Daeluin
-
Content count
1,966 -
Joined
-
Last visited
-
Days Won
8
Everything posted by Daeluin
-
They say a group hikes at the pace of its slowest person. When this person starts lagging behind.... some like to laugh and poke fun at. Others like to point out how the person is slowing the whole group down. The former relieves the pressure of inner struggle by dumping it on another - the latter places extra pressure on another by emphasizing expectation. Both cause the straggler to feel outcast, enforcing separation rather than unification.
-
sounds like a powerful equinox experience. hope you found a way to balance.
-
Very odd. Is this only hype or is it possible? Or is this media sensationalization simply more evidence of a odd and powerful qi imbalance?
-
Opening the Dragon Gate: The Making of a Modern Taoist Wizard
Daeluin replied to ValleyStream's topic in Daoist Discussion
Only mildly related perhaps - wasn't Wang Liping tasked with maintaining and organizing the daozang for future generations? -
Opening the Dragon Gate: The Making of a Modern Taoist Wizard
Daeluin replied to ValleyStream's topic in Daoist Discussion
In this book the achieved student spends 8 years in his small town, working and supporting his family like anyone else, hidden and waiting for approval from his teachers to share his lineage. This alone is a great lesson - sometimes it is important to allow things to settle and mature. Principle of the Lake trigram ☱. But during this time, others find themselves healed after short chats with WL, though he acknowledges nothing of this. Later, after he is teaching to the masses, a few students approach him saying they all had the same dream - but he denies having any intentional role, saying this is simply what the energy does naturally due to the circumstances. Those students were able to resonate and perceive, so they were the ones to have the dreams. This was possible due to the massive scale of the seminar and due to the high level of sophistication of WL's skill. In Shen Laoshi's translated blog, he describes his first seminar with WL, where he finds his hands forming a spontaneous mudra - again it is suggested that his energy was able to naturally resonate with what was available to all, rather than WL seeking him out deliberately and making his hands form the mudra. When someone reaches a level of self mastery, they heal others by simply being themselves. The higher their mastery and skill, the more widespread the affect. Zhuangzi speaks much on the trap masters fall into by teaching with words and becoming chained to the needs of others as opposed to the freedom and unhindered potential open to those who radiate their healing invisibly. We don't need to intentionally send out instructions for how others need to heal - that is Inferior Virtue. Superior Virtue is in trusting and allowing all to happen the way it needs to - allowing and trusting the tao to operate at its highest level, not controlling based on our own highest level. The power of wholeness inspires wholeness all around it, and operates on myriad layers at once.- 53 replies
-
- 12
-
-
Opening the Dragon Gate: The Making of a Modern Taoist Wizard
Daeluin replied to ValleyStream's topic in Daoist Discussion
Books like this help to open one's mind to the bigger picture. Many taoist techniques are simple stepping stones to assist one to center and transform - used when necessary and then transcended. This book in particular is great for tuning into the big picture, getting a sense of reasoning behind various phases of development, and good exposure to the hidden-in-plain-sight aspect of taoist art. Read between the lines, absorb the essence, and allow that essence to have a place inside of you without needing to fully understand. Property I'm living on has an albino squirrel resident. -
Not everything with the Taoist label goes to the root. When something isn't aiming at the root, it is just another side path. Emperors used to employ Taoists, and ancient China was very secretive. It was punishable by death to own a chart of the positions of the stars - and for this reason much fortune telling developed from an energy system not dependent on the positions of the stars. I would imagine a great deal of healing arts are like this as well. Who knows the cost of learning hidden techniques, and what stories have appreciated their provenance. Thus the value may well be associated with the pedestal history has placed it upon, rather than the efficacy of it's effect. The problem seems to lie in the way we value things these days. Those who achieve the root of the tao and walk among us heal by proximity, and often invisibly, charging nothing.
-
And on that note, the tao is forever telling us exactly what we need to hear for our healing. We just don't like listening, so we end up paying others to tell us what we want to hear, or temporarily make us feel better again. Saving up for $1 grand healing sessions is likely to create greater emptiness and a healthier lifestyle as we stop feeding the distractions and non-serving habits that made us sick in the first place, and start channeling all our resources toward healing. Maybe some will realize they can put that money in the bank instead.
