking backward, and the palms of our hands resting upon the thighs. Then we send waves of our benevolence and love from the chest forward, saying mentally:
“May all beings have peace! May all beings be calm! May all beings feel bliss!”
We produce each of these three states inside the chest first and then radiate them forward. Then we repeat this to the right, to the left, backward, up, and down. This is a powerful technique that allows us to bring harmony to ourselves, to the surrounding space, and to the living beings around us.
After this, especially at the first few sessions, a very important element of practice would be a physical warm-up, which not only allows us to “cheer up” the energies within the body and to get rid of unnecessary mental dominants, but also teaches us to concentrate the consciousness in the working parts of the body. The latter will come in handy in the future when we will be working with the chakras.
Let us stand up. By making paddy movements with the legs and the trunk, we swing both arms back and forth and then rotate them simultaneously. Concentrate in the shoulder joints. Visualize light emerging and growing brighter inside the joints.
Tense the muscles of the arms. Bend and unbend the arms repeatedly in the elbow joints. Watch white light gathering from the entire body to the working muscles.
Extend the arms in front of the body. Move the relaxed wrists quickly up and down. Tense the fingers. Bend and unbend them. Move the wrists while tensing the muscles of the forearms and wrists. Then let go of the tension and relax the entire body.
Bend the head from side to side while keeping the neck relaxed. Roll the head over the shoulders making a circle. Turn the head to the right and to the left around a vertical axis. Imagine that the neck segment of the spine is an axle and the cervical vertebras are balls stringed on it. See a beam of white light coming up the axle. Tense the muscles of the neck. Repeat the same exercises but this time with the muscles of the neck tensed. Imagine a stream of white light diameter-of-the-neck wide rising through it. Again relax the entire body. Shift the head from side to side while keeping it vertical and without moving the shoulders, then rotate the head in the same manner.
Raise the arms over the head. Take the right hand with the left one by the wrist and pull it over the head while bending the body to the same side and stretch the side muscles of the trunk. Repeat this movement with another hand.
While holding the arms up, tilt the trunk to the sides first in the pectoral and then in the lumbar segments of the spine. Tense the muscles of the trunk and make tilts and turns of the body. Imagine that the trunk gets filled with light. Relax the body. Turn the trunk around a vertical axis while relaxing the muscles and keeping the feet on the floor, trying to turn the head as far to the back as possible, concentrating in the spine.
Shift the pelvis to the sides without tilting it and bending the legs, keeping the muscles as relaxed as possible. Concentrate in the area of the spine below the navel.
Raise the right leg so that the thigh is parallel to the floor. Rotate the ankle as if drawing a circle on the floor. Concentrate in the ankle joint, seeing white light and warmth emerging inside of it. Rotate the shin, concentrating in the knee-joint.
Swing the shin from side to side, keeping the knee in one place and concentrating in both hip joints.
Draw a circle with a straight leg, first in front of the body, then at the right side, and then behind the body.
Repeat these exercises with the left leg.
After the warm-up we should take some rest in one of the following postures (asanas):
The first of them is the so-called half-tortoise posture.
We sit on the heels with the toes looking backward and the knees moved apart. Put the forehead and the extended arms on the floor with the palms pressed against each other. Relax the body and mind completely. Watch the belly sag more and more as the relaxation becomes deeper. This is a wonderful exercise that allows one to get rid of physical and mental tiredness. It should be performed for about ten minutes.
The second asana is called crocodile posture. There are two ways of performing it.
We lie on the belly, protruding the elbows forward as far as possible, the chin resting on the palms.
The second option — we put the elbows forward and place one forearm upon the other on the floor, holding the head and the upper part of the body up by tensing the muscles of the back.
In both cases we feel ourselves happy little crocodiles, which have crawled out on a sandy beach to have a sunbath! The sun warms our backs — and we dissolve in pleasure under its tender warmth, which permeates our bodies.
One has to perform the bioenergetic purification both of the organism as a whole and of its separate segments corresponding with the chakras. There are a lot of purification techniques, and each of them allows one to get rid of the next portion of impurity, which means elimination of diseases, overall improvement of health, and getting closer to the Ultimate Goal.
Now I will describe a few general purifying exercises of pranayama type.
We perform them in standing position. First, bend slightly to the right so that the right arm hangs freely without touching the body. Try to feel the arm thoroughly from the shoulder joint to the wrist. Imagine that a pump chamber, to which air-like light is being fed through the arm like through a hose, expands in the chest with every inhalation and contracts with every exhalation. Special attention should be paid to exhaling. Try to achieve a high clarity of sensations. The “hose” must be as thick as the arm, and nothing should prevent the air-like light from moving freely through it.
Then we perform the same exercise with the left arm, and then with each leg. The “hose” must come down from the chest to each leg through the corresponding side of the body.
Place images of two big barrels under the feet. Let one barrel be empty and the other full of white liquid light. Touch this light with the foot-hose and pump it through the body-pump into the other barrel. With each inhaling, the pump chamber inside the body and the head is expanding, drawing the light from the full barrel through the leg. With each exhaling, the chamber is contracting; the light pouring out through the other leg into the empty barrel. Thus we cleanse the whole body from inside.
When the barrel with light gets empty — fill it up again and overturn the content of the other barrel into an image of fire, so that all dirt that has streamed out burns. Turn the body around over the barrels — and repeat the exercise with another half of the body.
Then do the same, but this time placing the barrels under the hands.
In this way, we have to attain a feeling that the whole body is filled up with bright white light.
After performing pranayamas, we have to rest in one of the relaxation asanas.
Now let us learn four psycho-physical exercises. They got this name because their psychic component is combined with simultaneously performing physical movements, with the latter contributing to the mastering of the former. The basic idea of these exercises was invented by Peter Dânov, a mystic of the beginning of the 20th century; later it was developed by Omraam Mikhael Aivanhov, and then by us.
The first exercise of this series is called Awakening. We awaken from a long sleep of self-isolation from harmony, beauty, and love of the world. (While standing, we raise the hands up and stretch ourselves as if after sleep). We let all the purity, light, and the vitality from outside into us. Feel a waterfall of astonishingly pure, transparent, subtle feelings and morning freshness flowing from above. We fill ourselves with this morning freshness, with these fresh waves, overfill ourselves with them! (Hands move down to the shoulders, assisting this process, then move up again; we repeat these movements several times). We try to reach as high and subtle an emotional state as possible.
The second exercise is called Giving Away. We hold the hands against the chest and then make a wide gesture moving them forward and apart: what we have received, we must give away to other people — our level of spiritual advancement is measured by our ability to give. Also, so that a vessel may get filled with fresh water, it needs to be emptied first. They who do not empty themselves by giving away what they have, do not get renewed, do not grow. We repeat this exercise again and again, pouring out, giving away all the good that we have accumulated — generously, without the desire to receive a reward. Send subtlest and intense waves of streaming fresh and pure love far forward. Feel how the chest gets inflated by the energy of love that comes swelling from behind. A flower, exhaling a tender fragrance, starts to blossom out in the middle of the chest. Send these subtle vibrations forward. This is the fragrance of love itself!
The third exercise is Reconciliation. Raise the right hand above the head and concentrate in the palm and the space that immediately surrounds it. Then slowly bring the hand down drawing with it a sinusoid with a half-period of about thirty centimeters. The edge of the palm should be facing the direction of the hand’s movement. While doing this, try to feel the space, in which the hand moves, as some energy field, to which we assign new characteristics: peace, harmony, and calm. One may “extend” the hand. (One may imagine various ways of performing dancing movements: jerky and quick versus gentle, smooth, and elegant. Each of these ways disposes both the performer and the audience to corresponding emotional states). And this simple but powerful gesture, which symbolizes harmony, will be helping everyone in every situation as they master this exercise (one should feel it deeply through!), even if performed without being accompanied with movements of the body.
