In Search of a Lost Western Tradition of Inner Alchemy.

This book examines in detail a short book, often referred to as The Five Tibetans that was published in 1939 teaching a simple yet effective set of five exercises for health and longevity, the Five Rites.

Certain dietary rules and lifestyle principles accompanied the Rites, so did a Sixth Rite that worked the diaphragm muscles and redirected sexual energies, and also a set of teachings about seven energy centers or vortices in the body, though not the same as the well-known seven chakras along the spine.

These vortices are among the most distinctive things about the system, and are found in only a scattered handful of sources elsewhere. It is by awakening the vortices to their normal rate of spin, the book claims, that the Rites achieve their effects.