Owledge

How can the realm of the mind, in which the concept of true/false is created, be called untrue in contrast to a so-called higher realm in which there is no mind and thus no truth or falsehood? My very personal insight/view that I gained from my ayahuasca experiences is that this so-called illusion we are living in is a divine realm, so to speak. It emerges from the Oneness, and if it didn't have a purpose, it would not exist. So by emerging from the source, the illusion is as true as the source itself. In fact, ironically, while the mind is devalued in spiritual traditions as creating the illusion, of erring in some way, it is instead part of the divine manifestation. You could say, the mind is an agent of God's will, as is everything else, since the source of everything is regarded as divine. Did you ever wonder whether spiritual fish regard the sea as an illusion and the land as the true realm? Maybe fish jumping out of the water are spiritual seekers who are using special swimming techniques in order to reunite with the higher realms.

Let me test his sincerity by saying that I do. Hahaha.

"Gender: Male" I don't think so. ( )

By being sincere and then applying the definitions behind those words. Which, admittedly, are not necessarily so much about behavioral effects as they are about the inner process leading to those. A while ago I came up with an interesting idea though: Immaturity is fear So-called "immature" behavior, being not the same as childish behavior, is that which is based on fears - more specifically those fears that are expected to be overcome at a certain more or less post-adolescent age. In ironic contrast, so-called childish behavior is rooted in not being afraid, more specifically not being afraid to show behavior that is stigmatized by society because it reminds many adults of how they aren't anymore. It can be both.

There's something my teacher told me, maybe it can inspire someone. I think it basically says that specialization can create imbalance. He was/is very much interested in martial arts, but not really in healing. Then someone told him that he doesn't have to be interested in the healing arts, he doesn't even have to like them, but he should at least get to know them. He also felt like he plateau'd with his martial arts skills. When he got to know the healing arts, his martial arts skills were raised to a new level. (And vica versa for healers.) So if you are very good at something, and it seems like further progress becomes tedious or there is resistance, consider recreating balance instead, by widening the basis.

With Red Phoenix level 1?

Just for clarification: Personally I didn't find any statement insulting or derogatory. As usual, I simply provided my thoughts about the effects of making them. (I don't see any benefit in feeling insulted, so why bother?)

But maybe not.

Sincerity is an essential ingredient in that. And the outer expression of sincerity comes from the sincere wish to see past own illusions. (You know when someone says "This is my last posting here." and then it's not? That might come from not being sincere to oneself, in cases where that person believes the statement when they make it.) Because one can more or less sense the underlying intention of an action by examining the context and tone. Maybe that's what's called intuition. There was that discussion in a game forum where someone ended up calling me a liar all the time, because I merely showed him what he was doing. I eventually said my subscription is ending, so I'll not be able to post anymore and told him as a courtesy. His response: Liar, liar, liar! He was wrong. He created his own false reality and couldn't let go of it.

What I have heard from the realm of scientifically proven stuff is that memory persists more strongly when emotion is involved. That means if you love the world and you know how do defend yourself against wild animals, and you are occasionally attacked by one, and then that one time one cuddles up to you, you will put huge positive emotion into it and that will stick in your memory. That's how we shape our reality. Also, understanding why things happen, where they come from, can assist that process. Oncy you understand why a wild animal is attacking you, you won't take it personal anymore. You will have empathy, and that weakens the fear involved in the experience of being attacked. Something like: Knowledge leads to insight. Insight leads to understanding. Understanding leads to loss of fear. Loss of fear empowers love. Love supports enlightenment.

Gast - Mitglied - pretty much the same meaning in German as in English. It is your choice to entertain that belief system. Be aware that it shapes your perception, makes it selective. There is way too little data for one person to make an accurate judgment about how often people are judged by their good side or their bad side. That view might serve as a convenient tool for not looking at why we cause bad responses in other people. You can simply say: "That's how things are, people look more on the negative side of things.", instead of: "Why does my personal experience seem that way?". It will look as if the world is biased, when in fact you are. (connection outer and inner world)

After the end is before the end.

If he could walk through a wall, he would still not be 'fully' enlightened, because he would be delusional according to his own definition of enlightenment. Enlightenment in that view is probably that perfect ideal that can never be reached, since reaching is a function of time, and time doesn't exist in a state of enlightenment. Maybe that's why people say we are already enlightened. We are separating ourselves from it by believing in time. By the way, "the dreamer" is a pretty good name for what I perceived during my ayahuasca trip. It was like a single consciousness entity lovingly enjoying the creative process of infinite possibilities manifesting - all those tiny lights/facets flashing up everywhere all the time. A Christian metaphor would probably be God loving all his children equally.

