Mark Foote

Stages and levels in Tai Chi: The classic literature of Tai Chi appears to identify the ligaments of the body as a source of activity. The literature describes three levels in the development of “ch’i”, and each of the three levels has three stages. The stages of the first level are: “… relaxing the ligaments from the shoulder to the wrist”; “from the hip joint to the heel”; “from the sacrum to the headtop”. (“Three Levels” from “Cheng Tzu’s Thirteen Treatises on Ta’i Chi Chuan”, Cheng Man Ch’ing, tr. Benjamin Pang Jeng Lo and Martin Inn, pp 77-78) Unlike the contraction and relaxation of muscles, the stretch and resile of ligaments can’t be voluntarily controlled. The muscles across the joints can, however, be relaxed in such a way as to allow the natural stretch and resile of ligaments–that would seem to be the meaning of the advice to “relax the ligaments”. The stages of the second level are: “sinking ch’i to the tan t’ien” (a point below and behind the navel); “the ch’i reaches the arms and legs”; “the ch’i moves through the sacrum (wei lu) to the top of the head (ni wan)”. (ibid) Tai Ch’i master Cheng Man Ch’ing advised that the ch’i will collect at the tan-t’ien until it overflows into the tailbone and transits to the top of the head, but he warned against any attempt to force the flow. Omori Sogen cautioned similarly: … It may be the least trouble to say as a general precaution that strength should be allowed to come to fullness naturally as one becomes proficient in sitting. We should sit so that our energy increases of itself and brims over instead of putting physical pressure on the lower abdomen by force. (“An Introduction to Zen Training: A Translation of Sanzen Nyumon”, Omori Sogen, tr. Dogen Hosokawa and Roy Yoshimoto, Tuttle Publishing, p 59) I would posit that the patterns in the development of ch’i reflect involuntary activity of the body generated in the stretch of ligaments. There is, in addition, a possible mechanism of support for the spine from the displacement of the fascia behind the spine, a displacement that can be effected by pressure generated in the abdominal cavity and that may quite possibly depend on a push on the fascia behind the sacrum by the bulk of the extensor muscles, as they contract. The final level in the development of ch’i concerns “chin”. According to the classics, “chin comes from the ligaments” (“Cheng Tzu’s Thirteen Treatises on Ta’i Chi Chuan”, as above). The three stages of the final level are: “t’ing chin, listening to or feeling strength”; “comprehension of chin”; “omnipotence”. (ibid) Another translator rendered the last stage above as “perfect clarity” (“Master Cheng’s Thirteen Chapters on T’ai-Chi Ch’uan”, tr. Douglas Wile, p 57). In my estimation, “perfect clarity” is “the pureness of (one’s) mind” that Gautama associated with ...the fourth concentration. (A Way of Living) Gautama’s metaphor for the fourth concentration: … it is as if (a person) might be sitting down who had clothed (themselves) including (their) head with a white cloth; there would be no part of (their) whole body that was not covered by the white cloth. (MN 119, © Pali Text Society vol. III p 134) (Just to Sit) “Imagine that a lump of soft butter, pure in colour and fra­grance and the size and shape of a duck egg, is suddenly placed on the top of your head. As it begins to slowly melt, it imparts an exquisite sensation, moistening and saturating your head within and without. It continues to ooze down, moistening your shoul­ders, elbows, and chest; permeating lungs, diaphragm, liver, stomach, and bowels; moving down the spine through the hips, pelvis, and buttocks." (Hakuin's account of Hukuyu's teaching, from "Wild Ivy, The Spiritual Autobiography of Zen Master Hakuin", translated by Norman Waddell. © 1999 by Norman Waddell) I can testify to the sensation of a white cloth covering the head and the entire body. I believe that sensation has its roots in reflex activity of the body as a consequence of the placement of attention by the necessity of breath, reflex activity that works the muscles against the ligaments of the sacrum and spine to align the vertebrae and allow the displacement of the thoracolumbar fascia: The suffusion of the body with “purity by the pureness of mind” in the fourth concentration can allow the thoracolumbar fascial sheet to sustain an openness of nerve exits along the sacrum and spine. Such an openness is accompanied by an ability to feel throughout the body to the surface of the skin. There is a relationship between the ease of nerve exits from the sacrum and spine and feeling on the surface of the skin. Here is a chart from the early 1900’s of the specifics of that relationship on the front of the body: The free placement of attention in the movement of breath depends on an ability to feel throughout the body to the surface of the skin. (Just to Sit) The emphasis on the collection of ch'i at the lower dan t'ien corresponds to Gautama's second concentration, and to the Rinzai Zen focus on the hara that accompanied Hakuin's practice of the golden egg. That's the emphasis that Omori Sogen warned against, in the passage I quoted above. I discuss my approach to the concentrations in Applying the Pali Instructions, and again in Just to Sit.

duct-taping (whatever is waxing and waning, waving, drowning, to Roger Waters' Wall--see? simplified.).

