Love, Fear, and Despair

There is someone who we are meant to become in this lifetime. Alchemy is the process of transforming into that version of ourselves. But, ultimately, we do not know who that version of ourselves is. Therefore, we need an internal guide to lead us to discover him. Our Soul Body provides such a guide. It is through our Soul Body that we experience emotions through our movements, physical and otherwise, which give us information about how our movements align with our unique spiritual path. By listening to our Soul, we can learn who we are meant to become, and take action to realize it.

We feel the guidance of our Soul Body most strongly in our hearts. The heart is the most emotional organ, and represents the most powerful emotion there is on Earth, which is love. It may even be the most powerful thing on the Earth, and the force that formed it in the first place. Love guides us in our quest to become who we are meant to be. When our interests and movements are aligned, we feel passion, a form of love. When they are not, rather, when we spend our time and efforts doing routine meaningless work, then we feel despair. The feeling of despair serves to inform us that we are not on trajectory to becoming who we are meant to be.

Despair has physiological consequences too. Since the heart represents love, the implication is that it needs the warmth from love to do its job. Otherwise, it becomes cold. When the heart gets cold, things begin to calcify, like our skulls. A heart that which is malnourished through neglecting our passions, our guide on our life-long mission to become who we are, is the source of our physiological imbalance that over-exuberantly prefers the sclerotic male function. Not listening to our heart hardens us from the inside out, and results in overall poor health outcomes, MPB being one such outcome. For the sake of our physical, as well as spiritual well-being, we need to follow our hearts.

The problem is that following your heart takes courage. It's not as easy as it seemed as children, back when the adults in our lives were much more supportive of our interests, and when we didn't have to meet many social expectations or financial obligations. Rather, now it is quite evident that to do such requires sacrifice, risk, and overcoming fear. Fortunately, we were all given the strength of Ares during puberty, by means of iron retention, to take on this challenge. In fact, it is precisely why we were given our aggressive male warrior spirit. To fail to even attempt to do so, is, frankly, a waste of our existence. Furthermore, that despair will pair with Ares energy and manifest in various forms and combinations of disappointment and hostility. This is the sort of emotional constitution that works it's way up the chain, through the Etheric Body, and expresses itself in the Physical Body as skull expansion and sclerosis, and potentially many other ailments.

Unfortunately, and fortunately, I don't see any other way through this disease, and out the other side, than having the courage face down our fear and follow our hearts. I don't think that there is anything more of a "root cause" of a disease than never realizing, and doing, what it takes to become who we are meant to be in this lifetime. These are high stakes, and so the consequences are designed to be severe. Despair is a nasty emotion, and Hell is a bottomless pit for a reason.

There is no therapy, or hack, that we can do to make up for not aligning our movements with fulfilling our unique destiny. That type of movement is paramount. Movement suggestions that I describe on this page help get us connected with our Soul Body again, as a way to rebalance our emotional constitution. There are small things that we can do within every aspect of our life to get our interests and movements aligned, and, thus, prevent our Ares energy from surfacing in negative ways. These are suggestions. For everyone, however, the movements needed to fully nourish the Soul will be unique.

Movement

The movements that we want to focus on, are ones that send warming love energy to our heart, promote rhythm, and prevent rising qi. Movements that appeal to us, that which we do with enthusiasm, will have the warming effect on the heart needed to reverse skull foramen calcification. In addition, movements that incorporate rhythm will help to restore balance to our rhythmic dipole system, which modulates the use of the sclerotic function in the body. It will also help remove stagnation in the Etheric Body. However, the most benefit that I have felt from the exercises in this section is in how they help lower the emotional energy that comes with an imbalanced male disposition, as well help correct the imbalance, itself.

Movement influences our emotions, and vice versa. We want to cultivate positive male emotions that inspire confidence and willingness to take on a challenge, and expel negative ones that fester with self-preservation, disappointment, and unrealized potential. Anxiety and anger are, specifically, the two basic types of emotions that we want to get out of us immediately upon experiencing them. These emotions carry the most aggressive rising energy effect in our a body, and, thus, the greatest potential to contribute to skull expansion. Through physical gesturing and engaging our imagination, we can work to shed our old emotional constitution and gradually replace it with a divine one, in which the expansionary forces are kept out of the heads, amongst other, more important, spiritual benefits.

QIGONG STANCE

The qigong stance, which I described on the Etheric Body page, is the fundamental posture that helps cultivate the positive emotions of the divine male, and corrects those of an imbalanced male constitution. The following are the specific emotional benefits that are possible, with focus, while performing this stance.

