Dreams are the most real thing there is

It all started with a simple and real “stomach ache”. Then reality became dream: the image of an accessory that can protect and cuddle the navel. A dream that vanished the morning after… ignored like it usually happens with dreams…but then returned…. A second dream: but this time so real, precise, lucid, to the point of giving indications on where to find the pieces of leather to use in the creation of that “magical” protection.

So I made it, wore it, “felt” it: at its contact with the skin, I perceived a light massage, heat… and the stomach ache was “miraculously” gone. Like in a nice story with a happy ending. Knowing that fairy tales usually hide a moral, I got information and found many interesting things. Protecting, covering, defending this area surely provides physical, psychological, and energetic benefits. It can be inferred that there are many aspects connected with the navel, both physical and psychological, ethical, and behavioral, making this area of the body a very important one, that has to be safeguarded and protected, besides being taken care of with attention.

The navel and the body

Physically, the navel is the scar tissue remaining after birth and derives from the orifice run through by the vascular cord that in placental mammals connects the embryo to its mother.

It is positioned at the level of the third lumbar vertebra, the only one that is parallel to the ground. The imaginary line that cuts it horizontally is called “world axis”.

The navel represents the center of the individual, both of its physical vitality and of its spirituality.

The interested meridian that goes through it is the conception vessel (Jenn Mo). The meridian point that coincides with the navel is CV 8, SHEN QUE (The Palace of Spiritual Energy).

In the Oriental culture, the abdominal area is called Hara. In the sites of Taoism and Buddhism, Hara is held in highest consideration, as it is the center of gravity on which physical, emotional, mental and energetic forces operate.

In Japanese culture, KI is the term that indicates the “individual” energy located underneath the navel and is part of the REI, in the Dan Dien point that is the seat of creation.

It is well known that presently there is nothing, no element nor accessory, intended for the protection of the navel, other than the usual clothing.

How did the navel originate?

• Apollo (according to Plato) invented the navel, because he had to make a knot at the center of his body, gathering all of his skin in one single point.
• Physically, the navel is our first scar: a consequence of the cutting off of our umbilical cord. It represents our giving up feeding on our mother’s emotions, food, air, and the beginning of searching for the assertion of our own personality.
• with the Goddess of poppies (Late Minoan Era II^ 1350 B.C.) that connected it to the mystery of woman.

• ne of the strong scenes of “Matrix” is the one in which Keanu Reeves is pinned down and a spy-scorpion is inserted into his belly. A return to the origin and a closing of the circle. The navel, which was used by Apollo to seal, is now used, a million of billions of years later, by Larry and Andy Wachowski, Hollywood directors, to enter once more into the mystery of the body.
• There are those who hold that the navel is the “key” to get to one’s inner body: “Putting a finger in the navel cavity is a bit like having one’s eyes turned 180° inwardly….” In the regression technique, the Manjpura Chakra, located in the abdominal area, represents a way of “entering” inside ourselves through our own center.
• The study of “Sheng-Shue” is the diagnosis and reading of the navel and of the 10 lines that depart from it.
• In cookery, the popular imagination wants the famous and very Italian “tortellino” to be born from the inspiration of the cook of the Gonzaga family (lords of Mantua, relatives of St. Louis), who saw his lady, the duchess, through the keyhole of her room door … and only saw her navel. Enchanted by such beauty, he created the “tortellino”.
• Also the inhabitants of Modena lay claim on the paternity of the “tortellino”, and tell that it was invented by a local cook, who dreamt of Venus rising from the sea waves and, seeing her perfect belly, woke up and ran to the kitchen to create with dough the divine navel.
• The navel is also called “love knot”, which also originates from a popular tale, this time from Verona, about the “tortellino”. Alberto Zucchetta, a gastronomist and goldsmith, created a tale about it: the tragic story about a contrasted love passion between the brave Visconti captain, Malco, and a river nymph, Silvia. In memory of the unfortunate soldier, drawn in the Mincio River, remained a knotted silk and gold scarf – a love knot – given to him by Silvia. The local women started then preparing a sheet of pastry, as thin as silk, cut and knotted like that scarf.

The navel’s physical strength

The newspaper Corriere della Sera, on 03/01/06 reported the following news: “….And only a few days ago the 16 year old Kaylegh Bradley of Blackburn, Lancashire, was hospitalized with a kidney infection. The reason: too many evenings walking around with her belly exposed.”.
Traditional medicine explains us why a chill can lead to a kidney infection: exposing the navel area to cold can cause a tightening of the relevant area, with consequent internal damage, as it is the only point in the abdominal wall that is not covered by muscles. The navel cover also allows to protect the navel area from sun rays.

In the West the only therapeutic (unorthodox) practice that takes the navel into consideration is Huneke’s Neuraltherapy, that essentially considers the navel as the first scar in our life and, as such, a potential cause of ailments in later life. Some studies carried out by neuraltherapists, seem to prove that an injection of a local anesthetic in this point (lidocain and procain) can improve or heal a great number of chronic illnesses (Weinschenk).