-
I think it comes down to their motives for choosing such a price. Could be any number of reasons selfish, altruistic, or circumstantial. Karma tends to put us in circumstantial predicaments regardless. Sometimes money is a factor that contributes greater sincerity in behalf of the patient, which is likely to assist in the healing process. If you get a fortune reading from a person you walk past on a city street for pocket change, will it carry as much weight as the reading you shelled out $200 for after hand-picking someone from the Internet? It is possible the street reader was better, and that fate helped you to meet this person at the right time, and that what they told you is critical to your healing. But if attention isn't focused on what was said with any real depth, will any real change occur? Can't expect our healers to hold our sincerity for us.
-
111
-
Sitting/Laying Meditation & Falling Asleep
Daeluin replied to ValleyStream's topic in Daoist Discussion
Personally I don't like to be interrupted. But a timer helps me avoid deciding to stop early - instead I surrender the notion that I have any control over when I am going to stop. Also just now in my meditation I realized how awake the act of "turning around the light of the mind" keeps me. It's the idea of sealing the light of consciousness using inward intent. There's a bit more on this in The Secret of the Golden Flower, a great taoist meditation guide. Hey look, there's one available for $4.64 shipped in volume 3 of Cleary's taoist classics. Either way, you'll want the Cleary tl. -
as I bask in the field of hops, slowly drifting drifting away... I dream of fermenting; soaked in the love making of clear mountain streams, river rocks, moss, particles of gold, geodes radiating spiritual messages from deep below, now permeating into my petals and leaves.... awakened by a gentle breeze softly whisking away that fading warmth of horizon kissed starlight even as twinkles appear to greet my now homeward bound feet.
-
does a real human get drunk on illusory beer, or does all that swaying and near toppling only appear as drunkenness to those who do not see beyond the illusion?
-
Stephen Erikson's masterfully written Malazan Book of the Fallen incorporates a unique pantheon of ascendants, deitys, and elemental forces, personified in a Deck of Dragons. The cards of the deck will evolve as the powers shift and the players change, and readers of the Deck will notice new details emerge in the artwork as situations evolve. I recommend making your own set, choosing the players relative the the situations most pertinent to life as you see it. As things change, add new players, change the artwork, allow the alliances to shift as new groupings form and old ones dissolve. This could be a very interesting experiment in the form of electronic cards continuously updated by a forum of deck masters who observe the changes in the world.
-
they say open source software is free as in speech, but not as in beer. is the beer one brews any more real than the beer one is given? or is the illusion merely that those molecules ever belonged to anyone? does the beer found in the mysterious pass taste any fresher or free-er?
-
Sitting/Laying Meditation & Falling Asleep
Daeluin replied to ValleyStream's topic in Daoist Discussion
Also, I've heard that the more full your shen, the less sleepy one is. So meditating after being busy thinking might not be very helpful. Things like the internet, work, being social, absorbing music and movies all keep my mind spinning. Meditating after cultivation helps my focus. So does taking long walks deliberately avoiding thought, and anything that cultivates emptiness. Might help with avoiding falling asleep too. Also, sleeping is a pretty good emptiness practice. Try meditating after taking a nap. Or maybe wake up in the middle of the night and meditate. I certainly feel sleepy when I do this, but also very empty and spiritually aware. -
Sitting/Laying Meditation & Falling Asleep
Daeluin replied to ValleyStream's topic in Daoist Discussion
Persistence pays off, and is really the name of the game. Some tips I've read about include standing up and walking calmly around for a moment, then returning to sitting. Or allowing the eyes to be half open, and quasi focused on the tip of the nose, though you still want your focus to be inward, but this helps allow a little light into the eyes, and this and the focus help cultivate that merged state of conscious/subconscious. Try meditating after tai chi, after you've got some energy circulating. Try mediating after doing standing mediation. See if you feel a difference when mediating after wuji vs standing like a tree. What about after palms to the ground, vs palms/arms open to embrace heaven? See if it helps to keep the room brightly lit. See how your experience changes when mediating during different parts of the day. Just some stuff I thought up - I'd barely be considered a meditator at all compared to some people here. But I'm doing my best to change that, and the things I listed seem to help. But what helps most of all is consistency... and as much as I don't like using one, a timer. (Any good timer apps recommended?) -
Sometimes the best advice for all of us is to just slow down, leave desire on the doorstep and learn to eat time. After a while we start realizing we'd just been on a train 'bout to hurtle off a cliff into a bulging volcano, and are pretty thankful we decided to step off. Usually it is our bodies that tell us when this time is... like... maybe when things we'd been relying on stop delivering on our expectations.
