Hi,

Can anyone recommend materials that relate chakras to endocrine glands, and any research done in that relationship?

I don't know of any research, but a friend of mine wrote this over at Open Enlightenment, and it touches on the endocrine system and a whole lot more: http://openenlightenment.org/?p=326 Enjoy!

Anodea Judith's "Eastern Body, Western Mind".

Thank you both, I read the web thing and I have also read the Judith book some years back. Many attribute chakras to endocrine glands, Judith regards them as nerve ganglions. I find it interesting that, including my own experience, there are definitely centers of feeling in the places where tradition places chakras that must have physiological correlates or causes, whether glands or ganglions. So what is 'feeling energy' in a chakra, or feeling it activate? Is it increased blood flow? Increased or altered hormonal output? Increased or altered nerve activity. All of them?
Often people describe pressure in the third eye, why not see that as a simple increase in blood pressure through those particular tissues in the forehead?
It would not surprise me if these things will be the subject of future brain scanning and blood sampling, if that work hasn't been done yet.
The best drivers are not the best auto mechanics and it's interesting to see people's experiences regardless of how the system works.

Particularly remarkable also is the fact that all these things disappear on attainment of actual freedom! (and that although they seem quite essencial when one has them, their purpose, whichever it might be, seems to be completely unimportant for the good functioning of the mind and body) And I'm pretty sure that the glands/ganglions themselves are still there; maybe they are not activated, or are activated in a different way.

biologyofkundalini.com

love this e-book.

this is one of the latest i read that i found interesting, just found it in my bookmarks.. may or may not be directly relevant though..

http://maya12-21-2012.com/2012forum/chakras-and-meditation/chakras-8-and-up-(advanced-chakra-system)/

Thanks, yes, I've swapped a couple of mails with Jana Dixon previously, interesting project she has.
Has anyone considered that development of the chakras may have a genetic component, that different people will have different endocrine and neurotransmitter profiles and therefore some people are more predisposed to advancement in this area and some not?

Also, if chakras are based on the endocrine glands, forgetting other models of subtle physiology for a while, what would happen if someone gets an adrenal gland transplant - would they have someone else's chakra?

That's a really interesting question you bring up bilbo, nice one. It tends to bring into question the whole chakra theory doesn't it?

As the theory goes, universal energy is drawn in and transformed into matter (organs) via the chakras and subtle layers of the energetic body (an outside-in process). So when a surgeon puts someone else's kidney inside you, what are you actually getting? Just a lump of meat? A complex bit of machinery that functions once connected to your renal nerves, blood vessels, ureters and urethra? A kidney with a fully-functioning chakra attached to it?

Those that claim to be able to see them say that chakras are largely maintained by layers of the mind, mostly unconscious. So presumably if you have received a transplanted kidney you don't get the dead persons 3rd chakra along with it, you just get the kidney - (you get the hardware, not the operating system software). Presumably then what happens is that the kidney hooks into your existing 3rd chakra and runs on that energy. If your 3rd chakra is very messed up, your transplant fails. If it's not too bad, you get a few years out of the new hardware before it also fails. If your 3rd chakra is a total mess, you new hardware fails altogether.

Barbara Brennan is someone who claims to be able to see chakras and all manner of subtle energies around the body. Would be interesting to hear her opinion on this.

What do you reckon?

I reckon you have a career writing some very strange books if you wanted it.

But my thoughts exactly, plus a bit more.
Also science is just beginning to grow organs in the lab, what happens when the transplanted adrenal gland is fresh and lab grown, do you get a fizzy new virgin chakra too?
That could save a whole lot of clearing work, just pop a new one in, like a tyre change.

Even stranger, and I have yet to check on the possibilities, what would happen to transplanted brain tissue? Is it possible to transplant memories, personality traits if those are held in the configuration of the transplanted tissues?
Would then any knowledge of past lives be also transplanted?
If the memories are held in a psychic field, or some such, then would it make a difference to the transplantee who lost the tissue?

I'm familiar with Barbara Brennan's work, but don't know if any of her healings have been really tested or assessed properly, and I have never met anyone face to face who says they have that sort of aura seeing ability. I wouldn't rule out some sort of synesthaesia based on perceptions of people's physical presence, or interaction with an energy field, or just delusion. I don't know. There are some interesting possibilities to interpret these things in terms of already established science, and a lot of interesting work being done.
It's easy for spiritual people to grab on to science and warp it to their beliefs, and it's easy for scientists to be dismissive of things they have not experienced or do not personally value. I've seen claims that dark matter is chi, that the multi dimensions of string theory are the psychic realms etc etc. Some very big assumptions and claims, yet some aspects of spiritual philosophy such as chakras definitely are demonstrable subjectively and have a credible physiological correlate at least, however little studied or misunderstood they are.

