Taomeow

It is my impression that they add to the external image of strength, which is why they are popular, but take away from flexibility and pliability of the very muscles they create. People who do many push-ups look strong and stiff in the upper body to my taiji-conditioned eye, which actually translates into "weak" skill-wise. When I used to do TKD I had a sparring partner for a while who would show up early and start the warm-up by doing push-ups (not part of the TKD warm-up routine, his own preference). He was intimidatingly huge and half my age, and would probably demolish me with one punch if he ever managed to reach me -- which he never could, I could literally see "brakes" all over his muscles and could run circles around him while a punch was trying to get through all that tightness. My taiji teacher strikes like a cobra -- you don't have the eye-brain machinery to see it coming and it's already come to pass -- and he never once mentioned push-ups... ever.

Thanks, Forestofemptiness, I forgot about these. (One of these, was it? 'cause "don't" constitutes merely a phonetic shortcut, not a mental awareness-cut. Or do the rules forbid all phonetic shortcuts too? That I would consider superfluous, but I do not mind avoiding all abbreviations, just in case.) Of course the problem of using generic labels as substitutes for (more aware and more accurate) individual descriptions of individual phenomena can not disappear from just purging the "guilty" auxiliary verb from the language. In other languages such labels function without the use of the actual "bad verb" and owe their existence solely to specific (and widespread) structures of certain sentences that imply it without naming it. In Russian, for instance, older versions of the language named it, modern ones omit it, but the outcome remains the same -- in modern Russian, you simply say "John plumber" or "John a jerk" to express exactly the same thing as "John bad verb a plumber" or "John bad verb a jerk" in English. So R-prime can not function the way E-prime does, the problem lies deeper... How deep?.. "The whole of John" can not and should not, in our minds and in our definitions, equal anything we choose to label as equal to John (by using or implying the "bad verb") that does not really constitute the whole of John. Plumber, jerk, hero, husband, movie star, patient, teacher, driver, whatever... John the whole can no more get stuck in any one of these states than the wind can get stuck in a tree it blows through. Grammar lies... John truly consists of everything he consists of at all times; what our languages offer boils down to a method whereby you artificially stop this ever-shifting phenomenon of John with whatever definition provides for a manageable and limited John... Grammar lies big time. I think we have come to believe that our entire process of aliveness depends on nonstop manageability of our states and never-ending limitations imposed on them precisely because of the language we developed or acquired, whether naturally or, as I tend to think, not entirely naturally. We the human race I mean. I did not E-prime-check the above, just did my best.

This can elucidate many interesting points especially when applied to people. Instead of saying "Lucy is an administrative assistant," one would have to actually figure out what Lucy DOES for a living. The only way to accomplish this would entail turning one's awareness on. "Lucy rearranges papers on her desk, answers phones, manicures her fingernails, looks at her watch every five minutes, and suffers her boss's foul moods for a living." Likewise, instead of saying "John is my husband" --? Instead of "Li is a fraud" -- ? Instead of "Anna is German" -- ? E-prime can show you right on the spot how your language has conditioned you to avoid awareness (sic!) at all costs by substituting labels. "Is" means a (=) mark. It causes you to equate phenomena that can't really be equated, and in the process you lose the habit of noticing with any clarity what you're actually looking at. This encourages not merely static but downright faulty thought patterns. Worse: faulty perception patterns. The above, with the exception of examples in quotes, I wrote in E-prime. I don't mind doing this for a month.

Well, you've met one -- though not Chinese -- I was conceived there and spent the first year of my life in Altai. My father climbed Belukha right before fathering me. I have pictures in the family album...

Quote Because book owners frequently have favorite passages that the books open themselves to, some practitioners use dice or another randomiser to choose the page to be opened. This practice was formalized by the use of coins or yarrow stalks in consulting the I Ching The author of this explanation made it up. Yarrow was used for divination in all shamanic cutures wherever it grows long before the I Ching was written. It was, and still is, known as the diviner's plant, the oracle plant. Early divinational role of the I Ching was that of the interpreter for what the yarrow oracle is saying.

All of it. I guess my eyes refused to register what they were looking at. I've an offer... Do you mind if I do a reading on your behalf? I have my own idea as to why she won't talk to you, but I prefer to get the confirmation/refutation of this idea directly from the source. Do you mind if I ask her? If you OK it, maybe the response I get will make sense to you. If it doesn't... no harm done. I'm talking real modern sciences, dude, not the lowest-common-denominator obsolete "everybody knows" kind -- to wit, what can be learned from this book by a Nobel prize winning scientist -- "Quantum Mechanics, Diffusion and Chaotic Fractals, " by Ilya Prigogine; the mathematical theory of fuzzy logic -- as pioneered by Lofti Zadeh; genetics and computational chemistry -- as in "DNA and the I Ching" by Francis F. Yan, Ph.D., a Cornell U researcher; to name a few. When I say "science" I mean "science." I know your Popperesque definition and I've always found it amusing, but definitive? -- nah. I don't believe I gave you reasons to believe that my whiskers got involved at all, much less ruffled. My mind, yes. I have a mind to respond to what's brought up, I do. But a mind reader I'm not, so I couldn't possibly know that you bring up a point for the specific purpose of it being ignored. I stand informed.

Materialism? You mean you live somewhere where a car would be a materialistic excess? Well, I live in California. I'd starve without one. So it's a basic necessity for me, not a whim... not that the I Ching won't understand a whim in a real flesh-and-blood woman either, I'm not playing immortal sage with her, she knows who I am and I can't shock or offend her by being real-- and my real includes "occasionally whimsical" and "occasionally looking for a good deal" too -- I've no money to burn. She is a teacher and sometimes a disciplinarian... but first and foremost, through respect, trust, ongoing communication, and -- should I say it -- LOVE -- through giving her these I've succeeded in making her my friend... and she treats me as a friend would, who wouldn't be shocked if I showed my humanity to her. There's a hexagram titled Adornment which OKed an extravagant party dress I was fiending, and another one, Revolution, which I got when divining a hair color change. I am human, female, and real. You don't fool the I Ching even if you're fooling yourself with "anti-materialistic" words that can't possibly be substantiated by actions 24/7 365 days a year. And, no, you can't ask if you're getting a good deal on a car. You can't ask a question before you learn to ask a question. It takes me the bulk of my divination time to formulate the question, and in the process I become aware of the strengths and weaknesses of my own thinking process, many of my feelings, and importantly, my power of expression of same (or lack thereof). You can't ask a "yes" or "no" question, nor an "either-or," nor a "should I, could I, would I" question. You need to learn to ask the universe, via the I Ching (or vice versa, since they are the same), in a manner that is an art to work and work on in and of itself -- but once you've mastered the art, you can ask her about ANYTHING. Worst thing that can happen is, she will tell you to use your own brain, as she sometimes did when I was bothering her too much. (I ask "am I bothering you too much?" from time to time too, but not in a "yes" or "no" fashion, of course .)

"bow" thanks!

I have learned all I could from cars.com too. There's ways to know and ways to Know and the I Ching Knows what cars.com doesn't. It's not so much cultural prejudices as cultural handicaps, cultural cognitive disabilities, that we're up against. Ancient taoist culture and, especially, science (sic) dedicated the bulk of their research to the study of Time. Its laws, their manifestations in the human world, the shape and quality of the "invisible landscape" of Time. Our own culture and science are still crawling in diapers in these "modern times" in terms of their expertise on the nature and workings of Time; theirs, 5000 years of unwavering focus on same later, is rocket science. I'm not kidding. The I Ching is science for me, first and foremost, not philosophy. Divination is applications. Studying it without using it for applications is like having a caveman come across a manual on electrical engineering and study it -- without ever having flipped a switch and seen the light. The actual light bulb that is an "application." He might speculate as to the truthfulness of falsehood of all the "ideas about electricity" in the book he "studies." But put him in a dark room and tell him to flip a switch -- and he will Know an Application for the phenomenon of Electricity as harnessed in the Human World. The I Ching divination is such a switch you flip to begin learning about the phenomenon of Time as manifesting in the Human World. That's a start... whereas just reading the manual is not.

Yes. Have you tried to actually use it for divination? That would work well if you knew at all times what kind of situation you are in. Do you? I use the I Ching precisely when I don't. E.g., I'm shopping around for a used car. I ask the I Ching about a particular car I'm thinking to buy, but she tells me, in one changing line I get, "the wheels of the cart fall off." Sapientis sat. I keep shopping. I ask about another car and she says, in one changing line, "apply the brakes" and in another, "you will lose your belt." I don't buy it. I ask about yet another and she says, "gives help with the strength of an ox, supreme good fortune." I buy it. It's been problem free ever since. This is an example where you can't possibly know what would happen if you ignored the divination, but I've been in situations where it becomes clear in hind sight what the I Ching meant when she pronounced her judgment on a situation. She tells me not to travel on a particular flight, I change the flight. But later find out about the one she told me not to take that it was delayed for eight hours and the passengers were jerked around because it was first delayed for two hours, the passengers boarded, spent another three sitting on the runway, were taken back to the airport, spent another three hours there waiting, and only then departed toward their destination. No biggie, but who needs that when the flight the I Ching tells me to take is right on time?.. I think you can benefit greatly from studying it FIRST, using for divination later -- but to NOT use it for divination is to defy its origins, its purpose in life, the intent of its creators, its destiny -- and your own. And for what? To be true to "modern science?" -- doesn't work anymore, since there's areas of modern science that are perfectly in accord with the idea of using the I Ching for divination scientifically, stochastic disciplines that are not bad at all at predicting things -- though I suspect not as good as the original method.

In medieval Russia it was a male sport, according to a poem by Barkov (considered the most obscene of poets in all of history.) Here's a quick translation: "His father, old Porphirius, served the czar Ivan the Terrible and, by lifting weights with his (obscene word for a male body part), made the czar weep of laughter."

He 'married' it to Kabbalah, or rather cross-bred it with the latter. And rightfully so I might add, because the basics of kabbalah are nearly identical to taoist basics. The Tree of Life is a version of the wuxing/bagua superimposed on each other. I am pretty sure that it either originates there or both have the same source of origin. That Crowley "got it" means he had a good eye for sacred geometry, if nothing else.

Yup -- the Eranos I Ching (Shantena/Sabbadini). Once I started using it, there's no going back to Wilhelm et al. However, it's been my experience that you need experience to use it. I went through all the versions Pietro has mentioned and more (a rather unique Russian one, e.g., by Schutsky), and kept progressively "growing out of them" to the point where the translator's ideas as to what is being communicated were becoming more and more just a source of distraction and/or irritation. The Eranos version is better than what a native speaker would read in the original, because it lists all meanings of every word, including historic ones no longer in circulation but meaningful at the time the book was written. Some of these meanings are explicitly and refreshingly taoist or even proto-taoist, and can only be understood in conjunction with wider taoist studies and practices. The attempts to tie judgements into actual sentences are mere suggestions (prepositions and conjunctions between words given in a different font, indicating they are absent from the original), and even these I'm finding superfluous. In the preface it is suggested to interpret what you get the way you would interpret a dream -- YOUR dream I might add, which makes sense to you and not necessarily anyone else. With every other version, you wind up with someone else's dreams and their interpretations. Nice to know what the combined mind of Wilhelm/Baynes or the combined mind of Liu I-Ming/ Thomas Cleary can dream up, but most of the time it has nothing whatsoever to do with what the great book is telling ME.

Um... Aleister Crowley translated the I Ching under the name "Master Therion" and I use it without confusing it with TTC.

Aleister Crowley's.

A friend of mine once told me a story. She was on vacation, she and a few other people who just got acquainted decided to do a late night picnic on the beach. They had food and booze and music and fire and enthusiasm, and before long they decided to spend the night there -- it was very warm. Only problem, there were no bathroom facilities. So they looked around and decided that they would take turns going behind "those bushes over there," a few feet away. Which they did. Since there was a lot of beer, there was a lot of going behind "those bushes over there" during the night. Later they all fell asleep. When they woke up in the morning, they discovered that there were no "bushes over there" -- there was absolutely nothing there, an empty sandy place with not a single blade of grass growing out of it. Yet everybody -- seven to nine people as I recall -- swore that the night before there were bushes over there, that they went behind those bushes, making sure they were well out of sight...

When I did the "Sorcerers' Crossing" from the jungle to Lima, my hotel turned out to be located on the street named Grau. What are the odds? By the way, has anyone seen "Donnie Darko?" -- those glowing worms are graphically depicted therein. They emerge out of the body and pull -- and the guy (the main protagonist's father, who doesn't see or feel them -- his weird son does though) gets lifted from his chair and pulled in the direction of the kitchen. The worms lead him to the fridge, and he opens the fridge. The worms wrap around a bottle of beer and he grabs the beer.

