rest – Intuitive Martial Arts

Energy expenditure and renewal – Achieving Balance

Posted on 30th March 2025 Last updated on 30th March 2025 by joeharman8 | 16 min read | 115 views

Sleep begins long before you lie down to go to bed. The natural cycle is to rise in the morning, and gradually wind down from midday onwards. Generally, ones energies reach a peak in this daily cycle at midday. Obviously, there are demands in the world which prevent this winding down happening in the most natural way possible. However, the body’s energies are like the rising of the tides, they reach a high point and then recede back daily. The weather and other factors play a role in this, but there is a general pattern which happens anyway. This is how the human system works. Energy is expended and outwardly manifests during the day, and then gradually settles back to the centre at night.

Picture a circle. The energy reaches the periphery during the day time as the morning goes on. A big circle forms, which means the system is maximally outward bound. The outward bound internal pressure matches relative to that of the external environment. both rise throughout the morning. Then, into the afternoon and evening energy concentrates back to the centre and becomes a smaller dot at night rather than a big circle. This cycle happens daily, making sure that you are able to maintain your system in the best possible way. The planets also goes through this night and day cycle.

Essentially, the more you draw back in during the evening, the less your energies become externalised at night when you are trying to internally maintain the physiological system. If the energies are busy sustaining thought patterns and the brain is too active, this takes a lot of energy. Mental processes are thought to take up around 20% of one’s energy budget. There is a time for this to happen.

Sleep is linked to the formation of new memories because it rids the system of old accumulations of past impressions. Part of this process involves pruning the old branches of accumulated impressions, so that there is space to create new formations of memory. If you also sustain old impressions with energy by becoming too active at night, this slows the process of energy renewal.

If you stay up all day and night, it is like your inner sun is shining all day – the earth is bound to get scorched! However, if the temperature drops at night, this prevents the heat radiating out from the surface. In terms of the human being, this stops many aspects of your physiology from becoming over active, so that others parts of the system can do their job. During the night, metabolism slows, and the outward bound orientation of perception begins to recede inwards. When the energies become internally concentrated in this way, it is as if there is no mind.

The mind is actually part of the broader physiology, it is not just the brain. The brain is just one aspect of the mind. There is a pure mind or consciousness beneath this, unsullied by psychological processes. When the brain rests, this means that during sleep, you are able to sleep without becoming psychologically agitated or worked up.

This is all common sense. It is a question or resting to the extent that you recover properly, making you more able to work effectively. At the same time, it is about making sure that you do not store pent up energy which could interrupt sleep and restfulness.

The importance of sleep

It is important to go to sleep in the right kind of state so that you begin a new each day. Otherwise, there is a sense that the events and problems of one day follow on to the next. God is said to have rested on the seventh day of creation. This surely wasn’t out of laziness, but because there was some need to begin anew the following week, starting with the next day. Creating the world is not an easy thing to do, and we create our experience of the world through our own sense perceptions. The number seven represents the seven chakras, or energy centres. When one reaches the number seven, they are said to experience higher dimensions of thought, or pure thought.

When one has created for themselves the best possible situation, this too takes a lot of work. For example, when an athlete has trained to the utmost, they collapse in bed as if they are dead to the world. They then wake up revitalised the next day, ready to renew themselves. There is a lot of wisdom in doing this because there are many misconceptions about life which people ruminate over during the night if they do not expend enough energy during the day. It is foolish to go over transient thoughts which have not even developed to their full extent, as if they were enduring states. However, if you utilise the body’s energises properly, you reach a state of emptiness, which allows you to become free from agitation or tension.

Weeding out past impression: Pruning

One way of tiring the mind is to engage in lots of physical work. This naturally makes one more settled and still, which can help with sleep. This is particularly important for children. If children do not get enough exercise, scientists are saying that they can develop psychological problems. This is because if they do not strengthen new neurological and physiological connections with enough vigour, old behaviour patterns do not get rooted out.

This rooting out of old patterns of behaviour is called ‘synaptic pruning’. If neutrons get too enlarged or the connective synapses become too dense, there is a conflict in energy demands. It is like if you have a patch of soil with weeds in it, these weeds take up the nutrients from the soil, leaving a reduced amount of nutrients for the seeds you wish to planting new seedlings, You need to free up resources for new development. This is the work of the martial artists, to constantly keep their soil free of overgrown and hostile weeds.

Transforming past impressions

Unless you destroy the barriers to growth and renewal, you will not get rid of the same old problems which assail you. There tends to be a fear in people that if they destroy what they know, then who they are gets destroyed along with it. This is not so. It is only the illusion which gets destroyed, the memories of yesterday which have become weakened and damaged. These memories create the illusion that what you have achieved today will go on in its current form tomorrow. This prevents seeing things anew, as if for the first time.

None of this means that you retain no memory of the past. it is possible to maintain your memories so that they become flexible and malleable enough to become modified and adapted to the present moment of experience. Just as the stomach empties in order to become full again, the basic structure of the stomach does not change. Much of the contents of the stomach is transformed into new cells which go into maintaining the health and vitality of the body. It is the same thing with patterns of behaviour, the old patterns go into creating renewed ones, which look the same but are new. This is the reason for maintaining the purity of the martial arts forms, so that they can be absorbed in the purest form possible before they enter into your system and become modified in some way. Each practitioner modifies the pure form in their own way according to the times in which they live, their own particularly temperament, and many other factors.

Fullness and emptiness: Sleep and Wakefulness

What you have achieved in terms of work gets blown up like a bubble during the day. The bubble expands and becomes filled with air from the outside. This helps to oxygenate the blood, creating new cells and life within you. This is fullness. At night, the energy naturally recedes after expansion, just like how an area of high pressure drops to low pressure after a certain point. In terms of human experience, this point is when the outside pressure drops at night, which has a corresponding affect on inside pressure within yourself. It is only natural. It is not that you become pressure less, it is just that you become more concentrated and less outward bound.

So during the evening, if you manage to empty your container of high pressure, then you will naturally become settled, which sets the ground for maximum activity the following day. If you have not done this systematically, then energy tends to leave the body more abruptly. Whichever way, this is a daily cycle which the body must go through to reach maximum efficiency. Nature does not care how this happens, it’s up to you. So following an intense workout, if you manage to bring the body and mind back down to a resting state, then this promotes recovery and stable overall functioning.

When you have achieved balance between rest and activity, It is like being born again each time you wake up. This is why it’s best to tire yourself out with physical or mental work during the day time, and then gradually wind this down in the afternoon and evening, so that you enter into a more mediative state or easeful state later in the day. There is then a good balance between gathering new information and resources, whilst allowing time for the pruning of old irrelevant branches of information. This was how the Masters of the past traditionally structured the day for their disciples. They did not stuff their heads with content night and day as they might nowadays.

The masters of the past were not aware of the technical information which is available today, so they used very simple methods which worked for them. When something works, it is best to stick with it unless there is a compelling reason to change your methods.

When one feels physically tired, they just slip off to sleep easily because they have employed their energies effectively towards their work, keeping nothing for themselves. This works in your favour because you are preparing to reach maximum receptivity the following day when the energies get higher again.

