Force Guide, Part 3

[JediKaren]

The Force User Guide
Part 3
Manipulating the Force

Review
Being a Jedi is being a person who serves the Force. Because the Force and life go hand in hand, a Jedi serves life. To serve life, a Jedi should look at the bigger picture and serve societies. A Jedi protects the innocent and the good within society. A Jedi does not start a fight with evil, but merely puts down the dark side when confronted. Sometimes, the best way to serve and protect society is through the government, which is why Jedi work closely with governments. This does not mean the Jedi solely serves one or any government.

In order to serve the Force, a Jedi must be able to recognize and feel the Force inside them. Once a Jedi has learned to gather and ground away the Force, they can move on to feeling the Force all around them and in all living things. A Jedi knows this fact and is aware that they can and should be able to feel all live. The Jedi can feel how all life works with and against each other. With the help of empathy, telepathy, and scanning, a Jedi can see the truth of reality and therefore be able to perform their duty even better.

A Jedi is also aware of the dark side of life. He or she knows the dark side is present in everyone and visibly brought out through negative, harmful to all emotions and actions. Jedi are aware of what the dark side can do to their health, life and people around them. Through meditation and a thorough understand of how emotions work, a Jedi can avoid and can even cast out the dark side in themselves and others.

A Jedi understands there is a certain code of conduct which must be strictly followed if they wish to maintain their reputation as good doers. One should never gain power for the sake of greed, to use over others, or to abuse the Force in any way.

Manipulation
“Jedi skills in the Force are rooted in three areas. Control is internal. It is the Jedi’s ability to recognize the Force in himself and to use it to his benefit. Sense involves the next step, in which the Jedi recognize the Force in the universe outside herself. Here she feels the Force and is able to draw upon it for information about the rest of the universe. Alter is the third and most difficult area to master, for it involves the student’s ability to modify the Force and redistributes its energies. Through these skills, the Jedi can influence the universe, making changes as needed to accomplish its goals.”

Gate Keeper Bodo Baas, from the book I, Jedi

For most Force users, manipulating the Force is the hardest of the various skills to learn and study. Manipulating the Force requires mastery of these basic skills. It is highly recommended that the student study the living Force before starting work on manipulation. Manipulation also includes understanding the Force. The reason for learning the basics is simple; there is no other way around it. It is understood that a baby can not learn to walk until it has learned to stand and a Jedi must learn their basics before moving on to new, advance skills. To be able to use the Force, one should respect and be aware of how the Force flows; otherwise one will find them struggling.

The Force is like a river in that it tends to flow one way. When it hits a rock or fallen tree, the river must move around, slowing and disturbing the current of the river. The Force is no different in this sense. There are certain rocks that exist naturally in the Force. We, as people, are not considered rocks as long as we do not resist or disturb the current. We can resist the current of the Force by trying to ignore the feeling of the flow. We do this when ignoring our gut feelings. When we resist the Force, we end up causing harm to ourselves, as the Force must push through or redirect its path around us.

Understand there is another rock, or problem, which can block out the Force, is our emotions. When we feel pride, anger, doubt, fear, or guilt we close ourselves off from the Force which compounds the problem. When we shut ourselves off from the Force, we loose our touch with living things and a sense of reality. By not listening to the force we put ourselves and everyone associated with us, at risk. Should there be a warning from the Force; a shut mind can not hear it. Whatever is causing these harming emotions can only get better when we open ourselves up to the Force.

Aside from resisting or shutting off our access to the Force, there is another reason why manipulation is hard. Through the history of mankind, people have never had a reason to control the Force. Humans, along with most animals, are naturally semi aware and directly connected to the Force. It is natural because it is a survival trait. Controlling the Force has never been necessary to survival, so it is not practiced much. Manipulation can be learned, but it’s a difficult undertaking for most people.

Some people will have an easier time than others with bending the Force to their will. These people often think and do things in a logical manner. They tend to be interested in computers, cars, science and math. Because of these talents, they can grasp the idea of “programming” very well. These Force users find themselves struggling more with empathy, telepathy, scanning, and other perception skills, because these skills do not follow logic very well and are done in an imprecise fashion.