The fourth exercise is called Climbing Up. We raise the hands up with the palms facing sideward and then bring them down laterally, making sweeps. Repeat this movement several times, with each sweep we hatch out of another coarse envelope, as it were, and become lighter, purer; we rise to the source of the light above — to the sun… It becomes very close to us; a few more swings and we reach it… Flow into space of the purest and subtlest light, and enjoy being in it… Then slowly get down to the earth feeling the sun in the chest. Stand on the ground and shine at people and all other living beings with sunlight coming from the chest!
All sessions involving work with the chakras and meridians must be followed by a relaxation exercise called shavasana. It allows one to rest from bioenergetic work, which can be very tiring, as well as to get rid of bioenergetic defects that have not been eliminated yet.
Shavasana is the relaxation of the body and the mind in the position of lying on the back.
We lie on the back and make sure that we feel comfortable. Nothing should distract us. Then we begin to relax the body starting with the toes. One may imagine a plane perpendicular to the axis of the body — like a glass wall — and move it through the body from the toes to the head; behind this surface no tension remains. Let us feel that we lose any sensation of those parts of the body behind this plane. We alienate them, saying mentally: “This is not mine! This is not mine!…” If we regain sensation of any part of the body, we move the plane through this section once again. After the plane has passed through the head, we may experience the following states:
The first state: the self-awareness vanishes. We fall into something resembling a deep sleep, but this is not sleep. The self-awareness is regained in about 18-20 minutes. We feel thoroughly rested, as if after a long deep sleep. This is quite a blissful state. One does not have to stand up abruptly, but just enjoy it.
The second state: the self-awareness is retained, but absolute peace comes to us. We may scan the entire body with the inner sight. We may enter the inner space of the body from below and see light and dark regions. Gray or black colors mean disorders on one of the energy planes, which correspond to the manifest or still latent stages of diseases. We have to try to gather all dark stuff in heaps as if with a rake and throw it away from the body.
When doing shavasana, we may also experience involuntary full exits from the material body: we may suddenly become aware of ourselves being in a usual form but in an unusual position — for example, soaring above the floor or standing on the head and so on. There is nothing to worry about, though: once we feel like getting back into the body — we will find ourselves there right away. But under no circumstances one is encouraged to perform such exits: these are exits into a coarse space dimension — into the so-called astral plane. One has to learn to exit immediately into the highest spatial dimensions, but the methods for doing this are different.
Children under the age of 12 must not be taught shavasana: having realized that they are out of the body, they do not always want to return into it.
* * *
All these exercises should be practiced regularly: it is impossible to get the full effect from them after only one session.
When all the previous exercises have been mastered, we can proceed to the exercise called latihan.
The term latihan was introduced in the beginning of the 20th century by a Sufi named Bapak Mohammad Subuh [20], who used this word to denote one of the ways of communicating with the Holy Spirit. He visited many European countries, where he taught this method to Catholic monks and healed with its help many ill people, including those suffering from cancer.
In this technique, one addresses the Holy Spirit for help and asks Him to concentrate above the head (one has to become aware of Him there) and then to “shower” Himself down through the entire body as through a transparent glass cylinder. This will be a true baptism in the Holy Spirit.
In this way comes the healing of the body.
The body, having surrendered to this Stream flowing through it, starts dancing and performing other smooth and harmonious movements… This phenomenon is a variation of Laya Yoga — a set of methods of “dissolving” oneself in Divine Streams as well as in static states of the Divine Consciousness.
In fact, this is very simple if we really believe, if we really love Him and are willing to surrender to Him. And the Holy Spirit is always present everywhere as a sea of Light, including the space above our bodies — watching, loving, teaching, and… waiting for when we finally pay attention to Him with love and ask Him for help…
If we have prepared ourselves with the help of all the previous exercises, including Awakening — we will succeed in doing this one right away. If not — we may try to imagine ourselves… in paradise, under a heavenly waterfall, immersed in the tender sunlight, aroma of flowers, singing of birds… A cascade of heavenly water is falling down through the body, purifying the soul and making it worthy of paradise…
In order for the laya dance (the dance of “dissolution”) to start, being guided by the Holy Spirit, we should stand on tip-toes and raise the hands; the clothes must be light and loose — so that we almost do not feel them…
After the dance, it will be good to have a rest in a relaxation posture.
Upon achieving the mastery of the above said, we can get down to the cleansing of the chakras.
The condition of the chakras is closely interrelated with the condition of the physical organs located in the corresponding parts of the body. The chakras play an important role in supplying the organs with energy, while diseases of the organs negatively affect the condition of the chakras.
For example, the following chakras are responsible for the following organs:
— anahata: heart, lungs, arms, and mammary glands;
— manipura: among other organs — stomach and other structures of the digestive system;
— svadhisthana: the organs of reproduction, urinary bladder, legs, and others;
— sahasrara: forebrain hemispheres;
— ajna: the rest of the brain, as well as eyes, ears, nose, and nasopharynx;
— vishuddha: the entire neck, thyroid, both jaws, including teeth, and others. (The border between the “spheres of influence” of ajna and vishuddha coincides with the palate).
* * *
Let us get down to work with the chakras. There exist certain combinations of sounds (a sort of mantras), singing of which contributes to the development of the chakras by producing resonant vibrations. Mantras will also help us attain clear sensation of our chakras. Here are these mantras:
for sahasrara — AM (a-a-am),
for ajna — VOM (vo-o-om),
for vishuddha — HAM (ha-a-am),
for anahata — YAM (ya-a-am),
for manipura — RAM (ra-a-am),
for svadhisthana — VAM (va-a-am),
for muladhara — LAM (la-a-am).
One has to sing these mantras gently, producing high frequency sounds (taking female voices as a pattern for the pitch), but not in a loud voice, at the same time concentrating in the corresponding chakras. When moving the concentration of the consciousness into the next chakra, one should enter it from behind the back or the nape of the neck, as if getting into a cell or a niche.
One has to repeat the whole set of mantras several times, trying to achieve clear perception of vibrations in all chakras.
This exercise must be practiced every day. When there is no possibility to sing the mantras aloud, one may sing them mentally to oneself but only after mastering singing them aloud.
Let us pay maximum attention both at this and the next stages to work with the anahata chakra — just doing this makes life brighter and more joyous.
If the very subtle and gentle singing of the mantras for chakras has not been mastered — no further work can be successful. Men usually are the ones who have this difficulty especially frequently, since subtlety is often unknown to them. The following recommendation may help them. Take some water in the mouth and start gargling so that a gurgling sound can be heard. Bring the water lower down the throat. The sound must become higher. Let it reach as high of a pitch as possible. Those are the notes, at which one has to sing the mantras for chakras.
Let us learn another method of cleansing and development of the chakras. Visualize behind the anahata a white shining 3-dimensional figure formed by four equilateral triangles with joined sides. This figure is called a tetrahedron. Insert this figure into each chakra (one chakra at a time) from behind, with one of the tetrahedron vertices looking forward, while rotating it rapidly counterclockwise (looking from behind) around a horizontal axis coming from back to front. For the two outermost chakras the rotation of the tetrahedron must be performed around a vertical axis; in case of sahasrara the vertex of the tetrahedron must look upward, while in case of muladhara — downward. The direction of the rotation of the tetrahedron for these two chakras must be counterclockwise (looking from inside the body). Performance of this exercise will be easier if we combine it with “blowing” of the corresponding mantra into each chakra.
All exercises with the chakras described above (as well as with meridians, which will be described later) are more efficiently performed while standing.
But there is a simple exercise with the spiritual heart that everyone may try doing without any pre-conditions. Imagine that your head has moved into the chest. Feel the nose, the forehead, the lips. Move the lips. In order for the head not to rise to its usual position, we may imagine that we put a hat on the head. Then follows the most important thing: we need to open the eyes and to “blink” the eyelids there… From now on, learn to look at the outside world from the chest. The world will look completely different: not as tough and hostile, but as subtle, tender, and responsive to the emotions of love.
This is what is called opening of the spiritual heart. As we can see, this is quite easy to do. The only thing required here is one’s will!
Later on, one needs to learn to look from anahata not only forward but also backward.
