Daeluin

Biting Through is Hexagram 21, Thunder under Fire. When Action is applied without Clarity, one is acting before it is clear what needs to be done. When a situation is complex, there may be an entire process involved in bringing clarification to a situation. In such situations there is potential for timely actions to transcend, or "bite through" the situation, leaving what is unnecessary behind. Like digestion, or inner alchemy - there is a complex process involved, and if one acts out of place one suffers indigestion, vomits, tips over the cauldron, spills the elixir, or worse. But when the process is able to reach completion, everything is transformed. This hexagram tried me. I read many translations and interpretations before the essence starting coming through. Especially the last line seemed very confusing and out of place. Now I realize the last line IS the transformation, is the transcendence. When one finally reaches line 6 after all manner of complicated process, everything reverts upon itself, and none of your hard work matters to the situation any longer. Either your hard work is rewarded and you enter a new level of attainment, or you are put back in your place and with nothing to show for your efforts. Best accept this in emptiness and start over, rather than have your efforts be deemed improper and cause punishment. ----------------- He Luo Li Shu is a guide to using the principles of the He Tu and Luo Shu diagrams to map the ever changing energies of time to I-Ching Hexagrams. Using this guide, one might match a particular point in time frame to a Hexagram. Further, one may use the I-Ching to observe change through-out the lifetime of something created during a particular moment of time. The I-Ching is already well suited to understanding flows of change over time. Mapping the I-Ching to people's birthdays presents a very powerful and subtle astrological framework. ----------------- The He Luo Li Shu first came to me in the form of Sherrill & Chu's The Astrology of I Ching. Zhongyongdaoist has a post on this book here. For over a year I hand calculated the natal I-Ching Hexagrams of my friends, followed the yearly-monthly-daily changes from calculations described in the book, and observed. I wrote daily logs on the changes I felt and listened to the counsel of the yijing. Being new to the I-Ching, I let myself be empty. Various awarenesses emerged. I would feel strong for-shadowing of the next day as the current day neared midnight. I began to notice feeling yin and yang days differently. The hexagrams of my friends - I did about 20 - were interesting. Some matched the people incredibly well. Others were a stretch. But the yijing is a subtle teacher. If you look, you will find. ------------------- Last autumn I found myself facing Biting Through as my weekly hexagram. One line per day, six days. Day 1: Felt empty, without motive. And yet as though I were a clap of thunder. Went about my day as usual, intent on remaining empty. Day 2: Stirrings, questions. Investigating principle without penetrating it. Read many translations of 21 and posted to an I-Ching forum. And yet... found myself searching online regarding Astrology of I Ching, and uncovered some controversy regarding the proper calculations. Sent emails to two of the originators of this controversy asking for help and clarity. Day 3: Don't quite recall much aside from trying to be patient. Life as usual, waited to hear back, some more research, no conclusions. Day 4: Actively penetrate to the root. Got a reply from one of the sources I'd reached out to. We discussed how the hexagrams are calculated from the BaZi, or Four Pillars of Destiny, and how The Astrology of I Ching does not use the traditional method of performing these calculations. Day 5: Right and wrong and false and true are clearly distinguished. Indeed, various instructions on the correct calculations didn't add up. Unfortunately I did not discover this right away. Open and balanced, alert and wary, one will see that there is a primary principle; understanding it within and proving it without; all acts conform with the tao.... Well now, the principle was clear. Even so, things were already transforming. Day 6: If one is strong but unenlightened, not knowing how to distinguish truth, one misuses intelligence and gets sidetracked, wasting a whole life, eventually going to one's destruction. Too late I reached out for help correcting the errors. The answers came the next day, but only now - eight months later - do I understand their true purpose. But oh, the majestic subtlety of yijing. The very calculations which brought me to hexagram 21 that week, had themselves been undone by hexagram 21. As I arrived upon the trigram of clarity, I had already begun to stop following the old calculations, even as hexagram 21 worked its art. ---------------------------------------------- Essentially, The Astrology of I Ching is a fine book to follow, but I recommend doing separate calculations for the 4 Pillars prior to applying the stem/branch-to-number assignments found in the book. Without saying they are right or wrong, I will say some dates, when passed through these calculations, result in a different 4 pillars chart than traditional 4 pillars calculations. It is entirely possible I made errors in my calculations, but some computer programs which follow The Astrology of I Ching methodology produce the same discrepancies. Some Chinese websites also offer He Luo Li Shu calculations, and this matches what I get using the above method. -------------------------------- And so I was brought to attach my birth to a new hexagram. This hexagram brought me into a much deeper connection with the calculations and their principles. Each line of the main hexagram clearly matched struggles I've been through in life over the course of six or nine year segments. Yearly hexagrams also matched. The system for calculating yearlies is the same, but the year begins on li chun, the first day of Chinese spring, whereas in Astrology of I Ching yearlies begin on the day of the winter solstice. On this point, I did see a translation thread on the old fivearts.net site seemingly pointing to this interpretation, or at least to a beginning in winter. I've also read in the time of the Yellow Emperor the year began at Zi, instead of Yin. The monthlies are different, and didn't settle with me at first, and I haven't explored them enough to have any comment. So this year I've avoided attaching to monthly and weekly hexagrams, instead focusing on change over time. Gradual progress is my yearly hexagram, and that's what I've been cultivating. Recalculating my friend's hexagrams has resulted in almost literal clarity on the essence of change in their lives. ------------------------------- So this Spring I took a course on Chinese Astrology, which answered many questions I had on the system He Luo Li Shu is based upon. As it turns out the stems and branches are now appearing in classics I've stumbled upon recently. Or perhaps I'm just noticing them more now. Hah! Yesterday I consulted the yijing on the day - I use the rice method described in The Book of Changes and the Unchanging Truth, by Hua-Ching Ni - and received line 5 of hexagram 21. Later, in a Cafe I was amusedly pondering writing of my experiences with hexagram 21 in this forum... decided against it and went down do make an order. The number they gave me to set on my table while waiting for the order - do I even need to say it? - 21. But that's an aside. See... something has been bothering me, and I've been mulling this principle over more and more. Basically it's simple. Why don't the hours of mao and you align with the ebb and flow of sunrise and sunset as the seasons change? Externally at least the ebb and flow of energies adapts with the season. Is it really possible our internal meridians behave in shifts of strict 2 hour windows? Coming from a background in Western / Tropical Astrology, I realize what important differences precision can make. There are all manor of alignments and systems, based on the longitude, latitude, shape of the earth, etc. Now.... one can easily become lost in all these calculations and their implications. I much prefer the idea of feeling the changes and timings directly through cultivation. Last week I was looking for a phone app to display the 12-branch clock. After endless searching (I don't understand Chinese), I finally stumbled upon this Japanese Traditional Time app. The characters are the same, and it was simple enough, so I started using it. It didn't take long to realize this is a clock based on temporal hours, calculated based on my input coordinates. Sunrise is the center of mao, sunset the center of you, with noon and midnight aligned at wu and zi. I was thrilled, as this was exactly what I've been wanting to study. This also introduced me to the Wadokei. Lately the classics seem to be sharing more on mao, you, zi, and wu with me. To the point of mao and you: Further, there is great emphasis on using awareness of the ebb and flow of Yin and Yang in nature as a tool for understanding the unfixed and shifting nature of the cycles within our selves. Surely we may meditate during these periods of change in heaven and earth, and gain greater clarity on their influence to us. And at these times different energies are in operation, following the principle behind the ebb and flow of yin and yang. But the lesson in all of this is to understand how to apply these principles to the ebb and flow of yin and yang in ourselves. In any case, this investigation of principle lead me to confidence in linking the hours of mao and you to sunrise and sunset. It follows the principles and is not contrived. Thus I adjusted my birth time, which shifted from the hour of xu to hai, and resulted in another birth hexagram. It's funny. The last hexagram fit very well. The challenges of imbalance were all predominant themes in my life. And yet.... this new hexagram fits even better. They're of a similar theme, but this one aligns even more precisely and completely. At any rate I have some observation time ahead of me. And again, hexagram 21 leaves me in new territory after shedding an old skin.

