Taomeow

P.S. If one of the ingredients in an "umami" product is "natural flavor," that's MSG. It can be labeled as natural because, well, it does occur as a natural amino acid -- not in the totally unnatural amounts it occurs in commercially though. And not as a free-form amino. When it's part of a whole chunk of a natural product, a whole sequence of amino acids whose order of absorption trumps glutamate (all amino acids are absorbed sequentially when you consume them as part of natural foods) will have it wait for an hour, or hours, by which time a lot of it will safely and naturally degrade, so you get exactly the amount your body knows how to handle when its turn comes. But when it's a food additive, it overwhelms the system, and if it's used in the absence of other competing aminos (as in plant based fake meat and fish laced with tons of MSG), it will jump the gun right away. Potentially causing a bunch of adversities I've mentioned above, and a bunch I haven't.

Most "umami" products are MSG-based. Do read the fine print when you buy them. The Japanese chemist who coined the neologism (no, it's not a traditional thing and not a real word) actually invented and patented MSG, monosodium glutamate, as food additive, and the word (derived from the Japanese for "delicious" or "savory") came with it as a sales pitch when it was being marketed. Caveat emptor. Natural fish based sauces (notably made with anchovies) were an Asian favorite for thousands of years without carrying the label "umami," and without doing any damage to the CNS and the optic nerve or causing the "Chinese restaurant syndrome" psychiatrists and neurologists routinely deal with. I buy mine at an Asian market -- I think it's either from Vietnam or Thailand, too lazy to go to the fridge to check the label. Ingredients: anchovies, water, salt. That's what you want to shoot for. It lasts forever, offers a generous helping of essential trace minerals (not listed on the label, yet I've researched and know they're there), but asks for some practice when used in cooking, because a little goes a long way and too little goes nowhere, and too much stinks. Practice makes perfect. I use it to replace part of the salt in soups, stews, sauces, etc..

Great reference. My point all along: same game, same players... same shit, different wrapper.

I was under the impression that it was a jellyfish. That UFO dream I mentioned had a live jellyfish UFO -- I subsequently researched and apparently there's people who claim they've seen them in real life, though I never heard of it prior to the dream. The dream was one hundred percent realistic, basically nothing in it that had a dream-like "feel" or appearance despite the fantastic plot. OK, I feel I can tell it, but anyone who can't stand people tell their dreams should stop reading right here, because, like I said, it was a dream. In the dream, the house I used to live in, on a quiet residential street, suddenly is assaulted by a cacophony of police sirens and flashing lights -- one car wooshes by, two, half a dozen, more. Then back again. Erratic. A whole lot of police cars are rushing up and down the street at full speed, and I step out to investigate, look up, and say to no one in particular, "Oh... and there's the UFO." For some reason I say it with the satisfaction of someone in the know and feel a bit amused by the frantic police activity. "Well, good luck catching it." Michael, the picture of the lymphocyte you posted is also the right color, the edges especially, the jellyfish wasn't grey like in the pic I posted -- it was purple, lavender, with some iridescent play going -- it also had tentacles, long ones. I stood there looking at it for a while, not only unafraid but feeling very smug, for reasons the dream me knows but the waking me doesn't. Then it got a bit chilly so I went inside, and three people -- I knew they were not really people, they were "aliens" but looked like ordinary people -- walk out of my bedroom as I walk in the living-room, the one in front is a woman, looking African-American though I know she's really an "alien," and she beams at me and exclaims, "Here you are! And we were looking for you in Guangzhou!" "You kidding me? I've been at Guangzhou airport for, like, three hours, and it was a year ago!" Again I feel mighty amused. The black woman gives me a hug, I hug her back the way you hug someone you know, a friend, very familiar. And then everything dissolves and I wake up. Needless to say I check for "Jellyfish UFOs" from time to time since that dream.

I haven't investigated others but I know a bit about Wong Kiew Kit -- his was the very first book on taiji I ever read, many moons ago, and it was one of the sources of my subsequent interest. Don't doubt his high level of internal accomplishment -- but whether his training toward gaining it had anything whatsoever to do with Shaolin, besides the purported association with the mythical "Southern Shaolin" temple in Fujian whose existence was never demonstrated, is very debatable. Let me quote: Southern Shaolin Monastery. The location and existence of this has been disputed. The book Martial Arts of the World: Regions and individual arts gives the stories of a Southern temple as an example of the unverifiable claims often made for the establishment of Chinese martial art styles. It says "One example involves a Shaolin monastery in Fujian Province. During the nineteenth century, Heaven and Earth Society documents referred to a southern Shaolin monastery in Fujian Province whence so-called southern Shaolin martial arts styles such as Hong Quan reportedly originated. Although this assertion has been repeated many times, and claimants from three locations (Quanzhou, Putian, and Fuxing) have each made a case for their location, none of the claimants have been able to provide much evidence to support their claims." It also states that "Another aspect of the Shaolin story subject to misperception is the impression that martial arts called "Shaolin staff/' "Shaolin boxing," etc., were actually developed at a Shaolin Temple," noting that "Recruiters for organizations such as the Heaven and Earth Society also used stories about Shaolin prowess to recruit members. And, of course, playwrights and novelists created stories. This makes it difficult to confirm whether any specific style originated at any specific location, let alone at Songshan Shaolin monastery in Henan." It's quite likely that quite a few internal stylists merely used the name "Shaolin" because it's a trademark that sells, not because what they have was ever developed or practiced there. The Chinese government was instrumental in making it into a trademark generating prestige and tourism, by the way -- let's not forget that the "original" Shaolin monks were rendered extinct during the "cultural revolution" and the "great leap forward," and subsequently, upon opening China to the West, replaced by young communists with the "Party task" to train as monks... Institutional arts coming out of China in the aftermath of the second half of its 20th century history need to be taken with a generous helping of salt methinks. (This is aslo true for Wudang and even Maoshan, not just Shaolin...)

Without naming names... A teacher I know took a group of students on a China tour. They had a blast, visiting many noteworthy places and practicing everywhere, among other places at Shaolin. While practicing, one of the teacher's disciples met one of Shaolin's disciples and they fell in love at first sight and, long story short, got engaged. The Shaolin dude came to the US. He and the taiji disciple started exchanging practices, sharing everything they had. Taiji teacher said to his disciple, you better stop it. "But..." she goes. No buts. I don't give you high level to give away. That's why, he continues, most masters up until very recently were reluctant to teach daughters. Not because they loved their daughters less but because they expected it would be exactly like this -- daughter gets married, gives all taiji family secrets to husband, husband gives it to his brothers, cousins, neighbors, who knows who those people are, maybe friends, maybe not. So there you have it. This is not some centuries past. This is today. People I know. It's not easy to get "everything" even if you're exposed to "some of it." Yes, Shaolin and taoist arts cross-pollinated, no doubt about it. But to what extent Shaolin got "our" stuff is anybody's guess. I would say, based on my (limited of course) observations, Shaolin is 95% athletic, 5% internal. Give or take. Taiji? The good stuff is 95% internal, 5% athletic. They have very supple, juicy apples. We have very soft peaches. With the diamond hard pit inside.

I only know very old school photography, my dad taught me when I was a kid -- we also processed and printed the photographs at home (temporarily turning the kitchen into a photo lab), that was long ago, far away. Clueless about modern tech, but I was under the impression it can do better than what I did at the age of 10 or 11 with my USSR-made FED (no joke, that's what the camera was called, after Felix Edmundovich Dzerzhinsky), rather than worse. If it takes pictures of its own dirty lens instead... I dunno. What can it be? Doesn't remind me of anything I've ever seen in real life. Does remind me of a UFO dream I had a few years ago, one of those dreams that I get a few years apart now and then that are absolutely extraordinary, you wake up and think, OK, now I'm dreaming -- and that which I just woke up from, that was reality. Which is why the picture intrigued me. But, like you, I have no idea what it "really" is.

Any reason to think that that can be somehow verified? What lens are we talking about? The one that took the whole picture crystal clear, but somehow managed to also take and insert a picture of itself being so covered with this "something" that it couldn't possibly have taken a picture of anything?

Maybe someone can mansplain explain what this thing is -- captured today (October 27th) on foto-webcam.eu?