In Yoga the solar plexus chakra, Manjpura, affects the abdominal organs and creates physical and mental powers, among which an uncommon ability to control body movements (balance). This chakra affects health problems, as well as problems connected with energy, physical action, and immunity from illnesses. Furthermore, it is directly connected with the ability to take care of oneself and contains the energy that allows us to manifest our personality and assimilate experiences. Moreover, it holds our strength, fullness, wisdom, influence, and power. A good energy of the Manjpura Chakra gives the ability to experience pleasure, warmth, awareness of life, action, and will. A good energy is obtained through various techniques that are already being used and are all geared to protect, warm up, physically massage the area where this chakra is located, that is, the navel area.

Ruggero Bergamo, Shiatsu practitioner (insert report?), states in his report “Abdomen and its Exposure in the Oriental Tradition of Shiatsu” that: “…the presence of a structure that covers the navel area, without pressing against it or impairing its movements, would be very useful. It would perform both the function of providing protection to this particularly delicate area against physical impacts or cold temperatures, and the function of giving psychological support directly associated to the same feeling of protection that this structure could create.”

Wisdom from the oriental ancients

• At the time of Patanjali (the most famous yoga annotator), the center of human personality was not the brain but the heart. Even before then, it was not even the heart. The center was lower, close to the navel. In ancient times, the navel was considered the fountain of vitality, the original source from which every other thing derives: body, mind, and everything. When there is chaos, the brain stops functioning. For instance, if we are driving a car and unexpectedly someone shoots out before us, we react in such a sudden way that it cannot be the work of the brain. The brain needs time. It must think what to do and what not to do. When there is a risk of an accident and one suddenly pushes on the brakes, there is a feeling in the navel area, as though it were the stomach that reacts. The awareness has been pushed towards the belly button because of the accident. If one could predict the accident beforehand, something mysterious would happen: one could notice that the awareness has moved towards the navel: for the Eastern people: “he door between sky and earth”. And the fright causes us to breathe wrongly. As though this door, this “mouth of the soul” were for a moment feeding with a food that is not healthy: a food (the fright, fear, in this case) that causes a lack of balance and consequent illness if one does not promptly intervene to remedy.
• If one asks aZen monk: “What do you think with?”, he will put his hand on his belly. When the Westerners entered for the first time in contact with the Japanese monks, the had a hard time understanding. “How silly! How can you think with your belly?” But the Zen answer is significant. Awareness can use any part of the body, and the center that is closest to the original source is the navel. The brain is more distant, so, if the vital energy moves outwardly, the brain becomes the center of awareness. But if the vital energy moves inwardly, at the end the navel will become the center.

Wisdom in our days

Wisdom of the ancient shamans:

Seduction

Moralists

• On 16/08/05, Monsignor Domenico Stabia, parish priest of the Church of SS Trinità at Potenza, Italy, pronounced an anathema: “…enough with exposed navels… Instead of the beauty of nakedness, we have come to the nakedness of beauty, which is a totally different thing!”
• On May 2003, Prof. Maurizio Di Carpi, vice-principal of the Technical Institute for Tourism “Marco Polo” of Rimini, sent out a circular against the exposed belly, requiring female students to enter the classroom without showing their belly. This circular started up a series of disputes, and ended up gathering the kids’ approval.
• There are lovely women who feel deprived of their dignity of women by being forced by fashion (in order to keep up with times) to show their belly button.

Low waist pants

Fashion requires to wear low waist pants. Who among us does not wear them? They are trying to change the tendency, but with no success: why? s it only a question of anti-morals, or is there anything else hiding? Did you try NOW to wear high waist pants? One feels compressed, it seems that one cannot breathe anymore: how come, as we breathe with our chest? Everybody knows it!! Let us now shift our attention to children, let us watch them: what part of the body do they move when they breathe? They rise and lower their belly! This is correct breathing: breathing with the diaphragm. It seems obvious that, by compressing this part of the body (through high waist pants), it becomes hard to breathe in a healthy and correct way. This is the “hidden” reason behind our choice to continue wearing low waist pants….

“man apparently becomes irrationally untamable, whenever his body ‘perceives’ a benefit”….

Placing something on the navel, without pressing it, helps us to breathe correctly,as we are told by all disciplines concerned with wellbeing.

Navel cover and fashion

Furthermore, due to different outcomes after suturing, not all navels are regular, so that covering the belly button with a navel cover also permits to hide any esthetic flaws and to wear low waist clothing showing oneself without problem, thus eliminating psychological complexes. The navel cover allows to wear low waist clothing also for those who do not wish to show themselves completely, safeguarding a degree of privacy.

It can also be worn underneath the usual clothing, as an ornamental or accessory element of seduction, exerting at the same time a beneficial massaging and warming action.