I find it odd the Taoist I-Ching isn't mentioned here. This is Thomas Cleary's translation of Liu Yiming's commentary on the I-Ching. It focuses on a very specific theme of using combinations of yin and yang, with very little subjectivity. Sometimes I like a little subjectivity, and I'll consult many other translations briefly, and extrapolate the essence. When the root of what a particular line means isn't clear, this helps me to locate an angle from which I can gain perspective, and then the whole thing falls into place. It's surprising sometimes to see which book offers up the key. Or perhaps I don't find a key at all - this equally helps refine my perspective. This book is another favorite. There is an incredibly detailed introduction to taoist cosmology / math that even goes into the workings of Chinese Astrology. The readings for the hexagrams are poignant and are followed by poems and stories which help to capture the essence of the challenge one might face as related to the hexagram. The seed method is very simple and may allow greater calmness to focus on the question during the calculation. One simply reaches index finger and thumb into a container of seeds (something like short-grain rice) and pinch out some seeds into a pile. Do this until you have six piles. Then do a seventh pile to select a line number. An even number of seeds is yin. An odd number of seeds is yang. These are your hexagram lines. When making the piles, start with one close to you, the next a little further away, and so on with the sixth pile furthest away. Like the lines of a hexagram where we start with the bottom line. The seventh pile I place to one side, and if it has 6 or fewer seeds, the number of seeds indicates the line. If it has more than six I subtract six until there are six or fewer, and that is the line number. The focus is on the type of change described by the hexagram, and in particular, how the chosen line operates within this framework of change. This is simpler than working with multiple moving lines and 2 hexagrams, and allows to go really deep with one hexagram. I also like The Astrology of I Ching. Beyond the system of astrology, the commentary on each line is an in depth interpretation of someone's life time. This is invaluable when I'm struggling to unravel the deeper meaning of a line and other commentaries aren't offering enough to work with. If someone is interested in the astrological component I recommend reading my post on biting through he luo li shu and developing an understanding of bazi (4 pillars of destiny, chinese astrology) first. Just a general note.... the Changes are ever changing. Layers upon layers of nuance. One may study them for a lifetime. The text which accompanies the symbols is very elucidating, but is also written from the perspective of a very old culture. Our own cultures have likely explored these principles, and sometimes translating the historical metaphor to a contemporary metaphor does wonders. It really helps to understand the idea of Filial Piety. Also the husband-wife relationship may refer to the controlling cycle of the five elements. Also be careful framing the question. We tend to like either-or questions, but I-Ching is about balance. I find answers to this or that actually end up pinpointing the balance between this and that. Tell the I-Ching a story and see what advice it wants to share. I've read that historically it was not advisable to ask questions about the future, only ask about present situations. Ask why or how. Feel out the day. Don't be so black and white. Good luck, keep things simple, and study the trigrams!