…I say that determinate thought is action. When one determines, one acts by deed, word, or thought. (AN 6.63, tr. Pali Text Society vol III p 294) And what… is the ceasing of action? That ceasing of action by body, speech, and mind, by which one contacts freedom,–that is called ‘the ceasing of action’. (SN 35.146, tr. Pali Text Society vol IV p 85) Fixing thought, nix, nix: That which we will…, and that which we intend to do and that wherewithal we are occupied:–this becomes an object for the persistance of consciousness. The object being there, there comes to be a station of consciousness. Consciousness being stationed and growing, rebirth of renewed existance takes place in the future, and here from birth, decay, and death, grief, lamenting, suffering, sorrow, and despair come to pass. Such is the uprising of this mass of ill. Even if we do not will, or intend to do, and yet are occupied with something, this too becomes an object for the persistance of consciousness… whence birth… takes place. But if we neither will, nor intend to do, nor are occupied about something, there is no becoming of an object for the persistance of consciousness. The object being absent, there comes to be no station of consciousness. Consciousness not being stationed and growing, no rebirth of renewed existence takes place in the future, and herefrom birth, decay-and-death, grief, lamenting, suffering, sorrow and despair cease. Such is the ceasing of this entire mass of ill. (SN 12.38; © Pali Text Society SN vol. II p 45) Let the mind be present without an abode. (Diamond Sutra; translation Venerable Master Hsing Yun, from “The Rabbit’s Horn: A Commentary on the Platform Sutra”, Buddha’s Light Publishing pg. 60)

Along those lines. The couple in this video got serious scientific support, but a double-blind study will take funds they haven't secured yet. P.S.--as they say in the video, don't try this at home!

I don't sit lotus, bad enough for me getting up from a sloppy half-lotus! Thanks for asking, about my point. The point is that it is possible to act without will, without willing action to take place. That is the action described as "wu wei", so far as I understand it. As Zen teacher Kobun Chino Otogawa said: It’s impossible to teach the meaning of sitting. You won’t believe it. Not because I say something wrong, but until you experience it and confirm it by yourself, you cannot believe it. (“Embracing Mind”, edited by Cosgrove & Hall, p 48) From Wikipedia: Wu wei (traditional Chinese: 無為; simplified Chinese: 无为; pinyin: wúwéi; Jyutping: mou4-wai4) is an ancient Chinese concept that literally means "actionlessness" or "motionlessness". The term is interpreted and translated in various ways as "actionlessness", "non-action", "inaction," "without action" or "effortless action", etc. Wu wei is effortless by virtue of it being reflex or automatic activity, even though the individual is fully conscious of it taking place.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1 Corinthians 13&version=NIV Similarly, Bart D. Ehrman, in “The New Testament: A Historical Introduction”, notes that the Corinthian congregation faced numerous issues involving interpersonal conflicts and ethical improprieties. He states: “The congregation that Paul addresses appears to have been riddled with problems involving interpersonal conflicts and ethical improprieties. His letter indicates that some of its members were at each other’s throats, claiming spiritual superiority over one another.” (Marko Marina, Ph.D., Exploring 1 Corinthians: Authorship, Summary, and Dating) Always good to understand the context. I'm always floored by the assumption that everyone understands what "love" is. Paul gives characteristics, but if love is a feeling and a person doesn't feel it, the question is how do they regain it (love, that is)?

Don’t ever think that you can sit zazen! That’s a big mistake! Zazen sits zazen! (Shunryu Suzuki, quoted by Blanche Hartman in the "Lou and Blanche Hartman" interview by David Chadwick, on cuke.com) You know, sometimes zazen gets up and walks around. (Kobun Chino Otogawa, at the close of of a lecture at the S. F. Zen Center, in the 1980's) They do nothing and yet there's nothing left undone. (translation of 無 為 而 無 不 為 [wu2 wei2 er2 wu2 bu4 wei2], by Cobie [DDJ ch. 48])

Screencap from “The Pink Purloiner” episode of SpongeBob SquarePants.