I've read it too, and seem to recall that I thought glowing tapeworms were real but not limited to sexual activities in their origin. When I was reading that part, I recalled an interview with a clinical psychologist who always tried to talk her clients out of whatever "attachments" messed up their lives till she herself underwent an ibogaine session. With ibogaine, she saw that her body was entangled inside and out in exactly what The Crossing describes, glowing tapeworms, tentacles and tendrils and all that, and she (the psychologist) followed them and their length stretched across the continent and ocean all the way to Florida and that's where she found the source -- her mother! So she started ripping them off her body. I retain one vestigial habit from having read that book. I don't wear a watch. Strongly believe in getting rid of mirrors too, but that's another glowworm and I can even trace it to my grandmother, who used to scold me, when I was a little girl, for never looking in the mirror!

A warning -- "Fat Joe has a gun and is hiding in hay." At least that's what the year is likely to be like. The Tiger has Metal on top (in the Heavenly Stem), Wood on the bottom (in the Earthly Branch). It means a tiger carrying weapons on his back, irritated and trying to shake them off -- or maybe use them. Hiding in the grass, armed, and dangerous. I knew that, I just didn't know the tiger's name was Fat Joe. Don't throw anything heavy. Happy New Year!

Supposedly a technologically advanced but fairly troubled alien race that created us by combining the genes of a local primate (possibly Ardi) with their own. Indirect evidence: all primates have 48 chromosomes but humans have 46, and the missing pair is not just missing but #46 is actually created by fusing #47 and #48 together and replacing the original #46. No natural explanation for this exists or seems possible. Genetic manipulations of this type we ourselves are doing today can tweak with a hybrid's ability to reproduce. Supposedly the Annunaki could have sex with humans and reproduce but the resulting hybrids themselves couldn't reproduce (much like a horse and a donkey can produce a mule who is sterile) -- the chromosome fusion may have been part of GM aimed at overcoming this. They are most probably dragons, but opinions vary. They go by various names in pretty much all ancient records all over the world -- Sons of Heaven, Sons of Reflected Light, Nephilim, Naga, Plumed Serpent, Narayana, Marduk, etc.. The literal translation of "annunaki" is "those who from heaven to earth came." They are supposed to have needed gold for to disperse in the upper layers of their atmosphere, which their planet was losing to an environmental or cosmic catastrophe. (If we did this today to our own it would repair our ozone layer holes too.) According to what Sitchin says he read in the Sumerian tablets, they originally mined it themselves, but the workers rebelled for some reason, so they genetically engineered a slave race to do the work for them -- that's us. Apparently they had mixed feelings about what they did to us, or else some of them thought it was OK while others thought it was wicked (like humans, they are capable of having diametrically opposite opinions on any given issue, they don't all think alike). So apparently some of them just exploited us mercilessly and thwarted our normal natural destiny into what we all know and have to put up with today, while others tried to help, teach, share technology and nicer brands of ideology. To me it looks like the bad guys had the upper hand. Whether it is true or not no one knows for sure. (Those who think that a statement to the effect of "it's all new age BS" explains away all the countless anomalies of our species' history, biology, and genetics do seem to know less than those who simply don't know and collect information just in case it crystallizes eventually into something useful.) Hope it helps.

Spirit nutrition! Portraits of my ancestors, candles, bells, food, wine, bows.

Thanks for the link, it was pretty funny! I'm not as extreme as Fran... ...and I hope you're not as extreme as Manny Very interesting! Deep earth, eh? it's like extreme yang flipping over to yin, so his voice is on the Mysterious Border between the manifest and the unmanifest, the taomiao... it does have a hypnotic quality. Yup, "very deep very quickly" 'R Us. And kinesthetic- (#2) and auditory- (#3) dominant, after #1 -- olfactory sensitivity (what I really fall for is pheromones.) This last part may not be as spiritual as all that, but biologically correct.

Yeah, I suck at multitasking -- I was doing something else and typed in the name of the publisher instead of the name of the author while at it. Sorry. For the rest, I'll have to get to my files -- or rather my piles -- and see what looks good, then I'll PM.