The elongation of the spine inspires confidence. Confidence is synonymous with backbone for a reason. Consciously elongating our spine makes us feel more confident. Being hunched, rather, will make us feel timid. Therefore, in the qigong stance, we focus on making the spine long and straight. Imagine a string on both ends of the spine pulling it taught from both directions.

Bending the knees and sinking our weight into the Earth inspires acceptance. Men tend to want to control everything. This inclination comes from fear, which leads to anxiety, which pushes energy up into our skulls. Acceptance is about letting go of worries, and being content with how things are. We want to take time to focus on the present moment and have gratitude for it. This perspective helps ground our energy, which moves it out of our head.

Relaxing the unengaged muscles, in particular the shoulders, relieves tension in our emotions. Anger makes us tense. Releasing tension in our muscles releases stored anger, frustration, aggression, and all of the negative emotions that have an tensing, and rising, effect in the body. Holding on to such emotions has no benefit. In fact, holding on to all emotions, even good ones, has zero benefit.

Opening the joints helps cultivate receptivity. It's difficult to physically do this. For me, it's more of a mental cue to open up and let the energy of the day, and the energy of the Earth, flow through me. I want to shift from energy emitting, which is thinking and skull expanding, to energy receiving, which is more relaxed and natural. In addition, receptivity is a powerful female emotion. When we let the joints open to receive the energy of the Earth, like the feminine end of the battery, then we are engaging our female pole. The imbalanced male lacks the influence of female energy, hence the imbalance.

An important qigong maxim is "where the mind goes, the qi follows." Therefore, focusing on the dan tian, the female energy reservoir below the belly button, and the abdominal movement, will move the life-force energy down. This downward focus has a calming effect. Calm is a female energy because the natural life-force energy direction is down. Focusing on the internal flow of qi, or any movement in the lower parts of the body, can help calm us down. But, focusing the dan tian is especially effective for cultivating female energy, because it is the energy reservoir for such.

I like to do most other meditations in this stance for the added emotional benefit. The stance, itself, and focusing on the correct posture, is an effective mediation. It's good to do for a minute or so in order to calm and center the energy before doing other qigong meditations, like the next one.

QIGONG MEDITATION - HEALING THE EMOTIONS

The purpose of this meditation is the expel the toxic emotions that damage each of the five yin organs (lungs, kidney, liver, spleen, and heart), most of which relate to imbalanced male characteristics. This meditation can be done standing or sitting. Focus on one organ at a time and breath in and out through the nose. On the in-breath, imagine healing qi enter the organ, in the form of the specific positive emotion for that organ. On the out-breath, imagine the toxic qi being expelled from the organ, in form of the negative emotion that most afflicts it. You can do as many repetitions as needed to clear the negative emotion. Then, switch to the next organ.

Grief damages the lungs. It is why when we are hysterically crying that we have difficulty breathing. Other forms of grief are sadness and disappointment. I find disappointment to be the most relatable for me, and so I focus on that. For example, when I played baseball in my youth, I would be very disappointed following a bad performance. This emotion would linger for days on after. That's bad. That grief needs to get out of us. This is the sort of emotion that we can focus on expelling from the lungs. On the inhale, you want to cultivate integrity. The book that I got this from recommends thinking of being on a subway platform during rush hour when everyone is fighting to get on a crowded car, and you are keeping your cool while totally relaxed. I also think of a tree, which is something that stands strong under intense conditions. If you are biblically inclined, you can think of Jesus getting crucified while maintaining his integrity. Overall, I find it helpful to think of it as the emotion of taking a beating and still be standing the next day (or 3 days later in the case of Jesus). That's a good emotion for the lungs.

The kidneys are damaged by fear. Fear is a difficult emotion to overcome. The only antidote fear is to have faith. You have to believe in eternal life in order to not fear what happens to you in this temporary life. Rather, you have to view your life as spiritual quest, and see the bigger picture. I don't think there is any other way to overcome fear than to get to spiritual place. This is extremely important for correcting a male imbalance. Fear and aggression are a bad combination. Our Ares iron energy needs to be properly channeled into overcoming fear. Overcoming fear doesn't mean that we have to join the military and go kill supposed "bad guys." It's as simple as telling the truth and living the truth, which is not always so easy. It takes courage to tell the truth. For example, on the subject of Jesus getting crucified, Jesus told the truth. Did people like it? - No. They crucified him. He knew that was going to happen too. But he did it anyway. Why? - To show us the importance of the truth. It's the only way we can be free, and healthy. So, to help give us the courage to pursue the truth, we breath in faith along with the inner wisdom of who we truly are into the kidneys, and then breath out all the toxic fear that is making us cling to our temporary life, and preventing us from taking action to become who that true self is.