The importance of energy expenditure and organisation

When the body becomes tired, and the mind is too active, this can lead to mental imbalances. If you just go out for a long walk, chop some wood, or do any kind of physical or manual work for a few hours a day, you will see that it’s quite easy to go to sleep in the evening. This kind of activity also gets you out in the fresh air, which obviously is a healthy thing to do. Getting out in the fresh air relieves many modern problems, such as skin conditions and mental imbalances. So, the idea is to tire the body and focus the mind, preferably in nature, so that ones attention does not become too scattered and hyperactive. when you attention becomes scattered, you become dispersed. You have to gather this mess and organise it aside.

As we go from activity to non activity, we head towards nothingness, which is often referred to as death. In fact a restful sleep is a bit like a temporary death. At night, if you manage to become detached from purpose and drive, then activity becomes meaningless. This requires organisation rather than neglect. When you sit and rest, nothing else exists for you. There is just being, an organised being. This is not a state which you create, it is always there, so make it yours. So in terms of sleep, you are putting your purpose and activity to one side. Then, you can simply be. You then pick up your activity again the next day and begin your work afresh. This is true organisation.

Like this, you can go on indefinitely. For example, you put the days training to one side and then go to sleep for the night, rather than using the imagination to think about ways of improving and calculating how to actively improve. Sleep will make all the necessary adjustments for improvement if you have worked effectively during the window of activity in the day time. It is better to get rid of the old rather than hold on to the the past in order to ensure your successful development in an organised way.

Pure Memory

Just because you forget about the details during the night, this does not mean you lost what you previously had. Nor does it mean that you will forget about what you have learnt. It just means that this information becomes imbedded into your deeper memory – your subconscious memory. Just like if you pull the weeds out of a soil patch, they rot down into the earth and provide sustenance for new growth. In other words, you turn the old weeds into a potent energy form which transforms itself into new expressions of growth.

One way of looking at this is that you take the short term memory of learning something, and then imbed it into your muscle memory. This is just a different way of storing information, transforming it from short term memory into long term memory, which is more embodied instead of just brain based. Then the conscious memory (short term memory) becomes an embodied memory (long term memory) which no longer takes up so much space and energy within the brain. This is the purpose of so called synaptic pruning. At the same time, you can retrieve old information at any time because it is stored as pure memory. This pure memory is unimpeded by physical or mental formations, and exists as an energy. This explains how people who are highly trained can recall things they may think they have forgotten and relearn them again in new ways according to changing situations and demands.

This is why the traditional systems did not work with complicated theories about what works in various self defence situations. They did not want to constrain the complexity of martial arts to the confines of the imagination. One can plan to fight against a swordsman, but what about an enemy who wields a gun, or even some kind of yet to be invented weapon? The imagination cannot conceive of any such novelty, because spontaneous action requires direct perception rather than imagining an outcome in advance. This is why it is important to maintain the purity of practice by breaking it down to its fundamental essence.

To this end, martial arts masters wanted to free up the conscious memory so that they could process and experience the present moment. They did not want the distortions of past impressions and experiences to form the basis of their present experience. Instead these past experiences were to be stored in the longer term memory as a kind of energy form within the seat of the subconscious. The physical seat of the subconscious is located in the abdomen, the Hara Centre. This energy form within the seat of the subconscious can then become a kind of malleable expression of energy rather than a fixed form from the past. The Hara Centre is also important for maintenance of the body and its energy. When one becomes internally focused, they can use the energy which they have gathered externally to turn inward.

Memory and Energy

The long term memory has two aspects to it. It is both an energy and a physical form. In fact, all memory is actually a form of energy in itself, you could not act without memory. In terms of rest, it is important to store the energies of the body internally for maintenance rather than for externally orientated activity. For maintenance purposes, you do not need the same high levels of energy storage and expression as you do in high activity states during the day. So the activity of the day recedes back down during the night, like a lowering tide. This is why it is often said that sleep consolidates memory, because it imbeds conscious memory into the subconscious, turning our physical and mental activity into a kind of renewable and self sustaining energy.

It is important that you are realistic about what you can achieve in your activity and training. Rather than going by what you imagine or what social expectations suggest, it is important to maintain quality over quantity. Often, you get to a point where its best to write off the expectations for the day, dropping them off as you would hang your coat and hat up when you get home. Demands and work will still be there the following day. There is a time for these. You don’t need to hang on to them for longer than necessary.

A lot of people keep their coat and hat on when they should be trying to sleep. In other words, a lot of people remain active when the time has come to be restful. But what sort of state are they in the next day after being up all night? Often they are unable to do what’s needed of them the following day, and they regret being so active all night. This is particularly important if you have reached a stage in your life where you are looking for more than just basic survival.

A lot of baggage which we hold on to can be simply dropped off when we relinquish holding on to it. What is this baggage? The thoughts and feelings about the events of the day, an excess of energy which can be put aside. These can be things which you pick up and drop at will, if you develop the capability to do so. For example, when it’s time to sleep, instead of holding onto some idea about yourself, it is often better just to put it aside temporarily. Holding on to unnecessary thoughts is the same as storing pent up energy which has not been utilised properly. Thoughts are transient. You may not have much control over them, but you can let them play out and after some time they will transform into a different kid of energy if you make yourself a certain way.

Maybe you are a world champion kick boxer. There is no point being this way all the time, it just becomes a heavy weight to bear. It is often better to create some time and space to simply drop all of these ideas and become lighter. As I mentioned earlier, these rich ideas about ourselves lay the ground for new ideas to emerge. Allowing time for this process helps you relax and rejuvenate, which is a good way to enhance your own capabilities in the Long run.

Rest and Sleep

Posted on 22nd September 2024 by joeharman8 | 4 min read | 111 views

There is a tendency in Martial Arts for practitioners to never wind down. This is a big weakness if it isn’t sorted out with appropriate strategies. The biggest strength of martial artists is the energy they bring. To compliment this, learn to develop the opposite complimentary aspect of yourself during rest.

Historically, during times of war soldiers could easily get to sleep because they would be so exhausted. At the same time, they could be kept up at night with anxiety because of bombs going off around them. When people experience prolonged states of anxiety and restlessness, it is as if they are possessed by an external event. This can be a thought, a noise, or even stormy weather for instance. If it is raining outside, you can become possessed by the rain in your experience of it in a certain way. The same goes with ideas and thoughts if they become too empowered with energy at the wrong time. So the goal is not to eliminate these things. Instead, you lessen the impact that they have on your system by become more effective at winding down for the evening, or after a training session. Then you don’t hype them up to the extent that they bother you much.

It is important to get enough rest so that you are prepared for the next days tasks. It is a question of quality of sleep and rest rather than just quantity. The more you get into the habit of planning and preparing for sleep and rest properly, the more it becomes a habit like muscle memory. So the more you consciously aware of it, the more natural it is for you to become restful subconsciously. At first it may seem difficult, but after some time you find that on top of your efforts you also have subconscious habits and forces moving with you rather than against you. Then, a habit becomes a subconscious choice.

It is not a case of making restfulness and sleep a habit and then switching off your attention from such things. It is a case of increasing the likelihood that you succeed by making it your choice willingly. If you are swimming with the tide, rather than floundering against it, then this is a choice. You become willing to engage in this choice. It is not a choice to have no tide at all and just float around meaninglessly without any prevailing conditions. No one in their right mind would be willing to choose inertia, it is a fools paradise. The only real choice is to become a willing vehicle for the ebb and flow of energy to function at its best. In this way, what you are willing to do and what choose become one and the same.

