Synergistic Meditative Flows

After several years of experimentation and exploration the “Synergistic Meditative Flows” have been developed. These practices are designed for blossoming enlightenment and magical awareness along three distinct trajectories. The practices are designed to be used together, each one strengthening your capabilities with the others to allow for rapid progress with all of the skills and an opportunity to balance your skills in areas that may be weaker. Each of the main practices focus your consciousness in one of the three specific areas, concentration, bio-energetics, and visualization.

By practicing these exercises together you will be training your consciousness in a very powerful and dynamic manner. The great thing about these practices is that they are useful at whatever level you are operating from. A beginner will gain basic skills in focus, energy and visualization. More advanced practitioners will experience dhyanas, alchemical transformations and relations with the multitudinous facets of higher intelligence with which they interact consciously and unconsciously. Another nice thing about these practices is that they work very well, and very easily produce noticeable changes in awareness, usually with the very first try.

Once you have learned them, you can conduct them easily every day. These practices will also greatly facilitate physical ritual, and become particularly useful in developing group ritual, and will form some of the building blocks of this spiritual organization. Each of the practices begins with a specific bodily gesture that operates both as an anchor into the correct state of awareness but also as an aid in moving your consciousness to the right area of your body for the exercise. This is something significantly missing from the New Hermetics practices other than the basic “meditation anchor.” Gestures and vocalizations are being added much more consistently throughout this revised program.

The first main practice, called “Awareness Flow,” is a basic practice of concentration and insight based in large part on Zen and Vipassana Buddhist meditation techniques. It is probably the simplest meditation in the world to grasp but can take a lifetime to really understand. A basic form of this exercise constitutes the New Hermetics tool “Breath Awareness,” but this practice has improved significantly. The real essence of this practice lies in non-judgmentally experiencing whatever comes up in consciousness as you focus on the physical sensations of the breath. It is about developing both concentration and a flexible objectivity toward both pleasant and unpleasant experiences in consciousness. At times you may experience delightful dhyanas full of bliss and light. At other times you will spend the whole time contending with physical discomfort, boredom, challenging emotions or other distractions. When you can be equally satisfied and interested in either experience from a detached and objective place, focused with reasonable consistency in this present moment then you can consider yourself doing fairly well. The baseline of focus and awareness that becomes a natural part of your consciousness as a result of regular practice will greatly improve your abilities with the other flows, as well as directing your attention in ritual and life in general. You will gain an objectivity and calmness toward everything, while the other practices will keep you from entirely extinguishing your human uniqueness (or your struggle and strife).

The second practice is an energy movement exercise called ‘Bio-Energy Flow” and is based in large part upon the “microcosmic orbit” (lesser heavenly circle) of the Taoists. You will focus and collect energy in your belly cauldron, the area below and behind your belly button. This is often called the lower “dan tien” in Chinese martial arts and meditation. It is also sometimes called the “hara.” In Tantric Buddhism this area is where one builds the fires of “tummo.” If you have a Thoth Tarot deck, take a look at the card called “Art.” You will notice a bubbling cauldron at the bottom of the card. Placing the Tree of Life with Tarot paths on your body, the card would fall squarely on your belly. This area is your alchemical cauldron, heated by digestive fire and fed by the bellows of the breath. In this practice you collect and circulate several energies through your body, breath energy, sex energy, earth energy and cosmic energy, storing each in the cauldron to be further refined and transformed. This practice will grow over time and there are more advanced forms and variations that will be built into the new revised program. The most important part is to follow the sensations in your body along the line of flow. These need not be dramatic sensations. It may just be an awareness of the natural senses in that area. It may be quite a dramatic ecstasy. This is not as important as the focus and movement, and ultimately the depositing of energy in your abdomen. Eventually you will feel sensations in your skull and sinuses like things are moving around as you rotate the energies through you. This is a good indication of progress, but again, less important than focus and awareness. It is important to be genuine with this practice as you want to be sensing and directing internal energies, not just fantasizing. If you do not detect much energy at first, so be it. Focus on what you can feel, and cultivate it, deepen your awareness of it and your influence over it. Over time this will become a greater awareness of flows outside of yourself and the ability to sense and touch other’s energies and to push and pull various forces in the environment

The third practice is based upon Win Wenger’s “image streaming,” and is called “Visionary Flow.” This practice will help you to understand many of the psychological processes that create your sense of self, and the direction of your goals and desires. At a later point this becomes an awareness of patterns and flows of consciousness that shape things far beyond your own consciousness. Patience, perseverance, and objectivity are important in this. Do not get overly caught up in the importance of any of your visions. They are what they are. Simply observe, report, record. You are a scientist in this.

Classes in Synergistic Meditative Flows will eventually be available in your area, but until that time you may download a guided audio instruction recording here.

Meditation classes will form an important “outer court” function as we are creating an esoteric community together. While the Book club will offer “Mind-based” community, the meditation classes will offer a more “Body and Soul-based” community that is still highly informal and requires only a minimal commitment to show up as you will. The specific meditation practice taught at these classes sponsored by the Universal Enlightenment Society will be the “Synergistic Meditative Flows” or one of many variations on the basic theme. This is a very universal meditation system involving several integrated practices that result in some very dynamic changes in consciousness when applied correctly.

This meditation framework/system is really amazing, and I know you will love it. And once you love it, you will probably want to teach fun group classes in it. And teaching it will be a very simple process. These classes will be offered by trained teachers. As these meditation classes will involve qualified and trained teachers who know how to do and teach the practice, this segment of the organization may develop a little slower than Esoteric Book Club. In truth it is a very easy practice once you learn it, and becoming a teacher will not be a huge process.

The main criteria for meditation teachers:

Experience with New Hermetics (preferably having completed a course, but not a strict requirement)

Experience with meditation

Experience facilitating or helping with groups

A friendly personality

We hope to be able to offer some kind of teacher training in several locations in 2010 for people interested in becoming official teachers.

(Anyone who is interested in attending a teacher training should contact me at jason@newhermetics.com to discuss it further. Please also feel free to contact me to find local teachers).

 

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