Dharmakaya

Not sure about neidan specifically, but in his book he goes into internal alchemy via the three dantiens extensively, that's the main basis of his whole system. And he can apparently produce electric type chi etc, so quite powerful / legit. I would highly recommend reading his book The Master Key if you have not yet, super interesting story, highly informative, and well demonstrates a number of effective practices.

I'm late to the party. But I would think of jing, chi, and shen more in the context of energetic development - i.e. lower, middle, and upper dantiens - and the jhanas as mental states alone. And although the jhanas are interesting and attractive, they are also temporary states and do not confer lasting insight. Thus jhana 4 may be an "emptiness-like" experience, but is not a meaningful insight into emptiness. The jhanas themselves do not lead us to enlightenment, they are but an interesting way station along the path.

For general purposes, relaxed / behind the front teeth is probably fine. Remaining relaxed and conscious of your intention towards energy cultivation (in ren mai / du mai or just generally) is probably more important than any specific tongue position.

True, but close enough? Sometimes I think certain esoteric systems need to be taken with a grain of salt. In this case Luang Pu Wat Paknam may have just been making up his own new system based on an idea he had around "the center of the body", etc.

It's probably the same general idea as the Taoist lower dantien, just in a different spiritual system. Similar to how zen Buddhism talks about developing "hara" which seems clearly analogous to the lower dantien. Pretty fascinating really that a variety of traditions have independently developed roughly similar takes on the human energy body, or they're just cross pollinating..

I'm enlightened you know.. I can tell you how I did it or answer questions. PM me if you're interested.

Hey Wells! Why did you want to attain rainbow body?

Why do you want to achieve rainbow body? As far as I understand it, rainbow body is the result not of having good karma, but of having fully purified one's karma such that none remains. And I think logically, the only person who could achieve this would be a Buddha, as anyone short of Buddha-hood still has remaining karma. So really if you want to attain rainbow body, you are going to have to achieve full enlightenment. As such I think it's no surprise you didn't achieve it in two years, or that many westerners have likewise not achieved it. I think Buddhism, as a meditative system, has a lot to offer, but it also contains much dogma and it can be hard to separate the wheat from the chaff. In my view, Buddhism most basically is a system of progressive attainment; we can see this in a diverse array of teachings, from the Theravada 4 path system to the many complex systems of attainment in Tibetan Buddhism, including Mahayana approaches as well as Mahamudra and Dzogchen. However, without access to an approach or teacher that expressly recognizes progressive attainment, it is no surprise most practitioners experience little genuine realization.

Dawei's first link has an awesome explanation of the three dantiens!

The Master Key by Robert Peng is a good one. His qi gong system is based on the three dantien model, and so he goes pretty in depth about awakening and balancing the three dantiens, and their role in our lives. I would highly recommend it!

Sorry, I would have to say no. I have found that energetic attunements tend need to be overcome in a sense. If you do it of your own initiative however, that's on you. I am sure you have the best intentions, but thinking it over I have found I have definite opinions on this subject, which I have tried to explain below.. An analogy is; imagine we are all in individual space ships, floating around in space. If a foreign ship asks for permission to come aboard and I grant permission, I have willingly opened myself up to a deeper level of scrutiny, so any ill effects are 'on me' so to speak. If I do not grant permission, and an intimate probe attempt is made, the consequences are 'on' the invader. At the same time however, we do not live in bubbles. We are constantly interacting with people on a physical and energetic level, which involves offensive and defensive energetic systems. This is natural interaction and helps us to grow. In the space analogy, we are interacting with many different ships, from well known to foreign, at ranges from close to distant. We are constantly keeping an eye on all of them to varying degrees simply in the interest of self-preservation. For an outside ship to take a look at out craft from a respectful distance, even if we do not let them on board is perfectly acceptable. It is a natural occurrence; certainly we ourselves are looking around at our neighboring ships for various reasons. So if someone take a look at your ship from a safe distance simply because they are interested, with the best intentions there is no harm done, even if we have declined for them to come in closer. Also beyond the space analogy, I generally feel like we exist in an energetic balance such that what we receive from the world mirrors what we put out. So any energetic investigation would necessarily reflect upon us in the manner which we undertake it.

Yes! I am aware it may sound unbelievable, but it's true!