-
As a child, all the time, and sometimes be able to go back to the same dream after stirring. And flying. As an adult not so much. As I get better at this cultivation stuff I hope that will change.
-
BKA's vid was very yin to Meghan's yang - was nice to balance out all the "look at me" with a dose of humility. Meghan's vid doesn't seem directly sexual on the surface, to me, but in the context of USA conditioning, is laced with an undercurrent of sexuality, sure to resonate with some and not with others. And the comments people post exhibit these undertones as well. The principle of flowing like water to the lowest point seems to apply in an interesting way here. When others have done so much work to thoroughly build things up, it is simple and easy to flow along with it, as you know that is what will result in the support of others. Guess that's the case with money too. But really neither are completely natural. But then even the earth everything plants roots in and water rests upon and within is yet another temporary foundation which will eventually dissolve... but I suppose earth is one of those fundamental principles that is ever recurring. The same cannot really be said of money and image, as their value is based on the fine balance of their scarcity. I recall 12 years ago now at my first Rainbow Gathering, being excited to get up in the morning to do yoga with "Yogi Bear" by the lake side. Turns out it was "Yogi Bare" inviting a session of bare yoga. Had a great time though!
-
Actually a fair amount of theorizing came directly after reading the intro in The Book of Changes and the Unchanging Truth. A bit of study of the Ho and Luo diagrams is also recommended, as well as five element theory, which directly leads to chinese astrology - the 5, doubled (yang/yin) is the energy we absorb from the heavens (the 10 heavenly stems), and the 6, doubled (yang/yin) (the chinese astrology animals) is the energy stored in the earth (the 12 earthly branches). The hexagenary cycle describes how they merge over sixty phase cycles and are mapped out over the year, month, day, and hour in chinese astrology, and in the l'uo pan in feng shui. Ni Hua Ching's book goes into this as well. Having a thorough understanding of how the five elements work within both the pre-celestial bagua and the post-celestial bagua is also important, and again the key lies in the Ho and Luo diagrams. Studying the 12 earthly branches as they flow through the yearly seasons is also very enlightening... or at least it was to me. Learning to feel how the earth month between two elements helps to contain, balance and transform the energies is quite poignant - ie how the "dragon" (known as the entrepreneur, among other things), is positioned between the wood and fire seasons, and is able to position resources where they will best be spent, i.e. placeing wood in the fire pit, so that when it burns the burning is useful. Etc.
- 34 replies
-
- 1
-
-
- computers
- Yin & Yang
- (and 1 more)
-
The Book of Changes and the Unchanging Truth, by Ni Hua Ching, is a very good investment, and includes a lengthy primer on taoist cosmology and spirituality. The hexagram and line descriptions are followed up with insightful writing to help capture the essence of the type of change described. Some of the first editions are available fairly cheaply, though subsequent editions have made some corrections. Alternately there is the Taoist I Ching, a Thomas Cleary translation of Liu I-ming's commentaries on the I Ching, with specific notes on the firing process and neidan. Overall a great version to consult for a clear depiction of the interplay of yin and yang from a very objective perspective. I feel it really captures the root. I recommend the taoist classics volume 4 edition, which includes some other writings by Liu I-ming at the end, but the other edition is available a bit cheaper.
- 34 replies
-
- 1
-
-
- computers
- Yin & Yang
- (and 1 more)
-
Once I got to really understand expectation, I stopped desiring to make attachments to anything.
-
One day I realized I had something to share here... so I attempted to login and see if the account I'd created years ago was still active. It was, and this was the avatar that greeted me. It seemed just fine where it was. The backdrop of golden light had taken on new meaning for me, and I was pleased to see represented an unclear figure poised in a precarious position far out off a steep cliff. Fishing? Or idly pondering while eating time? What mysteries lie below are never quite clear. I look forward to discussing with you in the future. Of course, I do so without looking anywhere at all really.
-
Once I really got to understand competition, I stopped desiring to win.