If you've determined that your water energies need support, the following exercises will help you to appreciate them, connect with them, and unleash their power. In addition, eating foods such as pumpkin seeds and alfalfa sprouts (seeds and sprouts have immense energy potential and feed our foundation) supports the essence of the kidneys, as do B vitamin supplements and colloidal minerals. If your hormones are at a low ebb, indicated by an irregular menstrual cycle or a low sex drive, Chinese herbal tonics can help. If you aren't familiar or comfortable with herbal remedies, find a good naturopath to help point you to quality products. Be sure to check with someone knowledgeable before adding therapeutic herbs to an existing medical or natural treatment, to protect against unwanted interactions.
Meditation: Becoming grounded
This exercise helps strengthen you at your foundation: your feet. The meridians (channels where energy flows) that lead to the kidneys begin on the bottom of each foot, located between the center and ball of your feet. While you are sitting or standing, you may bring intensity to your kidney energies by feeling the bubbling spring that is their source, and drawing it up into your body, as roots draw up water from the earth.
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Pay attention to the subtle but firm force that connects you to Mother Earth. Once you feel the energy, bring that feeling up into your legs, sacrum (the base of the spine that joins to the hip bones), and spine. Feel the warm, bubbling water energy nourish your bones.
To nourish yourself further, care for your feet - not by having pedicures but by making them feel good. Walk barefoot more often. When you walk on grass, sink your toes into the soil and feel your connection to the ground. Before you go to bed at night, soak your feet in Epsom salts. Treat your feet well so that they can carry the weight of the day. How To Plan Getting Pregnant
Meditation: Connecting to the source
Many of us are energetically top-heavy, focusing most of our attention above the neck. This exercise will help make you aware of your major life source, the Dan Tien, or "chamber of essence," in the lower abdomen. It will shift your attention inside your body, and give you a sense of strength from deep within.
Root yourself to the center of the earth by being aware of the bubbling spring point at the bottom of your feet. Next, concentrate on the area a few inches below your navel, called the chamber of essence, where your uterus resides. Your most powerful energy, or qi, resides in this sea of energy deep within your center.
Feel yourself breathing in and out through your chamber of essence. Let your belly button lead your breathing and fill up your lower abdomen with the qi of life. With your mouth closed, place the tip of your tongue behind your upper front teeth and breathe up your midline. Bring your attention to the area between your vagina and anus. Tighten the perineal muscles there and pull energy up from the vaginal canal into and through the reproductive organs. Bring your focus to the life source, the uterus, and continue to breathe in, letting your breath pool as your lower abdomen expands. Inhale, up past your belly button, past your heart, and up to the area between your eyebrows. At the end of the inhalation, lift the energy to the top of your head. As you exhale, allow your qi to shower down along your neck and spine to the tip of your tailbone. With the next inhalation, scoop your sacrum up toward the perineum and repeat the circuit. (Note: Some women find it easier to reverse this flow, breathing down the front and up the back.)
Continue to breathe into your pelvis, expanding and contracting your lower abdomen with every breath and filling the pelvic bowl with fresh, clear qi. Moving your energy along this microcosmic orbit will enliven you with the power of the universe. This series of attentive movements is most effective when practiced daily. Try the exercise now and plan some other times to try it. Eventually it will become a natural part of your self-care rituals. How To Plan Getting Pregnant
Meditation: Counting your blessings
Taoists believe that the spine and brain are extensions of the kidney energies and that the spine must be supple and fluid to support healthy organ functions. To strengthen the spine, and therefore the kidney energies, do the following exercise.
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Beginning at the tailbone, mentally count your vertebrae, visualizing each bone and nurturing it with your attention. The bones represent your core self. Next, bring your attention to your sacrum, which houses your sacred sexual energies and is the root of your psychophysical structure (the word sacrum means *sacred place" in Latin). At the bottom of the sacrum is a hole through which massive amounts of energy pass. Feel this energy pulsing into the bottom of the sacrum and feel your sacrum moving back and forth as you breathe, as if it, too, is breathing.
Now shift your awareness to the five lower lumbar vertebrae, paying attention to their immense support. Then greet and feel each of the twelve thoracic vertebrae onto which your ribs attach to encase your heart and lungs. Next, connect with your seven cervical vertebrae, which run up your neck to the base of your skull. Then, pay attention to the back of your head, your temples, and your face bones. Finally, think of the top of your head as an outlet for the bubbling spring that is moving through your body. Let yourself become a fountain of energy that begins at your feet and emerges through your head. Feel the love it brings and appreciate the body, mind, and spirit it nourishes.
Smile internally with tenderness and with all of your being. To learn more, you can check out How To Plan Getting Pregnant.