The liver is damaged by anger. Anger causes qi to rise aggressively, which pushes it against our skull. We have to be able to manage our aggression in order to prevent further skull expansion. The complementary healing emotion for the liver is kindness. I find it effective to put a biblical spin on it, yet again, and think of "love for your enemy." It's difficult to get angry with someone if you are committed to loving them no matter what. The other way you can spin it is to "serve" your enemy, which is aligned with The Golden Rule. Whatever you feel works to get anger out of the liver, and some form of kindness into it. This will help us not react so strongly to mild irritants throughout the day, and keep the life-force energy down.

The heart is damaged by joy, and nourished with tranquility. It seems odd, but joy can be a problem. If you have too much joy, and then something devastating happens, then that joy can flip into something ugly. Not being consumed with joy helps us maintain tranquility, and helps put life in perspective. We tend to want to cling to things that give us feelings of joy. This creates addiction. Needless to say, addiction is not good. Joy comes and goes. We have to let it go. Let go of your joy with each out breath, and breath into the heart images of calmness, peace, and tranquility. I'm not a particularly joyful person, and so often I'll try to expel "excitement", instead. Excitement is also not good for the heart. Rather, the heart needs pure tranquility to do it's job properly.

The spleen helps our stomach digest our food. Its function is ruminatory, and is influenced by what we ruminate on in our minds. What are the kinds of thoughts that we ruminate on throughout the day? Do we worry about all the things that we need and need to do? Or do we ruminate on all the things that we are fortunate to have? Our spleens are nourished by acceptance. We want to appreciate what we have, and even appreciate the opportunity to overcome the disease that is afflicting us. Practicing gratitude is critical for healing, and worrying is counterproductive. Worry pushes the energy up into our head and expands our skull. Worry can be endless too. We need to get all that worry out. As Jesus famously asked, because I have to mention Jesus every time, something to the effect of "who here can add one hour to their life by worrying?" Worrying is pointless. There is always something to worry about. Let it go. It's not important, and it'll make you sick. So, breath in acceptance and gratitude, and then breath out and let go of all your worry and all your thoughts that you are ruminating on.

At the end of the meditation, just enjoy being. After all of those negative emotions are gone, you should feel much more present and balanced. In fact, much of being a balanced male is accomplished by being present. All those negative emotions are just preventing us from being present. It works the other way too. That is, the more present that we can be, the more balanced our emotional constitution will be.

WALKING MEDITATION

Walking meditation directs our awareness to the lower part of the body, which serves to lower the life-force energy. It's basically conscious walking. You are conscious of where the foot strikes, how the weight shifts, your breathing, and the leg movement. The movement is performed very slowly, and with focus. Otherwise, it is ineffective.

The legs will swing in to out in a semi-circular motion. Gradually shift the weight to one foot, slowly swing the other leg in and then outward. As the foot strikes the ground gently, feel your weight slowly shifting from one foot to the other. Once all the weight has shifted to the other foot, repeat the exercise by swinging the other leg in to out, foot strike, and weight shift.

While focusing on feeling the weight shift from one foot to the other and back, visualize the yin-yang symbol. The movement of the Earth is always in flux from one pole to the other. There is always rhythm, and never stagnation. Try to emulate that symbol with your movement. Synching the in-breath and out-breath with each weight shift is helpful to maintain this rhythm. Do this on flat ground, barefoot, and for as long as it feels good.

A simpler alternative to this exercise is to do a "Rice Paper Walk". In this meditative walk, you imagine walking on rice paper in a manner so as to not disturb the rice paper layout. Rice paper will stick to the heal, and be displaced, unless you walk as gently as possible. So, walk heel to toe, very slowly, and gently shifting the weight, so as to not disturb the make-believe rice paper. Focusing on the feet and the weight shift moves the qi down to that area, out of the head, and also facilitates rhythm in the body. This is a great exercise for overcoming the common cold because it's a gentle movement that helps to restore rhythm.

SHAKING, TOXIC QI EXPULSION, AND WATER

There are many qigong gesturing movements that we can do to help us to get the energy out of our heads, toxic emotional energy out of our organs, and have an overall calming effect on ourselves. I'll describe a few here, as there are too many to list, but this is a good basis from which to start. Once you understand the basics, then you can get creative and even make up your own movements.

Shaking is one way to get out bad qi. It's particularly effective in the fall season, when the trees are shaking off their leaves and their bad energy too. Simply shake your hands, feet, legs, and whole body. Making noises as you are shaking also helps get the bad qi out. Alternatively, you can swipe it out. For example, wiping fear from the kidneys, down the legs and out into the ground, helps get that toxic fear energy out of the kidneys, out of you, and helps restore proper function there. Another simple way is to push toxic qi out away from us.