You prepare for sleep as you would prepare for an exam, or even a competitive match. If you try to do everything at the last minute when all this should have been done earlier, this just causes regret and anxiety. If a blacksmith tries to heat up the metal when it’s time to cool it down, there won’t be enough time for it to set. And if the metal does not set, then the blade become weak and dull. This highlight the importance and timeliness of effective activity and recuperation. This requires organisation. Similarly, if the blacksmith tries to heat up the blade again when it is setting, they risk ruining the finish by interrupting the cooling process. Sleep is very much like that, you heat yourself up with activity in the day, and set into the mould at night as you take on a new form which is ready the following morning. Once again, this can become a willing process, or an unwilling process. It is a question of whether or not your a clear in your mind about the choice available to you.

Liberating the Genetics: From Determinism to Determination [Part 2]

Posted on 28th August 2024 by joeharman8 | 15 min read | 104 views

Part 2 follows on directly from part 1. Here, we look at how the influence of the karmic structure and the genetic body influences our behaviour. We will look at ways which have been used in martial arts traditions to use this powerhouse of energy in a conscious and productive way. By using the energy body in certain ways it is possible to make the energies more malleable rather than concretised, which we will look at now.

Contraction and Extension

From the tightly compact seed, the truth unfolds into an infinite possibility of expansion.

Part 2 follows on directly from part 1. Here, we look at how the influence of the karmic structure and the genetic body influence our behaviour. We will look at ways which have been used in martial arts traditions to use this powerhouse of energy in a conscious and productive way. By using the energy body in certain ways it is possible to make the energies more malleable rather than concretised, which we will look at now.

The reason for various back breaking martial exercises was to put the body under such pressure that the bodies energies would recede inwards and concentrate itself more tightly. This had the benefit of increasing fitness, and harnessing will power and discipline into focused activity. At the same time, when the energies have been compressed and made more focused, it is possible to spread the energies in a more organised way. This may seem counter intuitive, but condensing and concentrating this force of energy increases its possibility for expansion. In this way it is said to be possible to wear out ones karma by contracting the internal mixture, and then extending it like baking bread. The bread transforms the mixture into something else. This is one way of looking at it. This is also known as internal alchemy.

So these martial exercises were a preparatory stage for influencing ones own genetic material, or the energy body. By concentrating this dispersed energy, the physical body becomes more malleable and more open to transformation from within. Otherwise, the energies remain reactive to the external environment predominantly and you never know the potency of their potential. At the same time, when you have shrunk the genetic influence over the body and reduced it down, you leave space for increased wave forms of energy, which bring about a sense of ease and pleasantness rather than agitation and reactivity. When you have reduced it down, particularly within the area of the Hara Centre, it becomes warmed up and more able to extend itself further rather than contracting the energy body. When it goes out again it disperses more widely and as a less dense layer, until it dissolves altogether. This is known as dissolution of Karma.

When the energy becomes concentrated in the Hara Centre, the seat off the self, it is experienced in a more intense way which is more focused and powerful. This awakens a powerful wave of upwards ascending energy known in Yoga as the Kundalini force, or Linga Sharira. In Chinese systems, the awakening of this energy is known as grand circulation, amongst other names. It is essentially the full fledged functioning of the energy body, which creates a fire in the belly, which is partly responsible for both activity and dissolution of Karma. By becoming a wave form of energy, like water, it no longer sticks so stubbornly to the body and mixes with the wider existence. At the same time it becomes part of your own existence. I realise this sound like nonsense, but I am attempting to make this mumbo jumbo into some sort of logical explanation to the best of my ability, so bare with me.

It is only because of fundamental misunderstandings of the energy body, that people have gone about handling it in limited ways. Because of the power of the kundalini force, traditionally certain behaviours and codes of conduct have been instituted in those trained in its ways. For example, it has been linked with increased sexuality or instinctive behaviours, but only in situations where the energy dissipates at the level of the Muladhara, or root chakra1. For this reason, disciples were put to back breaking work or held in protective atmospheres in temples, so that they could fully explore the spiritual significance of this rising energy without inflating its influence over other areas of life.

When you want to move to the ultimate possibility, without developing the right internal circumstances and scope for development, then you are missing a vital first step. This first step is including the necessary cultivation so that this blossoming happens naturally, rather than by force. This is why certain qualities and virtues were always instilled in disciples of martial arts. This is particularly the case when doing something like raising the energies a higher level of functioning, or dissolving ones karmic influence. Otherwise, it is possible to diminish ones karma to the extent that there is no stable root, or make the energies lopsided in the body.

The whole point of martial arts is to develop the relationship between our internal and external environment. This is symbolised by Yin and Yang. In martial arts tradition, this has always meant developing the qualities of self discipline and work ethic, in order to cultivate an attitude of perseverance and self transformation. If this determination to develop is cultivated, then the genetic component of an individual is brought to its highest possibility. From the tightly compact seed, the truth unfolds into an infinite possibility of expansion. This is the essence of life. For instance, the sperm cells are amongst the most potent and tightly packed cells, which means they have the capability to create a body, along with the egg. This is one example.

Everything must be done according to ones capability and understanding. And above all, everything can be used intelligently rather than excluded due to judgemental prejudice. This is why it is foolish to try to destroy something like ones karmic structure or instinctive nature, without putting it effective use. If in the process of self realisation it leaves you, then this is good. At the same time a certain necessary amount is needed to function properly. This is the reason for harsh austerities which masters impose on themselves, which seem illogical. They create for themselves a resistance, a karmic load to carry, which gives them a strong root. At the same time they don’t get entangled it the process, and routinely work through their karma, which becomes a conscious choice for them. This choice can de dedication to certain exercises, a certain diet, or just about anything which they deem appropriate. There is no right or wrong here, it is just that there are different life goals and orientations.

It is not usually advisable to attempt to handle powerful internal energy situations head on initially. It certainly cannot be mastered by force. Since childhood the genetic influence has been campaigning about how you have be be dictated too by them, and how they own you. Fighting them only makes you more identified with them. The best way is to leave them to their nonsense until you experience something more than they are. Then you will never take them seriously. This is why the Master would make sure the the disciple was serious before moving to serious forms of practice. It was not uncommon for the disciple to have to move in with the master of the temple, or to dedicate their entire life to a system of martial arts practices. Today, these practices would not fit with the social norms of society. However, the practices are still alive.

It is ridiculous to talk about liberating the mind from misconceptions, when a large percentage of social media content relies on misconceiving reality as some superficial appearance. It is for this reason that the authentic practices have been left out of mainstream thought, but at the same time they are to be found in certain hidden places in full view.

The Masters of today will encourage the disciple with rudimentary seminar classes, before inviting them in for more advanced programs. Before they know it, they have moved from a weekly course, to a weekend seminar abroad in the middle of Thailand, for instance. This is done according the the discipline which slowly builds in the disciple. It is rarely the case anymore that people jump right in from the start.

The origins of genetic determinism

The idea about genetics defining a person comes from the need to keep practices within certain clans. It has little to do with what nature has endowed people with genetically, because this itself is largely unexplored. Nature has certainly not made genetic influence the defining factor in most people, because it is in and of itself not capable of doing so. At the same time, it is open to any possible influence. This is because the genetic body is intermingled with the karmic substance, as well as the physical and mental bodies. This is according to traditional thought. So what you are looking at is a complex amalgam, which can be a different mixture depending on the person.

