sillybearhappyhoneyeater

Baguazhang is typically thought to have a three year foundational period when you should only be walking and perhaps holding some simple postures. The walking has three levels, upper(high posture), middle (middle posture), low (low posture). When you start out walking, you hips will not be flexible and it will be very hard to turn with the posture. If you want to get to a high level of skill, you need to learn to walk in an upright and relaxed fashion. Some things which assist in this are forcing your back foot to stay on the ground as your front foot steps foward (don't lift the heal), make sure to drop your hips down and pull up through the top of the head, learn to control your footwork with your deep abdominal muscles (this takes time). Ideally, you should make walking and basic practices your daily practice and just walk as much as you can without hurting yourself (typically beginners with average leg strength can do about twenty minutes of serious walking at a time, but you may be able to practice several times in one day). Depending on what your teacher wants, he may instruct you to turn your hips or not at this time. Just try to follow his advice about this, since he can see your body and we can't. When i started out studying with my teacher, his English was also quite so so, but over many years my classmates and I helped him improve his English skills and I ultimately went on to become fluent in Mandarin. Martial arts opens lots of doors for all of us to grow and learn. :)

I was lucky enough to go visit my teacher for a few days, and what a difference! We talked about many things, but one thing I especially want to share here, because it is of great importance to people practicing Qi Gong, is the topic of "kong zhuan he che." He Che (connected cart) in Daoism is when the Qi in the Du and Ren meridians connect to each other. In Qi gong terms, it is basically the same is Xiao Zhou Tian (small microcosmic orbit). He Che is a valuable and important part of Daoist energy practices and something that takes a few years to develop. My teacher is a very thorough and always points out both positive things and problems that can occur in practice, so this time around, when we were discussing the energetic connection in the He Che circulation, he pointed out a potential problem that can occur in some people. This problem is called "kong zhuan he che," or "empty cycle connection," and is a common problem among Qi gong and Daoist practitioners. Basically, this is the practice of using the intention to move Qi around the small heavenly orbit. This is represented by many popular writers of Qi Gong books, whose names shall go unmentioned, and is also quite commonplace in the Western Qi gong community in general. How many seminars have you gone to where a teacher claimed to teach small heavenly orbit by having you use the mind (and maybe some movement) to draw a circle up your spine and down your front? I bet most of us have been to seminars like that. This practice can provide some physical sensations, but it doesn't help build up and replenish ti Qi and any long term of valuable way. The other problem is that this practice (which exists inside of a continuum of many older practices called "cun xiang," or "visualization") is that if you practice it for a long time, it can make you feel very tired. I think this is the reason why many teachers advise not to overdo the small heavenly orbit. Actual He Che practice, using post heaven Qi (we will just talk about post heaven Qi here, since pre heaven is a whole other can of worms) is better accomplished indirectly by either focusing on the lower dantian during practice (while empahsising correct posture and breathing), or by doing various auxilary Qi gong exercises which cause the Qi to naturally move through the du and ren meridians. Trying to actively move Qi in these places, especially while visualizing things like hot coals or fire can be very harmful and not produce any good results other than maybe feeling tired and relaxed after practice. To get the real benefit from he che practice, you need to either try to enter the pre heaven state through nei dan, or to do Qi gong which affects the he che by gradually building up a strong base of post heaven energy in the three dan tian, and finally causes the qi to move through the three gates of the back. Post heaven practice takes much longer to achieve than pre heaven practice, but has the benefit of being dynamic and also directly working with other areas such as flexibility and balance. Either way you do it, you should try to avoid doing "kong zhuan he che," since it doesn't provide very deep results and may actually be bad for you. :) :)

Don't teach people breathing exercises beyond just breathing naturally. Zhang Boduan warned against this in understanding reality 劳形按引皆非道， working the form, bending and stretching are not the Dao 服气餐霞总是狂 Swallowing qi and eating rainbows are all useless! This is commenting on how Daoyin, various breathing exercises and cunxiang (visualization) are not as good for you as simply being natural. Don't assume you have wrecked your mom, just get her to stop that practice now. If your mom has lower back pain, there is probably a postural aspect to it, as well as atrophy of various abdominal muscles. She could consider going to physio, and in the interim getting the book pain free by Peter Egosgue. Egosque's method is a very good short term remedy to many pain related problems. I also suggest feldenkrais, taiji classes with a compotent teacher, and looking into dietary concerns with a profressional. basic meditation won't hurt your mom, but crazy breathing exercises are not a one size fits all remedy. Remember that when it really comes down to the health of ageing people, we have to be very careful not to hurt them. :)

