BANISHING:
THEORY
BODY, HEART, MIND & SPIRIT


BANISHING : BODY ISSUES AND PHYSICAL ENVIRONMENT    (THEORY)

AIR- LUNGS/PHYSICAL ENVIRONMENT


"During inspiration (inhaling), the external intercostal muscles contract, lifting the ribs up and out.
The diaphragm contracts, drawing it down.
During expiration (exhaling), these processes are reversed and the natural elasticity of the lungs returns them to their normal volume.
At rest, we breath 15-18 times a minute
exchanging about 500 ml of air.
In more vigorous expiration,
The internal intercostal muscles draw the ribs down and inward the wall of the abdomen contracts pushing the stomach and liver upward. Under these conditions, an average adult male can flush his lungs with about 4 liters of air at each breath.
This is called the vital capacity. Even with maximum expiration, about 1200 ml of residual air remain…..
In other words, if I slow my breath down by lengthening it,
in the inhale and the exhale, I should be able to take in more air in each breath.”

-J. Kimball

from:
users.rcn.com/jkimball.ma.ultranet/BiologyPages/P/Pulmonary.htm



We begin with our lungs, one of the crucial places in our body where we renew ourselves every 15 minutes or so. We can live without war for 3-4 days, we can live without food for 10 days or more, we can even live without excreting for a few days, but our life without breath can be measured in minutes. Without delving into basic biology, the expulsion of what we do not need and the inhalation of what we do need sets the rhythm of our entire body.  In Yoga, the ‘vital air’ that we inhale does more than enrich our blood and feed our whole body with life-giving O2 and other elements, it also brings vital energy into our body and so infuses our whole organism with what is called PRANA.
    If we follow this reasoning and those who follow Yoga, then many physical, emotional and mental complaints and problems can be traced to ‘poor breathing.’
    If you feel lack of energy, lack of physical ability and overall fatigue. Look first to your breathing. Short, gasping or shallow breathing is indicative of a negative state of mind and body.
    Close your eyes, sit and breath for a few moments. Are you using your full range of breathing? Are your lungs fully inhaling and exhaling? Most people do not completely empty their lengths when they breathe, especially when stressed. Take a moment to breath in to your fullest extent. More. More. Now exhale to your fullest extent. More. More. You will likely be surprised at the amount of air that your lungs can hold and that can be exhaled. That last bit of pushed out air when you fully and completely exhale is called ‘stale air’ by some health practitioners. Coming from the very bottom of the lungs, it is often not fully exhaled and thus ‘stays’ in the lungs not being renewed.
    Simply ask your doctor or health practitioner about the importance of full breathing. You can see examples of what fully breathing and exhalation does to the blood and to the overall health of the lungs.
    We speak often about the importance of exhaling, the ‘letting go’ that it signifies. It is rare that a relaxation or de-stressing exercise is offered that does not entail slowing and deepening the breath.
    The quality of air is just as crucial to us here as is the action of breathing. The act of banishing focuses of getting rid of the bad while bringing in the good. Poor or polluted air accounts for a number of health issues such as asthma, energies, toxin-related illnesses and so on. It is crucial that you see what the air quality around you is and do what you can to improve it. I have seen removing m olds, for example, clear up a number of severe physical problems. Moving to a place that is less polluted, planting more greenery around you, installing and maintaining air filters or purifiers, all of these may make significat strides towards alleviating health issues.
    Simply getting outside surrounded by nature and BREATHING can banish all sorts of stress-related problems. The physical exercise, of course, is important, but if combined with deep, oxygen-rich lung clearing breaths can help to revitalize your whole body.
    We can bring other things into our body through our lungs aside from O2 that will banish. Of course, there are a number of medications. My wife’s inhalator banishes here infrequent bouts of asthma! But other sorts of fumes or smoke have been used for centuries to banish body issues.
    Steam, especially infused with special herbs, has been used since the beginning of medicine to open up the lungs and heal the body. Recently scientists have discovered that a dose of steam can shorten head colds, and who can say that the steam of chicken soup does not do the same?
    Smoke, of substances that are not harmful, has also been used for centuries to treat lung issues. Certain herbs, when smoked, open the lung and bring healing to the body. Sage comes to mind, but ancient texts and traditions are full of many different healing ‘smokes’ used when banishing illness.

    
    Bringing fresh air in your environment is a crucial banishing behavior! ‘airing’ out the house is something done in every culture and it has very real benefits. O2 kills many kinds of fungi and bacteria, opening things up to the fresh air when cleaning or ‘airing’ removes sources of illness as well as being psychologically and emotionally pleasing.
    So, this leads us to Aromatherapy. Now, this ‘science’ of using scents to Banish or induce moods, feelings and so forth is often ignored as ‘new age’ silliness, but quite a bit of hard research has been done and it confirms that scents DO banish negative feelings. One study from the University of Miami School of Medicine, USA. (called Aromatherapy positively affects mood, EEG patterns of alertness and math computations.) States that….
    “EEG activity, alertness, and mood were assessed in 40 adults given 3 minutes of aromatherapy using two aromas, lavender (considered a relaxing odor) or rosemary (considered a stimulating odor). Participants were also given simple math computations before and after the therapy. The lavender group showed increased beta power, suggesting increased drowsiness, they had less depressed mood (POMS) and reported feeling more relaxed and performed the math computations faster and more accurately following aromatherapy. The rosemary group, on the other hand, showed decreased frontal alpha and beta power, suggesting increased alertness. They also had lower state anxiety scores, reported feeling more relaxed and alert and they were only faster, not more accurate, at completing the math computations after the aromatherapy session.”   (from Source International Journal of Neuroscience. 96(3-4):217-24, 1998 Dec. Abstract)
    In other words, lavender scent Banished stress, rosemary scent banished anxiety! Now, if this doesn’t seem magical, I don’t know what does.
    The point is that scents can depress or stimulate us, make us feel down or energize us. Aromas have been shown to affect physical, psychological and mental moods and feelings. This is powerful stuff/ Thus, we want to keep in mind that the quality of the air we breathe in is not just about oxygen, it is also about the scents we breath in and fill our home with.

THE BODY/PHYSICAL ENVIRONMENT    (THEORY)

FIRE- NERVOUS/DIGESTIVE SYSTEMS


Your nervous system is what wraps about every other physical part of your body and plugs the whole kit-n-kaboodle into the operating system, that is, your brain. Through the fiery flow of neurons message race back and forth, commands, data, pain, pleasure, motion, reactions, it is the hard wiring of your ‘house.’ When we feel pain, it is a signal that there is a problem, the same receptor may also report pleasure, or heat, or cold or any number of other things. But all of there are interpretations our brain makes, thus for one person a pleasure may be a pain and the other way around. This keeps us on our toes and the sex-industry inventive and busy!
    In terms of Banishing, most people want to get rid of pain or discomfort. Aspirin, for example, is a simple Banishing of a headache. The problem is that the headache is often a symptom of another issue. Barring any serious problems, which ONLY a health provider can address, how can we focus on the nervous system to help us Banish?
The key lies in a centuries old view of the nervous system as the ‘meridians’ or ‘paths’ that vital energy (Qi or Chi) travel throughout our body. The Chinese and other Asian cultures call the science related to our nerve-paths acupuncture or acupressure.

“Meridians are twelve channels of Qi. Each meridian corresponds with the main organs of the body. Meridian system of healing is used in herbal therapies, massage, acupuncture, and Shiatsu. The meridian healing system (originating in Chinese Medicine) is based on the concept that an insufficient supply of Qi makes a person vulnerable to disease. Restoring the Qi is the ultimate goal in restoring overall health and well being to the individual. Practitioners (acupuncturists, Chinese herbalists, massage therapists, etc.) assist clients in repairing dysfunctional areas within their meridian systems to restore a natural balance by utilizing various healing methods.”

- Phylameana lila Desy   Author of Author of The Everything Reiki Book

 If we follow this idea, then by actually manipulating in various ways the meridians or lines of ‘power’ corresponding to the paths of our nervous system we can directly Banish problems by easing ‘blockages’ and such.
    Now, this author does not advocate sticking needles in yourself and, clearly, serious massage or acupuncture work should be done by a professional, but you can take charge of your own body (and it’s meridians) on the most basic of levels. Certain postures bring pain because meridians are being blocked, stress causes meridian blockages and these can often be massaged out or with pressure alleviated. The most important point in terms of Banishing is to be AWARE of your nervous system, to become sensitive to how very sensitive it is. To remove those things that are clearly impacting your nervous system, wearing clothes that do not injure your system and by treating your senses and the nerves that connect them with respect.
    Taking time to relax, massaging specific points on your body that feel tense or hyper-sensitive, reacting with avoidance towards any stress-causing impacts, these are all about Banishing.
    You can now buy small, portable stimulating machines that pulse electricity through pads. This is a marvelous way of opening blocked meridians and healing nerve-problems. Getting someone to massage or even just touch you in certain areas of pain or blockage can do wonders to alleviate nervous-system issues. Keep in mind that we are all ‘chi machines,’ i.e.: constant generators of electricity through our meridians. This ‘Chi’ can be positive (loving, healing touch) or negative (nasty attitude directed at you, physical violence) and the key to all of this is to Banish or block negative Chi and to bring in or invoke positive Chi.

