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Posted: 12-04-2013 18:37 Post subject: Navel-Gazing

Navel-gazing is a term often used for the height of self-indulgence, but was it ever a real practice? Did any gurus or their followers spend time contemplating their belly buttons? Does it actually work as a meditation technique? Anyone here ever tried it?

Posted: 12-04-2013 20:27 Post subject:

If you tried doing it for any lengthy period, you'd probably do your neck and back some damage.

Posted: 12-04-2013 20:39 Post subject:

If I recall correctly, navel-gazing is believed to have derived (sometime in the middle of the 20th century) from the earlier phrase "contemplate one's navel", which traces farther back at least as far as the 19th century. This earlier phrase was first used to describe yoga or meditation practices observed in India and / or the Far East, and gradually seeped into colloquial usage.

Posted: 13-04-2013 00:26 Post subject:

The briefest of searches brings up Omphaloskepsis

A word I plan to learn sometime, when I've figured out quite how the midwife tied this knot . . . Spiny

Posted: 13-04-2013 10:16 Post subject:

Yeah, the lady who delivered me did a good aesthetic job of making my belly button. I always felt very sorry for those few kids at school who had 'outies' - I wonder if, in adulthood, they still stick out?

Posted: 13-04-2013 16:04 Post subject:

I didn't realise it had a scientific name, does this make it an "official" (for want of a better word) practice or did some wiseacre come up with the fancy name later? It doesn't sound very Hindu.

You might hurt your neck and damage your posture, right enough, but I'd imagine the most flexible of yogis wouldn't find it much of a task. I'd like to think eventually the navel takes on the same appearance as the Stargate from 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Posted: 13-04-2013 16:27 Post subject:

Posted: 13-04-2013 16:29 Post subject:

"My God, it's full of blue fluff."

Posted: 13-04-2013 18:08 Post subject: