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Emotional Healing

Qiu Li Hui

A friend from Lapis Lazuli Light recently gave me a book “Emotional Balance: The Path to Inner Peace and Harmony” by Dr Roy Martina. I found it very beneficial and would like to share some of the book’s information with all of you.

Emotion is the strongest path to healing power, in the body-mind connection. Emotions are not only intrinsically connected to the central nervous and endocrine systems they are also deeply linked to our thought patterns and physical health. Emotions also represent the flow of energy along specific meridians in the body, focusing on seven energy or chakra centers. Exploring emotions as kinetic energy can cure physiological diseases and relieve stress.

The author analyses three levels of happiness. The first level is competitive happiness. When we win or are ahead of others, we feel happy. However, this competitive type of happiness is always temporary.

The following is an ancient story from India, depicting the limitations of this form of happiness:

One day, God sent an angel to a businessman and said: “From now on, any of your desires can be achieved but it is subject to a condition”. The businessman asked: “What condition?” The reply was: “No matter what you get, your opponent will get double.” Initially, the businessman was depressed and then he began to plan what he can do. After contemplating for a few minutes, he told the angel: “I know what I want. Please blind me in one eye!”

The second level is conditional happiness. We often link pleasure with specific external conditions. For example, when we were young, good-looking and our friends identified with us, we were very happy, but once the symptoms of old age set in, we felt depressed and defeated.

Conditional happiness never lasts because conditions always change. When that happens, we become unhappy.

The third level is unconditional happiness. Unconditional happiness is perfect bliss. We don’t need outside energy or stimulus to feel happy or at peace. We live unconditionally, gladly accepting both discomfort and pleasure and are not attached to the outcomes. We are grateful for all the blessings and experiences that we have along the way.

But ordinary people like us are influenced by past experiences. We are drawn by the stored habitual reactions, the so-called “bad habits”.

The author says: “Bad habits” are stored in the form of electromagnetic resonance in the body; they may be latent (inactive) but when stimulated by the same electromagnetic signals, they will be activated. All our experiences are stored in the unconscious or subconscious mind.

One of the reasons why we return to earth was to reexperience karma. For this reason, many of the conflicts happening in this life are the result of unfinished lessons in the past lives. Our life goal is to set aside old patterns that cause us to deviate from the ultimate goal to reach the realm of unconditional love and live in the present without prejudice and judgment.

Every moment of our experience gives us the opportunity to really live in the moment. It allows us to make our choices based on the highest values and not from past scars. This is the only reason why we want to experience inner trauma and turmoil. But once we let go of the old patterns, we will no longer be attracted to the same situation and our energy will no longer be consumed.

When we are still in the spirit world, the cellular memory is stored us. At that time, we decide on the purpose for coming to this material dimension, the earth. Also we decide what we need to learn in order to achieve the energy of pure love.

The purpose is to release the unnecessary pains and suffering created due to lack of understanding of our true selves and to discover our true potential. Our souls and hearts need to be nourished through love and compassion. This is the method for healing the soul and experiencing the ultimate existence.

If our inner beings are often consumed by fear, anger, jealousy, sadness and other emotions, it will hinder us from experiencing our feelings of love, happiness and peace.

The author says: “The inner part that you are not aware of can be observed outside the body. The outside world is a reflection of your inner world, like a mirror; everything in the outside world is caused by the generation of your inner thoughts. As a result, you become more alert and whatever you are alerted to, you can control. But whatever is concealed will control you.”

How can we harmonise energy and emotion?

The author says that there are two basic principles, integration and release. Integration means to accept feelings or sensations without emotions involved. In other words, we accept and recognize our own particular feelings and clearly (and deliberately) receive messages from the subconscious mind.

Then we can no longer be infected by others› emotional virus (or have resonance with the internal negative energy) such as anxiety, paranoia, fear, worry, low selfevaluation, sadness, frustration and doubt.

Release means a clear understanding of this message and let it go. Through letting go we are able to take responsibility.

In the book, the author mentions seven steps of emotional healing.

After you relax and go into inner reality, replace the negative emotions with positive emotions. Let these positive emotions go into every cell in the body. Visualise positive emotions flowing throughout the body, like a bright light illuminating every single cell.

