Awakening the Alchemical Child
PragmAlchemy Exercise #3
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�� �� NOTE: If you haven’t already done so, before proceeding with this or any other PragmAlchemy exercise, please read the PragmAlchemy Orientation. Also, be sure to start each session with the 1st exercise, Energy Intake in the Cauldron Position. After that feel free to mix and match subsequent techniques however you like to create extended personalized sessions.
TIMING, STACKING & OTHER CONSIDERATIONS
Locate a peaceful, comfortable space at home or another place where you can lie down completely outstretched in order to first do the starter PragmAlchemy exercise (Energy Intake in the Cauldron Position), which helps create room in and heat up your Cauldron, making any subsequent exercises more effective.
Then you’ll perform Awakening the Alchemical Child for at least 6 minutes. This means that your total workout time will be a minimum of 11 minutes.
Feel free to wear earplugs to shut out noise and allow yourself to sink deeper into this meditative pose, but avoid using a sleeping mask for this particular exercise.
Some days you might prefer earplugs; on other occasions they might be unnecessary. The main thing is to match your current inner needs with your outer environment and let go of any tendency to turn this practice into a robotic routine.
Note that you can perform Awakening the Alchemical Child as often as you like. But as with Energy Intake in the Cauldron Position, 10 minutes is probably the upper limit for how long you should do it by itself in a single session.
If you’re maxing out both of these exercises in combination, your total workout time would be 20 minutes. If you added Taking Wing with the Phoenix Heart before or after Awakening the Alchemical Child, you’d be looking at a maximum 31-minute session. Believe me, that’s a LOT of PragmAlchemy!
It’s easy to downplay how potent these seemingly simplistic bodywork, breathing and visualization methods can be, so I urge you to build up gradually to extended sessions.
This suggestion is all the more relevant as you begin to stack multiple exercises and/or if you’re simultaneously experiencing Potentiation or other activations in the Regenetics Method as addressed in the PragmAlchemy Orientation.
ESTABLISH YOUR HOME BASE
Before inserting your earplugs, if you’re using them, take a solid minute to appreciate your physical body and material surroundings. You don’t have to set your timer for this part, but you can if you like.
The idea in this little warm-up of sorts is to mentally establish your “home base” in the “real world” you inhabit in waking life.
Imagine for a moment even if you don’t actually believe it that this is the ultimate reality, the only world that exists. Pretend that what you perceive with your five senses is all that can be known and you’re firmly anchored and at home in this solid, immutable world of facts and figures.
As you awaken your inner alchemical child and begin the process of learning to project into other, equally real (or if you prefer, equally illusory) worlds, this home base is the place to which like a homing pigeon you’ll always return from your travels into other dimensions of awareness.
Connecting with the outer before you begin projecting your consciousness into your inner world can also produce a sort of “slingshot effect,” allowing you to propel yourself much more quickly and deeply inside yourself.
POSITIONING VARIATIONS
Now set your timer, if you like, to at least 5 minutes. Place your Ouroboros or very tightly rolledup hand towel on the floor, ground or other level surface in front of you in one of three positions (or in the first position in the case of a towel):
1) Flat and sideways (east-west) like a book positioned horizontally;
HORIZONTAL PLACEMENT
2) Upright and sideways (east-west) like a book balanced on its spine; or
3) Upright and vertical (north-south) like a book stood on end facing you.
Starting on your knees, allow yourself to sink onto your calves as much as your flexibility comfortably allows. Then, being sure not to stress your neck muscles, lie down with your forehead against your touchstone at the level of your “third eye” or pineal gland.
With your arms fully extended in front of you and palms touching each other while your elbows and hands rest on your rug, carpet, mat or other (ideally minimally padded) surface, simply allow the full weight of your head to gradually sink onto your touchstone.
AWAKENING THE ALCHEMICAL CHILD
Without the Ouroboros, this would simply be a common yoga pose. But with your Ouroboros decompressing the fascia around both your cranium and third eye, and while interfacing with your first “Mental Chamber” as I’ll explain shortly, it becomes so much more!
You might find the included reference images helpful in visualizing these positions. It’s also important to note that the order in which these positions are listed above charts an increasing level of difficulty as well as myofascial pressure.
I strongly suggest that you become adept at the first position before (optionally) moving to the second. If and when you feel like even more of a challenge, then and only then should you try the third position.
ADVANCED POSE
BREATHING & MOVEMENT
While awakening your inner alchemical child, be sure to breathe deeply and slowly with your diaphragm through your nose starting from your lower belly and filling your lungs as completely as you can from the bottom up.