One more note with manipulation is the Force is not to be redirected from the main current, or path it naturally flows. To redirect the Force will take more effort than to simple access and gather information that the Force provides naturally. This extra effort makes manipulation harder, although still possible.

The type of Force that is used in manipulation is the cosmic force. This differs with the living Force in that it is the opposite of the living Force. The source comes from anything that is not living. This source can be wood that is dead, pure dirt, metal, plastic, light, fire, air, or water. None of these sources are living and yet they exist and have energy. Therefore, they exist in the Force.


Sending
The first skill of manipulating the Force was creating a ball in your hand made out of energy. The second skill of manipulation is sending the Force to people, animals and objects. This skill will build the control and knowledge needed for more challenging abilities.

For sending the Force to something, a Jedi should open their body and mind to the Force and gather the energy around them. Then, extend your awareness so a near by object like a pencil or computer mouse can be sensed. Spend a minute thoroughly feeling the object and studying the object with your eyes. Imagine the Force as a visible mist that a person can control. Envision that you are willing or creating a breeze so the mist flows over to the object.

Make sure the shortest, most direct route is taken when envisioning the mist flowing to the object. Now, take the Force that is around you and direct your will of the Force to the object. You should be able to feel the object as something hard and solid (should the object be hard and solid). You should start feeling details about it just like you did when practicing “sensing”.

When you send the Force to an object nothing should happen, but when sending the Force to a person, something will happen. When sending energy to a person, they may or may not be aware of it. They generally will feel a bit more energetic and may notice an electric charge around and in them. We call this charging a person. A person can send the Force to another Jedi to start a link.

A Jedi should never send too much energy, in fear of overloading the person. Sending energy to another Force sensitive who has been trained will pick it up and send the Force back. This is called pinging. With a good, well known Force sensitive friend this can become a game and sometimes even get annoying.

Because animals by nature, are less intelligent in thoughts and live primarily on instincts, sending the Force to them will cause a slightly different reaction. Animals are much less aware of the Force, but will react to the Force and any disturbance that is caused in the Force.

If a Jedi sends the Force to an animal, the animal is most likely going to react in a negative way such as fear or annoyance, causing them to run away. Since animals react this way, a Jedi should not send the force to animal unless to warn, protect, or heal. Another other reason is wrong and part of the dark side.

Kinesis
Kinesis refers to the movement of mass caused by a stimulus. For Force users, the Force is the stimulant. There are many types of kinesis that a Jedi can do. Some kinesis are the combination of two different ones. Psychokinesis is generally thought as the over all kinesis. Psychokinesis is the ability to cause mass to move by supernatural means. Other types of kinesis are telekinesis, moving objects with your mind, pyrokinesis, starting, putting out and controlling fire, cryokinesis, creating ice, electrokinesis, controlling and creating electricity, hydrokinesis, the control over water, levitation, being able to lift yourself off the ground and float, and aerokinesis controlling and air and wind.

The hardest part about any kinesis is the belief factor. The actually performing kinesis is rather easy, but convincing the mind that one can do this is decidedly difficult. Many starters wish to see proof of this feat. Unfortunately, movies, homemade or professional, can be easily counterfeited or misleading in how easy it is to do the feat. Seeing someone do it through a web cam, in real time, is much more truthful, but even so the mind may not be convinced enough to succeed.

Many people make the mistake of thinking that a Jedi move or lift something or start a fire just by thought and will power. This is not so. A Jedi manipulates the Force so the Force causes the object at hand to do something. So in order to do any type of kinesis, a Jedi should use their mind to access the Force and let the Force do the moving for the Force user.

We all wish we could levitate the remote control to our hand and save ourselves the energy of getting up, but most of us have a long way to go. Even once a Jedi gets past the doubt aspect, he or she is going to only be able to nudge something or cause a flicker in a flame. All kinesis require mental strength and control. This strength must be built up with lots of practice, but beware of doing too much practicing at once. Short, thirty minutes or less practices, twice a day will enough. Should you find yourself feeling drained or with a headache take a break for that day. Then shorten the practice. Check to see how hard you are trying.