THE DIGESTIVE SYSTEM

“Through my 25 years in medical practice and health care…I have come to believe that the cleansing/detoxification process is the missing link in Western nutrition and one of the keys to real healing. I have seen hundreds of patients over the years transform regular or persistent illness into health and greatly improved vitality.” – Elson M. Haas, M.D. founder and medical director of the Preventive Medical Center of Marin

Under the rubric of Fire we also find the flames of digestion and excretion, the areas of your lower body that are in charge of taking raw fuel and ‘burning’ it in the digestive process so as to fuel the rest of the body in its needs.
    Just ad the digestive system is the furnace, the excreting system of the colons, bladder, urinary tract and so on is the key to Banishing liquid and solid toxins from the body. Just as in any other part of your life, if poisons (toxins) build up in the body, disease and problems occur. Too much of anything (oxygen!) can be a toxin, so it is all about balance.
    To state the obvious, what goes into your system is responsible for what your body has to work with. If you ingest more that you can use, then the rest is stored in fat. If you ingest toxins (like PCBs or mercury) they may be excreted from your body or may in fact remain in your body as a toxin because the body doesn’t have a way to get rid of it. This is not a medical book, but some sorts of body issues involving Banishing may require medical intervention. Accidentally ingestion an herbicide calls for inducing vomiting, mercury poison calls for chelating, (introducing a chemical that frees the mercury and allows it to pass out of the body.)
    The main point is to keep a balance in what you choose to put into your system, the amount you put into your system and the ways you help your system eliminate (Banish!) the negatives you want OUT!
    Begin by thinking about what goes INTO your body. Add whole or living foods, fresh made juices, and vital foods of all sorts.
    The easiest ways to Banish toxins and so on, aside from watching what you eat and drink to begin with, is to Encourage your systems of Banishing- your elimination systems. Drinking a lot of water is incredibly helpful on all levels for all systems. Periodic colon cleansings, as simple as fasting or taking herbs to clean out the system, can help Banish everything from physical problems to obesity. There are thousands of colon cleansing products and services out there and it is not the place of this book to recommend specific products, but I do recommend the process.
    Increasing elimination, for me, through increased liquid and fiber cleansings has helped my overall health in many ways by banishing a lot of JUNK from my system, toxins, fermenting old food, parasites and more. In this way you can help Banish fatigue, weight gain, bowel problems, digestion problems and all sorts of other issues.
    This sort of Banishing is contingent on full elimination. This means taking time out of your very busy frenetic life to properly let your body release these toxins. If you only have a partial evacuation of your bladder, infections can occur. If you suffer from chronic constipation, toxins build up. While these are often dietary, they may also be due to stress or simply lack of patience with our body functions!
    Take the time to let your body clean itself!


WATER- BLOOD/FLUIDS


Just as the circulatory system of your body infuses and transports toxins to be eliminated, so to do the other systems of glands and elimination perform key functions in terms of banishing the yucky stuff from your body.
    Keeping our blood and body free of toxins also has a lot to do with what we eat and drink, GIGO as the computer programmers say, ‘Garbage In, Garbage Out.’ While certain vitamins and enzymes can help purify the blood, we will instead explore the ‘water oriented’ forms of body banishing that have proven effective for thousands of years across many cultures
    Again, when we speak of Banishing in terms of the boy, we are speaking of elimination. The largest organ of the human body is the key to healthy elimination. This is, as you might guess, your SKIN! Millions of pores are a key to regulating body health. The most obvious way this can be stimulated is through sweating.
    Sweat lodges, saunas, steam room and all sorts of sweat-inducing practices have been a staple of healing since time began.

“Sitting in a sweat bath…. The heat produces an artificial "fever" and urges every organ of the body into action. While outwardly relaxed, your inner organs are as active as though you were jogging or mowing the lawn. At the same time, you are being cleansed from inside out by the skin, your body's largest organ and its excretion, sweat. The oldest know medical document, the Ayurveda, appeared in Sanskrit in 568 BC and considered sweating so important to health that it prescribed the sweat bath and thirteen other methods of inducing sweat. Throughout history physicians have extolled the medicinal value of the sweat bath in its various forms such as the Finnish sauna, Russian banai, Islamic hammam, or the American Indian sweatlodge

- Mikkel Aaland from Sauna & Health

    Some people call, the skin the ‘third kidney’ so important is considered the process of sweating out. Virtually every sort of health problem has been described in medical literature abs being helped by induced ‘Banishing’ sweats and many drug rehab programs make saunas and proscribed sweating a part of their detox program.
Other liquid forms of body banishing include bloodletting, i.e.: intentionally ‘bleeding’ a person to release a negative ‘humor’ or problem. This is clearly not something I’d recommend as a banishing technique for my readers, but it is interesting to note that when you get a cut, the best thing to do is encourage the blood to flow a bit to clean the wound as long as the bleeding is not excessive or dangerous. Even today, in modern hospitals, leeches are sometimes used to drain off excessive blood that has collected for various reasons. Such blood can lead to poisoning and even today leeches are the easiest and most effective way to remove such blood!
    The final water-ous method of body banishing recommended is the simple bath. From helping the body to efficiently eliminate toxins, the common bath can be a very effective method of Banishing stress and a host of other physical as well as mental or emotional problems.
    
“There are other health benefits to be gained from hot baths, such as easing muscle strain, reducing hemorrhoids, and relieving arthritis. Hot baths also increase circulation and can promote the elimination of impurities via the skin. A hot soak also slightly increases the metabolism…
Cold baths can relieve itchy skin, mild depression, asthma, and, contrary to popular belief, rev up your waning libido. There is also sufficient research to indicate that the cold treatment may improve a low-sperm count.”

-    by Karyn Siegel-Maier from the Healing Bath

    Combined with oils. Massage, salts, algae, seaweed and a host of other things, a bath can become a full healing ritual in and of itself.
    In Japan I experienced the therapeutic powers of hot spring (Onsen) bathing first hand. Many traditional hot springs have a high mineral content, often a very complex blend of minerals that for centuries have been ascribed to helping heal the body. Certain Onsen are said to heal certain ailments. Those with skin problems are directed to this hot spring, those with bone problems to another. I have personally been shocked by how hot spring treatments have banished physical and stress problems from my life!
    The final ‘water’ issue of body Banishing we will look at has to do with the glands of the body. The systems of glands throughout our body that regulate everything from growth to reproduction are so complex that even today the science of endocrinology holds many mysteries.
    One way of looking at these gland is not so much what their physical functions in terms of chemistry is, but in stead looking at their affect on the ‘whole body’ in terms of power and energy. For this point of view, we will turn to the Chakras. Chakras, briefly, are the ancient Hindu ‘power centers’ said to emanate from the energetic body of each person. There are seven such centers and they line up on the central core (spinal column) of the human body beginning at the base of the spine and moving up sequentially to the crown chakra at the top of the head. It is said that each center, from bottom to top, is more refined and vibrates at a ‘higher’ level than the center below it, ending with the purest center, our link to the ultimate divine (OM) at the crown of the head. We will look deeper at this concept later, but for now it is interesting to note that all the major glandular systems seem to ‘shadow’ each chakra and many feel they are the physical root or basis for each essentially spiritual chakra. This lines up like so:

Head Centre . . . Pineal Gland
Centre between eyebrows. . . Pituitary Body
Throat Centre. . . Thyroid Gland
Heart Centre. . . Thymus Gland
Solar Plexus Centre. . . Pancreas
Sacral Centre. . . The Gonads
Centre at the base of the spine. . . Adrenal Glands


This is a lot of information about a complicated subject, but so much has been written on the Chakras that I refer the reader to the many excellent books and web sites on the subject for further study. Our concern is Banishing; eliminating the negative, so keep these charkas and their glands in mind when we revisit them in terms of practical exercises and techniques.


EARTH – BONES/ FLESH

    In many ways when dealing with Banishing issues of the physical body, we often start with this topic because the number one thing people want to change about their body has to do with flesh and muscle! They want less fat and more muscle!
    Clearly the way that flesh (muscle, fat, skin) and bones (tendons, cartilage) interact are key to the way the rest of the body works. When I was very overweight, it put a strain on everything from my heart to my feet and all the organs, charkas and so on in between. Indeed, the ‘earth’ parts of our body are also the foundation of our physical being, the bricks, stone and frame that supports and sustains all else.
    Just as a house (or temple!) is only as strong as its foundation, so too is our body only as balanced as these elements are. The physical form of our muscles, bones and flesh, the physical YOU that is presented to the world is a product of everything you do and are in this life.

“The body shapes I imitate and resist at every stage of life arise out of the memory of the past, incarnate memory in the present, and project the memorial body towards its future. I materialize in my body the ghosts of my ancestors. This is a study of how flesh remembers.”