    1. Firstly, please say: “I accept and deeply love myself.”
      Deeply inhale and exhale → Focus on the base chakra: tenacity 
    2. “I ask God* to please help me find the origin of this feeling (or way of thinking), however long ago it may have been and help me heal completely.”
      Deeply inhale and exhale → focus on the reproductive chakra: enjoy.
    3. “I allow myself to dwell in every part and aspect within me so as to help me heal the initial incident, however long ago it may have happened. I fully accept and love the intention of that incident.”
      Deeply inhale and exhale → focus on the solar plexus chakra: acceptance and letting go.
    4. “Through God’s* love, I forgive myself for excluding myself and others because of incorrect beliefs, thoughts, emotions and cognition. I forgive the people, matter and things associated with these past experiences and release all the sentiments behind all the reasoning or beliefs and thoroughly be healed of all that was related to past events.”
      Deeply inhale and exhale → focus on the heart chakra: peace and forgiveness.
    5. “Now, I use the unconditional love and blessings of God* to let go and release myself from feelings or views that are associated with the past. I choose_______ (positive emotion or belief) as a substitute. Every cell in my body accepts (insert the positive emotion) this feeling.
      Deeply inhale and exhale → focus on the throat chakra: true self-expression.
    6. “I now allow myself in a relaxed and peaceful manner to let go of the physiological, emotional, mental and spiritual discomfort or any of its associated attitude, behaviour or feelings. Continue to do so.”
      Deeply inhale and exhale → focus on the third-eye chakra: self-understanding.
    7. “I thank God* for all the help. I express my love and gratitude to Him. I accept and am worthy of God’s blessings and love.”
      Deeply inhale and exhale → focus on the crown chakra: universal love.

The author also introduces some other methods of releasing negative emotions, such as massaging specific acupoints. A lot of these acupoints are similar to those that Dr Lai taught. Dr Lai taught tapping acupoints, coupled with recognition and transformation of feelings and saying affirmations of self-acceptance and love. These not only release previously blocked energy but also generate reacceptance and love for oneself. I personally feel that it is very effective. For specific practices, please refer to the article “向恐懼、憎恨、悲傷的情感說再見” in the May 2005 Issue of Taiwan Lapis Magazine (in Chinese).

The author also mentions in the book about imprinting positive messages into the subconscious mind. Dr Lai had taught not only positive affirmations but also some actions that I find very useful. That is why, in January 2008, I shared this in the Taiwan workshop “You Can Change The Future”.

For those who are interested, please contact Lapis Lazuli Light.

*Editor’s note : “God” is used to replace “angels” or “spiritual guides” or “Creator” used in the original text.

The original Chinese article is published in the Feb 2012 issue of Lapis magazine and is accessible online at: http://www.lapislazuli.org/tw/index.php?p=20120207.html

Freedom from Glasses A Natural Vision Improvement Approach

Meir Schneider PhD, L.M.T.

Vision is a gift from nature. As many people experience visual deterioration, they accept it as a natural part of life; just like getting wrinkles, white hair, or becoming bald (if you are a Jewish man in his sixties like me). I invite you to challenge this assumption. Why have we evolved into a people who are so advanced, but cannot see as well as our ancestors? What has happened? Just imagine if our prehistoric cavemen ancestors needed glasses. As you read, I hope to unveil the truth about vision and what’s going on behind the lenses of the 75% of our adult population that wears them.

Today, people over a certain age are simply expected not to see well closeup. Oftentimes, when someone over the age of forty has their vision tested, the doctor will say, “What do you expect? You’re not twenty; your close vision is deteriorating.” They are then diagnosed with farsightedness, or presbyopia. When vision begins to worsen, reading glasses are immediately prescribed, leading to a stronger prescription year after year. Thinking nothing of it, they accept their fate and move on, until the next annual appointment; however, it does not have to be so.

Denise, a 72-year-old woman, has been doing my natural vision improvement eye exercises for many years. When she was asked by her eye doctor to read a test sheet, she could read the smallest print! He did not seem happy for her, but rather frustrated, stating, “How can a 72-year-old not need glasses?” Isn’t she the “right age to have them?” Aren’t people supposed to have arthritis because they are 50? Back pain because they are 25? Heart problems at 60? In the therapeutic massage world, we argue against this. We believe that people may tend to become stiff in their forties, but both arthritis and back pain can be prevented through movement, stretches, and massage. Unfortunately, the majority of people believe that the eyes and vision can never improve and only get worse with age. Why is it that we are so quick to assume farsightedness is inevitable?