Who called the guy an enlightened master? How can he be enlightened based on his own definition if he's still there, talking to people, answering questions, giving his opinion. And even saying what is "really the truth". This seems to me like a clever (or foolish) conundrum. Maybe the idea was to make the person who asks realize the contradiction and thus stimulate their own search for truth and enlightenment. In my opinion, enlightenment can only seen as a process, not a yes/no question. And nobody who can use words can reach full enlightenment, because no-one knows whether they have seen the ultimate extent of it when their mind is talking about it. Also, always focusing on the end result devalues the process. Trying to 'reach' enlightenment will distance you from it. Enjoying a gradual process of getting more enlightened is enlightenment. You then have attained the process. But if you tell you too often that you have attained the process, you will even lose the process. Funny bit: The stuff that 'enlightened master' is talking about is the same stuff I personally experienced during my second ayahuasca ceremony. So am I on the same level as that guy? I could have given you the same answers. But I would not say this is the absolute truth, for I've heard that ayahuasca can be the most horrible of liars.

Then why limit it to Germans? I've heard US and English tourists being widely unpopular. It is not so much a factual phenomenon, but a perceptual. Hell, US tourists are dissed for wearing sandals with white socks. That's ludicrously trivial. But it shows where the criticism and stereotypes are coming from. And many people enjoy keeping stereotypes alive so much that the more or less 'factual' basis is long gone. Related to this, I just remembered a relatively recent interview statement by Morgan Freeman. He was asked: How do we get rid of racism? Morgan: Stop talking about it.

All you have to do is read and comprehend the very text you quoted. It's all in there.

@Friend Do you love stereotypes?

Then why is it that the one who allegedly merely reflects back negative energy is the one getting all worked up? I sense preconceptions here. Part of the problem or phenomenon is that Ya Mu automatically assumes superiority of his techniques. His statements in the pain thread (now made visible again) contain belittling stereotypes, but he never seems to actually care who the people he talks to are, since apparently if he doesn't like what they say, they must be amateurs. I am surprised how little it is known in this Taoist forum that inner and outer state are connected. There is no freedom from responsibility about outer experiences. Still, various people keep trying to explain events as one-sided. In case it is still not clear: 1) What happened would not have happened without my contribution to it. 2) What happened would not have happened without Ya Mu's contribution to it. So do you blame me for not being polite enough? Then you also have to blame Ya Mu. I am taking responsibility for my part. I won't take responsibility for Ya Mu's part. And that seems to be the problem. Because when I am rejecting his reponsibility, that causes dissonance. He expects the full burden to be shouldered by others. Same with the underlying theme of spreading medical qi gong in the western world. There's a lot of talk about resistances, disbelief, scepticism, rigid structures, medical qi gong being so much better. What about the other side of the coin? What about his desire to break through, to force stuff? Ah, well, this seems to be too simple to be seen or whatever. Maybe looking right at the source is too scary. It's just very funny how people can talk about spiritual principles on this forum without end, but when they are asked to take a look at how they are applying them, suddenly there's upheaval. In theory, the whole phenomenon is interesting, but in praxis, it gets boring. Guess when I sense illusions, I better leave people alone. It's just not interesting to shy away whenever I see more than people can handle, and usually it takes an initial testing to figure that out, and by that time, they're already heavily asking for feedback. So this is a learning process of course. I will change with it. As I said earlier, I welcome all experiences as meaningful. @mjjbecker You quoted a war criminal there who ordered the killing of thousands of civilians in order to drag the USA into war.

You seem so involved in your alleged projection-reflection that you don't recognize your own stuff anymore. Like there is none. keyword: responsibility I know that you probably mean your medical qi gong, but you should be aware that energy manipulation happens all the time during interaction between people. keyword: responsibility So you still entertain the convenient belief that it's the forum why people don't treat you the way you think you deserve to be treated. keyword: responsibility

Not necessarily. When something is treated the wrong way because it is not understood, that can counteract natural healing. And in severe cases, the right healing approach has to be taken. Many cases of AIDS are simply caused by very unhealthy living conditions overloading the immune system, and many are caused by AIDS medication after the misdiagnosis HIV. Cancer can be healed through a change in the psyche. In both cases there have been 'miraculous healings'. And the alleged discoverer of HIV (Luc Montagnier) stated on camera his opinion that a healthy immune system can get rid of it. That is like medical heresy, ironically. The medication is the toxin, and it's a common saying in the AIDS community that the 'side effects' of the medication is what eventually kills you, not AIDS.

