Sloppy Zhang

Well I don't have anything to give, and I'm not really looking out for anything right now.... so.... yeah, I'm just doing my part to let it die? I don't know if it's a good idea, or if there is a better alternative. On the one hand, I think it's good. But on the other, it is a time commitment. You'd have to check in every day (?). The teacher would be putting themselves up there, and there's no guarantee that they'll be partnered up with a good student. There ARE lots of good people here. I think what may be a good alternative is if we made use of the articles section. Maybe ask Taomeow to do a piece on dreams, Ya Mu to do a piece on foundational practices in preparation for his Stillness Movement, as 5ET to do a piece on spirit fighting or some of his Thunder Wizard Path. Obviously some people have their own sites, books, and other resources. But it might be good to host some material here, so that people get a good idea. I'm a "do it yourself" person with an eye for practical. So I, for one, wouldn't be so hot on another theoretical essay (not that those aren't good). But if a new person is trying to find a practice, and isn't sure what to do, and maybe would like to travel for a Stillness Movement seminar, or work with fiveelementtao, but wanted a better idea of what some practice would be like, a solid foundational/preparatory practice presented would be good. 5ET has some great free videos up on his youtube page for the Thunder Wizard Path, so maybe a little article to go along with some of those practices would be good. That way quality material would still be spread around from some of the quality people here, but if something were to happen where a mentee/student couldn't follow through on a practice, it's not like the whole month would have gone to waste. And this way, new people coming in would have a lot of practical where they could try out a practice on their own before deciding whether or not it's something they'd like to actually physically/financially spend money on.

People have been invoking "the end of the world", "the end of civilization as we know it", "impending mass chaos and destruction" for as long as civilization has been relatively stable. On the History channel I heard that some Roman historian prefaced his history book with "politicians are corrupt, society is full of poor, crime runs rampant, the young don't listen to their betters, society is collapsing and so I'd rather turn and look to the better days". I heard that the book of Revelations in the Bible had some numerical code that painted the Roman emperor Nero as the anti-Christ.... putting the end of days during the reign of that particular emperor.... which means the end of days has already happened So, basically, the point of all of these anecdotes is that, when put into perspective, it's nothing new. There's always going to be some calender which suddenly stops that we can point to and say "it's the end of the world!" There is always going to be some astronomical alignment which only occurs every hundred million years, and the last time it happened, a huge ass volcano erupted and killed everything on the sub-continent, triggering a massive tidal wave that destroyed a nearby island chain, which caused a mass exodus of living creatures which subsequently killed each other off in a competition for food...... People will look for messages even when there aren't any. Sometimes to the point where they'll miss the actual messages the universe is trying to send.... like.... "do something productive with your life!"

I don't know about the Embryonic breathing specifically, but I have a couple of Yang Jwing-Ming's other books. Very thorough. Depending on what books you have, there may be some significant overlap when it comes to history/theory. But other than that, very detailed oriented. I understand he has an engineering background, so when he explores a subject.... he's exploring EVERYTHING in that subject. I prefer having more details than I know what to do with, so I love the books of his that I have. It helps me piece together other stuff that I read from other writers who are light on the details because they don't want to "scare people off"

From what I hear, that's what happened with Dong Haichuan. He reportedly taught the skill to some young kid on his travels. Then Dong arrived in Beijing and started teaching Bagua and everything. Apparently as he was there, there was a string of burglaries that no one can solve. Being the ever responsible martial artist, and a master of qing gong, Dong himself kept watch over the rooftops, and ran into this second story burglar. Turned out to be the same guy he had taught the skill to, but all grown up. Dong told him to quit and hit the road, or else Dong would personally take care of him. So the guy disappeared, and Dong decided not to teach teach Qing Gong again. So supposedly that's what happened.

That, I would say, is an unbalanced power. Wherein you are already unbalanced, so by adding a bunch of power you just exacerbate the imbalance that you already posses. I'd say that TRUE power is balanced and not disruptive.

