goldisheavy

I don't think there is an easy answer. On one hand you have something perfect that you don't want to disturb. On the other hand you have something imperfect that you want to heal. What is more important? Is it more important to heal yourself? Or is it more important to preserve the perfect zone? I don't think anyone can really answer this. The only thing I can say is, make a decision, whatever it is. Once you made your decision, don't hesitate, don't sit on the fence and be full-hearted and honest about it. Don't do anything half-assed. And then be ready for any and all consequences. (it should be obvious, but I'll say it just in case, if you get a no, don't harass, just take it as is)

I've never been a Christian, and I've always had a dislike for Christian doctrine the minute I've read any of the Christian texts. So take this under advisement. I've been brought up as a materialist-atheist, and later I became highly spiritual in my view. I am still an atheist, but I am no longer a materialist (also known as "physicalist"). I've researched many traditions and I've gone through periods of loosely associating myself with one tradition, then another and so on. I kept finding better and better traditions and systems of thought. Eventually what I discovered is this: 1. No school of thought is logically perfect. Not even my favorite one. 2. No tradition is completely free of assholes. And I don't want to be associated with any group that has even one asshole in it. To expand on point 2, I am answerable for all my identities. If I maintain only a personal identity, I am answerable for my person. However, if I adopt a group identity into my personal identity, I become answerable for it. Thus, for example, if I call myself "a Democrat," suddenly I am morally obligated to keep all the fellow Democrats straight as long as I continue to associate with that label. All members of the group are personally morally responsible for how the group thinks and behaves. This is a high burden. Naturally, the smaller my identity footprint is, the less I am morally answerable for. It's plenty enough that I am a person and a human. That alone makes me answerable for being a person and for humanity as a group. That alone is already too much moral burden. There is no need to weigh myself down with more narrow and specific group identities. So be careful with who you throw your lot together. If you want to listen to my advise: learn from all that you consider wise, but keep your association loose and flexible. Don't attach yourself to any group.

Not all the paths are the same, and nor do all paths lead to the same destination. Think about it -- is it true that all roads in Italy lead to Rome? It's obviously false. Just because you can travel on any road to Rome, doesn't mean that the road itself leads to Rome. Whether or not you get to Rome using any particular road depends on your intention. And people have many diverse intentions. You could say most people want to be happier, but how people conceive of happiness is very diverse. I suggest you really study various teachings and traditions on your own. I also suggest you study strange things and various unpopular teachings. You don't have to follow any of them, but just take a look to get an overview of human endeavors. You should get an idea of just how different and diverse things are "out there." Some teachings are based on fear mongering. Others are explicitly aimed at eliminating fear. Some teachings teach magic, others teach to accept things as they are and to avoid manipulate phenomena. Some teach that there is no such thing as "thing as they are." Other teachings teach that there is indeed a true state for things called "things as they are." Some teach objectivity. Some teach intersubjectivity. Some teach subjectivity. Some teach a view that's not possible to express in either objective or subjective terms. Some teachings say that all things are ultimately the same. Some teach that all things are ultimately unique (which is to say, radically not the same, different). Just about for any teaching you can find a counter-teaching somewhere. And yet a lot, if not all, teachings have some kind of overlap. This is why you must learn to think for yourself. Don't let any Guru, religion, tradition, school of thought, don't let anything think for you. You should examine everything you reasonably can and consider everything you can consider, but make your own conclusions. Don't be a slave to knowledge. Be a master of knowledge. And help other people become masters of knowledge as well.