One has to perform the exercices with the chakras and all further meditative trainings with open eyes. (You may try to find out yourself — why?)
* * *
Having mastered this, we have to do the same with all other chakras. (The “windows” of muladhara and sahasrara look downward and upward respectively. But we can look also forward and backward from these chakras).
Learning to look backward is important not only because it contributes to the development of the chakras, but also because by looking forward we accustom ourselves to seeing the world of material objects, while pure and subtle eons with the Consciousness that lives in them are found behind.
Moreover, by performing this exercise, we prepare ourselves for future conscious exits from the body. And this must be also performed backward from anahata.
A great number of mystics of various countries and cultures get deceived by learning to exit from the body forward or upward. This manner of exiting from the body gets them into a certain sub-layer of the astral plane (depending on their own status on the coarseness-subtlety scale) — a rather dense eon, which is closest to the material world. From the astral plane one can very easily see the material world and people with their thoughts. This comes along with the possibility to “spy” upon them, play jokes on them, or influence them in some other way… This turns out to be interesting and exciting…
But when the body of such a person dies, he or she stays attached to material objects. He or she did not get any closer to God, and the incarnation was spent in vain.
But if we have made necessary transformations of our main meridians, especially of chitrini (Brahmanadi) — one of the subtlest structures of the organism, then by passing through chitrini we immediately “fall out” into the eons of the Holy Spirit at the least. And there we can see Him as Light-Love and feel Him as Tenderness. There we learn to merge with Him and to become one with Him.
… Do not these prospects, so easily attainable, spur you to reject your old dogmas and vices and to dash “with all your heart, and with all the soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength” towards the Embrace of God?
In the mean time, we may practice filling and “inflating” the chakras with an image of pure shining and sparkling white light, which we may “blow” into each chakra from an imaginary hose that comes from a powerful pump.
Images that we create in the subtle eons become a reality in them. Not only can we cleanse our energy structures with the help of these images but also heal other people by eliminating black areas of diseases and even by performing “surgeries” using images of various surgical instruments.
Starting from this stage of work, one can become a good healer. Healing is one of the ways we can give our love to people. This is why the Holy Spirit is always happy to help us when we heal, especially if we ask Him for it!
If we possess the skills of communication with the Holy Spirit, then during a healing session He may flow through our chakras if we ask Him. This facilitates development of the chakras and makes them more refined (see details about healing in [7]).
* * *
Now let us learn another exercise with the tetrahedron:
1. Rotate an image of the tetrahedron behind each chakra as a dentist’s drill.
2. Then insert it into the chakra like in a cavity of a decayed tooth. Dirt flies out in all directions; wash it down with an image of a shower.
3. Increase the size of the imaginary tetrahedron; this allows enlarging the chakra.
4. Upon working all the chakras through, take a “shower” and perform shavasana.
… The next technique of the development of the chakras is the following: get inside each chakra, one at a time, starting with anahata and feel the whole of oneself there like in a cave filled with light. Then by pressing against each wall of the chakra with the hands push them away to infinity…
And here is one more wonderful exercise: we imagine ourselves a powerful light bulb as big as the body, which is turned on; the bulb’s filament is in anahata. And then illuminate the surrounding space with the light from anahata.
In the future, we may move the filament from anahata into each of the remaining chakras and “burn” the arms, the legs, and all those parts of the body where any ailments are present. In this manner we get coarse energies “burned away” from the body; we cleanse, lighten, and heal ourselves, accustoming ourselves to being one with this light. For “God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all” (1 John, 1:5). In this way — gradually — we begin getting closer to the state of God.
* * *
The developed chakras can be combined into functional groups, called dantians in Chinese. The upper dantian is made up of the three upper chakras; the middle dantian is represented by anahata; and the lower one — by the three lower chakras.
Out of the three, the most important is the middle dantian, since it is by employing this structure that we can transform ourselves into Love and to infuse into God. The other two play auxiliary roles. The upper dantian helps to develop the middle one with its intellectual and esthetic appraisal functions. And the lower one, being the main power center of the organism, provides energy for this process.
All dantians (as well as all chakras) have to be developed harmoniously, although the middle one must always be given priority over the other two during the training. In the face of God, the main function of the organism is love. But love cannot become full-fledged unless it is supported intellectually, ethically, and energetically. This is why one has to pay attention to the development of each of these functions, while always remembering about the necessity to strictly adhere to the policy of constantly increasing the level of the subtlety of the consciousness: setbacks to coarse states of the consciousness would constitute a crash of all efforts and a halt in the development at best, and even a complete failure at worst.
The correct development of the lower dantian (also denoted by the term hara) can be achieved optimally by practicing special meditative techniques at special places of power. One of the secrets here is reviving the functions of the “embryonal” meridians, which are used to connect the energy systems of the fetus and the mother together. It is upon this “revival” that hara starts functioning as a whole, as a united power-center.
Upon mastering all exercises described above, it would be appropriate to put the main meridians of the body to rights.
The whole human body, as well as the bodies of animals and even plants, is being run through by numerous canals, invisible with regular eyesight, which channel energies of various levels of refinement around the organism. These canals, called meridians (or nadi) were discovered and utilized in ancient Chinese medicine (Zhen Tsyu therapy).
The meridians can be discovered, in particular, because of their increased — compared to adjacent body tissues — electroconductivity (but one should keep in mind that electric current, even the weakest one, is inadequate for them; therefore the methods of punctate electrodiagnostics and electropuncture can be used in the extraordinary cases only).
The meridians can be seen by people whose range of perception was expanded through a system of training similar to ours.
As a result of inflammatory processes in the body tissues, a contaminating type of nutrition, or external negative energetic influences, the meridians can lose their conductivity. In this case, lingering disorders of the organs, deprived of proper energy supply, may develop. Such diseases usually cannot be completely cured by using drug therapy. In cases like this, acupunctural methods and similar healing techniques (laser, vibration, and other kinds of influence through “biologically active points” of the integument) turn out to be efficient. These methods work, because they restore conductivity of the meridians by means of sending currents of energy through them.
But it is more effective to cleanse the meridians on one’s own using the methods described in this book.
Let us talk about several meridians that can be successfully used in psychic self-regulation.
All the chakras are connected with one another by large meridians that run along the spine, as well as the front and the middle part of the body.
A wide canal called sushumna (tu-mo or du-mo in Chinese) runs along the spine from muladhara to sahasrara. One of its functions is to distribute the energy extracted from food to the chakras. Within sushumna — in its back section — there is a significantly narrower canal (its diameter is about 2 centimeters), called vajrini, through which the energy of svadhisthana (called udana) flows to other chakras.
The third of the spinal canals — chitrini (Brahmanadi) — is located behind sushumna. It begins at the end section of sahasrara, passes under the occipital bone, and runs down the back part of the neck and then — down the backmost part of the spinal column, coinciding with the spinous processes of vertebras and the skin.
Chitrini is an extremely important structure. It will serve us as a standard for one of the subtlest states, to which we can attune the emotional sphere.
On the G.Gurdjieff’s scale of hydrogens [62], the state of chitrini is assessed as H-3. This is the Holy Spirit’s level of subtlety. Upon learning to concentrate in chitrini, one can easily “dive” as a consciousness through this canal into the eons of the Holy Spirit and directly communicate, embrace, and then merge with Him there. This is how religious truths turn from abstractions into reality.
The system of the chakras is also communicated by the front channel (zhen-mo). It begins from the upper end of sushumna, forks into two branches that turn around sahasrara and join in the forehead area to split into several small canals that run down the face and join again in the vishuddha region. One more branch of this canal goes through the middle of the head, reaches the chin coming through the palate and joins the other branches at the neck. After that the canal runs down the front side of the trunk, branching off to every chakra, passes the share bone, and heads for the coccyx.
We should pay special attention to the upper part of this canal, which unites the four chakras of the so-called emotional center [62] — anahata, vishuddha, manipura, and ajna — into one functional block.
