sean

not qigong per se, but in the realm of spontaneous movement, there are two standing postures (and one lying posture) on trauma releasing exercises that effectively trigger completely spontaneous trembling/shaking for me. worth checking out for the context (and to support the authors when you can) but the gist is: 1. do a wall sit, arms empty hanging at sides. when it starts to approach intolerable, raise your position a few inches while looking for the trembling. 2. best done after position 1, lean over forward, hands in front of you to touch the floor, knees still bent, and explore slowly straightening the legs, looking for (or maintaining the already existing) trembling. 3. lie down in "supta baddha konasana", bottoms of feet together, and thrust your pelvis off the ground about 6-12 inches. hold this for a minute or so. then lower back down completely, and let your hips completely open and relax. after a few minutes, begin bringing your knees together, looking for the trembling. there is also an excellent 4th posture for spontaneous movement, that you can find on qigong for self healing that is better left for jenny lamb to describe. in all of these the key imo is to find the emerging tremble and make that the center of awareness at first. immerse in the actual sensations, the texture, the richness, and expand awareness slowly, closely look for how the trembling might also be subtly expanding or deepening and allow this, and anything else that arises, e.g., sudden thrashing, sound, laughter, tears. sean

pretty cool! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldc3zDtLU18&NR=1 i'm frequently drawn to movements like this while standing, sitting, lying down, swimming, etc. but i really like the possibilities this "exploreboard" thing opens up. can't find much info on them, but looks like they run $1500. now i'm wondering what other kinds of tools could facilitate movement exploration like this. sean

cool! now we are coming down in price. http://www.amazon.com/Powertec-Fitness-P-HC10-45-Degree-Hyperextension/dp/B000P7ANRI http://www.amazon.com/BodyCraft-F670-Hyper-Extension-Roman-Chair/dp/B000MQTS14/ http://www.yukon-fitness.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?page=yukon/PROD/UB/HYP-156 http://www.amazon.com/Body-Heavy-Roman-Chair-GRCH322/dp/B002EEOOAM http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000RYQDRS/r http://www.fitnessdestination.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=FD&Product_Code=DF404 http://www.amazon.com/Apex-Roman-Hyper-Extension-Bench/dp/B000ASB66O/r sean

i've noticed diminishing returns on any set duration over time. for example, 90 minute sits are fantastic for a few weeks, but eventually i get lazy in spite of them. "ahh... well, i've got 90 whole minutes here, plenty of time to be present, i'll just daydream for the first 20 minutes here". if i switch to super short meditations at this point, even as short as 5 minutes, it can actually have the effect of snapping my meditations back into a more alert presence. "i only have 5 minutes, every second counts". but this effect is only relative to the presence cultivated in longer sits, once again, after some days/weeks, 5 minutes just starts to zip by with less presence arising, or conversely even the 5 minutes starts to feel long and boring. so as an experiment, lately i've been trying random interval meditations, between 5-90 minutes. pretty interesting, for each sit i have no idea when the timer is going to go off inside of a pretty large range of time. i find myself more conscious of every second this way. hopefully it takes my ego a little longer to game this system. sean

the thing is, i'd want to feel certain that the structure was rock solid, not going to budge an inch, and absolutely not going to fall over or break while i am in some kind of bizarre, vulnerable position. sean

make me one! sean

de_paradise, awesome, thanks for the tips. still in research mode, figuring out where i'm going next. but if i come over your way it would be great to meetup. best, sean

i was into video games between 10-15 years old or so. i can remember getting a nintendo, i think i was in 4th grade. definitely changed my life, and i'm not sure if for the better. i recall being way less interested in going outside and exploring my neighborhood, riding dirt bikes with my friends, it became all about beating the boss on level 5. i recently stumbled across this article by a game designer with the perspective that social game designer's goal is to degrade the player's quality of life. very interesting view, and imo it displayed a certain level of consciousness that intrigued me enough to want to play the kind of game this guy would create. so i played a game he designed. it's called "braid". i think it was like $8 for the pc. 2d side scroller reminiscent of mario or kid icarus, but with a layer of depth added through a nonlinear story that can be interpreted a number of ways. the focus is on solving clever puzzles that i have to admit felt rewarding to figure out. sean

still waiting, i heard he is working on it though and even wanted to make a whole blog post or two out of some of the questions. i'll write them today and see what's up. sean

well one way to do this currently is via your own personal practice discussion forum. i'm pretty sure we set those to be visible only to logged in users. sean

