Athanor

Would you mind telling us, who've never practiced this, about the effects and results you mentioned? I'm really curious.

Look at this video. You can actually make the paper thing and put it on a pin. Try to spin it around. I worked a while with the paper thing but I couldn't figure out how to fake the spinning what you see in the video. Blowing can't be the answer because it makes the paper staggering, while the one in the video doesn't stagger at all. I once found another video in which someone did the whole thing under a glass, but I can't find it now. The question is: how can you do it? I don't mean theoretical answers like "guiding your qi" and such - of course we would need the theory too -, but I want to know how to apply the theory in real life, how to actually do things in my mind (what to think, where to focus, etc.) and my body which will lead this little paper to spin on the pin. If you can do the spinning, try to observe what you do in all the details and share it with us. Let's try to create a description which can be followed by anyone, and can result in the actual application of the theory of guiding qi. It would be a great aim in further exercises and individual development. Edited: Please keep in mind that this topic was created to find answer to the question HOW TO DO IT. According to this, please do not come here just to insult me - you can open another topic for that if you like. Please note that the answer to the "how" question is a properly described experiment which is repeatable and produces the same result under the same circumstances. So just because you state that it's caused by heat, it won't be true, unless you can tell HOW and we can make it. Let's move on.

One very clear way to show others that you're driven by your own ego is to expect others to respect you.

Indeed. I'd just like to point out one more thing. There is a difference between asserting something and explaining something. For instance, answering to a "what" question (with what can I do this?) requires only a statement (with this and that), while answering to a "how" question (how to do this?) needs an explanation. A proper explanation tells the whole necessary process with reasonably great details; expecting the other (the reader) to be a total layman. By explaining something this way the explanation will be most likely adequate to everyone, even to those who are really total laymen. However, if you are asked a how question and your answer is a simple statement, then you did not answer the question. (Except of course if the process description was short enough to be fit into one statement, but most of the time this is not the case.) And then there is no need from you for any further fuss. Don't be mad if you don't answer properly and the other rejects your answer. Try to figure out why it was rejected.

Well you certainly put a smile on my face Thanks for the post. Maybe not all demonstrations are fake. Maybe it can be done with qi energy too. But I wonder how to learn it, if not on a place where lots of highly qualified people gather together to share knowledge...

Actually, if you ask a Buddhist "What does reincarnate, what is the particular thing that is you, that carries your karma to the next life?", they won't give you a fair answer either. I didn't say there is no "me", I said that I can't think of anything that could be truly me, the real me - because the things I can think of are mostly just parts of the whole "me-concept"

When I try to examine this question then the above argument indeed loses its meaning. However, when I tried to find an answer to this, I could only find that I can't find an answer, i.e. that I don't find a single thing which can be called "I" or "me", or my "self". I can't identify the inner observer. So obviously I can't tell about its parameters, capabilities and limits, neither can I tell what affects it and how. However, I think enlightenment may be something like becoming fully aware of our real identity, "who we are" in reality. But I have little knowledge on how to do it, I mostly rely on Shankara's Atma Bodha in this issue.

Exactly However, when after committing a crime they face the judge and they try to defend themselves saying "I had no choice, I have no free will, I was determined to do that", the judge can also say "I am determined to send you to jail". So this actually doesn't make someone avoid consequences either

I don't know whether I have free will or not. But I found that it doesn't matter. We do the same thing if we are bound to do it according to external circumstances and inner states (mental, emotional, etc. states) because all is predetermined, and when we are allowed to choose free because we have free will. The only difference is in recognizing free will itself. When you recognize that you have it, it will become a very important parameter that will change all your behavior. However, this change also occurs if free will is not actually there but you still recognize it as if you'd have it, because it will still become a parameter in the process. A very powerful parameter actually, which will alter the outcome of all your behavior, regardless whether this behavior is actually the product of free will or determination. In this approach, the question whether you have free will or not is not important.