There are two principles that we need to be aware of to make these movements effective: (1) it's important to send the qi somewhere, because energy needs a place to go. And (2), we need to engage our imaginations in moving the qi because it is the intent of our Minds that moves the energy. In addition, it is good to have an understanding of where we store energy, and what types of energy is stored there, in order to help get particular types of emotions and energy out of us, or moving around. For example, thoughts and spiritual energy are stored in the upper dan tian, at the third eye. So, that's where we want to gesture in ways to get our toxic thoughts out. As another example, anger is stored in, and harms, the liver. Therefore, that's the area where we want to swipe or gesture to get our toxic anger out.

Take some basics from this website, do a little research, and run with it. If you want a non-digital qigong information source, I got this book, The Way of Qigong (affiliate link), a few years ago. I don't think that it's the best book on qigong out there. In fact, you can probably pick up something pretty good at a local library. In regards to this book, the guy studied with qigong masters in Asia for decades starting in the 70's. He's a little too into modern science for my tastes. Overall, though, it has been a pretty good basic reference guide, especially starting from nothing. Even though there it is "sciency", there's plenty of ancient wisdom packed in it. I just ignore the science stuff.

One more example of something that we can do, before I move on, is to do movements where we imagine bathing in water or moving through water. Water is powerful stuff. It's much more than hydrogen and oxygen based molecules. Rather, the ability for water to store energetic intelligence, and its unique fourth phase in a densified, structured, and ionized form in between a solid and liquid, are the essence of life. We are basically intelligent and structured water, and we want to imagine our natural state as a still surface of water, probably because that's essentially what we are. We get disturbed, as water gets disturbed, but like water, we naturally tend back to perfectly still. However, in modern living, and the way we have been conditioned, rarely can we return to being perfectly still.

Qigong movements and meditations are an effective way to return to our natural state of stillness and watery essence. With movements, in particular, it is helpful to visualize water as a cleanser, or the natural medium through which we move. For example, we can imagine scooping up healing water and washing it over our bodies, moving through a fluid-y realm, or wading side to side in waste deep water. The more things that we can do being fluid or moving through fluids, the more relaxed and free flowing we will encourage ourselves to be internally, as well. Such will help us to more easily return to our natural state of stillness.

SHOULDER MAPPING

This is a simple gesturing exercise that inspires confidence through posture. Starting with a hunched posture, imagine a wave of energy moving up the front of your shoulders, over the tops, and then down the back of your ribcage. As the energy moves up and over, the shoulders roll up and back.

The other version is to stand in a slumped position with the hips pushed forwards. Imagine an energy wave that starts down in front of your legs that pushes your hips back, then changes direction to push your chest out, and then sprays out from your solar plexus like a mist.

I do this for a few minutes, every so often, switching off between each variation. It's a good exercise to do in morning to get the body moving, and a reminder to keep a confident disposition when facing the challenges of the day.

THE TIDES

Start with the right foot slightly forward. As you step with your left foot, the arms raise to the sides, palms up, and to shoulder height. As the weight shifts to the left foot, the arms bend and the hands swing in front to the center of the body. Rather than meeting, though, as the hands come together, they stop in a staggered position. The left hand stops out in front, positioned just forward of the right hand, and both hands are positioned on opposite sides of a razor thin imaginary plane that runs between the hands and through the mid-line of the body. Then, as you step forward with the right foot to be even with the left, the hands drop, the arms swing out to the sides, palm facing up, back to shoulder height, and extended out to the sides. For a few moments, hold this pose of even footed, arms out, palms up position, and looking forward, or slightly up.

This gesturing exercise evokes feelings of openness. It's a good exercise for cultivating an attitude that is accepting of challenges of the day, and for having gratitude for the opportunity to work on ourselves. It's easy to get frustrated and gripe, especially after many years of failed attempts to regrow hair, but this contributes to the problem. The foundation to healing is having the right attitude about disease. Disease is an indication that something is misaligned, and we need to be thankful that our body is helping us to figure it out. So, to remind us of having the correct attitude, we spread our arms, look up to the sky, and give thanks for the challenges in our life.

SWIMMING

Swimming, especially in natural waters, is very therapeutic. Swimming is rhythmic, which helps our body stay in rhythm. For us, it restores rhythm to the dipole system, which gets us out of the male "fight or flight", sclerotic pole. Furthermore, it has a calming effect on us. It facilitates the release of negative emotions.

