Dahn Yoga Boston, MassachussettsBoston MA Dahn Yoga Community Blog

Our discussion here concerns Brain Integration. This aspect of BEST works to reunite the diverse processing centers of the brain, reviving dormant connections between thought, emotion, and reasoning and helping vou to discover your true self.

The human brain is the most complex structure we can imagine. Its billions of neurons interweave in countless neural connections, and it is a living, dynamic system. Millions of nerve cells die every day while more are created as a result of new experiences. Though we have made great leaps in our knowledge of the hormonal, electrical, and functional operation of this amazing organ, we are still  light years away from understanding how the physical brain gives rise to self, awareness, and consciousness.

According to a 2006 study conducted at the Yale School of Medicine, the brain uses both digital and analog coding for communications across its expanse. Digital signals, the yes/no option that defines today’s computers in everything from cars to video cameras, are very efficient and were thought to be enough for the brain to do its complicated work. Not so. It turns out that analog signals, which depend on changes in the voltage of the electrical impulses that drive our brains, are also involved. The result is a solution far more subtle and efficient than we ever expected. Our brains are full of surprises, as are we. Your brain gives you the potential to reinvent yourself at any age.

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You may remember the comfort you felt as a child when your mother rubbed your tummy if you weren’t feeling well. As an adult, you can give and receive the same kind of comfort.

Have the person lie down on the floor comfortably. Sit close to the person and place your hands on the abdomen above the navel. Focus on the warmth of your hands and the rhythm of the breath.

With your hands slightly cupped,begin to rock the person gentlv back and forth. With the base of your palm , begin to work in a circular motion around the abdomen.

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Older people with strong emotional intelligence can and should serve as “emotional mentors” to younger people who are struggling to let go of their own emotional baggage. Clearer perspective on emotion also lends older people the vision to become leaders in the community, where decisions must be made based not only on one’s gut feelings, but on everyone’s demonstrated needs. Best of all, this kind of emotional awareness can renew lifelong relationships by allowing you to let go of meaningless grudges and locus on the positive, affirming traits of the people in your life.

Put together longevity and attitude and you get longitude. This kind of longitude may help you become oriented in life, but we are not talking about the lines on a map that let you know how far east or west of some point you are. We are talking about the territory defined by your mental approach to life. When you refresh your brain and break the hold that negative memories have over your emotions, you change your longitude. Finding your longitude is about locating what is most important to you in life and then observing where you are in relation to those things. In other words, you focus on what you value most, not on past disappointments. By choosing to let go of past pain and view life with a more positive, uplifting, joyful attitude, you will increase your longevity. Equally important, you will increase your enjoyment of life. Quantity and quality—for what more could anyone ask?

There are many randomized, controlled studies proving the link between a positive mental state and better health and longer life. One of the most thorough is a study that was published in 2002 in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. The work, completed at Yale University, tracked hundreds of adults over fifty for 23 years. It found that “those who had a positive attitude towards aging lived roughly seven and a half years longer than participants who were dreading reaching their twilight years. The apparent life-extending benefits of a positive attitude remained even after the researchers accounted for other factors that can influence longevity, such as health, gender, and socio-economic status.”

A positive attitude had an even greater effect on health and long life than maintaining low cholesterol or normal blood pressure. Of course, it may be that people with a positive outlook are more likely to take care of their health and suffer less from stress. But we think there is more to it than that. The mind has an extraordinary ability to affect the body, so why should it be any surprise that a diseased mind, riddled by anger, regret, fear, and resentment, should bring on the same disease in the body? In any case, the effects of improving your “longitude” are clear. As you can see. doing so is a conscious choice anyone can make at any time. It is never too late. Seeing the world with greater hope and kindness improves your health, clears your mind, frees your creative brain, and improves the overall quality of your life.

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You’ve probably heard that some people, like old wine, mellow with age. As it turns out, this is true of all of us because of the way our brains age. Researchers have discovered that older people generally have better emotional control and a more positive outlook on life. They theorize that the human brain is designed to shift from a more aggressive, competitive mode in youth to a more cooperative mode in later lite. In the past, this may have been biologically advantageous as older people, no longer of reproductive age, shifted their attention to support of their kin, which indirectly assured survival of their genetic information.