It is like, if you plant a seed into the soil. The plant itself will grow according to the soil in a certain minimal way. Whether the soil is good or bad will determine much. Along with that, much of its growth depends on the sunlight, and other environmental factors, which taken together are responsible for the majority of the plants growth. If it grows to full potential it will look a certain way, but this appearance is not why it grew to its full potential. In fact, it may look the same way if it is healthy or unhealthy. It is just the longevity and the susceptibility to certain influences may be different as a result of its growth. this becomes apparent as time goes on.

So the environment can influence the genetic body, or energy body, to the extent that it becomes intertwined with the physical body. This creates a powerful link between physical practices and disciplined lifestyle. In fact, it is not even true that you have an energy body separate from the physical body, or even a brain separate from the body. It is this energy, which is largely to do with environmental influences which is responsible for the organisms development and cultivation, as well as the expression of so called genetically determined factors. It is through pride that people have labelled themselves genetically superior, or other inferior, which has led to racism and ideas of genetic determinism.

The idea that genetics determines a persons future is flawed for several reasons. First of all, genes are said to be almost the same in everyone. That means that the genes of your grandparents, as well as relatives from thousands of years ago, are probably the same as you. Even in a chimpanzee, they are 98 percent the same. Yet, we still see a lot of variation in people. This is because the same soil is responsible for the cultivation of an infinite variety of life. This is what makes a forest the way it is, full of variation and organised chaos, where everything has its place.

Over the course of thousands of years, human experience has changed dramatically. Human experience has also changed dramatically in the last 20 or so years, with the massive development of technology. It has changed to the extend that modes of living from a few decades ago are now almost totally redundant. So factors such as these determine the transformation of our experience more than genes do. But at the same time they alter the expression of our genes. This is why it becomes complicated, and also this explains why the old ways can so quickly become redundant. At the same time this explains why timeless traditions can also remain relevant.

Various other factors aside from genes have played a vital role in determining the course of our development. You could say that genes provide the constant platform for infinite possibility. From this platform you would not make a roof or a window, for instance. So the platform is the fundamental constant. The rest you can play with any way you want. This infinite possibility is inside of our genetic code, rather than outside of us. At the same time we become intimately linked with our external experience, which we ourselves can gain increasing mastery over. So I am not down playing genetic influence, I am merely trying to demonstrate that its potency has been assumed to be something less than it is by making out that is defines the outcome of our experience. It is much more than that.

Learning from our environment

So genetic disposition is predominantly to do with the social norms and habits which themselves breed a certain kind of genetic energy within groups. These live beyond individual lives, so for this reason they are passed down from generation to generation. Nobody wants you to be liberated from this. It is an individual thing, which can none the less be done in a community. It is the tribal mentality of separatism which inflates the differences between peoples, as well as the genetically determined aspects of sticking with the tribe and loyalty towards certain causes.

Take the planet, for instance. It is the planets warmth and electromagnetic force which sustains life on the planet. This is what sustains its development, and this energy is what is passed onto life on this planet. It is not owned by the sun. In the same way, the habits and practices of people far outlive the physical body itself, but they are a consequence of the planet. These practices and the body itself are connected to each other, but it is the coherence between life and disciplined practice which determined the inevitability of genetic disposition. The other choice is to become liberated from this, by following the dictates of a more casual influence, which has to do with the greater existence.

Practices you can do

“The abdominal wall sends waves through the system which travel further than the abdomen, ensuring that the energy transforms appropriately rather than creating high pressure everywhere.”

This environmental energy can be an enormous factor in an individuals growth. This is why certain traditions have kept secret practices within their own ranks, because they either thought they created them, or they thought it was too dangerous to include people who weren’t receptive to the environments they created. These environments became entire cultures, such as in the Himalayas and India for example. These practices provide the driving engine for developing the necessary fire of the body, whilst at the same time offering a water element for its cooling.

The brain works best when it is cool and at low pressure. This is why nasal breathing has been recommend in order to send cool oxygen straight to the brain directly, rather than through the bloodstream. Try this exercise. Find a quiet place to sit, and simple breath through the nose in an upright cross legged position. Feel the nasal passage expands you touch the roof of you mouth with the tip of the tongue. If you sustain this position for around ten minutes or more, a sense of ease and energy will generate in the nasal area and enhance your sense perception, leading to increased well being.

The body’s physical centre, the Hara Centre or the abdomen can withstand more pressure and heat without overheating. In fact, the intestines have enough potential force to crack a Brazil nut. So when you create this pressure through abdominal breathing exercises, as well as other martial arts exercises, you create an area of relatively high pressure to the brain. In this way, it was understood that certain physical practices to develop the Hara Centre would naturally and sustainably cultivate the area of low pressure, which is the brain. This is based on the law that areas of high pressure naturally flow to areas of low pressure in waves. For example, the abdominal wall sends waves through the system which travel further than the abdomen, ensuring that the energy transforms appropriately rather than creating high pressure everywhere. Basically, this encourages bioelectrical energy, or neurological energy, to travel throughout the system at sustainable rates.

Try this exercise, which can be done at the same time as the nasal breathing above. As you sink down into the cross legged posture, into the sitting bones, utter or imagine the “ahh” syllable2. At the same time extend upwards, lifting the upper spine and stretching the lower spine. You can repeat this at least six or so times, or even for as long as desired.

So this is why the brain is always kept cool by certain modes of conduct and meditative exercises. If the brain becomes the driving force, then you are going increasingly by theory rather than experience. Keep the brain cool therefore, and the body (particularly the abdomen) warm, balancing out the Fire and Water elements. This is the idea behind the practices of abdominal and nasal breathing, taken together.

The brain is likely to become a source of entanglement in the aspiring martial artists, because it excessively complicates what the body understands genetically or in the energy sense naturally. It is this unwillingness to work with the body and go through the necessary disciplined practice which is scaling down the overall understanding in the energetic sense of the body. This comes at a huge price for the aspiring martial artists. In this way martial arts has become increasingly theoretical, because of hyper development of cognitive activity, and lack of involvement and aliveness of the physical and energetic expression.

References

1 Sexuality and Martial Arts https://intuitivemartialarts.com/2023/05/01/sexuality-and-martial-arts/

2 Sound and Form [Part 1] https://intuitivemartialarts.com/2023/12/20/sound-and-form-part-1/

Hara Centre: Centre of Creation

Posted on 2nd February 2024 Last updated on 13th February 2024 by joeharman8 | 16 min read | 109 views

“The earths atmosphere, which is electromagnetic, would not be possible without the earths core being the way it is. The Earths core is hot and high pressure, like our own physical centre. The surround electromagnetic atmosphere of the Earth can be likened to the nervous system. So the core directly affects the nervous system, and the nervous system is not possible without the core. So you can transform you energy and situation by working with this core in ways that are not possible otherwise. “

When you perform an action from the core, it radiates outwardly to the periphery. This is the case for any martial arts movement. In fact, it takes a lot more competence to do this than to perform the move superficially. So the idea is to move the core, the abdomen, and then extend out from there. It does not happen the other way around, that you start with the limb first, and hope that this creates a whole body motion.

