It's been a long time since I've written anything in this particular blog. I'm not sure why. I've been writing journals centering around my spiritual life but none of it made its way in here. I think I may remedy that.

    Here is what I've been into lately. :-)

    This is from my journal this morning. I was still in a malaise/funk from my practice the day before, dealing with the emotional cleansing that the Kunlun had started.

    6-20-08 – My most significant tarot reading – the one that went well into the future – still sticks in my mind. Everything has been happening as it said it would. After the seminar and after a brief burst of Kunlun enthusiasm, I fell back into my regular habits, started losing touch with the reality of the energy and its feeling, and now everything is pretty much back to normal, so much so that yesterday even while practicing I hit a point where I just stopped and found myself staring at the floor. Suddenly I recalled an old picture of myself as a child sitting by a giant tree with some random white object in my hand, my head hanging down and to the right, staring at the wet ground, waiting for something to happen. I was now in the exact same position in front of my altar. I actually paused after I realized it so I could take in the feeling and remember it. It was like empty space, a void I've always wanted to fill or always waited for someone else to notice.

    After that I decided to work on my heart, and I had one of my most emotional experiences so far. Mostly I've been laughing and yelling and speaking in tongues. Well, yesterday I started to whimper and wale. It's like there's a catch in my heart, something my mind skips over with every breath and won't acknowledge. Something released it just a little bit this time, and I felt myself open up in ways I haven't felt before. My voice was different, like I was pleading with my mother. I didn't cry but it felt like my body was weeping. I'm starting to realize how much hidden stuff is in there. We go along day after day making inner conceptions of ourselves, defining and redefining ourselves, picking ourselves apart, psychoanalyzing ourselves, getting to the “core” of things, and we think we're actually healing when we're really just adding mental layers to our already muddled self-conceptions. There's dark shit in there and I'm glad to feel it finally. I'm glad I'm realizing just how wounded I am.

~~~~

    Today, however, I decided to throw everything to the wind. Surrender surrender surrender. That's what this is all about. I can't complain internally about not being "taken" by the energy if I still hold up these huge walls in my mind or about my body. What if I fall in the floor? What if this space is too cramped? What if the neighbors hear me and think I'm dying or having sex? Forget all that. This is my practice. Deal with it. (Of course I'm speaking to myself, not the neighbors, really.)

    And let me tell you! Talk about being "taken" by the energy. I think I've finally learned "focus" on surrender, if that makes any sense whatsoever. By that I just mean that surrender has become the theme of my practicing and what must be done to truly feel the energy, to truly heal, to truly experience what I want and need to experience.

    I had images spinning through my head like crazy. I was twisted around toward my fish tank -- which I now realize is probably to a good thing to practice next to -- and twisted around from one side to the other from my waist. I almost fell off my chair. I howled. I moaned. I felt the energy so strongly all around, I was actually moving it at times. And I realized the difference between opening and closing your eyes while practicing.

    I used my obsidian sphere to pull out negative energies. It always changes the experience so much. At one point I held it in the palms of my hands(it's huge) and activated the Kunlun energy. It was very strong, grounded because of the obsidian, and eventually I pushed it down near my root chakra. The quality of the experience changed. I made a strange face I've never made before -- it reminded me of my very intense friend, J, an Aquarius with too much Scorpio in his chart -- and I really felt I was activating and clearing and cleaning my root chakra to the max. I felt incredibly balanced, as if for the first time I was embodying all that was male and all that was female in me. I felt for the first time both halves of my body in perfect alignment expressing perfect power.

    The funnest part came after practice, after I had talked to R. and agreed to go out with him and his coworkers for lunch. I was already feeling not quite like myself -- but somehow more like myself than ever -- and the strangest thing happened in the bathroom. I sprayed my hair with hairspray a few times and suddenly I felt a tingling sensation in my crown chakra. I thought, playfully, Oh, no. What do you want now? As I thought this my crown blasted open and a huge current of Kunlun energy washed down over me, and I was lifted up as if by a tractor beam toward the ceiling. I grabbed the doorway and started breathing heavily. I laughed a little, thinking it was all over, and then I walked into the bedroom. It happened again and I started writhing in ecstasy and fell to my knees, put my hands in the prayer position, and let this energy do what it had to do with me. It lasted for some time. I felt special somehow, like I was being acknowledged as beautiful. (I don't know exactly where that notion came from.) I was tearfully thankful until it ended.

    After that the smallest things would set me off into bliss-shock. Putting on my shirt was difficult because the feeling of the cloth against my skin was so blissful. Looking at myself in the mirror sent me into a fit of laughter. Touching my car keys made my soul wanna come. I think I may now know the meaning of the Lust card.