I have read about a woman who calimed to have become much smarter after having a kidney transplant. She went from Ricky Lake type tv shows to Marcel Proust over night more or less. The kidneys are key for intelligence and memory in TCM. I have also read about a claim of having gotten some of the memories of the former "owner" of an organ. But as far as I no there are no studies only anecdotal and rare reportings of such things.

As for seeing auras and such, I have several times had contact with powerfull healers that could scan my energy body. One of them was with Santiago Dobles. When I talked to him on the phone the first time he only gave advice and didn`t do anything energetically. Next time I talked to him I suddenly felt like a huge I was going up and down my spine lokking arround and I started buzzing with very pleasurable energy. AFTER I had felt this and before he had mentioned anything about scanning or healing, which was not the purpose of the call only advice, he said I am scanning your spine can you feel it? Very interesting experience. he located one block I already knew well and that other healers had pointed out as well and two blocks I was not aware of but could easily feel when bringing awareness to the area.

When I had a healing with Jim Nance (from springforestqigong) he asked me to tell what was the problem but before I had said much he said he could see what was up and started working my spleen and solar plexus (the Solar plexus was the key imbalance Santiago Dobles also pointed out). It was like a laser was running arround in my body and all the internal colours which I can see very well sterted changing. The splenn became yellow like it is suposed to for the first time. The solar plexus started spinning clockwise in stead of counterclockwise like it had previously and lots more. Chunyi Lin was the same just with a more powerfull laser.

My own teacher can feel or see quite a lot too and has recently started projecting energy to me. I wasen`t aware he could do that or that he felt it was a good idea. No idea why he suddenly started to. I have known him for a couple of years and he never did it before. He can measure stuff like how much energy is in my dan tien (when I had gone celibate for a little while he could feel it). His energy feels like lightning. I have a problem with getting to much energy in my if I meditate and that can happen during massages as well because I relax so much. I sometimes get Chi Nei Tsang massages from him but I never get too much energy in the head during this as he uses his energy to hold my energy down while doing it.

All this has been strange but I opening experiences. Along with the supremely annoying expereince of taking over other peoples bad energy and emotions and involuntary energy exchanges with women (I get cool yin from them and they get hot yang from me) it has changed my view on reality quite a bit. I can also sometimes see energy arround people if they have either very strong energy or are feeling very emotional. Once when a manic depressive friend was having one of his most extreme depressive attacks I could see it just radiating far out from him. But I have never been able to see auras in more detail.

bilbo, according to the theory, your newly grown lab kidney would run on your chakra's software, and so would survive or die according to the health of your existing chakra. So to make the lab organ into a functioning kidney, you'd have to fix what's wrong with your beliefs and attitudes as they relate to issues of autonomy, individuation, will, self-esteem, proactivity and power. Same applies to brain tissue. It's just a bunch of non-functioning neurons until powered by energy in the 6th and 7th chakras. Best 'treatment' for 3rd chakra issues (if you have any) is creating a new belief that people accept you as you are. When you've integrated that, you just automatically do whatever you feel like doing in the moment because you have no concern about what others think of you (social mores go out the window!!). This powers up your individual will big time. Your desires become pure because they're no longer tainted by "I hope I don't look silly doing this". But don't try to be all *spontaneous and carefree* before integrating the belief of acceptance, because it will muck things up. I'm sure you've seen people trying to act spontaneous and carefree, rather than actually being spontaneous and carefree. Cart before the horse!

Remember that the kidney is one of a few different 3rd chakra organs, alongside the liver, pancreas, spleen and so on.

a couple of random stuff i remember

donna eden, a clairvoyant healer says in her book that each chakra has many (7) layers. so there are 7 main chakras and 7 layers. this makes for very distinct flavors of people. for instance, when having sex, because of all those dinstinct energies, there are so many possibilities (she used the example sex, maybe this is when the energy flow is most open)

when my energy is strong, i sometimes feel people like "textures". sort of like that described above. its like each chakra is interconnecting with another's. everything has a texture, a magnetism, attraction or repulsion, resonance or dissonance.

perhaps with organs, the same is true. it isn't only important the health of the person's chakra receiving the implant, but also whose organ s/he was receiving, and if the organ's energy/memories resonated with his chakra, or did not.