-    Katharine Young from The Memory of the Flesh: The Family Body in Somatic Psychology

    Clearly there are emotional, mental and spiritual forces that help shape the physical body. Those things (‘ghosts’ i.e.: traumas, problems, lack of care) that have impinged upon our lives negatively influence out basic body form. These can be banished, with the right amount of Love (of yourself and what you have been physically given) and Will (the strength to make shifts in your life for the good of your body.)
    There are specific things that can be done to benefit the bones, muscle and flesh. The most obvious is diet. Clearly more calories ingested than burned will lead to fat being stored in the body. Just as obvious, but always worth restating, is that increased exercise builds muscles and helps burn fat as more calories are burned. Casting off 10 or 20 pounds is literally casting a demon off your body! Everything will function better.
    Bones:
    Some specifics for helping the foundation of the body include specific dietary changes, adding minerals and vitamins that we may need. Working the joints, doing specific exercise, immersing you in a healthy environment, all will help build and maintain bones and bone-tissues.
    Flesh:
    Massage, vigorous stimulation/scrubbing and anointing with specific lotions, liniments and oils do wonders for the skin. Clearly diet and sweating are part of this equation too.
    Muscle:
    Being out of shape and weak is like letting your house foundation crumble. No Banishing will truly work if the foundation is not firm. Yoga, Tai Chi, steady exercise of ANY kind, all help. A good place to begin if you are really out of shape is stretching. Systematic stretching opens up all the muscles, increases circulation and increases the flow of vitality throughout your body. Stress locks into the muscle, as do other mental or emotional traumas. The fastest way to banish these negative impacts if to STREACH and send them out of the body!
    So much has been written on exercise that it seems like belaboring the obvious, but it is interesting to note that recent studies show that vigorous exercise, not just walking or strolling, several times a week is really necessary for body health. We can look at this as a serious banishing! This sort of exercise truly engages the whole body and gets all the organs and systems to work. Toxins in every area are expelled and the demons of fatigue, depression and lethargy are expelled! Endorphins are one of the most powerful Banishing elixirs in the work!
    It is the most fundamental truth that how we treat out flesh and bones, how we create our FORM and maintain it sets the tone for all other things in our lives. It is almost a certainty that when evil or problems jumps on us, our flesh and bones reacts in some way. Our ‘flesh crawls’ when a nasty person is in the room. We shiver in fear when confronted with horror, we tighten up and ache when stressed out or attacked. Focusing on the flesh and muscle and bones of this wonderful body we have been given often is a place to start in any physical Banishing. Wilhelm Reich called this interaction…: MUSCULAR ARMOR and defined it as “ The sum total of the muscular attitudes (chronic muscular spasms) which an individual develops as a block against the breakthrough of emotions and organ sensations, in particular anxiety, rage, and sexual excitation.”

SPIRIT-BODY- THE BRAIN /ETHERIC BODY

    The Body is not simply the physical body we have broken down and discussed, it is a Whole and all its systems interact and interpenetrate so as to function in the most miraculous manner. It is interesting that in all the recent debate among theologians on God and faith and creation that the most ‘religious’ voices seem to be those of biologists and trained scientists who see the evolution of life and the amazing complexity of the human body as something ‘divine.’ and interconnected. From many angles, we now realize that the non-physical impacts or spiritual interactions of our physical body with the world has a scientific basis.


“Our new scientific knowledge is returning to an ancient awareness of the power of belief. Beliefs are indeed powerful…whether they are true or false. While we have always heard of the "power of positive thinking," the problem is negative thinking is just as powerful, though in the "opposite" direction. Problems encountered in health and in the unfolding of our lives are generally connected to the "misperceptions" acquired in our learning experiences. The wonderful part of the story is that perceptions can be relearned! We can reshape our lives in retraining our consciousness. This is a reflection of the ageless wisdom that has been passed down to us and is now being recognized in cellular biology.
An understanding of the newly described cell-control mechanisms will cause as profound a shift in biological belief as the quantum revolution caused in physics. The strength of the emerging new biological model is that it unifies the basic philosophies of conventional medicine, complementary medicine and spiritual healing.”

- Dr. Bruce H. Lipton, Ph.D.  The Human Genome Project:

    These relearning of negative thoughts or influences leads us to the brain, the neurological system without which there simply would be no YOU. This system and the extremely complex functions it enables, both biologically and psychologically are beyond understanding at this point. Having interacted with Neurologists form many years I can report that they themselves often have no idea what the brain does and how it does it. One told me that they know about ‘one percent of what these is to know about the brain.’
    Clearly the brain is a physical part of the body, the ‘commander’ of the human flesh, but it is also the seat of our perceptions, our consciousness and even of our Soul or Spirit if you will. Techniques for exercising the brain and for focusing it on different stimuli will go far to banish certain problems. And ‘demons.  Our ‘point of view’ and the mental perceptions we hold, according to physicist, actually alter our reality. Visualization and focusing the mind on healing, weight loss, repair of the body and so on has been proven to work just as hypnotherapy can, for some, lead to psychological and physical changes. I have seen people under hypnosis manifest physical symptoms! The idea of ‘mind over matter’ is not just an abstract concept but, in many ways, the guiding principle of this book.
    Clearly all the demons we want to Banish, physical, emotional and spiritual, reside in the brain and the functions of the brain hold the key to the success of any banishing.


"Over the years, psychiatrists have wandered down countless blind alleys, looking for alternative, 'more scientific' answers to mental illness than those purported by the ancients," she states. "Today, the mental health community is coming full circle…."

-Dr. Mohdi, PHD

    Just as clearly, severe mental illnesses such as schizophrenia cannot be ‘Banished’ in the same way that, for example, a negative behavior or feeling of loss can be. A professional should always be consulted if severe mental issues are involved.
    That being said, some mental demons can certainly be ‘exorcised’ or Banished. The first step is to look as the physical aspects of neurological functioning and to realize that the body and mind are one. Physical exercise can relieve mental depression. Mental stimulation of a positive kind can banish physical pain.  Thus the first questions you should as are:

Is my brain getting the right nourishment?

This includes foods, nutrients and the chemicals it needs to function.

Is my brain getting the right exercise?

Are you constantly doing ACTIVE thinking, learning, adding to your skill-set or are you increasingly passive in ‘absorbing’ information.

Is my brain getting healthy and balanced stimulation?

Are you ingesting stimulants that over tax your mind? Are you in ‘sensory overload’ mode all the time? Too much media/multitasking? Do you feel overloaded and burnout?

Is my brain getting enough rest and relaxation?

We require a certain amount of sleep and recent studies prove that we are getting less and less of what we need. Sleep disorders are sharply on the rise. Periods of calm reflection, meditation if you will, and free cognition (day dreaming) is crucial to your mental health. How much ‘down time’ do you give your brain?

Is my brain getting the right training?

Mental organization and methods of keeping mental focus are LEARNED not inherent in your mind, disorganized thinking, undisciplined mind and simply being susceptible to others thought, demands and persuasions leaves you wide open to losing command of what and how you think.

Are you paying attention to your Unconscious or Deep mind?

Our conscious mind is but the tip of the iceberg, we sit upon a vast and important unconscious mind that influences us in many ways every day. In other cultures, this was a crucial part of the culture and of healing. Mental problems, demons and such were rooted out by shamans, priests, medicine men and seers who helped the patient journey into the ‘spirit world’ (the unconscious mind) and Banish the evil that was found there. Imbalance in your life will manifest in dreams and often in physical complaints.
    It has been known for centuries that psychological factors are can directly cause physical illnesses. Often traumas of any kind cause physical problems and some psychological environments techniques help us feel better. A recent study reported that women who experience trauma--domestic violence--have 50% to 70% more neurological, gynecological, and stress-based physical problems than women who have never been abused (Johns Hopkins School of Nursing, 2002, Archives of Internal Medicine). The opposite is true too, of course, having a physical injury can make us depressed and cause a negative mental state while good health contributes to balance and joy. There is always a two-way relationship between the psychological and physical issues. An entire issue of the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology (July, 2002) documents well the role of psychology in the management of many specific physical problems and diseases.
    So much more can be said, but the crux of the matter is this: Banishing mental or neurological demons, unless they are purely caused by a physical issue like a chemical deficiency, are all about integrative solutions that connect the brain/body. These issues and solutions therefore must address the sources of the problems and YOUR perceptions.
    
ETHERIC BODY

“In the last fifty or so years, since the work of Einstein started to change our understanding of the universe, the world's most advanced physicists have been telling us that solid matter as we know it is actually another form of energy. In other words, the molecules we thought were solid are made up of tiny "particles" that are best described as vibrations. That means our bodies are in fact, when broken down to their smallest components, bundles of vibrating energies, and a great deal less solid than we can easily imagine. There is also growing proof that the mystics have been correct for thousands of years, and we do have "subtle bodies" (or etheric bodies) made up of energy patterns around our physical bodies. “

-    Gina Groom, Where Science Meets God


    Our entire body and the field of energy that surrounds and interpenetrates it has been a constant theme in religions and beliefs of countless cultures from the dawn of time. Cave paintings in Australia that I have seen that are tens of thousands of years old seem to show ‘auras’ as do Christian icons, Hindu murtis or religious images and countless other paintings and pictures across the world. A few decades ago Kirilian photography actually was able to present physical photographic evidence of the aura or etheric body. It even showed that hands with a finger cut off still showed the energetic imprint of the missing finger!
    At this point, no one disagrees with the fact that every human being emits a field of bioelectric energy. Devices are being created not that actually use this field as a source of power (shades of the Matrix!) but where people differ is in what this field means and how it affects us.
    In terms of Banishing, we can see the aura or etheric body as both an indicator of demons (stress/problems)
 And a field for target banishing. In other words, a stress or ‘cut’ in the energetic field indicates a physical issue and being traumatized energetically  through emotional or physical violence, for example, leave a clear impact on the aura.
    Physical manipulation of the aura with other energy fields (a person’s hand, a magnet, an TV set) will affect your aura and thus affect your physical body. Bombarding the aura with positive energy (chi) such as sunlight, the green energy of nature and so on is a classic technique for revitalizing the human aura/body as well as an overall methodology for Banishing.