Probably the power of suggestion mixed with an intelligent and creative mind. Daoism has dragon archetypes, so does Taijiquan. It is a great idea to cultivate some of the movement characteristics of Chinese dragons though. In Baguazhang there is a saying "walk like and eagle, turn like a monkey, change like a dragon." It means that your movement should be direct and soaring like a great bird (also you have the intention of a predator watching its prey), you have intelligence and nimbleness in your foot and hand work, and you flow through movements and fold the body like a dragon in flight.

I am a great devotee to the concept of religious pluralism, but having said that, Daoism has one very special concept that other spiritual traditions for the most part are lacking in. Daoism views the Dao as being accessible through practice, which means that it is not confined merely to the realm of belief. Daoism also has both the concepts of xing and ming, while many other traditions tend to focus on one or the other. Having said that, Daoism is no more special than any other tradition, perhaps it is just that it speaks more to some of us than the others do.

I'm just working on becoming Yuanshi Tianzun :) :)

I would like to start a weekly or bi weekly session of meditation and taijiquan classes in Toronto for the next several months. If anyone is interested in learning Neidan basics (probably starting from Huang Yuanji's method) and Tian style Taijiquan with a strong influence from the Xian Xue school of Daoism (Chen Yinging, Hu Haiya et al.), please contact me and let me know. I'm coming from Guelph, so the best situation is if there is a room somewhere that we can use.

Great post Dawei!!!! http://ctext.org/shiji/wu-di-ben-ji above is a link to a history of Huangdi in the Shiji history anals.

The secret is to wake up every day, get out of bed, have something to drink and eat, use the washroom for both number one and two, shower, clean, shave if required, put your clothing on, and have your day. Then at night to go to sleep and stay that way for as long as you can afford to. Then wake up the next day and do the same.

Your stomach feels empty because you have lost some of your development during a long period of non practice. My suggestion is that you find time to meditate and exercise that are not around bed time. The reason for this is because meditation, although it can make you feel sleepy and help you sleep, should be about developing a strong system and building yang energy. Chen Yingning suggested that it is a good idea to meditate every day when you get up in bed for at least two hours and then once at night for two hours. Obviously, most of our schedules don't allow that, but you could consider doing a morning meditation practice when you sit up in bed. This will help get your nervous system ready for the day and help maintain energy levels throughout the day, while also helping you set your sleep patterns more clearly (having a daily transitional period going from getting up to movement in a gradual way). Consider focusing on the middle palace for a few weeks (the middle palace is the place behind the solar plexus between the chest and adbomen). Just place your mind there and observe your breath, with the out breath being a bit longer than the in breath. The middle palace is much easier to practice well than the lower dantian, since it is much faster to enter a restful state using this concept. The biggest key is to not force the breath, because this area of the body needs to be treated very softly and lightly. Once you can get to a deep place using the middle palace, you can start considering practicing the dantian again (or just keep going with the middle palace). Keep in mind to focus on subtracting and relaxing the mind. Minimize and take away things instead of adding things when you practice. Become more calm, more empty, and move toward the genuine yin energy state. This is the real key to building yang energy in the body (yang is the natural biproduct of pure yin). You should also consider finding a teacher if you can, since self practice has many unclear places which can be hard to navigate without guidance. Also, if you feel so inclined, you can have a look at my book (in the link in my signature), it is very much geared toward helping people use meditation techniques to achieve a sense of restfulness and happy calm. When you lie in bed at night, you can also consider focusing the attention on the lower abdomen and just feeling the breath as you consciously send messages to yourself to relax. This can have a great benefit on your ability to relax fully before sleep. Remember that your thoughts keep you awake, so you need to find a way to minimize and cope with thoughts around bed time. Cut out the booze, cut down the caffeine and sugars, and eat as many vegetables, fruits, and beans as you can. Good luck!!!!!

Qi, both kinds of Qi, have no relationship with electricity other than some stimulation feeling that can occur because of breaking up blockages. post birth qi is related to blood, breath, oxygen, and intention. pre birth qi is something else which may be hormonaly related.