Swimming is emotional therapy. In water, we can move in ways that we can't on land. The physical liberation that we feel from the confines of gravity has a coincidental emotionally liberating effect on us. Try to hold onto feelings of anger, disappointment, worry, etc. when flipping, twisting, diving, splashing, and plopping around in water. It's quite difficult to do so. I can attest to this therapeutic effect. As I have mentioned, a few years ago, I was suffering from a chronic back injury. For over a year, I couldn't run, jump, or do anything remotely athletic. However, after I endured a long, and painful, drive to Southern California, I went in the ocean. There, for the first time in months, I could move. I was flipping, turning, and playing with very little or no pain. I was free. Furthermore, months of grumpiness, resentment, and mopiness all melted away. It didn't last long because the water in SoCal is chilly, and I had lost a fair amount of weight during the injury. But, I'll never forget how the emotional weight was lifted after I was able, albeit briefly, to move freely again.

The freedom that we have from gravity, while in water, helps to free ourselves from the negative emotions that are also weighing us down. The more that we can get in water, the better. The additional health benefits to swimming are grounding, cold therapy (depending on the temp), being immersed in the Earth rhythms of the ocean, and even detoxification.

MOVEMENT WITH PURPOSE

Gyms are unhealthy. Going to the gym and banging out a workout routine is like an addition to the work day. It's more drudgery, and more purposeless movement. Getting on the treadmill for 30 minutes while looking at a screen in doors is not good for you. Yes, there is some physical benefit. Yes, it is superior to sitting and looking at a screen. And just about anything is better than going home, sitting on the couch, eating delivered food, and scrolling through your phone with the TV on. But, still, gym workouts are far from optimal.

Movement needs a purpose. Our body responds well to a purpose. When we no longer have a purpose, we wither away and die. Every fiber of our being wants us to have a purpose, including muscle fibers. Lifting a weight up and down several times has no purpose to it. It didn't achieve anything. The weight is back where it started. Nothing was accomplished. The body knows it, and so does our Soul.

We need to get out of the gym, outdoors, under natural light, move, and breath fresh air. The Soul Body is related to the Air element for a reason. We spend too much of our lives indoors. Leisure time needs to be spent outdoors. And when we are outdoors, we need to learn to move again with purpose. Even something as simple as climbing a tree has purpose. A pull-up at the gym on a pull-up bar has no purpose, but hoisting yourself up to climb a tree does. The purpose is simple - to get up in the tree. But, it's still a purpose. The physical and soul bodies will respond better to that. Furthermore, it's even a superior strength training exercise, as it requires more balance and core strength to account for the lack of a perfectly parallel bar on which to grip and pull up. Purpose and variability in terrain are the foundation of functional movement training, for which the opportunity to perform such is so severely lacking in a gym.

We can figure out how to add purpose to jumping, pressing, balancing, kicking, and all of the movements that our body is capable of. Playing sports is even a way to add purpose to movement. I notice how I tire more quickly when I'm training for the sport, or even doing a warm up ROUTINE for the sport, than when I am actually playing the sport. Rather, when I play the sport, I don't even notice the fatigue. This is not to say that we need to do extremely vigorous exercise all the time. In fact, that will damage the liver. Rather, it's indicative of how the body responds positively to purposeful movement. Even riding a bike outside TO somewhere, or running TO somewhere, and back, has a purpose. Going on the elliptical machine or a treadmill, on the other hand, is soul crushing. Rather, we need to go outside and figure out how move somewhere and for some reason.

MOVE LIKE THE WIND

Sometimes we don't have the opportunity to move with a purpose, due to the weather, or our muscles just need a rest. We don't always need movement with purpose, sometimes we just need to move.

The ancient alchemists associated the Soul body with the Air element because we are supposed to move like the Air, free and wild. Experiencing the full range of movement that our bodies are capable of is nourishing to the Soul. Sometimes just freestyle movements are what we need. It can be silly, rhythmic, weird, or whatever.

The Soul Body will also tell us what movements we need through our mood. Whatever type of exercise that appeals to you at the moment is exactly what your Soul needs. You'll always be in the mood for something. So, do that. Don't do leg day just because it's leg day, or stick to some workout schedule. The Soul does not respond well to routines. Neither do the muscles. We need variation. We need fresh energy. The most energizing movements that we can do are those where we are indulging our impulses and freeing ourselves from reps, sets, routines, and schedules.

There is a qigong freestyle exercise that I will describe, if you need help or inspiration going rogue. It's also good for getting a feel for the life-force in the body because, in this exercise, the qi moves you.

Stand in a relaxed position and gaze up at the heavens. Imagine the qi beaming out of the third eye (between the eyebrows) into the heavens, and spreading throughout the firmament, all the while accumulating the wisdom of the cosmos. Then, the qi gathers back together at a focal point, and then beams back into the third eye. Then, feel the qi move your body. Let it move in whatever way it wishes, and respond. It will likely move you in subtle, soft, and rhythmic ways at first, and then get bigger and more expressive. Do this for however long it feels nice.