I personally don't think that you have the right to make a decision in the name of humanity, or to decide what is nonsense and what isn't. Flying was also considered nonsense once, and people who merely believed something without further research and development, they were the ones who considered it nonsense. I think true spiritual mastery begins with letting others do their own mistakes. Someone said once that everyone has the right to be stupid. If you think about your own life, you will probably see that you didn't develop although you made failures but you did because you made failures. And that experience cannot be replaced with teaching or mere belief. You of all people, with so much experience, should know how important this is, and that you cannot protect people from failures because those are the things which will help them to develop. Instead, people should fall into traps, do mistakes, and suffer the consequences, and a master should preferably be there to help them understand what happened, instead of avoiding it to happen. IMO. I still think, according to your posts here, that you expect people too much to believe what you say. I am glad, however, that the animosity-part is over, and I'd gladly continue a discussion about this in a peaceful manner if you like.

I agree, but I don't think it's easy at all. One basic principle of a society is that the members can be manipulated through certain aspects of the society itself. These aspects are things from average income, through general aim of people, as far as the belief and attitude of the members. Marketing on all level is based on this manipulation, and there are very precise systems which can tell what will be a profitable manipulation. This is only possible because people do not use their potential of free will. It is much harder to live our life in a totally unique and not attached way than to give in to attachments as the rest of the society, to become somewhat homogeneous with others, and to rely on others on a much larger level than necessary. This leads me to another interpretation of karma. If you live your life according to certain rules and parameters, your life will be the result of those rules and parameters. This can be understood as the results of one's life are the karmic consequences of those karmic principles which are embedded in the rules and parameters of the society. The more you rely on these, the more you rely on karma. Yet, if you reach total non-attachment, the consequences predetermined by the society's rules and parameters won't affect your life - or at least they'll affect it on an infinitesimal level. In this case you indeed bring your own free will into effect, and you will not have to face the usual karmic consequences. Of course relying on the society is just one side of the whole, the same type of attachment goes to natural phenomena and many other things too.

If Lao Tzu would see these exalted, spiritually developed, much achieved and much experienced people acting like a prig or a peevish child, I bet he wouldn't bother to write a single word into his little book. If someone might still have a description on how to do the spinning with qi energy then I'd be glad to read it. Otherwise I consider this topic closed.

Well, there are no on-line sanghas around here, and the nearest real sangha is about a hundred km-s away My hometown is not really the ideal place for daily practice... You see, it is said that the place of birth and living is also a karmic result. And it determines pretty much, doesn't it? Oh well... thank you for your help, I don't bother you anymore. But if you really write an article about this issue then let me know

In case you haven't noticed, heat was not the answer. You might want to read the insult policy reminder topic before posting once again.

Well, first let me thank you for your time and effort to write down this long answer, I really appreciate it. However, I'd lie if I'd say I fully understand what you just said partially due to language difficulties. I'd gladly read your article on this issue if you'd use less complex sentences so I could understand it easier Anyway, I still don't really understand what you mean by karma. I mean you said "karma is not justice". Alright. But then why do the religions which accept karma teach that if you do good then good things will happen to you and if you do bad then bad things will happen to you? Because basically this is what they teach when they tell you to be compassionate and practice loving-kindness... Most likely if you put a fork into the power-socket then you will not pay the price of innocent play. According to the religious approach, in this case you'll probably pay the price of an earlier bad deed, maybe from one of your previous lives. I think this notion of karma is a little elementary. But, besides that most people probably understand this much from the whole concept, I still don't understand what would be the significance of karma if it does not determine anything. I understand what you said about the possibilities, that the actual present limits the possibilities of the future. I also understand that there is a degree of freedom. What I don't understand is that if these things eventually don't determine our lives because - as you said - it's not justice, then why should we care about karma at all? And then what is enlightenment about, if karma is not something to care about? Am I asking stupid questions? Sorry...

THE SOLUTION: First I'd like to tell you all that I expected more from you people on this forum. I haven't faced so much ignorance and animosity for years. I explained why I wasn't satisfied with any of your answers, but you just kept saying things without reason, without explanation, and without experimenting with this very-very simple thing. It would just have taken 3 minutes from your life to check whether your ideas were correct or not, but NO! And yet, you called me ego-driven, and I was the one who almost got banned out of here. Then again, I remind you, NONE of you answered the question HOW to do it. I clearly pointed out that I don't ask the theory, I ask the practical application. But did you tell it? NO! I am very disappointed that a forum dealing with spirituality does not take spirituality seriously; does not want to learn; does not want to develop; does not want to experiment. You just tell things to each other and expect the other to believe, like Ya Mu, or you just insult others, like fizix, for no reason at all. It's a shame. And here I am sharing with you the knowledge I received from a physicist who was open-minded, educated and enthusiastic enough to think about it and share his reasonable thoughts. Solution #1: When you put your hand near the paper, you create a quarter tube. If you blow into your hand (not on the paper but into the tube, the space between your hand and the paper), if you blow in a very thin line, perhaps through a straw, then you create an air current which will pull the paper's one side with itself, thus spins the paper. Blow from about the height of the paper to avoid downward streaming air to sway the paper. With two straws you can do the same thing with both hands, with two objects. With one more person behind the camera you can do it as long as you can breath... Solution #2: Take tiny metal pieces and glue them under the paper. Put a jar on the top of the paper just to avoid air currents. Take an adequately strong magnet and ask someone to move it under the table in a circle. If the magnet is not too strong to pull the paper down from the pin, but is strong enough to affect the metal on the paper, then it will spin it. Although these applications don't involve qi energy, they are still achievable. Although I wanted to learn how to use qi energy to affect things, at least I learned how this experiment can be faked. Do you know why this is good? Because now I KNOW. And do you know what I avoid with this? BLIND FAITH. But you just stick to that if you will.

Finally someone understands Thank you! However, I can't recall any proofs from those who I didn't agree with...

LOL I said it wrong I mean to make it seem like if it would spin because of some mystical energy but actually it's not In fact, I also know a way how to do the same trick under a glass jar

I figured out a way how to fake the spinning

I just don't understand how this relates to karma, as something what determines our lives, our future, and our future lives Do you mean that the degree of freedom is what we experience as our own choice, and thus it directly affects the whole process? But this would mean exactly the opposite of what I've learned from karma. It would mean that when you do something karmically unwholesome, then you don't necessarily have to "pay the price". Because of the uncertainty of the whole system, you might actually get away with no effects at all, or even the opposite effect. The degree of freedom also states that the effect must be close to the cause, but since karma is something what remains for thousands of lifetimes, it's hard to imagine that it'll still work then... Or did I miss something?

This sounds like the uncertainty principle.

Well, let me just explain some things. 1. I didn't know you wrote that book. Michael Lomax and Ya Mu don't seem to be the same name. Sorry if I should have known. When you wrote you finally learned your lesson from there, I thought you meant by reading that part of the book. 2. I didn't write "you lie", I wrote "you are allowed to lie". It means that the reader may decide whether what you wrote is truth or fiction, because you aren't obliged to write the truth. 3. We all follow what we believe, even you. I'm not unique in this. "Evil spirit" experiences can be most likely caused by many psychological dysfunctions and can be cured in the 21st century. However, I must admit, there are also unexplained phenomena which might be caused by something that is yet considered as supernatural. 4. Literature is neither exact, nor science. If I handle it as unscientific, it's not my fault, you should have expected this when you first started to write. For your consideration about this "I don't believe" thing, let me just remind you that humanity was kept in darkness and fear because of their belief. Having the desire and will to doubt is what raised mankind out of the middle ages. You should be thankful for it instead of blaming one for his doubt. Don't think that I just say "I don't believe this" to anything. But I've seen many people misleading and misguiding thousands with "angels" and "evil spirits" and "good spirits", yet, no one else has seen those creatures except for those people who made millions by selling the stories about them. I didn't say you're this kind of person. I just said that the belief which you value so much leaded to a very reasonable doubt about such stories, books, and authors. This is definitely not my fault. Overhanging someone with being banned out of the forum is indeed a personal attack. But I don't care.

Are you talking about other people's strong egos because then you feel as if you wouldn't be driven by your own? Think again. You are clearly driven by your own. If you remind others to their weaknesses, that won't make you strong, but will clearly show your own defects.

I was thinking about this too. But if you look at many of these videos, you'll find that they don't put there their hands carefully, they do it more accidentally and their hand's position is mostly different. They don't try to create convectional route. Not to mention the ones in which the man puts both his hands on the both sides of the paper, thus there would be two convections towards the opposite directions. I'm still looking for the one video with the glass...