The potentially considerable pressure (depending on your level of flexibility) created by your knees against the sides of your solar plexus will make diaphragmatic breathing harder than under usual circumstances, so don’t be concerned if you’re unable to inhale fully.
A noteworthy aspect of this exercise as in the first two PragmAlchemy techniques is that it incorporates a version of High-Resistance Inspiratory Muscle Strength Training (IMST), known as pratiloma in Ayurveda, which can quickly strengthen the diaphragm when practiced regularly. Research has shown that such controlled breathing against resistance can do all sorts of positive things: lower blood pressure, prime the lymph pump of the diaphragm, improve heart and lung function, and even assist with heartburn.
While breathing, listen as intently as you can to your body’s wisdom, as it just might direct you to roll your forehead left or right against your Ouroboros.
If you do get an urge to incorporate gentle movement, go extremely slowly indeed, keeping the pressure constant as you explore pain points along the forehead, brow ridges, and bridge of the nose. (You can even do this to some extent with a towel, but an Ouroboros is far more effective.)
When you reach an ouchy point, stop and be with it until the pain subsides. Then, if you feel called to, keep moving slowly until you encounter a new sore spot.
This is how you work through multiple adhesions which are ultimately linked together in the giant “spider web” of the body’s typically compromised fascial network in succession.
I’m not going to sugarcoat it: this particular exercise can be pretty darn challenging in the discomfort department. Always remember that PragmAlchemy is meant to work with, not against, pain to improve circulation, detoxification, and energy flow. The objective, as previously remarked, is to become a pain searcher.
I can’t emphasize enough how important it is to learn to distinguish between “good” pain and “bad.”
This technically applies to a wide range of activities and therapies, but it’s a defining feature of PragmAlchemy, whose golden rule is to always, always, always pay attention to your breathing. Let your breath be your magical mystery tour guide as you seek the transformative pain inside.
Good pain meaning pain you can tolerate indicates you’re getting to adhesions at the level of your connective tissue. These hardened fascial restrictions (including scar tissue) often attach to bone, which means you have to reach the bone to undo them.
Hands down, the Ouroboros is the most powerful tool I know of for doing this. But even a rolledup towel can provide a certain amount of myofascial decompression.
Again, the way to decompress fascia is to apply pressure over time (at least 3 minutes, sometimes longer, depending on your personal circumstances). How much pressure depends on your individualized pain level. Whenever you feel your breath catching (indicating bad pain), ease off until you can breathe easier.
At this point you’ll likely notice that the discomfort, while still there, has become manageable good pain. When not too severe, this discomfort is actually a wonderful sign that your frozen fascia has begun softening and is about to start melting.
Melting, or decompression, creates space for deep cellular detoxification and renourishment through elevated blood and lymph flow in combination with increased penetration of the life force that conscious diaphragmatic breathing automatically pulls into the body.
In this exercise, rather than concern yourself with the length of your inhalations and exhalations, simply breathe in the most relaxed manner possible. Don’t think too much about your head movement either; let that be gradual and instinctual something, like your breathing, sort of in the background.
Instead, bring the full power of your attention to the visualization aspect I’ll describe momentarily as you relax, relax, and relax some more.
LIFE FORCE FLOWING AROUND & THROUGH US
WORK YOUR MICROCOSMIC ORBIT & PERINEUM
Pressing the tongue against the roof of the mouth whenever you’re performing this and any other PragmAlchemy exercise is crucial. This positioning, as a reminder, completes a vital energy pathway called the microcosmic orbit.
Your tongue doesn’t need to be in any exact position as long it’s resting firmly but comfortably against the hard palate. If you’re still unclear as to the layout of your oral structure, please do take a moment to reference a diagram of the mouth. You’ll move forward with greater peace of mind knowing that you’re doing things right and safely.
By maintaining this tongue position, you keep the life force you’re pulling into your system via your breath from clumping together and stagnating, which can lead to temporary Herxheimer reactions, or healing crises.
MIND YOUR TONGUE
While maintaining your microcosmic orbit and inhaling slowly and deeply through your nose from your diaphragm, also be conscious (in the background of your awareness for this exercise) of contracting the area between your anus and genitals known as the perineum. Then, while exhaling, relax it.
This will help you maximize the physical and energetic benefit from your breathing cycle. You can even practice maintaining your microcosmic orbit while going about your daily business. At first this might seem strange, but you may find that you feel more alert yet peaceful when doing so.