Aspects of Tea Ceremony: Chinese tea ceremony, or Cha Dao (the way of tea), has five principle components. Here is a short introduction to what they are. Cha Yi, Cha yi is the art of brewing and pouring tea. Cha Yi can encompass many different attitudes such as gongfu cha (the Southern Chinese art of pouring Wulong tea), Dian Cha (the ancient Song dynasty art of preparing matcha, currently practiced in Japanese Cha Dao), Da Wan Cha (the simple art of drinking tea in a big bowl), and so on. Cha yi is a large category encompassing any type of Chinese brewing style, or styles which existed in past generations and have either been lost or passed to other nations such as Japan and Korea. Cha Li, Cha Li is the courtesy aspect of drinking tea. This involves various politenesses such as how to receive tea, how to drink it, knowing who should get tea first and so on. Since the Ming dynasty, tea drinking has been based around being natural, so Chinese tea practice only has aspects of courtesy such as being respectful of each other, taking sips rather than gulps and so on. Cha Li as it was practiced in ancient China has mostlly been passed along in Japanese and Korean tea ceremony, where the rules of propriety are much more strict, and resemble Tang and Song dynasty Chinese habits. Cha Jing, Cha Jing refers to the environment in which we drink tea. Again, the modern enviornment for drinking Chinese tea usually favours nature and it is always preferable to drink tea in natural places when possible. There is some aspect of Fengshui in the methods of preparing a space for tea drinking, and the best tea drinking areas have open and free movement of air, light, and natural sounds, but are also protected from wind, rain, and unusual smells. Xiu Xing Cha, Xiu Xing means to cultivate spirit through prayer or meditation. In the world of tea, Xiu Xing means to cultivate spirit while you practice tea ceremony. This ranges from doing meditation when you pour tea alone, to learning the art of service when practicing with other people. Xiu Xing in tea is deeply attached to Buddhist and Daoist ideas and is very deep, but also somewhat elusive since there are no documents from antiquity which clearly define the process by which tea can be used as a spiritual medium in practice.

Canadian by any chance?

very interesting. Can I interview you for my tea blog?

manitou, bet you were in west lake in hangzhou right? lovely place. aithrobates: there are lots of different ideas about this floating around, but to be honest, there is no document which clearly uses tea to explain self cultivation, just a lot of historical allusions. that means that even though tea does have some relationship with buddhism and daoism, it hasn't been fully disseminated as five elements theory and so on. There is quite a lot of disagreement about all of these things. I did a lot of reseaarch last year about the five elements and tea, and although I did find articles from chinese medicine doctors and so on, there is nothing conclusive which draws a deep historical relationship between the elements and tea. I think the best route would be to understand how tea affects the vital organs and then go from there in classifying it. There are several medicine documents which do this, a few of which I have translated.\ Xiu xing tea, although it really is a thing, isn't very well discussed, even in tea circles. Zhou yu (the granddaddy of Taiwan tea ceremony) gave us a wild harvested wuyi tea from pinlin earlier this year which shot qi straight up my du mai and made me sweat like a mofo. I recently also had a wild pu'er that did something similar. Zhou yu said that if you don't have meditation experience, the most that tea will do is give you post heaven qi, but if you have experience, tea can actually create pre heaven qi in the body, due to it sharing its jing with you.

It depends on which Daoist you asked. Typically, religious sects in Daoism advocate non contention as a way to deal with problems, but this can be really difficult if you have people bothering you every day. There were many people in the 20th century who practiced both Daoist methods and the martial arts (my teacher's teacher Fu shoubo for instance) and who didn't take bull from anyone. I think if you were to go to the DDJ for answers, you would find that Laozi doesn't specifically decry the use of soldiers, but instead says that one shouldn't use soldiers more than needed. I think the best way to deal with most people who annoy you is to either convert them with your kindness, or just treat them like they are mosquitos trying to get a little drink of your blood, no big deal. For really dirty, nasty, terrible people, you either have to cut them right out or if the going gets tough, deal with them as quickly and effectively as possible, by whatever means are the most suitable. Most mean people have had difficult lives and don't know how to show positive emotions to others. Please keep this in mind before you lash out at anyone for treating you poorly :)

Hi there, I'm glad to hear you are starting to have interesting experiences based around your Xingyi. Make sure that you emphasise posture, uprightness, roundness, and clear transfer of relaxed power early one. The emotional benefit of practicing Xingyi for a long time is that it makes you more brave, so if you have invisibility issues, correct practice of xingyi can make you confident to show up more in public. This is a real treasure for people who have a hard time making themselves heard. Good luck with the practice and remember to emphasize vitality and dynamic movement in your practice!!! :)

