"Délivrance" movie about vipassana meditation

"Délivrance" french/swiss movie about vipassana meditation.

It happens in Swiss and Burma. A young European tired of wasting his life in the west goes to Burma and discover another approach and meaning of life through vipassan

a meditation. Interesting and well done.

Plagued by the vicissitudes of his agitated life style, Léo vainly tries to find a shelter by becoming intoxicated with electronic music, alcohol and hashisch. When a work colleague talks to him about a meditational training effective in putting an end to the root of all sorrow, it sounds to him like a great revelation.

Free download at http://dhammadana.free.fr 

Instructions for Life in the new millennium from the Dalai Lama

1. Take into account that great love and great achievements involve great risk.
2. When you lose, don't lose the lesson.
3. Follow the three R's: Respect for self, respect for others and responsibility for all your actions.
4. Remember that not getting what you want is sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck.
5. Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.
6. Don't let a little dispute injure a great friendship.
7. When you've made a mistake, take immediate steps to correct it.
8. Spend some time alone every day.
9. Open your arms to change, but don't let go of your values.
10. Remember that silence is sometimes the best answer.
11. Live a good, honorable life. Then when you get older and think back, you'll be able to enjoy it a second time.
12. A loving atmosphere in your home is the foundation for your life.
13. In disagreements with loved ones, deal only with the current situation. Don't bring up the past.
14. Share your knowledge. It's a way to achieve immortality.
15. Be gentle with the earth.
16. Once a year, go some place you've never been before.
17. Remember that the best relationship is one in which your love for each other exceeds your need for each other.
18. Judge your success by what you had to give up in order to get it.
19. Approach love and cooking with reckless abandon.

Gokai - 5 Reiki Principles Guided Meditation

Gokai - 5 Reiki Principles Guided Meditation

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Negative States of Mind & Yoga

In order to release past impressions from our minds which negatively influence our behaviour, is it enough to simply witness them in meditation, or is it necessary to re-experience the pain and emotion that go along with them?

Past experiences in yogic terminology are known as samskara and, if you are aware of them you can get rid of them by simply witnessing them. If some samskaras come up to the level of the conscious mind during meditation and you re-live the pain and emotion, it is possible to get rid of it completely. The problem lies in knowing what our samskaras are, because generally we believe that our desires, ambitions, likes and dislikes are samskaras when actually they are not. They are patterns or modifications of mind- vrittis.

Samskaras go much deeper than that. They belong to the realm of the unconscious mind and construct the human personality. Without samskaras we would not be classified as human beings. If we try to understand personality in general, we will find that even animals have personalities. They have samskaras which go beyond the instinctive aspect of animal consciousness. Even trees and plants have samskaras, but that goes beyond the state of consciousness in which they live and survive.

The literal meaning of samskara is 'uniform personality', 'akara' meaning 'form', 'shape' or 'personality', and 'sam' meaning 'the totality of'. We relate intellectually to everything we perceive in the world as a form or object. That is the external experience, but when we talk about the aspect of consciousness, energy and personality in each object or being, we are talking about the samskara. So, even this tape recorder has a samskara, although it is a mechanical object. It can be classified as an object having a samskara, identity or uniform consciousness. Matter contains energy, energy has movement and within that movement there is some underlying awareness which maintains it in its gravitational field. That is actually what we call samskara.

When we say, 'Oh, I have this samskara in me' meaning 'I like this or that' or 'I want to achieve this but can't due to my samskara', that is only a modification of mind. Samskara are related to karma also. Consciousness was there before you were given birth and it will be there after you die. This consciousness has been given certain impressions which we can call experiences of the deeper self. We become aware of these impressions when we practise deep meditation, not superficial meditation. When we transcend the conscious, subconscious and unconscious experiences of personality it is possible that initially we become aware of certain traumas that have taken place in our early childhood, and of which we did not have any conscious recollection. I will give you an example.

One lady came here some time ago who used to suffer tremendous headaches since very early childhood for no apparent reason. No amount of medication or meditation had helped her. Then one day as she was meditating she had this splitting headache and suddenly she had a vision of herself as a miner in a coal mine in Wales, United Kingdom. The whole mine collapsed on her head and she died. Since re-experiencing that event she did not have a single attack of headache.