Hmmm.... do naked qi gong then decide if you feel different from when you do it with clothing.

Thanks for the nice video. Can fajin be seen? More about feeling, not watching. One can emit bursts of qi from any part of the body. Many possibilities exist, just waiting for people to master them. When one extends qi into weapons I imagine the possibilities just grow based on the limitations of the weapons. We can study proven techniques to more quickly gain experience, but nothing is impossible - allow possibility to present itself by dissolving attachment to presumed limits.

I wonder if Taomeow has made any more discoveries on this in the seven or so years since the last post. Does (almost) seven years of silence count as seven cycles of reduction?

So.... shortly after my last post I heard a cracking or popping noise behind me. Pop! -pause- Pop! -pause- Pop! There, over my bed was a firefly caught in a spider web. The firefly was struggling, and the spider was there with it... I couldn't quite tell if the popping came from the spider biting the carapace, or if it was caused by the firefly's struggle. Either way the noise drew my attention, and I soberly reflected how much this scenario fits with our theme. This morning I awake and the struggling has stopped, the firefly is fully encased in a white cocoon. So I think when we're in these situations we need to make sure we can develop and not be destroyed. Often I bet it's a pretty fine line, perhaps without any room for choices. Especially as children we may be broken by our home situations, but as long as we aren't killed and don't give up, we may still heal. Even when wrapped in chains by our enemies, waiting for the spider to want it's meal so to say, perhaps there is a way out. King Wen comes to mind. On the other hand there are many circumstances more likely to destroy us before we develop.

After I posted, I knew it was time to leave. I walked home, exchanged greetings, checked the mail. Then felt drawn to consult the yijing. Didn't ask a question, just went straight up, in the moment. 47 - Lake over Water. Besieged Entrapped Exhausted On the top of the stack of books to my left was Hua-Ching Ni's The Book of Changes and the Unchanging Truth. Picked it up, read.... bam! Exactly about this conversation: "Entrapment. This is the time to keep to oneself. A great person nourishes his personality to alter his future. No blame, though now his words are not trusted." At first I thought it was tell me to keep my opinions to myself. I'm familiar with the concept of the lake being drained by the body of water below. But... the very character is of "a tree, surrounded by a very tight and confining environment". The yijing never ceases to amaze me. I highly recommend reading the full description in this particular book. Here's an excerpt: "The normal tendency of people is to avoid difficulty. However, in times of being seized, the I Ching teaches stillness and quietude. During such times, the mind is usually unbalanced, actions are not centered, and words are not believed. It is crucial to calm oneself, to gather and center one's energy, and to face, accept and experience the difficulty. After one's eyes adjust to the darkness, they will be able to see again. Likewise, after one adjusts to a new situation, there may be an opportunity for reform, or a new solution to the problem may be found."