With all this talk of Kundalini awakening, I thought I'd offer a different point of view. Kundalini cannot be awakened any more than the blood flow can be awakened. You can become aware of your blood flow, but blood flow is always there and it doesn't need to be awakened. Kundalini is also always there and requires no awakening. In fact, thinking that Kundalini needs awakening can be a cognitive block, because if you believe in awakening you will be looking for awakening. And upon not finding it, you might conclude you have no Kundalini. Or worse, you might mistake some energy disturbance for "awakening." Imagine if you believe that blood flow has to be awakened. Due to the normality and mundanity of the blood flow you don't notice it. Then one day your heart skips a beat and flutters for 5 minutes. This is not exactly healthy, but you can take this for blood flow awakening and begin celebrating it. That's not exactly a good thing. The awareness of anything, including of subtle energies in the inner being, is always a potential. As one's intention and attention settle on the energy, it naturally becomes more apparent over time. As your attention and intention drift away, the feelings of energy naturally pacify. That's how it is with all phenomena. So for example, if you begin paying attention to ghosts and if you intend to find them, eventually you'll begin seeing and finding ghosts. Then, if you turn your attention away from that and turn your intent away from the ghosts as well, the sightings dwindle, settle into the periphery and eventually disappear altogether. That's the magic of mind. There is more to it of course. For example, intent has to be conjoined with beliefs that are aligned. If you intend something you dramatically disbelieve, nothing will happen. But as long as your beliefs allow it, attention and intent summon and disperse all phenomena without the need to formally awaken them. It's like mold. You don't need to introduce mold into bread to get it to grow. The mold-potential is ever-existing. Just subject the bread to the right conditions and mold grows. You don't have to awaken the mold. The mold is there at all times. The same thing with diseases. We carry every disease in our body at all times but none of them manifest usually. When conditions are appropriate, diseases begin manifesting without any kind of awakening, initiation or formal introduction. That's why to be healthy it's not that you must avoid germs, it's that your immune system must be strong. Germs are always there. In fact germs are your friends as long as your immune system is healthy. If your immune system is healthy you can eat clods of dirt and rotten meat and not get sick. Unfortunately our spoiled, over-protected coddled modern lifestyle has damaged our immune systems somewhat, so we have lost some of these abilities. There is no awakening of anything.

Can you briefly expand on each of the conditions you list, please?

I agree with NeiChuan -- it doesn't stop. It's possible to relax or take a break for a while, but I don't think this is the same as stopping cultivation. When you go to sleep, do you stop everything you are doing? In my view, not exactly. Because even as you go to sleep, you intend to continue as soon as you wake up, thus the intent is maintained even in sleep. Intent remains unbroken during rest. I don't think it's possible to lose interest in cultivation in a permanent way. I don't believe any condition is permanent.

You can't get rich counting other person's gold. There is so much stuff you can learn on your own, that for you to try to discern what someone else has or hasn't learned is really a waste of time. With one exception. That exception is -- information is being shared freely and without any ulterior motive. If that's the case, use the info. If someone wants to bait people with secrets, let them keep their secrets and don't fall for the bait. There is way too much very good info available as is to be wasting time with secrets. It's almost like trying to figure out how John Chang's armpit smells like. Who cares? If you are really desperate, just smell your own. If John Chang wants to share something, he certainly can. If not, that's his choice, but you don't have to take the bait.

Let's say you discover a tasty liquid. You get all amazed and start gulping it down. If you don't find a way to moderate liquid consumption, there are going to be negative consequences for your well-being. Or let's say you find some very tasty bread the size of a mountain. You begin eating it. If you don't find a way to slow down and reach a reasonable pace, if you try to eat the entire mountain of bread all at once, there is a good chance you'll rupture your stomach. Well, the same thing happens with new ideas. New ideas can be very interesting, stimulating and they can point you toward the truth. However, if you don't establish a reasonable pace of integration and digestion of these ideas, you might go insane sooner rather than later. So, just take it easy. Just slow down and relax a bit.

If you are new to the kb, or if you're a new to the weight, for example, if you just upgraded to the 24kg kb, or if you just upgraded yourself to the 32kg kb, then you will probably not be able to combine it with anything. KB will demand your entire attention and if you screw around, you'll get punished by the kettlebell. However, once you become very effortless and comfortable with a particular kb, you can do anything with it. You can clean floors, cook, do secret smile, whatever, all the while tossing the kb around like a little toy. At this point the kettlebell will not be able to distract you and it won't dominate your efforts or your attention.

You're not missing anything out. You're getting a different kind of exercise when you do it this way. What you describe is the traditional way to lift the kettlebell. When it feels like the kettlebell lifts itself, that's the correct feeling. When you can do it many times, you need a heavier bell. If you can do 200 snatches with 32kg kb, then just get yourself a 56kg bell, like everyone else who has it too easy. And if you can operate a 56kg kb as if it weights nothing, good for you. If you can do it without using muscles, then good for you. Don't worry about what's right and what's wrong. Look at the result! But also try to understand what is happening so that you can explain it to someone else.