Thanks for the heads up!

Hm, interesting stuff. I don't know that much about the kunlun+red phoenix practice (aside from the public stuff), but what about it would render the knowledge of all of that "not very useful"? If it's something that can't be publicly shared, just let me know, no hard feelings

Speaking of all of this, on the Primordial Alchemist website, there seems to be a lot of Egypt related stuff being tied into it. I dunno. I recall hearing that the Kunlun stuff was at the foundation of the "12 mystery schools", but I (still) don't know what the 12 mystery schools even are, let alone what the root of them may be It's understandable that if you have the root knowledge, you could grow into whatever mystery school you want. So if people were interested in Egyptian mysticism, and you really had the root, then I could see how you could legitimately be teaching Egyptian mysticism that would actually get to people. Any elucidation on this point would be greatly appreciated.

Great to hear from you, cam. I followed a lot of the kunlun threads in the past, but never really commented. Never made it to a kunlun seminar myself. From what I recall, things really were touch and go with you for a good while. Really glad to see it all evened out for you. And yes, I do think you're a great testament to "sticking with" a practice. I tend to favor the "downward flow, water, releasing, opening up" type practices. The ones I'm involved with primarily (B.K. Frantzis) encourage taking it sloooooooooow. Sometimes frustratingly, stagnantly slow. But even with them I've opened up and released some stuff, and have experienced some freaky things. And that's at a slow pace (as in, one scary thing every 6-8 months). Thanks to reading about Kunlun, I figured that's what it was, took note of it, but then let it go and moved on. I think I'm better for it. But good lord, I couldn't imagine going through those experiences one after another in a hyper drive day in, night in, day out, night out kind of way. And that's the thing- thanks to TTB's, I had a pretty good grasp of what was going on, but I was still freaked out! I couldn't imagine a newbie going through that and not coming close to a total breakdown. I think witch is on to something with pointing out that more experienced people had, overall, better impressions of Kunlun (I recalled a lot of "it's just another releasing and letting go practice, no big deal"), than some of the people who seemed to have had less experience/years of quality practice who came to it and were like "zomg freaking out right now". Buuuuuuuuut that's just me getting the impressions from removed sources (the internet ). Anyway, good to hear a 4 year report!

Really? Putting it on the same level as the multi-orgasmic man??? From what I can tell (of both books) is that they are fine when they are practiced correctly and undergone in the proper context (namely, when accompanied by other practices and a teacher who's been down that road). Mantak Chia has a LOT of material out there (healing sounds, MCO, massage, etc etc etc), and it seems like the people getting hurt from the multi-orgasmic part aren't coming at it with the requisite training in other parts of the system. Kunlun seems to be the same way, at least as far as I can tell. Don't see why there's any need to "burn" it just because it is an intense practice that requires the context of other supportive practice plus a good teacher. Now witch's comments regarding the book and max are interesting, and it seems like she'd have a different reason for burning the book (again, from what I can tell). But that's up to her whether to share it or not.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5QKYbSz56kA

Yes, there were a lot of good discussions back in the old days. Some people have gone back and deleted some of their posts, I think, so perhaps some stuff won't be there for the new person who is trying to find out info. If I recall correctly from some random post from some random person, it was because they were going to publish a new version, so the old version was just out of date. That is, if I recall correctly and that random post from a person who I forget is correct.

By that logic, are you not equally honoring them when you are sexually aroused by them?

I do understand your concern. Unfortunately, the way modern society is set up, you're sort of between a rock and a hard place- to get successful enough so you can "get out", you have to play the game for a little bit. Otherwise you wind up being a wage slave, living from paycheck to paycheck, or are borderline homeless. More_Pie_Guy had a neat idea where he'd save up enough money for a camper and a small plot of land, and live off that, working part time for about half of a year, then living minimally for the other half to cultivate away from society. But if you want to set yourself up in, say, a house, have a car, etc etc, bills are going to pile up and you're going to have food costs and stuff, which is going to require money from the system you're trying to escape from. No problem. And look, it ain't just about getting back into that same field, but if those people can provide good references and can attest to the fact that you're a solid guy with a good work ethic, that's good stuff too.

Pretty much. Unless you planned to work in academia, or look for research opportunities through a university. If it's a skill that you can learn on the internet for free, as a general rule, don't be spending money to learn it at a college/university. If it's something that requires resources that you can't provide for yourself, then go to school for it.

Yes, definitely. Do not overlook your 9 months of job experience. And really, for 18 years old, that's valuable experience that other people, who may just be working part time or not at all, don't have. You can leverage that for a lot, and can turn it into something beneficial. So you can say that you're more of a "doer" than a passive learner, so you wanted some experience away from school and in work. The work was hard, but it's something that you are glad you went through (never complain). You realized that education was important just as well as experience, so you decided to go back to school and get your education finished, and you have a better perspective than you did before. ^Maturity and perspective are huge bonus points, and colleges like that, as opposed to the 18 year old who's happy to leave home so they can drink and fuck as much as they want.

You should do the same! Let the other mods take the work, and the heat

I'm 21 years old, and a senior in college. Truth be told, I don't practice nearly as often as I could or as I want to. I cut my practices short once they reach around the hour and a half mark. Sure, I could feel as if I could keep going for another hour and a half. But I can't do that when I need to get back and do homework, or go back to my job. I've already picked my practice over my course of study- I chose something that I liked and was relatively easy for me to accomplish, as opposed to the thing that I had an interest in but which would have been incredibly hard for me to accomplish, simply because I wanted to allow myself more time to practice. Who knows how that's going to wind up playing out in the future. I also went to college mainly for my parents. I thought about taking a year off after high school, or taking some classes in a community college to see what I liked. My parents wanted me to "stay on track" since I got into a good university right out of high school. At big (liberal arts, in this case) universities, you have to take a shit ton of courses to be "well rounded"- these are mostly pointless courses that everyone tries to find the easiest ones so they can save their GPA. It is one of the stupidest things I have ever seen. To graduate, one must have 120. I added it up, and I realized out of those 120, I will have spent roughly 35 in classes that I actually enjoyed and classes in which I can honestly say I got something out of it. Total waste of time, and total waste of money. The thing is that the "prestige" of the university is almost (more?) important than the content. When I start applying for real jobs next semester (instead of just internships and stuff) we'll see how that works. When you say "grade 12 university courses", I'm assuming you mean something like advanced placement (AP) courses. You need to fight to get in those. I'm going to assume you're going to a public school, and that you're in America. Public school administration is lazy and stupid, full of excess (like most school administration.....) They have cushy jobs- they roll in at 9, take a lunch break at 12:30, get back at 2, and then leave at 2:30. Not even joking, that was the schedule for the academic services at my high school (and the university schedule ain't that different). They are averse to doing work. So here's what you do: you have to make it so that doing "less" work means them putting you in the class that you want. You have to fight their inertia. Right now, it is easier for them to tell you "no" and watch you walk away. You need to make it easier to tell them "yes". That means start asking them "why", start telling them your situation, tell them you don't have a year to waste, tell them you want to go to college and study engineering (lie to them, engineering is what smart people do, show them you have a goal, or they won't take you seriously). If they won't do what you want, get your father to give them a call. Seriously. A huge portion of Asians went to my high school. The whole "asian parent" stereotype is true. Those parents will drive down to the school and yell at anyone they come across until their kid gets put in the hardest, smartest, most rigorous class. That's because Asian parents know that school administrators are lazy and have overpaid, cushy jobs. They don't want to rock the boat. Adding kids to class rocks the boat. Having parents yell at you threatening to call the city council or whatever rocks the boat more. So they add you to the class. It happened all the time in my high school. There is no reason why it wouldn't happen for you. Also realize that advanced placement tests (AP tests) are administered by the college board. NOT by the high schools. You have to pay a fee and show up to a testing site to take the test, usually outside of normal school hours (sometimes during the middle of the weekday, sometimes on Saturday). Since a lot of high schools offer AP (to attract smart, college bound students), a lot of high schools make it easy so you can pay through the school. But don't get confused: your school is NOT in control of the examinations. And ultimately, it's your score on the AP exam which determines how much (if any) college credit you get. What score you need on what exam depends on what college. Some colleges won't give you credit unless you score a five (highest). Some will give you credit if you score a three or above (three, four, or five- middle to highest). The grades you get in the "AP class" in high school depend on your teacher in high school (a lot of things "depend on your teacher"- it's a fact of modern life- get a bad teacher, and you can seriously get screwed). So