Why Vision Declines

There are many reasons why vision may decline, from constant use of smartphones to restricted blood flow to the eyes as a result of tight neck muscles. Muscles have a tendency to become weaker around the age of forty; that is why it is important to exercise when we are younger, so that they will be fit later in life. In my sixties, I can testify that I am as fit as a twentyyear-old because of the exercises I have done. I can swim in a cold ocean and run for miles. If I had reached my age having sat in a chair my whole life, I would probably be arthritic. The same holds true for the eyes. In particular, presbyopia comes from stiffness of the lens and weakness of the muscles surrounding it (the ciliary muscles). These muscles allow us to view objects at varying distances. Just like other muscles in our body, exercising the eye muscles when we’re young can help preserve their strength over time.

I do not believe our vision declines due to the inherent fact of aging. Our modern lifestyles are drastically different than those of our ancestors and this leads to many vision problems. Today, we constantly look at things up close while reading, writing, and looking at computers. Consequently, we are putting our visual systems under assault. When we look up close, our ciliary muscles become convex so that our lens can function as a magnifying glass. When we look into the distance, they are stretched and the lens becomes flat, held by the suspensory ligament. Humans used to spend a lot of time looking far away; our existence depended on it. Farmers needed to look at cloud patterns to predict rain or drought, and hunters needed to look far to track game; as a result, their ciliary muscles were stretched often. When we do not look into the distance, we keep the ciliary muscles contracted, leading to continual stress and eventual weakness.

Secondly, we rarely engage our peripheral vision; we have little reason to. In the past, if we walked through the jungle and ignored our periphery, animals would eat us. Today, we can afford to ignore it. When looking at the computer, you look straight ahead without engaging your periphery. As long as there is no threat of a saber-toothed tiger, why bother? But, neglecting our peripheral vision leads to stress on our central vision, leading to eye weakness and farsightedness over time.

Our central peripheral vision is also very important. This is the part of our vision that helps us locate objects in a vast area before narrowing our focus on a visual target. For example, when you look through a telescope, you must first locate the object with your free eye in the broader sky before focusing the telescope on a smaller field. Or, when you read words on a page, you easily track them and the spaces between them. In doing so, you are using your central periphery. A strong central periphery helps to gain visual strength and clarity.

How Can “Natural Vision Improvement” Help?

Glasses may be used to cover the symptoms of strained vision and weak eye muscles, but that does not change the process of visual weakening; it only enables it, just as using a wheelchair will not make your legs stronger. As massage therapists know, when muscles are overworked, they can become weak. For modern people, there is no muscle more exhausted or overexerted than the ciliary muscles. Thus, to preserve our vision and prevent the onset of farsightedness as we age, we must find ways to stretch and relax these muscles. Natural Vision Improvement Therapy can help us do just that. With a few exercises, we can prevent the deterioration of vision. You can learn more about my natural vision improvement exercises later in this issue where I will explain a few to try at home.

A great way to relax the eyes and stretch the lens is to make it a point to look into the distance. When you stare at the computer for long periods of time, take breaks every twenty minutes to look at something far away. It takes a nearsighted eye about a minute and a half to adjust, and a farsighted eye about a minute, so if you look into the distance for 4 minutes, it will guarantee that your muscles are stretched and relaxed. In addition, when you are looking into the distance, wave your hands to the side of your head so they are only visible in your peripheral vision. Stimulating your periphery reduces strain on your central vision.

Make sure that when you are looking at your computer, do so with a soft gaze, and blinking gently and frequently. Also, enlarge the font so that you can see it without your glasses. For example, if it’s hard for you to read letters in font size 10, but you can read them comfortably in size 12, enlarge them so that you can read comfortably until you do more eye exercises and your vision becomes sharper.