STARING AT THE WALL OF YOUR MENTAL CHAMBER
In PragmAlchemy focusing the power of your attention on the realm of energy is just as important as utilizing correct breathing and myofascial decompression.
Your visualization for Awakening the Alchemical Child starts the moment you place your forehead on your touchstone. In that instant, simply close your eyes and “slingshot” away from the “real world” as you leave your home base completely behind until your timer sounds after 5 minutes or longer.
With eyes closed and seeing with your mind’s eye instead, stare intently at the inner surface of your eyelids. After a few seconds, depending on the amount of ambient light around you, you should start to see something like a shifting curtain of colors that can appear quite psychedelic.
That’s the “wall” of your first Mental Chamber. It might also resemble a fogbank, an aurora, a moving tie-dye, a lava lamp, or even changing code like that seen in THE MATRIX. It may or may not feature recognizable patterns.
The reason I suggested not wearing a mask is that you need a certain amount of ambient light coming through your eyelids to be able to “see” well enough especially when first learning to project your consciousness in your inner world.
Breathing deeply, with your forehead pressed against and (optionally) moving incrementally along your touchstone, your initial task is to merely observe this wall. Marvel at it as it shifts, morphs, and transforms seemingly with a will of its own.
Entertain the idea that you’re on the threshold of a far more mutable reality than the fixed home base you just left behind. Technically, your home base is equally changeable because it’s merely another part (albeit a slower-moving one) of the infinite and eternal Dream that is the multiverse you’re starting to explore.
With time and practice, you might even find that your work in inner alchemy thanks to increasing your energy and fortifying your imaginative power begins to allow you to create more and more dramatic changes in your outer circumstances.
Some of these shifts can, admittedly, be rather subtle; others might border on the miraculous. Always keep your third eye peeled for any major or minor “glitches in the Matrix” of your socalled reality.
ACTIVATE YOUR THIRD EYE
In spiritual circles old and new, the pineal gland which boasts photosensitive retinal ganglian cells that regulate light-dark cycles and melatonin production is almost universally viewed as the “eye” with which we observe and navigate the more subtle dimensions available to our awareness.
Melatonin is a very important hormone to the inner alchemist. Stimulating more production of it, as this exercise can do, is capable of significantly elevating your consciousness projection game.
Note that the primary purpose of Awakening the Alchemical Child isn’t energy accumulation. Rather, the goal is to begin activating your ability to use your psychic “sixth sense” rooted in your third eye to project your awareness beyond the material world.
Exercising your imaginative will in this manner does naturally increase life force, but not in a way that prioritizes conscious accumulation and refinement.
What you might choose to do later say, lying in bed before falling sleep is spend a couple minutes packing any new energy resulting from this technique that has naturally, like rain pooling into the nearest lake, made its way into your Cauldron.
But for the purposes of this exercise, your initial focus should remain on watching the trippy movie of the wall of your first Mental Chamber. While this can be a lot of fun, most people also find that it’s a lot harder than it sounds.
One’s thoughts tend to jump here and there erratically for a while. You might find yourself anywhere but in front of your wall while experiencing a totally different reality.
That’s an important development worth paying attention to through the lens of this simple question: What just happened in my psyche to trigger this seemingly random switch to another setting?
The more accurately you can answer this question, the more you’ll be tuned into the inner workings of your mind that you can learn to use in a more conscious manner to skip around and explore interdimensionally.
With dedication, and with the boost provided by gently stimulating and tonifying your third eye with myofascial decompression, you’ll likely find that your attention wavers less and less. If you perform this exercise regularly, after a few weeks or months you’ll probably be able to focus on the wall most of the time and eventually the whole time.
Then, and only then, when you can watch your wall for at least 5 minutes without your attention straying, are you ready to add to your visualizing by creating your first Mental Chamber.
CREATING YOUR 1ST MENTAL CHAMBER
PragmAlchemy isn’t a race. Or if it is, you’re only racing yourself.
Ultimately, it’s pointless to rush this process of embodying more of who you’ve always been; embrace it instead and take your sweet time. By being the tortoise instead of the hare, you’ll stress less and gain more long-term benefits.
Nowhere is taking your time more critical than in honing your capability to project your consciousness as you progress through PragmAlchemy’s visualizations. In my own case, I literally spent months just staring at the wall of my first Mental Chamber before daring to create the chamber itself.
Finally, though, I felt comfortable transitioning my projection from 2D to 3D. But before I explain how to do this, let me first describe this so-called chamber.