It is like how the Earths rotation begins at the core, and this moves the mantle and the plates. The plates and the surface do not move the core. In the same way, the chemical receptors on a plants do not make its roots grow. If pesticide is used too much, then this just impedes the plants overall development of certain internal processes which produce these things naturally. The same thing goes on in the human body. In terms of movements, the internal signals which are related to the core, function much better if the core is the initiator of the movements. This helps you memorise and imbed certain movements more deeply. Even on a superficial level, it is better to perform core movements because the core leads all basic movements. In this way the only things that changes is the particular limb you are using when driving from the seat of the abdominal core. So your kicking and punching becomes very similar.

Knowing the Unknown

When you do a punch, it is only a punch from the core if it starts at the core. This is why in martial arts they say “Hit from the core”. This core is the abdomen or Hara Centre as it is known. “Ha” means Sun in Chinese. According to the Indian Sutras, “Ha” means the same thing too, and “Ra” refers to a radiant sun, the centre of the Universe. So together, “Ha-ra” can be taken to mean the earths centre, or the universal centre. It is from the centre that the rest of creation happens. You can only illuminate the vastness of the unknown from the high pressure centre which eventually creates light. In the Solar System, energy starts as non visible. This energy only becomes visible light after some time when it extends out from the Sun and certain particles react at a certain distance from the source as the pressure drops. This is the case with Martial Arts.

The Hara Centre, the physical centre of the body, is the only energy centre which can transmit itself anywhere in the body directly. It manifests differently depending on the action. In terms of technique, it can go to the arms, legs, or elsewhere physically. This is why it is universal in nature. In others words, it is not just located in the abdomen, the energy can be transported anywhere. The lower abdomen is the source. For example, if you drive a nail into a block of wood, you do so from the core, just as you do with say, a golf swing. This applies to everything. It starts one place and ends up somewhere else. All these things are driven from the core. It is impossible to start from the end, because this isn’t yet in your experience. This is why in the traditional arts they never rushed learning, nor were they given to over analysis.

It is just because you don’t know how to do a movement before you have learnt it that we say “drive from the core”. You cannot do a complex kick before you have learnt to do this. So you practice something you don’t know by doing something you do already know. This is why I always say “drive from the core” first. Personally I don’t bother with explaining all the details of a particular move because this becomes obvious over time with the right fundamental platform. This platform is a strong core. It is not necessarily an athletic strength, but the right energy and maneuverability.

So develop the Hara Centre first. It is only possible from there to know the unknown. It is only when this unknown comes into your direct experience that you learn the mysteries of martial arts. The core functions much better in children. this is why they learn everything naturally. The adult core usually becomes lazy from excessive sitting and poor lifestyle habits which we develop in society. The point is that we can switch on this source to learn anything like a child does, even as an adult. So this core is like the little white dot in the Dark space of the Yin Yang symbol. This is called mastering technique, so that it manifests properly.

Drugs and Chemicals

The expression Energy takes can vary dramatically depending on a number of factors. But when it originates in the Hara Centre and finds expressions elsewhere, then there is some discretion and volition as to where it ends up. Otherwise, if it starts elsewhere, it is often an unconscious act, or simply accidental. Conscious acts are always intentional and consciousness is always a choice. Let’s say that the energy is taken in from external sources, such as some sort of chemical supplement. Such chemicals tend to inebriate the system so that it acts purely from a chemicals basis, or dampens other energy sources in the body. This is the problem with drugs and chemical supplements1.

So chemical energy is itself a manifestation of pressure and heat. These are naturally occurring when things begin in the gut. For instance, many chemicals can be created internally which people are now ingesting more and more because their system has gone taken a kind of backwards step. This takes a bit more time and particularly a mediative digestion, so that the body can rest and regenerate properly2. But people are “Go, go, go” all the time. It is for this reason that Excessive physical training can happen at the surface level, because the chemicals are just being replaced by supplements. It is like with plants. The soil quality is going down, so fertiliser and chemical sprays are needed just to get some fruit and ward off disease. None of this is necessary until you exceed the natural capabilities of the earth. The Hara Centre is like the Earth.

So chemicals come in, then they will run their course over a certain period of time and then dissipate at some level. Often, these chemicals are being abused, so the natural production goes down and a kind of external dependance happens. Of course, the biggest intoxication from outside occurs when greed and corruption take over in the mind. It is for this reason that in the traditional arts, they urged against competition and prestige. Competition is fine once you have develop the necessary mental fortitude. In my experience, there are so many life lessons which I have absorbed that it almost derailed me completely. So if I didn’t have the necessary inner tools of development, I would have been broken by certain experiences. This is why I stress “Meditation, meditation, meditation”, or some kind of meditative dimension and development of this.

Overcoming Self Deception

The biggest deception if from the intoxication of conquest. The lust for conquest brings about the same disorders as actual chemical abuse in many cases. This is a false high. This is referred to as Maya in the Indian systems, or simply self deception. This is because when you overcome the need for these things, it is as if they never happened and the events become meaningless. This is not so with any reality which is learnt from the core of truth, which is the Hara Centre. There is nothing wrong with chemical supplements, they can be taken if needed. But the very same things can be created internally, setting in process and lasting mechanism. The results are often the same but more sustainable. But what a difference it makes if you can produce these things internally.

Inter Transformation

We have looked at how the Hara Centre can transmit itself anywhere in the body. With the other centres of the body, such as the chest or head, these act as relay points, so the energy takes a more roundabout route. There are exceptions to this, such as Martial Arts masters whose physical body’s have failed them but they have developed the proper energy channels. These are exceptions however. With the Hara Centre, it can reach anywhere. It is like how you can create a heater with the use of electricity, there are transformers involved in that kind of technical process to convert energy. If you want to create heat, movements is needed for example. Movements is a kind of transformer in the human body. There is all sorts of mind work that goes into it, such as knowledge and motivation to move. This is why in many ways, reality begins in the mind. Importantly, the mind is linked to the gut, not just the brain.

The earth itself transforms heat into water, and then water into steam. All of these processes are only possible because of the earths core dynamo, which is molten iron largely. This is like the Hara Centre. The earths atmosphere, which is electromagnetic, would not be possible without the earths core being the way it is. The Earths core is hot and high pressure, like our own physical centre. The surround electromagnetic atmosphere of the Earth can be likened to the nervous system. So the core directly affects the nervous system, and the nervous system is not possible without the core. So you can transform you energy and situation by working with this core in ways that are not possible otherwise.

Let’s look at technique. If the punch begins at the shoulder, then you are not punching from the core. You can still do it, but a lot of additional steps are taken, often unconsciously. So the idea behind “using the core” or the abdomen, comes from this idea that from this centre of mass everything spreads outwardly. There is an inner intelligence that grasps this intuitively. So if you get this, then you are 90% of the way there. Why 90%? because the microorganisms of the body account for 90% of the body’s make up. And these guys are largely in the core and work according to the gut primarily. From the core, the rest radiates outwardly. In terms of cognition and learning, if the brain and nervous system attempt to perform a particular movement without the cores involvement, the results are limited. This can produce many problems, such as over use injury and a whole host of physical ailments, particularly later on in life.

From Gross to subtle

If you point a finger, this can be performed from the core, or you can simply wave the arm out and point the finger. If the action is led from the core, then the finger pointing is just the final expression at the end of the movement. In other words, it is the end phase of a core movement. You might say, that everyone can point a finger, what’s so special about that? However, anyone who doesn’t pay attention and concern towards these things on the path of martial arts is setting themselves up for problems. This is why in the traditional systems, the master would look at how you conducted yourself in every aspect. So to take care of the large, you can pay attention to the small things, which is required if you wish to transform these initial steps into greater possibilities. The idea that you can do something carelessly but repeatedly and yield good results is completely wrong. You go from basic to complex, from gross to subtle expertise.

