Daeluin

My childhood was somewhat like this. More recently it was reflected to me that I was providing the energy that fed some of the extreme situations we found ourselves in. At first I felt shocked, but over time I came to accept the truth in this. Even without options, simply remaining in that situation did allow my energy to support and feed the ambitions of the other. Without this energy the other could not have gone as far. Water is often symbolized by the trigram Kan ☵. The true yang surrounded by the false yin. The name also means a pit, or an abyss, and the trigam is also called danger. In relation to Fire, Li ☲, which mean separation, these two symbols describe a fundamental principle. That of the natural tendency of the original yin and yang, symbolized by heaven ☰ and earth ☷, to exchange with each other. The heavy core of heaven falls into the receptive embrace of earth. Heaven, separated from its core, becomes Li, and Earth becomes the pit that the core of heaven fell into. The emptiness of the mind and consciousness is represented by the true yin now residing at the core of heaven. The thing is, this Kan, pregnant and heavy with an energy that is difficult to maintain balance, is always slipping into any place that seems receptive enough to hold it. This can be seen in every facet of our interactions in the outside world. It is when our own strength of mind is separated enough from this water energy that it tends to pull us into a situation that we weren't prepared for. The intentional manifestation of this can be very beautiful, as in pregnancy. Yet too we see how for many pregnancy can become an unexpected situation that binds those involved in a new long-term enterprise that was not necessarily their intention. Too we can see this operation in monetary exchanges, like gambling, where one embraces the danger of massive loss for the potential of massive gain. In my situation growing up without autonomy, disallowed the freedom to make my own choices, I happily hid my inner development away for a time that I could discover it freely. In the mean time I made myself content to observe behind a shell. But was a I really content? My mind sought to escape into stories, and as my Fire lessened it's focus on reality, my Water became more difficult to control, and I wonder if the resulting exploration of sexuality was also related to allowing my Water to escape and thus be absorbed as resource to fuel the ambitions of the person without much Water. Sure enough things ramped up during those years, and fell away after I left home. Whatever the case, it is clear that when the fire and the water separate from each other, we are pulled in two directions. If we ramp up the fire and attach to the True Yin, we can burn up the Water so that it cannot control us, and we also remove much of our influence on the water domain. And if we cultivate the True Yang within the water without also strengthening the True Yin which can maintain the inner home that contains it, it becomes more likely for the True Yang to fall out of balance and risk the danger of becoming entrapped in some external abyss. The cantong qi puts it well, translation by Fabrizio Pregadio in The Seal of the Unity of the Three: "When Yang loses its token" Kan is man and is the Moon, Li is woman and is the Sun. Thus the Sun sends forth virtue, the Moon unfurls radiance. The Moon receives, the Sun gives, and their bodies are not harmed, not depleted. When Yang loses its token, Yin trespasses on its light. Between the month's last day and the next month's first, it encroaches, overcasting and upsetting: Yang dissolves its form, Yin invades, and calamity is born. Each upon the other should man and woman wait, inhaling, exhaling, each nourishing the other. Feminine and masculine should mingle, each seeking the other kind. "If man goes past the measure" Metal transforms into Water, water by nature flows everywhere; when Fire transforms into Soil, water can proceed no further. Man is movement and gives without, woman is quiescence and stores within. If man goes past the measure and exceeds his proper share, he is seized by the woman; thus the po latches the hun, lest it be wasteful and lavish. Neither cold nor hot, they advance and recede in accordance with the time: each of them attains its own harmony, exhaling their tokens together. This refers to the inner feminine and masculine, as well as the external. The principles extend throughout the universe.