Massage techniques used to this day on the navel area:

• Shatsu s one of the most powerful techniques to help the body regain a deep balance, an essential element for keeping a good health. Balance is a natural condition, but today’s models of life, that pull us away from natural rhythms, favor the rise of that state of discomfort called “psychosomatic imbalance”, which always goes with a lack of life force. In the presence of complex energetic imbalance, a local treatment is made. The navel area is massaged (in a delicate way, trying to dissolve any type of tension) to heal symptoms like constipation and digestion problems, problems related to the menstrual cycle. This massage provides benefits to all abdominal organs, as well as a recovered sexual vigor and vitality in general.
• Acupuncture is part of traditional Chinese medicine and aims at regaining a balance between Yang and Yin, maintaining that any illness and ailment are the result of such imbalance. The navel, seat of an acupuncture point (CV8, or JM8), is considered by acupuncturists as a dangerous point, as it is the only point in the abdominal wall that is not covered by muscles, and is thus in direct relation with the spleen and stomach. A blow to this point can cause serious damage and even death. It is never pricked by needles but only delicately massaged and/or cauterized. The meridian that runs through it is the Conception Vessel (Jenn Mo). The point on the meridian that coincides with the navel is CV8 SHEN QUE (Palace of Spiritual Energy) and the navel cover shields and lightly massages this point and sometimes also the points CV 7 YIN JIAO (crossing of the Yin meridians) and CV9 SHIU FEN (Distribution of water), besides the Kidney Meridian: KI15 ZHONO ZHU (Central flow), KI16 HUANG SHU (Point of transportation of the vital centers), and KI17.
• The Chi Nei Tsang is a Chinese system of deep healing that uses the energy flow of the five main body systems: vascular, lymphatic, nervous, tendinous and muscular, and the acupuncture meridians. Through this practice one can increase the energy flow to specific organs through the massage of specific points in the navel area. The Chi Nei Tsang dissolves energy blocks in the navel and then directs luminous, healing energy to other parts of the body. The Chi Nei Tsang was brought to America by Master Mantak Chia.
• Finger Pressure is an antique massage technique which can also be practiced on oneself. It was born in China about six thousand years ago and was named Jyy Ya. This is where Shiatsu originates. This massage is done by pressing one’s fingers, or by doing a light massage with the fingers without exerting any pressure on the navel, for a few moments, on the energy points. According to Eastern philosophic theory, in fact, whenever we get ill, the constant energy flow is blocked. When the most important energy points are not “protected”, we are more inclined to energy blocks and therefore to illnesses.
• Crystal therapy,ccording to Latrina Raphael’s school, that works on 8 chakras, one more compared to the classical “fundamental” 7, the navel chakra is the center of the energies that rule our physical being and the material implementation through the exertion of our will (if this chakra is inactive, it will be difficult to carry out any project). It is a very important chakra, and the healing work is accomplished by the stones; in fact, physically laying them over the navel eases the balancing of vital energies and the reconnection to the Mother.
• The Ohashiatsumassage is a modern version of Shiatsu, spread by the Japanese Master Ohashi. It consists of self-massage exercises: very light pressure starting from the body’s center of gravity, the hara, placed at the level of the navel.

Longevity Exercises

• In longevity Exercises the instructors, in order to explain the exact movement of the abdomen during a correct (abdominal) breathing, suggest to place one’s hand on the abdomen and “listen” to the air that goes in and out: by touching that precise point, the awareness (attention) goes there, resulting in a more easily learned correct breathing.
• Taiji Quan is a martial art, psychophysical practice, dynamic meditation, in which one of the declared principles is to “concentrate breathing in the lower fields of cinnabar” (qi chen dantian): located most times three inches below the navel, and other times, by some authors, between the navel and the kidneys.
• For Taoists the navel is very important. In the words of Miao Yin “In the navel lives the Tao… there lives the energy point where we can accumulate and distribute our wellbeing….” The TAO, in fact, defines the navel as the “great mother”: its task is to protect us. The students of this discipline suggest to focus on it, in order to feel the flow of an extraordinary force for our physical wellbeing.
• Navel therapy unites meditation and breathing, focusing on the “elixir field”, located right on the navel. By stimulating and warming this area of the human body, it is possible to strengthen the immune system and re-establish a state of harmony and wellbeing. It acts as anti-stress therapy.
• Varna Paranayama (a healing therapy with color self-therapy) starts from the awareness of the navel area: the process of self-therapy takes place imagining a color that starts from the navel area and moves in every direction towards the periphery of the body.

A “correct” breathing, besides bringing balance and avoiding states of anxiety (that can occur when breathing in the chest), has the advantage, among other things, of facilitating digestion and accelerating internal secretion, thanks to the pressure exerted on the various interested organs.

As a consequence, an object physically placed on the navel (a light heat, a delicate and continuous contact on the area surrounding the navel), could be extremely useful in bringing awareness (the attention of the person wearing it) to this area: awareness that can turn into a help and an incentive in the use of the abdomen in the respiratory process.

Longevity

• Don Juan (Nagual), while explaining how to behave in order to meet the ally, and for his protection, advised him, in case the ‘signals’ had not been good, to: … “Let yourself fall on the ground, take off your jacket, put it around your navel and huddle like a ball, closing your knees around your stomach….” “…if you will follow these simple indications, nothing evil will happen to you.”
• … “In fact, if those forces come to you, they can take you by surprise; fear will open your crack (located underneath the navel), and through it your life will flee irresistibly.