Anahata and vishuddha play the leading role in this complex. The intensity of emotions depends to a certain extent on the manipura chakra, while the ajna chakra serves as a liaison for interaction with hypothalamic-pituitary complex, which plays an important role in coordination of the emotional and behavioral reactions of the entire organism through the endocrine system.
Only those people whose front canal is well developed and who know how to use it are able to experience truly exalted positive emotions in communicating with other people and with nature. But such people are extremely few: only a handful per thousands. Most people do not have a developed front canal, and it takes special efforts to develop it.
In Chinese tradition, the system of the spine and the front canals is called microcosmic orbit. By means of circulating energy around the microcosmic orbit, one can perform transformation of energies within the organism. The aim of this work is to produce and accumulate Golden Elixir within the organism; the subtlest energy obtained as a result of such transformation was called by this term in ancient alchemy.
Performance of exercises with the microcosmic orbit produces a strong emotional effect.
On one of the subtlest planes, the system of the chakras is communicated by one more canal — the middle meridian. This wide meridian connects the developed chakras, running vertically through the middle of the entire body. It forms along with the development of the chakras: it cannot be found in people whose chakras are undeveloped. Its width corresponds to the diameter of the chakras. This is also a very important energy structure of the organism.
* * *
Let us begin with sushumna. The easiest way to cleanse it is to use an image of a “bottle brush”. In order to do this, we need to imagine ourselves moving back from the body out of anahata and becoming a little bigger then the body. Then we start to scrub sushumna with this “bottle brush”. An important detail to keep in mind while doing this is that we need to cleanse also the passage from sushumna to muladhara, which goes not just down from the sacrum in a straight line, but down and forward.
The next in turn for cleansing is the middle meridian. It is convenient to work with this structure at special places of power, which are auspicious for moving the concentration of the consciousness below the body. This implies that by this time the consciousness of the practitioner must be developed by performing the previous exercises to such an extent that allows moving as a consciousness below the body without losing the subtle state.
Upon entering the middle meridian from below, we have to “wash” its walls with an image of a wet rag with soapy foam for example, or in any other appropriate manner.
After that, it is quite important to cleanse the partition between sushumna and the middle meridian. In order to do this, one has to be in both meridians at the same time, coming into sushumna from above and to the middle meridian — from below. In this case, the partition between these meridians and possible dark spots on it become visible. Elimination of these spots brings the next stage of purification of the body.
When sushumna is cleansed, we may start working with the microcosmic orbit. For this purpose, we enter the two lower chakras and bring their energy up the sushumna, move it over the head, and bring it down through the front canal back to the two lower chakras. We repeat this exercise several times. During this process, coarse energies, including those causing diseases, get transformed into subtle ones in the zhen-mo meridian.
After the first few times of working with the microcosmic orbit, one must perform a deep relaxation in shavasana.
In the future, we may learn to change the trajectory of the energy moving around the microcosmic orbit — so that the energy flow will pass through the diseased regions of the body (if there are any). This will enable us to heal them.
We begin to learn to rotate energy around the orbit which includes the sushumna meridian. But then we have to learn to do the same through chitrini and within the energy cocoon that surrounds the body. All this will bring yet other levels of health improvement and refinement of the consciousness. In the practice of our School, this is usually performed quite easily at the corresponding places of power — areas that have a special energetic significance for a human being. You may well find them somewhere around the place you live in.
In conclusion of this chapter I want to mention that there are methods of Chinese Qi Gong that got into Europe, which involve work with the microcosmic orbit without preceding thorough cleansing and development of the chakras and meridians. In such cases the entire work is performed only at the level of visual images, while purifying, healing, and refining effects are not obtained.
The energy cocoons mentioned above surround the bodies of all incarnate living beings. (They are also called etheric bodies. But one should take into account that the meaning of the latter term is unclear: some authors may denote with it other structures and states, when they simply do not know what to call them). The cocoons form of the aggregate biofields of all cells of the body. There can be multi-layer cocoons, i.e. they can consist of several layers of energies of different densities located at different distances from the body.
The cocoons of healthy people are more or less egg-shaped. But their borders can have either protuberances or dents against the diseased regions, which corresponds to either increased or decreased activity of the cells in the affected parts of the body. This is significant for performing extrasensory diagnostics and can be determined by palpating the boundaries of the cocoons with the palm of one’s hand. But it is preferable to learn to see the cocoons as well.
It is easier to learn to see one’s own cocoon first, and then cocoons of other people with the help of the following method. One has to place the concentration of the consciousness (the assemblage point, in Juan Matus’ terms) in the area about 50 centimeters behinds one’s own heels. From there one may watch the volume inside the cocoon and begin cleansing it.
Cleansing of the cocoon is an important healing method, because pathogenic energies may reside not in the body but in the cocoon as well.
The concluding knowledge of this chapter would be that the cocoons consist of two unequal parts, which Juan Matus [6,11] called bubbles of perception.
The division of the cocoon into two bubbles of perception takes place at the collarbone level. The upper bubble includes the head and the neck, while the lower one encloses the rest of the body.
In other words, the upper bubble includes the upper dantian, and the lower — the other two and the legs.
The upper bubble is very important for communicating with the material world, while we use the lower bubble for communicating with the non-material one. A practitioner can perceive from them separately either material world or other eons.
The quantitative growth of the consciousness and meditative work are performed primarily by the lower bubble of perception.
The main part of it is the middle dantian, refining in and expanding from which we get closer to Perfection. I emphasize this point again, because this is the most fundamental postulate of the entire psycho-energetical work, and any deviation from this mainstream results in prolonged straggling and in wasting of very precious time of our short stay in bodies here.
Harmonious development of the lower dantian (hara), which is the second important component of the lower bubble of perception, is also absolutely essential for meditative achievements. But regarding this structure as the basis for spiritual growth, which is typical of many schools of martial arts, is a gross mistake.
The overall energy structure of the body can also be considered as consisting of 4 vertical segments. But talking about it in practical terms makes sense only at significantly more advanced stages of spiritual development.
* * *
Such exercises not only change us in the needed direction, but the attitude of other people towards us also changes. We become pleasant to communicate with as well as just to be around. People start coming to us for spiritual advice too. I have witnessed a great number of such transformations.
… Two interesting cases come to my mind.
Once, after a class that I conducted, a woman came up to me and complained: well, you are saying right things about love, but what can I do with my flatmate: he is always irritated; we have not talked together or said hello to each other for years! I answered her: look, why don’t you start pouring your love at him tonight — right through the wall — like in the exercise Cross of Buddha. When she came to the next class, she told this: I did as you recommended and the next morning when I met my flatmate in the kitchen, he smiled to me and said: “Why haven’t we said hello to each other for so many years? Let’s start greeting each other!”
There was another case. A young woman came to take part in a class in tears. I asked her what had happened? She said that she had been on the beach, taking sunbathes and doing the Cross of Buddha. A child had suddenly come up to her and said: ‘Don’t go there; there is a snake!’. ‘Why are you crying then’, I asked. She said, ‘It was the first time in my life that a child came up to me on his own!’
The realization of the functions of the spiritual heart is the first serious step towards God that man can take. It may become the beginning of the Straight Path towards the complete spiritual self-realization, towards Perfection, towards Mergence with God in the aspect of the Creator.
* * *
It is most convenient to perform the exercises with the chakras and the following meditative training in standing position or even when walking.
After completion of the courses that we have just described, only a few of the total number of students are able to move immediately to the next — the higher — stage of spiritual ascent. The only ones that can go that fast are the ones who were mastering these stages in their previous incarnations and now are only reviewing what they studied before. Other people have to stop for a while in order to establish themselves in the states they have learned to attain.
But this does not mean the latter have nothing to do. There must be a lot of reading, thinking, discussing, helping others, and listening to how God assesses one’s actions… It is necessary to seek harmony with nature, especially in the early morning. It would also be good to learn to identify the voices of best singers among birds, to know them by names and how to attune to their subtlety. Among them are song thrushes, blackbirds, starlings, blackcaps, whitethroats, robins, skylarks, large curlews, woodcocks, black grouses, and snipes…
One can use also special esthetical classes that include analysis of works of various kinds of art and creative activity of the participants.