There are also several lifestyle modifications that can be made to reduce dependence on reading glasses. If your close vision is just beginning to change, try to postpone wearing reading glasses as long as you can. If you already use them, try to wear them as little as possible. One way to do this is to read in the strong light of the sun. When we read in bright light, our pupils contract, and this helps to compensate for the weakness of the ciliary muscles. Using your pupillary strength, rather than your ciliary muscles, should help you read with less fatigue.

When you go to restaurants or other places that insist on using dim lighting for the sake of romance—which I’ve never understood since I prefer to see the face of the person I’m speaking with—try shining a small light on your menu so you can read it without your glasses. You can also have your date read it to you.

So, if you already wear reading glasses, I will not tell you to get rid of them abruptly. I realize that if you ask people to do what they don’t want to do, they might not listen to you. I would encourage you to read in the sunlight without glasses as much as possible, or read larger print independently of your glasses, so your prescription does not continue to increase.

 

Start Your Journey Now…

I have provided a few tools with which you can reduce or eliminate the need for glasses, but, ultimately, the work is yours. I overcame childhood blindness resulting from cataracts at birth and unsuccessful surgery. You can definitely overcome farsightedness. Through the practice of natural vision improvement exercises, you can help combat the myth that your vision will only get worse. Moreover, you can also help prevent cataracts, which I strongly believe results from the stiffness of the lens throughout the years. So why not take the time to relax your eyes? Why not preserve your vision? You can revolutionize your life if you do!

 

Meir Schneider, PhD, L.M.T. (www.self-healing.org), developed a holistic approach for prevention and rehabilitation of degenerative health conditions. He is the founder of the non-profit, School For Self-Healing in San Francisco and author of “Vision For Life: 10 Steps To Natural Vision Improvement”.

Crystal Singing Bowl

Zhaorui Lian

In August 2012, I took part in activities conducted by Dr Lai in Crestone. She invited Leigh Ann, a sound healer, to teach us and I experienced her ingenious use of crystal singing bowl acoustics that resonate with our deep memories. Many students were amazed by this wonderful journey.

Leigh Ann Phillips was interviewed by KASA TV (Fox) – New Mexico Style Show. She is a sound-healing practitioner, an award-winning singer and songwriter. She believes that music is not only an art but it can also bring health, peace and hope.

Through her work in sound healing, she travelled globally. She runs a sound healing retreat centre and is also responsible for The Shimmering Sounds Foundation, a nonprofit organisation, dedicated to bringing sound healing to the masses.

Ann has developed a method, using different singing bowls, to shift and slow the brain states. This lets people relax and also release emotional blocks causing diseases in the body. She incorporates singing bowls, tuning forks, harps, herbal medicine, piano and her voice for healing. Her singing bowls allow sound vibrations to go deeper. Through these healing methods, she hopes to help people lead more fulfilling lives in healthier bodies.

I live in Silicon Valley, USA, and nearly all my friends are high-tech professionals who usually work under high pressure. So, I invited Leigh Ann to Silicon Valley to give a sound healing workshop. During the workshop, Leigh Ann said that life, in fact, does not have to be planned very clearly and carefully. By doing so, it forces the constant use of the left brain, preventing relaxation.

Vibration of the singing bowl connects to our deep consciousness and allows emotional release of trauma. The special sonic frequency resonate with the cells in our body and healing occurs. During classes, Leigh Ann sometimes dances, accompanied by her wonderful songs. Once, many students had a very special magical experience and almost all of them were very joyful and relaxed at the end of class – as if they just had a massage without skin contact. It was a really wonderful journey of soul massage.

I observed that students with total trust, without haughtiness and without many specific expectations had a deeper and indescribable experience.

I hope that everyone will have the opportunity to have a blessed journey with Leigh Ann’s Singing Bowls.

NOTE: Interview of Leigh Ann Phillip can be view at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0WkIRskYHP8.

The original Chinese article is published in the Nov 2012 issue of Lapis magazine and is accessible online at:
http://www.lapislazuli.org/tw/index.php?p=20121104.html

Brain States and Consciousness

Leigh Ann Phillips

The brain is a great mystery. The number of neurons or brain cells in the human brain outnumbers the number of stars in the known universe. That statement conjures up a compelling and complex number of possibilities.