Brain scans have revealed that older people simply process emotions differently, which may account for the improvement in emotional control. In the older people, more areas of the brain are shown to be active during the experience of emotions, especially in response to negative emotional stimuli. This finding suggests that life experience may provide additional brain connections to help neutralize negative emotions more quickly. Overall, older people are healthier mentally than younger people. Incidence of neurosis decreases, and older people are less likely to report feelings of despair and worthlessness.

That being said, mental health is not automatic for older people. In fact, depression is common and the occurrence of suicide is more common among older people than it is among middle-aged people, especially among older men. Just because the older brain is better equipped to deal with negative emotion does not mean it is immune to emotional difficulty. After all, there are many aspects of aging that are difficult to handle, including death of friends, one’s own physical decline, and the sense of aimlessness that can accompany retirement. It is best to prepare yourself with a strategy for emotional well-being in order to make the most of vour brain’s natural wisdom as you age.

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Negative thought patterns spring from memories of unhappy events that you have clung to in your mind. They exert influence on your brain, leading to unproductive habits of thinking, preconceptions, even biases, all of which all have negative effects on health. Brain Refreshing helps you release the traumatic events of the past and clear your mind of burdensome memories. The result is deep emotional and spiritual healing—a renewal of your ability to look at life in a positive, healthful way. Gradually, you erase the negative neural pathways that were deeply dug into your brain like ruts in old roads. You create new highways to courage, inspiration, and serenity. This is very much a renaissance of the mind—a rebirth of the emotional freedom you experienced when you were a child.

If memories from the past do not haunt you, then perhaps the thought of losing your short term memory does. This is indeed a brain skill that declines with age. However, studies have shown that older people greatlv overestimate their short-term memory loss. When you are twenty, misplacing your kevs is absentmindedness; when you are sixty, it is a “senior moment.” On top of that, memory degradation mav be a cultural phenomenon, as young people are becoming less adept with their memory skills than the youth of previous generations, presumably because of the influence of information-storage technology.

Although Brain Refreshing is not specifically about improving memory skill, it can help with memory. It has been clearly documented that stress and negative emotions can get in the way of learning and memory. Stress literally shrinks the hypothalamus, the part of your brain in charge of memory. By freeing yourself from negative emotions and habits, you will be opening your brain to receive and store new information, like throwing away old files in a filing cabinet to make room for new.

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As Ilchi Lee explained in his book , the preceding Young Brain Quiz is not a scientifically designed assessment. Rather it is simply a fun self-assessment that is meant to help you to see your own habits and attitudes more clearly. If you would like to try a scientifically validated test, try the Senior Fitness Test on page 210 of the appendix. It is very easy to do, and through it you can see exactly how you measure up in comparison to other adults your age. It was developed in the process of testing more than seven thousand older adults for strength, balance, and flexibility. Created through the work of Jessie Jones, Ph.D., and her colleagues, it is one of the most widely recognized and commonly utilized methods in the world for determining senior fitness. Test yourself once before you begin BEST training, and then retest after three to six months.

Read books containing tips about Dahn Hak exercises and training.

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Dahn Hak practice articles by Ilchi Lee.

When life energy travels through the meridians, vibration is a natural expression of the body. When internal energy pathways are stimulated by the fresh injection of external energy, they not only expand with force and movement, but also clear away existing blockages. When this occurs for an extended period of time, the body tends to shake and vibrate, much like a curled water hose when channeling a powerful stream of water. This phenomenon is referred to as jin-dong.

Self-Vibration Exercise does not mean waiting around for the body to vibrate on its own. It means that you take the initiative to ignite the vibrating reaction in your own body. There are not any set or pre-determined patterns tor self-vibration. As Ilchi Lee instructs you just let your body go along with the natural rhythm of life.

