Maddie

I realize this is an old thread but as I was doing the inner smile today precisely this question came to my mind. I was thinking that if in mindfulness meditation you focus on one thing to achieve emptiness then would not the inner smile (focusing on a organ) also be a way of doing this?

Well I used a Lung meditation yesterday and that helped a lot, and quickly too.

I agree it should be felt too. What I've noticed is after I visualize it for a while, I then start to feel it. Every time I do these kinds of meditations eventually I start to feel all sorts of tingling and buzzing in that area.

Speaking of visualization. In another thread I had mentioned how I've just sort of gotten back into qigong organ meditaion and that today I worked on my Liver. I noticed that it was harder and took longer to make the Liver glow brightly its color (green) as opposed to the other organs I'd done earlier this week. hmmm....

Never said it was pre-natal jing, just some kind of jing.

This problem in TCM is called food stagnation. The herbal formula Bo He Wan is good for this problme. http://www.activeherb.com/baohe/

You know a while back I used to do this type of qigong extensively (working on specific organs) for various reasons but just recently have starting doing it again and I think its great! I started off earlier this week working on my Spleen and that felt really good. Yesterday I did my Lungs and that made me feel really good too. Today it was the Liver which also made me feel great. The main method I use is a combination of the inner smile and the healing sounds. Does anyone else do much work with organs like this? If so what do you notice from it?

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/substance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adenosine_triphosphate ATP is a molecule made which in turn is made of atoms, which have weight and take up space so fit the definition of substance.

Really?

Isn't emptiness both a Taoist and Buddhist concept / goal?

Does anyone else combine Vispasanna with their mantra? If so do you find it effective?

Yea I was contemplating how many various topics have come out of the sexual energy thread, but I guess that's what generative energy does haha.

Hmm yea that sounds very interesting. Yes I am studying acupuncture which makes this book seem all the more interesting :-)

Hey Lindelani. I'm a TCM student, and ideally you want yin and yang in your body to be as balanced as possible. So anyways I'll try to do my best to answer your original question of yin and yang (its funny I woke up pondering this lol). You can think of Yin and Yang simply as the polarity of opposites. They are the two forces of the universe that are constantly in motion. They oppose each other but also balance each other. Some examples are , male/female, light/dark, sun/moon, up/down/ left/right... ok you get the idea lol. The original model of Yin and Yang was the light and sunny side of a hill way back in ancient China. Now as far as the notion of good and evil. Yes I have heard of this interpretation so in one sense you could say it does apply. But in Taoism the idea of good and evil is not really the same as in the west. What I mean is in Taoism they tend to not want to label something as good or evil because a lot of what is called good or evil is not absolute but a matter of perspective. A good example is Darth Vader lol. Ok so everyone is like "yea he is the evil bad guy". Ok, but then you watch Anakin turn into Darth Vader and he is not thinking he is doing evil, but he thinks he is trying to save Padme's life. He is actually wanting to do something good. So anyways you get the point (I hope) haha. Now in Chinese medicine the balance of Yin and Yang is very important. If someone's yin and yang is more or less balanced they are said to have good health. If one (or both) become unbalanced it causes health problems. Actually the imbalance of yin and yang in almost any case causes issues. As far as your question how can you balance them with in you there are several ways. But keep in mind that since yin and yang are always in motion you can't just balance them once and think your good, its kind of an ongoing effort. The TCM approach uses acupuncture and herbs, The qigong approach uses movements and meditations. The typical teenaged boy approach is to chase girls haha. So there are lots of ways. :-)

Yea the word "vs" is in there but not really one I would have picked. I think Buddhism and Taoism compliment each other wonderfully!

well since ATP is coming from the western as opposed to eastern point of view pinning it down can be a bit ambiguous, but at the very least I'll give my rationale for classifying ATP as jing. If you make the distinction of jing being electrochemical potential energy and qi being electromagnetic energy then you would have to consider ATP as jing. I would see the qi coming from the ATP going through the electron transfer chain and then giving off that electron in the process of turning into ADP. I would venture to say the qi is produced when that electron is given off. At least that's may take on it.

Funny you mention the motivation part cause I had not thought about it until you mentioned it, but yea I do have a bit more motivation lately.

lol I'm very familiar with what ATP is, I am in med school after all ;-)

I'm not sure if this is applicable to this conversation or not, but based upon my personal experience lately of a combination of celibacy and meditation my desire to learn seems to have increased a lot. Also I feel like as I keep doing this my understanding of cultivation principles has improved. I suppose that is the reason monks do all that cultivation along side their studies, or at least part of the reason.

I believe ATP would be a sort of jing.

Yes, this used to bother me too, until one day I mentioned this same question to someone and they asked me if I remembered being born lol. No I don't, but obviously I was :-P.

I like what you shared, and found it particularly interesting as just recently I have begun feeding hungry ghosts. The ceremony involves saying some mantras over the food you give them, so yea very cool :-).

Oh, its been a while since I read the book but I could have sworn Dr. Yang said it stores qi too.

I've practiced RAB quite a bit in the past, but I want to make sure my theoretical understanding is sound. So from what I understand about RAB theoretically is that it not only builds qi, but also helps to store it efficiently. Is this a correct understanding? Are there any other benefits as well?

I believe the Buddha said ignorance is not seeing things as they really are.