Telekinesis
This skill is the most famous of all. It has been mentioned in movies and books, often only half describing how to do it. In the present world, telekinesis is not a mandatory skill to learn for a Jedi, but one that is interesting and will teach the Jedi more about the properties of the Force. Telekinesis is best known as the ability to move objects with your mind. A Jedi should know that it is the Force that moves the objects, not strong thoughts.

A few times an untrained Jedi will open themselves to the Force while concentrating on an object and cause that object to fall. This is not bad and can be used for the belief problem by remembering that telekinesis can be done. In fact, one really good trick that a site describes is fooling your mind into believing that you just barely moved the psi wheel, knowing you really did not. Once your mind is convinced this can really happen, all you have to figure out is how to ask the wheel to move, not force, beg, or will it to move. Then, you learn how to be aware of the part of your mind that is moving the Force around the wheel and start learning control.

Remember, the more you do something, the easier it becomes. Occasionally an angry, emotional, untrained Force user can cause near by objects to break. This happens because the Force user has a lack of emotional and Force control. Emotional control and concentration is essential to telekinesis.

Some beginners think that trying very hard to move an object will do the trick. This is hardly correct way of thinking. No Force user should try to "will" anything to move, you have to "ask" and let the object move on its own. In reality it takes very little effect to move a piece of paper. Do not try to command the force to move something, always respectfully request the Force to do it.

Psi Wheel
A psi wheel is a small, hand made toy that is perfect for learning telekinesis. It is called a psi wheel because the psions, a type of Force users, invented the wheel. To make a psi wheel you will need a sew needle or pin, a small, one inch squared piece of paper and a cork. Stand the cork on a flat surface and then insert the needle or pin in so the pointy side is facing up. Fold the piece of paper twice and unfold it. The crease should divide the square into four litter squares. Balance the paper on the point of the needle or pin. Notice how easily the paper will stir. Let this enforce the idea you can move this paper.

First off, sit in front of the wheel. Get comfortable because you are going to be there for a while. Have the wheel at a distance so if you breathe hard you will not move it, but try to get fairly close to the wheel. Now, ignore the wheel for a minute.

Breathe and relax your mind and body to open your mind to the Force. Fear or anger will stop a Jedi from doing this. Allow Force to flow through you and become aware of your surroundings. Extend your awareness to the wheel. Feel the paper, sense the paper and know everything you can about it. Sense the paper so thorough that you become part of the paper. It is like you are seeing and feeling it with your hands but in an all in one feeling.

Think of a direction that you would like the wheel to move in. Do not try to move the wheel. Do not try to mentally push or shove the wheel. It will not work and it will give you a headache. There is something in the back of your mind that does the moving of the psi wheel. You will have to find this part of the brain through experimenting. In order for the wheel to move, your mind needs connect to the wheel with the Force.

You have to have this connection, ask the wheel to spin. At first the wheel might only shake or wobble. This is a good sign. Continue to think of a direction for the wheel to move, but do not think about it too hard. After a couple of practices, the wheel should start moving. With time, practice, and experimenting, your control will grow.

Pyrokinesis
Pyrokinesis, the ability to start, control or end fire, is the second most popular kinesis to learn. For beginners, all they will need is a candle and a lighter. Needless to say, a bit of common sense about not getting burned would be good too.

Sit in front of the candle and light it with the lighter. Make sure that if you breathe heavily, you will not disturb the flame. This is the take away the possibility of a breeze causing the flame to move.

Remember the properties of fire. Fire needs three things to exist: air, fuel, and heat. If you take one away, the fire will end. If you increase one of the elements, the fire will grow. In this exercise, you will manipulate the amount of heat in the flame of the candle. The goal will be to make the flame bigger by adding heat to the flame.

To do this, open yourself to the Force and sense the flame. Use the “becoming one” method to become the flame. Sense the heat the flame gives. Sense the middle of the flame. Now forget about the flame for a minute. Extend your Force sense to the near by area around you. Feel the energy in the room. Where there is energy there is heat in the room. Gather the heat in your body and then direct the heat to the flame, using the Force to create a link to the fire. You should see and sense the flame getting hotter.