if you have a teacher who gives lots of assignments, and who has an anal grading policy, you may have lower grades in the class, but may score well on the AP exam at the end. Furthermore, some schools have rules about having a minimum grade in the class before taking an exam- this is bullshit, and it's a rule there to protect the school's reputation, because it looks bad if they have 200 kids taking the AP exams, and the average score they get is a 2 (1 being the lowest). So you need to understand this, and if they try to bar you from taking the AP exam, give them a hearty "fuck you" (in your mind, because if you say it out loud, you'll get in trouble), and take the exam anyway. That said..... AP exams, and AP classes in general, are hard. Don't take them unless you're sure you want to take them. Okay, nevermind, fuck that. If you want to take them, take them, and if you do poorly (C or D), you'll still get a better education than you would in the stupid classes (just don't fail them). C's in AP exams look better than B's in regular classes, and sometimes even better than A's in regular classes. Colleges know what is important in administrations. Now, when it comes to colleges. Seriously do not overlook community colleges, or small state colleges. As I said earlier, if you go to a big university you have to put up with a lot of bullshit classes. If you want to study engineering or computers, you have to wait until you're a junior or even a senior to get your hands on some materials and actually start doing stuff. Freshman, sophomore, and sometimes even your junior year, you'll be taking bullshit courses to "round you out"- English, writing, blah blah blah blah blah. If you're an English major, you have to take extra sciences, math, blah blah blah. Again- you'll be doing a lot of things you don't want to do, and you won't be able to get a gauge of what you actually want. Plus, you'll be spending money on that shit. Unless you have a scholarship, in which case it's still a waste of time/money. Not your money, but your time. And you can't get time back. However, if you go to a community or a small state college, you can get right into the classes that you WANT to take. So if engineering/computers really isn't your thing, you find out your FIRST semester freshman year, rather than your fourth semester (second semester sophomore year), when you finally get to take your intro to engineering, and find out it sucks and you hate it, but are pushed by the academic advising people to declare a major (again, this isn't for your sake, it's for theirs- they look bad if they have a bunch of students who take 5 years to graduate, and it's a waste of their resources if they have people sticking around). Community colleges/small state schools get you in the door fast, have a no-nonsense approach, and typically cater to people who didn't do well in high school anyway- minorities, dropouts, people who didn't go to college but who lost their job/failed at their career and want a second go, but don't have the funds for a big college. You can finish your degree there, in some instances, in 2 years. Not to mention that you can transfer to a bigger university, and have your credit transfer over- so you'll pay less to get your bullshit credits out of the way, and go right into doing the stuff you want to do (which you discovered at your small school) at the big university. Bigger universities like to keep a certain transfer rate, because it creates the illusion that they are helping people "move up" in their education. So there's an instance in which you can exploit something that is for their benefit and not yours, but you can use it to your own benefit. Sorry for the super long post. I really hate the education system. Most of it is a pointless waste of time. "Red tape", to get you into places that actually do stuff. Big universities get funding for science research projects- sometimes they have professional quality labs, and if you're a student with the right credentials, you can get access to that. Which is a big plus. But if you are doing pretty much anything that doesn't require a particle accelerator, universities are pretty much just a "name" that you can have on your resume. And let's not forget personal contacts and recommendations. Network and get to know people. They will get you in the door and move your resume up to the top of the pile with a little gold star that says "I think you should strongly consider this candidate". You'll get wind about jobs you didn't even know existed, and things that just don't turn up on google or any of those job hunting websites. Universities are great places to make those contacts- go to seminars and talks and stuff, and get talking to your professors and teachers. Even if they aren't your own, find out what research people are doing, and go find stuff that interests you. Even if your interests are spiritual, find an Asian religious studies person and talk to them about meditation across cultures or whatever. That shit gets people saying "hey, that person has some ideas", and they'll think of you whenever new positions open up. Teachers usually have some relevant experience in the field that they are teaching. They generally know people who know people, and know what's what. Find some that you like, become friends with them, get them to know your name and be able to associate a face with that name, as well as interests. Get them talking, talk to them, and drop hints that you're looking for something along the lines of a job/career. They "just might have the thing for you". And basically, along the way, you're going to have to put cultivation on the back burner. Pay attention to school, set yourself up, get a job that can earn you some steady income. Along the way, do what you can. If it comes down to meditating vs homework, the safe money is on homework- you're more likely to get a job to sustain you than you are to suddenly reach enlightenment to sustain you.

