My students are always asking for my top ten relaxation technique (s) as the basic relaxation technique seems to change and be different for different people. Students mean it as a joke, but a group of ten related relaxation technique (s) that will lower blood pressure, increase concentration, remove or reduce harmful stress in the body, make the heart lighter, though not in a physical sense (See? You’re getting lighter already,) may be light in and of itself, but shouldn’t be taken lightly.

Though I’m sure prescription drug companies would all love it to be so but the removal of stress and the calming of the soul do not simply occur at the pop of a pill. What happens is numbness, which might look like relaxation of an uncertain kind, but isn’t.. The truth is, you have the best calming device unknown to man with you at all times. It’s your mind, just in case you weren’t sure. And furthermore, you don’t have to travel to Nepal or the Caribbean or the South of France, or anywhere else to use it. That’s your mind I’m speaking about.

Of course, if you can afford to travel to the South of France, that’s your business, and it marks you as a member of the Elite, the Idle Rich or a student, since everybody else is not traveling these days, except in large packs on cruise ships and the like.

The reason that drugs are so willingly resorted to in this culture is that we do not put down our illusions easily. If you’re at your wits’ end about the shortage of rent, meditation seems difficult because the inner voice is screaming HELLO-OH! WHAT ABOUT THE RENT? I’M TALKING TO YOU, DOOFUS! And the body hears all this screaming and tightens up and tightens up and all of a sudden you have high blood pressure if you’re lucky and a paralyzing stroke if you’re not, and there goes a whole bunch of hopes and dreams down the tubes and then... You get the idea.

Let me begin by speaking briefly about illusion. We live in one, but if you’re in need of relaxation you’re a long way from this realization. You may well think that he who dies with the most toys wins, and if that is what you do think, then God help you.

Just remember, if you believe the illusion, that belief will engender a certain type of stress. A whole bunch of people who watch the news as if it is real worried for years about the possibility of nuclear war. Stress. Unrelenting, undiscussable stress.

A second type of stress comes from your childhood, from living with an alcoholic, or having been beaten regularly, severely and whimsically, so you couldn’t actually predict how your assailant would treat you this time. Tonight you’re beaten for saying hello, tomorrow you’re kissed and fawned over for saying the same thing. Uncertainty. Stress. There are other stresses... financial, personal, relationship, job, traffic, threats of war, pestilence, famine, plague. Those damned horsemen went for reinforcements, and they’re outside.

And then there is a tension everyone has and nearly no one can find, and that would be the experience of some trauma from a past life. Don’t believe in past lives, you say. The idea is alluring, but it’s quite impossible you say. The Bible doesn’t cover it you say.

I’ve lost the friendship of two persons I grew up with when I made comments to them about past lives. They’re Christians, you see. One of them remarked that what I had to say was interesting, but ‘as a Christian I do not believe in reincarnation.’

My response was that reincarnation, like gravity, was a fact whether we believed in it or not, and at that moment a cloud passed between us. We have not spoken since. I might have taken some time to explain that reincarnation, though not actually mentioned in the Bible, is there nevertheless.

" Who do they say I am?"

"We thought you were Elijah, come again."

"He came, and you knew him not."

And by this it was clear he was speaking of John the Baptist.

Here’s the point. That exchange is not possible if reincarnation is completely unknown. Think about it. And realize also that in 352 AD, in Antioch, there was a meeting of all the bishops in the East. The meeting was called by the Emperor Constantine to codify the faith, and one of the items of faith specifically excluded was reincarnation.

Only two bishops argued in favor of this item, and they were summarily executed on the Synod floor in front of God and everybody. The result was epiphany. Suddenly, it became clear to the other Bishops that reincarnation was hooey. And ever since, certain Christian sects have been looking for a way to explain what ‘Ye must be born again’ actually means.

The procedures of shamanic technique would not leave you up such a creek.

The second friend is a fine fellow who’s lived a difficult life and played all the cards he was dealt with honor and character. We are walking up a hill together, chatting and he refers to a case of multiple personality I’ve been working with, and he says he has ‘some problems’ with some of the things I’ve been telling my client as I coach her to perform her own exorcism of the demons that possess her. God forbid a shaman should be practicing medicine without a license.

Since the woman is improving as a result, I am overcome by impatience. I tell him he doesn’t know a thing about what I might be telling her, and he certainly doesn’t know what I believe as we have never spoken of it. I tell him that if he wants, we can talk anytime. He bids me a cheery farewell at my gate and we haven’t spoken since. In fairness to him, I didn’t seek him out to convert him. He has the right to believe what he wants. I’d just have hoped he was more in possession of the facts. And he’s an elder of his church, too.

But I digress. I was talking about stress, where it comes from and how to get rid of the harmful aspects of it while still keeping a little reservoir of adrenaline for use in escaping the local lion.

So, here’s a tool. Let’s call it one out of ten. It’s easy, it’s free and I hope it helps.

Sit somewhere quiet. Or lay yourself down. Take some time to listen to the softest sound you can hear. Listen to that sound. Identify it, and then listen for the next softest sound you can hear. Keep doing this until the softest sound you can hear is your heart.

Then:

Imagine the color pink, the soft, fluffy pink one sees at sunset, reflected on the clouds. Imagine that this pink is floating around your body. As you breathe in, the pink is drawn to your nostrils, as you breathe out, the pink is pushed away.

Then:

Breathe deeply, so the pink enters your body and goes to the most stressful place inside. (Eventually, you can wash your whole body with the pink, a quarter at a time, but for now...)

Breathe the pink out, and note that it’s heavier, so it drifts toward the earth and disappears. Fresh pink appears.

Now there’s a count to this, so let’s get that going.

To a count of five, breathe in the pink.

Hold your breath for a count of six, run the pink through your hips, or where ever you are tense.

Breathe out for a count of seven, emptying the lungs.

Hold the breath out for a count of eight while the heavy pink drifts down and away.

Repeat.

And repeat again, in cycles divisible by four. (Eight, twelve, sixteen)

Eight, four times a day once you’re in practice uses up maybe three minutes total. This exercise clears one of the sorts of tension and helps others. Very good results immediately, outstanding results in a month. Enjoy.

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