    Banishing demons of the Body requires a different way of perceiving an issue or problem. A headache can be ‘banished’ with aspirin, but is that really banishing? Did the cause of the headache get banished or only the symptom? If the mind is cleared and the demon headache closely watched, it may be seen as a symptom of another issue. Possibly an emotional conflict that really needs banishing, a physical issue (allergies? Florescent lighting?) Or possibly a mental issue (over work? Anxiety?). All of these, not to mention spiritual issues, will likely reflect in the temple of the soul, the Body. Our body is the first place we look when banishing and the physical environment around us is the first place we approach when seeing to Banish demons!

 


BANISHING: THE HEART -EMOTIONAL LIFE/FEELINGS

So much of what affects us both positively and negatively stems from a triggered emotion or is caused by an emotion. A headache may be caused by an emotionally painful fight with a mate and, just as often, a headache we have may lead to an argument or fight because we feel terrible. Emotional state and physical state are entwined together and both are also interwoven with what we think, but more on that later.
    Moving from the Body to the Heart, we carry the knowledge with us that there is extensive overlap, which Banishing a negative emotional influence or issue may help you physically and Banishing a negative physical issue or problem or influence will very likely help you in the realm of feelings and emotions.
    Yet in this chapter we will step a bit away from this interconnectedness and look carefully art emotions or feelings and see what the roots of negative emotions are and how they can be Banished in theory. Following, as with the first chapter, will be specific ways that negative emotions and their sources (!) can be banished from your Life.
    First, you need to acknowledge the power of emotions and feelings in your life, something very difficult for many people to do. We men, especially, are taught to discount or push aside feelings we may have about certain situations. All of us avoid uncomfortable or negative feelings that seem to target our sense of self. Some negative feelings, like anger, are often seen as justified or motivating or ‘called for’ in terms of ‘getting things done’ or ‘fighting for what is right. Yet even ‘righteous anger’ (which the Dalai Lama says is like saying ‘righteous cancer’) leaves us drained and feeling irritated, defensive and unhappy in the end.
    So, again, we will set the overall aim for any emotional Banishing that you do as this: Your happiness and the happiness of those around you. What this means to you in your life, that really is up to YOU.
    We will explore the basis and the methods of banishing negative emotions and feelings through the lens of the five elements again, but with a traditional twist. In the Far East, encoded in several faiths (Buddhism, Hinduism, Tantrika etc) is a concept that fits our needs fairly well- the KLESHAS.
    KLESHAS translates as ‘knots’ or ‘aggregates’ and the idea is this; To achieve growth (liberation) a human being needs to ‘pierce’ or ‘loosen’ these emotional clusters. Ands so be released from their bondage. In our culture, this means that we need to ‘work through’ the negative emotional issues clustered around these concepts and so become freed from letting them manipulate us. In other words, instead of letting jealousy, anger and irritation rule our lives; we can choose to bypass those emotional reactions. Again, how do you avoid anger when ‘someone makes you angry?’ You do it through the ultimate personal powers of Will and Love.
    You use your WILL to control your emotional reaction and even to change the very basis of your emotional reactions and though LOVE of yourself (anger makes you ill, why inflict that on yourself) and LOVE for the one ‘making you angry’ (Compassion) you can simply not choose to be angry.
    In fact, with very few exceptions that fall into the ‘instincts’ category, YOU choose when to feel anger or hate or irritation or guilt or any other emotional reaction. All of the following is predicated on the firm belief that YOU have the ability to control and banish negative emotions and feelings, which no one can ‘make’ you angry, for example, YOU choose to be angry. By banishing the cause of the negative emotions, internally or externally, and by banishing the triggers or even by banishing the actual emotion as it floods you, you will become a more balanced and confident person. In short, you will take the reins of your emotional horses in hand and have more control of what does and does not emotionally affect you. This will make you and everyone around you a happier person!

THE 5 KELESHAS/ELEMENTS


AIR-
* “Avidya (ignorance) is the misconception of our true reality, believing that the temporary is eternal, the impure is the pure, and pleasure to be painful.   This false representation of reality is the root klesha and produces the four others.”

As we mature, we each develop an individual style of dealing with our emotions. Our personal style becomes set fairly early on, so that, without even thinking, we react to various emotional stimuli in our own particular way. For example, the person who, when frustrated goes into a rage, versus the person who keeps his frustration inside and develops a headache.

-    by Avrene L. Brandt, Ph.D., Overcoming Negative Emotions
-    
Almost all of the negative reactions we either experience or generate come from ‘ignorance.’ This does not mean being stupid but it does mean being unaware. Unaware of the root causes for these emotions, unaware that these negative emotions are not going to get us what we want long-term (happiness and balance) and in fact simply lead to situations and reactions where more negative reactions will be generated.
    This is the idea that lies behind the creation of all other negative emotions. The basic truth behind this is that all things are transitory, that things are changing all the time including our desires and our perceived ‘needs.’ The ‘ignorance’ spoken of is the ignorance of how we get to those negative feelings, that seeking pleasure leads to loss of pleasure, that seeking immediate gratification leads to a feeling of being unsatisfied. In short, the basic ‘ignorance’ or unawareness is that short-term emotional needs or outbursts have long-term negative impacts and effects that are not obvious at the time.
    If you are clear and aware of your environment, then you can see this in action. It is, of course, much easier to see this in the behaviors of others. Take the most destructive emotion, anger. You have been driving ands seen examples of ‘road rage,’ everyone has at some point in their lives. Watching that angry crazy person weaving in and out of traffic, tailgating, yelling and gesturing, you likely shook your head in disbelief and wondered at what that person thought they were accomplishing. What did they gain from that episode? Did they feel better? Did they make others feel better? Did they get home faster? No. Yet it is likely that you have personally felt this sort of anger while driving, even if you did not go nuts and endanger others, everyone has. I sometimes get furious at people who go too slowly in the fast lane. Why do I vent this anger? It makes me ‘feel’ better. But does it really? Studies show that it spikes my blood pressure, lowers my immune system, harms digestion- a host of negative physical impacts. And afterwards I feel exhausted and that anger is like a contagion! We have all been angry at something and then carried that anger into other places affecting other people who wondered ‘what is wrong with you?!.’
    So Avidya (translated as ‘without knowledge’) simply means that we usually remain unconscious of three things about the negative emotions pouring through us.
1.    The self-destructive affects this emotion will have long-term
2.    Why these negative emotions are triggered
3.    The root cause of these negative emotions.

Why do we have ignorance or unawareness of these things? Mostly because we learned our emotional reactions as we grew up, we imprinted and acquire all those triggers and patterns of negative actions and feelings from our environment as a child. Thus someone from Thailand learned not to show anger or impatience while in traffic, yet a typical American reaction to traffic is impatience, anger and frustration.
    Traveling through other cultures and even areas of your own country shows you that your emotional reactions are not the only possible ones, that the external reality around you is simple there and that YOUR reactions to it emotionally really have endless possibilities.  Traffic makes many people irritated, but it doesn’t have to. Someone yelling at you makes many people angry in turn, but it doesn’t have to. Yearning for something you cant afford, being jealous of someone who has coveted things, being deeply hurt by an insult, all of these in our culture would seem like ‘normal’ emotional reactions, yet they do not have to be. A visit to other cultures shows us that different people react very differently to different situations and that ‘norms’ of emotional reaction are quite varied.
    You have a choice as to the feelings you feel most of the time.
    Ask yourself the above three questions about emotional situations or reactions you want to Banish. For me, a key one is irritation over not being able getting things done quickly.
    1. The self-destructive affects this emotion will have long-term
    Irritation
    Irritation causes me stomach problems, insomnia and fatigue over the long term. The adrenaline and hyperactivity spurred by my irritation also can spill over into my relationships with m family in a negative way. Once I am in the headspace of being irritated, it is very hard to get out. This state of mind precludes happiness, relaxation and rest!    
    2. Why these negative emotions are triggered
    I know from observation that there are a number of things that trigger this kind of irritation. Some of them are: Seeing other people working/driving too slow for my tastes, waiting what seems an excessive amount of time for something, feeling overwhelmed by all the tasks I have set myself because I have set myself too many tasks and so on.
    3. The root cause of these emotions
    This is the hardest place to get to when observing our emotions. For me, it meant delving into childhood memories. My father was extremely impatient and irritated a lot of the time. Part of this was due to an injury, part was due to alcohol abuse and part, I’m quite sure, came from HIS parents. Tasks given to me were never done fast enough and it never seemed I could get enough done. From my mother and school I consistently got the message that I was capable of MORE, more work, higher grades, more tasks accomplished. Then there was my environment, I discovered New York City and spent much of my time there. The city was FAST and the culture of that place was all about speed, efficient use of time and getting things done! Later on I lived in Tokyo for four years and this city, even more than New York, was all about speed and efficiency and the lifestyle filled with tasks and work. I had 6 jobs there! Then I moved to a much slower paced city. Bam! I was moving at 75mph and everyone else at 30mph!
    This carefully thought-our analysis of the roots of this emotion helped me to detach from the triggers and become AWARE of this emotional reaction. Once this was done, once the animal was tagged if you will, THEN I could banish it.
    Knowledge is power and so Avidya, ignorance of our negative emotions is lack of power. It is this that causes you to say ‘I cant help it, it irritates me!’ or ‘that person MADE me angry!”
    So, step one is understanding and gaining knowledge of your negative emotion. Realizing that through your WILL to be happier than you are and do something about it and through the LOVE for yourself and others that you can bring to any situation that you have control over your emotions and your emotional reactions.
    Is it easy? No. These old patterns and acquired responses are deeply engrained, but like everything else, they are transitory and in a very deep sense, not objectively ‘real.’ Most importantly, you can ride the horse instead of it riding you!

FIRE-
“Asmita (I-am-ness) is the identification of ourselves with our ego.   We create a self-image of ourselves that we believe is us, but it is not us.   This self-image can contain both external (I am poor) and internal (I am a bad person) false projections.   We become trapped within the projections we have created of our life.”

Who are YOU? Are you what you feel? Are you what you think? Are you what you own? Are you your work or what you do for fun or the kid your parents see or your physical body?
    No, you are not any of these things. You THINK you are, you identify with all these things, you may think that you are a combination of all the4se things but, in the end, you are more than the sum of all these parts. Most religions and spiritual faiths would say that all these things are just a shell or even illusions surrounding who YOU really are, a spiritual being. Buddhists would say, yes, but even that spiritual being is non-existent as a ‘thing’ or idea, that really what you are is beyond all perceptions, ideas or thoughts.
    Clearly we are drifting into the realm of metaphysics and weirdness, but if you are to get a handle on Banishing negative emotions, it is crucial that you realize that there is not objective SOURCE for those emotions. The being you identify as ‘ME’ is merely your view of who you are, and that changes! Added to that is your perception of how others view you, who you are a player in the world (a worker, a father, a lover…) and you can begin to see the arbitrariness of much of this.
    It helps to think of ‘you’ as a series of masks they come with certain emotional triggers, emotive defaults and emotional baggage. If you are a parent, you know you act much differently in that capacity than you do as a child of YOUR parents. Think about your emotional states when you are out having fun with your friends as opposed to when you are in school studying or at work being a ‘worker.’ You are wearing different ‘masks’ and playing our programs, expectations and emotional responses that are very different, in fact, you can be said to have many different sides or facets to your Ego. Logically, this implies that YOU (ego) is not the solid bedrock we like to think it is. I’m always shocked to see old pictures of myself or old poems and bits of writing I did. I was a different person! I had completely different reactions to things!
    The fact is, as ever-changing and (we trust!) ever evolving beings, our sense of self is always in flux. This means our sense of self, our ego, is as transitory as everything else in this world is. This is a great sourse of freedom and the basis for all successful Banishing! YOU are not your emotions, nor are you set into some sort of permanent state of emotional reactions. Yes, you have patterns, traits, behaviors, neuroses etc that you acquired from your environment BUT you are not doomed to be stuck with them because there is no fixed YOU! How great this is. This means there is a way out of the emotional traps we create externally (traffic makes me mad!) And internally (I’m a boring person…). Simply the realization that nothing is ‘permanent’ that everything is ‘fixable’ and that your EGO or sense of self is NOT the final arbitrator on how you need to feel or react to others feels frees you to selectively Banish what you Will to do so.
    Some see the Ego as an enemy to be vanquished or to be overcome, I do not. I see the Ego as just another idea or thing, one that is important to our survival in many ways, but also not the ultimate Truth of our existence. What the ultimate truth of YOUR life is up to you, but we can be sure that the ego, which ceases to exist at death, is not ‘it.’
    

When we cease to be dominated by the ego's needs, our self-concerns naturally begin to fall away, and we can afford to feel more loving and compassionate toward others. Eventually we can afford to feel compassion even for the ego itself because we come to recognize that it, too, is a suffering being! We see that all its obstinacy and resistance has been motivated not by any evil intent but by its own past sufferings and its horror of future annihilation. Consequently, instead of treating the ego as the "enemy," we learn to embrace it with an open heart, just as a loving mother would a wounded child.

- Joel Morwood, Center for Sacred Sciences

WATER- “Raga (attachment)

This the attraction for things that bring satisfaction to oneself.   Our desire for pleasurable experiences creates mindless actions and blind sighted vision. When we cannot obtain what we desire, we suffer.   When we do obtain what we desire, our feelings of pleasure soon fade and we begin our search for pleasure again, becoming trapped in a endless cycle.”

“You can’t always get what you want
You can’t always get what you want
You can’t always get what you want
But if you try sometimes you just might find
You just might find
You get what you need”

-The Rolling Stones- Let It Bleed

    What do you want? What do you need? Two very different questions.  What has shocked me the most as I have traveled all over the world, especially when I have traveled through very poor countries like Nepal, is how most people seem to be more content and happier with what they have than Americans do! I’m constantly struck by the incessant level of whining, complaining and endless lusting after stuff I experience every day in this country. Americans consume more of EVERYTHING than any other group of people; yet seem, as a whole, to be more agitated, less contented and unhappier than many other people in the world! Clearly having enough to eat, drink and use does not make for a happier person.
    The roots of this are emotional and, again, have to do with either not realigning you have control over these negative emotions or not knowing how to take control over them and Banish the ones that you find impacting your life in a negative way!
    We are trapped in a two-sided cycle of negative emotions when we consistently attach our sense of pleasure and well being to transitory sensations or objects or people. Being dependent on another person for your happiness is recognized as neurotic, we call such people ‘dependent’ in a negative sense. Yet so many people are unconsciously dependent on things for their sense of well being and this is equally ‘dependent’ in a negative sense. You feel good because you have a new car, then the car breaks down. Is it any surprise that the resulting emotion is pain or anger or frustration or all three? We are unhappy and so go shopping and soon feel better. But then the pleasure fades. Your first reaction is to go shopping again and again and again. Yet each time when the pleasure fades, there is a negative emotion generated, be it one of loss or pain or simply the original CAUSE of the need for pleasure (a miserable relationship, a bad job) remains. Or we seek to go shopping or seek to buy that new car that we know will bring us pleasure but we cant due to lack of money. Then we are unhappy, jealous of others, desirous of having more money, maybe frustrated and resentful. This is the two-pronged cycle of attachment, a key generator of negative emotions for you and for those around you.
    Does this mean we cant enjoy pleasure or do things that we like to do for fun and enjoyment? No, of course not!
    The key here is ATTACHMENT to those things and to those emotions as well as keeping the focus on happiness as opposed to pleasure. The difference is that pleasure is always fleeting and does not, as you might think, always lead to happiness. Take a moment and think about it. Think about the tings that give you a temporary flush of pleasure. Do they bring real lasting happiness? A year later, does it matter? Ten years later?
    The problem here is desires, both false and real, and the triggering of those desires by internal Ego-driven feelings and external consumer-driven impulses. These things are not in and of themselves bad, but they trap you in emotional yo-yo patterns that drive you crazy if you let them! I’ve met millionaires who never have enough! They never have the right car or house or club membership and so are driven to make more money than they can ever use in ten lifetimes and amass more stuff than any entire village needs and build a 40-room mansion most of which will never be lived in! Isn’t this a kind of illness?
    So, the first seep to Detaching from external and internal emotional manipulations is to ask three more questions.
1.    What do I really NEED to make me happy?
2.    How much X  is enough? ($, a car, a house, vacation…)
3.    How can I let go of X emotionally when I don’t get it/lose it?

By accepting the fact that you will NOT get everything you desire and that even the things you DO get are transitory, including all relationships, you can begin the work of Detaching from the emotion strings that pull you like a puppet. Once you have found a place of detachment, THEN you can selectively Banish those emotions/reactions that have for most of your life pushed and pulled you like storm waves in your search for those things and emotions that you THOUGHT would bring happiness but only bring more sense of loss. Once you get the knack of detaching, a whole new level of satisfaction and happiness will become apparent to you and, though aware and conscious Banishing of negative attachment/emotions, you will become freer than before.
    The key to all of this is acceptance. Accept what is and what you have, accept that all the fleeting desires and cravings you feel, most of which come from others anyway, will never satisfy that itch. Accept yourself and what a wonderful and worthwhile person you are. Most of all, accept the world you inhabit. The does not mean being passive or ceasing to strive for things, but it means a realistic view of what you NEED and what you will to be connected to as opposed to unhealthy attachment and unrealistic emotional expectations. It also means accepting other people and their irrational attachments and emotional responses WITHOUT getting ‘hooked’ by them into creating negative emotional states of your own!

“For me, attachment is like holding on tightly to something that is always slipping through my fingers--it just gives me rope burn. But letting go--nonattachment--relieves the constant, painful irritation.
…. Scientific research has shown that people who are optimistic and have an ability to accept or let go of negative memories, experiences, and events tend to be healthier and live longer than people who are pessimistic and worry about or try to change things that are out of their control. Indeed, acceptance is actually transformative, and awareness is curative.”

-Lama Surya Das, Letting Be & Letting Go


 
EARTH-
“Dvesha (repulsion) is the opposite of raga, aversion towards things that produce unpleasant experiences. If we cannot avoid the things we dislike, we suffer.   Even thinking about unpleasant experiences produces suffering.”

If you are like most people living in our hectic contemporary society, you worry a lot, probably way more than is good for you. Anxiety, worry, fear, stress and dissatisfaction, according to recent surveys and accounts, is on the rise. Along with this is an overall sense of powerlessness and a belief that the frenetic pace of life, information, conflicts and the daily assaults of overwork and underpay and so much else is simply overwhelming.
    Much of these unpleasant and negative emotional states concern things that we dread, things that are impending or possible or those we must do or pay or confront. In other words, the anticipation of a negative event or situation often generates far more anxiety and emotional turmoil (i.e.: repulsion) than the actual situation itself. For example, I often dread going to the dentist. Days before a session with the ‘torture dentist’ I begin to have feelings of dread, worry, fear and in general being upset. I deal with days of this! The drive there is a horror! Then the actual visit is usually not more than an hour. And as I make my appointment on the way out for my next filling, the cycle starts all over again. In fact, this cycle of fear/repulsion/confrontation/dealing with it seems so natural and a part of my having to cope with the world that it was easy not to question it.
    The problem is that it is all coming from ME, not the dentist. My dentist, who is actually a very nice man, is busy worrying about something else and cycling through the same sort of cycle but concerning something altogether different, maybe an audit or a check-=up or getting his car repaired. He isn’t giving any thought to my fear of the dentist, because he does not have that repulsion.
    Just as attachment leads to unhappiness, disappointment and negative feelings, so too does repulsion. Those things you hate, despise and are repelled by are just as firmly rooted in your mind and your heart and your life as the things you lust after, desire and want. In fact, as everyone knows, extreme love can easily turn to hate and visa versa. Just read any Jane Austin novel! In fact, it is a truth because they are 2 sides of the same coin, two sides of connective ness, of identifying with an external projection of your own self and either pushing or pulling at it to such a degree that it generates negative emotions.
    In the same way that attachment is a double bind, so too is repulsion. If you fear/hate/loathe something, then you fear dealing with it. The reality of having to deal with it increases the repulsion you feel, as the time approaches when you have to deal with it or you MIGHT have to deal with it, the negative emotions intensify. Then, if the actual event occurs, you have a let down. Things are rarely as horrible as the build up is, and the letdown fills you with self-loathing and self-criticism because of all the fear ands worry you invested in it. If the resolution or confrontation doesn’t come, then you are simply left with more fear, worry and dread because there has been no closure.
    In other words, repulsion and all the negative feelings surrounding it really don’t die down or get resolved because they are self perpetuating. If we are not worried about X then we fear and dread Y, if one set of irrational fears don’t cone true, there are plenty more where that came from.
    The old adage is that ‘what you fear most will come true,’ a rather depressing and pessimistic point of view but there is a kernel of validity in it. It is this: Whatever you put tremendous focus and Will into is bound to manifest because you are telling the universe that you have a need, a need to confront some issue or things or event that is stuck in your craw. This is why hypochondriacs get really sick eventually and people who fear spiders always seem to run into them. Part of us wants to be repulses, gets the same sort of thrill from it as being attached- just look at the popularity of thrillers and horror movies whose sole purpose is to make you uncomfortable, fearful and repelled! You pay money to experience those feelings!
    Yet constant stress, worry, hate, repulsion and fear poison us. They wear down the immune system and lead to a host of mental and physical problems, nothing new there.
    So what can you do? Believe it or not, the answer is quite simple, ‘don’t worry, and be happy.’ Of course actually making that happen is a bit harder. The key is to recognize that YOU are in control of your emotional response to something, including repulsion, fear and hate. As with attachment, the place to begin getting off the repulsion merry-go-round is to stop, get centered and clear and ask yourself three questions:
1.    What do I REALLY hate/fear here?
2.    What is the root cause of this hate/fear?
3.    Will hate/fear/worry help me in any way- can I let it go?

    Once you get clear on the answers to some or all of these questions, then you can banish them!
    Ill gives you a clear example. I am repulsed by heights, have ‘acrophobia’ and in general fear/avoid/worry about high places like observation platforms, cliffs and the like. For years I avoided such situations and will admit to still occasionally avoiding them (helicopter rides, never going to happen) but I am over the worst of it and rarely think about this repulsion whereas I was quite focused on it before. So here are my answers to these questions:
1.    I hate/fear heights! But as I looked at the question further, I realized that it wasn’t all heights. I was fine in a 747 but freaked looking down from a 50-story building. It was a sense of vertigo, of deep-seated disorientation. My fear was not intellectual, it was instinctual, a ‘body’ fear. It was illogical and irrational and I acknowledged it as such.
2.    I’m not sure about the root cause, though after lots of reflection I remembered some very scary falls I had as a kid, one from the roof! So I’m quite sure that the root cause was some sort of trauma, maybe my Dad tossed me in the air and dropped me when I was an infant! Who knows, though it certainly would explain a number of things about my personality!
3.    This was the longest process, I intellectually knew that the worry/fear I have about heights was not helping me in any way shape or form, but the worry seemed a part of me, part of my ego, who I was. Even my friends considered it part of my personality. It seemed cemented into my life. Some experiences caused me to shift my point of view, to challenge the belief that this was an inevitable set of worry/fear that I simply had to adapt to. It was NOT something I was born with; it was created, acquired, and artificial and so could be changed.


Once I realized that my fear of heights could be banished, then I set about deciding how to banish it. I decided to confront and deal with it in such a way that I could become detached and accepting of heights. To make a long story short, I got a pal to teach me how to rappel down cliffs! The first time was, of course, the hardest. I did a series of meditations, repeated sets of phrases and did it. I was a sweaty mess! I did it a number of times and got pretty good at it. It never ever became comfortable, but it became manageable. Raw terror was replaced by fear was replaced by discomfort. That is as detached as I could get at that time in my life and it was where I left that particular work! By bringing the repulsion down several notches, heights then seemed to elicit only a mild fear and a little worry. In fact, and here is the real point, looking back I could not for the life of me comprehend what I had been making all the fuss over! The fear I had had seemed irrational, even though at the time, it was quite real and easy to justify!
    This is the crux of the matter when approaching the Banishing of emotions: When you are in the middle of a negative emotion, be it anger, fear or hate, you are blind to its harmful effects on others and on yourself. It is riding you, it is a demon that is in full possession of your consciousness! Looking back, you may feel ‘that wasn’t me’ or ‘what got into me?!” And the answer would be: a Klesha, a demon, an emotional thing that was controlling you not visa versa. And your Ego is no help here! It is part of the problem! It will justify your anger or hate or fear, rationalize it, make it worthy of defense! No matter how much harm it does, it will not help you Banish. Only your True Will fueled by love can do that.
    And once you have banished the demon, like me and my repulsion to heights, you will look back and wonder how you put up with that silliness and pain for so long! The answer is that you needed a bit of perspective, a place to put that lever, a procedure and method of release. Hopefully this book will provide some of that. And when these things are done, then you can return to the natural emotional default of a human being, what is called equipoise or contentment. By Banishing those emotional knee-jerk responses of repulsion or attachment we get some breathing room to become AWARE of these reactions and decide what our Will is in each situation. We can cease to be manipulated by external things by Banishing or LETTING GO!

“When we train in letting go of thinking that anything-including ourselves-is either good or bad, we open our minds to practice with forgiveness and humor. And we practice opening to a compassionate space in which good/bad judgments can dissolve. We practice letting go of our idea of a "goal" and letting go of our concept of "progress," because right there, in that process of letting go, is where our hearts open and soften-over and over again.”

-    Pema Chödrön, Start Where You Are

SPIRIT-
“Abhinivesha  (‘clinging to life’) is the deepest and most universal klesha, remaining with us until our deaths.   We know that one day we will indeed die, yet our fear of death is a deeply buried in our unconsciousness.”

Many noted psychologists, Freud at the top of the pile, trace all neuroses and psychological issues to either sex or death. While seemingly simplistic and rather materialistic, there is a solid truth here. We have evolved as human beings for over a million years, but we have only been ‘civilized’ as we know it for a tenth of that time or less. One could argue that we are a very short distance form being purely animalistic barbarians, as the recent Rwanda and Kosovo genocides show us. Our basic territorial, mating and defensive reactions are still very instinctual and they are motivated and echoed by our emotional eruptions and responses.
    In the above-mentioned kleshas, we can easily see how sex and death are part of our ego and deeply entwined with the concepts of attachment and repulsion, but there is an even deeper instinctual drive that predates and supercedes the ‘urge to mate,’ this is an instinctual drive that even fills organisms that do not need to mate to reproduce, it is the urge to survive. This fear of death is so pervasive in our mind, body and heart that we scarcely notice it except in times of threat or intense stress, yet it is the ultimate attachment. Without getting too weird, we can even refer to Freud and others who talk about the inner reaction to this survival instinct and label it a Death Wish! Yet for our purposes, we will acknowledge that the urge to survive no matter what trumps almost all other urges in the human body, except for the Key one: Love.
    True love can over-ride the survival mechanism; the ‘higher power’ of such love causes parents to sacrifice for children, lovers to give up their lives for their loved-ones and comrades to sacrifice their lives for their fellows. We all recognize and acknowledge the heroism and purity of such love and, deep down, wonder if we could do the same if such a dire situation was presented to us. Those who are able to make this sort of ‘ultimate sacrifice’ have managed to pierce this klesha, to bypass the hard-wired biological survival instinct with a higher core of purpose, what could be called True Will through Love.
    While this author does not denigrate the survival instinct, mine having saved me a few times in this life, it needs to be noted that the Fear of Death is, in fact, the root FEAR we feel whenever we allow fear to control us instead of the other way around.
    Unless we confront and supercede our Fears, then they control us. If you are to do this, you need to trace the root of that fear (fear of being fired, fear of being homeless, fear of rejection) to the real source of all fear, the fear of death, or personal extinction. If you can ACCEPT your own eventual demise and in doing so Banish that fear, then the influence of all other fears on your life fade away.

I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain.

Bene Gesserit Litany Against Fear - From Frank Herbert's Dune Book Series
© 1965 and 1984 Frank Herbert


    A number of philosophers have pointed out that Fear is the root of many negative emotions. Fear of a particular minority has often led to anger and to violence, fear of hunger and poverty lead to economic exploitation and excessive and harmful greed, fear of losing status or a job can lead to immoral, unethical or illegal action. You have but to pick up today’s paper to see the results of such fear. Those who are caught and tried almost without exception find emotional justifications for their warped and harmful actions. If you listen to them, they always trace back to fear. Fear of loss of power, lost of money, loss of territory…but it is always a Fear. In the end, all fears are one fear, the fear of Death, of losing Ego, of losing our attachments to the things and people we love. In the end, it all comes down to this: Can you accept your death?
    This does not mean you want to die or will not do what you can to survive; I know I have and will do so! It does mean that the over-riding fear of your own ending as ‘you’ is acknowledged and accepted. When this occurs, it cannot control or warp you any more, it cannot generate and support other fears. These become easier demons to Banish once the BIG fear is dealt with.
    
    
THE KLESHAS AND NEGATIVE EMOTIONS

This has been a rather swift exploration of what is clearly a deep subject. Yet to Banish specific negative emotions and emotional states, you need to recognize them in yourself and in others. The place to begin, of course, is with YOU and YOUR emotional stuff. We all need work and constant vigilance and awareness of how we let these emotional demons manipulate and drive us is the real key to getting them corralled and, when appropriate, Banished. Yet you are a complex individual with a complicated emotional history, all sorts of patterns and emotional experiences, traumas and so on, this is not an easy work. Banishing the demon of, say, anger at a co-worker may be a one-shot process or may require constant attention and work. Everything depends on you and what you Will to do and how much Love you can muster for yourself and for your fellow human beings.
The key is this: You have control, you have the power to decide what your emotional actions and reactions will be and YOU get to choose what fear, anger, hate, irritation, sloth, jealousy, etc   you will Banish from your life.


Everything can be taken from a man but one thing; the last of the human freedoms - to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way.

-Viktor Frankl, Holocaust Survivor & Author


* Note- quoted definitions of the Kleshas from www.yogabasics,com


 


BANISHING- THE MIND/THINKING & PSYCHOLOGICAL ISSUES

MIND-  Mental/Intellectual Banishing-  Banning/Averting   :KNOWLEDGE

Banishing thoughts, patterns, attitudes and ways of approaching things, beliefs and all intellectually dysfunctional or negative processes is a tricky business. In many ways, the head rules the heart and body. The brain is, of course, the command center for all three and it is here that the real work of any sort of banishing is done because before there is any action there must be a PLAN of action, an intention based on knowledge and it is, of course, the brain or the Mind that creates the intellectual framework for all these kinds of actions to occur. We look at X, amass the knowledge about it we need, make a plan, organize steps to that plan and then, maybe, carry it out. Even when we react to something on impulse or on instinct or emotionally without little conscious thought, it is our Mind that gives us permission to do so.
    Now, like the Body and the Heart, the mind can be lazy, indolent, misused, ignored and simply turned over to someone else. We all know people who let others do their thinking for them. If an opinion is vented on a radio station by some blowhard, that person can be heard parroting the same opinion having given it no real thought or analysis.
    This book is not for people who simply let others (pundits, media, religious leaders) do their thinking for them. The ability to Banish something in and via the Mind is a very delicate one requiring an ability to step back from your own thoughts, ideas and mental behaviors and admit that some things are simply wrong or self-defeating for you and need to be changed. This is far easier to say than to do. We can ‘vow’ to stop a negative behavior, maybe obsessing about a problem or a person or a kind of food, but the actual practice if far harder to implement and maintain. Body issues like overeating are often emotional in root, but they are just as often about mental issues like handling job stress due to overwork.
    The oft-repeated line ‘it is all in your mind’ is actually quite true. Without getting all philosophical or metaphysical on you, reality is really what you perceive it to be and this in turn affects you emotionally and physically. Taking it a step further, physicists have been able to prove that our perceptions and thus our thoughts and ideas about what we sense as reality actually affects that very reality. In short, quantum physicists, String theorists and Buddhists all agree: There is on objective reality, we are participants in its manifestation not simply players in a stage that is set before us.
    Now, of course the way we live our lives is on the understanding or effective illusion that things are what they are, your house, street, job and so on exist and you maneuver amongst all of life’s rich variables interacting with all of them as best you can. Unfortunately, this is the racetrack of the Ego, in other words, this is the reality-framework where your Ego is in control because it is based on survival patterns set tens of thousands of years ago. People joke about primate behavior, that we are basically cavemen with new tools and that punching the clock is similar to hunting mastodons, but the truth is it really is the same game, the same mental map.
    We begin our day getting in gear, mentally setting up a list of tasks or chores we need to, responsibilities we need to meet, patterns (dressing, eating, meeting people, driving) that we seem to have little control over. We spend many years building up this complex reality and these tasks and responsibilities often expand as our family grows, as responsibilities increase and as what we OWN gets to be a bigger and bigger pile.
    Previously we discussed the emotional reactions to this, attachment being a prime player here. Yet it is our mind that acquires the patters of how all this unfolds from our parents and culture and then implements it as best it can give the resources it has. It is the Ego, our sense of self that is built up from all of these behaviors and the thoughts that lie behind them.
    Many people are quite fine with this whole reality construction, this whole mental ‘Map’ if you will, until some part of it does not function the way your expectations (Ego) thinks it should. This is why losing a job, losing a loved one, dealing with stresses that seem unwarranted or undeserved, all these things tend to shatter your whole world because it is created from a very delicate Map indeed, one that you work very hard to create and follow. It is often at these times of dissatisfaction, stress and     problems that we turn to spiritual help, which can be defined as ‘forces outside of my mental universe.’ What is God if not ‘that power that is beyond my thought or manipulation?
    Yet a turn to spirit for help leads often to three choices. Spiritual help tells us ‘here is the real reality as laid down by X in this book (or other dogma) follow it and all will be well. And this works for some people, which is fine, but it is again turning over your Will, your ability to use your Mind, to another authority. Or spiritual succor may simply say ‘accept it all, this is the way it is, learn to live with it, it is God’s will’ in which case the original problems, the pain and issues that need resolution are still there, still negative and so coping strategies are brought into play. Escapism, self-medication and so on. The third path is spiritual in nature as well, but it is a looking INWARD, believing that the source of spirit is, in fact, the Mind. Not the Ego, not the brain and all those electrical impulses, but the MIND.

"What is the mind? It is a phenomenon that is not body, not substantial, has no form, no shape, no color, but, like a mirror, can clearly reflect objects."
Lama Zopa Rinpoche

    So we begin with a very different idea of ‘mind’ than most will ascribe to. Psychologists talk about ‘psyche’ and spend time objectifying other parts of this ‘thing’ but we I will side with the freethinkers and philosophers by using this definition when referring to Mind, the topic of this chapter.
    In conclusion, the point is this: To Banish aspects of the Mind, be they neurotic thought patterns, unwarranted beliefs, harmful ideas or worries or mental attachments, you first need to be able to grasp them, understand them and have power over them. This means you have to DISTANCE yourself from them and their causes. You must be able to say, “Hm, yes, that is a dysfunctional and negative thought pattern. IT is not ME because my thinking processes are not ME, I am above and beyond these processes and therefore can CHANGE them is I Will to do so with Love.”
    And that, in a nutshell, is the process for Banishing mental issues and complexes. It can be done. You can do it for the most part, though it is important to note that come ‘mental demons’ are bigger than others, some require lots of banishing and some very little. Some may require professional help because their roots may be biological or may be so overwhelming (the death of a loved one) that your Will may simply need some support and guidance.
    This chapter is about Banishing small to medium sized demons. It is my belief that, in the end, YOU are the only one that can banish your demons, no matter how large or small, but part of that Will may be to seek help sometimes that seeking help from others is KEY to the banishing that demon, sometimes simply reaching out to others IS the Banishing required.
    Back to you and your mental demons! This chapter is broken down, as has been the pattern, into five more sections but with a difference. I will be looking at the theories of Banishing Mind problems through an ancient philosophical set of values called ‘the powers of the sphinx.’

THE POWERS OF THE SPHINX

        The Sphinx has persisted as a symbol of hidden wisdom in many traditions. The Sphinx was said to be a mythical creature with the head of a man and the body of an animal, often a lion. In the hidden traditions passed down within Western spirituality, the Sphinx has been used to symbolize and explain how one can train the Mind, to adjust and focus in such a way as to take control of your thinking processes in such a way as to take control of your life and make things happen in a positive way.
        This is shown ands exemplified in the traditional ‘riddle of the sphinx’. The riddle, as reported in Greek myth, is this: What has 4 legs in the morning, two at midday and three at sunset? The answer? Man. Man crawls on 4 legs (hands and feet) as a child, walks on 2 as an adult and hobbles on three (legs and a cane) as an old man. In this way the Sphinx is identified as the bringer of TIME and TRANSFORMATION of every human being. Yet the Sphinx is removed from this cycle of birth and death. How can this be so? Because only MAN is the only animal that has control over his MIND.
    Another hint as to the identity of the Sphinx is the fact that the Sphinx is often shown with wings outstretched, though it can be male or female in form. In fact, as we will see, the Sphinx personifies the HIGHER ASPECT of the animal being/body/senses governed and controlled by the Mind.  Thus the riddle and answer can be seen as thus:
        What being evolves, is aware of this evolution and through Mind has much control over this evolution and self-grown through self-awareness? Only Mankind, only YOU.
        The legendary powers of the sphinx are 4, but they culminate in a 5th.
        The 4 powers are:  to know, to will, to dare & to keep silent.
        These ‘powers’ are nothing more modes of behavior that you can adopt and which will inevitably lead you to control over your Mind. The potential is there, as shown by the four powers of the Sphinx, but it is the fifth power that shows HOW to do this. When you hold these keys in your hand, then you will have the Knowledge, the Will, be able to Dare and the keen focus (silence) to Banish the negative from the center of your being, your Mind.

KNOW - AIR

INTELLECTUAL KNOWLEDGE- LEARNING ABOUT SELF AND WORLD- THINKING:CONSCIOUS BEHAVIOR AND MIND SHIFTS

The traditional psychological label for this mental function:
EGO (the sense of a false ‘ME’ that is seen as the center of learning, knowing and giving information)

The Power of the Mind:
    TO KNOW: By becoming aware of what you truly KNOW, then you come closer to truly understanding your personal reality and your place in the universe. By getting clear on this, you will be able to Banish falsehoods and rigidity of knowledge and thought.

How do we ‘know’ something?

You are inundated from the moment you wake up until the moment you sleep with information, entertainment and other people talking at you by a variety of physical and electronic means! In general, the more information streams you have coming at you, the more confusing and contradictory the messages they are sending are. Here is quick explanation about knowledge.
    You are born into a reality that has set schemas, that is, ‘ways of seeing and making sense of the world. This includes, but isn’t limited to, beliefs, traditions, social norms and mores, rules, relationships, accepted sources of information and so on. While all human beings in the world are essentially the same, it is these social and cultural schemas that set us clearly and sometimes violently apart.
    So someone born in a Catholic family in Italy, for example, will have a fundamentally different frame (s) of reference and worldview than a farmer in Islamic Pakistan. They will eat differently, believe differently, watch and accept different streams of information differently, socialize differently and so on.
    Now, here is the key. Each of these people believe that THEIR way is the RIGHT way, they believe, as do we all, that OUR schema, our ‘way of knowing’ and our sources of authoritative knowledge are the CORRECT ones and that others are not correct. Those people who are more globally informed and who are as open minded as can be work very hard at accepting that a variety of schemas and world views and traditions and beliefs are acceptable, but the reality is, deep down, even if acceptable they are not naturally YOUR schema because you were born and educated and exist in YOUR culture.
    I could go on to discuss that this is the root of war and bigotry, something that is likely true, but the point I want to make is different.
    We assume that everyone learns the same way: they do not. Aside from each person’s schemas and reality framework that they are given from birth, people also innately learn differently due to their personality. A systematic way of looking at these styles was developed by Dr. Gardner who has codified 9 different styles.
"We are all able to know the world through language, logical-mathematical analysis, spatial representation, musical thinking, the use of the body to solve problems or to make things, an understanding of other individuals, and an understanding of ourselves. Where individuals differ is in the strength of these intelligences - the so-called profile of intelligences -and in the ways in which such intelligences are invoked and combined to carry out different tasks, solve diverse problems, and progress in various domains."
-    Gardner (1991).

While this is fascinating, the key is simply to realize that ‘knowing’ and ‘learning’ are very individual processes that YOU ‘know’ things based on your prior schemas and on HOW you learn.
    Meditating on HOW you learn and what you really KNOW will help you understand the processes of learning that are negative or cause you pain. Eliminating these WAYS of learning or adapting your mental ‘learner’ to they way you want information thrown at you will help resolve all sorts of issues.

What IS Knowledge?

‘Imagination is more important that knowledge.”

-Albert Einstein


WHAT is this thing called knowledge? Einstein and others saw knowledge as a negative! It presupposed a finished or completed unit of information, labeled TRUTH and then cemented in the mind. These building blocks of TRUTH are then linked together through the set schema of the Mind via the EGO and expressed as Opinion! If someone disagrees with your opinion, then they clearly don’t grasp the TRUTH and are wrong. The whole system, guided by the Ego, which is programmed to see itself as the center of all things, is flawed, as Einstein and many other thinkers and philosophers have pointed out. Why? Because it assumes that when you LEARN something, the process is over. In fact, what can be proven bedrock truth, like the fact that TIME exists as a linear process, can be proven later on to be quite false. In fact, TRUTH is apparently a very relative thing with each culture, religion, political party and so on holding very different things as absolutely TRUE.
    Real Knowledge, as the root word got knowledge (Gnosis) implies, means ‘direct experience.’ That is, if you see or experience it, then you KNOW it. Since so much of the ‘knowledge’ we store in our mind is second hand or even more removed form our reality, how can we ‘know’ that, for example, that the earth revolves around the sun? Most of what we ‘know’ are facts that are determined as true by someone else. Some fit our basic scientific schema (the world is round) because they have been proved and we simply accept that others have done this proving so we may move on. Other ‘facts’ (THIS book holds God’s law, there are no ghosts) are actually quite debatable and fall under the rubric of ‘beliefs.’
    We are all set to roam into the fields of philosophy but we will stop here, simply noting that when we determine WHAT we REALLY ‘know’ and what we simply believe or feel is true are different things, then we are free. We are free to be more open, free to banish those unfounded modes of thinking that are hindering our growth or free to separate our beliefs from intellectual knowledge in an open and clear manner.


Where do we ‘get’ our knowledge?

We get our knowledge from three basic places

1.    ‘Accepted’ knowledge is part of our upbringing and forms the ‘background’ or schema that forms our worldview or view of reality. We often do not question such knowledge and they are often so deeply rooted in our childhood as to be unconscious.
2.    From other people/sources. These range from well-studied teachers and authorities to idiots on the radio or TV. All of this knowledge, unless tested and proven, is not authoritative. Usually these streams of information are delivered for a reason, with a specific spin or end in mind, the goal being more than simply informing you but also to bend your view, schema or set of schemas to a specific end.
3.    From direct knowledge of your outer or inner reality through your perceptions. This includes your knowing things about your reality, like how an apple tastes, and also from what is called apperceiving or directly experiencing the essence of something, like ‘knowing’ that you have a soul.

All of these three modes of acquiring knowledge hinge on number 3- because all the information thrown at you goes through your filter, your ability to perceive. Why is this crucial? Because by Banishing blockages or limitations on your ‘reality funnel’ you can change amazing amounts of ideas, patterns, ideas and though processes! You can take back control of your learning from those sources of information that seek to control your mind!
    By Banishing knowledge-base false attitudes, opinions and certainties, you are open to ways of thinking and solutions that were not apparent. You can also banish tape-loops of negative ‘knowing’ that cause needless harm with no basis in truth! Imagination IS more important that knowledge. By retaining and reclaiming mental flexibility through knowledge you are open to the universe.

Passive Meditation (Tamas Yoga):

Much of this Banishing work is done through guided ‘passive’ or open meditation. Observing HOW you think and learn and using the powers of your Mind to puzzle out what the blockages are AND freeing yourself from the self-imposed walls around your worldview created by bricks of ‘true knowledge’ is an incredibly liberating experience. This gives you the tools and the procedures for banishing these things you know understand.

These tools are:
Logic, mental focus exercises: awareness of who you are and how you learn.

 

WILL- FIRE

BEHAVIORAL AND MENTAL MODIFICATION- THERAPY/CHANGING MENTAL PATTERNS

The traditional psychological label for this mental function:
SUPEREGO (The ‘big parent’ part of the mind that is formed from traditions, accepted rules, norms and all other solidified authoritative elements acting as a part of our Mind)