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Just as the neo-cortex, limbic system, and brain stem have their separate roles and activities, they each have a unique energy-frequency to which they respond. With proper selection of, and control over, the energy frequency, it is possible to stimulate or stabilize different parts of the brain. Generally, the neo-cortex responds more readily to intricate musical pieces with diverse sounds, such as a symphony, while the brain stem responds better to more “primitive,” simple driving beats of ancient Asian or African indigenous music.

Prof. Ilchi Lee writes in his book that light has a calming effect on the neo-cortex and sound has an immediate influence on the emotional control of the limbic system. Vibration in the form of a simple, powerful beat has a very noticeable effect on the brain stem, because the brain stem is the seat of Yullyo, the rhythm of life. When our consciousness is able to penetrate the layers of the neo-cortex and limbic system, and enter into the brain stem, we can meet with the energy of life.

Contemporary humans have a highly developed neo-cortex, to the point of sometimes suppressing healthy activity of the limbic system and the brain stem. The best way to tone down the activity of the neo-cortex and maximize life energy of the brain stem is with a repetitive, continuous rhythm. This is something like falling asleep to the monotonous hum of a car engine. Self-Vibration Exercise uses repetitive rhythmic vibration to tone down activities of the neo-cortex, activate the limbic system, and allow you to meet with the life energy that resides in your brain stem.

Read Books About DahnHak Basics.

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When you yell “Ah,” your chest will ring. “Ah” is the sound that the energy of your heart makes when it is voiced. When your chest feels blocked in Dahn Yoga exercise, place your hands on your chest and shout out “Ah.” You will soon teel the fire energy of your heart flow outward as coolness and balance are restored.

Now, make the sound “Eeh.” Feel the sound “Eeh,” as it circles inside your chest and travels up your spine. This is the sound associated with the stomach. The sound “Ooh” strengthens the lower abdomen, the center of your body mass. The sound “Huh” stimulates the lungs, and the sound “Shee” strengthens the uterus. The sound “Sshh” stimulates the kidneys.

Every sound has its own unique frequency of energy vibration that stimulates the associated internal organ. The sound “Om” has all five elements of energy, stimulating not only the internal organs but also the brain. By concentrating on the pathways of energy vibrations emitted by the sounds, you can feel how the sound vibrates from the brain, spreads through the chest, and fills the whole body, as you are transformed into one giant sound of the cosmos. The best time for Om vibration exercise is at dawn.

Read all about Ilchi Lee the founder of Dahn Hak and Dahn Yoga.

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The benefits of Yoga studio, however, extend well beyound physical health.

Rule One, Revolution vs. Rotation. The Earth rotates on its own axis while revolving around the sun. As in all of these rules, the order of the descriptive terms is crucial. Rotation must not come first, or at the expense of revolution. Likewise, you cannot put your own self-interest in front of the collective good. In this case, if revolution itself stops, the result will be an abrupt halt in rotation. In other words, self-destruction will occur. If the order of the solar system were to break down, the Earth could not exist its own. Individual action that does not add constructively to movement of the whole is bound cause trouble. When our consciousness is in synchronicity with the process of collective revolution, we will judge the desirability of our individual actions by first consulting a standard for collective good, and abide by the rules of harmonious living.

Rule Two, as  Professor Ilchi Lee says Centripetal rs. (As in object rotates around a central axis, the lotxc lli.il [Mills llic object toward the center, keeping it in a stable broil, is t centripetal force. This is basic high school physics. Imagine you are swinging a sling whose pouch contains a rock, above your head. Your arm provides the centripetal force thai keeps the rock from flying off into the air. The rock’s tendency lo My oil at every turn is the centrifugal force. A combination ol the centripetal and centrifugal forces keeps the rock in proper orbit, balanced, potential constructive energy.

Centrifugal force, the individual, must not become stronger than the centripetal force, or community, or it will destroy the balance and the individual will fly oil into oblivion. Centripetal force without its centrifugal counterpart is a mere possibility, without real force. Conversely, centrihig.il lorce without centripetal counterbalance is a destructive ami unbalancing force. Only when balance between the forces is stable is the overall movement of the system similarly stable.

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