ANIMAL WALKS

According to anthroposophical evolutionary theory, which is radically different from, and much more interesting than, evolutionary biology theory, as the different parts of human body densified into their current forms, these parts coincidentally manifested in the forms of plants and animals out in nature. I have described this on the Etheric Body page, in the context of how plants correspond to unique energies in our body. For example, when the liver formed, the energy of the liver broke off and manifested in nature as the schisandra berry plant. The essence of the plant, therefore, contains the same life-force energy as part of the liver. When they reunite, by means of an extract or homeopathic remedy, then the liver reunites with its essential energy and starts to function better. This is why it is liver herb. I think that's the gist of it, anyway.

Similarly, as our emotions formed, those densified into different animal forms. For example, when courage formed in humans, that energy coincidentally densified in nature as the lion. The reason why lions represent courage, which was established before any of us were born, is because our ancestors understood evolution in this manner, and had unique perception that allowed them to identify our courage in that animal. Likewise, we have many other such spirit animals. Even if it seems absurd, the idea is intriguing, and potentially useful.

Animal movements were a part of ancient medical practice because the emotional healing effect that it has on us. This makes sense in the anthroposophical evolution model, which is what these ancient medical practitioners were basing their methods on. For example, animals inspire many of the movements in qigong. There are five animal "frolics", consistent with the theme of five in TCM. These are inspired by the crane, deer, monkey, tiger, and bear. Each of these frolics has a different energetic effect on us, because each of the animals is the embodiment of a unique emotion. These movements are relics of ancient Chinese shamanism, the foundation of qigong, the practices of which were much based on dressing like, making the sounds of, and moving as various animals, in order to provoke a healing response in us. The five animal frolics can be found on YouTube. I have used the deer frolic with success to recover from a back injury. Deer correspond to the Water element, and the Winter season, all the movements of which nourish the kidney organ system. Problems in the kidney system often manifest in lower back problems, because that's where the kidneys are, and the kidney system governs skeletal and joint health, according to TCM.

In addition to qigong animal movements, I found this YouTube channel, Vahva Fitness, years ago when I was training to dunk a basketball. It was at this time that I developed the recurring back injury that I previously mentioned. I was seeking alternative strength training methods because I kept hurting myself doing the conventional ones that I was taught during high school and college athletics. This guy is a great resource for building functional strength, and doing movements that nourish us in deeper ways. He has many videos of "animal walks", which range from low to high mobility and strength capabilities. I have been doing them for years. They definitely helped with my back injury recovery. In addition, I enjoy doing these movements. It's great way to stretch out, have some fun, and build strength, after a day of minimal range of motion. I feel much better, emotionally, after an animal walk workout than a gym routine. It's not the cure for MPB, but it's a step in the right direction with for our fitness goals.

Overall, it's good to me mindful that our animal bodies, in which we have the ability to move like animals, albeit less gracefully, and experience animal emotions, albeit with a greater level of objectivity, are our connection with our Souls. Therefore, in some way, moving like animals nourishes different parts of our Soul. So, a good approach would be to learn a variety of types of animal movements, incorporate them into our daily movements, do whichever ones are appealing in the moment, and perform them freely without regard for sets, reps, or a routine. Furthermore, to amplify the beneficial effect, I am told, when doing an animal inspired movement, try to become the animal.

LEMNISCATE DYNAMIC

The natural directional flow of energy at the head is inward. It is because There we have eyes, ears, a nose, and a mouth. All those are sensory INPUTS. The head is our biggest sensory input area on the entire body. Things do come out of that area too, but it's mostly in. Rather, the main output area is in the pelvic region. In general, things go in through the head and out through the pelvic region. That is the natural energy flow.

We are conditioned to think too much, which runs counter to this natural energetic flow. When we think, the energy goes out. Our thoughts go out. This creates tension in the whole body. The lemniscate dynamic redirects that flow inward, through the head, and out through the pelvis. When we consciously redirect the energetic flow in this manner, it relaxes us. It changes the way in which we interact with the world around us, in the way in which it was originally intended, and the way in which it will one day be again.

This exercise is performed standing still, and all the motion is perceived. However, the intent makes it real. As I have mentioned, intent alone moves energy through the body. It's a powerful human ability over our Etheric Body that we are mostly unaware of (more on that in the next page). Stand still with the arms circled. palms out, in a halo around the head. Consciously feel the information from your environment, in the form of sights, sounds, smells, or even energy, flow in through your head and out through the pelvic region. Note how natural it is. Then, to get a feel of the opposite, reverse the direction, and send the energy out from the head, like a radio broadcast. Note the tension that it creates and interference with your senses. Then, reverse the flow again. Keep alternating, in and out, as long as it feels comfortable, noting how much tension is created and released when the energy flow changes direction.