And development of the power in subtlety (or crystallization of the consciousness in G.Gurdjieff’s terms [62] — by analogy with the growth of a crystal) can be best attained at this stage through meditations at special places of power, winter swimming, and meditative running. Other methods of crystallization include special exercises of athletic gymnastics and Sufi whirling: both should be performed while being in special meditations, but it does not make sense to write about this in this book.
It is important to emphasize that crystallization can be correct only if performed by consciousness concentrated in the spiritual heart. At the same time, it can be successful only when the structures of all dantians, including the lower one, are developed and working properly.
Correct crystallization is performed by a consciousness that grows in the subtlest eons: in this way we can cultivate Divinity in ourselves. But coarse crystallization, i.e. performed by people who eat bodies of killed animals, live in coarse emotions, and are devoid of correct spiritual aspiration, can form devils out of them. The same psychic techniques will produce either the former or the latter effect, depending on the inner state of the one who practices them.
This is one of the reasons why it is so dangerous to reveal secret esoteric knowledge to those who are not ready to apply it correctly.
Winter swimming, i.e. swimming in ice-cold water, is a wonderful method not only of tempering the body, but also of increasing the energy might of the organism.
Statistics holds that among those practicing winter swimming the sickness rate decreases for cold-type diseases 60 (!) times, and for other diseases — 30 times. As a therapeutic method winter swimming can heal many diseases, including radiculitis, both high and low blood-pressure, pulmonary tuberculosis, pancreatic diabetes, chronic gastrointestinal diseases, inflammations in genitals, menstrual cycle abnormalities, dermatoses, and so on [32,65].
One should not begin to swim in cold water necessarily in autumn, as some people think: one may start right during the hardest frost, if one likes. But it is recommended to master first the psychic self-regulation techniques that we described above. In this case, winter swimming will directly contribute to strengthening the ability to preserve the subtlest psychic states. Coming out into the frost naked and submerging into ice-cold water become not only an act of volition, but also a controlled experiment on oneself in order to maintain the subtlest states of the consciousness in the conditionally adverse environment. It is beneficial to disidentify oneself from bodily sensations and to merely observe them from the depths of the subtle planes.
The organism responds to the cold shock with energy stress, which may be colored with positive or negative emotions — depending on the mood, with which one set about winter swimming in the first place and one’s psychic self-regulation skills. The activity of the energy system of the organism increases and initiates an intensive heat generation process. The right mood and disidentification from bodily sensations allow one not to feel the coldness of the air and water even during a hard frost. After staying in ice-cold water, a person also does not feel cold for some time, while when the frost is not too hard, one may even start to feel hot due to the continuing process of intensive heat generation in the organism. But after 10-20 minutes, the resources of the organism get depleted, and one starts chilling and shivering. As one proceeds with training, the intensity of such sensations decreases. At such moments one may warm oneself by performing active movements, indoors, or coming near a fire. These kinds of stress and depletion of the energy system of the organism train this system, increase its mobility and capacity.
One has to submerge into water together with the head. Upon entering water, one should immerse oneself into it completely, then wait until the breath calms down, and then immerse oneself again together with the head. During this procedure, one may notice lumps of dark energy flowing out from the body; this has a healing effect on the body.
One of the most eminent popularizers of cold tempering in Russia was Porfiriy Ivanov, who with his life example demonstrated the possibility of merging harmoniously with nature in all its manifestations. He walked barefooted even during sharp frost wearing only pants, swam in natural water reservoirs many times a day or showered himself with water from wells during winter, as well as slept in the snow without clothes.
Although swimming in ice-cold water is undoubtedly the most effective tempering procedure, do not get too upset if there is no suitable water reservoir where you live. You may, for example, run barefooted in the snow and, if there is the possibility, lay in the snow for a while without clothes. You may pour well-water on your body. As a last resort you may lay in the bath-tub filled with cold water or pour it on your body from a bucket or basin.
But one should keep in mind that water with temperature over 8 degrees centigrade (about 46° Fahrenheit) does not induce the launch of the described energy processes in the organism and swimming in it is less effective, while it may even cause untrained individuals to catch cold.
Cold procedures can be performed both as a part of a special training and every day in the morning or in the evening after work in order to relieve fatigue, as well as in all those cases when for various reasons we have lost inner harmony or do not see light in ourselves anymore.
All cold procedures must be performed using psychic self-regulation methods and not merely through an act of volition. Attempts to increase their effect by creating sharp temperature contrasts also do not make too much sense. For example, if you plan to pour cold water on your body, it would be appropriate to submerge the wrists into it first and imagine streams of blissful freshness and joy rising up the hands. Then you may wash your face and feel the freshness and joy entering your body through your face. Spill a few handfuls of water on your head imagining that this is the water from melted snow in a spring puddle on a meadow, that this is spring itself. And then you may really feel the sincere desire to get united with this water with your entire body!
After swimming or showering, you should observe the energy processes inside the body. You may see there the bright white light-fire blazing up, which you should distribute evenly over the entire space inside the body. This fire heals the body and rids us of coarse energies.
In conclusion of this chapter, I want to say the following. Even without prior studying the techniques of psychic self-regulation, winter swimming saved many people of severe diseases that were considered terminal, including cancer. There are many well-known cases of quick healing of respiratory diseases in the acute stage using this method. Enthusiasts of winter swimming accumulated certain experience of healing children, and this issue deserves a thorough in-depth study.
But it is not a panacea (the cure of all diseases). For example, in case of chronic diseases, which are accompanied with slightly increased body temperature, it does not always produce the positive effect. The organism apparently does not have the resources that could be activated by submerging the body into ice-cold water. Such patients should rather get hyperthermal (high temperature) bath treatment [64].
There may be no constraining to winter swimming, even for therapeutic purposes, since it is being mentally ready that to a large extent predetermines the effectiveness of this method.
Meditative running is a powerful method of increasing the energy potential of the organism and of development of its energy system as a whole. This method was created by Tibetan spiritual seekers (it was called Lung Gom running). In Russia, the group version of this technique became popular thanks to efforts of Yan Koltunov (Moscow).
The method consists in performing pranayamas and meditations during a long group running, which is done at a slow pace. Performed in this manner, the meditations and pranayamas help students: a) distract their attention from bodily sensations, allowing them not to concentrate on being tired, b) create and maintain positive emotional state, c) train their concentration, visualization, and meditation abilities, d) develop personal power (power of the consciousness), e) harmonize loads on muscle, cardiovascular, respiratory, and other systems of the organism, etc.
Running sessions of groups consisting from 5 to 50 people should be led by an instructor who uninterruptedly (this is important!) suggests exercises to the group.
Compared to the static variant of psychic self-regulation classes, the exercises of meditative running are performed at an incommensurably higher energy level, which increases their efficiency dramatically.
The condition of psychic attunement of all participants of the running and the monotonous background of the working muscle system contributes to better concentration.
It is advisable that this method is used after all participants have mastered the basics of psychic self-regulation. Unprepared beginners must not be included in the group, since those unable to participate in meditative work synchronously with the rest of the group make this work more difficult for the group as a whole.
Below we are going to set out our modification of this method as a program for a two-hours running (without taking the warm-up time into consideration). As we will see, this program is an intermediate stage to the higher methods of spiritual work, which will be explained in the following chapters.
First sessions must be limited to 30 minutes or less. Then one can gradually increase the load.
Because of certain adjustments that take place in the muscular system during the time of the trainings, one should increase the quantity of protein in one’s diet (milk products, eggs, nuts, mushrooms, etc.). Drinking milk afterwards will also be very good.
I also want to mention that women may experience menstruation delays during intensive running trainings (this is a well-known phenomenon in sports medicine); this must not be considered as a dangerous indication.