So one initial movement sets up the possibilities for the next. It is the same with a punch. You rotate the core into the punch and there is a lot more power and transmission of energy as a result. This is because it began from the centre of mass and transformed into a punch as part of a complex process. It’s not like you get each phase technically correct separately and then it works. No, instead you have to transform one phase into another. It is like the pressure of the earth gradually dissipates as you move away from the core. This creates the complex physical reality around us. Due to this pressure release, other forms of energy, such as gravitational energy and electromagnetic energy, gradually express themselves. These act upon the physical word we experience. This is a complex process, but it is an intuitive one. Gravity can then act upon larger masses, whereas it is weaker the closer you get to the centre. This is because other more powerful forces of Chi energy, or radiation in Scientific terms are happening closer to the centre. This is also known as dark matter1.

So in the human being, when you perform a punch, it is only possible because of a release of energy which gradually takes another form. This is how you create something from nothing. This nothing actually contains the whole possibility, it just that this has not been Brough to bare in your experience yet. But it will the more you work with it. This is why there are no set traditions other than oral transmission in most traditional systems. You have to work for it internally.

Self Creation

If you just swing the arm at the opponent, then there is an entirely different effect even if it looks the same as a punch from the core. This is why there is so much emphasis on breathing from the core, digesting properly from the core, and moving from there in the traditional systems of martial arts. The diamonds are produced there. In the Earths core, Molten Iron erupts out of the surface from the core. It is only when the atmosphere changes that we see the diamond formation of this same heat energy, which has now solidified. These diamond are what we create in martial arts, expressions of high pressure which have materialised. The Earth doesn’t think about it, it is an energy intelligence. These diamonds can absorb electromagnetic waves from the earths atmosphere. So the Earth itself generates an electromagnetic fields which sustains the outer surface. The same thing happens in us, and this is entirely intuitive when you develop the right perceptions through practice. When you rely too much on physical strength of the limbs, you can easily forget about using the core properly. This leads to various injuries, which although inevitable sometimes, become chronic and excessive. It is just like if you exploit the nutrients of the earth more quickly than they are created, you will likely have issues.

Let’s take the example of digestion. If you eat whole foods, or healthy foods generally, then these have to be digested in the stomach properly. The thing about sugar is that it goes straight out of the stomach and into the blood stream. It doesn’t go into deep nourishment, such as bone and deep tissue regeneration. This is why it is linked with so many internal problems, even if it gives you a sugar hit. Healthy whole food on the other hand, goes into reproducing the cells and creating an entire person. Over the course of around seven years, Science has show the the entire organisms cells are likely to be replaced. This isn’t so if degeneration is happening too much at the same time as replenishment. So when anything is done at the surface level, whether that is learning or nutrition, there is a certain level of nourishment which gets neglected and undermined..

When blood sugar builds up too much, you can get a range of health complications, such as nerve damage, and inability to produce enough insulin. We have also looked at how osteoporosis may happen too, because the bones need nourishment, not just the muscles and blood. So when a person exists at the surface level, what you end up with is an irritable or excitable mood with a kind of frantic and compulsive disposition. This undermines health obviously. This can in itself lead many of types of mental health conditions, as well as physical ailments. The variety of these are countless, and exploding across the world. From this, we can see that a physiological problem can become a psychological one quite easily, once certain patterns of behaviour become habitual. So certain patterns of behaviour are thought replenish or undermine ones pre birth energy, or chi.

The point is that what appears to be a mental health issue, often has its origins in the physiological or energy realm. So by taking care of the physiology, you end up taking care of the mental side. This is the same with martial arts. It is often the case that people train with all sorts of gels and sugary liquids, just to keep certain chemicals active in the blood stream. From a performance perspective this has some benefits, such as making one more aggressive and reactive. This comes at a heavy price, because it intoxicates your system just like a drug. Drug and chemicals are just a different part of the cycle. You take them in and perform some activity. It is possible to take in various supplements properly, but that is something else. It requires a level of self restraint and awareness to perform certain activities properly. From a health perspective, over supplementation is not only stupid but disastrous. So when the body eventually breaks down with age and wear and tear, the solution for many is to take a cocktail of supplements to keep the game going. But this only hastens decline or fails to get at the source of the problem to change things.

References

https://wordpress.com/post/intuitivemartialarts.com/2227 Conquest at all costs: Drugs in Martial Arts.
https://intuitivemartialarts.com/2024/02/02/how-to-use-stress-for-your-own-health-and-the-importance-of-the-hara-centre/ How to Use stress for your own Health, and the importance of the Hara Centre.

How to Experience Victory all the Time

Posted on 23rd August 2023 by joeharman8 | 11 min read | 113 views

When somebody wins a contest, they are ecstatic. When they suffer a loss they begin to doubt themselves, because their winning streak is over. This is a misunderstanding. It is because they have begun to doubt themselves that victory leaves them. Victory is not something that happens and then fades away the next day. It is something to pursue directly rather than dependant on some kind of situational advantage. If you sat on a chair in an unbalanced state, disorientated and irritable, you would naturally feel uncomfortable. However, someone who has attained a certain ease within themselves would feel comfortable on any kind of chair. So it isn’t to do with the conditions of the chair, the comfort level or the appearance, it is to do with the inner reality of the individual and the state they are in. This is what victory is.

Victory cannot be stolen by anyone, except by that person themselves. For many people, the sense of victory, or the inner balance within, has left them. This may or may not correlate with outside circumstances. These are just happenings rather than casual agents. Simply being able to train and to accept wins and losses as they are is victory. Victory has nothing to do with the contest of the social situation you’re in. These are just ways of defining it in a small way. For example, it was once understood in martial arts that you got better by undergoing constant challenge, whether or not you won. This prepared you for any major contest or life and death situation, not some prior experience of success or failure. It wasn’t necessary to win anything, just to undergo the most challenging situations that was appropriate for your development. This would vary from one person to the next.

Let’s look at a sporting example. To make an olympic wrestling team, it might be necessary to lose against the number one and the number two guy. This is normal, it just means you have lost to the best. This in fact means you have won in terms of extracting for yourself the best level of challenge and ensuring that you are motivated to improve. This stops stagnation which comes with being too satisfied with past results or limited expectations. So it’s just a case of following this process to the conclusion and eventually reaching the top. Many people drop out prematurely from similar situations when they are not used to this kind of atmosphere. This is why in Martial arts, one of the main tenets is humility. This does not mean getting used to being limited, it means embracing the best conditions for your development even if they are outside your comfort zone.

Victory is a process

So winning is not about a result but is a process. This includes ups and downs. In the situation of the olympic wrestling team, the number three wrestler might not know they are good for many years. this is necessary for their development, all they need to do is wait. If they can wait, without achieving what some of the others in the team are achieving, then that is all that’s needed. It’s just that people can’t pay attention to the process and just wait. This is one of the hardest things to do, because it seems as though others might be surpassing you.