Hi friends, here is a small piece of translation work describing the relationship between the terms Water, Fire, Led, Mercury, Pre birth, Post birth, Yin and Yang. This piece of writing divulgest a huge amount of code words from earlier Daoist writings that are hard to read without training. This can help us a lot when we research documents like Wu Zhen Pian, and Lu Dongbin's writing. 觉真子曰。金丹大道。不离自身三宝。 Jue zhenzi says: the golden elixir great way doesn't separate from the three treasures of the body. 后天水火。先天真阴真阳耳。 The post heaven fire and water is the real yin and real yang of pre heaven and that is all! 人在母腹未生之前。 In the mother's womb before being born. 本干南坤北。 At its root Qian is south and Kun is north. (Chinese readers may note where the transcriber made a spelling mistake). 先天主事。母呼随呼。 The main activity of the pre heaven state is the mother exhaling and inhaling. 十月胎足。 Ten months is enough to build the fetus. 瓜熟蒂落。 A mellon ripens from its base. 一个筋斗下地。 And its sinews wrestle their way toward the earth. 哇啼一声。 It cries out in one sound. 先天气收。后天气接。 The pre birth Qi is passed on, the post birth Qi is received. 朝失中爻之阳而成离。 The day loses its centre line's Yang (the centre line is lost from the Qian trigram) and it becomes Li (fire) 所以离中虚。无也。名曰汞。 Because the centre of Li is empty, it is absent, its name is Gong (mercury) 坤得干宫之阳而成坎。所以坎中满。有也。名曰铅 Kun gains the Qian Palace Yang energy and is called “Kan” (water). Because the centre of Kan is full, therefore it “is,” its name is called Quan (Led).

NO STAIRWAY... denied!

Morality and Nihilsm are constructs we use to explain our relationship with the world around us. This relationship is unclear and undecided, but the brain requires a way to sort this business out so it doesn't become parylized. If you look at the functtion of the left and right brain, so can see that information is constantly passing between the two hemispheres in order to check the veracity of an experience. Accord to Iaian McGilchrist, the left brain is more or less logically self consistent, meaning that if the left brain picks up a form of logic that doesn't deviate from itself, then it will accept the logic as truth. The right brain on the other hand, tends to reject logical constructs even if they are true. These two sides of the brain are how we judge the varacity of situations we meet and separate what is important from what is not. In some ways, this could be described as understanding that the dragon in front of you is just a statue and it is not going to eat you, or on the other hand, that the dragon in front of you really is a dragon and you better get out of the place fast. In studies where people have one side of their brain disabled, it becomes bluntly obvious that the logical faculty of the brain requires both sides to work proerly. Logic must be intuitive and the creation of rules to define our relationship with the world must also be intuitive. Even a cat knows what its relationship with you is and it never treats you like it does a mouse. The addition of complex language and linguistic communication complicates things somewhat, but in effect, we are simply a speaking beast which can derive some sense of knowledge of self where others may not be able to. Incidentally, a friend of mine is doing research into the differences between Chinese and western culture and he has hit upon how linguistically, Asian societies actually have a more difficult time separating a clear sense of "me," when compared to Western societies which have a very detached idea of what self is. Hope this is somewhat germain to the topic.

Just flipping through Hu Haiya's commentaries today and saw his assertion that Kun is in the feet and Qian is in the head, if that helps at all.

http://www.tambulimedia.com/books/internal-elixir-cultivation/ Hi all, on this page, you can download a free sample chapter from my book Internal Elixir Cultivation, the nature of Daoist meditation, printed by Tambuli Media. Also, I have a free mailing list where I teach two Daoism classes every week. You can send an email to [email protected] and I'll add you to the list. Right now we are covering Middle School Daoism and a little from Chen Yingning's immortality study method. Also going to organize some classes in Toronto when I get back from China in November. Anyone interested can send an email to me for details (will also post here when the time gets closer).