I will bite: yes I have. I had a temporary enlightenment experience in high school and meditated extensively in various Buddhist traditions until I gained a permanent return to that state. I am happy to answer any questions!

I am pretty interested in this as well, and I don't think it's actually that radical. The key is epigenitics. The way I understand it, our DNA is being changed all the time, minutely, through environmental interaction. Environment doesn't just mean where we live, but also our internal environment, how stressed we are, how we feel about the world and ourselves and so on. If stress causes DNA changes, spiritual practice, where ideally we are overcoming our innate issues, the opposite of stress, is thus very likely to be encoded as well in our DNA. Basically, I think epigenetics means everything we do effects us on a chemical - cellular level, no matter how minute, so inevitably spiritual practice is going to have an effect and be recorded. The more progress we make, the more change; an enlightened master has probably altered their genetics more than the average person. We can think about it as our genes are what we're born with, and if we overcome issues like anxiety, or jealousy, maybe this gets passed on, at least to an extent. Another interesting aspect about this is that we only pass on the changes we make to our DNA before we have kids. If we think about average age of reproduction, between 18 and 35, the changes we pass on are those that have occurred growing up and in our early adulthood. In some ways, our parents may have a great effect on what sort of altered DNA we will pass on because they are responsible for our environment in many ways for these early years.

Thanks for sharing your experience! I have read a few NDE books, and it is very interesting stuff. I agree with you, based on my own experiences I definitely believe death is not the end of the road.

Woah! Does your cousin have a website or something?

I had a mystical experience when I was in high school that was in essence a complete glimpse of enlightenment, or a samadi experience. This glimpse of enlightenment was the most beautiful and amazing experience I had ever had (and ironically it happened in the bathroom at my high school). The shell of my logical and conceptual ego completely dropped away leaving nothing but the united present moment. I had been having manic depressive episodes up until this point, where for a few weeks my mind would be under a heavy and oppressive weight of anxiety and self-criticism, and then I would have a day where this cloud lifted and my mind would just race at 200%. The day my mystical experience happened was a super manic day, and for an instant I broke through the barrier of ego and glimpsed what lies on the other side. This experience only lasted maybe 20 seconds, and I then returned to normal. Although I had had this tremendous experience, I was than back in my normal everyday mind. However the impact of this experience was great; afterwords I knew without any doubt that a state of mind existed that was utterly transcendent, and of greater importance than any possible material gain. After this experience, I would have given anything to return to that state; in the brief moment I experienced it I clearly saw it to be the pinnacle of existence. So to answer your question, while this experience did not necessarily make me a 'better' person, it gave me a massive boost in spiritual drive because I knew irrevocably that reaching the end of the spiritual quest was more valuable than anything else in life. IMO the spiritual path is extremely difficult, and it can only be accomplished by those who are willing to literally give it their all. Thus to have gained this mindset as result of the mystical experience was invaluable. Cheers!

Just to clarify my other post, I do think retaining semen to some degree is important and helpful for Qi Gong practice, however I don't see the benefits of doing it in the long term. To each their own, but perhaps a more balanced discussion of semen retention is necessary. In The Way of Qi Gong, Kenneth Cohen writes, "Ejaculation frequency should be determined by health, season, and age". In essence if you are young and healthy, it is natural to ejaculate about once every 4 days, and as you get older this period will gradually increase. Personally, if I ejaculate more than once in a 2-3 day period I notice a marked decrease in energy levels. On the other hand if I don't ejaculate for a week or more I notice that my energy becomes somewhat stagnant, and creativity is diminished, as if the the "pot is too full". The strong mental turbulence or emotional agitation that the OP noted is to me a clear sign of the need to ejaculate as one has a lot of pent up energy that is beginning to cause energetic issues. Ejaculating with a frequency of about once every 5 days (+/-) allows me to retain good energy levels, as well as a balanced and open state of mind.

