Aetherous

This dude has a fully opened third eye.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/17/world/europe/syria-united-nations.html?_r=0

It's just my experience that bad qi comes out of the navel. I experienced it once in a dream, visibly like a fog pouring out during practices and filling the entire room...and in waking life I feel that it happens as well, but not visibly (at least to me). It's like a detoxing of the body and mind. For a more reliable source of this information (it's hard to trust the experience of someone who is just a fellow bum)...Mantak Chia teaches Chi Nei Tsang. In that method, you open the "wind gates" to release stagnant qi, by massaging gently around the navel. At a higher level of it, the practitioner puts their elbow on the wind gates, and the sick qi travels from the elbow up the forearm, and shoots out through the fingertips. So that's also saying sick qi leaves through the navel. About age. Imagine going to a nursing home, and putting your head near the navel of someone there. It's just kind of a disgusting feeling, I think, for anyone (especially if you've been to a nursing home before, yuck)...that feeling you have is reliable! Nothing against old people...everyone ages. Their bodies just aren't working optimally like a young person's. Over 50 isn't elderly by far, but I think most people that age will admit their bodies don't work as well as they used to...unless they're really masterful in their self healing. Trust how things feel to you.

Oh my bad _/\_

But true.

I wouldn't put my head at the navel level of old people; really bad qi. Sit in a chair just like everyone else during that meditation class. When at home, do the seiza.

Good observation.

At least personally, that was only a kind request; an intention set for the thread. Celestial wanted a thread about understanding Taoist Yoga, which wasn't cluttered with off topic stuff...so I made that one. If people are respectful of the members and topic involved, they will follow such a request...if not, there's nothing I can do about it. I didn't report anyone.

I'm not a student of Tantra, but I've heard that they consider masturbation basically useless in comparison to actual sex...and they have methods for the sex, not just regular old bangin. Look at all the people getting it on in the world, and not getting spiritualized from it. You have to learn real Tantra.

I'm cool with you believing that I'm wrong and you're right, for whatever reasons...if the reasons are clear and sound, I will listen and learn something. I've said all that I need to say regarding my view of it, and people can come to their own conclusions upon further study and contemplation. The book is so dense that discussing it, for me at least, is a total waste of time and energy. It would only serve to confound, rather than to clarify. So really, I'm bowing out with respect.

joeblast, I say that it absolutely is, and am quite firm in my view. But to each their own understanding. I don't have any desire to debate what I've already said, or about the opinions of others. Who can really say that someone is wrong regarding the book, Taoist Yoga; as if anyone really knows? For people who are interested in comparing the first stage of Taoist Yoga with other traditions, to get a more clear view, I'd suggest that they also study the first two chapters of the Yoga Sutras...practice calm abiding meditation (starting with an external support) twice a day...possibly also read "Mindfulness, Bliss, and Beyond" by Ajahn Brahm...if you are lucky and find any school of alchemy, where they teach about the symbolism of "mercury" and similar things, by all means join it. ... By the way, I want to be clear: I agree with Drew that "stilling the heart" is the practice.

Calm the mind, still the heart, fix the spirit...all exactly the same thing. This thread was started with the clear intention that people won't debate, as the original post indicated. If you're going to say others are posting wrong comments, at least give reasons (examples of how it's wrong, and what you think is right). Not giving any reasoning is disrespectful, as well as unenlightening, because no one is learning that way.

If a lack of confidence is learned, and is something that's been added onto "you" later in life, then it's unnatural and isn't who you really are. Your natural state is who you are before that happened, and who you will be after that stops happening. You're most natural when you're either alone, or with your favorite people, doing things you're enthusiastic about or just relaxing and having fun. Do you know that feeling? Feels good. These people are saying...be like that. That's who you really are. That's your natural state. Have fun, relax, have some interests, enjoy people's company, feel at home anywhere you go with whoever is there.

Apparently neither does posting extremely disturbing pictures. Actually when I see something like that, I tend to ignore the person's post and feel that they are imbalanced in their views...so your strategy might be having the opposite of the intended effect, at least with some people. I see your point, though, and can agree to some extent. It's good to be aware of problems, rather than unaware.

I don't know if it's just me, but these pictures of deformed children and infants are not cool. I think we can make our points without that.