A friend of a friend spent a few weeks meditating in the woods, and came out crazy. A decade later she says he still hasn't recovered. I recall listening to Liu Ming speaking of his needing to spend a year alone in nature to help his re-integration. A friend awakened at 17 and spent the next 20 years digging up all the knowledge he could find. We spoke about my concerns that walking the fire path of conscious awakening, where one finally reaches to the clear spot beyond all the writing on the blackboard. What happens to the water after the fire burns through far enough? I wondered if then one would then be tempted to just burn the water away into the emptiness, like a black hole. He said that for years he did just that. Apparently he changed after that, but the continuation of our discussion is for a day yet to come. My sense is the water and the fire need to make it home together. The water can't be too strong or it'll put the fire out, and the fire can't be too strong or it'll burn the water up. One yin, one yang = dao. My sense is that people break through, and have mental clarity even as they remain embodied. What happens to their body? Are they one with it? Or do they feel separated from it, as though it is false? Then learning to cope with living out the rest of one's time within this realm of the false, how morbid! Ever separate, yet trapped. What to do, but maintain emptiness? The water path is just as much trouble, for one is hard pressed to avoid becoming trapped by attachments and desires. Everyone offers a home for your water so they can use it to their own ends, and it is difficult to know what desires are your own, unless you have none at all. Having none at all without disconnecting from one's essence is truly the development of character, of true wholeness. One may be nothing, yet one is everything. One may detach from choice and control, and one's influence grows subtly more powerful. One looks for nothing, yet sees everything. I may not have proper reference to understand what other have seen, but I sense I did once, and I sense that isn't what it seems. Just my sense. I don't know anything, and that's fine with me.

I had to take some math courses a few times in college, mainly because I couldn't understand the teacher at all, and sometimes when I could understand them, their flavor of teaching math didn't work for me. But that doesn't mean they weren't great teachers, for those who could understand their teaching styles. Up to us to follow what resonates with us... makes no sense to stick with something that has no resonance. And if we follow this principle, we may find it helps free us from judgments entirely. Just go where it feels right in this moment, and if it starts to feel wrong, move along. Some things take time to unravel, but flowing like this leads us there too.

Great videos, thank you. I agree with most of what they say. It is about working toward simplicity, non-ego, etc. And yet this does not need to happen through abandoning the body. It is when the material and the spiritual merge as one that we get even deeper. When the consciousness becomes too focused and burns through, it is hard for the spiritual essence to avoid burning up the material essence, and difficult for these two to merge as one, while one is so much stronger than the other. It is when the consciousness rests gently upon the body like a warm flame, that the physical essence is melted and refined without getting burned away, and the two are allowed to merge mutually, without one controlling the process. It is even more difficult to keep to simplicity this way, as many physical changes can unfold that may distract one. Yet the principle is the same - follow simplicity, place intention upon becoming whole, and everything will come to completion on its own. Some days it is nice to simply take a long walk in quietude, practicing resting the mind on the body. The body moves and is able to stir things up and empty out, allowing the mind to integrate more deeply within. As these changes unfold, as one gets deeper, the voice changes too. It resonates from deep within, emanating from the whole, rather than seeming to come from the upper body alone. Also, it is not about what I agree with. Follow the way that resonates most deeply, always looking deeper within the balance.

Urges and dreams are natural. And yes, sun is important, though we get plenty of it by simply living naturally. Living in homes isn't what I would call natural. Thing is, the more we make decisions about what we need, the more we enforce the strength of the ego patterns, rather than learning to tap into universal awareness. When we humble our ego, dissolve the patterns, and learn to allow ourselves to flow along the unique path that is there just for us, we become more like a river, twisting and turning, beautiful surprises around every bend. Rather than controlling our way, it comes on its own as we simply deal with what it brings. Sometimes there are challenges we must be able to bear the responsibility for, even though we might feel they belong to others. But the quicker we do, the quicker we let our river flow on. And the better we get at this, the more we find the strangest things happening, like we walk into a store at the same time as three of our friends, or we spontaneously meet strangers who draw us into conversation and talk about something that is the answer to that which we were pondering recently. The further we progress in this way, the more we will find we are loaded with potent power that is the key to a powerful healing to those around us, and we weild this power simply by letting it unfold naturally, never controlling it, but always doing our work to contain it by focusing inward. The more it grows, the more tempting it could be to use it, unleash it, and the more strength of will is needed to provide the inner gravity that keeps it within. So as we flow along like this, the rewards for our fidelity are boundless, and shaped exactly according to what our inner heart will find most rewarding. Dreams unfold and become manifest, all because of our work. Perhaps we learn to fly, read thoughts, eat heavenly nectar for sustenance, etc - but all of these manifestations are possible because they are natural - when we attach to them, we begin to eat away at what allows them to exist. Strange and beautiful world out there, and our inward focus need not prevent us from experiencing it. Really just a matter of experiencing without attaching to the experience, ie, learning to digest the experience fully and equanimously as it unfolds, which allows us to live ever more fully within the present moment, one with all.