If I were an animal born into an oppressive family situation, I might naturally exercise freedom to survive on my own. In some species this is part of their nature. On the other hand, if I were a tree born into an oppressive situation, I'd selflessly make the best of it. In an unhealthy forest I might find myself contending with a strangler fig, overly crowded circumstances without balance, etc. Without too much say in the matter I would bow before nature and allow time to sort things out. Humanity is in between. Once we were few and could exercise great freedoms. When there are so very many of us, our freedom to explore self-serving ambitions is limited. Without frameworks of limitation we would destroy our environment. Think sanitation, food, shelter, violence. Think on the population of the United States (318m) compared to China (1.365b) or India (1.246b). Often limitations are found in forms of violence and law. Limitations set by principle are more elegant. In Confucianism the classic of xiao (filial piety) teaches principles whereby one strictly stays in ones place in the web of life (to paraphrase; it seems biased towards the human web of life). One knows one's place and avoids chaos by staying in it. One also endeavors to correct imbalances within the web of life, and thus an effective system of maintaining balance and correcting imbalance is found. This is very similar to the life of a tree. On the other hand we have Capitalism, where the main principle is ambition. Balance is achieved by ever changing laws and a specific shared value system. There is much oppression and the right answer is to find your own way to wholeness through the chaos and destruction. This tends to follow the law of the jungle animals: kill or be killed. In terms of person A and person B, which system should one follow? I think either is fine..... but!!!! Boy do we land in circumstances we need to be in. A sage cultivates superior te. Virtue that is not used of itself. Pure wholeness. It does not express of itself, but is manifested everywhere. Any intentional control over ones environment, inner or outer, is the use of inferior te. A sage is like a leaf on the wind. It does not move itself, but it's natural shape uniquely maneuvers it into the proper place. People talk of immortals in their minds. In enter the dragon gate Wang Liping has students all with similar dreams of his teaching them while they slept. But he denies any involvement, saying that is what happens at higher levels of cultivation. When we pass by a sage, we are changed in whatever way we are open to. It is not the sage who decides, it is us and our flow with the tao. In this way the sage retains the purity and emptiness that defines them as sage or immortal. Perhaps they are still working on becoming Celestial Immortals, and are still dissolving the emptiness of their past incarnations. I have much experience in the shoes of a person A who is not a sage. My destiny lead me to seek the tao. I have limited connection with person B these days, and yet I understand person B to be the one primary challenge I must face equanimously to become and retain my wholeness. May I find my wholeness without person B? Yes. But is it likely I will survive the unwinding of my karmic past, and thus maintain my wholeness, without overcoming the challenges person B presents to me? Not very. The answer depends on how you want to cultivate yourself. Regardless, life always puts us where we need to be. My approach has been to work towards harmony, avoiding conflict, step by step. First know my center. Next understand when I lose my center. Understand when I react, etc. Often I feel like a cart with a broken axle, being demanded to move (hex 26 line 2). I don't need to move. I don't need to respond to questions when the answers aren't waited for. There is no reason to feel hurt when person B's unrealistic needs of me are not met. The longer I can maintain open and compassionate, the longer I can maintain my relationship with person B. Perhaps one day I will become so centered, empty and radiant that person B finds themselves unable to find a way in, or need for one. But if I cast away my relationship with person B as a negative influence, perhaps they will attach to me in the afterlife. Depends on the relationship. Surely I have encountered similar patterns with others, but those lessons are much simpler to learn than this one. Every person will have that handful of triggers that must be faced in order to break through. Hexagram 21 is about breaking through such situations. I wonder, would a Sage find violence in their path and decide to take a different route? That would be an act of inferior te. I think a Sage would move into the violence or conflagration of blockage through to the end and emerge from the other side transformed. See Chuang Zu, story of the Butcher, who enters emptiness when the knife reaches the knot in muscle, and even then the knife emerges from the tangle effortlessly and not a bit duller. We tend to attach to a certain pace of life, and when we reach obstacles we want the solutions to match our current pace. But if we go inside and slow down, what appears to be a tangle is full of openings, the way appears, and we walk on down the path, never separating from our connection to the tao.

Journey to the West: "When Wukong heard this his hairs stood on end, and, kowtowing reverently, he said, "I beg the master to be merciful and impart to me the method to avoid the three calamities. To the very end, I shall never forget your gracious favor." ... ... ... "Very well, then," Said the Patriarch, "What method of escape would you like to learn? There is the Art of the Heavenly Ladle, which numbers thirty-six transformations, and there is the Art of the Earthly Multitude, which numbers seventy-two transformations." Wukong said, "Your pupil is always eager to catch more fishes....." To bad Wukong seems to have indeed forgotten his Patriarch's gracious favor in favor of catching more fishes. I wonder if 72 is more of an earthly number across the board... and 36 more heavenly? I'm curious to see how this story continues to unfold... still very early. All this heavenly preference seems unbalanced - in a very subtle context. Anyway....

Hmmm.... when our physical yin decays what is left? Some pattern of spiritual yin/yang, based on how we cultivated and refined all the different levels (or demensional bodies, however you want to look at it) of yin and yang while we were alive. My take is we tend to focus on the physical world, and when we die our patterns are still fairly "course" and we get trapped by the fields of the earth and the solar system. Maybe some of us get further. Depending on our patterns and refinements we'll end up in various places that match our patterns. Maybe we could call this the many heavens and hells of yin mixed with yang. In this state it seems we don't have the uh... leverage to correct our patterns, so we pretty much wait in these relatively unchanging realms, until we get lucky enough to have our pattern matched to the mating energy patterns of some procreating energy blossom, along with the energy patterns of whatever system we got trapped by - the energy patterns of the earth, or solar system, say. Perhaps we were bad and have incredibly course patterns.... who knows, we might find ourselves going through some cycles of physical refinement as more instinctual creatures, or maybe more spiritual creatures like trees. I dunno. Or perhaps we're very spiritually aligned with our destiny and we get called back pretty quick because the unfolding times still match our patterns pretty well - ie we didn't abuse our positions but were trying to listing and work things out. The more we come back and work things out, the more we're creating harmony, and thus refining and dissolving all the patterns and attachments that hold us to whatever particular realms we've bound us to through past incarnations. In time we will be ready to truly dissolve, and thus we can use internal alchemy at the higher degrees without life telling us "no, you aren't ready for this yet", and we are naturally able to reach very deep levels of refinement, to the point where we pass through the gate of life itself, and then we spend... they say 7 days working through the great pass as all our lifetimes flash before our eyes. Maybe part of that challenge is to dissolve all those lifetimes then, or maybe that comes later. But after we have all these spirit clones from our past lives, and so we spend 9 years shattering the emptiness to dissolve all these remnants of our existence on this planet. And then we can move on in a truly free fashion. But how can I speak of any of this? Hah! I don't know anything. There is only what I feel true from my perspective. How can I speak or even imagine upon things which are beyond my existence? I admit something may exist beyond the physical realm, but it is shameful of me to speculate. We're here now. Despite all the confusion that abounds regarding what comes later, we should really try to remember to be here now.