Now, this can be classified as a samskara, an impression which the consciousness has carried through several or more lives and the physical manifestation took the form of a headache. We can infer from this that her consciousness had undergone the experience in some previous life, but because of its traumatic effect on her personality, it remained within the folds of consciousness. Then, when that consciousness re-manifested in another body, the same trauma was again expressed by it. So, a human being is not a totally different entity than its experiences in its previous lives.

We can also term many other experiences which we may have had in childhood and about which we have entirely forgotten, as samskaras which have left a very deep impression on our personality. Children whose parents are drug-addicts or who have been divorced very early on have a different mentality because of this samskara.

Samskara has nothing to do with our intellect or buddhi. If we could rationalize our experience and try to clear the mind of it we would not give birth to that samskara again. Clearing the mind is important. If something comes up and you remember it or see it in the form of a vision, that is clearing the samskara. For example you may realize 'I know I have a lot of emotional problems. Previously I was not like this. I know the cause. I had a fight with my wife and we got divorced. Intellectually we cleared things up but emotionally we were not able to clear that experience from our mind'. So this emotional frustration later takes on the form of a samskara and transforms our personality.

If you know the cause of your present malady then you should also try to make sure that your mind is clear in all respects, not only intellectually but also emotionally and psychically. A spiritual aspirant must have this kind of awareness. We should not look at things only from the intellectual standpoint but from the aspect of the total personality. This is what meditation actually teaches.

Although we do begin the meditational practices with technique of self-observation, of observing our thoughts and what we are feeling, these techniques are not limited to this superficial awareness of personality. They go much deeper than that and whenever we meditate we should try lo keep the idea or concept in mind, that it deals with the total personality and the purification of an event which has already taken place.

How can we remove negative tendencies such as fear?

According to yogic, Eastern and Western psychology, negative tendencies are a part of our individual personality which must express itself whether we like it or not. So negative states of mind cannot be eradicated completely. The modern psychologist has defined fear in many different ways and there are many different types of tear. Children are afraid of the dark; some people are afraid to travel by aeroplane although it is the safest way of travelling in the world, because they think it can fall down from the sky or be hijacked.
Fear can be caused by insecurity also, or by certain dislike, or our inability to cope with life's difficult situations You may have a boss of whom you are afraid. As soon as you hear that he is calling you, you begin to sweat, your heart begins to palpitate, your blood pressure goes up and you begin to tremble without any real reason. So many types of fear we have to face, but it is possible to develop the state of mind of observing our mental reactions and physiological reactions, and controlling the symptoms. By controlling the symptoms, eventually the tendency can also be controlled. This is where pratyahara comes in.

First of all we must develop the attitude of witnessing everything taking place within us and around us. After we have been able to develop this attitude of witness, observer or 'seer', we can observe how a mental tendency influences our actions, behaviour, and our emotional and intellectual patterns. Then we try to find a rational way of dealing with this disturbance in our personality.

There is one practice called antar mouna which involves observing the thoughts, the emotions, creating them, removing them, developing attention, developing awareness - and this is one of the most effective means of combating any type of destructive disturbance in our personality. And this applies to fear, haired, jealousy, anger, frustration, depression or any negative state of mind.

by Swami Niranjanananda Saraswati

Three Gunas - modes of nature

1. TAMAS
Symbolised by the colours black or dark-blue Tamas is a quality of awareness reflecting the realm of latent, murky, obscured or ‘occult’ knowledge and power. In physical nature it finds expression as gravity and inertial mass. In human nature it is felt essentially as a downward-pulling sense of inertia and heaviness. If and when it dominates the individual however, it may be experienced somatically as ‘fatigue’, ‘lethargy’ or ‘lack of energy’, experienced mentally and emotionally as ‘dullness’ of mind, ‘negativity’ or ‘depression’, expressed outwardly as ‘laziness’ or ‘sloth’, or embodied as physical weight or obesity. It finds positive expression as dignified ‘gravitas’ or ‘groundedness’, as depth or ‘weightiness’ of character, the ability to ‘bear’, ‘support’ or ‘pull’ weight and to sink one’s awareness down meditatively into the depths of one’s body and being. Essentially it is potential action and awareness experienced darkly or obscurely. Theologically it iis associated with the primordial darkness and power of the primordial
mother goddess known as ‘The Great Black One’ (Maha-Kali). Temperamentally it is the Guna uniting the ‘phlegmatic’ with the ‘black bile’ of the ‘melancholic’. Anatomically and medically it is associated with the bowels, abdomen and womb. Psychiatrically it is labelled as mild or severe depression. Sociologically it can find negative expression as the destructive potential of spiritual ignorance, generalised political apathy, the dullness of routinised work, lack of empathy and lifeless personal relationships. People search to compensate for Tamasic existence either though Rajas - hyperactivity and busyness, revelry in drugs and consumerism or mindless entertainment or through bland Sattvic states of spiritual harmony, peace and calm.

2. RAJAS
Symbolised by the colour red, Rajas has essentially to do with the emergence of the vital impulses to outward action and motion (‘e-motion’) that lay latent, obscured or blocked in Tamas. Rajas finds expression as the very process of ‘emergence’ (Greek ‘Physis’) that is the root meaning of the term ‘physical’, and with ‘energy’ in the root sense of ‘action’ or ‘activity’ (energein). That is why the Rajas Guna is principally associated with red-blooded vitality or passion, with the impulse to act, and also hot-blooded anger and rage – with ‘seeing red’, and with the aggression necessary to release blocked action or communication. Temperamentally it is the Guna uniting the sanguine with the choleric. Anatomically it is associated with the genitals and heart, blood and menstruation, psychiatrically with mania and paranoia. Sociologically it can find negative expression as rapacious
greed and pervades the active realms of sport, politics and business.

3. SATTVA
Symbolised by the colour white, Sattva is a reflection of the clear light of awareness out of which alone truth, clear insight, direction and ‘right
action’ can arise. As a natural quality this Guna is associated with radiance, light and lightness, and thereby also with the expansion and
expansiveness of space. Its root meaning is ‘being’ (Sat). This Guna is favoured by many pseudo-spiritual types - being associated with perfect ‘brightness’ of spirit, ‘balance’ and ‘well-being’. Yet the flip side of the ‘balance’ or ‘well-being’ experienced through the Sattva Guna can be a mere bland emotional equanimity, lack of empathy and blankness of mind – albeit disguised as meditative ‘calm’ and ‘tranquillity’. Alternatively it finds expression as an idealisation of asceticism and ‘spiritual’ transcendence at the expense of full- blooded vitality, embodied presence and depth of soul. Just as ‘black’ is not intrinsically the colour of ‘evil’ so is white not intrinsically the colour of ‘goodness’ and spiritual purity – for it is also the colour of fearful pallor, of ghosts and skeletons - and, in the East, of death itself. Temperamentally the Sattva Guna unites the phlegmatic with the
sanguine. Anatomically it is associated with the lymphatic and immune systems, medically with anaemia and anorexia, and psychiatrically with schizophrenia. Sociologically it is associated with the realm of institutionalised religion and the search for inner peace and harmony through ‘spirituality’. Commercial media advertisers are very keen and clever exploiters of both the Sattva and Raja Gunas – whether it be through emphasising the Rajasic qualities of such commodities as cars or alcoholic drinks, or the Sattvic qualities of ‘well-being’ associated with ‘healthy’ foods, cosmetics, over-the-counter medications etc.

by Peter Wilberg 2007

Shavasana Ajustments

Differend ways to prop up shavasana for increased relaxation and comfort for final relaxation.Yoga Props needed: Rectangular Bolster, Eye Pillows/Cover, Blanket, Relaxing music CD or Yoga-Nidra Audio, low lightning.



You can also use a blanket to cover yourself for added comfort and warmth. Once your body stops moving, the heat generated from the yoga class begins to dissipate.  Most people find that a cold body reacts with muscle tension and resistance.


