Maddie

No matter what you do in life there will always be those who agree with you, disagree with you, and who don't care. "Truth" more often than naught is a point of view. The meth addict on the corner may think your mean when he asks you for meth money if you don't give it to him. If you were to give it to him, someone else might think you were bad for supporting his habit. Of course you shouldn't try to go out of your way to be mean to others, but ultimately you need to find your own way, and thus the irony of me telling you to find your own way (the tao that can be named is not the tao) lol.

yea sorry that's what I meant, I'm tired lol

Ah yes your probably wondering how a thread about Buddhism vs Taoism lead to this. Well the jist of it is that it was being discussed how Taoism is unique in that its older than Buddhism and came from the pre-solar/patriarchal period of mankind while Buddhism being younger came out of the Brahman culture that had already become solar/patriarchal. Weather you agree or not, at least that was how this topic came to be discussed. Personally I find it fascinating.

Well the key when doing mindfulness meditation is to observe what is in your mind but with out judgment. Also since some or many of the things that you do find make up your conditioning (not your true self) are not always very flattering you need to have a lot of loving-kindness and compassion for yourself, as you observer your thoughts. Detachment is the key, and if you can't detach enough then self compassion.

yea, I'll just use those lol

yea I'm using a computer but its hard to hear. Part of the reason I posted that video (aside from me feeling like that guy when I was asking you to turn it up) was so that I could play them side by side and compare. The video I posted is much louder. For the one you posted I have to keep my head very close to the computer :-(

My main sources for learning these types of meditations were Mantak Chia, Michael Winn, and Gilles Marin who wrote "Five Elements Six Conditions" where he teaches each element meditation in detail. Gilles Marin was a student of Chia who is very much a Chinese qigong teacher. http://www.amazon.com/Five-Elements-Six-Conditions-Psychology/dp/1556435932

And this shift is part of that transition you were talking about from lunar/matriarchy to solar/patriarchy? And with the solar/patriarchy came agriculture, the infinity containing mathematics, war, rape, ejaculation addiction, and all that other jazz? I found that video you posted a few days ago where that lady was talking about the connection between solar worship and the Christ myths.

Hey whats happening? I love the videos but if you could somehow make the volume a bit higher...um...yeeeeaaahhh.... that would be great.

In another one of my discussions with my ex-gf who was the anthropologist we were discussing human violence (war,rape) and if I remember her explanation correct it was something along the lines that humans and chimps are both sort of nuts because we developed large cerebrums which along with the higher IQ brings with it greater tendencies for problematic behavior. [i'd say it certainly applied to her at least lol]. Then I asked her if that was THE reason why the Bonobos were more peaceful but according to her they had "issues" because they were totally sex obsessed. So whats your say? Does a larger cerebrum bring with it greater problems necessarily or is there something else going on?

Something I'm wondering is how much these shifts and changes in mathematical calculations and such that you talk about a lot impacted the average joe in day to day life. Now I'm sure joe farmer out there was not pondering all of this directly but I imagine that through the process of cultural conditioning and the collective sub-conscious it must have changed the way he lived and out looked his day to day life. I'm just wondering how?

I actually asked that question to my native studies professor. According to her in the pre-missionary days old for an Eskimo was about what was stated earlier 50s-60s and the most common cause of death was malnutrition (you live 60 years up there and its bound to happen that a hunt or two is not successful). So that was the biggest pre-missionary cause of mortality. Upon contact with the missionaries the mortality rate fell drastically as up to 90% of the population died in massive small pox extinctions. Of those survivors of the small pox holocaust the primary killer became alcoholism as alcohol did not exist in Eskimo culture prior to the missionaries so they had no natural tolerance built up for thousands of years like other cultures did. Though a problem alcoholism is a bigger problem amongst males who leave their native villages and move to towns as they no longer have anything to do (hunting). Women tend to do better in the towns as inside work is their domain so they tend to get jobs more often and don't have quite the same problems. Alcoholism in the native villages is still a problem and is responsible for lowering the overall mortality statistics but is not quite as acute as in towns.

I like this version better :-) https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Oe6W1PB9I_4

Let's look at it this way, sometimes people do bad things to each other. I was married to one totally psycho chick and then not long after getting away from her I get a total psycho gf. Now just to put this into context so no one thinks I'm being overly dramatic I'm talking this chick would physically assault me, and then threaten to kill herself when I was in the process of leaving cause she was assaulting me, and this happened numerous times. Do I think all women are nuts because I got deeply involved with two crazy ones?.... um .... well .... no lol (had to think for a second) haha. To be fair I've known a lot of totally crazy dudes, especially when I was in the Army lol. There are some real nut cases out there of both genders, and men are mean to men, women are mean to women. Basically you get any mix you want out there if you look for it. Of course it does not stop there either. Then you get the whole racist thing, and homophobia, and pretty much people find all sorts of reasons to treat all sorts of other people poorly that are different from them. So is there misogyny in India? um yea. Is there misogyny in the US? yes. Would there be misogyny on the moon if we had a colony there, yup, and all sorts of other stuff that is intrinsic to human nature no matter where they are.

Yea I do agree that as far as my experience goes that Anapana does it best for me for sure, but these other practices are definitely a nice supplement, AND facilitator of these deeper practices

One day in meridian theory class I asked my professor about meridians and evolution (I think he cringes when I raise my hand sometimes lol) Anyways he said that yes various nationalities evolve slightly different meridian systems as an adaptation for the climates they came from. So while we did not specifically mention Eskimos it would seem reasonable to assume that the meridians and blood vessels in their extremities are better adapted to the extreme cold. Even after having been in Austin about 2 years now I still get way hotter than everyone else I know here, and when I'm comfy everyone else is freezing their arse off lol. Its a hard life up there. Wears ya out faster.

