Apr 242017
 

Dante Inferno

I’ve read Dante’s Inferno, en el mezzo del camino… but, in my opinion, he had always gotten one thing wrong and that was that hell wasn’t spinning.

Until recently I would have described Hell as {insert here the details} but it is spinning, constantly spinning, everything is going around and around and there is a constant sense of both being completely disoriented and nausea, the two working together to keep the participant rolling in crashing wave after crashing wave of physical and mental agony.
Until recently I would get dizzy after running in a circle twice while chasing my 3yr old teacher; with that dizziness would come the beginnings of nausea and that cold sweat and the sense of being overwhelmed by discomfort.  So it is with joy and great surprise that I find myself whirling and spinning on the spot, each morning, for 10 minutes at a time!  As I observe the contents of my room passing by me over and over and faster and faster until blurring speeds, and as I stay aware of my breath and my posture and my turning feet I am constantly and repeatedly amazed at what is happening.  How can this be?  And simply: WOW!

This feels like a door that had always been locked shut and kept in the shadows has been unlocked and brought into the light.  I’m excited to open it and explore.

Dec 172015
 

Screen Shot 2015-12-12 at 12.08.11 PMI want to focus on showcasing the brain structures in relation to the brain’s Ventricular System.  In this series of posts and videos I will be considering the Ventricular System to be the main central landmark of the brain and showing the various brain structures in relation to it.
Here is the Medulla Oblongata, the first brain structure one encounters when passing upward through the foramen magnum.

 

Dec 112015
 
Screen Shot 2015-12-10 at 4.26.35 PM

Screen Shot 2015-12-10 at 4.26.35 PMSpent part of today playing with colors and textures for representing the different parts of the brain.  Particularly working on the tentorium cerebelli and the cerebellum.  I may make the ventricles more water-like too.

What do you think?

Dec 102015
 
Screen Shot 2015-12-09 at 5.50.24 PM

The more I thought about this jump that I have made from showcasing individual bones to showcasing the ventricular system the more it makes sense in terms of my larger goal of dissecting the body and presenting the relationship between bones and brain (and spirit).

You see, I had thought I would transition next to the sections of the brain that are in closest contact to a particular bone such as the Sphenoid and thus progressively work my way inwards; this is generally how brain anatomy has been taught (to me).  However, the brain is an extremely complex structure not just in function but also in form.  Studying brain anatomy is a huge field of research and we have still much to understand.  So I feel that, as is the case with learning your way around a new city, we need to start by the main landmarks.  We have the walls of the city, those are the bones, those are a key landmark now the city itself is made up of grocery stores and the city hall and the post office and the individual living houses AND running through the city is its waterway.  It seems to me that it makes much more sense to give directions to someone based upon the internal landmarks rather than the city walls.

“The grocery store is 50 meters north from the 4th cistern”.
“From the main gate follow the stream south and you will first pass by the bathhouse then you will come to the city hall and afterwards you will see the church on your right”.

For when we are studying or living in the city we can quickly forget about those all-important containing walls but we never forget where the closest water-source is.

And as such I have completed the video on the Ventricular System and completely justified myself to myself as to why my innate intelligence chose to showcase the Ventricular System next. :)

Enjoy!

My invitation is that you watch this video and that you practice closing your eyes from time to time, maybe pausing the video at key moments, and take into your mind’s eye the image of this waterway that exists within you.  Continue this practice until you have a good sense of the shape of this waterway and until you can sit in meditation posture and replay the video within your mind’s eye.
Once you have accomplished that major milestone then allow yourself to feel the sensations arising from the Ventricular System within you.  For some it may be helpful to relate this system to an area of your brain that is spacious and flowing, thus feeling the flowing nature of the ventricular system.

In my next post I will expand upon the Ventricular System to highlight a few other key aspects of its shape.

Blessings.

Dec 022015
 

I’ve been focusing on the ventricular system this week. 0350

What a fascinating and beautiful system it is. 0839

Deep within our brains.  1436This system is sometimes discussed as being a thing in itself and sometimes referred to as the gap in between things.

2011So curious.

2967It is easiest to focus on what we can see and touch but then to focus on the spaces in between and notice that they are no less important.

3996In meditating on the ventricular system we meditate on the spaces in between.
Some meditations are focused on the bones, feeling into the shape of your frontal bone and sensing the sensations that exist in that area.  Frontal bones, temporal bones, sphenoid bones are akin to trees and sand banks.  For the ventricular system we are sensing into the rivers and streams that run between those trees and those sand banks; the waters that touch one tree and then flow to the next and the next and the next.

Message-carrying waters, and cleaning waters.

Nov 302015
 
0909
Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita
mi ritrovai per una selva oscura,
che la diritta via era smarrita.
 
Midway upon the journey of our life
I found myself within a forest dark,
For the right path had been lost.
- Dante (of course)
0759 0909 1026
In the middle is the journey.  Sitting between the apparent beginning and the apparent end.  And though they too carry importance, those stagnant tips of the the rope, it is in the middle that.
Making the ends transparent we peer into the middle where we get lost and lose all hope of return.
Nov 162015
 

I have just posted a new video (made a year ago) when I started some explorations into showing the Beauchene representation of the skull.  A Beauchene skull is also known as an Exploded Skull and it is one in which all the bones have been separated from each other.  This is an amazing feat to accomplish using real bones and pins and screws and wires; much easier when using model bones.

From Craniophiles.wordpress.com https://craniophiles.wordpress.com/tag/beauchene/

 

I’ve been fascinated with beauchene skulls since I found out about them in 2007 or so.  After making these meditation videos for several years I began to envision a meditation that would show the skull coming apart. At about the same time I was reading Eliade Mircea’s “Shamanism” and was impressed by how in some shamanic traditions the initiate dies and is taken apart, all bones separated, and then put back together again. I found this a powerful image and wanted to recreate some that through videos.

This is an initial meditation towards that goal.

Enjoy: