Susan Schwartz shares A  Personal Story of How Jin Shin Jyutsu Nourishes My Roots and Life in The Main Central Jin Shin Jyutsu Newsletter, issue Number 62, Fall 2008:

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ROOTS

2 ovals, 2 eggs, 2 eyes in the middle of the word. These 0’s are looking at each other as if looking in a mirror. These two 00’s are sandwiched between R (18) and T (20). 18 means Life ~ “Chai”, 20 symbolizes judgment and the final state of personal consciousness. It also represents perpetual intelligence and suggests a stretching, an extension beyond the limits of the modes of consciousness common to most human beings.

My story is a story of life, generations and growth.

Jin Shin Jyutsu is my/our tool for self-awareness. When I began my journey I was so willing to help others around me with this gift from the Universe via Jiro Murai and Mary Burmeister. I began with my roots. My family was right at hand to help me to learn and practice Jin Shin Jyutsu.

Generations, Roots,

 I AM                    ~ Physio-Philosophy

WHO I AM          ~ helping me understand myself Physio-Psychology

Giving sessions to my mother opened a door for me. Living together in one house, our relationship takes on many facets. The things I saw in her that disturbed me and annoyed me became the mirror for things in me. I got to watch my reactions, my judgments, and my emotional world. Jin Shin Jyutsu became my tool to help our living arrangement succeed. Not only does it give her quality of life, it provides the same for me. Each session I give her fills me with a profound inner peace and realization of my gratitude to her for being my mother. She is 91 years and counting.

The gift of Giving and Receiving ~ The Breath ~ the Oval 0

An injury has created the opportunity for my daughter to begin giving me sessions. It is the mirror of the situation I described with my elder; I am on the other side of the looking glass. This has been a wonderful gift.

Another generation, a Doorway through which light enters ~ moving into the NOW

A New Relationship and a New Connection

My mother and my daughter (and my husband) are my wonderful teachers. I AM a much better student because of Jin Shin Jyutsu. It helps me look into the Mirror and gives me the opportunity to embrace Awareness to help me Understand

The Hebrew word for “root” is shoresh. It is written shin ray shin, 3 Hebrew letters שׂ‎ ר שׂ‎. The letter shin is written שׂ‎. Three branches meeting at the bottom. When you want something to be strong you say it three times. Strong ropes are made of three cords wrapped together.

According to the Gemara (part of the Talmud that discusses the oral Jewish laws given at Mount Sinai), “3 generations make a family, a core, that is bound and will not break.”

The mediator (3) harmonizes the masculine and feminine; bringing together parts of ONE. It facilitates oneness, being whole and operating as one. The wrapping, the binding of the mediator, is like the wrapping of the cords of a rope ~ both the Mediator and the rope foster strength, growth, expansion and everlasting eternity ~ our cosmic memory.

My daughter has joined me in giving sessions to several of my clients. She has expressed an interest in studying  and learning more Jin Shin Jyutsu. This is a dream many students have in which all members of their family start to see the benefits of our Life Study and want to make it theirs as well. Danielle and I are spending quality time together; giving sessions, sharing, growing in a new and profound way.

We carry the torch, we pass the torch, and we share the torch. Jiro Murai did this with Mary and Mary did this with Us. Now I have the opportunity each time I touch someone…to continue…

THANK YOU MARY

Thank you, Susan.

Thank you, Mary.

Thank you, David.

Gassho, Namaste, Blessings

All issues of The Main Central Jin Shin Jyutsu Newsletter are available at http://www.jsjinc.net.

Christina Burawa shares Impersonal Self in Action: “Thwack Thwack!” in The Main Central Jin Shin Jyutsu Newsletter, issue Number 62, Fall 2008:

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What would it be like to approach a Safety Energy Lock not through your palm or the tips of your fingers, but from the end of a long stick?

At Rinzai Zen Buddhist sesshins, or week-long retreats, students practice zazen (sitting and breathing meditation) for up to twelve hours each day. The hours are broken into twenty-five minute periods, with walking meditation, or at least a release from zazen posture, in between. Still, the physical challenge is considerable, and intentionally so. A minimum of sleep combined with physical rigor are meant to break down the students’ habitual defenses, to help the students drop their fixed, seemingly separate, “I am” selves —- to realize Impersonal Self. Impersonal Self is defined by Mary in Self-Help Book II:

IS – Impersonal Self

What is IS?

Unload all ATTITUDES

A few times each day, each student goes before the Roshi (venerable elder/teacher) for sanzen, an encounter in which the student will attempt to manifest some understanding of the nature of reality. Silence is the rule at Zen retreats. However, were one to go looking for pointers on how to approach sanzen, one could find no better advice than Mary’s words, found alongside the description of the Number 11 “SAFETY” Energy Lock in Self-Help Book II: “Be the dropping of your shoulders – unload, receive and tune into the rhythm of the cosmos where there is no-thing.” No thing. No separate self. No “other”. Can you go before the Roshi with no self and no other?