The overall purpose of this movement is to get a feel for the natural energy flow. It will remind us to relax and let life come to us. This will help us to react to adverse situations with more quickness, intelligence, effectiveness, patience, and less effort. When we let the energy flow in, maybe it will even push our skulls back in to place. Energy has a force. When it goes out, it pushes out. When it goes in, it pushes in. Our skulls are in need of a force constantly pushing in, or at least stop the one from is pushing out.

DANCING

I don't dance nearly enough. I hated dancing as a kid, and so I never developed any knowledge base. The only dancing that I do now is when lulling my daughter to sleep. I need to do more.

Dancing is an energetic powerhouse. It can lower our life-force energy, restore rhythm to the flow from one polarity to the other, and can heal the emotional body. There is something primal about dancing too, which is lacking in modern man-hood. Men used to dance to bring rain. That's powerful. It requires emotional control. This is the kind of dancing that we need. Unfortunately, I don't know much about it. I'll get to it eventually. Perhaps after I finish writing this website.

FUNCTIONAL STRENGTH

I used to be a college athlete. For decades, I lifted weights to try maintain my musculature. In my experience, it doesn't work. Over the years, despite still dedicating hours at the gym, I lost muscle mass and strength. Since replacing all of my gym time with soft and purposeful movements, I don't notice much of a difference in my functional strength. I can throw a baseball just as hard and jump just as high when I train to do those things without any gym time dedicated to improving muscle strength related to those movements.

As far as I can tell, strength training at a gym is just a waste of time. It's, at the very least, just as effective to do varied activity, according to our whims, as our daily exercise compared to the most sophisticated strength training regimen for whatever sport. I can attest that varied purposeful and wild movement improves flexibility, mobility, and builds functional strength. So, I don't think there's ever a need to ever set foot in a gym.

Living Our True Identity

I want to end this page by reiterating the importance of what was explained to me as "living our true identity." The movements described above are all important, and I do one, or some combination of several of them, every day (except the Sabbath) for somewhere between 1-3 hours. However, that's a very small portion of the day. If the other 13-15 hours of that day are spent doing meaningless work, then that's not good. There's no way I'm going to off-set 10+ hours of misery with a few hours of vibrant movement, and expect to be healthy. Rather, in order for our movements to have the significant positive impact on the health of our physical bodies and souls, then we need to invert that relationship.

I think that 13-15 hours of meaningful movement can off-set 1-3 hours of drudgery. That 1-3 hours is the time I need to brush my teeth, clean up dinner, make my bed, change Cassandra, and do all of my boring perfunctory household chore movements and life sustaining activities. In fact, in traditional societies, they only have to spend 1-3 hours a day doing such. Somewhere and somehow, we got sold on 8-12 hours per day of meaningless work in exchange for access to an economy and money system that only makes us poorer, schools that only make us dumber, and, of course, a health care system that only makes us sicker. There has to be a way out, and a way back. This is not how humans are supposed to live. The good news, is that we all have a unique opportunity to rebel against the system. And the way we do it, is by pursuing the truth of who we are, where we are, and who we are meant to be.

Even if you don't believe this, it's better to do so than to not, because the alternative is 13-15 hours of misery per day. The idea of "living your true identity" is that there is someone who we are supposed to become in this lifetime. God assigned us this identity and put us with our parents, siblings, in this time in history, and with these bodies to realize this identity. It may be aligned with some karmic mission that we have to fulfill, related to our previous lifetime, or just some part of our spirit that we have yet to work on. Who knows. The point is that we have a purpose. We have a unique identity. It involves a special gift given to us by some divine power that is meant to help others in a special way.

The Soul body was given to us to help us in our pursuit of realizing who God made us. Our interests and passions are leading us to realize our unique identity and discover our special gift. Positive emotions, like inspiration, are indicative that we are moving in the right direction, and give us the energy to do so. However, when we are off track, and not living out our true identity, then we feel despair and lethargy. Negative emotions like anger, resentment, depression, hate, anxiety, stress, etc. are what the Soul Body makes us experience to alert us that we are off track in our quest. And we probably feel tired because the Soul wants to discourage us from continuing to do these harmful activities. Overall, the Soul's job is to inform us that our movements are not aligned with realizing our unique identity. And we need to listen.