    What follows is a transcript of a recording I made yesterday after being absolutely pounded flat by shamanesses in the Kunlun line. I opened some door and they drove a tractor through it. But it was a good tractor. Anyway, the text doesn't do justice to how intense this experience was, so if any of my friends out there want to hear it, I will certainly let you. Be warned it's a little terrifying and sounds like I'm either having a seisure or getting a really good blow job. In fact it was much better than either. ;-)

    Where I use the marker (GASP!) here, I'm actually gasping in the middle of saying the word that precedes the (GASP!) marker.  On the recording it sounds very sexual in nature, as I said.  In fact it was not sexual in nature; the energy was very intense and clear, very spiritual, feminine, and comforting, but so intense that I couldn't control it to speak at times. Oftentimes when I would imagine one of the visualizations I had seen, I would get another jolt of spiritual energy and that would cause me to gasp in the middle of a word again. Try to think of the (GASP!) marker as a wordgasm. ;-)

    Some of the words are omitted to protect the innocent. (The only innocent being me.) Remember you can hear the recording if you want, and please bare with the transcript for a while because it is worth it. It just takes a bit to get going. Thanks, guys.


(VOICE SOUNDS TIRED, LOW, SLOW AND LABRORED)
    Oh, goodness.  5:45 PM, June 25th.  No, fourth.  (PAUSE)   I didn't mean to get ___.  And I practiced a lot of Kunlun today.  Had some very intense experiences.  Feeling kind of mala -- a kind of malaise about the practice, even though it was quite extraordinary.  I'm not sure why.  I guess it's because I have to deal with everyday things as well, and it's difficult for me to integrate the two. 

    But (I) did get ___ because (I) got ___ for B.  And S. always wants to ___, so I was packing a ___ before I knew what was going on.  Then he left.  And I felt like I should energize the ___. (What he left.)  And I also think his lighter is here.  So I started to. (Energize his items.)

(Here's where the recording get interesting.)
    Had an interesting set of visual (GASP!) Oh, God -- visualizations, very powerful(VOICE HIGHER, FULLER) very balanced women, umm -- very symmetrical (GASP!)(GASP!) Long black hair!  Hah.  And she's in the Kunlun position.  (GASP!)  And her left hand is just a very -- thin! (GASP!) Small! (GASP!)  Powerful! (GASP!) Ah (GASP!) hah.  About the size of a marble. (GASP!) Blinding white light.  (HEAVY BREATHING)

    Oh. (SIGH)  And the same on her (GASP!) -- her right hand, above -- whoa.  Oh, geez.  Excuse me.  One moment.  (Sharp in breath)(GASP!)  Whoa. Kay.  Focus, focus, focus. 

(SIGH)(LONG PAUSE)  Obsidian.  Obsidian Aka Dua. (Here I started generating the Obsidian Aka Dua because it's incredibly grounding.)

    (GASP!)  Obsidian.  (LONG PAUSE)(VOICE NORMAL)  Anyway, same visualization over and over.  (GASP!)  The more I think about it, the more cartoony she becomes, but she was very -- powerful!  She's still very powerful, obviously.  You can tell from this crazy recording.  I hope it's recording.  I really do.  If it's not I'll be very upset.  Hello? (LOUD)  Oh, thank God.  (SIGH)

    Okay.  Whew.  And just kept getting that visualization over and over and had some interesting experiences.  Did one position -- wait a second.  I did the five elements Qigong before I did the cleansing of the ___ -- in front of my obsidian sphere, I might add -- and it was very interesting, but then I just started getting lost in the stoniness and I stopped.  Then I went over to cleanse the ___.  And then all the other visualizations started happening.

 Then I was hit by -- wait, no.  The first position, I saw Max do it at the seminar.  I can't remember why.  It doesn't feel right in my hands right now.  But this is -- I'm pretty sure what was -- what it looks like.  It was just hands folded except for middle and ring finger on both hands touching, flat, you know what I mean?  And the -- like this, if I'm right-handed, then my left hand's pinkie is on the bottom, and my right hand's thumb is over the left crossing it.  And the middle and index fingers are touching flatly.

    And I think there was some mention of a sword, and it was -- I don't know, I guess the bliss is raised (GASP!) And it's all the way up to the (GASP!) -- crown chakra, and he kind of used it as a sword.  Not in a -- yang kind of way, but it's just suddenly -- (GASP!) -- in the middle of the air and it just heavily falls down with absolutely no effort. 