Shielding
The chances of getting attack from out of no where on Earth are very rare indeed. More times than not the person being attacked did something to deserve it or even wanted it. There are people that use their abilities to battle each other for fun, competition, or for revenge. Sometimes, people will ask other Force users to purposely attack their shield so the shield’s strength can be tested. Shielding requires a fine control over manipulation of the Force, which may give some Force perspective people trouble.

Mirror Shield
Empathy overload is a very real and serious problem that many naturally talented Force users face. There is a way to avoid the onslught of emotions and that is done by a shield. The common shield used to deflect overloads is called a mirror shield. To create a mirror shield, you should gather the Force around you, about two inches away from your body. Image an invisible mirror that is the thickness of paper. Envision this mirror to be so strong that nothing can get through it. Take the gather Force and have the Force copy this image in your mind. Ask the Force to have this shield not only block any emotions or thoughts, but to send them away from you. If you want to be able to feel only one emotion, ask the Force to program the shield so only that emotion is allowed in.

Mental Attacks
The chance of someone coming into your mind to attack and take over you is low, but it does happen from time to time. There is a way to protect your mind. You have learned that the mind has layers. A Jedi can learn to shield different layers of the mind. If you remember, the top layer is for surface thoughts. This layer can be shielded in such a way that should anyone unwanted comes in; the Force will alert you or block the person out. A permanent, exceedingly strong shield can be put around personal thoughts and memories. The mind can also learn to use shields as a way to fight and push out the intruder.

Physical Attacks
There is a Force attack that can be used to physically harm a Jedi. The attack is hard to do and extremely rare. It involves the Force user to gather and send the Force to another person to drain energy from them. These Force users are known as psi vampires. A psi vampire is a Force user who consciously or unconsciously gathers energy from another person to such extent to the point the Force user feels very tired, unusually calm or drained of energy.

Some psi vampires do this to harm or take out an enemy. Some are naturally doing this and do not know they are doing this, or that it is bad. The use of a shield can keep a psi vampire out and also keep out people sending the Force to harm you.

[JediKaren]

Healing
There is a kind of Jedi that serve others by being healers. They have a special talent for finding injuries and illness and using the Force to heal the problem. Jedi healers also know how to use herbs and medicines. They gather the Force and link to the patient, searching for a problem. Many healers can see the aura of the person and the damaged part of the person. Using the Force and medical knowledge the healer can fix the damage and heal the person. A Jedi should note that the Force can not heal or completely fix all problems. Should a person be very close to death, it may be too late for a Jedi to be to save them. Some extremely illness or diseases are extremely hard to cure or incurable like many types of cancer.

The Three States of Healing
We all heal ourselves naturally. We heal ourselves in our sleep. Dreaming is a way to distract the mind, like using television to distract a kid. If we do not dream, we are not healing or not doing any serious healing.

There are three states a Jedi or any energy user can be in self healing. The first and the most natural healing state is called sleep. It is a state where the body and mind come to a rest, a halt. The Force will slowly flow through the person in small amounts. The level of the Force is low and not being directed, promoting and helping natural healing.

The second state of healing is called meditation. Meditation is when the body goes to sleep and will start healing, but the mind remains half active and alert. There are many types of meditation, each with a different goal, but all meditations are helpful to the mind and body. The Force flows greater and can be controlled. The amount of control depends on the user’s skill level.

The last state is the least natural and is known as trancing. Trancing is when the body goes to sleep, but the mind is fully alert. The Force is fully controlled. What makes this start different from all others is the mind is totally focused on it’s self. It is like sleep in that the person is not aware of anything around them. This state allows the Force user to focus completely on healing the body, while getting the sleep needed.

Connection of the Force
The natural connect to the Force is something all humans have. This connection is critical to their health. Should a person ever try to cut themselves off from the Force, even if they are not Force sensitive, their health will rapidly disintegrate. Sometimes the body and mind will develop energy blocks which block the Force from flowing naturally. It is important that a Jedi healer looks not just at the body of the patient, but also the mind, checking to see if there is a disconnection.