But don't take our word for it. Sometimes well-intentioned guiding hands interfere with our desire to find our own way, and we find ourselves going the opposite of where we're lead. It helps to realize that many of the feelings and emotions within you are coming from external sources. Discerning these influences, we more easily dissolve them. Doing the opposite of something is no less being controlled it than doing it. In my opinion, our best guidance is within our hearts. If we listen deep within, for long enough, we'll feel the tug there. But to hear it all the patterns the ego has woven upon the heart must be gone. Those ego patterns were built up by our attachments to the best perceived ways to navigate all those feelings, the ones that largely come from the external influences of a scattered, disconnected society. The dao is full of paradoxes. When we discover we like the taste of food that has a little salt, and proceed to salt our food, we think we are tasting more, because the taste is stronger. However, we are really covering up a multitude of complex tastes with one overpowering one. This is no different than attaching to one thing instead of the whole. When we learn to taste the tasteless, ever seeking for the emptiness, the most bland, along the way we uncover this world of complex tastes, incredible, stimulating, simply through increasing our sensitivity, which we did by focusing on the whole, rather than attaching to the extreme of one part. And it is by increasing our focus on the whole, by looking for the nothingness, the emptiness, that exists at the root and heart of everything that we continue to unravel the pieces of the world, unminding of their sensations. It is in this way we recover the universe within us. Similar to saving money, ironically. You save it by not spending it, but boy does spending it feel good! Feels good to be on top of the world. What is raised up must come down. What remains humble has strong roots. Same in martial arts - people who think too much have trouble standing on one foot for long, and they are easily knocked over. People who don't spend long practicing don't develop a good foundation - people who don't save, don't have much to depend upon. Going the other route, that of spending, is easy.... we can race to see who can spend the hardest, party the longest, but it isn't long before age catches up to us. We all walk our own paths, and over time come to our own realizations.

When the whole is divided, parts need names. When we eat too much of anything, we get sick, even medicine. So if we focus on breathing too much to a particular organ, things could happen. How do we know when is too much? Hard to say. In general the idea is to rest the mind on the breath, and let the breath move throughout the body as a whole. Often people will recommend lower abdominal breathing, as the lower abdomen is the lower center that supports and merges with all centers, and thus helps connect one to the whole rather than focusing on the parts. And even here, focusing on the lower center doesn't always help one get there - sometimes it is by breathing to the heels, or the lowest part of the body in terms of where one's mass rests upon gravity, that one finds that one is naturally breathing to the lower abdomen. And often all one needs is the strong intention to become integrated as a whole, that assists one in doing so. The more we focus on details and parts, the more easily we may separate from the whole. As we increase our awareness of the whole, we find our energy becoming more empty within. This emptiness is actually that which creates all things. If we instead focus too much on yang, and not yin, then when we encounter yin in our environment, our excess yang will follow the path of least resistance to find home there. So it is up to us to cultivate the yin to match our yang, and we do this becoming able to look at the external world and see the emptiness within it. If we are able to look at a something and see through it's surface to its emptiness, it is unlikely to be able to pull us into its polarity. A daoist looks at nothing but sees all. Sometimes we have lots of questions. Answers so easily beget more questions. Questing so easily becomes an endless endeavor, until we learn to quest within, and find the answers there by cultivating patience and waiting for them to show themselves without expectation. I'll leave you with this gift.

Thanks for this. This would seem to have interesting interpretations in terms of physical immortality and the operation of wuwei. At the heart of things perhaps one is able to root to the source, and yet one's body remains manifest. One could shed one's shell and move on to the spiritual realms, and yet, if one is able to shape one's energy/light in such a way that it moves in cycles, then it is contained. And if it cycles close to the speed of light, then very little mass is needed to simulate the normal human density, even as one's experience of time barely exists. Hence the use of wuwei/ziran to exist without acting. Perhaps the amount of mass necessary to pull this off can simply come from what is absorbed from one's environs, allowing one to forge a presence that internally is able to step beyond time (not just in mind, but mind and body), returning to the dao, even while remaining present as a system of active integration with the dao. Clearly I'm butchering something somewhere. Just throwing ideas around for fun.

