resonance

Hello Marblehead...im glad you are glad lol...hope im not coming over as a "know it all"! To be honest i dont post much on the net and when i do i cringe a bit at what is written, it is an unforgiving medium and lacks so much that person to person communication has..never the less i find that in itself a good thing too. None of my teachers have been advocates of 'self improvement' there most common advice was "stop struggling! Leave yourself alone!" The view was WuWei...pesonally im going to try not to use to much 'taoist' terminology as there are almost as many interpretations of it as there are practitioners lol [ im joking a bit here!] Purity? Whats pure? Whats impure? What can be aware of both? Some would say that being embodied is the reason for 'conditioning' they then become frantic trying to 'get away', wanting to become beings of light or 'spirit' or some such...jing/chi/shen are not other to each other but aspects of each other or of life...we flip and flop between catagorizing our experiences as pure/impure, nice/not nice, material/spiritual etc but what is consistant throughout? Is consistancy even possible or desirable? I feel 'not knowing' is fine. I agree that if a person is uncomfortable for some reason it is natural to want to change circumstances for the better. Man I ramble...peace

Yes, awareness is a much better word, at least because it is simple and explanatory whereas 'enlightenment' is a word everyone seems to have there own interpretation of leading to many long winded food fights! However if the word is qualified well enough..ok. Wolf..i may be wrong and/or misunderstanding you but your post reads a little like you feel 'tainted' by anything 'other' and are under the impression there is some kind of 'pure' 'you' . All 'things' are 'conditioned' my friend..relax..

Hi everyone ...a little about myself... I came to oriental thought a short while after I starting to practice chinese martial arts [ like a of people ] and wanted to know more about the culture these arts originated from. My first intro to Daoism was the DaoDeJing which was baffling but compelling at the same time! I continued wth the Zhuangzu and Liehzu [ im sure this route will be familiar to many ] My interests expanded to Buddhism particularly Zen and also to other forms of Mystic stuff ie Sufi and esoteric Christianity, as a youngster I had flirted with paganism and was always interested in the 'meaning' of life etc. Up until 8 or so years ago all those were things I read about but not in any way actually practiced, but around this time I started to sit on my own couting the breath etc and shortly after a friend who had experience began regular meditation with me, this was in the Buddhist tradition...Sammattha and Bodhichitta practices. I had also been reading the books of Ken Wilber and got into his 'view' of Integral Practice as it was then up until a few years ago. [in my mind at the time it seemed like a modern or western version of the Qhaunzhen 'view'at least my interpretation of it!] A few years after I began the 8 brocade practice with a few people associated with the LungMen sect which I continue to do though that group no longer meet. Over the last 6 years or so my 'cultivation' has been 8 Brocade with 'dissolving' meditation, Zuowang [ had some exposure to the Zhengyi sect through a priest who was a friend though sadly am out of touch with at the moment] the same priest was into Dzogchen also so have had some exposure to that... Anyhow have gone on to long suffice to say am happy to be here and look forward to being a part of this community ...peace all