Article Links To Zen Practice and Hypnotherapy.

Articles on Zen and Hypnotherapy

Hypnotherapy and Zen    Hypnosis is an altered state of consciousness that enables the subject to replace negative thoughts and behaviour patterns with positive ones. It is also a 'tool' to enable a subject to recover lost (repressed) memories that are causing unwanted conditions in life. It is not really different to guided meditation when with a hypnotist, or meditation as practised alone. It often said that all hypnosis is self-hypnosis and therefore mediation.... Read more
Zen: Why Meditate?   Zazen is a form of Zen meditation whose aim it is to empty the mind of all thoughts - although many Zen practitioners would say that zazen is not meditation at all, but more of a process. It is very easy to describe how to do zazen, but it takes commitment to make it work effectively.  Read more
Zen:Balance     If you live your life in a constant state of achieving, you experience 'aliveness'. You become dynamic living in a state of achieving and not so much achievement.  Zen is the journey (achieving) and not the destination as achievement which is past. Read more
Law of Attraction  There is nothing magical or mystical about hypnosis. Hypnosis is persuasion, and to realise any form of success we have to persuade our subconscious mind that the success we aspire to is possible and is as good as manifest. Read more..
When All Is One  Most of us regard mind and body as separate parts of ourselves. But in the east, this is something that is not so. In spiritual disciplines such as Zen and many martial arts such as Ki Aikido, mind and body are considered one and these disciplines eventually lead to the realisation that All is one, and that nothing is really separate. Read more..      
The Art of Zazen (Zen Meditation)  Zen Meditation emphasises focusing on the breathing. This is because, in the East, breathing is considered to be the source of life. Zazen utilises breathing meditation and is one of the most powerful forms of meditation. Read more
Looking At Awareness  You can put your awareness wherever you want to. In your left foot, at the top of your head and so on. But you cannot define exactly what awareness is. It can't be your thoughts because you can become aware of your thoughts and re-direct them. It can't be your feelings because you can become aware and change them, if you know how.  Read more...
Zazen: A Personal Experience    Zen is certainly not for everyone. It's rewards are hard-won, and almost possible to define with words, yet words are all we have to communicate across the internet. Zen communicates through experiential practices. Read more
Chakras Chakras are vortexes of energy that are located in positions throughout the body. If you can accept the reality of energy  - and who cannot - you can accept the reality of chakras.  Read more
How to Meditate on Chakras    This is my way  of doing meditation on chakras – there will no doubt, be other methods, but I invite you drop all preconceptions about chakra development, and especially not to blindly believe in what I am saying here, but to go through this exercise and experience for yourself. Read more
Hara:One Point in the Lower Abdomen      Back in the 1980s, I attended a martial art class in Ki-Aikido and this was the first time I ever learned of the value of what our Sensei (teacher) called, ‘the one point in the lower abdomen’. Read more
Phobias & Fears    For some people, trying to ignore or wish away some phobias or  trying to ‘hypnotise’ them away can make them worse, especially if accompanied by panic attacks. Read more.
Power of Acceptance   The majority of clients who I dealt with as a therapist were suffering as a result of a severe "inner critic". Symptoms can range from severe phobias to deep depression. The resolution lies in the power of acceptance, for if we resist an unwanted experience, we may seem to be rid of it, but in most cases it is suppressed. Read more
Power of Commitment      Commitment has power.  To exercise commitment means to exercise integrity, which, in turn means to take control of your life.... Your Destiny... Read more
Power of Forgiveness   On that rare, but profound experience when Self and others can be experienced as one, the invitation for forgiveness crops up. Misfortune visits us all sometime during life and most of us seem to add even more weight to our burden through the process of blame. Read more.
Zen Eating and Dieting   Being a Zen practitioner and hypnotherapist, I supported my clients with an entirely different approach – the daily practice zazen (a form of sitting Zen meditation), to gain a higher state of awareness using this Zen method not to hypnotise, but to awaken them into a higher state of body and feeling awareness. Read More
Zen Reading  In my experience, reading books, when coupled with zazen (Zen meditation), creates a "pathway" that begins to penetrate through the barriers put up by (some would say subconscious) mind that lead ultimately to spiritual enlightenment. Read more

A Master

A Master...

And this is it. Trust. Total trust.  And you can choose!

Life can be a master;  a stone on the ground can be a master - a butterfly...

Trust that there is something to learn. Sorrow of some loss, can be a master. Fear of that sorrow, even though there is nothing discernible to fear right now, can also be a master.

You get "what ifs"?  Any one can be your master. Or if you constantly have them... "Ah but, what if this, what if that?"  This could be useful - many masters!

Trust... In order to fly, his life circumstances
demanded that he had to take the leap of faith

The prerequisite though is that you accept totally and just witness it, and it will be the master.. And if you cannot, you are aware that you cannot accept it, and you are still in desire. So just desire (some object or goal) and know that desire totally to its core until it is no more.