The thread title, I see, is "martial arts in the real world?" Do you study tao? Following tao about becoming real human. You say philosophical sentiments. Do you not believe in real humans? There are many posts here, by some of the most respected members here, who have had taoist masters speak in their minds. That not real? You say you will be cut and shot. Ahahaha. Path of radiating trust deep and long. But walking this path develops "real world" skill at slipping past conflicts and enemies. People who always look for trouble don't even find you. A few years of sincerity and this already attainable. Over time you learn how easy to slip past others minds. With mastery you ignore conflict and it rebounds upon itself. Very real. If you disagree that fine. Carry on. Edit: Perhaps this isn't considered a "martial" art. But certainly one way of dealing with them.

Can't fajin through gloves? I wonder. I dunno much about non-internal taiji. But taiji is largely about internal. Internal starts slow. Like water flowing. Can't force it to move fast or it just splashes around. Be slow with it, flow with it. Over time it will speed up. Once it becomes light, who can see your punch? Who can hit you? Taiji offers one this path. When achieving internal prowess, does one still want to fight? Does an opponent still want to fight after standing before your unveiled fighting spirit? When their mind broadcasts before every punch, what thrill in dodging? I'm told true masters won't fight; no point. They already know the outcome.

Radiate trust. Be one with all. Dissolve and penetrate everything. The one who faces you with evil intent will find they point the gun at their own head. When attempting to aim at you, they cannot find you. But you are one with everything. The only thing to aim at is their self. I figure this is tao forum, and tao is all about fighting by not fighting. Sure it takes decades of sincerity to reach achievements like this. But what is more powerful?

I think this is getting into the concept of post-celestial manifested energy vs unattached pre-celestial energy. Here I think we transcend the ideas of Male and Female. Really, I think the path of taoist cultivation is the path of dissolving the distinction between Male and Female. As we begin working with pre-celestial energies and merge them back into one-ness, the post-celestial expressions that manifest in our sexualities are no longer the focus.

Great topic! I see the concepts of yin and yang as tools for discussing different manifestations of polarity. What is important is to understand the perspective of the discussion. Without this context, yin and yang are both present in most phenomena. In Chronicles of Tao I recall yang being described as a phone pole, and yin as a moving car full of busy people. The context here (I don't remember the exact description, so this is what I see in it), might be one of purity vs conditioning. But in the context of active vs receptive, the car is yang and the telephone pole is yin. But does this mean women are more conditioned and men are more pure? Or women are more receptive and men are more active? These are VERY broad principles being applied to VERY dynamic lifeforms. In the basic anatomy men have genitalia that becomes straight and rigid, while women have soft and receptive genitalia. The sperm carries a blueprint, which is imprinted on the egg. So far this matches the principles of yang and yin, in terms of the creative and receptive. I recommend reading hexagrams 1 and 2 of the yijing. But does it just stop there? What about emotion? In the anatomy of the heart center, women have protruding anatomy while men do not. Emotionally women are more yang (active, warm), while men are more yin (slow, cold). In terms of flesh, women tend to have a higher body fat content, which is a type of receptivity and follows the principle of storing energy, while men tend to have less fat but more wiry hard body-types. What about in the context of reproductive cycles? Women have a reproductive cycle that tends to be very regular and cyclical. This may not be seen as yin, until we compare it to the reproductive cycle of men, which is very impulsive. In general men engage their cycles on emotional whims, although it is very possible to (I speak from experience) feel a deeper rise and fall that is connected to the moon cycle. But still, it's a choice. Women follow more of a natural cyclical flow. So both genders have cycles, but it tends to be easier for women to embrace and tune into and harmonize with their circular nature. Circles are very balancing and harmony oriented, when compared with the very impulsive and wasteful patterns of male sexual expression in our society, which can be seen as yang in comparison. But also, circles can represent following a pattern over and over again, which is a yin type phenomena. In general stereotypes, I DO see women who are incredibly social and active, but in a very circular way - not attempting to shake the world with their ambition, but attempting to craft the perfect social lifestyle. And I see men who preserve their vitality as pillars strength and power, who climb the very straight ladders of ambition, or who use it up in explosions of lust and desire. But yes, these are just principles. I think these principles DO stem from the inherent nature of our anatomies, and so can be seen in the world as the stereotypes we ascribe to men and women as yang and yin. But there is more than gender giving us yin or yang. Take Chinese Astrology (4 pillars of destiny, bazi), for example. When each person is born, Chinese Astrology maps out 8 different energies, each of which can be yin or yang. On top of this system you can draw yijing hexagram, which has yet another overlaying of yin and yang. Using this framework one of my friends was born during hexagram 1, line 5 - the controlling line of the most yang hexagram. She is very feminine in her way, but her strength and creative force is not to be ignored, and she tends to have a very "yang" style expression. All over the place I see women who do NOT seem very cyclical in nature, who are very ambitious, who are pillars of strength. And equally often I see men who are incredibly receptive, with yin body types and even more cyclical in their sexuality, just by nature. So we can look at the root of our anatomy to find the source of the principles, but we cannot forget that we have other very primal influences on our energetic makeups too. It's all connected and related. The principles apply to us all uniquely, which is what makes all life so special and beautiful and difficult to write off as a specific combination of this or that.

Thank you Taomeo! The idea of incorporating wuxing and yijing principles into fiction is exciting. Recently a friend and I started a world-building project with basis in taoist principles. In no time it started shaping itself into something unique and incredibly real feeling. We both have interest in writing novels. Erikson and Esslemont have produced some tremendously creative sagas stemming from a co-created role-playing conversation. But wrapping principles in our stories is one thing. Giving them a life of their own is another. And shaping so as to allow a subtle emerging of clarity, without teaching... I suppose that is akin to mastery. I have great respect for Ursula Leguin's novels and their simple but profound artistry. Best wishes to your project as it unfolds. I'm a "new" poster here, and often enjoy a gentle cloud-clearing of my mind as I read your posts. This time, I feel momentum towards some taichi neigong.

To what you describe I think on images of absolute yin or absolute yang. These images feel very dead indeed, and I wonder if they are even possible. On its own this word feels so heavy with bias. Yet when used to describe the tao I feel it begin to dance. Is anything in the tao not perfect? Hah, such a word is the death of its self! In nature do things care about having something to add or remove? Yes. Feeling comes from our senses, and they are important tools for us to adapt ourselves to our situations. Sense is related to the metal phase. Metal is controlled by Fire, Fire is related to Social Harmony. When we use our senses to help us flow based on what is most harmonious, everything becomes naturally more fair and just. What is most harmonious depends on both the internal AND external elements of any situation. What about when feelings are attached to? From what I've seen, needs which arise from fixation on feelings do NOT create balance. When we attach to our senses senses we condition the mind into patterns. Some people eat cake, feel good and forget about it. Others eat cake, feel good, and store the memory away. This attached sense merges with other attached senses, so that we "know" when we feel a certain way, and are in a certain part of town, and have enough money, and have no pressing obligations, and there isn't a long line, and when it isn't past a certain time, and when that person we don't like isn't around, when no one is being violent, and when mercury isn't retrograde, we can go eat cake. We live in complicated, demanding societies. Before we are set free to live as "adults" in "the real world", many of us have been trained to memorize an overwhelming set of rules and regulations, so we can "survive". We often become so conditioned by attachment to regulating sensory input that our patterns become our identities. When our patterns persist, cycle upon cycle for decades, we would rather die than change the pattern. But.... these attachments and patterns are literally attached and encrusted all throughout our energy body. Not only do they get in the way of our natural energy flow (causing dis-ease), they block our senses. It takes time to process senses, and the more attached we are, the more we must focus on processing instead of awareness. Our senses are just one part of who we are. When we don't focus so heavily on sight, sound, taste, touch, and smell, and dissolve the encrustation of our attachments, we begin to learn there is more to who we are. As we become more empty, and refine our awareness, our spiritual sense increases. This is resting sense on social harmony in the self. But this is just fire and metal. There are five. Here is an interesting story of what is possible when people live in full awareness of the moment. This isn't about powers though, but self-discovery. healing, and merging into wholeness. Not isolated, but in flow with our environment. As we empty of this life-time's conditioning, deeper layers of conditioning emerge from past lives. Our destiny is to dissolve this conditioning. The key is flowing harmoniously with life in our own unique way. Ultimately we won't want to add or remove anything because that would break our living connection to tao - we will spontaneously change in the way that maintains this connection. But the way is long, and what is right is what is right in front of us. It is so awkward to write about this stuff without actually knowing anything about it. How do you know if you're wrong? If you're wrong how much confusion will you cause? What makes sense from every angle you look at it still doesn't cover the angle you aren't aware of. One must be, not think about being. And see? My attaching is encrusting the original intention of this thread, which is to allow people to share their goals.

Hexagram 52 of the I-Ching is called "Stillness", and is composed of mountain over mountain. And yet it is all about movement. I think people get confused by the idea of stillness. The idea isn't to turn into a rock... rather to settle into such a perfect balance that all things are done without doing them. "All things" here means all the things that are part of our highest evolved destinies, relative to our cultivated capacity to accomplish "all things". It's pretty typical for a person's "ego" to think it knows how to accomplish its own destiny, but how can one part of our whole selves know the destiny of the whole? Cultivating stillness helps us come into greater alignment with our capacity for doing "all things", by getting our ego's out of the way so we can just be natural and whole.

To merge my de with tao.

Thank you for this. Much of this resonates deeply with me. An essence of the web of life is conveyed here, where every part depends on every other part. Also the importance of maintaining the stability of an established foundation. Both these principles struggle to find foothold in the cultures I've been exposed to growing up and living in the United States. I see us plunder the earth and each other, constantly stripping away what holds the delicate balance of our foundation together. Usually the reason is related to the choice of instant as opposed to delayed gratification. Why wait for him, let's just go! Why save up for that, put it on credit! Why deal with congress to pass new legislation when we can exploit this loophole now? Why spend millions on new sewers when we can dump this industrial waste where no one will see it? Aeons of the creation of heaven and earth bless us with such abundance, and in our greed we are blind to the effects of this plundering. Though, these affects seem so clearly present simply in how we live our lives - full of ego, lack of respect, heart locked away behind ten thousand defenses. ----------------------------- It is interesting though.... the tao works in all things after all. This lack of foundation we have is really shaking things up, and in some ways really levels the playing field for new innovations, which often arise from unique circumstances that did not begin with a stable foundation. I sense major changes are occurring in the evolution of humanity, as globalization continues on and on, and that a new foundation is being reforged which will support what these changes are brining. Throughout all this, I feel the principles taught in this classic are of utmost importance. And yet there are definitely conditions I have seen and experienced where the definitions of "unrighteous conduct" are difficult to define, due to the many unique situations which abound. Remonstrances might be appropriate from one person's perspective, but not from another's, and who is to judge? This classic seems to stress specific acts of righteousness, while the tao seems to rest righteousness on the social harmony appropriate for the particular situation. Never the less, even as I struggle to maintain equanimity under the challenges my family brings, I still do find it critically important to respect and love my family, and do what I can to share what is most harmonious with them. For myself, and for others I know, this is among the most challenging tasks we have ever faced, and, at times the most harmonious path is separation. Separation from my family is a struggle for me. Once the tao very clearly lead me to a teacher who taught me how violent oppression in family circumstances must be dealt with by completely separating and severing from these family members until one achieves one's self. Teachings in the tao seem to indicate the tao may be walked in any circumstance - often the more oppressive, the more developmental. I needed to read this, and feel humbled. Thank you.

1. When the whole is divided, parts need names. In cultivation we focus inwards and work on dissolving our conditioning to become more whole. We might first focus on the area of the lower dan tien with our breath and mind, as a tool for helping us return to centered being. The 3 dan tiens and the 3 treasures (jing, qi, shen), are ultimately one whole. As the foundation is built, it will naturally transform, and it seems to me, an important key in cultivation is being unattached enough to hear and allow transformation. The more we attach to understanding, the more we get in the way of transformation, and often block it outright. 2. I haven't studied these terms a great deal... but perhaps I have something to offer. They say the five elements/forces are originally in harmony within ourselves when we are young. As we become more and more conditioned, we fall into ruts where we do the same thing over an over again. As we rest our desire for stability on the rut we've carved - rather than being centered in the flow of transformation - we lose the ability to readily transform our energies internally. Usually patterns are created as we learn to interact with our external environment, particularly social situations. We might develop patterns of interacting with others.... say our loving and giving parents are always providing a certain energy for us, and forget how that transformation operates internally. As we grow up and leave home, we aren't getting that particular energy fed by the same people, externally. Internally, we've forgotten how this even operates, and it has formed an energetic blockage. The need for the energy is still very real however, so we will somehow find other people to provide that energy externally, unless we heal the blockage internally. Maybe a healer helps us identify and heal a blockage. But we still need to heal the pattern on our own, or before long we'll be blocked again. I don't know if this follows the traditional understanding of neidan and waidan. I would speculate that neidan is related to cultivation of the flow of energies internally as a closed system able to support itself without outside influence. And waidan might cover the exchange of energies between all things. On Wikipedia it seems waidan is associated with chemistry. On an qigong level I would speculate waidan covers the exchange of energies between the inside and the outside. For instance, in the use of emitting particular types of energy externally in martial arts. Or, in the art of absorbing external qi to replenish internal qi. On these applications, 2 important lessons have been taught to me: Application of inner energy outside of oneself depends that one has internal energy to use. Thus the importance of cultivation and healing work. In cultivation, we often take in external energy. This energy is not just free, it comes from somewhere. How we transform this borrowed energy, and how we respect its gift to us, is critically important, and often overlooked. Are we absorbing external celestial qi only to mentalize it or worse? Are we offending spirits and immortals through our lack of respect for this energy? How do we use what we have cultivated of ourselves as service back to the tao? This is our payment. Originally we were born with enough to accomplish our destiny. Why did we lose it, and why do we take and take without giving back? 3. When the whole is divided, parts need names. When the whole changes, it separates into parts. When these parts are flow in harmony without attachment, perhaps they follow the order of the pre-heaven 8 trigrams. I might speculate this order flows as a waxing and waning of yin and yang. I might further speculate that when these unattached energies take on attachment to form, the way they attach and create new parts follows the arrangement of the post-heaven 8 trigrams. One could look at this arrangement of the mating of opposing energies. Perhaps one might follow the energetic ordering of the pre-heaven 8 trigrams to refine one's attached and separated energies back towards wholeness. But this is subtle. In bagua I have trained in feeling these arrangements of energies, and they have changed me. I feel many levels of awareness are connected to them. Yet (as others have stressed), how can this be of use to you without a teacher to guide your training? And when you find that teacher, if you are not empty, how will you be able to hear the deeper subtleties in their transmission when your mind overflows with your own attachments to understanding? Perhaps I can share something helpful as way of answering some of the essence in your questions. When we train in forms, we shape the form of our bodies in different ways, and the wholeness of our energy (and the way it behaves in interaction with our inside and outside) changes. We flow through these changes and transformations of our energy without leaving our center and our wholeness. As our practice deepens, the changes and transformations of our energies reach deeper into places where we might have blocked and stagnant energy. The changes and transformations penetrate into these places and over time liberate these stagnations and the completeness of our whole increases. As we become more whole, it seems the need for movement practices lessens, and we are able to go deeper into stillness through sitting practices. The more stillness we are able to bring into movement may, I speculate, be related to higher abilities in martial arts and/or earthly immortal feats. Explorations of HOW these changes and transformations operate are attachments. Attachments can be useful tools, but.... when there are tools scattered all around our yard (mind), how can we be free to feel and dance? Seems we'd always be looking down or getting tripped up. It is said the pre-heaven and post-heaven arrangements of the trigrams came from the He Tu and Luo Shu diagrams, which are pretty subtle. If you are interested, here is a nice doc that goes into some of their application.

Ahahahahahaha. Found some excerpts from the Triplex Unity, and they were descriptions from the thread my last post proclaimed for their clarity. The tao is forever humbling me. Here's a thread I like about Dantien.

Thank you for this. I have not read (a translation of) the Triplex Unity, and it was presumptuous of me to judge it as I did. My projected judgment came from what I read in Cleary's introduction to Solving Symbolic Language, part two of The Inner Teachings. Here it is described how the symbolism introduced in the Triplex Unity was misinterpreted and misunderstood for centuries, resulting in much straying from the path as people tried to find the tao via alternate interpretations of this symbolism. Certainly there are no shortcuts, and these attempts got what they deserved. But one of the things I appreciate about taoism is the focus on simplicity of explanation. And yet we've got all this deliberately confusing and hidden symbolism, just begging to be misunderstood. I wonder if this is necessary. Various sources indicate a wise one would avoid leaving any written traces of understanding, as it is sure to be misinterpreted without a guiding hand. This seems to be fairly evident throughout history - the higher a particular teaching is valued, the longer the grip of its confused interpretation tends to last. Last night I was reading this thread and, after a long bit of searching, I may finally understand the Golden Elixir, and the essence of this work. Less from the Names used, more from the simplicity of the description. I've ordered Pregadio's Triplex Unity, and the scholar in me is interested in exploring the origin of some of this symbolism. As far as doing the work goes, my experience seems to indicate it is more important to understand the essence of the work and to allow the details to unfold following their natural course.

When I really surrender and allow my sincere practice to change me wholly over time, I really do change. I'd say I am surprised by some of the changes, but that's not it... how can I be surprised by what I fully am? In allowing my mind and ego to transform, I allow them to die, and thus they may be reborn. When I attach to particular ideas and understandings, I prevent myself from changing. Interesting how merging with the tao has been correlated to invisibility. I've heard in walking the circle one will find the tao. In my opinion this is related to invisibility as well. Interesting sharing on shen, TAXICAT. We could look at shen as being related to fire. And the qualities of fire? Illumination and clarity. When something is completely clear, it can be seen through.

Knowledge is limitless, but our lifetimes have a limit. Today we have great accessibility to knowledge via science and eficacy of various principles (often communicated via metaphor). But if we aren't careful, we get trapped by such understandings. The ancient ones did not need them to find the tao. The triplex unity introduced these alchemical terms that have contributed to much great confusion. To me the deeper teachings exist in the tao te ching and chuang tsu, where alchemical effects may be found by cultivating virtue. If one cultivates energies, but not virtue, how far can one get? My aim in both previous posts is to feed the essence of this thread: How does one care for one's dan tien(s)? We do so in many ways, and there seem to be many levels and opinions on how we understand this. Perhaps trying to explain something so mysterious as the pattern of change through time and how it uniquely applies to each of us was rather ambitious. But the idea here is that we all have our own unique flow through time. We don't need to understand it, we need to be sincere and gentle with ourselves. Nothing else. Liu I-ming takes the (complicated) metaphor oft used in Taoist Alchemical Classics and simplifies it by putting it in terms of things we can ALL understand. Becoming stronger with perseverance, never turning back even though foiled a hundred times, being imperturbable, unwavering -- this is "setting up the cauldron." Alert observation at all times is the furnace. Working gradually, serenely, unpressured -- this is "steadying the furnace." To work on our dan tien's without harming them, these points seem to be at the heart.