Ilchi Lee tells in book about dahn yoga that after bemoaning the fact that I was just a simple Ki energy technician, I went back into the mountain and vowed to never come out until I had the answers to the questions that I was looking for. I chose to test the limits of my physical and mental endurance by not sleeping for twenty-one days straight. Ah, the torture I put myself through . . .
I tried everything not to sleep, including sitting at the edge of a sharp cliff and wrapping my arms around a thick branch of a tree so that the fear of falling down would keep me awake. I think I pulled many clumps of hair out during that period. After a week or so of no sleep, a severe headache of the magnitude that I have never felt came over me. It had been building for a while, but it struck with full force after a week or so. Pain accumulated in my eye sockets and my ears until I couldn’t see or hear. As time went on, my brain seemed to shrivel up inside and start to desiccate. At the same time, my head seemed always on the verge of exploding. I knew that I would die soon. This was after about two weeks. I even received a fleeting temptation to sleep, drink, and even eat something in order to prolong my life a bit. I would have succumbed to that temptation had I not survived the training ordeal in the snow-covered field on that rezone day before.
