Phoenix from the wasteland

I'm 23 days into working on my root chakra. I've been meditating every night and getting regular sleep. I've given up alcohol and ciggarettes. I feel more energised than ever.

Firstly, I'd like to share my meditation routine. I listen to binaural beats on my headphones to put my brain into gamma and theta frequencies. I begin with two different breathing exercises. Firstly, I take 40 slow deep breaths. While I am inhaling I contract the muscles inbetween my anus and my genitals and relax them when I exhale. Then I conduct the breath of fire for a couple of minutes. This is quick rhythmic breathing through the nostrils using the diaphragm. I then work through my body from head to toe tensing and then relaxing each muscle.

I then visualise red roots rising up from the ground around me. I can feel the parts of my body that have tensions and aches. As my attention shifts from point to point I imagine the red roots connecting with each point. I imagine love and nourishment flowing into me through the roots with every breath.

The second visualisation I do is to imagine my life as a four dimensional life tree. I do this imagining that as I move through 3d space and time I create a 4d tube. Since I return to the same places many times the tube traces out a tree. Places like my bed which I return to become the trunks with all the places I go to from there branching off from it. At some of these places I draw nourishment or lose energy. My aim is to get the tree looking as healthy as possible drawing energy from all the right places. I visualise myself conducting the habits I'd like to introduce into my life. This is how I add positive roots to my tree. Then I imagine myself in the situations where I might be tempted to continue bad habits and I imagine myself responding to the temptation with self discipline and willpower. That's how I prune the negative roots.

The other way I use this visualisation is to move backwards along the tree into my past. I figured that my memories are a major way that I am rooted into this world. So, as I go along I try to find points in my past that contain locked energies or blockages in the tree. I try to go over these points and unlock the feelings that I may have supressed at the time.

Doing all this before I go to sleep has lead to some incredibly symbolic and synchronistic dreams that I will share in my next post. I don't claim to have any knowledge on this subject at all. In fact I am making it all up as I go along. So please feel free to correct me and point me in the right direction.

I'm on a mission to balance my chakras. If you don't know what a chakra is - here is a good article about them at Reality Sandwhich..

Chakras

There is a great quiz here that will give you some insight into the state of your chakras. Here's a graph showing the results of mine.

I'm going to spend a seventh of the year working on each chakra. At the end of the year I will do the quiz again and see if I have managed to balance them. I will post here and describe what practices I have used and also what changes I have noticed within myself as a result of them.

If you have any doubt about the validity of this ancient system then check out these links that look at the scientific evidence for it..

Chakras, Rationalism and Science

The Anatomical Proof of the Existence of the Chakras

At the beginning of most computer games you get the option of choosing the difficulty level on which you'd like to play the game. Something along the lines of easy, medium or hard. Everybody has different preferences as to how challenging they would like the game to be. As your skill level on a particular game increases the challenge decreases and so this might make you want to increase the difficulty level of the game. Another reason for selecting a high difficulty level is that you achieve more kudos and a greater sense of achievement on a high difficulty level compared to an easy difficulty level.

Assume, for sake of argument, that reincarnation is true. Maybe, before you are reborn you get the chance to choose your difficulty level. Challenges in your life would then be signs that you have previously chosen a high difficulty setting suggesting that your immortal soul had mastered the previous difficulty level and wanted a challenge.

Modern games increasingly give you the opportunity to change the difficulty setting at any point during the game. This is analogous to changing the way that you make decisions. If you courageously throw yourself into challenges with the attitude that they will make you stronger and will give you the chance to prove yourself then you are increasing the difficulty. If you shy away from challenges then you are turning the difficulty down. I'd hate to get to heaven and realise that I'd been playing on easy my whole life.

As an example: I used to bemoan the fact that my culture (Welsh) is chronically alcoholic. This makes it really hard to abstain from alcohol. Now I see it as a chance to improve my will power and a potential opportunity for me to triumph over my environment, upbringing and possibly even genetics.

Personally, I think that I have been playing on Easy too much and it's about time I ramped up the difficulty level of my life.

I'm halfway through a book called Pronoia by Rob Brezsny. It's a wonderful book that I will be reviewing in depth when I finish it. He is most famous for his internationally syndicated horoscope column "Free Will Astrology".

It's a horoscope like no other. With out fail it challenges my boundaries and inspires me. It is never mundane but raises me up in a fun way. It's a celebration of life and creativity. Whether you believe in Astrology or not - read it to get a glimpse of the thoughts of a man with a great world view. I would love to be able to write with such verve. He writes what I think - better.

Read This weeks horoscopes

Or his website

I recently wrote a post about creating a manifesto for change. See here.

When ever I get disillusioned by the world and I feel my idealism slipping I remind myself of the words of Ghandi.

"Be the change you want to see in the world."

I remember that it's hypocritical for me to bemoan the state of the world when I am a reflection and a cause of it.

So, I thought I'd go through the points in my suggested manifesto and try and work out a way I could "Be the change".

Remove the rights of the banks to create money
The only thing I can think of here is to try to remain debt free. Every debt that I take out allows a bank to create money out of nothing. If we all remained debt free then whole banking system would fail.

Investment in renewable energy and sustainable farming
I can do this by making sure that I buy products from sustainable farms and trying my best to source my energy from providers that invest in renewable energy. I can also limit my use of dirty fuels in general.

End to artificial scarcity - sharing legal - no such thing as intellectual property - rewarded through charity
This doesn't just mean that I should download anything I want. It means that I should make sure I reward creators for anything that I use for free. I already do this. If I was to download an album and enjoy it enough to listen to it regulary then I will always find the a way of giving the band some money in the most direct way possible. There is a flip side to this one. It also means that if I was ever to create something that could be shared for free then I should share it for free. I have no problem with that. If it's good enough I will get some reward.

A switch from an economics predicated on our inate greed and self-interest to one where charity and cooperation is assumed. It's a self fulfilling prophecy.
Perhaps this is just a matter of mind set. I always do try and assume the best in people and to give my trust willingly. I must also give more money to charity.

Predominantly non-interventionist foreign policy - conquer others through aid - be so helpful to others that people will emulate us rather than seek to destroy us - residual army for defensive purposes only.
I guess this would translate into living life in a non-aggressive non-manipulative way. Something I try to do already.

A hierarchy of currencies from local towns to national
I should get involved in any local currencies near me.

Work less community/family more
As soon as I get into a position where I can afford to work less then I will. This one more than the others would be a lot easier if everybody took the same attitude. I really want to look into the economic effects of everybody working a 4 day week.

Massive disincentives for large families / incentives for fostering or not having children - encouragement of education for women around the world
The most obvious one here is to not have a large family myself. I think that having two children is acceptable since if everybody did so then the population would fall. There is also a british thinktank that is devoted to this cause which David Attenborough is a patron of called The Optimum Population Trust. I will sign up with them and become a patron.

Reestablishment of civil liberties
I should donate to Amnesty International. I should also join any protests of this theme that I can.

Decriminalisation of psychoactives
Less said on this one the better.. but lets just say I've fought the fight

Mass-deprogramming
I question everything and continually educate myself on systems of propoganda and control. I also study comparitive mythology and depth psychology in an effort to know myself and my myths.

Absolute transparency of government- and increased interaction with the populace through technology
I should make more of an effort to use the existing ways to interact with my government on the internet.

Well that should give me enough to be getting on with for now.