Think of it as a gigantic room without walls or a ceiling. Its only structural feature is the floor that supports you. This may strike you as strange at first, but you’ll quickly get used to it.
Otherwise, the way the first Mental Chamber appears is highly individualized. I tend to experience it as something like the Construct in the movie THE MATRIX, only darker, more mysterious, and alive with code. In THE MATRIX, by contrast, the Construct is completely white sort of a blank slate for uploading programs, training modules, and even virtual objects.
The Construct is a helpful analogy because it’s where you’ll be “uploading” new capabilities of your creative attention as you train yourself to access more and more of the power of your imagination to “materialize” very different realities and possibilities from the ones to which you’re accustomed.
The two ways I’ve found to create the first Mental Chamber are total opposites. The first strategy is to push away the wall you’ve been staring at to create your internal Construct through force of will. I discovered that for me, at least this works most of the time, but not always.
Archetypally, what I just described might be considered a “masculine” (or “yang”) approach. When this fails, I’ve learned to substitute a “feminine” (or “yin”) strategy by simply waiting patiently (but with full expectation of a successful outcome) for the wall to disappear and the Construct to appear in its place.
I suggest that you try both and see what works for you. Especially in the beginning, your first Mental Chamber might come and go, requiring you to face the wall again and again in order to reestablish the chamber.
But eventually, you should be able to create the chamber and stay there basically as long as you like. Once you can easily stay in your first Mental Chamber for the entire exercise, the fun really begins!
EXPLORING THE 1ST CHAMBER & YOUR SELVES
As you become used to being in your first Mental Chamber, the natural progression of this exercise is to learn to move around in it. Start by just turning in a circle and observing how that looks and feels.
Now try walking backward and forward. Try jumping, sliding. Can you skate around the chamber? Can you flip and twirl? Can you do gymnastics? Can you levitate and even fly around in this space?
Of course, all of these actions and more are entirely possible here! If you experience any difficulties with such movements, however, think about how you learned to pull or push the newly refined energy from your stomach into your Cauldron in the first PragmAlchemy exercise. Well, you can use this same natural force of will to push and pull yourself around!
While learning to move in your chamber, learn to observe yourself. Can you look at yourself from behind? above? Ask yourself who or what is doing the observing.
Just as importantly, spend time learning to move in your chamber with self-awareness while also maintaining awareness of the self atop your touchstone projecting into your chamber.
It isn’t too much of a stretch to say that you’re a kind of ouroboros yourself, a serpent consuming your own tail to create an infinity loop at the level of your identity.
With this reflexive dynamic in mind, try looking back at yourself from inside your Mental Chamber, then looking back at the self looking back at you. As I put it in a meme I recently created, Be the Watcher … watching the self … watching …
WHO ARE YOU … REALLY?
Doing this is the first step to recognizing that the totality of yourself is so much more than you’ve been taught. And this totality deserves your serious contemplation and exploration. You can practice this phase for many months, even years, and always get more and more out of it.
The ultimate goal of genuine inner alchemy, which PragmAlchemy strives to emulate, is to awaken the filius philosophorum or philosopher’s child that is the transcendent aspect of your being.
The philosopher’s child is ultimately what allows you to create your Philosopher’s Stone and, as I put it in my new book on this subject, GET OUT OF HERE ALIVE.
In a later exercise, I’ll teach you how to implement the final two steps of tapping into the creative potential of the first Mental Chamber as well as the technique for moving beyond it into the second Mental Chamber.
In the meantime make sure you finish each session of Awakening the Alchemical Child by simply willing yourself back to your home base.
Your home base is your ultimate safety net if you ever feel uncomfortable, scared or stuck in your inner world. Just slingshot back to it the way you did out of it and open your eyes to your everyday reality.
Blink, sit up, and even splash some water on your face if that helps. Then go about your business reenergized and a little more aware of who you truly are than you were just a few short minutes ago.
DISMOUNTING YOUR TOUCHSTONE SAFELY
To avoid injury while getting off your Ouroboros, be sure to inhale deeply from your diaphragm and, at the pause just before exhaling, push yourself up and off as you breathe out.
Congratulations! You can actually consider yourself an inner alchemist now!
MOVING ON
Whenever you’re comfortable performing this technique, you can move on to PragmAlchemy
Exercise #4, Quetzalcoatl Rising.
DISCLAIMER
The information contained in this text is for purely educational purposes and is not meant to provide medical advice, diagnosis, treatment, promises, or guarantees. See the full disclaimer
Copyright © Sol Luckman. All Rights Reserved.