Before sanzen periods, a monk or nun will slowly and deliberately patrol the meditation hall with a stick called a kesaku* held balanced on their shoulder. They will stop in front of male students whose sitting posture has stiffened, often resulting in a pulling up of the shoulders, a tightening of the 11s. It is as if the student’s resisting body is saying: “No! I don’t want to let go of my baggage!” The stiff student is rapped on his shoulder with the kesaku, indicating that he is to lean forward and to one side in order to receive a double strike of the stick (Thwack Thwack!) on each shoulder. (Female students must ask for the kesaku by bowing if they want it.) The kesaku strikes the shoulders at the 11s, helping the shoulders to release and hopefully helping the student to let go of some of their baggage.

The student is challenged to release some baggage, some attitude, in the act  of simply facing the one who holds the kesaku. Can the student encounter the stick and the person who carries it with no fear? No perception of threat or punishment? Equally challenging, or perhaps more so, can the monk wield the stick with no-self?

The “Thwack Thwack!” suffuses the silent meditation hall. Each time the kesaku is used, one can hear where the striker “is at”. You can hear hesitation. You can hear trying-to force. You can hear it when the kesaku properly meets its target.

A monk wielding a kesaku, a Jin Shin Jyutsu practitioner being the jumper cable, each one sensing their way to the heart of the Safety Energy Lock. When we are able to drop our thinking minds and our attitudes, when we act, or rather, when we BE from the standpoint of Impersonal Self, we have an increased capacity to tune into the rhythm of the cosmos, to allow that rhythm to express itself through us. And that is when a stick may become a helper, an instrument of kindness.

Thwack Thwack!

Thanks and gassho to Matthias Roth for being a catalyst to this essay.

*A kesaku is a flat, flexible, tapered stick, about a yard long and traditionally made of oak.

Thank you, Christina.

Thank you, Mary.

Thank you, David.

Gassho, Namaste, Blessings

All issues of The Main Central Jin Shin Jyutsu Newsletter are available at http://www.jsjinc.net.

Waltraud Riegger-Krause shares about THUMB FUNCTION ENERGY AND LITTLE FINGER FUNCTION ENERGY in The Main Central Jin Shin Jyutsu Newsletter, issue Number 62, Fall 2008:

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Thumb Function Energy and Little Finger Energy

continued…

So we see that Umbilicus Flow relates more to the Little Finger Function Energy, and Diaphragm more to the Thumb Function Energy. How Thumb Function Energy is related to Diaphragm is explained in the first part of the article in Winter Issue #59.

Then there are the cold feet, which relate to a lack of fire energy. If the Heart Energy is in disharmony, it will affect the Kidney Energy. Fire and water elements in the body have to be balanced. And if one is out of harmony, it will affect the other one. On page 57 [Text 2] we can see in the drawing that one branch of the small Intestine Flow could separate down and affect the Kidney Energy. That is why in the application of this function we hold the shoulder blade with one hand. As we do this, we check the whole shoulder blade and clear any accumulation. Sometimes it is further up; sometimes it is further down. Small Intestine Flow has to cross at the first Thoracic Vertebrae (TV 1). If it is blocked at the shoulder blade, the pathway can deviate and can go to TV 3 and affect the lungs, or it can go down to TV 7 and affect the kidneys and diaphragm. So we can put our whole hand on the shoulder blade or go along these three lines on the blade (in the drawing on pg. 57) and clean them out.

But there is also one branch of the Heart Flow that descends through the axilla to the back into the 7th Thoracic vertebra. (see drawing, page 18, Text 2). Here the Small Intestine Flow is not crossing the blade properly and could intermingle with the Heart Flow and affect the branch going into the kidneys. As a result, fire energy is blocked from going into the kidneys and that’s when we get symptoms like cold feet.

While we hold the blade, the other hand is holding Safety Energy Lock 17. Depending on the side where we hold 17, it helps Heart or Small Intestine energy. Holding it more on the front side helps the Heart and holding it more on the back is helping the Small Intestine energy. Seventeen brings inspiration, strengthens the intuition and harmonizes our nerves. It helps all trying to’s and brings us into the flow with the cosmic energy of the 7th Depth.

Mary also said that this Function Energy helps when the body is too alkaline. When the body becomes alkaline, it starts in the blood. I see a connection from 3rd Depth Blood to the underarm. Liver, one of our 3rd Depth flows, scatters one branch of its energy to underarm area (Pg. 34 2.c.(1)-Text 2). As a self-help we can hold three tense knots in the axilla (underarm), fingers pointing towards the wrist. Lung energy is passing the underarm on the front (thumb) side, Diaphragm in the center, and Heart energy on the little finger side. With this self-help we can clear 2nd, 6th and 5th Depth Energy, all three fire element chest flows. In this little flow we are dealing with all fire element related organ flows. As you experience them you can explore more and more.

Thank you, Waltraud.

Thank you, Mary.

Thank you, David.

Gassho, Namaste, Blessings

All issues of The Main Central Jin Shin Jyutsu Newsletter are available at http://www.jsjinc.net.

