The Awakening of Intelligence
The Buddha, is simply the Enlightened One, or the Awakened One -- with the implication that most people are asleep all their lives, while going through the motions of ritualized behaviors so that most people cannot tell the difference. The exceptions, are the Adepts -- those who are at least aware that some aren’t, and can be awakened to function at a higher level.
The presumption in most societies is that we are functioning at our best -- or that there is no difference between functioning at our worst and at our best -- that there are no differences, and nothing makes a difference. We even see that there are organizations dedicated to blurring every distinction, and banning discrimination of differences, as though that were the supreme attainment, the enlightened state of being.
The problem with modern Buddhism, and particularly the study of it in academic and intellectual circles, is that it has become largely about words -- rather than practices, so that one thinks he is enlightened because he knows the words, rather than the being of them -- the practice, the actuality, and the fulfillment.
Previously on this site, I had discussed the One-Minute Workout, which importantly shifts the focus of the conditioning practice from the heart to the brain. It is pointed out that physical exercise should be of greatest benefit to the most important organ of the human body, which is the brain -- that regulates all other functioning in the body. That is the critical path of which optimal functioning is impossible if ignored.
Once the flow of circulation to the the brain is enhanced first thing upon awakening each morning, the functioning of that individual in everything one does, is greatly enhanced -- beyond mere trying without that practice -- as the single most important moment one can devote to such heightened awareness and functioning.
The usual manner of thinking is to believe that the only way to enhance mental functioning is with purely mental exercises -- as in thought, without recognizing (as is difficult for academics and intellectuals to realize), that the greatest part of the functioning of the brain is beyond thought. Thought is maybe 5% of brain function -- and that which is beyond conceptualizing as thoughts and words, we can simply call attention and awareness. With that simple state of awareness, the brain is hardwired to function -- beyond our conscious efforts, because that is what it has evolved to do -- not just in humans but in every form of life with a brain.
When there is an alternation of the full muscle contraction with the full muscle relaxation, it specifically and greatly enhances a pulse or flow of blood, oxygen, neuromuscular impulses towards the area of such focused movement -- by accelerating the flow back towards the heart, thereby clearing space for the new.
The paradox for this necessary process, is that one cannot fill a cup that is already filled -- but it must first be emptied. Such an empty mind is therefore fresh to learn everything new -- and see things it never saw before even though they were there all along.
posted by Mike Hu @ 12:30 PM
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Many people, if not most people -- stumble through the day trying to wake up from the Twilight Zone -- to have a moment of clarity in which they are all there, up to speed, fully functioning. There are many subcultures that make morning practices essential to their lifestyle -- morning prayers, morning meditations, morning postures, morning exercises, etc. In modern contemporary life, we generally don’t attend to a systematic process of waking up -- but rush headlong into the trauma of another chaotic day, feeling always a step behind, wishing we could take back the opportunity we missed, then talking about it while the present moment passes by unnoticed and unattended.
There are small sects of people, usually living in cloisters who do such devotionals immediately upon waking -- or soon after, but they too, don’t integrate the movement into the consciousness. And then everything they do further separates them from the totality -- so their entire being is this longing for wholeness and integration with the great Oneness. Why should we fragment reality in the first place -- just so we can make it a high attainment after a life of monumental striving and discipline?
That specialization and fragmentation of comprehension was a dominant theme of life in the 20th century -- of assembly line work, specialization and identity. It was the “mass” everything -- including mass, or class identity. We were either labor or management -- owner or consumer, but never all. We were always the part -- and so became partisans, as our greatest fulfillment -- rather than all of intelligence and consciousness. And that really is the solution to many of the problems resulting from the divisive partisan and partial solutions of the 20th century.
The divisions blur -- and those most rigid in their insistence that the divisions must be sharp and inviolable, have the greatest difficulty adapting to the new world consciousness as a whole. One is no longer simply black or white -- but black and white, and everything else in the spectrum. So it is a dying of the age of partisanship -- and more partisanship -- to that beyond all partisanship. More fragmentation and more partisanship doesn’t get one to the wholeness of reality -- each part struggling against every other part, and in that manner, nullifying each other‘s energies and efforts.
One has to solve it wholly from the very beginning. Later on is too late -- after all the damage that could have been avoided, is done. Then there is no need for the therapist, the problem-solvers, the solutions. Things are as they should be.
The problems are mainly the conditioning to seeing life as a necessary problem (evil) -- rather than a wonderful opportunity already working out.
The Zen people have this practice of "zazen," -- which is just sitting, in meditation, sometimes for hours, in an uncomfortable position that somehow is supposed to produce elightenment if one can transcend the pain and discomfort.
One can attain a fairly high degree of clarity just resting in the the One-Minute Workout posture after completing the One-Minute Workout -- and surprisingly enjoy that timeless bliss before recalling that it's time to get on with the rest of the day.
A lot of people spend a lot of time, energy and money trying to achieve that sensation of "letting go," and beginning with a fresh mind, eager to live a day that's never been lived before.
This position is also invaluable for those with back pain -- which movement towards the extremity of the spinal column releases tension.