    And, you know, that took me a couple places and raised my energy and everything and then I was hit by something.  I felt kind of like it was overload, and so I was kind of pushed back into the chair, into the couch, by the rainbow crochet blanket, and fell back and felt very grounded and good even though my Dantian was burning a little bit and -- felt -- well, actually I ate a very very very spicy lunch.  And that's been hurting.  Oops.  Finish this later.

(At this point Russell was walking in the door and I had to get my whits about me and greet him. You have no idea how difficult that was. Because I was still being opened and bombarded with energy, I told him that I had been doing some very intense energy work and I was still being blasted with a lot of energy, so beware.)

This is the pertinent journal entry after this amazing experience.

THE BEGINNING:

6-28-08 – I had an amazing practice with Nick the other day. I had gone down to Escondido to visit my mother and pick up an old hard drive from her computer. Nick and I had tentatively scheduled that I would come over afterwards. I thought it somehow appropriate that I was seeing my mother – whom I never ever see – on the first day I was going to practice Kunlun with another person. I was more excited about the practice initially, but my mother and I seemed to be getting on quite well. I taught her a few things on the computer, and we decided to go get sushi for lunch, which used to be out “thing.”

THE QUESTION:

We went out and spent a lot more time together than I expected, and I was completely unprepared for a big question she hasn't dared to ask me since I left home. She said, “So, what do you believe?” I said, somewhat smugly, “I believe a lot of things, mom.” I knew that wouldn't suffice and my mind raced for something to say about what I “believe” that wouldn't completely freak her out. I told her I believed in cycles, in a somewhat altered version of reincarnation. I was skirting around the fact that I do believe in the permanence of consciousness and the soul.

We didn't get too deep, but that was enough for both of us, I think, to simply open a dialog. When it comes to change, everything has to happen very slowly for her, and it was a huge step to actually open herself enough to ask me what I believe. A few years ago if I had tried to tell her, she would have said she didn't want to hear and walked into her room and cried. We cried a little as we said goodbye. It was purging. No bawling, just gentle weeping and a warm flow of love and a mutual understanding that we don't really understand each other's spirituality. I felt good about it.

THE JOURNEY:

I suppose it was the opening of that particular emotional channel that set me off on a tirade of anger and meanness as I drove all the way toward Encinitas in classic San Diego traffic. I was bitchy. I was driving fine, but everyone and everything was pissing me off. It also didn't help that I couldn't get a hold of Nick; his phone wasn't accepting calls and I didn't remember which exit to take to get to his house or even if he was in the same house as the last time I was there. I was texting him while driving, asking him to find a payphone to call me because he couldn't make calls either. I took one exit and drove a long while before I decided it was completely wrong. I tried two exits down and figured it would be just my luck that it was probably the one I passed. But it looked familiar. I drove around and got passed on the right by angry San Diegan speed demons and honked at by a truck that didn't know how to use his brakes down hill. I was in a bad mood. Gas is expensive. I probably wasn't going to find Nick's house, or if I did he probably wouldn't be there.

I found the house eventually and I didn't see Nick's car. There was a foreboding truck in front of it and it didn't look exactly the way I remembered on the outside, so I figured he had moved. I called and called but wasn't brave enough to knock. I sent texts, I sent IMs. Finally, despondent and drained, I messaged him saying I would be at the meditation gardens by the SRF temple. I began my search, and just as I was nearing Yogananda's old stomping grounds, Nick messaged me back on AIM(on my phone) and said, What? I'm here! Come back! etc., etc. And, Did you knock, silly? I was still perturbed but realized that I couldn't stay mad if we were going to practice now; I really did want to practice with him and... well, it's just impossible to stay mad at that boy. And deep deep down I truly knew that all this perturbation and disruption of my recent cheery mood was happening for a reason. I told Nick he owed me one, and he said okay, but then we talked some and he agreed it was probably the Kunlun throwing me off my rockers so we could have some great openings today. I felt better almost immediately.

THE PRACTICE:

His roommate was leaving at the very moment I arrived, so if I had gotten there earlier we would have had to wait until she left to really start. Damn universe. We lit incense and he laid out a large crystal grid between two chairs facing each other with my giant red obsidian sphere in the very middle. We put on various types of music in a play list. I wasn't really sure how to start. Do we “direct” the energy to each other? Is there some special mindset I need to have for this? I didn't know what to expect. We relaxed and breathed for a while, and then we just started opening up.