Here is an alternative opinion, and hopefully it doesn't get buried: I went to a Qi Gong class last summer with Robert Peng (a highly respected teacher), and during the class he mentioned, "Don't practice during thunderstorms, many people have been injured that way.." He didn't really elaborate, and so, I guess not knowing the risks, I did not heed this advice. A few days after the class I was back home when the mother of all thunderstorms moved into position above my house. Coincidentally I really wanted to practice Qi Gong at this moment.. I started doing a practice involving moving qi up and down the central meridian through the Dantiens; from the lower to the middle and back, from the lower to the upper and back, and then from the lower to heaven, and then down to earth and back to the lower. As I did this, specifically as I sent Qi up to heaven, there was a gigantic lightning strike right close to my house, and I felt the extremely powerful thunderstorm Qi come down into my middle Dantien (heart), and "blow it out". In my experience the middle Dantien or Heart governs who you feel yourself to be. At any rate, immediately after this event, this heart perception was "blown out", as though it had been overloaded and was now unable to function in a normal or contained capacity. This feeling went on for about a week until I went on a massive and challenging bike ride (a very strong cardio workout). That night I felt a big release in my heart area, and my perception returned to normal. In essence the entrance of thunder Qi had resulted in a major heart energy blockage. Thus it was that I learned the danger of practicing during thunderstorms, as well as gaining experience in the function of the heart/middle Dantien, and experienced the release of a major (and recently imposed) blockage. Cheers, and I hope this has been interesting to read!

I don't understand what the fixation around here with semen retention is about.. One of the posters above said to take up walking, but I read it "wanking", and that seemed like pretty solid advice! In my experience moderation is key, and I would say; just jack off once in a while!! The true spiritual benefits of semen retention versus a regular meditation practice are probably negligible, if that. While I could see this practice leading to increased control over desire or sexual craving, there are multiple ways to skin the goat if you know what I mean, and I don't think semen retention is some kind of silver bullet. The simple yet highly effective practice of keeping attention on the lower Dantein would probably be more beneficial than forced and uncomfortable semen retention.

I saw the video where Aurelian and a teacher were levitating small bits of paper with their qi, and I would ask, what he was doing there with his qi in order to produce this effect? How long did it take to refine his qi to this level? and what was the progression like? (i.e. stages of development..) Given that his teacher can set things on fire with his qi (there's a video of him starting a fire in pine needles), I am very curious to hear how this power is developed, i.e. how long it takes, what the progression is like. My question would be; what are the mechanics of progression in your tradition i.e. opening the dantiens and filling them..? Awesome thread!

Hey Spotless, that was an interesting post! Could you talk a bit more about how going deep in this area can lead to insanity? I have heard from others that it can be somewhat dangerous at the higher levels, and I am curious as to a deeper explanation for why this is, especially from someone with experience. Cheers, Tim

Indeed some good advice here. I would say kind of to follow up on what NIkolia1 was saying, where you seem to be at is actually a really good place to start. In Buddhism, the path begins with the recognition that you are suffering, only once you realize this can you begin to change it in a meaningful way. The fact is that everyone suffers, and if you become aware of this and your self-centered tendencies than frankly you may have a spiritual leg up on most people. Seriously, a place of genuine dissatisfaction with ourselves, or the state of our lives is THE starting point for genuine spiritual practice. Congratulations! ha It sounds like you have been doing spiritual practices before, and seemingly using them to enhance your ego? For this problem Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism by Chogyam Trungpa is a great book to read. Also it can be helpful to have some notion of the true goal of (Buddhist) spiritual practice, which is attainment! If you are interested in this I would recommend reading Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha by Daniel Ingram. It's available as a free PDF download online. Cheers!

So it seems you want to make spiritual progress, and you have hit upon celibacy as a way to do this. Given your past porn addiction this seems reasonable. However let me say clearly; celibacy is not a requirement to make spiritual progress. In my view spiritual progress has much more to do with the strength of person's desire to overcome their obstacles, their strength of willpower in steadfastly applying effort, and the correctness and correct suiting of the teachings they follow. Overall though the most important may be a 'middle way' mind set. Too little exertion and one gets nowhere, but too much exertion and one can become stuck, like trying to pull your fingers forcefully out of a Chinese finger trap. Spirituality is ultimately about giving up and surrendering to what is. Personally I find relationships to be very helpful for practice as one is forced to develop compassion for another person and give up selfish ideas. I do not see 10 years of celibacy to be conducive to forming healthy intimate relationships, however if you undertake this you will no doubt discover the true effects whatever they may be. My point is balance is important; remember the middle way! All the best!

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