One of the major problems of working out the major muscles in isolation is that there is no natural expression at the extremities of the head, hands and feet -- which are the outlets for energy and power released in the body. Those forces get trapped in the major structures of the musculoskeletal system -- because they're not made primarily for movement but for support of the movement occurring at the fine neuromusculature.
In this way, often the result of a conditioning program is that it produces injuries rather than eliminating them -- as proper movement does/should. So what forces even successful trainees to abandon their training is that injuries force them to. Obviously, something is wrong with that kind of conditioning -- preventing it from being a sustainable lifelong practice. Yet that is far and large the end result of bad conditioning practices -- for which one is often advised to work through the pain!
Eventually this kind of brutal conditioning discipline have to be given up by even the world's greatest athletes -- as the sole objective seems to be inflicting pain and injury upon themselves -- resulting in the very common occurrence of formerly great athletes not doing anything anymore -- because their whole condtioning experience has been of this sort overkill or nothing.
So it is a surprising revelation of how little it takes to produce fairly dramatic results and productivity with intelligently designed movement.
In athletics, this position is called "the tuck" -- making the body as compact as possible. The lesson for people with too much body mass (fat) is that practicing the tuck, is learning how to make the body smaller and to appear smaller. To make the body smaller, is also the function of muscular contraction (to make smaller).
One of the misfortunate aspects of using the heart muscle as the focus of conditioning instruction, is that the heart is the only muscle in the body that doesn't need to be instructed to make a full contraction or full relaxation because it has to operate in that fashion.
The voluntary muscles of the body,however, have to be trained to achieve full contraction and full relaxation -- which most fitness instruction totally ignores. But that is the most crucial understanding and instruction to learn/teach -- which most exercise instruction doesn't have the competency to explain.
They will simply quote the totally arbitrary target heart rate as an indication of their credentials that certify them to be "experts."
But even among the most knowledgeable in the field, what many presume to be the limits of full contraction and full relaxation of the muscle, may not be the ultimate limits of that expression. For example, many think that simply bending the arm works the bicep, while a tenfold more powerful contraction occurs once the arm is already bent fully and then the upper arm is lifted so that the elbow points toward the ceiling.
To which exercise marketers I have pointed this out to then ask, "What kind of machine can we build that does that?" Obviously, one doesn't need to build a machine that does that; the body does that -- and any machine will limit/restrict the body's ability to do that!
"But," they will counter, "shouldn't we build a machine to produce even greater resistance, to be even more effective?" Now think about this: the contraction one can attain is ten times more forceful than the previous contraction they could attain using their old movement -- even with great resistance.
More is not the answer to a better movement. A better movement obviates the need for more.
The importance of knowing what a full muscle contraction is -- is that with that knowledge, it is possible to effect an instantaneous transformation in one’s “shape” (condition) -- if the muscles are conditioned to perform that function, as a focused, primary task. And for most people in this day and age, the muscles are free to do whatever physical tasks want them to do -- since otherwise, the sedentary contemporary life dictates no prior, specific demands. One can run if one wants to -- but that is not a requirement for obtaining optimal health and condition.
As a muscle contracts, the insertion (far end from the heart) moves towards the origin (near end to the heart), which in turn, connects to the insertion, of the supporting muscle. When a muscle contracts, it creates high pressure by contracting volume, accelerating the movement of fluid that tends to cause bloating in the body when stagnant, and what most people regard as the permanent state of fat, rather than recognizing it as a very temporary, fluid state.
In injuries, one is advised to compress that area by wrapping in elastic bandages to reduce swelling. Not only will such compression reduce the swelling in the immediate area of injury, but will also reduce the volume of the unaffected areas that are wrapped incidentally. Thus, treatments such as body wraps, work not because of the aromatic herbs used in that process, but mainly for that simple law of physics -- that increasing pressure reduces volume.
As people age, skin also loses its elasticity (compressive quality) that provides this kind of pressure. Nylon stockings and support hose work for this same reason -- of not only improving circulation but improving the appearance by slimming down the area it is worn. Massage therapists attain their increased feeling of well-being and actual improvement in being, by simple manual pressure in directing the fluids (bloat) back toward the heart, and thus, the purifying organs of excretion.
All these matters are not addressed in the usual “burn more calories” advice of so-called, self-proclaimed experts, who largely still propagate and perpetuate the “old P.E. wives tales” of conventional wisdom. Reporters recognize that those they interview on such matters don’t seem to have a very scientific basis for their understanding and so rather than consult with these “experts” again, proclaim themselves the experts -- rather than searching for, and being able to recognize the real authorities on such matters.
That is the age-old quest of the relentlessly inquiring student searching out the real masters of their art and discipline of interest. Now we have organizations that proclaim that study as their “turf,” and determines and certifies the experts -- who have paid them the appropriate fees and gone through their indoctrination. And so education has many people who aren’t great teachers -- while the professional trade association, attest they have properly “paid their dues.”
Among the reporters, investigators and writer/editors, many have learned nothing more than how to fake their knowledge to seem credible, rather than actually being so. It is quite common for whole publications/organizations to have nobody on their staff who authentically is an expert on anything other than pretending to be so. They all manage to fool one another -- since nobody can tell the difference.
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