The feedback I’ve received on my treatment of Fuxi’s poem is generally positive, although many have questioned my inclusion of so many particulars of anatomy.
The anatomy is an aid to me in relaxation. For me, the feeling is a lot like standing out where the waves break in at the beach, and sorting out the direction and strength of the flow of each wave in order to keep my feet.
In sitting, it’s my own breath that is the tide in my toes, and understanding the anatomy helps me settle into the sand (as it were).
I have now added illustrations, and I hope that they will help in the visualization of the descriptions.
I’m aware that Fuxi’s poem works on many levels, and I’ve had many discussions with friends about people like the modern-day Indian teacher Nisargadatta, who said:
My Guru ordered me to attend to the sense ‘I am’ and to give attention to nothing else. I just obeyed. I did not follow any particular course of breathing, or meditation, or study of scriptures. Whatever happened, I would turn away my attention from it and remain with the sense ‘I am’, it may look too simple, even crude. My only reason for doing it was that my Guru told me so. Yet it worked! Obedience is a powerful solvent of all desires and fears.
(that’s from here)
The key in that short description for me would be the words “the sense ‘I am'”–Nisargadatta is referring to a sense.
“It may look too simple, too crude”: when I say I attend to the relaxed distinction of the senses, waking up or falling asleep, you might think it’s a cup of tea- and you would be right.
The meditation of coming back to location that you describe Mark is actually so darn simple that one could easily discount it, but it works, and I like it as one technique I can use when I wake up in the middle of the night, thanks.
(astralc, on The Tao Bums discussion forum)