Waking Energy 7 Timeless Practices Designed to Reboot Your Body and Unleash Your Potential

It’s only at night, when we venture forth into the velvety darkness that obscures sight, that we can
see the stars. When we call upon the powers of our insight in the deepest, darkest recesses of the
mind, illumination emerges. To access our higher mind, we must obscure distraction. Stillness is
what’s required for us to truly perceive this light.
Like the ancient masters, we have used our practices to achieve greater balance in our bodies, so
that our minds can move beyond to dance with universal source energy—with love—our highest
expression as human beings. Just as Taoist adepts have used qigong for millennia to create the
immortal body with which they can leave the earth and travel to higher realms, and just as yogis have
used poses to move toward enlightenment, all your journey so far has led you to this place. Now it is
time for us to enter the great mother of yin, blackest night, the infinite void out of which all matter is
born.
Every practice you’ve tried thus far has prepared you for this moment, awakening new energy and
awareness, helping you to explore your limitless capacity for growth. Having stimulated, opened, and
balanced your subtle energy systems, having toned and strengthened your body, and having enlivened
and rejuvenated your spirit, it’s time to take on another kind of challenge that will further you on your
evolutionary path and yield countless rewards. On the meditation chair or cushion, all elements of the
Waking Energy Way come together.
You are ready to meet your mind. You may feel like a glider plane that’s been cut from its enginerun
escort to fly on its own, but I’ll give you some launch instructions and, trust me, you will be able
to pilot your craft on your own when it’s time. From the comfort of your meditation chair or cushion
you’ll meet your mind in all its uninterrupted glory. Your sole task—and mind you, it’s not a small one
—will be to connect to your breath and follow it as it moves in out of your body, engaging in the
zenith of all the practices you’ve performed yet: mindfulness. As you’ll soon discover, although
meditation is an opportunity to tap into an extraordinary font of energy and reduce stress, it can be a
challenge.
Mindfulness is the state of being fully present, one in which we can attend to the most
foundational pulse we know, the breath, and in an even more focused and refined way than in our
energy adventures that have led us here. Mindfulness is the personification of yin energy, a kind of
artful attention replete with respect, grace, subtlety, refinement, deepest quiet, and stillness. It can
help to restore you in ways that few things can.
Going Out of Your Mind
This, my friend, is what all the hoopla is about. Meet your worst enemy and best ally: your mind.
After all you’ve experienced on your Waking Energy journey, you are well prepared for this
encounter. I smile at you knowingly and with great compassion because we’ve all wrestled with our
thoughts before. But know that every practice you’ve done thus far has served to mobilize and
harmonize your prana in such a way that you now have the inner space and fortitude to learn to
befriend your mind and get it on your side.
The mind—specifically, the notorious monkey mind—likes to undermine itself and create
distractions, not just when we’re seated on our meditation cushions, but when we are earnestly trying