Yep, I have that one open too, but haven't had made time to read your long post there yet. Aslo it's in Off Topic, so...

I worry that abandoning the illusion because it is an illusion is similar in function to favoring the shining light over the material, because it's shining light. I realize worrying at all is doing the same thing in reverse. Here's the thing - even though the illusion expands, and there is the appearance of increasing separation between the material and the spiritual, there are places like earth where a refined balance has been achieved that fosters and nurtures ever more refined balances, that ultimately lead back to integration. As this happens, the appearance of expansion begins to contract, and these vast extremes, over time, can come to ALL become more integrated. We won't have the issues with galaxies abandoned or colliding, but they'll be like the ecosystems here on earth that miraculously integrate within each-other, dancing ever-so-close to the dao rather than at the extremes of the dao. I'm not convinced that the source is infinite, and cannot be expended, although that is possible due to its nature. Zhuangzi declared it was impossible to speak of what is beyond the known forces of the universe. If there are limits, then the integral cultivation of the illusion/appearance could be "important". Several spiritual people have passed onto me this idea that it is important to help the universe, alluding that those who lie in the extremes of spirit are unable to have the same influence that we as humans do. So I ponder, even as I accept all as it is.

All this leads me to speculate on some things. First... for those who are able to cultivate a connection to the source of things, and then use that source to radiate out like a sun... are they contributing to the expansion of the universe by drawing upon this source? And then, what happens to the physical component they draw from this source, is it just burned away by the light? Next, black holes in the universe, they draw in all these other planets and bodies that contain their own balances of light and dark. Is the light that gets emitted from them truly the creation of new light as the heavy-dark reaches extreme, or is it merely the squeezing out of all remaining light within all that it sucks in?

Well said, beautiful. On earth, life forms are very balanced and integrated with their physicality and spirituality. So, while at their extremes they change to their opposites, when balanced, going too far in either direction creates separation. So if we are balanced between physicality and spirituality, and then we attach to laws, food, hide in homes, act depressed, we become more physically oriented, stiffening and lowering, and meanwhile our spiritual side is pushed out as things condense. Conversely, if we consume a lot of cannabis, igniting our spiritual fire, allowing its light to radiate everywhere brightly, it flies away, and the more we consume, the less feeling of light there is and the more we feel sluggish and heavy. Thus the importance of those on a spiritual path to understand the difference between traveling to the spiritual extreme and abandoning the material, vs, refining both and integrating them into one another. For when the physical essence is cultivated and refined, it provides a home where the spiritual nature can exist without flying away. Thus the difference between the shining light that separates from the physical, and the clear light of emptiness that reunites both to their origin.

Great! I'm just saying this state of true being is related to the expansion of the universe. Those who attempt to prove it with tools (concepts, science, brain) will fall short, or worse, will only contribute to accelerating the expansion, and thereby the separation between all things. But that doesn't mean we can't present the connection without proofs, and invite those who wish to experience it through being to do so on their own, and thereby invite greater integrity rather than greater expansion.

How can your brain understand things that can't be explained in words?

Sounds like you're listening to people who only seek and examine externally. The truth is often present in the heart of things, while the surface obscures it. Those who cannot sense the heart of things seem quick to dismiss those who speak of what is there.

What we read in books has been left behind by others, and is frozen, unless we can make it come alive. Often book knowledge will lead us to a dead end, where we know there is more, but the ladder grows no taller.... until we are able to change that through our own experiences. There is much written on reincarnation, transmigration, immortality, and yet, one's ability to understand these things in depth will hinge upon the depth of refinement of one's awareness of balance and change. In the end, some things can only be known by being. For to use knowledge as a tool prohibits us from being complete, yet being complete, there is nothing we prevent ourselves from knowing. In terms of taoist knowledge, the classics reach the root, even as they are difficult to know. Cultivating the dao through qigong, and studying the classics, perhaps one's ladder will grow.

Then perhaps the key lies in whatever is is that produces the expansion of the universe.

So perhaps in terms of light, yang is the bright light that radiates out, yin is the black space that the light travels through, and when merged together as one they become the clear light known as emptiness.

