liminal_luke

@Walker You mentioned that it expels pathogenic cold. Does it also work for excess heat? If you know something similarly effective and simple for heat, and feel like sharing, I´d be interested.

Thanks Walker! Saves me buying one of those expensive rebounders. This sounds very much like a warm-up I used to do in tai chi class. Robert Peng also uses it as a warm-up for Yi Jin Jing. I´ve done something similar as well when I received some Zapchen coaching only they called it "jiggling." Didn´t know it was specifically for the immune system, though. Very cool.

When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.” “The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.” “The question is,” said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master – – that’s all.” - Lewis Carroll

@ralis I don`t really want to debate at all. Many people feel strongly about the ethics of eating meat and some of them have organized politically to try and push a plant-centric agenda; I see the idea that vegetarianism is better for the planet as part of that push. But like I say, I`m no biochemist, no climate scientist. I just wanted to present an alternative viewpoint to show that there is an alternative viewpoint. You`re free to think the links I`ve presented are hooey or minutiae or hopelessly biased by big cattle. For all I know, you might be right. Seems to me though that there are intelligent people on both sides of this debate.

More on the relative influence of beef on greenhouse gases... https://agreenerworld.org/a-greener-world/it-wasnt-the-cows-after-all/ And here´s something about how cows raised in a certain way can be a net plus for the environment... https://sustainabledish.com/its-not-the-cow-its-the-how-new-study-shows-grass-fed-beef-can-be-a-carbon-sink/ If you don´t want to dig into this stuff, I certainly don´t blame you. But the cattle-are-bad battlecry is far from uncontested.

I haven´t made an exhaustive study of it, @ralis. I´ve read that grass-fed cattle can be a net-positive influence on environmental gases though I can´t find that link now. Perhaps you´re right. Statistical analysis is very complicated and can be deceptive, especially when all the players potentially have axes to grind other than the truth. I just think there´s doubt about the subject and no one position possesses clear definitive proof. Ditto for the alledged health benefits of plant-centric eating.

Well, a little disputable... https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/12/151214130727.htm https://www.intechopen.com/books/forage-groups/domestic-livestock-and-its-alleged-role-in-climate-change https://theconversation.com/yes-eating-meat-affects-the-environment-but-cows-are-not-killing-the-climate-94968

Sex and reality TV take up a lot of my energy, so I don´t have time right now to engage in an extended scientific debate about the virtues of vegetarianism. Suffice it to say that there are reasons to question the oft-repeated notion that consuming meat is bad for health or the environment.

Hundreds of middle-aged male grillmasters with sagging libidos beg to differ.

LIke you, I´m not very into cars or hats. I will say, however, that you have a very nice wand. It´s true, I think, that material things can get in the way of spiritual development but they can also serve as spiritual aides. Everything depends on a persons relationship with the material. If the having of something becomes a way of building up one´s false persona, that´s destructive. Many people construct their identities around stuff. I am someone who owns a sports car. I am someone who owns diamond encrusted cowboy boots. In a similar way, people can build identities around spiritual labels and ranks. I am a Daoist. I am an ordained priest. If people are lucky they come to realize that there´s not enough praise and prestige in the whole world to fill a broken heart, not enough material riches to mend the primal wound. Only self- love and self-compassion will do. Other people manage to possess all sorts of stuff, receive all sorts of public acclaim, and still manage to walk lightly in the world. They don´t use things or labels to puff themselves up. Instead, they surround themselves with beauty as a kind of hallelujah to creation. The ownership of a beautiful car can be a prayer. It´s a short hop from rapture over an automotive engine to the glory of God (or whatever word one wants to use for ineffable holiness).

Thanks @silent thunder for your wisdom about non-interference. Thinking about my flurry of posts in this thread last night, I wish I´d more inclined towards non-interference. I got caught up in thinking I was right, forgetting that I don´t even much enjoy being right. Being wrong is even more of a bummer. (Good thing it happens so infrequently!) It´s more fun to connect with friends, walk in the sunshine, eat Alfredo sauce. If Walker or Flowing Hands or anybody else wish to chastise Lord Josh Allen for saying he´s a Daoist, well, that´s just a drop of rain falling where it´s supposed to. I can relax and let be.

Actually, I don´t get too worked up over gay community definitions either. How many letters are there in the acronym that supposedly represents the community I belong to -- LGBQT, or is it more now? Don´t ask me what queer means or how it might differ from garden-variety gay. There are plenty of men who have sex with other men while claiming to be straight; more than a few women who´ve never had sex with another women who claim to be lesbian. Who can keep track of it anymore? I´m happy to let people call themselves whatever they want. As far as homophobic slurs go, to me it´s all about intent. The slur isn´t in the word -- it´s in the intention of the person using it. But this is far afield from the subject of weather magic (even if Lord Josh Allen is, as he claims, the Liberace of the occult world).I do hear your point.

Sports analogies usually go over my head, but I think I get you. Seems like a pretty accurate analogy to me.

@Earl Grey @Walker Please understand. When I said to Walker "I suggest tolerance" I wasn´t trying to cast asperions on Walker´s character. Maybe it´s a subtle difference, but I didn´t mean to call Walker intolerent. Walker -- I respect your knowledge and opinions. I´m glad you are here and feel I can learn a lot from you. I know you take your Daoism seriously and I appreciate that seriousness. I´m serious about my own spiritual path too. I don´t call myself a Daoist however. The most I´d say about myself is that I am engaged in some Daoist practices. My musings about the use of the word "Daoism" are offered casually, conversationally. Mostly I guess I wanted to support Josh. Seems to me he´s been very candid and upfront about who he is and isn´t, and didn´t deserve the heckling he got here. Sure, he´s not a wandering hermit, not a sage. Then again, he isn´t claiming otherwise. I think he´s a Bum in process, much like myself. It´s possible that at some point that the cars and the clothes won´t mean what they mean to him today. He might look back on his videos and feel embarrassed that he ever presumed to call himself a Daoist. Or maybe not. I just hope that there´s a place here on the board for people at all levels of spiritual development. So yeah, I suggest tolerance. My conscious is clear in doing so. At the same time, I respect those who have put more time and effort into this path than I. Please don´t think otherwise.

Considering my many shortcomings and misdeeds, the possible misuse of Daoist nomenclature isn´t remotely a priority.

@Walker I´m sympathetic to all the points you make. Obviously Lord Allen Josh isn´t a Daoist in the sense you mean. Obviously I´m not. But many people are going to use these terms loosely. Arguably, that´s a harmful thing, a confusing thing, maybe an uneducated and disrespectful thing. It´s also an undeniable reality. Even if you convince LJA to use the term Daoist in the more restrictive sense you prefer, even if you convince every member and guest of TDB likewise, you will not stem the cultural tide. I suggest tolerance.

Maybe everyone here should take a breath...

Yeah, but you´d have to deal with weird judgments from strangers on the internet every time you bought a pimp suit.

Yes you are.

I don´t get a greedy guru vibe from Josh. If he starts offering to sit in full lotus after receiving Paypal offerings, I´ll change my tune.

I´m betting he got it as a paid weather shaman for the Florida Citrus Growers Association. If it turns out I´m wrong and the money comes from an inheritance or trust fund of some kind, will you esteem him any less? I won´t.

I used to fantasize about becoming a Breslover Chassid. That was thirty years ago and today I can´t help but ask myself -- what was the young adult version of myself thinking? There´s a million reasons why that culture would never work for me. Still, for all their insularity, I believe Rabbi Nachman´s followers are heir to a very special vein of spiritual wisdom. There is Truth, the truth of the Truth and there is Peace. The truth is "the boy stole an apple", the truth of the Truth is "the boy was hungry" and Peace is "nobody stole anything, now, give the boy an apple." -Nachman of Breslov

I think that real identity -- Daoist, Jewish, whathaveyou -- transcends prescriptive conventional boundaries. It´s a matter of soul. Otherwise, what´s the point?

For better or worse, in many communities a Daoist is anyone who proclaims themselves to be one. Usually what happens is someone reads a book or two, feels an affinity for the philosophy, and voila. Traditionalists may quake but ya can´t fight it. The who-is-a-Jew question is not any less murky, btw. Orthodox Jews are loathe to accept the jewishness of Reform converts.

I´m not so sure that tai chi practitioners need to know anything about mitochondria, though such knowledge might indeed fascinate and inspire. Mitochondria, however, need to know about tai chi. Fortunately, implicit knowledge of tai chi (in the broad philosophical sense) is preprogrammed into the mitochondrial operating system. (Well, I don´t know this for a fact. But it sounded good to me and so I said it. By definition, all of nature, including mitochondria, follows the dao.)