(off topic)
they say a nice movie about this stuff is "the eye"

Yes, Donna Eden, another healer who's books I found can be resold for good money on Amazon.
I don't know, Brennan deals with nine auric layers, but Eden only goes with seven. Apparently celestial/alien type beings can twiddle with those higher auras, I think she subcontracts out to the aliens for that.
Barbara Brenna used to be a Phd physicist - universes inside black holes, dark matter, multiple dimensions, parallel universes, entanglement - no wonder she gave it up for something less bizarre.

I think, after practicing reki for a while, that the mind is capable of some really interesting interactions regardless of all the junk that comes along with reiki mythology. It certainly seems possible to train the mind to visualize energy flows and anatomy, but I could not say whether this corresponds to anything real. Good studies are pretty thin on the ground I think.

Yeah the eye is a great movie, the Asian version I saw, anyway.

I think that there must be an awful lot of cues given by our bodies as to it's state of health; colour of skin, posture, sound, smell, voice - a myriad of things. My question is whether a healer with a strong perception of auras is picking up on these things and producing a synaesthetic experience out of normal physical clues, rather than perceiving an energy field per se.
For example looking at the work of Daniel Tammet, an autistic savant who can perform incredible mathematical feats using his synaesthesia in a way markedly different to the slower symbolic process most people use, shows that synaesthesia perceptions can be very powerful tools.
Hmm, I may well send off questions to synaesthesia academics.

I'm quite enjoying your sense of humour there bilbo. On that topic, have you read Eric Pearl's book 'The Reconnection'? Very funny guy, and that's unusual for a healer so i took it as a good omen. Highly recommend it. He goes on about the Akashic records a bit, which I don't understand, however that doesn't detract from the book. He is very "anti-technique" which is right up my alley. He has had hospital research departments look at what he does, and has addressed the UN apparently.

I can't see chakras, nor feel them with my hands. However if I put my hands on someone with a sore body part, and clear my mind, I can feel blobs of *something* pulse through my palm, which the person confirms (ie they can feel it too), usually with a stunned expression on his/her face. It always results in a dramatic reduction in the pain. If I am physically close to people I can often create trance-like phenomena without using any words (eg, lip smacking, fixed gaze, automatic movements).

Well, it's nice that you have such a good effect, but does it mean a prana healing or just suggestion?

I have recently watched a video of a man having a hernia surgery while under hypnosis, witnessed by surgeons from London teaching hospitals. No anaesthetic, just a guy saying relax, relax, relax while he was cut open.

When doing reiki it certainly sometimes seemed like I was feeling more energy at chakra points, but I could not say if that was due to suggestion, or simply the posture I held my hands that affected blood flow, or real energy field sensing. That's just for me, I cannot say what it is like for others.

One other effect is that spiritual healing is a kind of body scan meditation by default simply by virtue of focusing on inner feeling for both patient and healer, so you have numerous effects due to relaxation and repeated sensitization of the nervous system.

Yes it is nice. Makes me feel powerful.

Suggestion alone I've found to be quite impotent. However deep rapport (without any suggestion) seems to work really well. But I have to get myself into "state" which can take a minute or so before I start. So I'd say it's prana or some invisible energy. The other thing that makes me say that is if I turn may hands so that they are facing palm out, (without the person seeing me do this, and without dropping out of state), the effect is reduced. Try it yourself. There was no suggestion in those 'pop' sensations in my palms that both I and the person receiving felt. For me, deep rapport feels fantastic - sort of a heady, entoxicating feeling and can easily turn into sexual feelings if I don't watch myself.

Do you have a link for the video?

edit: any sort of relaxation has de-sensitizing effects on the nervous system, as you'd be aware. But presumably the de-sensitization wears off fairly soon after 'treatment'. If the pain stays in abeyance well after the person resumes normal consciousness, then I guess something has happened that is not purely a symptom of relaxation.

Yes, here you are, it's a long documentary, about an hour and forty.

http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?docid=-6246151609103284389#

Thanks. bilbo, are you posting as russell john butler as well? Or just a coincidence?

No, just me.

Ha! It's a slam dunk! Game bilbo, the genius!

Auras are synaesthesic effects!

http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/shortsharpscience/2010/11/auras.html

His experiment and the instructions his mom gave him are straight out of the old texts, such as the Visuddhimagga.

One learns to see ones emotions as colors within one's self and then, by doing this, one learns to see the same colors for others.

This is Samatha with Powers 101 and nothing new at all.

Daniel

Aye.

It is good to know that chakras disappear on attainment of actual freedom. I can confidently say that this is absolutely essential if any kind of freedom (it can be branded by using any word, actual or otherwise) is to be obtained. I am sure that there have been many many people in the past who had done this. I say this because in my own experience, it is not that hard a thing to do and I did it using past knowledge.