I don't dismiss this kind of story at all. I believe it's possible. At the same time, has anyone asked this Chinese guy to lift a 160 lbs dumbbell? Is it specialized skill that's only good for certain things (like resisting a push)? Or is it a general purpose skill that works for many diverse applications? Maybe this guy is really great at a few things and everyone else could learn a lesson or two. At the same time, it doesn't disprove other methods. In particular, you have to admit that strength training works for a lot of people, whereas someone who's benefitted from zhang zhuang to the same extent as Mr. Fong, well that's a rarity. I think it's possible to embrace it all. Common strength training has a certain mentality and a certain worldview that backs it up. People don't challenge it. I think real zhang zhuang operates from a very different worldview (not a physicalistic one). Unfortunately Chinese people are shy to introduce this worldview and the Western people are all to happy and enthusiastic to slap a physicalist worldview on top of every Chinese spiritual practice. Shamans of the old didn't think of the world in terms of substance. We just need to admit that. If we want to try to live the life of a shaman, we have to believe as they believed.

I think these videos speak for themselves.

If you do the standard kb exercises, such as swings, snatches, clean and jerks, you can't avoid breathing, as these are done for high reps. The kb pretty much dictates how you will breathe. If you breathe wrong, the kb will punish you, hard. If you breathe right, you are rewarded. The general kb attitude is to do everything with minimal exertion and minimal struggle (so in this way, Pavel Tsatsouline is somewhat of a deviant, as he advocates adding extra struggle and tension on top of the normal challenge that kb gives you). The non-deviant kb way is to use 0 force and no strength, if you can manage it. The kb should move itself in the ideal scenario.

Very nice. Thanks.

In Chinese books that I've read, it's been said that to harness Chi one has to give up one's addiction to Li (translated as physical strength). So, at least in the few materials I've read, there is a kind of opposition between chi and li. Personally, I don't believe there is any opposition. We create the opposition in our minds, if anything, but we don't have to create it.

I am aware of Russians using kettlebells for a very long time, but I don't know of any of them trying to develop chi at the same time. Chi is not a Russian concept, as far as I know. There is no Russian analogue for chi. When Russians want to discuss chi, they use loan words like we do in English. Perhaps if you stretch a bit, you can convince yourself that "boi na lubki" as practiced by the Opheni ethnic minority (originating from Greece, supposedly, and not exactly Russian in my view) is something that may combine weight training with "chi." Except there is no obvious analogue to chi and nakat (overwhelming of the opponents consciousness using non-contact methods) is explained with consciousness and symbols and not with chi. Plus there is no obvious advocacy of weight training either by any of the last surviving elders, who are all dead now, that I know of. Maybe I am missing something. You're probably right about the Shaolin though. I think the monks there did perform both strength training and qi gong.

So getting an extended stay in the cosmic prison is considered "good karma" these days?

That's how I learned English. Worked for me. It helps if there is a fun activity that can only be enjoyed in the language of your choice. I learned English so much faster than I otherwise would because I liked watching various TV shows and playing many text-heavy, and therefore English-heavy games. Understanding, reading and writing are the easiest, but speaking in a new language is the hardest to learn, in my experience. For the longest time when I was learning to speak English I would have to say each sentence in my mind in Russian, and then painfully translate into English, even long after I could understand, read and even write English. What a pain in the arse that was. My timeline was like this: to understand English more or less perfectly it took me 6 months. It took about 2 years to learn to write. And it took about 4 years to learn to speak. There is no way to learn to speak a language well without actually speaking it at all times for a long period of time, imo. And to add insult to injury, before I even had a decent command of the English language, I already half-forgotten Russian as well.

Nice. I especially liked the second half, once he was done congratulating everything and everyone.

Ooo, that's funny I got it all backwards! My apologies. OK, so "Tin Si" is an honorific title. I'll try to remember that. For what it's worth, while I didn't agree with everything Mak Tin Si said, I didn't dislike him to the same degree as some people here.

Have you checked out meetup.com yet? There may be a yoga or taichi group in NYC that meets regularly.

http://gaia-health.com/articles301/000301-big-pharma-scores-big-win-medicinal-herbs-disappear-eu.shtml This article seems to indicate that the situation for medicinal herbs is very dire in Europe. I don't live in Europe and I know nothing of this, but if it's true, it is concerning. I figured I'd pass it on for all the Europeans here.

Very nice. Thank you SFJane. I enjoyed both videos.

Your job demands are simply inhuman. You just don't understand our current business culture, so you irrationally expect yourself to fulfill all the insanely overstated performance demands and expectations. There is no easy solution. You may need to change your place of work. Or you may need a more radical solution, such as complete renunciation of the worldly involvement at the inner level. I don't think anything "small" will give you the big stable peace you desire.