Sit on a chair and straighten your back and stretch your chest. Your arms are relaxed. Take a deep breath from your abdomen and bring your shoulders up like a turtle pulling down its neck inside his shell. Then breath out from your abdomen while bringing down your shoulder and stretching up your neck. At the end, breath out completely. Repeat this turtleneck exercise several times. This is my favorite exercise these days. I do it about one set every hour. When I do this very slowy with deep breathing while I stretch my neck up and down, it makes my head clear and I don’t get sleepy.
When I’m working on the computer, I try to keep my neck out and stretch it up. The image is as if someone is pulling my head up from above. I sense my life power is getting charged when I do this. I feel it would be very dangerous to use a belt or someone else stretching your neck. It is always better to make a good habit to do it by yourself on a daily basis. Especially the neck has all the most important nerve bundles and blood vessels. It’s best to work it on your own.
People who work in an office all day have the tendency to put stress on their neck. That would bring bad circulation to your entire body. In fact, stress on the neck would cause constipation. So please be conscious about stretching your neck in your daily working hours. If you are constipated it will help solve your problem and at the same time make your head clear.
Turtle is indeed an interesting creature. The hexagon shape of the shell is a sacred shape. I have taken a photo of the hexagon that appeared in Ise. It is in my photography book (太陽と大自然の神々の地、伊勢). The hexagon is still used as a sacred crest in ancient Izumo and Hakusan line of Shinto shrines.
In Ko-shinto, there was a ritual to burn a turtle shell and see the appearing shape to read a revelation. The legend of Urashima-taro also talks about a turtle being the messenger between the god’s world and the human realm.
Today, there are foreign turtles in the river that has bitten people. Maybe this is trying to tell us something. We must find a way to coexist with mutual prosperity.
Kami is trying to show us the right path to peace through figures and conditions in the nature. Today, there are too many people with neck problems. Lets start by stretching the neck and feel refreshed like the turtles. By doing it daily, you will start to find the way to solution.
Ikashite-itadaite arigato-gozaimasu
Thank you for letting us live
I would like to spread the Gratitude Awareness towards ancestral spirits and everything around you so 5% of the world population will start acting on it on a daily basis.