Still does -- for some people. Which is what I'm driving at. The best practice for you is the practice you love, so you practice rather than quit. Taiji is unprecedented in my life in that it's the one and only (so far) thing I don't want to "experiment with" and "see what happens." It already happened. I want it always. Even if it winds up making me a taoist sage (and it can, it's one of those arts that can be taken that far with no help from any others), I won't quit. It doesn't mean good qigongs are not better for someone else, they are. I know people who do qigong exclusively, know people who do taiji and qigong, know people who do only taiji. These arts are customizable. But "I'm not that into tradition" means you are not likely to get the full benefits of any one of them. So I would humbly suggest you reconsider. Traditional arts practiced the traditional way are, far as my experience and understanding go, vastly superior to "mix and match" deals... believe it or not, those "supreme ultimate" arts don't really "evolve" anymore... no more than a modern person who has spent the bulk of her waking life sitting in front of screens or in traffic or at the desk is "more evolved" than her ancestress of four hundred years ago who has spent an equal amount of hours in front of her real self -- practicing taiji . And she, that ancestress of four hundred years ago, in her turn, always aspired to be as accomplished as her ancestress of four thousand years before...

Thank you for your thoughts. I'm curbing my desire to get into this subject more than a toe deep, or share personal experiences, but one thing I'll say and just leave it at that is, it's not a can of worms. It's Pandora's box the size of planet Earth. Pandora may have genuinely believed that being able to fumble with the lock on that box was a triumphant accomplishment of science and technology.

You made me very happy, BES. I thought, judging by our prior conversation of long ago, that you're one of those people who will stick to their guns syringes no matter what. You just gave me a glimpse of hope. As for "an outbreak of polio," that's a very interesting subject to look into, partially because... well, not going into everything that can be said about it, have you looked at the polio vaccine in conjunction with cancer-inducing simian virus SV-40 which hundreds of millions of doses worldwide have been contaminated with? (For my generation, e.g., pretty much all of them.) Here's some research data, not from any alternative, dissenting, anti-vaccine sources but from the NIH, no less. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK221112/

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follow the money

Ancient arts and documented linages are two different things. Of course qigong, judging by a whole bunch of archeological finds in China, is at least five to six thousand years old and fully indigenous... but a direct unbroken line six thousand years long... good luck demonstrating the validity of such a claim. Which is why legends should never be pitted against documented histories. It's not even apples and oranges. It's apples and Xi Wangmu's peaches. Not saying the peaches are less real. But proof can't possibly rest on "it's so because I say so" or "my guru says so" or "my scriptures say so." In my main style I'm 13th generation, it's "only" some 400 years of documented history -- but I know who was who all the way to the founder (the genealogical tree is available and as real as any family tree.) The only people who changed the forms were the founder's direct descendants, blood relatives, and a talented outsider who was not a blood relative had to call his modified version his own name. Yang Luchang was his name. The style he created was not called Chen style anymore. If his name had been Chen Luchang instead, it would have been "a version" or "a modification." Or "new frame" or "Beijing school" or whatever. But no. It's Yang style, because only a blood relative is allowed to make changes to the family style and still call it the family name. People who invent those stories about a direct transmission from Bodhidharma (of an indigenous Chinese art to the Chinese, no less) miss out on a whole lot of cultural context. All Shaolin's qigongs are rooted in waigong, yet these days it's suddenly in vogue to talk about "internal" arts, so quite a few waigong practitioners have grown fond of lecturing internal cultivators, practitioners of assorted neigong arts, about how they are doing it all wrong and how theirs (waigongers', hard stylists') whatever-they-do is the "real" this and that. Not saying waigong is not real. Apples and Xi Wangmu's peaches though. Certain apple pie eaters just can't help it, they have to tell the story of how the stuffing of their apple pie is not only a peach but a better peach than Xi Wangmu's peach. And how Bodhidharma himself planted her garden and baked her pie...

Yes. Among other things.

This describes the natural process accurately, but the reverse is not disorder, it's alchemy. Alchemy is messing with the mind of tao, no less. You do raise yin and drag down yang if you want them to mate and merge. Otherwise they will just naturally go in the opposite directions. P.S. I should have said if you have the know-how for alchemical work, otherwise it can indeed just mean something along the lines of that Hiawatha parody: He killed the noble Mudjokivis. Of the skin he made him mittens, Made them with the fur side inside, Made them with the skin side outside. He, to get the warm side inside, Put the inside skin side outside; He, to get the cold side outside, Put the warm side fur side inside. That ’s why he put the fur side inside, Why he put the skin side outside, Why he turned them inside outside.