谢谢! really appreciate your help. *deep bow* sean

thanks for the help gerard! fwiw, right now most of my questions have become logistical: how to handle visa requirements - e.g., should i pre-apply for some kind of extended visa while i'm here, or just extend my visa when i get there. decent studio in $400/month price range cheapest flights (i usually use hipmunk.com or kayak.com) where to study Chinese - you mentioned National Taiwan University anything I need to know in advance about training with Luo De Xiu or He Jing-han (e.g., can I just show up? what are the fees?) any good groups to practice stillness meditation (sitting or standing)? ideally it'd be great to connect with someone over there already that'd be up for helping me a bit while i get settled in. sean

thank you. and to everyone else for the additional feedback. also, Gerard, thanks for the tips on taipei and these amazing videos! *bows* sean

great topic, i love this forum! sean

fwiw i do see "add" traits in myself but without the "h", i.e., i don't exhibit any hyperactivity. also imo "add" is a bit of a misnomer as it's not a deficit of attention, it's experienced more like a preference for intense laser-beam like focus on a single thing, accompanied by a sense of difficulty transitioning quickly from thing to thing. this attention style works great for going deep with a single thing, e.g., i can sit for hours in stillness meditation, but is problematic when i need a wider, more diffuse attention. anyway, hopefully i don't really have to learn tai chi first as i have yet to experience much of a pull to that art. would you care to elaborate on how you see tai chi as a base art for learning bagua? my understanding is that bagua precedes tai chi by quite a bit. Gerard, thanks for the article and for highlighting those points. if you don't mind me asking, is He Jing-han your teacher? from the little i've seen he seems amazing. hear hear! ... if bagua keeps hold of my tail over the next year or two, i'm considering spending a few months in taipei to study chinese and practice with Luo Dexiu. sean

fwiw, i've heard good things about Insight Meditation Society, planning to do at least one retreat there in 2011. sean

i hope your embrace of feminine energy includes an immediate stop to disparaging non, otherwise you are going to be taking a break from posting here for awhile. sean

great suggestion, i just added this link to lo-fi mobile version. sean

Vajrahridaya, you're suspended for 90 days for direct insults. If you come back and do it again you are banned permanently. Sean

hah, tell your wife thanks for these tips. bagua is going well. really i feel like a whole new world is opening for me. i'll try to communicate what that is like. my core practice for many years has more or less been variations on sitting in stillness. through this i've grown familiar with certain depths of awareness, relaxation, clarity, equanimity, even bliss. the gifts of this practice do spill into my life, and yet over time a distinction between my sense of the reality i access in my sitting practice vs. "the real world" and my day to day life has grown. really it was always there, and my experience now is that this distinction is, in a way, much more than just a thought. it's embedded in my structure. the very way i approach sitting meditation vs. the way i switch into walking around unconsciously when i'm "not meditating right now". with bagua i've had tastes of that same oneness i experience in sitting, and yet i am simply walking. may sound trivial, but it was a real satori kind of experience for me. "wow, this too! this too." similar vibe to some of my awakenings with adyashanti, but more grounded in my body. this body. this world. to be clear, from a form perspective i am surely at most a hair above downright terrible at bagua. but it feels like bagua was/is an important key to cracking open an important door just a tiny tiny sliver ... allowing something on the other side of the door that is much larger than bagua and much more than i expected to push back. sean

Moved to "Forum and Tech Support". That is what this area is for, please stop starting topics likes this in the Taoist discussion area. FYI, GiH is suspended for 90 days for repeated, direct insults. Here was my message for him: Ralis, I think you are under some misconceptions. This is my forum, and it really is best to think of it as my home. I am just one subjective human running a small privately owned Taoist-ish-esque online discussion forum to the best of my abilities. As this site has grown I've invited other members to help me keep things in order and I entrust them to make decisions and also to make mistakes and learn from them. We have loose guidelines and no constitution, as would seem fitting of Taoist types, and then I, in particular, reserve the right to break any and all of them whenever I see fit. Ultimately, this forum is run by my subjective judgments. That is the reality of where you are. The word "censorship" is grandiose in this context. Editing extreme profanity, direct insults, violence, etc. is the equivalent of painting over graffiti from our walls. This is how the forum will continue to operate. This is not a government and I believe your activism would be better served elsewhere. Sincerely. For example, how about instead of railing against tiny splinters on a tiny Taoist discussion forum, you brainstorm and implement specific, tangible plans of actions to evolve, oh I dunno, half of our US citizenry beyond violent, right wing extremism, religious fundamentalism, racism, sexism, and willing indoctrination from fear-based "news" propaganda. You strike me as someone with a lot of political passion. Anyway, I do invite constructive criticism of moderation here. That is partly what the "Forum and Tech Support" area is for. But consider that if you truly think I am a poor leader, and/or that I have chosen a poor leadership team here, and/or that the approach on this forum is somehow fundamentally flawed, it might be best to either find or start your own utopian discussion forum. Best, Sean

there is an important distinction between what may be an appropriate part of any one of our spiritual paths and what is appropriate and tolerated on this specific, privately owned and subjectively managed discussion forum. sean

Well it seems by popular demand, the old discussion-based training journals are back. Feel free to give me your feedback about this change, either right here on the ongoing thread Regarding Forum Complexity. Sorry for all the confusion and musical chairs with the forum lately. Things are still very much in flux, but are bound to settle down again soon. I really appreciate everyone's patience and feedback. Sean.

aligned, relaxed, resilient - will johnson hara - karlfried graf durckheim becoming the lotus - martin faulks wild swans - jung chang the words of my perfect teacher - patrul rinpoche the post-american world - fareed zakaria sean