Irrelevant Zen!

That is where I am. That is what I am. Imaginary It has to be I am in my mind, as my mind.... .All is imaginary.

Whether that is true or not is irrelevant. So I seek truth, but need to drop the seeking.

 So one thinks he has discovered something that is true. So what? If God is there, or God is not there -- so what? He is there to the degree he is not!

It's always been the way it is, and always will be the way it is... but will be?  What am I saying?

Knowing it intellectually is irrelevant! Believing it is irrelevant. Knowing it experientially is profound and then... irrelevant if one begins to believe!

The aphids strip the plant of its life-force.... It is natural.

Zen Waiting

Waiting is an art of acceptance of being in the now, just waiting for the moment of...

Any time..

Always waiting, and paradoxically, creating that art of waiting will bring us to the here and now. We have arrived where we always were, are now..

Always....

Words, as one would say when visiting a Zen garden, are useless, and so we approach Zen with silence, and live Zen silently, yet here I am writing of it...

How else can I possibly convey my Zen? It is so paradoxical.  It is so wonderful....

Leaving one speechless, and if fortune smiles for a moment...

Zen leaves one thoughtless, without thought, without mind.

So how can we speak of it?

Waiting... Wait and see...

Thunderbolt..

Mind loves to have so many labels.  If you can understand something, you can feel a little more comfortable. Get it into a nutshell and say, "Ah, this is it. That's why…!"  All reasonable and the mind seeks out reasonableness constantly. It is reasonable to "fix things!" and the mind wants everything fixed… right now! The uncertainty of... What if this? What if that? This is beyond the comfort zone.  Being is uncertain without our labels, and living life as if it is certain is the mind's trick.  But having lived life, one can look back and say " it is certain", simply because it has happened already - we know it well, as it is in our memory, even if it is embellished for our comfort.

But right now, something may go very wrong, it can be as if a thunderbolt has hit us.  We feel helpless. We may search and search for a resolution, but there is nothing we can do - or so it feels… This thunderbolt, the shock, is always the worst ever!

Just the very essence of the shock itself may not provide a fix, may not provide an answer.  No cure! And we may be desperate!  But a "dark night" has come and there is no other option other than to go through it. If here we focus on its essence, we may realize that there is no getting better, but there will come a point when it really doesn't matter. This could be the point of transcending mind and realizing spirit, our essence of being but again no certainty other than the way it is.  We can go where we come from and we've been there before - it's our awareness. Awareness is always certain.

The one thing that we can "do" in such an impasse is to drop our doing and just be. Even though rationally there is no choice, there is!  We can choose it to be the way it is. To walk through it.. Let the shock of this thunderbolt into awareness more and more.  It may be a valuable wake-up call!  Or not! For there is no certainty - if we look closer we may get to see that it actually lights the way!

At one time, there was "I am not" it cannot be grasped by the mind though. Then there was a time when there was "I am". Both "I am" and "I am not" depend on each other. Not aware of I and aware of I.  We create one and we create the other just as white is created by black. To see this, often involves the realization of a thunderbolt.

Letting go, from where we were has led to where we are. Letting go from where we are now, takes us further. Letting go of now.. That's now..  Understand? It is so whether or not...

Dropping Lessons..

Dropping the "lessons" from all great masters we look in the here and now where "I-am" exists and teaches experientially, not through words whether they be one's own or others..  Be aware and drop judgement. Is that possible? Inquire and see.

For instance anger...  Examine it closely. Anger at self? Forgive! Accept it as so and work with it, not reacting or trying to obliterate it, but witnessing it. Then work with the essence of forgiveness. Forgiveness is is totally abstract because it is not a "doing" thing. They say it is a verb, to forgive? But it is not done! It is felt, experienced. It is realized, sometimes suddenly one can say, "Ah yes... It is OK now", whatever it is.

Anything... Anything at all that is "wrong", will release with forgiveness, no matter what mistake it is.  So can we quit judging as either trivial or important!

If  we can just see that everything has it's value and it is of value to examine anger - self anger, guilt that releases on forgiveness.  For all is self even another. If I am wrong, or you are wrong - judge it to be so and "wrongness" manifests and feeds on judgement.

Sounds And Silence

In zazen, the sounds come to me from without. A bird call, a creak from the building, the sound of my breathing.  Who is it that is receiving these sounds?

There has to be a space into which the sounds can flow. That space is the silence. The stillness. The context of all contexts. The emptiness into which the sounds will flows.

Expanding consciousness can see the soundless emptiness that contains all sounds that come and go. Accepted in this way, all sound is transformational, so open up to the sound, whatever it may be. Zazen is not about shutting out anything, but accepting it, embracing it fully. It is not about bliss or angst, but the silent emptiness in the centre of all - no-thing, mu, shunyata,  breathing. The space that contains all the sounds.. I am.

See the sound enter the space of I-am. Silence now. Just a moment.. Silence