Postural Initiation: A Cross-cultural Path to Psycho-spiritual Transformation

Description

This video class on”postural initiation” is a companion piece to my Substack article on this topic. The class begins with a lecture on the importance of (and sacred doorway of)  posture in  cross-cultural spiritual traditions such as Buddhism, Native America, Shamanism, the Greek Mystery Tradition, Taoism etc. The major focus is on the role of postural initiation in the Chinese internal arts tradition.

I discuss aspects of my forty year initiation process with various Qigong Masters, including my Sifu Master Fong Ha. Carrying forth the thesis of my Substack article, that Qigong can be practiced as more than a health exercise and even more then as a spiritual practice, the class shows how postures have four dimensions of purpose: Self healing, spiritual unfoldment, self defense and changing one’s life stance psychologically. The emphasis is on how in our stillness in Standing meditation our psychophysiological blockages emerge to be transformed. So each posture initiates us into (and out of)  journey to our underworld. 

Following the controversial thesis that Nagaboshi Tomio presents in his book Bodhisattva Warriors—  that in early Buddhist training, postures were used to work through kleshas (destructive mental states and obstacles) ) we put the emphasis on the phenomenology of posture as a teacher and psychospiritual tool.

Some specifics of what you’ll be introduced to:

• Practices from the Bodymind Healing Qigong Extended Short Form practiced from the perspective of a psychospiritual initiation.
• Learn how each  posture in Tai Chi/Qigong has four dimensions of purpose: Self-healing, spiritual unfoldment, self defense and changing one’s life stance psychologically.
• How does stillness provide a pathway to shape-shifting into essential elements of healing your imbalances. 
• Standing meditation Qigong  as an initiation into “no-thingness.” Is “no thingness” everything? 
• Be initiated into the Standing like a Tree (zhang zhuang) practice to develop rootedness and relaxed aliveness (fongsung).
• Fongsung: The secret Chinese pathway of finding a combined relaxation and energy at the same time.
• Transform your posture from being a straight line into a being  ball of energy.
• Learn how to sacralize body sensations that arise in your practice to provide a pathway to divine energy states.
• Posture as a gateway to being initiated into how yielding is not collapsing.
• Discover the Taoist healing  experience of “less is more.” Movements gradually  become smaller until they are nearly imperceptible, creating an experience of  movement within stillness.
• Learn a wounded healers Qigong prayer which may become part of your every day practice.
• Posture is not posture — it’s an entryway to wuji (the mother of chi). How does sound, imagery, breath, and movement connected to stillness come from posture? What self-healing, spiritual unfoldment, self defense abilities, and psychological transformation can come from your life stance?
• Standing Meditation: What do you Stand for? (Mayer, 2004). Learn how your life stance comes from your posture and how your intention (Yi) guides your chi. Discover how your stance can become a starlight meditation that can enhance your becoming “the star you are.” 
• Be introduced to  stances and movements to cultivate  the energies of the  five elements (fire, earth, metal, water wood) and their correlation in Chinese medicine to tonifying the internal organs.
• Fixed posture and the circle that arises from stillness. Finding stillness in movement and movement in stillness.
• The Yi Chuan Qigong postural initiation tradition. Cultivating intention through no intention—  just being still, standing and walking meditation as an integral whole, how animal forms of qigong (and finding your primordial self)  are enhanced through postures of stillness.
• Experience the esoteric dimensions of postural initiation, i.e. doorway to the mysterium tremendum.