rex

Vajrayana buddhism has the Vajra Tent.

Periodisation stops burnout. If you train three times a week only push to your max once a week and divide the training days into low, medium and high intensity sessions.

Thanks for this, I hadn't heard this explanation before. Well it's a tribute to my immune system that despite the food the colds have never developed into a fever.

Prevention is better than cure though there isn't a cure for the common cold, is there? The old saying starve a fever, feed a cold holds good.

Nice reading about kundalini. Reading the on-going soap opera, not so nice.

Doesn't the distinction between absolute truth and relative truth address this apparent problem?

White is all the colours of the rainbow :-) White for the lungs could signify the connection of the life breath to all the elements.

Just a wild guess: Pink is Fire and Metal combined. The predominant element of the combinaton depends on the hue. Heart => Fire => Red Lungs => Metal => White

In terms of practice one way of looking at them is: Hinayana: do not harm Mahayana: cultivate a wealth of virtue Vajrayana: train and tame the mind Vajrayana is built on the indispensible foundation of mahayana which in turn is built upon the indispensible foundation of the hinayana.

Nice integration of the basic premise into a higher level view - those who can truly experience it are fortunate indeed.

I often fall over, then remembering the Sufi saying 'this too shall pass', pick myself again up and keep going until the next time, where I recall a Sufi saying ... For sure I'm repeating patterns but each time it's slightly easier to get up again. One day I may even walk down a different street: I walk down a street. I fall into a deep hole. It takes me a long time to climb out. I walk down the street. I fall into the hole. I climb out. I walk down the street. I see the hole but I fall in anyway. I climb out. I walk down the street. I walk around the hole. I walk down another street.

Offering the benefit of practice to the welfare of all sentient beings works with the ideas of interdependence and karma to create the causes and conditions for universal happiness. In some belief systems there are forces working actively for universal peace, harmony and happiness and dedicating practice to something greater than oneself gives the potential for grace to flow more powerfully. [is this suitably E-Prime?]

Of related interest: Interiorized Fire Rituals in India and in Tibet By Yael Bentor "Among the practices discussed here are inner heat (tapas and gtum-mo), breathing (prana) and the subtle body (rtsa-rlung), sexual yoga, food yoga, mental fire offerings and the fire offering of enlightened wisdom."

There's the idea of sin as separation from God. One interpretation of the coats of skin given to Adam and Eve is that after the Fall they were given physical materiality, i.e. physical bodies, as had they stayed in their pre-Fall Garden of Eve spiritual form, they could have caused creation a lot of damage (just looking around the planet now is bad enough!) Original sin in the newborn may refer to how connections with the upper spiritual realms are diminished once physical form is taken so the rite of baptism is used to restablish the links. Now there's a Buddhist teaching on how humanity used to be immaterial energetic beings living for thousands of years without the need for food but through the insidious effects of the five posions gradually declined to become physical beings relying on food - I'll dig it out. Later Edit: On second thoughts I won't dig it out - the jist has been mentioned and I don't want to be a Buddha Botherer in the wrong thread.

I like Dr. John Painter - The Gompa Channel Maybe some of you like him too.

No, the translations and commentaries are collated from a number of documents: "More than 150 documents related to Embryonic Breathing practice, written during nearly four thousand years of Chinese Qigong history, are now available. Many of these documents focus on theory, while others emphasize the general concept of the practice. Naturally, the contents of many of these documents are redundant or repetitious." p155 "The main sources of documents were from Daoist and Buddhist society, with a few from scholar and medical society. Documents generated from martial arts society are very scarce. Even though there are some, their discussion and practice remains on the surface level. The majority of the documents translated and commented in this book are from the following sources: 1. Dao De Jing and Qigong, by Ding, Xin-Bai and Pan, Ming-Hua; Anhui, China, 1996 2. Chinese Qigong Dictionary, by Lu, Guang-Rong; Bejing, China, 1988 3. The Great Completion of Chinese Qigong, by Fang, Chun-Yang; Jilin, China, 1989 4. The Study of Practical Chinese Medical Qigong, by Ma, Ji-Rhen; Shanghai, China, 1992 5. The Complete Book of Nourishing the Life in Chinese Daoist Qigong, by Li, Yuan-Guo; Chengdu, Sichuan, China, 1991, 6. The Great Completion of Chinese Life Nourishing, by Fang, Chun-Yang; Jilin, China, 1992 7. Important Collection of Concealed Daoist Qigong, by Hong, Pi-Mo; Shanghai, China, 1991." p156 [Chinese characters missed out and I took the liberty of using a semi-colon to separate the place of publication from the authors].

I'd be wary of any living teacher that claimed they were enlightened. However if I was lucky enough to be in the presence of one that made no such claims, but was revered by others as such, I'd do what Trunk suggests and rest my mind in their presence.

Feeling and trust.

Here's a nice five page summary: The Six Yogas of Naropa

"Neuroplasticity" Documentary on YouTube (Sorry, can't get embedding to work in the new forum). Articles: Meditation and Neuroplasticity Meditation Alters Structure of Brain

After a qigong session rub your hands together and tap around your gums - from the outside not the inside.

To live with greater happiness and die with better hope.