Today,
I'd like to invite you to take a journey with me.
A journey of returning.
Of coming home.
Following the returning path back to the source.
For so much of our lives,
Our energies are directed outwards,
Our eyes are open.
We're taking in the world.
We're listening to all the sounds around us.
We're reading all the words on the screen.
In the Taoist Qigong tradition that I practice,
We call the eyes the spiritual windows.
The spiritual lights.
For so much of our lives,
These lights are drawn outside of our body.
Through our senses,
Through our eyes,
Through our hearing.
The world tends to hook our attention and draw our spiritual energy outside of our body.
This is the whole basis of advertising.
How to hook the attention of a human being into their story.
So in these incredible unique times,
So much of our lives are spent with a screen in front of us.
Our eyes are open and our spiritual lights are flowing into the latest story.
This week on SHU,
We're talking about reversing that flow.
Returning back to the home within our body.
The home within our body.
Just sit with the vibration of those words for a moment.
You have a home within your body.
A home that travels with you everywhere you go.
Just think about your average day.
How much are you drawn outside of your body?
How many words do you read through your spiritual windows?
How many stories are you drawn into each day?
Even walking through the grocery store.
Have you ever tried to walk through the grocery store and not read any words?
It's a good challenge.
I recommend trying it.
Notice your Shen,
Your spirit,
As you walk through the store.
See if you can keep your eyes partially closed,
Looking within.
Can you go get exactly what you know you need to get and leave without being drawn into any of the labels,
Any of the signs?
Very challenging.
So this idea of returning back to the home within the body.
Wherever you are,
Unless you're driving a vehicle right now,
Try this with me.
Just find yourself seated in a stable place.
I call this the one seat.
Right where your body is.
Feel your shoulders relax,
Your back stable like a mountain.
Feel the solid earth beneath you.
Connecting with the sun,
Moon and stars above.
Feel the top of your head light the open.
Now gently close your eyes.
Bring some awareness into your breath.
Don't use force to close your eyes,
But let the eyelids drop kind of like window shades.
There might be a small opening at the bottom.
And turn your spiritual lights around.
So think of your eyes as two lanterns shining out into the world.
Turn those lanterns around until they're shining back into your home,
Your body,
Looking within.
You can imagine you're gazing down into your lower belly,
A place we call Dan Tian.
Dan Tian is the elixir field.
Down below the navel about an inch and a half,
Right in the center.
Just notice how this feels to gaze down into your Dan Tian.
You can imagine a star shining in your Dan Tian or a golden red sun.
This is a way of returning your spiritual energy to your body.
Reclaiming all of the pieces of yourself that you've scattered throughout the stories of the day.
Bringing that light back into your body,
Back into your home.
Just breathe with that sense of inward observation or Nei Guan.
Looking within.
There's an old saying that the ten thousand thoughts become one thought.
This is really meditation.
It's not that there's no thought.
Because then we create more turmoil and we create more thoughts trying to push away the thoughts that are coming in.
But this idea that the ten thousand thoughts become one thought.
That one thought is your practice in the moment.
So from this place of looking within.
Imagine the sunlight surrounding your body.
Feel the warmth and light of the sun surrounding you.
Just thinking about it is good enough.
As you inhale,
Imagine the sunlight entering all the pores of your skin.
Like you're merging with the sunlight,
Merging with the chi.
As you exhale,
All of that sunlight gathers down into the lower belly,
Into the Dantian.
So in that one breath,
There's one thought.
Sunlight surrounding my body,
Entering the pores of my skin as I inhale.
Gathering into the lower belly as I exhale.
So the one thought is the practice.
So whenever you're feeling scattered or lost or alone.
Just take a moment to remember this simple practice.
Find a place where you can sit or stand peacefully,
Even just for a few breaths.
Adjust your body,
Feel the shoulders relaxed,
Back stable like a mountain.
Lifting the tongue to touch the top roof of your mouth.
Relax your eyelids,
Bring your spiritual lights back to your body.
Looking within.
As you inhale,
Imagine the chi-like sunlight surrounding your body.
Entering all the pores of your skin,
Like you're merging with the sunlight.
Breathe out,
Gather all of that light into your lower belly.
Just that one breath can shift your whole perspective of the moment.
Can change your experience of this one whole day.
And if you can do that for one breath,
Then you have a tool.
That one breath is always there for you.
No matter what challenges are coming your way,
No matter what you're working through,
You can always pause and take this breath.
Remember your one root in your body.
The ten thousand thoughts become one thought.
That's it.
You can bring this into your daily life.
You could be doing the dishes.
You can remember.
Take that breath.
Gather that sunlight into your home in the body.
Stabilizing the moment.
Stabilizing the moment.
May your breath become your greatest ally,
Your closest friend.
The first tool you turn to.
When you're feeling stress or anxious,
Breathe.
And let that breath return you to your home within the body.
The home that travels with you no matter where you go.
Your home.
This is your root,
Your life root.
Build your home here.
Let that home be a stable field to help others find their home.
Lao Tzu in the Tao Te Ching says,
If you cultivate the Tao in your body,
It will emerge in your family.
If you cultivate in your family,
It will emerge in your community.
If you cultivate in the community,
It will emerge into your government.
Cultivate in the government,
It emerges in the whole world.
But it all starts in your own body.
Be that stable presence for your own life force,
For your family,
For your community.
Be it.
Breathe it.
Moment by moment,
Day by day.
Wishing you a beautiful week of breath and flow and stability.
Until next we meet.