Know the white, keep to the black... can be linked to the color associations of the five phases, where white is metal and water is black. And further associated with the bagua, where Metal is the trigram of Heaven, all yang, and Kan (water) is yin surrounding true yang. Thus water can be associated with black that hides the white, which is related to knowing the white and keeping to the black. Is curious why these colors were chosen to represent these things. At one point in my cultivation work, doing standing meditation in a "heaven" posture with arms straight up, feet shoulder width apart, I both felt the yang energy that filled me from head to foot and "saw" it somehow as pure white. I'm not much of a seer usually, but this was more than a feeling, and was unmistakably white. Meanwhile my sense of yin is black. Though maybe this is all unrelated to what you saw.

Searching this forum for "fu fa shen" should give some nice info, and effilang drops a bit of info here as well.

Oh yes. I love clouds, especially here in the mountains. As the sun sets the clouds creep into the valleys and cover the mountains like a blanket. Or they dance high above like mighty deities. Or have so many nuances I am left with no words.

From the Shuogua, one of the ten wings of the Yijing, translated by Master Zhongxian Wu in Seeking the Spirit of the Book of Change. This is a wonderful book for an introduction into the basic ideas of daoist cosmology. First, on the Xiantian (precelestial) arrangement of the Bagua: Then, on the Houtian (postcelestial) arrangement: Continuing: So in the postcelestial world, we can look to Kun for nourishment. In the postcelestial world, we can find Kun in the southwest. Zhang Boduan discusses this in his Wuzhen Pian, and Fabrizio Pregadio has an interesting commentary in his Awakening to Reality: And of course the rest of this poem+commentary is also important but I'll move on, leaving those other truths hidden in the books for people to explore on their own. I've been reading more from Chase and Shima's An Exposition on the Eight Extraordinary Vessels, and there is indeed a commentary on the location of the divine tortoise: A turtle is renowned for being able to hide within its shell or poke its head and limbs out. Some turtles are able to poke their heads out pretty far. Perhaps this mechanism was thought as similar to the changes of a penis. I'll speculate here the divinity is related to the penis' ability to release the True Yang that is nurtured by the principles of the southwest, that is in relation to the cultivation of the yin qiao. We've read earlier in the thread that as the yin qiao is cultivated, the testicles begin to draw in and changes can be felt therein. The rest of Poem 7 from above details the timing necessary to make use of the Lead / True Yang when it emerges, before it is no longer usable. Finally, Liu Yiming has a chapter related to this which may convey another important principle. From the translation by Fabrizio Pregadio in Cultivating the Tao: I hope these words are able to lead others toward greater clarity.

Any recommended yijing apps for phones? Please specify android, iphone, etc, and why you feel it is good!

The repetitious cycle of life and death of one entity might be like a sine wave. Where does it end? Even should the planet die and the sun die, we may still trace the energies though yet more stages of living and dying. To what end? They say the universe is ever expanding, and yet does so from no common point. The mysterious center that exists everywhere yet nowhere, is this where we might find that origin of things? Holding deep integrity, perhaps we might integrate back before the polarities of life and death, of being and non-being, each time unfolding a new layer of immortality, yet never giving in until we fully return to this mysterious source. Do we end up in the realm of the Jade Emperor, or is that yet another side-path? What is going all the way? Would there be anything left? Perhaps we simply reintegrate with the source, return the power the dao gifted to us back to the dao, and pull the universe back together a little more.

Hi, and welcome! I don't know much about fencing, but I find the potential parallels between the fencing sabre and the chinese broadsword somewhat interesting. The chinese broadsword has one cutting edge, and is used for slicing and thrusting. Because it has a non-cutting edge, it can be used to touch the body by wrapping it around the body for defensive movements, and in conjunction with spinning movements, such that the sword might begin at the inside of a spiral and then whip out at any point unpredictably. Also the off-hand can be used to guide or enforce any sweeping or slicing movements by placing it on the non-cutting edge. The broadsword is associated with the Metal phase, and that makes another interesting parallel to Metal Tao's name. This is not the stiff and rigid metal, but the soft and malleable that is constantly reshaping itself. The curving shape adds subtlety and unpredictability to the style. I wonder if any of these aspects of the Chinese broadsword carry over to the nuances of the fencing sabre.