? A bit like "killing the messenger", no? A fight goes down, and someone records it- it ain't the camera person's fault! Unless the camera person started up a fight to get some footage. I can understand the point about him getting a job that doesn't involve the suffering of others (good luck finding that, btw, because I'd say most jobs do), but that wouldn't mean he's to "blame".

It ain't just women (as far as that video), but America's attitude towards violence (and I can only really speak about American culture) is pretty ass backwards, if you ask me. When I was growing up, I was the fat kid, and half a foot taller than everybody else. I got picked on a lot by all of the smaller, faster kids. Nobody believed that I got bullied because, you know, I could easily beat them up, they wouldn't pick on me. But being the nice guy that I was, and being as anti-violence as I was raised, I didn't do anything. So these kids kept running around talking shit and generally causing problems. One day I punched the kid in the face, got suspended from school for a week, but never in the next three years did I have any bullying problems, and never in the next three years did that kid get into anymore trouble. In another instance, I have a cousin who likes to talk shit behind all the parents' backs. Everyone in our generation knows this guy is an asshole. One day we heard that this group of three kids in his high school got together and beat the shit out of our cousin. None of us were surprised. He probably said something racist to a bunch of people bigger than him, and since he was so used to getting away with everything thanks to his parents thinking he was a little angel, he got himself into some trouble. Sometimes I think we're taking natural survival "control" mechanisms away, and allowing stupid people to get away with stupid behavior that they wouldn't otherwise have gotten away with. Not to say that I think that people should go around beating up anyone they want to get their way. Not at all. But some people have this idea in their heads that they can insult, harass, and otherwise heckle someone with no consequence. Because, you know, if they get hit, they can call the cops on the other guy for throwing the first punch. And if you're a woman, well, god forbid any man lays a hand on you, because you'll have his ass sent down to jail for assaulting a woman, and nobody will ask many questions for a couple of weeks until it gets to court. Now to the video specifically, I don't know what the situation is. But I know that if someone is making a move to walk away, and you follow them down the street taunting them, you're basically asking to get knocked the fuck out... at least, if you're a dude.

I'm down for something like that at the very least. I log in today and see stig is suspended???? For what now? It just ain't clear what's going on. I feel like I missed something

Well I for one didn't see stig do anything anywhere close to my definition of disruptive, so maybe I'm missing something else. In what way?

Seriously though, you know what really helps? Thinking of her as a person rather than a sex object. That will kill your masturbation boner hella fast. The point is, there is a way to protect your own energy while at the same time being able to relate to others in an emotionally healthy way. So instead of alienating the rest of humanity during your cultivation, you can actually grow closer to them as you're growing spiritually. Then again, maybe that's just my mind trying to trick myself into keeping attachments.

Wait.... did I miss something? What'd Stig do for the suspension?