Watch out for nutrition science: ... The stand out example for me is nutrition science. A lot of the big, obvious effects have been picked through and now so much of it is simmering in noise with strong incentives to find various different things by getting significance. Alcohol/chocolate/coffee does, doesn’t, does, doesn’t, does, doesn’t cause increased mortality. I don’t know how we could expect that discipline to turn around. There is good work being done there here and there, but so much of it is GIGO. I have a paper in the works trying to sort out how we can know if a field is producing knowledge or just chasing ghosts . . . (Joe Bak-Coleman, collective behavior scientist at the University of Washington) ... Regarding nutrition science: yeah, this is another field where there’s endless crap being hyped. Also related areas in health science such as that stupid cold-shower study or all the crappy sleep research. I don’t have any sense of an escape route for all this. On one hand, nutrition, health behavior, exercise, sleep, etc., are hugely important and worth scientific study. On the other hand, these fields are so rotten, with really incompetent or unethical people deeply embedded within the system of academic publication and news media promotion, that sometimes it just seems entirely hopeless. (blog "Statistical Modeling, Causal Inference, and Social Science", today's entry by Andrew Gelman, professor of statistics and political science at Columbia University)

A Bastet case, I have become reading sonnets, having fun The port is good, so they declare in Portugal, some cat is there who sweeps a tail across the rug and makes a toy of some poor bug photo Jon Bodsworth

Gautama taught four initial concentrations, and I would say the fourth has a freedom of movement of consciousness in the body. From Just to Sit on my website: The suffusion of the body with “purity by the pureness of mind” in the fourth concentration can allow the thoracolumbar fascial sheet to sustain an openness of nerve exits along the sacrum and spine. Such an openness is accompanied by an ability to feel throughout the body to the surface of the skin. That’s reflected in Gautama’s metaphor for the fourth concentration: … it is as if (a person) might be sitting down who had clothed (themselves) including (their) head with a white cloth; there would be no part of (their) whole body that was not covered by the white cloth. (MN 119, © Pali Text Society vol. III p 134 ) There is a relationship between the ease of nerve exits from the sacrum and spine and feeling on the surface of the skin. Here is a chart from the early 1900’s of the specifics of that relationship on the front of the body: The free placement of attention in the movement of breath depends on an ability to feel throughout the body to the surface of the skin. As I wrote previously: When a presence of mind is retained as the placement of attention shifts, then the natural tendency toward the free placement of attention draws out thoughts initial and sustained, and brings on the stages of concentration. (Shunryu Suzuki on Shikantaza and the Theravadin Stages) The first four concentrations were said to be marked by equanimity with respect to the multiplicity of the senses. The four further concentrations were marked by equanimity with respect to the uniformity of the senses, and the first three were induced by the minds of compassion, of sympathetic joy, and of equanimity "without limit". From my The Inconceivable Nature of the Wind: [One] dwells, having suffused the first quarter [of the world] with friendliness, likewise the second, likewise the third, likewise the fourth; just so above, below, across; [one] dwells having suffused the whole world everywhere, in every way, with a mind of friendliness that is far-reaching, wide-spread, immeasurable, without enmity, without malevolence. [One] dwells having suffused the first quarter with a mind of compassion… with a mind of sympathetic joy… with a mind of equanimity that is far-reaching, wide-spread, immeasurable, without enmity, without malevolence. (MN 7, tr. Pali Text Society vol I p 48 ) Gautama said that “the excellence of the heart’s release” through the extension of the mind of compassion was the first of the further concentrations, a concentration he called “the plane of infinite ether” (MN 7, tr. Pali Text Society vol I p 48 ). The Oxford English Dictionary offers some quotes about “ether” (Oxford English Dictionary, s.v. “ether (n.),” March 2024, https://doi.org/10.1093/OED/1514129048 ): They [sc. the Brahmins] thought the stars moved, and the planets they called fishes, because they moved in the ether, as fishes do in water. (Vince, Complete System. Astronomy vol. II. 253 [1799]) Plato considered that the stars, chiefly formed of fire, move through the ether, a particularly pure form of air. (Popular Astronomy vol. 24 364 [1916]) When the free location of consciousness is accompanied by an extension of the mind of compassion, there can be a feeling that the necessity of breath is connected to things that lie outside the boundaries of the senses. That, to me, is an experience of “the plane of infinite ether”. I'm thinking this is all connected with the freedom of the akh in Egyptian mythology.

Sorry to hear of your father's illness and passing, Steve. Take care of yourself!

