Ki Breathing Meditation: Four Basic Principles to Unify Mind and Body
These four principles will facilitate both Attention Training Therapy and Ki Breathing Meditation.
- Relax Completely – The way to approach this is to relax your shoulders.
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Keep One Point – As you relax your shoulders, let your weight fall naturally to a point low in your abdomen.
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Let Your Weight Fall Underside – As you relax your shoulders and relax completely, your weight falls to a point low in your abdomen and to the underside of your arms. If you are sitting, your weight falls under your thighs, feet, and arms.
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Extend Ki – Rather than narrowly focusing inside your mind, breathe out, extending ki infinitely.
Exhalation
Drawing by Hitomi Dames
Breathe out through the mouth, making the whispering sound of “haaaaa” throughout the entire exhale. This will help keep your focus on your breath and let you know your whether your breath is strong and even.
At the end of your exhalation, lean forward from the waist. Though you feel you have breathed all the way out, force out a little more air. Wait a second, then close your mouth.
Inhalation
Drawing by Hitomi Dames
In this same leaning forward position, begin to inhale through the nose.
Through the entire exercise stay relaxed, so you can breathe in through the One Point low in your abdomen. (See Video Below)
As you inhale, gradually rise back up.
Take in a forced last breath and return to your original starting position. Keep your breath in for a few seconds more, then draw yourself up slightly and begin the next exhalation.
Stay relaxed, keep weight low in the abdomen, weight underside. Either one of these affects all three. If you do either one of these principles, it should affect the other two. (See Video Below)
Concentrate on the One Point low in your abdomen. Inhale down to the One Point. (Watch Video Below)
Feel as though you are drawing the universal down into your abdomen. Become one with the universe.
When you inhale, you are taking in the ki energy of the universe. When you exhale you are dispersing Ki infinitely.
You can decrease the time of exhalation and inhalation, but it is important to focus on the One Point low in your abdomen. This is an effective method of calming your mind even as you walk along.
Breathe the Ki of the universe through your body.
Correct Posture
Correct posture is the posture which is the most comfortable, the most stable, and which allows you to move anytime. Correct posture is not the posture that puts a strain on your body. It is the most comfortable and stable posture. Stretching your back upwards, sit up tall, comfortably tall.
Correct posture prevents diseases and other problem conditions.
Ki Breathing is to activate and interchange with the ki of the Universe. Harmony means to interact with the Ki of the Universe. We breathe the ki of the Universe throughout our body.
Ki is the infinite energy which exists among us. It is important to apply Ki in your daily life. The more we spend Ki, the more we receive Ki. We activate our life power through an interchange of our Ki with the Universe.
Use Your Mind Positively
By using our mind positively, our Ki interchanges with the Ki of the Universe.
“If we are interested in making the whole world and all of society brighter, not just ourselves alone, we must individually develop our own plus (positive) attributes and with them attempt to change everything around us to plus (positive).” Koichi Tohei
Watch this video daily until you get the routine down. Then don’t worry about keeping a count of seconds. The main thing is to deeply relax and open your capillaries. If the video helps, keep using it. But you want to be able to Ki Breathe any place, any time.
I find two best times for practice are upon arising and before sleeping, both lying on my back in bed. Mornings get me off to a good start. Before sleeping sets me up for a good nights sleep.
Ki Breathing Meditation on Steroids
I have PTSD. Ki Breathing is essential especially throughout the morning. If I fail to Ki Breathe through much of the morning, I feel miserable. I find myself focusing on all the negatives in my life. But if I can Ki Breathing a few hours in the morning, I feel good – a huge difference in affect. When I breathe in, I breathe in all the way down to my feet. After a while I can feel my feet alive and tingling. I feel healthy and alive physically and mentally.
It is hard to focus on your breath for very long, so each time you realize you are not focusing you return to Ki Breathing. This is why I call it Ki Breathing Meditation. When you keep returning to your breathing it becomes a form of meditation. This is basically what Zen is about, constantly returning to a focus on the breath. And this is the heart of Insight Meditation.
Self-help books that help:
Total Self-Renewal through Attention Therapies and Open Focus
The Open-Focus Brain: Harnessing the Power of Attention to Heal Mind and Body