Mental Healing
The brain has a large amount of control over the body. The body may naturally heal itself. The brain can sometimes purposely keep the body from healing, or heal in a certain way. Sometimes this happens because the brain itself is hurt or fooled into thinking there is something wrong and needs to be straight before the body can be healed. There are chemicals in the brain that when imbalanced can cause certain mental and physical reactions. A Jedi should be aware of this and check the mind out before looking at the body.

Headaches
Everyone naturally guards and fusses with any wound they might have. We all know that if you put a band-aid or get some help the wound will heal faster. A headache is no different. If you could force your mind to stop guarding the pain, your body will naturally heal the mental wound. This is a hard skill to attain. For some, it is easier to heal someone else than to heal themselves. Please note there is very little difference in healing someone and healing yourself.

The first step is to find out the exact location of the pain. You will have to scan the person's mind and study the pain. Why is the pain there? How bad is the pain? Is there something else wrong or weird in the area? Do not be afraid to question the person about the headache and its history, especially if the information you get isn't enough or you can not scan correctly.

Have the person relax. The less brain activity, the easier it is to heal them. Once they are truly relaxed you can then "touch" the pain. This skill is done in telepathy, empathy, and sensing. Now slowly, but firmly push their mind away from the mental wound. The person you are healing may find it painful if you are not too gentle, so be careful.

The person should feel detached. This is a good sign. Build a shield or that can be thought as a "band-aid" between the mind and the pain. This shield should last for a few hours at least. Make sure the person clearly understand that they need to rest. If they can, sleep. The worse thing they could try is to do something hard, like math homework, because then the mind is forced to work. It is as if you were trying to do too much exercise when you are tired it will end up not only getting more tired and less effective, but the muscles might get cramps and cause you pain. Even when Force can heal living beings, it is far from being a miracle in almost all cases.

Numbing
When you numb you are literally doing what the doctors do with the needles. Have you ever gone to the dentist and been given a shot of Novocain? Have you ever broken a bone and been given a painkiller? Remember that feeling of nothingness. The feeling was like that broken foot did not exist. What was happening was that the painkiller was blocking your foot nerve’s signals from reaching your brain. You will be doing this blocking of the nerves yourself.

Let's say your cat scratched you a minute ago and you would go after the beast, but your bleeding leg hurts too much. First off, stop the bleeding. Relax your mind and body. Forget about the fact you want to kill the cat. Now close your eyes. You do not have to, but it makes it easier to focus. With you mind, go straight to where the pain is in the leg. Focus on the pain. Accept the pain and do not try to fight it. Mentally wipe out all the pain. You should feel the pain suddenly disappear. Remember, you are getting rid of the pain, not the leg. Do not try to numb the leg, just the pain. If the pain returns just do it again. For injuries like broken bones and sprains, you are going to have to hold this numbing method for a few more seconds to get a lasting result. Leave the wound alone. Once you touch the leg or have something brush up on the leg, the pain will come back and you will have to start all over again. So sit or lie down for a while.

You can use this method for any type of pain or itching. It can be used for mosquito bites. The hardest thing about healing is that you have to calm down when doing it, or else it will not work. Also, keep in mind that it may not always work, especially if the pain is way too big. Injuries like bad sprains, broken bones, bad tears in muscles, cramps, and sore throats might not be able to be entirely worked with, but it even still does help somewhat.

Infections
Whether it is an infected cut, a cold, or an illness, it generally can be healed. If cause can not be cured, the symptoms can be healed. Here is a technique that can work on your self. For bad colds or an upper respirator infection the first step is to open your self up to the Force and look inward. Mentally go to each area of your body that is bothering you. Use the Force and sense where the germs are located in each area. You will know what the germs are because they will feel wrong and alien. Let’s say you were sensing your lungs because you had a bad cold. Imagine the germs traveling out of the lungs, up your throat and out your mouth.