I'll have to practice my "look" in the mirror haha. Even the Chinese ones are becoming emboldened to talk more lol. I mean I do like a good conversation, I just don't like feeling like I have chronic fatigue syndrome because of it. So just to cover all my bases I went through all five elements and their corresponding organs with qigong meditation. Aside from the Lung I didn't really find anything of significance. What I did find in the Lung was sort of interesting. First thing I noticed was that after only a few minuets of doing the lung mediation I immediately began to feel less tired, just like the other day in class. It was almost an exact repeat, but since this time I was home and not in class I could pay more attention. I noticed that I was still having my energy drawn upon by those females that I had spoken to in clinic even though I was home. After meditating on my Lung and then observing its strengthening effect on my wei qi I saw this "draw" stop. Just about as soon as it stopped I stopped being tired, almost immediately. This confused me at first but then I thought it gave more evidence for the theory that the universe is just one giant hologram, well this and things like reflexology and ear acupuncture and others. That the entirety could be contained in a fragment. I know a Shaman here in Austin and he calls this phenomenon "cords" but while I suppose that is one way to look at it and label it, this definition didn't seem satisfactory to me. I did not sense "cords" coming out of me, but again using the holographic model of the universe it was as though space-time was irrelevant and since they had established a draw on me it simply continued due to the omnipresence of consciousness which I guess is why the Buddha said we all have the Buddha nature and all we have to do is remove the delusions that prevent us from seeing it. Anyways the realization I experienced while doing the Lung mediation is very difficult to put into words but I hope that at least gives an idea of it.

Yup you keep them girls away from the nuts and they won't get pregnant lol. Yea the diet of the Eskimos in Alaska is overwhelmingly animal based. If they down a flask of seal oil even in the midst of winter there they can break out in sweat. Also just like what you were saying about the Bushmen. The Eskimos are very spiritual about their whale hunts. They have a big ceremony before they leave and no women are allowed to participate or even see the men before they go out on the hunt. They say the whales "give themselves" and when they bring it back they honor its spirit and thank it for feeding the whole village for quite a while. When you get your bachelors degree from the University of Alaska you pick up a few things along the way haha. http://www.amazon.com/Whales-They-Give-Themselves-Conversations/dp/1889963666

Well that is the idea, but of course you don't want to just eat those specific 5 things lol

very wise ;-)

Ok so yesterday I was off, no class, no clinic, just me at home and I felt great. I got to meditate a lot, and had no problems. . I had meditated for about 6 hours yesterday and doing almost an hours worth of the qigong standing set the eight brocades Today I did a clinic shift, and I'll just state the facts nothing that could possibly be just in my head. So at clinic I see a patient no big deal, but in the study area I am totally swarmed by all the girls and all they want to do is talk, talk, talk. Now don't get me wrong I enjoy good conversation so I'm not complaining about socializing lol. But when I get home once again I am just dead tired, including right now. So here's the pattern with no subjective "mental interpretation". Last week I'm off and meditate a lot and feel very good. Early this week my roommate hangs out with me two days in a row (which is unusual these days). The next couple days I'm drop dead tired. I'm off Friday and meditate most the day, and feel very good. This morning I'm skipping to clinic happy about how good I feel and how energized I am. I get to clinic and am swarmed by girls all wanting to talk. I come home from clinic and am drop dead tired again. And come to think of it not only am I uber tired, but I feel kind of bummed out again too. But of course its all just in my head lol. *edit: after posting that I did the lung meditation again and once again it helped quickly. I definitely need to do this before heading out lol.

I was watching this interesting documentary about Greek mythology last night and what was interesting was that one of the scholars on the documentary was pointing out that one thing that was unique about Greek mythology at that point in time was how much emphasis was placed on violence and warfare and that this stood out along with the rise of the patriarchal figure of Zeus. I believe one of the points she was making was that in the past all the emphasis on paternity and violence and warfare was unheard of. She connected it to the rise of agriculture and that now that with the land based agricultural system defending that land and conquering other lands was now the new focus. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8U-06pD958

From a TCM point of view the problem with eating too much of just fruit or too much of just any "flavor' is that each flavor corresponds to an element/organ. As always the key is the balance of the 5 elements in our body, in our mind, in our environment and naturally imbalance causes problems. The flavor of fruit is sweet. Sweet is the flavor of the spleen/earth element. A weak spleen can cause sweet cravings and sweet cravings (if given into) can cause a weak spleen. Its good to try and eat a balance of the five flavors as much as possible, and of course the can be modified depending on season and body constitution. Bitter- heart/fire Pungent (spicy); lung/metal Sweet- spleen/earth Sour-liver/wood Salty-kidney/water

Lol thats funny cause as a kid I totally sucked at basketball. So in Alaska I got into qigong and martial arts big time. After Alaska I am staying with family in San Antonio for a few months before TCM school in Austin begins. So my brother and I are at our old high school shooting baskets just for kicks on the weekend. This group of high school kids shows up with their basketball and after a while challenge my brother and I to a game. Me and my brother accept but I'm kind of thinking that since they are young and seem to be into basketball this might not go so well lol. Well to make a long story short my brother and I totally slaughter them haha. All that qigong and martial arts in Alaska gave me a lot more focus, coordination, and endurance than I had even had as a kid, and certainly more than these kids had as well lol. Qigong makes everything easier :-)

I bet it was super hard for him to give up Kung-fu considering how good he was at it and how much a part of his life it was. I felt a sense of loss just reading about that lol.