monucka

Yup. As far as I understand, "one path only" means don't mix any other enlightenment/spiritual practices with vispassana. As in, no kundalini yoga, no pranayama practice with spiritual overtones, no lesser kan and li, etc. Taiji practice is not (or at least, isn't in my system) an enlightenment practice. The folks who taught at the course I attended both practice yoga for health. They don't visualize prana flowing through channels, and explained (lucidly) why I should avoid mixing vispassana with qi visualization in taijiquan practice. I have no problem with that; qi visualization is not part of the system I practice. I only speak here from personal conversation with the teachers, from questions I asked and answers I received. I did ask, point blank, if continuing with vispassana means I must quit taijiquan practice. The answer I received was a qualified "no". I can't speak to what old students told you when you took a course. - j

Actually, they won't. I checked on that in advance, since I'm a taiji teacher. But then I don't claim my taijiquan practice as a spiritual path, any more than i'd claim hatha yoga as a spiritual path. The grey area seems to be that long term, they're not big fans of visualizing ethereal energies. Neither am I, so it's not a big deal.

I lived in one of those Sedona vortices for a year or so. It was really powerful, it's fun hearing your experiences as well. As for the Lemurian thing, may I point out that you can also pay $1000 per hour to have some sack "channel an ascended master" to you in Sedona. Like ascended masters take Visa, or something. The Hub of the New Age indeed.

Well, the guy who wrote your article points out that the "green power" isn't as sturdy as the "green life", and on checking the exact name, i've got the "green power". So i'm not the only disappointed user. The twin gears are very solid steel, but they're mounted on pastic screws (who engineered that, anyway?) so they eventually wear out, crack, split, and then break entirely. Mine lasted five years. Maybe that's a good lifespan for a juicer, but at $500, i wasn't all that impressed. For half a grand i want something that'll last more like 20 years, or at least 10. Besides that, it does make great juice, although you'll seriously want a compost pile to discard all the pulp to, cuz' the pulp comes in very large amounts. I've refrigerated the juice and it tastes much the same after a day in a sealed mason jar in the fridge as it does right out of the juicer. The pulp is also pretty dry, which suggests that the claims about the efficiency of the 2-gear system are accurate. Mine was -not- portable. Oh, and you can use it to make (very dry) nut butters, mochi, whatever mashed stuff you want, but i didn't do much more than make some almond butter and some pure fruit sorbet. On the former, it's cost effective to just buy raw almond butter at the store. - j

I rock climb, and try to avoid the obviously dangerous stuff. It works for me, even in a rock gym. I'm somewhat convinced that our ancestors had to climb at least often enough to have selected for inherent ability: little kids, once they trust a rope, can climb like no others. If that's true then, like running, it's a naturally optimized form of exercise. Plus there's a real opportunity to connect with mountains, sky, weather, balance/rooting, and personal fear and limitation. I train slowly, go for strength and endurance, stay as safe as possible, and avoid the competetive aspects of it. That seems to make it fit more with my worldview. - j

Those are some excellent juice recipes. I think a collection of health-oriented recipes, with indications for use (like you just wrote) would go best in contributed articles. My two cents. So here's a question for you: what kind of juicer do you prefer? I'm looking for one that is easy to clean, effective at expressing juice, and not way too expensive- personal recommendations go a long way. I used to have a Green Life twin-gear, but the crappy plastic on the gears broke, and i'm thinking maybe i ought to switch brands. Thoughts? - j

I almost always assume that mind is a translation of xin (or hsin) unless it's prefaced with some qualifier like 'original' or 'monkey'... And even then it might be the same character. No guarantees, but that's probably a good guess. No idea about yuan qi, but qi usually gets translated as breath, so that's half of it, maybe. I would love to see more etymological and linguistic concepts posted- wu can mean primodial too, right? So there's a difference between yuan and wu, but I'm not sure what it is. - j

Standing meditation.

I do! While enlightenment may be necessary to effectively help others (a la mahayana literature), most guru/marketers sling hype aimed at making their product a... well... product. Better orgasms, more amazing insights, cracking all the wood in your house late one night, immortality, whatever.... cool, but I'd prefer if it wasn't called spirituality. And your excerpt on single path processes (as opposed to spirituality a la carte)- that was awesome. <grin>. Thanks! = Jeff

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I don't have a copy for ya, but I'm a big fan of interlibrary loan, and had a copy for two months- just go to your local library and ask how to do an ILL. - Jeff