If you can just train and wait for the process to take place within you, then everything begins to take shape naturally. For example, if the plant establishes a strong root, grows daily in a supportive environment, and takes its time, it will eventually become a big thing. It’s then able to create more leaves for itself, more pollen, more seeds, etc., Similarly, when you have created the right conditions, even the outside situations can be greatly enhanced. This increases your potential, even if there was none in the first place. So first of all, martial arts is about cultivating an inner potential. This is the reason behind the internal practices. They can be used to heal, in the so called healing arts, but at the same time they can be used before any damage has taken place. This is why traditionally, the Master in martial arts did not heap praise on the disciple, and in some cases didn’t even talk to them. All they needed to do was wait and to generate a potential which may or may not have been there or laying dormant.

A waiting game

If you take a nap under a tree, you do not call this losing at life. It is just taking a rest. It is a form of recuperating, so that the system can balance itself out. If you are asleep in the womb, the same thing happens. So each victory or loss, or growth, requires some kind of rest, which is not a loss but simply life functioning as its should. This is how growth happens, during some period of rest or down time. This can be done before or after a particular contest, for example. It can be done for no other reason than to generate some kind of energy, as in meditation. Sitting under the tree can mean sweeping the floor, or joining the lowly ranks for a time, symbolically speaking.

The fundamental reason why people don’t reach their potential is because their system is not kept in balance. In other words, they have not taken time away from the stresses and rigours of the external life. In martial arts, exceptional balance is needed. In this way, it is sometimes necessary to develop this balance with a persevering attitude by first establishing harmony, instead of plunging in before this balance is achieved. This is the reason for waiting. It is possible to charge ahead recklessly, as is done in the more athletic styles of martial arts. There is nothing wrong with this, it can be a tremendous development. But after some time, the natural urge to dominate and compete leaves the martial artists and after some accomplishment, it is natural to want to break free from it and move beyond it. In other words, to detach from identification with some kind of status, which becomes a limitation.

Planning the Process, not the Outcome

You determine what is victory, and what is defeat, just as you plan a strategy to win a contest. Exactly how the contest plays out and the conditions of your winning and losing are entirely in your hands. So you build the very victory in your mind, rather than the stipulations of the contest. When I say you build it, I mean the intelligence functioning within you to the best of its scope and ability. Whatever is built around that physically in terms o capability, is the outcome. So it is entirely up to the individual which kinds of conditions for victory they create. This requires a balance to be established, so that the system can functioning easefully. It is then possible to become a live process in the making rather than an outcome. In other words, you become the fight itself rather than an outcrop of it. Otherwise, all sorts of distortions and malfunctions can take place. So when you see things clearly, there is less of a need to do everything in such a conquest fashion. It is a disturbance in the system which creates this excessive need for conquest.

A grain of wheat contains within itself the means to create an entire plant, as well as to pass on itself to the next crop. In other words, it can reproduce what’s there, or transform itself into a growing life. At the moment, we are using our seed just to produce what’s expected of us in various situations. When the Art of war discusses the similarities between large scale and small scale war, this does not mean that you just fight like an army would on the individual level. Instead, what it means is that you mobilise the forces in order to change the world.

Inner Warfare

Depending on the situation in front of you, you either take over the world, or maybe bide your time. You don’t chose inactivity just because its not the situation you want. It’s about being active but receptive to the actual possibilities, rather than imagined ones. So you have spies, which give you feedback as to what is possible, where your weaknesses are within your kingdom, that sort of thing. The internal mechanism of the human has similar network which can be tapped into with such activities as meditation, mindfulness, and breathing exercises. It becomes obvious to even one who cannot see, because it is felt though the organism, through the to tissues and fascia for instance.

Your whole system is like a spiders web, and like the spider there are vibrational forces which you send through yourself by tapping into the breath. It is only though the subtle movements that the spider is able to send sonic forces through the entire web whilst maintaining its integrity. These forces or vibrations are not for therapy but to gather information, which is contained within an energy form. In the human, this is known as the energy body, which is said to have eight limbs like those of the spider, which includes the physical as well as the sensory aspect of the body. In other words, the sensory aspect of the body supports the structural capabilities of the physical. This is because if you become more intuitive, you can more easily sense damage and incoming threat by using this internal network effectively.

In the same way, you can mobilise the forces of your inner army to become the general and the troops at the same time. This means you plan the very process of engagement with the battlefield, the time and place, what you are willing to spend or sacrifice, all of these considerations. Otherwise it’s just endless skirmishes which go nowhere. When you think of victory and defeat in such a narrow sense, then war makes no sense at all. Unfortunately, increasingly martial arts is being throught of in such a narrow sense.

Victory in Defeat

You can work towards some outcome or become a process. Obviously, you can also fall somewhere in between. If you think of yourself as a winner or loser because of some result or some training you have had, you should know that you and a result are different things. A prisoner of war can be captured and then survive through sheer determination of his interior will power. It is not the house that stays standing but the experience of living in it, even in trying times. The blue print of a house might be good or bad, but it still has to be lived in. The builder may or may not know what they were doing when they made the house, and in any event, they may not know certain laws of living. However, when you learn to live in a house properly, it needn’t matter whether you are in a hut or a palace, you make the most of it either way. This is making victory out of nothing.

Victory is born within you, so in striving for it you will include everything that is involved with it. This includes defeat where appropriate. For example, you might think it’s all about winning over the enemy. This kind of thinking came about because somewhere people started thinking that they don’t need a rival to bring the best out of them. With the arrival or increasingly scientific methods, people started to think it was all about technical skills. This is like thinking a cultivated flower will be a tenacious as a wild one. It may look better, but it needs all sorts of artificial supports. This accounts for something but not everything. It is like if you fatten a pig on a farm, it seems like this is what a pig is. But as soon as you open the gate and it runs in the wild as nature intended, then its starts to drop the fat and returns to its usual state. Such a pig would be more adapted to the wild even if it lost its comfort level. So this is not really a defeat for the plug, only the owner.

The contest is half going on in the opponent and half in you. In other words, it’s inside and outside of you, it’s just that there is a thin bubble which separates the two which we are seeing as big barrier. This bubble is the boundary line between your inner experience and the outside, which are one and the same. So when the experience is felt only from within, you become like the fat pig on the farm which is functioning outside its environment. You don’t realise it, but you need the outside will environment with less comfort. The grain of wheat that came from a plant, doesn’t know where it came from originally nor does it care, it still was born of a process. In the same way, the pig that finds its freedom does so of its own nature, but with the existence of a wider experience functioning through it.

How To Sleep

Posted on 5th June 2023 by joeharman8 | 11 min read | 124 views

During sleep, the body renews itself and recuperates energy. The general guidelines are to have eight hours of sleep and to get a regular schedule in terms of when you go to sleep and get up. Personally, I like to get to sleep early, about 8.30pm, and then get up at around just after 4.am. If I get a bit less, it doesn’t really matter so long as in general I go by this roughly. The exact amount of sleep a person can get, or that they need, will vary from person to person. For example, people may need more sleep if they eat a lot. This is to make sure that the energy is processed properly through digestion and muscle growth, which occurs following heavy training during sleep predominantly.

In recent times, sleep has become more and more difficult, and many people resort to taking various drugs to help them, or sleeping with the television on to distract them from over thinking. In todays world, people in general are less active. For example, even in a busy job, there is emailing instead of walking up the stairs, and increased transport options instead of walking. Even in martial arts practice, there is a standardised way to do things, which involves being told exactly what to do rather than figuring it out independently.