Almost instantly I could feel the energy physically between us, pushing and pulling. The balance was incredible. I'd start coughing and he'd start laughing. He'd open something up and my hands would thrash back and forth toward him, expelling more energy. There were times the energy was so strong I felt like my head was going to completely erupt. Several moments for me were very much like a strong spiritual orgasm; that's all I can think of to call them. We both did things we haven't done before. I didn't expect that because he's been practicing so much longer than me. I screamed in ecstasy, he whistled. He did strange “tricks” to me like energizing water and splashing the top of my head with it. I melted. I've never felt the sensual or tactical element of bliss so strongly. Every sensation was intense and beautiful, like I could lose myself in one touch forever. It was extraordinary.

We took breaks in between our sessions. There were times I felt Nick was opening up more than me and experiencing more, and I had just reached a point of resignation. But all I had to do was really let myself go and make it okay. At one point while we were standing up, Nick fell into very intense bliss. I can't remember what set it off. He went down to the floor and started kicking around. I moved his chair out of the way so he could stretch out. He was moving every direction and going crazy for quite a long time. I got a crazy idea and went into his room, grabbed my Native American flute and snuck up behind him and played a fierce loud and low note while flicking my tongue. It sounded kind of like a mini-didgeridoo. That put him in a nice place and we played like that for a while. Eventually he was going so far out of reach I felt I should touch his feet. Then I touched his knees and it grounded him a lot more. Eventually he came to.

THE SPHERE:

I was a little jealous of his “trip” because, apart from not having much space in my apartment to stretch out, I've never fallen on the floor and gone crazy quite like that. I know that's not what it's about, but part of me wants to not have to surrender and just be blown away and lose control. But boy was I in for a surprise. (Continued 6-29-08) We were so generally blissed out that I can't recall exactly when or how we stopped and started again, but we had a few more sessions and I was feeling a little drained and wasn't quite feeling the energy as strongly anymore. It was all mental blockage of course. I was running things through my head, still trying to figure out what this should be, how I should behave, what I should do, etc.

I sat there in my chair looking at Nick for a while. I saw his half-opened eyes and he saw me. He was falling in and out of bliss. I was sort of jealous that he was still open and I was having difficulty. Finally I decided I had to get physically closer to him to connect better. I knelt down in front of him and worked with the energy for a little while. Then spontaneously I felt I should give him the obsidian sphere to hold. I said, “Hey, Nicky. Hold this.” He said, “Oh, no,” but let me plop it into his cupped hands. I stood off to the side in the space where he had been blissing out on the floor for some reason, as if I was just going to stand and watch, when suddenly this huge force with strength I've never imagined grabbed a hold of my lower dantien and hurled me to my knees. I let out a loud cry as I hit the floor, and I was done for. I have never felt so overtaken by any type of energy in my entire life. I shook my hands out as if possessed, I kicked my feet, and howled and moaned, I raised my hands to the sky and shook them, I spoke in tongues, I wailed in ecstasy. I can't recall how long it lasted. Several minutes. I felt the energy deep inside my body, in my muscles, in my organs. I felt absolutely amazing. I had no control over what the energy was doing to me and I didn't want any. It was incredible. At that moment I felt fully immersed in the Kunlun experience with no expectations or questions or whatever. There was no egoic direction like, “Come on now. Are you really feeling that good?” or, “Do you really need to be trashing about so?” I was bliss.

THE RESULT:

From that point on, everything was different. I was laughing a lot more and felt more open to do whatever I wanted or needed. I could have done that before, but... So we played and played and played some more. We got closer and the energy flowing through us together was intense. I moved one way and he moved to balance it out perfectly. Once I was prostrate with my head on the floor in front of him, and I raised my head up slowly, eyes closed, to find he was automatically lowering his head to mine. It was pretty incredible. I suppose it was some kind of bliss tantra, but there wasn't a real sexual component to the bliss we were feeling. Sex would have paled in comparison at that moment.

I had to leave soon after that and get back up north. It was difficult to say it. It was difficult to separate, not in that we were emotionally invested in each other; we were both having our own experiences separately together. I didn't feel all tangled up inside him. Getting off the floor and away from Nick felt funny, like a tree suddenly uprooting itself and skipping about. I was all giggles and bliss after that. And since then it's been so much easier to hone in on that feeling of bliss in anything. Sometimes I'll just brush up against something and the feeling seems to last forever and shocks me into a feeling of giddiness. I can open up to the Kunlun much more quickly, and the practice seems to be balancing out. One arm isn't doing one thing while the other does another. I'm more symmetrical in my movements. My stomach feels different. I'm feeling the energy on a deeper visceral level.

I'm changed forever.