We humans have a lot of yi (attention, awareness, focus) naturally invested in vision; it's our predominant perceptual avenue. Modern life, physically sedentary and mentally over-active, exacerbates this predominance.
Brain Massage Meditation
Re-Claiming Visual Chi
Yi, Vision, Modern Life, and Brain Alchemy
We humans have a lot of yi (attention, awareness, focus) naturally invested in vision; it's
our predominant perceptual avenue. Modern life, physically sedentary and
mentally over-active, exacerbates this predominance.
What often results is that there's too much yi habitually located in the
eyes and in front of the eyes (outside the body), as well as
excessive tension in the ocular muscles and along the optic nerve pathway.
There's excessive yi in front, yet a deficit of yi in the back regions of the brain, which throws brain alchemy off.
The yi, and consequently the chi, gets stuck in the front exterior.
The brain has many parts, folds, separations. A big part of the purpose of brain meditation is to promote good balanced circulation amongst these parts. It's good for the brain itself and has healthy effects throughout the body.
Reclaiming the Yi in Vision: The Main Brain Meditation
In the following meditation, the first (and major) stage is to return the outward yi, slowly, into
and through the eyes, follow along the path of the optic nerve, and conclude in the back of
the brain, where vision is processed. It's really as simple as that.
STEP BY STEP
1. Place your attention somewhat in front of your eyes, then slowly bring your attention back into your eyeballs, actually into the orbs, starting in the front center and slowly moving toward the back of the orb interior. Perhaps rest a little at the inner back wall of the eye, in order to facilitate the transition to the optic nerve.
2. Slowly pass from the center of the back of the eyeball, to further back along the optic nerve. Allow any tensions to simply play out along the way.
3. Continue to slowly follow the optic nerve pathway illustrated below, concluding in the back of the occipital lobes (where the brain processes vision). Allow any pulsings, etc., along the way to simply occur. There is no need to intend anything.
Brain
Massage: Equalization of Pressures within the Brain
Since vision is so heavily wired directly into the brain, and since we have so
much awareness invested in vision, it's an effective meditation pathway to
follow. I think you'll find that once the outward yi is re-deployed inwardly, it
adds considerable boost to the brain (in terms of nourishment
chi, and blood) - which results in very healthy circulation and re-balancing within the brain.
What you'll find is that there are pressure inequalities within sections of the brain, front to back, upper and lower, left and right hemispheres, inner and
outer sections. Once the attention is brought more fully into the brain, these
pressure imbalances pulse across brain parts, start to balance, and equalize.
It feels like a brain massage.
This
"brain massage" can, of course, be prompted by
various other meditations. Some people get it through the m.orbit, other
channels, by working with the centers, or simply by relaxing the face during
meditation. Personally, I find the optical nerve pathway meditation especially
effective. In any case, the equalization of pressures within the brain (or
lack there of) has many important implications regarding jing
gong.
Once this first meditation is complete, once awareness is retrieved backward along the
pathway of vision, and once the resulting pressures are allowed to balance
- if you want to - you can explore
further by placing your yi at various specific structures of the brain, which
will prompt further specific circulation. (See pictures at bottom of essay.)
Balance
I would emphasize here that the over all goal should be to promote well rounded balance.
Not any particular part of the brain, nor any particular part of the body,
should be over-emphasized. Once this meditation has played through, employ
whatever other practice sequence you do in order to integrate with the whole body and to
establish root. For example: Following the breath,
AYP's
Spinal Breathing, lower tan tien breathing, standing practices, leg work,
inner smile.
More Neutral Vision
The following is a quoted excerpt from a post at TheTaoBums.com by
VCraigP, here with his permission:
"This subject prompted me to remember something I learned from one of the HT instructors in Europe while on a retreat in Mexico.
We were talking about vision. It was just the expression of a basic principle.
Normally we “reach out” with our eyes to gather information and to interact with the world.
If we can change our focus or style we can learn to let the information passively come to us.
So what is ordinarily a very yang activity – sight, connected with the Liver, which represents new yang, spring, rising up, ambitious energy, can become a more yin activity.
Learning to be receptive in your vision. Just this concept by itself changed things for me as soon as I began to apply it.
At first it is kind of like you have to “pull” your intention back into your eyes, as a way to balance out the old style of reaching out to gather information.
Soon you begin to have the sensation of a neutral energy at the eyes, neither reaching out nor pulling in.
This type of gazing is also helpful to open up and enable better peripheral vision."
(Thank you! to VCraigP.)
Links
Eye-Movement Exercises complement the meditation.
Pictures for General Study