In the past it was more normal to expend more energy so that you cultivated an emerging sense of accomplishment through trial and error. This is when seeking to become was more important than arrival. In other words, there was a certain amount of energy expended which was good for health, which would be considered inefficient in terms of technical performance by todays experts. So ambition to achieve more at a quicker rate has paradoxically made us more lazy and unhealthy in many ways. This has made many people more restless instead of more accomplished.

Because of the hectic schedules we live with, there is a need to switch off but at the same time there is a lot of confusion surrounding the best way to go about it. It is difficult to go to sleep and have a restful sleep if you are thinking in terms of what you haven’t achieved. What about that email you didn’t send? Maybe you forgot to reply to a text message quickly enough. All of these modern day problems can be played over in the mind and turned into problems. In reality, however much you achieve, there will always be more to do tomorrow. So it is important to stop trying to cram in so much everyday, because no matter what we achieve there will always be more to do. For example, if you are a salesman and you reach your targets they will go up anyway no matter how much you try to reach them.

When you try to go to sleep immediately after being in a high energy state, all that happens if you toss and turn in your bed. For example, if you bring the work mentality to bed at night, when you lie down you tend to be wired and tired at the same time. So sleep begins long before you drop off. For example, the natural cycle is to rise in the morning, and gradually wind down from midday onwards. It’s like the rising of the tides, they reach a high point and then recede back. This is because energy is expended and outwardly manifests during the day time, and then gradually settles back to the centre at night. If you picture a circle, the energy reaches the periphery in the day time, and then concentrates back to the centre and becomes small at night.

So to be up all day and night is like your inner sun is shining all day – the earth is bound to get scorched! So the temperature drops at night, metabolism slows, outward bound senses begin to decline. To sleep effectively, you want to be in a state of non activity. Or at least, this is what should happen ideally most of the time. This slows everything down, including the mind, which is otherwise be active during the day. This is all common sense. It is a question or resting so that you can work, as well as working so that you can rest.

So it is important to go to sleep in the right state so that you begin a new each day. Otherwise, the events and problems of the previous day tend to follow on to the next. In the Bible, God Himself is said to have rested after creation. This surely wasn’t out of laziness, but because not only is there a need for non doing, but also of breaking down the old. In Hinduism, Shiva is depicted as the destroyer. The relevance of this is that unless you destroy the barriers to the new, you will not get rid of the old. Obviously, there is a fear that if you destroy what you know, then who you are is jeopardised. However, what you are gets blown up like a bubble during the day, and all that happens at night is that this same bubble pops and flattens back down. There is a change of form but the materials are all there to be revitalised and rebuilt anew each day.

When you feel a renewal and fresh perspective, It is like being born again. This is why it’s best to tire yourself out with physical or mental work throughout the day time, and gradually wind this down in the afternoon to enter into a more mediative state. When one feels tired they just slip off to sleep easily because they have usefully employed their energy. If you just go out for a long walk, chop some wood, or do any kind of manual work for a few hours a day, then you will see what I’m talking about. This also gets you out in the fresh air, which obviously is a healthy thing to do.

So we go from activity to non activity, from energy to nothingness. This state of nothingness is often called death, but in fact a restful sleep is a bit like a mini death. It’s important to establish this idea of renewal and becoming anew each day in the mind, so that nothing is left unfinished from the previous day.

It’s not like you need to achieve everything in one day in order to rest. This is unnecessary holding on and leads to anxiety before sleeping. This does not mean that you do nothing in the day just because you think it will never be enough. It’s not that at all. It’s just about being realistic about what is actually possible and doing that, rather than what you imagine or what social expectations are. These realities are often very different. So you get to a point where its best to write off the expectations of the day at a sensible point, dropping them off and picking them up again as you would your luggage at the campsite. However, a lot of people hold on to their luggage and refuse to rest for the night. But what sort of state are they in the next day? Often they are unable to do what’s needed of them, and they regret not stopping earlier.

when you go to sleep at the right time, the bags are there in the morning ready for the next hike. It really is like that. A lot of baggage which we hold on to can simply drop off when we relinquish holding on to it. Knowing this and putting into practice can drastically reduce the need for so much sleeping pills or other interventions. So in the morning, you take it all, all the baggage, to the new destination is the next day. There is absolutely nothing to be gained from wanting to do an entire life journey with a heavy back pack in one day.

Further Tips

Certain sounds assists with dropping off to sleep, because they resonate with the heart chakra, the solar plexus. The solar plexus is known as the heart centre, because it is related to not only distributing blood and energy around the body, but because it is in charge of relating us to the wider environment, including the universe. So this chakra is more active in the evening and night, whereas the Hara centre (the bodys physical centre) of the lower chakras is more active in the day time. To assist with night time work, try listening to water sounds, which are related to blood and circulation. It is also beneficial to listen to Indian Classical Music, as well as Western classical Music. Personally, I find Indian Classical music only makes sense when one becomes meditative, I never had any taste for it before I that.

There is a tendency in Martial Arts to be in this mode of never switching off. This is a big weakness if it isn’t sorted out with appropriate strategies. The biggest strength of martial artists is the energy they bring. To compliment this, learn to develop the opposite complimentary aspect of yourself during rest. During a war, a soldier could either easily go to sleep because they would be so exhausted, or be kept up at night with anxiety because of bombs going off around them. The bombs going off around you are not anything you can change, but your self awareness that you should be winding down is entirely within your control to respond to. so if the work has been done, it even becomes easier to sleep under disturbance. So it is not so much about having perfect sleep all the time, but creating the necessary inner conditions for the best possible outcomes.

It is important to get enough sleep so that you are prepared for the next day. The key point is that it is a question of quality of sleep rather than just quantity. The more you get into the habit of planning and preparing for sleep properly, the more it becomes a habit like muscle memory. So at first it may seem difficult, but then on top of your efforts you will also have good habits going with you rather than against you. In this way you will be swimming with the tide rather than against it. Otherwise, sleep becomes a big effort that requires too much insistence and energy for you to settle into it and relax. What a burden it then becomes! It is the same thing in training, at first it’s a big effort but eventually habits kick in so that your efforts become easeful and relaxed, even though you are fully energised. So going to sleep has nothing to do with diminishing energy, it’s just the energies of the body go down and the inner subtle energies are used to revitalise the system.

You prepare for sleep as you would prepare for an exam, or even a competitive match. All the hard work is done earlier on so that you gradually taper off with confidence. If you try to do everything at the last minute when all this should have been done earlier, this just causes regret, anxiety, and all sorts of emotional states which interrupt clarity of the mind and restfulness. If a blacksmith tries to heat up the metal when it’s time to cool down, there won’t be enough time for it to set. This requires organisation. Similarly, if they try to heat it up again when it is setting, they risk ruining the finish by interrupting the cooling process so it doesn’t set. Sleep is very much like that, you heat yourself up with activity in the day, and set into the mould at night as you take on a new form.

In terms of sleep position, I recommend sleeping on the right side. The right side is usually the stronger side, the yang side of the body. This is where the liver is and pressure here helps to stimulate this area so that it works optimally. If you keep your knees slightly raised and overlapping, this also creates a bit of pressure in the abdomen, to help stimulate the gut. It also stops you rolling over so much. I’ve been doing this for years, and I’ve never had a problem with it. The key is to also stretch your spine enough so that your not compressed. The left side is generally reserved for circulation, so pressure here could become counter productive, whereas if you make it free to expand by lying on the right side, the allows for increased circulation. Of course its only natural to toss and turn from time to time, so these are just guidelines.