Music and sound have been proven scientifically to shift the consciousness of the brain. It has taken me years of doing music to really understand how music affects people. It is very easy to come to this understanding when you are standing up in front of an audience and playing music for the sole purpose of moving an audience.

Even Johann Sebastian Bach in his heyday was using music to help people relax and shift consciousness. He was hired by the Russian envoy Count Kaiserling to write music that would help his insomnia.

Bach composed the Goldberg Variations, named after Kaiserling’s harpsichordist, Johann Gottleib Goldberg. Years later it would be proven that largo musical movements (very slow movements) increase alpha activity in the brain. Alpha brain waves bring a relaxed state of awareness to the body. Alpha waves are very important, for if someone cannot bring their body to an alpha state, they cannot get to the deeper and slower brain wave levels in the body where rest and rejuvenation can occur.

Sound and Science

Within the scope of sound research, another science was born. Psychoneuroimmunology is the study of how consciousness and emotions affect the immune system. There have been many scientists who have done significant research on sound, and many of these people will be listed in the resource section of my website (under construction). Because of this research, doctors, hospitals, therapists and laypersons are using the technology of psychoacoustics all over the world. I feel that understanding the brain states is significant to understanding this science. Research shows that sound can positively affect our emotions, can increase intelligence, decrease stress, enhance problem solving and increase wellness. All of this is very possible. If we can open our perceptual box and begin to perceive the world in ways our mind has not been able to do before, our world shifts dramatically. Opportunities that could not have been seen, are seen. Ideas are born. Emotional blockages are released, and happiness and gratitude become more accessible.

Brain state is based on a cycle per second, or hertz system. Just imagine being on a pier by the ocean and seeing the waves come in and out. If you look at the top of one wave to the top of the next wave, that would be one cycle. We could then count how many waves there would be in one minute. But when you are dealing with electromagnetic pulsations, they happen so quickly that we have to deal in cycles per second instead of minutes.

Neurons and the Flow of Information

The brain cell itself has three parts to it: the dendrite, the soma body, and the axon. The dendrite receives incoming information from other brain cells (neurons) and passes it on to the soma body. The soma body takes in the information and integrates it, and then sends it on to the axon. The axon then sends it across the synapse to the dendrite of the next neuron. That process of receiving information and then sending it on creates an electromagnetic field that pulses. If you have ever been in a house and experienced a power surge and seen a light bulb get brighter and then dimmer when the power surge is over, this is a similar experience to what happens to the electromagnetic field in the brain. EEGs measure these fields of electromagnetic fields of groups of neurons or brain cells. This is what really allows us to look at different brain states.

The language of brain states is deciphered by a kind of measurement called an EEG, or electroencephalogram. This measures the electromagnetic fields produced by the neocortex, that surface area of the brain that is right underneath the skull. These electromagnetic wave fields pulse at different rates. Some pulse slowly, some medium, some fast and some super fast.

Levels of Consciousness

The slowest level of activity in the brain is called Delta. It is associated with sleep, ranging from .5 to 4 cycles per second. There is a lack of conscious awareness. People that are in a coma are usually registered at less than .5 hertz.

The next level is Theta. This is a very interesting state, being the state of visions and dreams. When someone is in theta, they have no awareness of the external world. What is lucidly real is your internal experience. This is a very important state in terms of developing brain potential. The range of theta is from 4 to 8 cycles per second.

The next brain state is the threshold between being aware of the external and internal worlds. This is called Alpha, ranging from 8 to 13 or 14 cycles per second. This is a significant state because one is relaxed but still is aware of the external world. This is an important state in stress management and also athletic performance. Professional athletes sometimes call this “the zone”, where they can watch themselves from a place of deep relaxation.

Alpha and Theta are very, very significant for someone doing sound healing or music therapy because pure sound without language can stimulate trance-like states of body and mind. Tom Kenyon refers to these brain states as the “magic window” because inner transformations can happen during these states, where self-healing and/or a psychological breakthrough can happen.

EEG readings above 14 HZ are in the Beta range. This includes K-complex, Gamma, Super-high and Ultra-high Beta. There is a high state of awareness of the external environment in Beta, ranging up to 150 HZ.

Perception and Perspective

It is important to remember we are never in just one brain state. Different EEG patterns can occur simultaneously in different parts of the brain.