If you decide to run in the morning, you may do it on an empty stomach or have just a glass of water with a teaspoonful of honey or jam. In case the running sessions are held during the day or in the evening, the last intake of food should be several hours before them. It is very difficult to run with a full stomach.
Clothes should be light. So, if the air temperature is above 0 Centigrade (32 Fahrenheit) just a regular tracksuit will be enough. When it is below -10 Centigrade (12 Fahrenheit), you may put additional training pants, light sweater, and a cap. But you may also dress lighter — overheating of the body should be avoided while performing this type of exercises.
During summer heat, it makes sense to make the route go near natural water reservoirs and to make stops for swimming. It would be still better to run in the morning and to stay near the water during the day. This time may be used for discussions and studying food resources of the forest. In winter, the running session can be followed by swimming in an ice-hole (but it is absolutely necessary that near the ice-hole there is a warm room or a big fire made in advance). If these conditions cannot be found, a hot shower would also do just fine. The running session must be followed by the washing of the body.
Before running, one has to perform an intensive warm-up of the body that would involve all muscles and joints (its description can be found above). In winter, it is better to warm up indoors, so that one comes out to the frost in the already warm condition attained due to muscular activity.
Then the running itself begins. The instructor has to run behind the group so that everyone can hear him or her. The first thing the instructor does is giving the command to maintain the correct posture:
“Attention to the posture. The body is straight. We may even slightly bend it backward. The body should be in such a position so that the muscles of the back are not strained. Relax the muscles of the back. Throw the head slightly back. Relax the back muscles of the neck.
“Attention to the feet. Place them on the ground straight with toes looking forward. Feet are relaxed. They touch the ground smoothly and gently. Relax the muscles of the shins and the thighs. Feel that legs are relaxed all the time, so that we cannot feel the moment we are touching the ground.
“Attention to the chest. It is slightly raised. Imagine that the collarbones are like small boards lying on it, feel them. The chest remains expanded during the entire running session.
“Raise the chest and let it stay in this expanded position while breathing. The belly is relaxed, but it does not hang down as long as the chest is expanded.
“Make sure that the body does not bend forward — otherwise it will get tired very soon. Fix it in the correct position. Attention to the wrists: they are relaxed and hang loosely.
“Imagine that we are suspended on a long wire attached to some distant cosmic object. The body is suspended; it hardly touches the ground and is relaxed.
“Move with the concentration of the consciousness to muladhara. Then look to the center of the Earth from it and see a sea of Fiery Light there. Let us send a beam from muladhara towards this sea. Here, it reaches the abode of this Power… A powerful reciprocal impulse of energy rushes up that beam and fills our chakras and our entire body. Let us repeat this exercise. Concentration is in muladhara. We are sending a signal beam to the center of the Earth…, and receiving a reciprocal impulse of Power!… Feel energy inside the chakras. The entire body is filled with power and light; it expanded; the density of energy inside it increases… We repeat this over and over…
“Let us imagine a giant vacuum-cleaner 30 meters below the Earth surface with its nozzle facing upward. We are going to turn it on, and it will start sucking all dark energies inside and around us and sending them to the center of the Earth. Here, we turned the engine on, it started grumbling, the sucking power increases… We observe the space around the group and see the dark energies fly away, sucked down by this vacuum cleaner. Track their way… They rush at enormous speed towards the center of the Earth — and vanish there…
“Let everyone examine the space within one meter of the body. We click the switch, and the engine power doubles. Watch dark pieces rip off and fly away. Scan thoroughly the space around the head…, the neck…, the chest…, the belly…, the pelvis…, the hips…, the knees…, the feet…
“And now let us turn the attention into the space inside our bodies. Click the switch once more. The power quadruples! The vacuum cleaner starts shaking. Incredible sucking power tears off all dark stuff that remained inside the bodies. Everyone scans the head, the neck, the chest, the belly, the pelvis, the hips, the legs… The bodies get filled with the purest light that comes from above to replace what has been gone…
“Let us turn the palms of the hands upward. Imagine a tennis ball made of white-goldish light lying on each of them. We toss them from one hand to another. They grow brighter. Superpose them into one ball on the left palm. Let us inflate this ball with energy from our anahatas…
“Muladhara — ‘inhale’ from below, anahata — ‘exhale’ into the ball. Muladhara — ‘inhale’, anahata — ‘exhale’. (Repeat this ten times). The ball is as large as a large watermelon… (Some more ‘exhales’ into the ball). It is already one meter in diameter… All balls merge into one common ball… Look at its surface from inside. It separates us from the surrounding space securely. There is a subtlest transparent environment filled with lucid light inside the ball. It is incredibly easy to breathe in it; we feel amazingly light and weightless… It seems that all bodies merge into one organism inside the ball… We continue running inside the ball.
“Let us do a series of pranayamas. ‘Inhale’ the light through the legs and ‘exhale’ it through muladhara forward, pushing out everything that hinders its flow. This is the light that we may see in abundance below the Earth’s surface. The left leg — ‘inhale’, muladhara — ‘exhale’ (3-4 times). The right leg — ‘inhale’, muladhara — ‘exhale’ (3-4 times). The left leg — ‘inhale’, svadhisthana — ‘exhale’. (And so on — going through all the chakras). Muladhara — ‘inhale’, anahata — ‘exhale’ (3-4 times). The spine — ‘inhale’ from below, ajna — ‘exhale’ (3-4 times). The left leg — ‘inhale’, the entire right side of the body — ‘exhale’ (3-4 times). The right leg — ‘inhale’, the entire left side of the body — ‘exhale’ (3-4 times). The left arm — ‘inhale’ — through anahata — the right arm — ‘exhale’ (3-4 times). (And then the other way around). Muladhara — ‘inhale’ from below, sahasrara — ‘exhale’ up. (Repeat this several times; then it should become the uninterrupted flow of light). Make this flow stop and watch a cloud of light forming above us. It wants to pour into our bodies; let us open ourselves up and let it in, let it fill us with its tenderness and purity…
“Feel a small sun between the palms. Look at its goldish light, feel its caress… The sun dissolves in our hands…, we soak its warmth and light through our arms into anahata and sense a pleasant expansion inside the chakra. And now we will emanate the light and the warmth of the sun from anahata at all living beings around us…
“Let us shift the concentration of the consciousness into the rightmost part of anahata. Find the subtlest plane of light there and cast out all coarse layers from the chakra. (Repeat the same from the rightmost part of vishuddha, then ajna and sahasrara, then from the leftmost part of sahasrara, ajna, and so on in a circle).
“Let everyone imagine that we are foxes. A red fox with a large fluffy tail runs smoothly in the forest. Running is a natural state for a fox. We run upon soft green moss among trees, bushes, and stones. We run, ignoring everything that surrounds us. The fox has a goal. The fox has to see the sunrise. A pointed gently sloping woodless hill is ahead. We run up its slope and freeze at the top. We stand on the top, watch the disk of the rising sun go up from the horizon. Anxious expectation, readiness… The sun rises and touches the hill with its light. Here, it is up. We look at its disk. The streamy light flows out of the sun and fills the body. Let the body get filled with light, let the light grow thick and liquid. We fill the entire body from the tail to the eyes with this light… Density of the liquefied light inside the body increases…
“… And now each of us is a fallow deer. A jump — and we soar upward, enjoying the freedom. The bodies get filled with happiness, exultation of flying over the woods and fields, immersed in the tenderness of the clear morning and golden sunlight. We get overfilled with happiness, ecstasy, and bliss. We breathe in the freshness of the warm wind, mixed with sunlight. Down below is a forest river and hills covered with grass and bushes. A small wave of wind touched the leaves. We get close to the ground. Aroma of flowers reaches our senses. We touch the ground and shoot upward again into the space of light, towards infinite joy of flying!… Feel the warmth of rays of the sun with our soft and gentle fells; we smile at the sun, at the whole world, at all living beings that surround us: birds, flowers, grass, trees, beetles, butterflies, animals, and people! We want to fill them all with the light of joy, to melt hardened and rude souls!… What a happiness it is — to live in harmony with everybody and everything, to live in love!
