when I do trance work, or stillness meditation, my heart rate slows down, my breathing slows down, etc.

But when I do intense energy work my heart rate shoots up... it skyrockets, the energy I feel is extremely pleasurable almost like a marijuana type high.

Here is the problem, I want to be able to feel the flows of energy strongly while remaining deep in trance, but it seems the rapid heart rate is a major road block to that.

Does anyone have any ideas on how I can do energy work while remaining in trance, keeping my heart calm.

Your probabaly going to have to go into more detail on exactly how to practice, but the first thing that springs to mind is doing your energy work first,the immediately following it with a fairly decent meditation period. Perhaps even lessening the length or intensity of the energy work.

It sounds like you react EXTREMELY sensitively to energy work,so cutting back a bit wont detract from it, & the meditation should enhace the feeling anyway. Cultivate a little energy first, then savour its glow deeply in the meditation period.

With less deliberate energy work, & more meditation, your sensitive system should be able to get the best of both worlds.

I say this because I think I have the same reaction as you do, at least in terms of sensitivity.

Regards , Cloud

there's the problem, i believe.


attachment and control. oftentimes wanting something to happen can prevent its achievement. relax. stop trying to 'make' it happen. 'allow' it to happen instead.

increased heart rate sounds to me like you've gotten into the habit of forcing things. very yang-oriented. many people swear by this type of practice because the effects/experiences are more intense/sensual. but this type of approach is also why many qigong masters die young.

make your in-breath the more active and your out-breath the more passive. rather than generating the manifestation of energy flow, let it arise naturally as a result of your own overabundance. much healthier, and the energy is more powerful when not colored/distorted by your effort. wu wei.

well I am using robert bruces system, inherently you control the flows of energy with your will. So you are forcing them.

I am trying to combine this method with trance work, but I become so full of pleasurable energy my heart spirals out of control quickly breaking the trance.

If I tone it down a little focusing on just moving a little sphere of energy in an orbit, then it doesn't break trance, and this is what I do most of the time.

However I would love to be able to feel the flow through my full body at once, its feels incredible, however my racing heart always brings me out of trance, which takes so long to achieve.

what is the end result of your practice supposed to be? and who is your teacher?

Where is yor breath centered when you are doing your energy work?
If you can keep the focus in your tan tien it might keep your heart calm.

Reread Hundun's post, it was a good one. You dont want to force qi - think of it like water; when you push water, it will go wherever it may; when you lead water, it follows your direction.

thanks joe and hun... I will try its so hard to explain my internal feelings in a way that make sense to other people from my perspective I don't feel as though I am forcing anything, but perhaps I am. hopefully with years of training I can overcome this

Forcing does not necessarily mean exerting excessive effort. Your last comment is illustrative... Good luck!

Yes, and I have a suggestion here..meditate on the distinction between force and power. They come from two distinct energy sources. The life force is a polarity:

Force comes from one aspect of the life force that's about quantity not quality, so it can't generate anything new. When we use that to try to generate something, we feel blocked and have to strain and struggle to try to get something done. That's the energy system that the false ego uses.

Power comes from a higher power source. It comes from the generative life energy that if not blocked, creates resonant relationships for us in everything that we do, because our true desires (coming from the true self) are driving the energy.

People often mistakenly think that if they don't use force, they can't get anything done. And if they do, the effort is strained. They get caught in the false either/or.

The key is to tap into a whole different energy source, based on resonance, which is a much more efficient source! Mastering energy, in any form, means letting go of force and switching over to the higher power source.

-Karen

I like that imagery - resonance - blending with, going with, yielding, collaborating. It resonates with me. It gives me a sense of the 'power' inherent in wu wei, in surrendering to the Self (in the Hindu sense of the word), rather than the 'force' wielded by the self (in the individual sense of the word). Nice post, Karen.
Steve

Hi Steve,

Yup, I resonate deeply with resonance . It has such a dynamic quality, not at all the passivity that the intellect thinks the alternative to force must be. When "the power is with you" (not the force ), you're like a dynamo. You have leverage, so it takes much less to achieve a lot more.

Force really does require "wielding" - even the word makes me feel tired!

Although that aspect of the life force does have a place, and there is a polarity between the two. When something is a matter of quantity - like we don't have enough vitamin C so we have to take vitamin C, then we use that quantitative energy to fill the deficiency or remove the excess to achieve balance. Put something in or take something away, less or more.

I see a lot of people focusing on the quantitative side, asking what foods or supplements or practices should they do more or less of.

But we also need to tap into this other capacity for resonance, to generate qualitative changes that we can't get by simply rearranging quantities of things.

-Karen

May I ask why? I've always understood trance to be something to avoid, an abdication from reality.
But maybe we mean different things by the word.

indeed...letting go and relaxing provides the greatest capacity for qi flow.
its kinda like a garden hose...or an electrical cable, for that matter. you can kink them up so much that the flow of water, electricity is stopped. tension in muscle/tendon does this in your body to a certain extent.

About trance, it's the law of similars - like cures like. Use trance to wake up from trance. Good article by Jack Elias on that.

What exactly do you mean by "it" in the above sentence?

IT's the phenomenon that explains how trance can be used. The law of similars is a law of nature that's operating when two similar entities (or states of mind) come together which are similar, and they cancel each other out. This is really the basis of hypnotherapy, NLP, and many practices we do without realizing that we're using the law of similars.

Trances are just states of mind that we get attached to, ways we narrowly focus our attention. To release the pattern, we use other ways of focusing attention, which are themselves trances. (Like cures like).

The example I like to use is of the kid who's running around the house slamming doors (taken from a true story by Milton Erickson, the founder of hypnotherpy).. Using the law of opposites would be to tell the kid not to slam the doors. Well, that's not likely to work. (Same as just telling yourself to do the opposite of a behavior you're trying to change-- if the behavior is not so deeply ingrained, that can work; but otherwise, not.). So you tell him to slam the doors even more. Suddenly the kid doesn't think this is fun anymore, and stops.

There's a lot more to understanding how the law of similars is used, but that's just a simple example to illustrate the point.

The trance was the original behavior. The similar trance that you induced was telling him to slam the doors more. The result is the release of the original pattern.

Was that IT?

-Karen

trance, I mean the state where your body is completely asleep and paralyzed, you cannot, see, hear, feel, taste , or smell anything, but yet your mind is awake and quite. You are aware of your existence but nothing else.

I am using RB's system because I wish to learn to have OBE on a regular basis.

My reasoning behind this is to gain access to higher knowledge, and bring it back to aid in my training, perhaps even seek out dead masters to help in my training.

How are you defining trance?
–noun
1. a half-conscious state, seemingly between sleeping and waking, in which ability to function voluntarily may be suspended.
2. a dazed or bewildered condition.
3. a state of complete mental absorption or deep musing.
4. an unconscious, cataleptic, or hypnotic condition.
5. Spiritualism. a temporary state in which a medium, with suspension of personal consciousness, is controlled by an intelligence from without and used as a means of communication, as from the dead.
–verb (used with object)
6. to put in a trance; stupefy.
7. to entrance; enrapture.

I'm sure you dont mean dazed or bewildered

You can also look within to get where you want to go. IMHO, better to look within first to center yourself and then look without, having a more solid foundation.