Gather the Force and center it in your lungs. Use the Force to grab on to the germs. Send the Force and the germs up and out of your throat. You will want to do this when breathing out. Do not inhale until a second or two after the germs are out of your mouth, or you will end up breathing them in again. Go back to sensing your lungs and check to see if you got all of the germs or not. It is likely you have not and that is ok. Just repeat the steps above for a few more minutes.

Animals
Healing an animal is similar to healing a person, but there are differences that need to be noted. Most animals have a better immune and healing systems than humans. This is because most animals do not heal their kind, nor have the understanding to. A Jedi should also note that animal bodies can work much differently than a human’s body. Techniques that work on people may not always work on animals. Be careful about overloading an animal with too much energy. Do not send more energy than that species is used to. Often times the best and first step to helping an animal is to earn its trust in you and to calm the animal down. To do this, gather the Force, create a link to the animal and sense the mind of the animal. Create a very strong feeling of calm and peace in yourself and transfer the feeling to the mind of the animal. The animal should respond, but it may fight you. One technique that works is to visualize the injury and visualize it getting better while sending energy to that spot.

Warnings
No matter how good a healer you or another healer is, this healing should not be used to substitute going to the doctor or hospital, if needed. Even if the Force helps with a nasty flu, you should still have your pills. Never heal anyone for more than half an hour at most, or you will hurt yourself, by draining yourself of energy. Never heal yourself for more than twenty or more minutes. It is better to do short healing sessions than long ones. Short sessions, followed by rest, eating, and drinking gives the body a change to do some healing for you and recover from any stress the healing caused the body. Also beware of having your empathy when healing people. It is very easy you are your mind and body to feel the other person’s sickness and feel, but be, sick. This can fool the mind into being unable to feel and gather the Force.

Force Suggestions
This ability is well known and used quite a bit in star wars movies, but the level of control displayed is extremely high. To be able to do this ability requires knowledge of telepathy, the mind, and good manipulation of the Force. It was said that in the movies the stronger the mind, the harder to control, but even weak minds are not easy to confuse, fool, or control.

A Jedi should be aware of the consequences that follow mind control. This ability can be easily abused. It is too easy use the Force to suggest something that is minor, but wrong. It will become easier to keep abusing the Force on people. So it is highly advised one practices any type of mind control with caution.

Mind control
Mind control is an aggressive and harmful telepathic skill. Mind control involves a Force user going into the mind of a person and gaining control of the mind. With this control, the Force user can control any movements or anything said by the victim. This is not an ability that a Jedi should learn, but a Jedi does need to be aware of it and be able to block it. This attack can be avoided with strong mental shields and experience with the Force.

Force Suggestions
Force suggestions are similar to mind control, but it is done in a more passive, less controlling way. The idea behind Force suggestions is to telepathic suggest an idea or strong urge into a person’s mind, but not to take over the person’s control. The idea or urge is strong enough that weak minded people will obey without question and stronger people will be affected, but may not obey. The chance of Force suggestions working depends on the concentration and strength of the Force user. Should a Jedi use this ability, it should be done to help. To do Force suggestion, create a link with the person. Make sure you have a strong connection with them. Focus on their mind and the part of the mind that deals with emotions and planning. Think about a feeling to do something or say something extremely hard and then send this thought to the part of the brain you sensed in the other person.

Invisibility
While it is impossible to make yourself disappear from plain view, it is possible to fool a non Force user into believing you do not exist. It is done with Force suggestion. Reach out to the Force and feel the people around you. Create a weak connection with them. Gather the Force and send this this suggestion to their minds. Plant the idea that you are not important and are not worth noticing. They do not need to see you. Should this suggestion work, no one will look at you. The teacher will not call you. The police will ignore you. It will become easier to worm through crowds. Of course, you will still have to keep a low profile. If you break your concentration, this suggestion can be washed away and backfire on you. The people you fooled will suddenly find you interesting, if not suspicious.

Disconnection from the Force
Another way to fool people and possible save your life is consciously disconnecting yourself from the Force. This is only recommended for throwing off other Force users. Disconnecting yourself from the Force leaves you very blind and venerable to attacks. You will fail to sense any dangers or people around you.

May you continue to train hard and may the Force be with you.