“Now let us get back into our human bodies, which keep on running, and start to form an ‘envelope’ of light around them. We ‘bandage’ the body, starting from below, at the distance of 50 centimeters of the body, with wide bandage clockwise if looking from below. Form an envelope around the feet…, the shins…, the hips…, the pelvis…, the belly…, the chest…, the neck…, the head… Then let us touch its walls from inside with the hands of the consciousness… Let every one of us imagine the mirror image above ourselves, the double, running upside down. Now let us continue making an ‘envelope’ to include the double’s body: the head…, the neck…, the chest…, the belly…, the pelvis…, the hips…, the shins…, the feet. Then detach ourselves from this ‘envelope’ and fly about 5 meters up. Do not look down… Enjoy the coolness of the wind, the expanse and the freedom…, then get above the park (the forest, boulevard, the stadium). Birds fly around us, let us greet them. Now rise close to the cloud layer (if there are clouds), and look at them from below… We get ready to break through the clouds where the sun shines (if we run during the day). We turn into a rocket for a second and skyrocket there — into the world of exultation and light! The sunlight reflects in the dazzling white clouds beneath us. The shine and sparkling of joy in the bright sunshine! Let us feast on this light and fill ourselves with its joy!
“And now let us head for the outer space and leave the Solar system… We glide in the expanse of the boundless cosmic space… Stars are all around us… Silence… Let us feel the eternity and the endlessness of the universe in all their entirety… Stars are shimmering… This is the cosmic pulse. Let us feel this rhythm. Stars are shimmering rhythmically. Silence. Calm. Eternity and Infinity… Wisdom of the boundless space…
“Let us start returning. Now, we approach the Sun. It grows larger; we immerse ourselves in its familiar tender light, fill ourselves up with its rays again, and get ecstatic! We suspend ourselves over white dazzling clouds and dive down through them. Underneath is the surface of our home planet, forests, rivers, fields, villages, and cities… Let us start descending. We fly over the Earth surface and shine at all living beings with the sunlight that we accumulated in our bodies… Send our care and tenderness to trees, birds, animals, people… Let us wish all people to live in peace and harmony with everyone and everything… Let us pour the light of love into all emptied and hardened hearts. Let them get rid of coarseness, hate, violence, selfishness, lie, and addiction to alcohol! Let the whole world become filled with the bliss of peace and love! Let all living beings’ hearts become filled with sunlight!
“We descend to our city, to the park, then even lower and look at the group of people running down below. These are our bodies; we approach them, get into them, move immediately to muladhara and send a beam of light to the center of the Earth from there, receive a reciprocal impulse of Power, that starts filling the chakras, the entire bodies… (We repeat the latter element 3-4 times).
“Now let us work with the microcosmic orbit for some time… Then let us feel ourselves in anahatas…, in manipuras…, in svadhisthanas, in muladharas, in svadhisthanas again…, in manipuras…, in anahatas…, in vishuddhas…, in ajnas…, in sahasraras…, then above the heads… We swim in the light, fly freely, feel joy, tenderness, purity, subtlety of the sunlight!
“Then we start to condense our flying forms, draw the light of the subtlest space into them as if with some magnets… The flying form of everyone accepts the anthropomorphic shape, grows dense and filled with light, starts shining like a morning sun and then becomes our ‘sunny double’. We slowly superimpose the physical body on this “sunny double”. We feel dense sunlight inside ourselves, this precious load of Golden Elixir, making sure it gets distributed evenly inside the bodies.
“Now let us place a ball that consists of goldish white light between the palms of the hands. We place it in front of manipura. Then we connect a tube to the back part of manipura, through which a stream of light starts rushing into the chakra and then into the ball. The density of light in the ball increases (but its size remains the same). Now that we have filled the ball to the limit, we disconnect the tube and dissolve it. Attention — into the ball. Internal processes that produce the colossal rise of pressure begin inside it! A subtlest goldish-white fire rages inside the ball! We insert the ball into manipuras with our hands. The chakras are bursting with power. The whole bodies get filled with incredible strength!… We can hardly control the bodies, it wants to make giant leaps, to tear at full speed… A red triangle starts moving forward slowly out of manipura… It drags every body by the center of the belly. (In 1-2 minutes we stop accelerating our pace with the command:) Dissolve the triangle!… The front runners — run on the spot! Get closer to one another. Manipura — ‘inhale’, vishuddha — ‘exhale’. (Repeat several times).
“Everyone imagine a fragrant whitish-pink rose in front of anahata. Rays of the rising sun are sparkling and playing in the dewdrops on its delicate petals. We insert the flower into anahatas. The chakras gets filled with a delicate aroma. (Let us insert images of flowers into all the chakras).
“Immerse ourselves into the blue of the clear morning sky. We let the light of the sky into the bodies and fill the inner space of the bodies with it…
“(If it is winter and there is a pure snow — we may take off our shoes and run in the snow barefooted for some time).
“We continue running. Concentration — in the center of the palms. In the center of the palms, pulsating warmth emerges. Feel the pulse in the palms! Feel the pulse! Feel it! Concentration — in the thumb-cushions. Pulse and warmth emerge there! Feel the pulse! Feel it! (And so on, repeating this for all intervals between fingers and the cushions of all fingers’ end phalanges).
“Feel the wrists. There is pulsating warmth in them. The pulse! Feel the entire arms, the arms along with the chest, then with the head, feel the pulse in the whole upper part of the body! The entire body turns into a pulsating heart! Imagine ourselves to be a pulsating heart! It grows in size — two times, ten times… A huge pulsating heart, tireless and powerful organ filled with hot blood, with immense inexhaustible power in it!… We keep on pulsating!… Feel ourselves like pulsating hearts!… Gradually shrink and condense ourselves, sense the body again and realize the concentrated power of this gigantic organ inside the body…
“Expand, as consciousnesses, in the surrounding space. Let us concentrate on the plants around us: grass, flowers, bushes, and trees. (Or in case of winter we make corresponding exceptions). We feel their state and send our tenderness to them… Let us attune to the emotional state of the birds singing, and then send our love to them.
“A wall of wind-light approaches us from behind. The subtlest light blows through our bodies on the subtlest plane, washing and carrying away all coarse layers. Body shells got deflated, we realize that we are incorporeal beings floating in the space of light, driven by the wind-light. We merge into one big ball of light and continue floating…
“Everyone reclaims their individuality again by condensing into forms of white swans. We fly up in the rays of the morning light. Above is the blue of the sky with bright white clouds floating. We enjoy the flight, feel the warmth of tender sunlight. Feathers vibrate gently in the currents of warm air. We move our wings slightly. We enjoy the flight. We look down. A river winding about in the forest carries its waters to a big lake with small islands. We get down to the water, approach its mirror-like surface. We touch the water with our paws, splash a line, stop, look around… All swans are talking tenderly with one another in their musical swan language. We swim up to one another, fluff our feathers and gently place our heads onto the backs of our friends from the flock. Vishuddhas get overfilled with the bliss of this moment.