The Soul makes us experience serious emotions, that have serious health consequences, and for good reason. The consequences of not fulfilling our destiny in this lifetime are greater than sclerosis in the physical body. I'm not sure what that consequence is, exactly. I think it has to do with the biblical harvest, or getting promoted to a 4th density being (we're currently 3rd density) instead of working off our bad karma in an alternate realm for several more incarnations until we finally understand the importance of fulfilling our purpose. In any case, it's better than a lifetime of misery, and with male pattern baldness.

I don't know to what degree a calcified skull foramen, that which is pinching off the venous network to the heart, actually contributes to MPB. However, it is certainly an indication of disorder. Sclerosis is the distinguishing characteristic of a male emotional imbalance. This imbalance is bad for the heart, the most emotional organ. When we live a life that is not aligned with our divine purpose, then the heart suffers. It gets cold. It stops listening, and we start to harden from the inside out. Exercise is important, but not pursuing our true identity, for either lack of courage or neglecting our heart, is why our skull foramen are calcifying. We can't bio-hack our way around cold-heartedness, or through the alchemical transformation to realize our true identity. Rather, it requires a full lifestyle commitment. Our heart needs us to be doing what we were meant to do, all day every day, to make this transformation happen.

In all of our folklore and fairy tales, there is no more prevailing theme than "true love saves the day." This is likely because it is true. It's probably on par with a universal law. Love is the most powerful force within us. We were created from love, and we were created to love. The more that we can love, the more healing we can accomplish. All interventions are important, but I doubt that we'll get anywhere with them if we don't make this change, and we don't have a life filled with love.

Conclusion

Of all of the interventions on this page, the easiest thing to start with is to avoid routines. Just do that. If you still have a gym membership, or want to go the gym for the social aspect, then fine. Go there and just do whatever exercise appeals to you without any regard for sets, repetitions, and which part of the body's "day" it is. That basic principle is that movement needs to be as free as possible. Just go with that.

I still do push-ups and core exercises sometimes, especially in the Winter. That's fine if that's what appeals to you in moment. The important thing, rather, is to break from the thinking that you have to do certain exercises every day, or week, to be fit and healthy. We don't. Furthermore, it likely has the opposite effect. As I mentioned, I'm a recovering gym routine guy. It's difficult to break the routine approach. But, when you do, there's a rush of fresh energy that invigorates the "work out", and it feels like you just broke out of prison.

To transition to the next page, I have to do another Jesus quote. Jesus came up a lot on this page because he is the example of the Divine Male at the end of the alchemical transformation process. Therefore, he exemplifies all of the emotional characteristics that we are striving for: integrity, inner wisdom, fearlessness, serving our fellow man, tranquility, and acceptance. Whether you believe the story of Jesus to be true or not, there is no better example of the characteristics of the divine male put into practice from which to emulate.

In addition to the constitution aspect of the Jesus account, much of what I am suggesting that we do, as far as lifestyle changes, is challenging and risky. These are themes throughout the Bible and the story of Jesus. For example, all of his disciples walked away from their lives IMMEDIATELY and followed him. Can you imagine just walking away from everything that you own and following some guy who you just met? But, it's representative of what we have to be willing to do to change. If Jesus is the truth, or the truth of who really are, our true identity, which I think he represents, then we have to be willing to drop everything and follow Him (our identity) immediately, as well.

It's interesting to note that ALL of Jesus' disciples were men. This is an observation that's likely to be interpreted as offensive to women, and a historical account that is likely to be interpreted as representative of the systemic oppression of women, on face value. But, I have a different interpretation, which, admittedly, may be equally useful and wrong. When we incarnate as men, we have a unique challenge in our lifetime. Women are equally important, and they have their unique challenges. But, women are not men. They are not given Ares energy at puberty. In fact, they are deprived of it. Therefore, I believe, that it is our responsibility, as men, to be the ones who are daring and courageous enough to risk everything in pursuit of the truth. We have to do it for our families and our communities, because we are the ones with the Ares sized stones that were given to us in order to do it. Women can do it too. I'm not saying that they can't. But, women have a lot to deal with. Rather, we need to help them out, on the principle of the division of labor, by taking on this responsibility, and being the risk takers and spirit warriors in our families and communities.

Ultimately, the Jesus quote that I have been trying to get to, to end this page on, and to transition to the next one, is: "The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak." The flesh does not want to do all this risk taking and truth seeking because the flesh does not want to leave the comfort of our home, our wealth, incomes, status, meeting social expectations, etc.. However, the Spirit is more than willing to do so. In fact, the Spirit likes it when we do so. It unlocks a potential within us at the absolute deepest level of our being. Within our Spirit, our Minds, and our thoughts sits dormant our most powerful healing abilities. However, in order to access it, we have to do some work. It requires meditation, long fasting, prayer, and changing our inner attitude.