Man... you are way off. I hardly remembered who you are, and responded to what you wrote with zero personal allusions and no intent other than to respond to what you wrote with some of my own thoughts. OK, now I do remember. You're someone who thinks everything is about him. Fine. Who am I to blow against the wind? If you think you've earned a place in my world, take it. And if you think the only reason anyone would want to talk to you is out of "malicious intent," my condolences. People must have been cruel to you. But trust me, I wasn't one of them -- not in this thread and not ever.

If we call something a thing we choose, we give ourselves a measure of power. That's the rationale behind name-calling. But there's a difference between name-calling and calling a name. In many traditions, knowing an entity's true name gave you true power over it, whereas name-calling gives only illusory power. I don't want to give the Unmentionables more power than they already have, so I choose to call them nothing -- to call them a name that mentions no names. And my only message for them is, "You have no power over me." It's true that they have plenty of illusory power over me, but real power? They would have to know my real name.

The last time I consciously did something bad, I was 4. I can tell the story if anyone's interested. Of course the bulk of bad stuff in this world is done unconsciously, at least by humans. (The Unmentionables do evil stuff consciously and enjoy it. I will use this name for them from now on. I used to call them the elites, then the overlords, then I considered calling them the parasites, but none of these definitions satisfied. The word "elite" had positive connotations originally, the word "overlords" implies power whereas we're dealing with abuse of power -- big difference, and the word "parasites" applied to them insults a whole class of animals who never go so far as to falsify the host species' habitat and endanger its very existence. The Unmentionables it is then.) People who think they never did anything bad haven't been paying attention.

And The Lord said unto John, "Come forth and receive eternal life." But John came in fifth and won a toaster.

Nah. I know I often criticize "Westerners," a definition that includes most modern Chinese and other Asians if we are talking education/indoctrination rather than ethnicity, for doing things bass ackwards, but this is neither here nor there. Baduanjin, which I have practiced too, is in no way a "step one" before yijinjing, and zhan zhuang is not "combining all these three practices together." And "paida" is not an internal practice at all. This is a hodgepodge of the very "Western misconceptions" you may want to avoid. I should make "don't learn from the internet" my sig. Foundation steps of MA as practiced in Chen village: start at the age of 4; by teenage years, practice three times a day, 8 hours a day; and if you try to skip, get a beating from a father or an uncle. Compare this to how it's done elsewhere, Beijing or Los Angeles, doesn't matter: start in your 40s; learn from a video of a guy or gal who learned from a video; practice three times a month; get on the internet and teach everybody the One True Way. Oh, and make your own video of course. Let me reiterate. There's many good qigongs. There's no "supreme ultimate qigong." Three times a month is not going to make much difference, an hour a day every day will make a big difference if you're doing something good under guidance, not something from the internet on your own "creativity." Two hours -- well, if you have this much time on your hands for internal cultivation, might as well add taiji to the mix. Which of them is your forte is discovered only experientially. If you discover that it is taiji, that's what you're going to be doing, and no, you don't need qigong if you have good taiji, you may want it and who's to stop you, but you don't "need" it. And vice versa. Everybody needs to learn from a teacher who understands what they want and what they need and can tell the difference.

I don't think I've ever laughed this hard over something this idiotic.

I would be curious to see what it has to say, but I would never learn movement from something that does not move. However, I'm very much interested in the Mawangdui I Ching -- considering I don't have a lineage I Ching master and am a self-taught diviner who used and compared many sources and commentaries to grasp the principles. With qigong, by the way, I'm pretty sure it would be educational to find out what the manuscripts say, but it would be useless practice-wise to anyone who doesn't already have the gong. I remember reading Taiji Classics fifteen years ago, but I understood how to use only something like 1%, and then a few years of practice down the road I re-read them and understood how to use about 5%, and then a few more years of practice later, I understand how to use more than a half of what they're talking about. Whereas an arrogant noob with no teacher to give feedback (or a poor teacher giving poor feedback) might "understand" one hundred percent right off the bat. I'm slow that way. Until my body knows what a book (or a teacher) is talking about, I consider myself ignorant.

"Legend" and "original" are two different things. Bodhidharma is not part of any lineage. My teacher is. Have to amend my earlier "don't learn from the internet" advice. Don't learn qigong from "documents." Or as Alan Watts once put it, "don't learn birdsong from stuffed nightingales."