Interesting point of view; thanks.

In the book "Riding Windhorses, crossing the arms or legs is said to disrupt the flow of energy (through the person, between the sky and the earth). That is all the book says very briefly. I think crossing creates a circuit and kind of locks the energy within the body, and it keeps you separated energetically from the macrocosm (so it's somewhat good for sense withdrawal and becoming internally meditative)...yet if you uncross your legs, it helps connect to the external energies (like the earth) a little more, which is considered better for well being. I don't really know but that's an idea for you. ... By the way, I also personally noticed that touching the soles together during practice was really draining of the body's energy. I don't know why that is; but as a result, I'd never recommend anyone practice anything with their soles touching together.

Absolutely love that!

Thanks for the response Aaron. I was pretty much asking how you would really feel, in a real situation where there's a choice between your brother and some complete stranger (lets say who might actually want to kill you or harm many other people). Not hypothetically or philosophically. Not about what's theoretically true. I'm trying to talk real here, which is hard when it's not real and we have to resort to extreme examples. Sometimes it's almost impossible for people to know how they'd really act if something happened. I think that if things got real, we very likely would all favor our own families and selves. And there is nothing wrong with that, in fact it's very right. While I agree that all human life is sacred and one is not better than another, in theory, I also think that it represents a loss of our humanity if we don't have preferences for the people who are close to us. How would your brother feel if he knew that you chose some complete stranger somewhere else in the world to live rather than him, since you felt like it didn't matter at all because each person is equally sacred? Don't you feel like it'd take a kind of monster to choose someone who is not family? There's such a thing as a false and destructive idealism clouding our better judgment.

Preserving one's culture, traditions, and wisdom is a great thing. As the OP said, it promotes cultural diversity. Think about this: if people didn't do anything to preserve their culture, we wouldn't be able to study Taoism at all (for example)...and if people had done more of it, we would know quite a bit more about Taoism and could study actual complete traditions with ease. I feel like it's a shame that I know so little about my Finnish and Germanic heritages, and wasn't raised with those traditions completely intact. Culture brings spice to the melting pot, and can sometimes help everyone in general (if you have medicinal knowledge for example).

If you do calm abiding meditation with external support (for instance, having your object of meditation be the leaves of a tree) it will help you feel normal and great. It can be considered as connecting with nature, which is a very Taoist thing and is great for well being. It grounds you in reality. It helps you to flow with life, calmly in the present, rather than be stuck on certain concepts and energies. Internal meditations awaken internal energies; for instance AYP's deep meditation is an example of that...and "I am" is specifically said to directly awaken kundalini. It's good to cultivate a balance between internal and external energies...too much internal energy work leads to feeling energies coursing through your body outside of practice time, which creates energetic stagnation and poor well being. It's not good to have attention be stuck on internal energies. Taoists and Buddhists say that good emptiness meditation means you're not even aware of the body. This emptiness of mind actually cultivates the energy of the entire body, internally...but it's done in a balanced way. It's good to cultivate your attention to be fluid, and capable of anything. Practicing martial arts or working out somehow (I prefer lifting weights) ensures that the body and mind are working in harmony; if you want to move the leg, it'll move skillfully. But your attention is not stuck in the leg. So exercise is another way of grounding you in reality. It'll also open up your energetic channels to promote flow and well being.

Would your brother's life be more valuable than someone you don't know in another country? Not saying that philosophically, one life is more valuable than another for any reason...but practically and naturally, we value our own groups. edit: by the way I haven't really been keeping up with this thread lately so I don't really understand what's being discussed...just wanted to interject with that little idea.

I'm going to try this way of yogurt making, since it doesn't require you to heat the milk. Matsoni cultures. The whole heating and stirring thing was really annoying and time consuming to do. I only made the yogurt once because of that. And it possibly also destroys some of the nutritional quality of the milk. One could even make matsoni yogurt with raw milk, which many people say is better for your health. There are also Viili cultures, which are the same concept. ... Another thing: I recently ordered this coconut oil. Besides its health uses and purposes, it's supposedly one of the best oils for cooking or baking anything due to its high smoke point and light flavor. The linked brand is apparently the best you can get.

I'll be hanging out in there for a while.