Be aware that my actions were not motivated by that view. I would have made the same recommendations to anybody else who acted that way. The fact that Ya Mu's behavior coincides with him being an energy healer simply added to the curiosity of the whole situation. He is presenting his profession and making claims that then, in interpersonal relations, apparently don't hold water. If you advertise stuff, you have to expect public scrutiny. I can understand why he is on that quest against adversity in the first place, if his behavior in the pain thread is the way he deals with critics elsewhere. Also, I am not out on a mission, but merely tried to help someone eliminate a source of stress to the best of my understanding, and the response was provocative and practically asking for trouble. If someone can't see themselves in the mirror and keep pounding on it, don't blame the mirror. Sometimes people will eventually recognize their own picture in it, sometimes not. Sometimes the denial is so elaborate that it looks like I was able to help, and then of course my following actions based on that deception/misunderstanding cause further dissonance. P.S.: Still no info on the advertising question. "Pain Killer Sales Soar - Why not try Medical Qigong - Medical Qigong instead of Narcotics" is clearly an advertising thread. We should have a right to know whether 'covert' advertising schemes are being supported by the forum.

What I'm curious about: When someone pays the forum for advertising, is it limited to the ad banner, or does that also allow to advertise in the form of forum threads? And does Ya Mu pay for advertising?

(EDIT/CORRECTION)For informative purposes: http://www.thetaobums.com/index.php?/topic/23169-pain-killer-sales-soar-why-not-try-medical-qigong (Ya Mu said he and others reported me to the mods. He called me a stalker and my writings potentially dangerous.) Unlike Ya Mu, I take full responsibility for my contribution to the crisis and the consequences of moderator action. I voiced my disapproval though. Unfortunately, the moderator remained anonymous. I don't know who I was dealing with. The following is just an explanation of my viewpoint, so I hope the moderators can accept to keep this thread, since it is about what happened and thus not off topic. I am merely stating my personal viewpoint - like I did in said threads, which some people apparently take as personal attacks. The whole dispute was, from my viewpoint, about Ya Mu not wanting to take responsibility for his actions, namely posting with an agenda of he vs. adverse forces preventing him from spreading medical qi gong in the speed that he desires. I tried a lot to point out how this is unhealthy and how with that mindset he will only get into trouble. You know, manifesting outer stuff that reflects the inner state. I started very gently and kindly, actually voicing understanding, but that was called passive-aggressive by him. Also, his claims about being on a level of consciousness that I simply cannot understand were not sound. He said he energetically led the discussion so that Twinner would behave properly, when from what I've read, Twinner seemed a lot more relaxed and reasonable than Ya Mu. Furthermore, then why was Ya Mu so extremely unskillful in leading me energetically? My standpoint is that when someone loses his composure, it is not healthy; there is an emotional vulnerability that should be overcome. My suggestions were met with complete and offensive denial and Ya Mu used a lot of preconceptions and stereotypes, potentially insulting whole groups of people in the process, and made a lot of assumptions about me, while reacting upset about any comment about his behavior. To sum it up, I tried to show Ya Mu an imbalance between abilities and character. I pointed at the moon and he fought my finger. I mean, he's a teacher of an energetic healing system, supposedly approaching problems from a veeeery high level. Where was his skillfulness there? When is character refinement taught in that system? I stated to the moderator that I thought lively discourse on a personal level is part of the spiritual quest - that gives the forum depth and enriches it as a tool for the spiritual seeker, and that shying away from a dispute and 'calling the authorities' is disempowering the person doing it and the forum. There is a difference between malevolent behavior for the sake of it and well-intentioned behavior that causes an aggressive reaction. There were so many more or less basic spiritual lessons in the the whole dispute and Ya Mu chose to completely disregard the opportunity to overcome his super-sensitivity. Because funnily all I did was pointing at the very behavior that was evidenced by what he wrote, and he countered with freaking out even more. Eventually I thought he had realized what he did and really looked at himself, but it turned out it was another smokescreen - for himself in a way.

Really knowing is relative. It is a personal decision based on the rigidity of standards we set for ourselves. We can finally be convinced we know something, then talk about it, and in those very talks discover that we were wrong. Speculation and rumors can still be part of the search for truth, for insight. It depends on each person's intention behind the action. All of life is a spiritual quest. Rejection of life experiences is what causes suffering. Our mind is that which rejects. Our heart is that which feels pain. Pain doesn't cause suffering. Rejection of pain does.

Did you consider that some speculation and arguing might be done by people who already have found their truth and are living it? Life is a pretty good teacher. It says: Everything has meaning and every experience is a lesson. Maybe you should update your info column. It says: "Interests: Life". Then again ... maybe not.