These different brain states serve very different functions, and give us very different perspectives of perception.

Neurologically, science has shown us that you can have ten people in the same room, but those ten people will have ten completely different perceptions of what is taking place. There are a number of different reasons why people may have such varying perceptions, but we know that both the number of neurological networks that are in the brain and the presence of emotional blockages can greatly affect perception. This is connected to the fact that humans have two very different brains.

 

Left Brain, Right Brain

The left brain coordinates the right side of the body, and the right brain coordinates the left side of the body. Science used to think that they were diametrically opposite, and that there was no interconnection, but now we know that the whole brain is involved with the act of perception. The left brain takes in sight and sound and allows us to understand language, and allows us to speak language. This hemisphere of the brain is logical, looks for sequence and is very analytical.

Fiery Dancers The right side of the brain does not speak. It has impressions. The right side tends to look for paradox, novelty and has more to do with the intuitive part of us that does not speak. Science has shown that this area of the brain becomes very enlivened when it hears sound and music. Research shows that when the right brain hears sound and music without language, it gets activated. In observing PET scans, which can be used to measure the glucose consumption of the brain, you can see a lot of activity when the right hemisphere hears sound. If we just exposed the brain to words, only the left side of the brain would light up. If we have music with lyrics, both sides of the brain become activated.

If someone were used to using only their left brain to perceive, they would be looking at the world through the screen of order, logic and sequence. If some event occurred that did not fall into one of these categories (because it leaned toward paradox or novelty), they might dismiss a potential opportunity because it did not fit into their expectations. Every day we make choices, and there could be opportunities we could be missing because either events do not have enough logic or order for us to recognize the potential of the situation, or we are not comfortable with something so perceptually “new” to recognize the possibilities within our grasp. When we use whole brain processing, our potential can become a reality.

There is a beautiful story of an inner-city teacher that had a class of students that not only all graduated from high school, but most of them went on to college and became successful, when most other students in that school did not have a high rate of success. The board of education was so impressed by this teacher, that they visited her to find out her “secret.” When they came to her classroom and asked about her special technique, all she said was, “I just loved them like they were my own.” When she opened a file and saw that there was divorce or drug addiction in the family, she did not add that to her perception of what the potential was for that student. And so those kids were able to meet the perceptual potential that she offered them. It is a wondrous example of how important our perception of other people (and of ourselves) is.

Bridging the Gap

How we biologically can build our perception has to do with the corpus collosum. This is the neural “highway” that literally connects the right and the left hemispheres of the brain. Research has shown no matter what your age or health is, you can build the neural networks in the corpus collosum. Building this band of neural fibers can allow for more creativity, better health, more intelligence and better problem solving. It is really the key.

Both the research and my personal experience indicate that working with pure sound is a joyful and effective way of reaching this goal. The crystal singing bowls are powerful tools for this because of the harmonics and overtones that are created. The incredible sounds emanating from the bowls allow your brain waves to slow down to the alpha, theta and sometimes delta levels where the body can rejuvenate and build those neurological networks AND allow emotional release to occur, so blockages can no longer hinder the person’s goals and dreams. Often people will “psychonavigate” in a sound healing session, visiting the past or future, and releasing old feelings that never had the opportunity to be felt.

The Power of Voice

The other vital sound healing tool is the human voice. I feel it is the medicine of the future. The human voice carries “essentic” waves, which are sound waves activated when we are touched or have an emotion. The voice can match feelings and allow them to be released from a practitioner to a client, and even more directly, any of us can use our own voice from the inside out to resonate with whatever needs movement and needs to be released. Some of the most powerful healing I have experienced was with one person singing and playing one crystal bowl. It is not always comfortable to release old blockages, but the long-term rewards are unquestionably worth it.

This is why I feel it is so important to understand the workings of the brain and mind so that we may expand our potential for growth and happiness. If there are more neurons in our brain than stars in the known universe, that allows for more possibility than we can probably imagine. The more we can imagine, the more we can expand our potential!

 

This article originally appeared on http://www.leighannphillips.com/sound-healing/the-science-of-sound/and is reprinted with permission from the author.

The author would like to acknowledge Tom Kenyon for his book Brain States and his CD series The Ultimate Brain, which are the sources for much of the information on the article.