Waltraud Riegger-Krause shares about THUMB FUNCTION ENERGY AND LITTLE FINGER FUNCTION ENERGY in The Main Central Jin Shin Jyutsu Newsletter, issue Number 62, Fall 2008:

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Thumb Function Energy and Little Finger Energy

(Continued from Winter Issue #59, posted here on 12/24 & 12/26, 2016 as Parts 1 & 2)

Before I go deeper into Little Finger Function Energy, I will just look at both Thumb Function Energy and Little Finger Function Energy, and see what relationships come up.

Lung and Heart are both chest flows which deal with fire energy. Fire being the pure flame of spirit, giving us vitality and opening up to Spirit, Second Depth, little breath receiving BIG BREATH OF LIFE and Fifth depth, little blood receiving BIG BLOOD OF LIFE. They both open the chest.

Large Intestine and Small Intestine are both finger flows. They deal with energy of renewing and reproduction. By receiving the fire vitality of their partner flow they help create the earth for renewing. They open the arms and shoulders, so we can embrace life as it is. They are also both connected in the 13 Flow, as well as the 6th Depth Umbilicus Flow. The 13 Flow also combines the Main Central Flow, another 6th Depth Function.

On another level, the thumb side of the arm belongs to the descending energy and the little finger side of the arm belongs to the ascending energy, so the respective flows will then support this descending/ascending energy.

If I look at thumb and little finger, I think also of the Mediator Flow. In the flow route of the Mediator, the energy goes first through the same side little finger and then through the other side thumb. By holding the sequence for the Thumb Function Energy we will help the opposite Mediator, and by holding the Little Finger Function Energy we will help the same side Mediator Flow.

Lung and Large Intestine Flows are both surface flows. Heart and Small Intestine Flows are both deep flows. Big Breath is 6th Depth and Big Blood is 3rd Depth, they are both middle flows. So again we can clear all three dimensions of man with these simple flows.

The function of the 5th Depth fire energy is to receive the big primordial FIRE of the 6th Depth. So when the 5th Depth functions are not in harmony, our heart is not receiving enough Light. If the flows of the 5th Depth, Heart Function Energy and Small Intestine Function Energy, which run along the little finger side of the arm, are intermingling, they cause symptoms that are almost identical to the symptoms we find listed for the Heart Flow and for the Small Intestine Flow in Mary’s Text 2. Those symptoms not listed there are the appendix, solar plexus, cold feet and thyroid disharmony. The appendix is located right after the Small Intestine becomes Large Intestine, so it is still influenced by small intestine. In my notes from Mary, I have thyroid disharmony listed as a symptom coming from Heart Energy not in harmony. As part of the hormonal system, thyroid has to do with the Main Central, 6th Depth. Also, the Solar plexus has to do with the Main Central as well as with Umbilicus Flow. And the connection of solar plexus to Small Intestine Flow has to do with the location. It lives right where the Small Intestine Flow passes along.

To be continued…

Betsie Haar presents a book review in The Main Central Jin Shin Jyutsu Newsletter, issue Number 62, Fall 2008:

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A Touching Good-Bye, The Gentle Use of Jin Shin Jyutsu® at Times of Critical Illness and Death ~ by Judith B. Andry, M.Ed.

continued…

The second part of the book contains photographs illustrating the hands-on with related text and instructions. For example, there is both a picture showing how to hold left and right Safety Energy Lock 4 and written instructions for doing so. The pictures are black and white, very simple and clear.

The last chapter is self-help for the caregiver, a very welcome addition to the book. Judy suggests holding one’s fingers, the 36 breaths, and the Main Central. She also reprises the favorite self-help of Al Canner, the executive director of the Colorado Hospice Organization, whose personal story appears in an earlier chapter.

Judy is very careful not to overwhelm the reader with too much information. The Main Central self-help is the only complete flow sequence in the book. She’s extremely conscientious in referring the reader who’s interested in learning more to the Scottsdale office, the 5-day seminars, The Touch of Healing, and Mary Burmeister’s self-help books. This is a book you could give to an acquaintance, colleague, or family member without explanation.

“I cannot say enough good things about A Touching Good-By,” writes instructor Philomena Dooley. “It should offer great help and consolation to anyone faced with the loss of a loved one. Just being able to help a loved one at this critical time with a loving touch should do much to allay the feeling of helplessness – while knowing at the same time you are offering great comfort. It is in the best tradition of Jin Shin Jyutsu.”

NOTE: this book is sold through the Scottsdale office.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Judy Andry first experienced Jin Shin Jyutsu in 1984 and has been studying and practicing the Art ever since. In 1998 she was asked to become one of three members of the first Jin Shin Jyutsu Advisory Council. She holds a M.Ed. in Guidance and Counseling and worked as an elementary school counselor, had a private counseling practice and lectured on parenting and adolescence. She is the author of two other books – From One Parent to Another; On Adolescence – and Pauses Along the Way. She lives in the French Quarter in New Orleans with her husband, Allain. They are the parents of three children and grandparents to nine grandchildren.

Thank you, Judy.

Thank you, Betsie.

Thank you, Mary.

Thank you, David.

Gassho, Namaste, Blessings

All issues of The Main Central Jin Shin Jyutsu Newsletter are available at http://www.jsjinc.net.