“We swim up together to the green patch of reeds and admire its reflection in the water. Well, it is time to fly again! We take off softly and head to the sun effortlessly. We get higher and higher… Let the sunlight flow into the bodies, let it condense inside them, filling them from the tail to the eyes. We fly towards the sun and get filled with thick golden light… The entire body gets filled with thick, heavy, and blissful light-power, the unshakable power of love…
“We get down — and fall into our human bodies. A golden fuel of life spreads all over them. We create an increased density of this fuel in the lower chakras. Next portions of the same kind of light pour into the bodies from above; the bodies get filled up with it…
“(The exercises for climbing up steep slopes on the route:) A strong current of white light blows at us out of the Earth through muladhara. It inflates every body like a balloon. The body gets blown up and grows weightless… It becomes difficult to keep it from taking off; we can hardly touch the ground with our feet… It takes tremendous efforts to reach the ground with our feet…
“We enter into anahatas with the concentration of the consciousness, look at the world out of it…, then enter into manipuras, look out of manipuras, enter into svadhisthanas…, into muladharas…, again into svadhisthanas…, into manipuras…, into anahatas…, into vishuddhas…, into ajnas…, into sahasraras…. Imagine ourselves above sahasraras in the form of a small disk-shaped clouds… We draw in light, become brighter and brighter… All of us merge into one large disk. The disk starts drawing in the subtlest light from the surrounding space and gets filled with it… The light inside the disk grows brighter… The higher the density of the light inside the disk, the more intensively it draws in the energy from space… We accumulate tremendous power in ourselves… Now the disk is able to move in space instantaneously, at the speed of a thought…
“We imagine ourselves beyond the clouds — in the bright sunshine… We are behind our running bodies… Now we are far ahead of them… We extend ribbons that consist of light to our bodies. Each ribbon is attached to the center of the belly of the running body. Start towing the bodies. The disk accelerates slowly; the ribbons get strained… Tow the body by the center of the belly, the speed increases gradually… The ribbons turn into navel-strings. The energy of the disk transfuses into the bodies through them. The bodies get filled with the power that was pertinent to the disk and with the qualities that were pertinent to it…
“Everyone imagines themselves to be a small cloud above the running body. Draw in the light from the surrounding space. By drawing this light, we condense ourselves to the human form, becoming our ‘sunny doubles’, who runs as it were on the ‘second floor’ — above the head of the body, which runs on the ground floor. Imagine ourselves totally to be running on the ‘second floor’. We run in the space of goldish light, draw in this light, and thicken it inside ourselves… The light inside the bodies of our ‘sunny doubles’ grows thicker, more dense… (we may perform the Cross of Buddha, a series of pranayamas, and other exercises while running on the ‘second floor’).
“Get down to the ground to the right of the running bodies. Let us take it with the left hand by its right hand. Now we run together holding hands with our bodies. Let us transfuse ourselves into the running bodies, superimpose ourselves on it and feel the blissful power of Golden Elixir inside…
“Attention — into muladharas. We perceive them as firm foundations. A house built on such foundation will never suffer from any storms… We feel the power of the Golden Elixir in muladharas. Connect muladharas with the Fiery Light in the center of the Earth with a beam of light and fill these chakras with that power. Muladharas are filled up with dense light, energy, power.”
We slow down to walking, surprised at how unusual it is for us to walk. Running has become a natural state of the organism, hasn’t it? We watch our breath and pulse. They are the same as those during regular walking.
After the running, one should swim or have a shower, perform a deep relaxation and other exercises.
It should be noted that the impressive lightness and the sense of being filled with positive emotions that appear during group meditative running cannot be achieved when running individually.
Here are examples of the meditations that can also be included in the program of running:
The Cross of Buddha performed from the dictation of the instructor.
While running on the “first floor” we may deviate from the previous trajectory and far aside from it perform actions that the instructor suggests.
When running in the forest or a park, we may “extend” the arms that come out from the anahata and gently touch or caress tree-tops with our hands.
Run forward from the body, then run near the body holding hands with it, then hurry the body by pushing it on the back. (This meditation can be easily turned into a merry game, filled with jokes; casual witnesses of such moments get amazed at seeing a group of laughing runners compared to the usual sight of exasperated and exhausted sportsmen).
When running on the “second floor”, “connect” “cosmic hoses” to the chakras and fill them up with “cosmic fuel”: fill muladharas with the “fuel of eternal life”, svadhisthanas — with transparent subtlety and purity, manipuras — with energy of powerful and harmonious motion, anahatas — with white light of all-embracing love, vishuddhas — with subtle blueness of the morning sky and first golden rays of the Sun as well as with morning dew and aroma of flowers, ajnas — with active and mobile “intellectual fuel”, and sahasraras — with the subtlest all-pervading and all-embracing cosmic light. Feel the wholeness and conformity of the entire system of the chakras, of the entire organism, as well as its imperishability and ability to withstand all difficulties that may emerge on our path. Perfection can be found primarily in Love. Let us feel love for all living beings. Perfection is also in Wisdom. Let us get filled with understanding of everyone and everything and unite this quality with Love. Perfection is also in Power. Let us feel perfect and unconquerable power, merged into one with Love and Wisdom, as well as readiness for great selfless service. Let us realize in ourselves the qualities of Those Who have already attained Perfection. Let us feel one with Them. Let us feel Them in ourselves, the simplicity and clarity of Their perfect Love…, deep, universal, and powerful Wisdom, as well as boundless courage and impregnability of Their perfect Power!… Let us imprint all these qualities into ourselves forever!
Imagine ourselves to be running behind the bodies and cleanse them inside and out of all that is different from light. Then wash them from a hose and fill them with light.
While running on the “second floor”, let us feel the energy structures of our organisms… Perform exercises with the microcosmic orbit. Then concentrate in chitrinis behind anahatas. From this point, rush forward through anahatas into the space of the purest light. Expand in it and merge with it… Then condense ourselves again to human bodies’ dimensions… Feel the power distributing all over the bodies that keep running on the “second floor”: every body becomes solid and resilient. Tense the muscles of the legs…, those of the lumbar segment of the body…, of the arms…, of the chest… Feel clearly that all muscles of the back are tensed… Jump on the ground of the “second floor” with our strong and resilient bodies, make a somersault… Run on the “second floor” raising the knees high in the air…, then touching the buttocks with the heels…
Concentration — in the center of the belly. From there, extend “tentacles” and attach them to a distant cloud. Transfer attention to the “tentacle” completely. Then everyone contracts the “tentacle” and pulls the body forward with it. No additional muscle efforts should be made! Just contract the “tentacle” (the speed, at which we run, accelerates dramatically, we do not feel any additional load on the muscles).
Slow down to walking. With the “tentacles”, snatch at various objects and pull ourselves to them. Tense and relax the “tentacles”. No energy of the body is being spent for these actions, thus the body does not get tired.
Imagine that we run behind the bodies. Then with a wand made of light cleanse the middle meridian from the bottom up to the head chakras.
We may allow ourselves to play and to frolic. While running far ahead of the body, turn a somersault in the air, jerking the legs in a funny way intentionally: we must not feel shy — nobody sees it anyway, except for us. Watch friends doing this (everybody laughs).
Running on the “second floor”, feel it as our home — familiar and cozy… Before getting down to the “first floor”, each of us attaches one end of a rubber string to the “second floor”. The strings will stretch without hindering our movements, but we will always be able to pull ourselves back to the “second floor”… Attach the strings to the “second floor” and get down to the “first floor”. Everyone attaches the other end of the string to the center of the belly. We may touch the strings with our hands. We stretch them — and find ourselves on the “second floor” at once.
(While climbing uphill:) we imagine that we are in a rapid stream of water. It drags us forward at enormous speed…
Immerse into the space of light inside the body. Then scan it through and cleanse it, then turn all attention to the Light that exists inside the Earth, look at the Earth as a living planet, which loves us. Let us comprehend the nature of the Light that fills the Earth — and there will be no doubts that the Earth is a living being and that she loves us as her children! Let us send an emotion of our gratitude to her…
Let us immerse into the Light of the Earth. Let us feel its tenderness and our close relation to it. Let us submerge in it completely and expand as consciousnesses from anahatas across the entire inner space of the Earth. Now we are one with our dear planet. Everyone is now aware of oneself as being in the space of the mother-Earth filled with tender Light. There is the inner space of the Earth and a small jut on its surface — the inner space of the body… From the inner space of the Earth, we watch this jut of light moving on Earth’s surface.
Let us move the concentration of the consciousness back into our bodies and feel the Light of the Earth inside them.
Let us imagine a rising sun, wash our faces with its light… Let the subtle light of the early spring morning — into the body through the face and fill the entire body with it!
Let us look up through sahasraras and see clouds of Light that gathered above us — sparkling goldish Light! Let us raise our hands and bring a wave of this Light down into our bodies!
We watch the light of the Earth and light of the Sun merge inside our bodies…
