Say you are body scanning, checking out the tingling type feeling - what is that ?

I'm really, really fed up with people who say it's "energy". Yeah yeah yeah, can't we be a bit more precise than that ?

1) nervous system activity ?
2) circulatory activity ?
3) in the brain ?

Would it be correct to assume this is something that we have fully in infancy or when happy ?

How does it become numbed ?

Why would our physiology be built to allow it to become numbed ?

4) if it is a nervous system signal that indicates health, is it constant, but blocked by the brain - or is it blocked at source in the arms/legs/whatever ?

5) Is it mapped onto the brain like the cortical homonculous - or even identical with it ?



Or is it something different altogether ?

I might have to start a blog about this rather than be always pestering people for answers.

I was a huge sceptic of all things 'woo woo', that facet of my personality put me into engineering, and far away from things like meditation.  But then I started meditation and experienced all kinds of crazy stuff, so I have an answer for you.  It's my answer, your mileage may vary.

I think it's simple.  We have sensory neurons all over our body.  We have a nervous system that connects the senses to the rest of the body.  We have a brain that senses all that stuff, simplifies the information and it's that simplified picture that we are consciously aware of.

When you do vipassana, you gain the ability/tendency to bypass the interpretation, the simplification and gain awareness of the raw sensory information. Early on, the experience of sorting out raw info and our normal filtered info can be freaky.  'Energy' is just a word people use.  It's probably literally a good word, but way to general to be explanitory.

The actual system is surely incredibly complicated.  You're never going to get a collection of words or pictures to accurately explain it to you.  Do vipassana and you'll know for yourself soon enough.

I hope this is a helpful answer.

This is one explanation:

https://meditationstuff.wordpress.com/2014/12/08/the-truth-about-energy-work-reiki-chakras-spiritual-healing-energy-healing-healing-touch-much-more-than-you-wanted-to-know/

Some reasonable stuff there. That person is applying some brain to it all. I'm sure acquainting myself with physiology books will solve some of my questions.

I have a theory that part of what it is about is the release of chronic muscular tension.

Imagine you need to go to the bathroom. If you pee, the sensations are quite ordinary.

Now imagine you need to go to the bathroom, and due to circumstances you have to hold it in for half an hour. When you finally get to pee, the sensations will be quite blissful.

It's even more noticeable when you release chronic holding patterns you may have held since infancy. When you release tension you've held in your body for 30, 40, or 50 years, the unraveling can be quite  exhilarating. Your entire nervous system comes back to life.

That's kind of a disturbing picture, haha...

Anyway: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proprioception

I don't think it's a coincidence that doing stretching, weight lifting, or some other form of exercise will give you similar special effects.  Most of the traditions that deal with "energy" directly involve exercise of some kind.  It makes sense, though, in a non-woo aspect.  The brain isn't the only place nerves exist.

I like your analogy, btw, Droll, lol.