Gently place an eye pillow over the eyes and temples.  The weight of the eye pillow creates a sense of ease and release in your facial muscles.
For an increased sense of grounding, place an eye pillow in the palm of each hand, or on each wrist depending on your comfort.

Place the bolster under your knees to support the lower back.
Before you settle in relaxing posture, lying on your back, lift your pelvis and slide your tailbone away towards your heels to comfortably spread your lower back.


Keep just a light, natural arch to your lower back. Rest your pelvis on the ground. Lengthen your legs, opening legs hip width apart. Let your legs and feet evenly and naturally roll outwards and feel your groin soften.


Lift your arms and shoulders up enough to spread your shoulder blades and back ribs. Ease your shoulders away from your neck.
Roll shoulders back and down, than lightly slide your shoulder blades more under and down your back to enhance the expansion of the chest and anterior shoulders.
Lift and opend your chest to be able to draw more oxygen into your lungs.


Then,roll your upper arms and forearms out to move your palms of hands towards the ceiling and rest your arms beside the torso at about a 45-degree angle. Place your palms up to encourage your chest and shoulders to open. Image your collarbone and chest spreading as your arms settle.
Lengthen the back of your neck by slightly moving your chin towards the chest.Slightly open your mouth and relax your jaw and your tongue down.


Once comfortable, take a slow deep inhale. As you exhale, let your body relax and sink into the floor. Maintain stillness as you relax and quiet the mind. Picture your whole body rejuvenating and resting. Feel your eyes relax into the sockets. Soften the tongue, lips, jaw and forehead. Let the heart, lungs, and other organs relax.
Continue to gaze inwards watching your body and mind rest. Relaxation can last from 5 to 20 minutes.
To exit, inhale bringing your legs into your chest and exhale gradually hugging your knees into your body and rock side to side several times. End rolling to the right pausing to feel your self mentally centered. Push from the right up to sitting. Take a moment to sit tall and feel the calmness Savasana has created.


Article writen by Kreg Weiss, B HKin

Shavanasa

Savasana (Corpse Pose) is the easiest of all Yoga postures to perform physically, yet is sometimes neglected as being the most important asana within the Hatha Yoga practice.

Savasana is a crucial closing of the physical practice where prana, life-energy, has a moment to become grounded, purposeful and collected. As one practices yoga flows, the yoga postures and breathing saturate the energy channels with prana. To exit a yoga practice (especially an extended one) without Savasana, this powerful energy may leave one with sense of disconnection. With this settling of prana in Savasana, an additional practice of internalizing, connecting and meditative observance can be explored.Practise of Yoga-Nidra here is complementing relaxation and isvery beneficial.


The process of conscious relaxation acts as a deep healing for the nervous system, thus can be helpful in reducing stress, tension headaches, and anxiety. Though simple in its application, Savasana can be an uncomfortable Yoga pose to perform for some. The basic position of lying on the back can pose as a challenge and, without being completely comfortable, achieving a state of full relaxation and beneficial healing is diminished.

Tight Hip Flexors and Low Back Tension When you lay flat on the back, the extension of the legs creates a lengthening of the hip flexors (the hip flexors begin at the proximal region of the thigh bone and come across the hip bone to attach at the inner hip crest region and partially at the lower lumbar vertebrae). When the legs lay heavy and the hip flexors are lengthened, a pulling motion is transmitted onto the pelvis and spine. If the hip flexors are tight, a large enough pull can occur on the spine such that the lumbar vertebrae experience a minute, but uncomfortable back-arch effect. This pulling motion on the spine can create an echo of back tension and send negative stimuli into the nervous system.


To reduce the effect of the hip flexors pulling on the lumbar vertebrae and pelvis, simply place a bolster, thick pillows, or a rolled up blanket under the knees. As the legs settle on the support, open the legs wide as well. The opening of the legs and the bend maintained in the knees creates a light outwards rotation of the thighs and reduces the lengthening of the hip flexors. You then basically reduce the distance between the origin and insertion of the hip flexor muscles, thus reducing the muscles' tension acting on the pelvis and spine.


Article writen by Kreg Weiss, B HKin