Hi again friends, I don't want to overload you with too much information, but think this may also be helpful for people. Daoist writing has a great deal of literature concerning two phenomenon, one is called xing and the other is called ming. The easiest way we can understand xing and ming philosophically is to use Zhu Xi's explanation (he was a Neo Confucian who studied the book of changes and created his own meditation methods based on 'li' or propriety through ceremony). Zhu Xi said that Xing is like the emptiness of the heavens and Ming is the life of the earth. From these two things, we can see that Xing and Ming are yang and yin. Much later on, Xing Ming Gui Zhi, a very important meditation manual from the middle school of Daoism said that Xing is the mind before it has met with the spirit (shen) and Ming is the body before it has met with Qi. Xing and Ming are things which apply directly to meditation in the middle school and I just want to touch a bit on how they work. I promise I won't write an essay :) The most basic way to understand how to use Xing and Ming is to use the analogy of Chen Yingning (founder of the Immortality Study School). Chen said "Ming is like the gas of a lamp, while Xing is like the brightness of the lamp, illuminated by the gas." He used this analogy to explain how the body cannot function without both Xing and Ming. If there is no Ming, then there can be no Xing, but if there is no Xing, although there may be Ming, it will be dormant and useless. We can use that analogy to further inform our practice! If you remember, earlier I mentioned that Zhu Xi compared Xing to the sky and Ming to the earth. Consider that the sky is a basically empty entity and that it allows all things to pass through it unobstructed. That means that the sunlight is able to reach the beings on the earth. Ming is the earth, and although things do not pass through it (in the sense that things can easily pass through the sky), it upholds, births and sustains all life. The important part is that Xing, while being insubstantial, is required for things to exist. When you meditate, the mind should naturally enter an empty, connected state, similar to the relationship of the sky and the earth. Assuming you meditate on your lower dantian (I use this just because it is the most common method among the various schools), then after you have set your mind there and after the mind slows down, it will naturally begin to become open and empty. This is when Xing begins to interact with Ming. When the energy of the body becomes lighened up, the Xing and Ming are mixing and giving birth to life (Yang energy). This is also related to the concept of "San Cai," or heaven man and earth. Xing is the heavens, Ming is the earth, and the marriage of heaven and earth create humanity, who are a combination of the energies of yang and yin as represented by heaven and earth. Both the middle school and the Immortality school call this type of activity "xing ming shuang xiu," or "xing and ming practiced simultaneously." Just some thoughts. :)

San Cai occurs in many places in chinese culture. My partner is a Feng Shui practitioner and recently told me about how san cai work in Feng shui. really interesting stuff.

Open Dao is correct about this. Also, the ren and du mai are not the only purpose of circulating jing. Depending on what you practice, it is very common for the jing to simply illuminate the entire body. Huang Yuanji said that when you focus on the middle palace (solar plexus area), you should assign one breath to leave and one to enter. These two breaths are the full cycle of yang and yin and during meditation the breath will go from being two separate breaths, to one full cycle, back to being two separate breaths again. He calls this the "mystery gate subtle portal," (it is also called this in xing ming gui zhi and many other places). In order to open the portal, yin and yang have to be harmonized in such a way that the breathing doesn't seem like two anymore, it only seems like one continuous cycle (前後相隨 front and back follow each other). Once this has happened, the mind will go into a state of mixed unclarity. This is where the subtle portal is located, since yin and yang have joined chaotically and are not separated, then the mind gradually slows down, becomes unclear, and eventually enters a deep state of Yin energy, or quiet. From the deep quiet is where genuine yang energy emerges from. Chen Yingning said that small quiet produces small energy, and great quiet produces great energy. Once you have this, then the subtle portal will open and the qi will go everywhere in the body. the key concept here is that while you have one qi, you can't quit practicing. you have to wait until the qi becomes quiet again and returns to the root. That way you will have both created and stored your Qi. This is called "xing ming shuang xiu," or xing and ming mutual cultivation. Again, Chen Yingning said that ming was like the oil inside of a lamp and xing was like the brightness of the lamp. without the oil there could be no brightness, but without the brightness the lamp would have no use. The mind illuminates the essence and then returns to the essence. Of course when you practice this, the ren and du mai will have activity, but so will the governing channel, the yin qiao, the sky gate, the three dantian and so on. Opening the body to yuan qi has many many stages of preparation before the actual circulation of yuan qi. I created this thread to talk about what people here mostly refer to as MCO, since there is a great deal of incorrect and scary knowledge floating around on the internet. I really want to contribute something safe so that less people are injured by the funny methods of some so called Qi gong masters.