I am late to the dance, too, at 75. In Gautama’s teaching, the extension of “purity by the pureness of mind” belonged to the last of four concentrations. The initial concentration is induced, said Gautama, by “making self-surrender the object of thought”: … the (noble) disciple, making self-surrender the object of (their) thought, lays hold of concentration, lays hold of one-pointedness. (The disciple), aloof from sensuality, aloof from evil conditions, enters on the first trance, which is accompanied by thought initial and sustained, which is born of solitude, easeful and zestful, and abides therein. (SN 48.10, tr. PTS vol V p 174; parentheticals paraphrase original; "initial" for "directed") In my experience, “one-pointedness” occurs when the movement of breath necessitates the placement of attention at a singular location in the body, and a person “lays hold of one-pointedness” when they remain awake as the singular location shifts. Gautama described the “first trance” as having feelings of zest and ease, and he prescribed the extension of those feelings: … (a person) steeps, drenches, fills, and suffuses this body with zest and ease, born of solitude, so that there is not one particle of the body that is not pervaded by this lone-born zest and ease. (AN 5.28, tr. PTS vol. III pp 18-19, parentheticals paraphrase original) Words like “steeps” and “drenches” convey that the weight of the body accompanies the feelings of zest and ease. The weight of the body sensed at a particular point in the body can shift the body’s center of gravity, and a shift in the body’s center of gravity can result in what Moshe Feldenkrais termed “reflex movement”. Feldenkrais described how “reflex movement” can be engaged in standing up from a chair: …When the center of gravity has really moved forward over the feet a reflex movement will originate in the old nervous system and straighten the legs; this automatic movement will not be felt as an effort at all. (“Awareness Through Movement”, Moshe Feldenkrais, p 78) “Drenching” the body “so that there is not one particle of the body that is not pervaded” with zest and ease allows the weight of the body to effect “reflex movement” in the activity of the body, wherever “one-pointedness” takes place. In falling asleep, the mind can sometimes react to hypnagogic sleep paralysis with an attempt to reassert control over the muscles of the body, causing a “hypnic jerk”. The extension of a weighted zest and ease can pre-empt the tendency to reassert voluntary control in the induction of concentration, and make possible a conscious experience of “reflex movement” in inhalation and exhalation. Gautama offered a metaphor for the first concentration that emphasized the cultivation of one-pointedness. Here’s the full description: … just as a handy bathman or attendant might strew bath-powder in some copper basin and, gradually sprinkling water, knead it together so that the bath-ball gathered up the moisture, became enveloped in moisture and saturated both in and out, but did not ooze moisture; even so, (a person) steeps, drenches, fills, and suffuses this body with zest and ease, born of solitude, so that there is not one particle of the body that is not pervaded by this lone-born zest and ease. (AN 5.28, tr. PTS vol. III pp 18-19, parentheticals paraphrase original) The juxtaposition of a singular bath-ball with the extension of zest and ease such that “there is not one particle of the body that is not pervaded” might seem dissonant, yet in my experience the two can be realized together, and at least initially neither can be sustained alone. (Just to Sit) Shunryu Suzuki said, "in shikantaza, our mind should pervade every parts of our physical being." Gautama said, "… seated, (one) suffuses (one’s) body with purity by the pureness of (one’s) mind so that there is not one particle of the body that is not pervaded with purity by the pureness of (one’s) mind." The difference between "every parts of our physical being" and "not one particle of the body that is not pervaded" is the difference between "all over the body" and "throughout the body": Yun Yen asked Tao Wu, “What does the Bodhisattva of Great Compassion use so many hands and eyes for?” Wu said, “It’s like somebody reaching back groping for a pillow in the middle of the night.” Yen said, “I understand.” Wu said, “How do you understand it?” Yen said, “All over the body are hands and eyes.” Wu said, “You have said quite a bit there, but you’ve only said eighty percent of it.” Yen said, “What do you say, Elder Brother?” Wu said, “Throughout the body are hands and eyes.” (“The Blue Cliff Record”, Yuanwu, tr. Cleary & Cleary, Shambala p. 489)

The advice most zendos give beginners is to “follow the breath”, though as Shunryu Suzuki said, following the breath is only a preparatory practice: … usually in counting breathing or following breathing, you feel as if you are doing something, you know– you are following breathing, and you are counting breathing. This is, you know, why counting breathing or following breathing practice is, you know, for us it is some preparation– preparatory practice for shikantaza because for most people it is rather difficult to sit, you know, just to sit. (“The Background of Shikantaza”, Shunryu Suzuki; San Francisco, February 22, 1970) Suzuki described shikantaza in more detail: So most teacher may say shikantaza is not so easy, you know. It is not possible to continue more than one hour, because it is intense practice to take hold of all our mind and body by the practice which include everything. So in shikantaza, our mind should pervade every parts of our physical being. That is not so easy. ( “I have nothing in my mind”, Shunryu Suzuki, July 15, 1969) Gautama spoke similarly about the mind pervading the body: … seated, (one) suffuses (one’s) body with purity by the pureness of (one’s) mind so that there is not one particle of the body that is not pervaded with purity by the pureness of (one’s) mind. (AN 5.28, tr. PTS vol. III pp 18-19, parentheticals paraphrase original) “The pureness of mind” Gautama referred to is the pureness of the mind without any will or intent with regard to the activity of the body. (Just to Sit) Pretty much the same, there!