Green Tiger

Hallucinations are funny things. Did you know that when people smoke DMT, almost all of them experience journeying to a similar place inhabited with elfish creatures? Perhaps no more significant than the hallucinations you have when you meditate, but I find it curious and fascinating that they all experience basically the same thing.

Does it look anything like this:

You just joined today? I would recommend you do a search for "stillness-movement." You should find plenty of material to keep you occupied.

I stared at that thing for 5 minutes straight and all I got out of it was a strange feeling like I need to send SonOfTheGods all of my money . . .

Apparently there's a new 'long-hair mohawk' trend starting to catch on in Hollyweird.

I think it really depends how hairy the legs are. To be honest, I haven't encountered a lot of hairy women, even the hippy chicks around here shave, for the most part. I will say that female underarm hair is a turn off for me. Maybe just because I'm used to not seeing it and it just doesn't look quite right. If I were used to seeing it, then I'm sure it would be a different story. I had a waitress the other night who had a mustache. She was pretty cute otherwise, but I just couldn't stop staring at the mustache. It was like a top hat on an otter. Maybe he is the most adorable otter ever, but all I see is the top hat.

A panther? You really get some cool wildlife down there. The most exotic thing I've had show up in my back yard while practicing was a big snapping turtle. He walked slowly in from a ravine, sticking his neck way out like he was smelling for something. Then he dug himself a little hole in the gravel not too far from where I was practicing. EDIT: Deer are pretty common and rabbits are almost a nuisance. I've never had a rabbit come so close to me before I started practicing qigong.

The escalator is also out of order. It has become stairs.

I changed my vote to 'no new forum'. The reminder that Mo Pai is (officially, not just in my mind) a closed system, was a wake-up call. FWIW, wanted to add a thought: I was thinking about all that mo pai traffic we get. 60% or more of the google search references we get are due to mo pai? It's easy to dismiss that as a bunch of spammers and puppets, but what if there is legitimately a lot of interest in Mo Pai? One would hope these people find Tao Bums and read other threads besides the mo pai threads and become interested in a system that is more accessable. Maybe that's an idealistic notion, but I know I didn't originally come to Tao Bums looking for stillness-movement, yet I found it here. It's good to keep people coming in the door. Even if they aren't looking for something we can honestly offer them, they may stumble upon something they really need.

I was always kind of partial to the original Dragonball. Z was too drawn out.

Okay, so here's the list of questions I've got. They aren't all questions from Tao Bums, I hit up some people in my tai chi class and also a push hands group that I occasionally visit. I think it turned out to be a good mix of questions. Certainly better than what I would have been able to come up with on my own. I'll be submitting these to Mr. Holden today.

I definitely get where you're coming from but, (correct me if I'm wrong Dawai) the reason we're talking about this is because we get quite a bit of traffic here from people searching for Mo Pai on Google. The people who want a searchable forum are saying something like this: "We've already got them coming here, there's nothing we can do about that. They're here, they meditate on copper wires, get used to it. It's certainly not fair to start screening members for their affiliation with Mo Pai like some sort of witch hunt. Instead, let's just to give them an express lane to Mo Pai town or keep them all in one little Mo Pai village, if you will. It's segregation, but it's not a witch hunt. Better to be corralled into a ghetto than burned at the stake, I always say." The people who are saying there should be a non-searchable forum are saying: "They'll quit coming here altogether if we make Tao Bums stop appearing on Mo Pai Google searches. We could do that by moving all the threads to one unsearchable forum. No fuss, no muss. All the Mo Pai traffic goes away."

I voted unsearchable, but I really don't care which way it goes, so long as they have a common area to thrive. I don't know why, but the mo pai threads tend to get batshit insane. At first I thought it was amusing, now I think it's just annoying. I would prefer the mo pai threads not be searchable on Tao Bums, because I think most of the Mo Pai threads here are not indicative of the average tenor of our discussions. For the most part Tao Bums are helpful, collaborative, and insightful. The people who seem to be drawn to mo pai tend to be elitist and argumentative. On the other hand, for people who sincerely want to seek out Mo Pai information, this board is probably a fairly helpful resource, and I don't want to see any seekers barred because their brethren couldn't keep a civil tongue. The most just thing would probably be to treat it no differently from any other forum, but make it its own section because we really do need to isolate all that smack talk to one corner of the board.

You might want to start with the 8 pieces of brocade. It is a good introductory practice. If I were you, I would take Brian's advice and ask your kung fu instructor what chi kung he/she would recommend. It is likely your instructor has learned some chi kung and can teach you. From what you've stated as your interests, I think you might also want to investigate ashtanga yoga, if you haven't already.

If that's the direction you decide to go anyway, I'd be happy to help out. I don't have a strong opinion about how to handle the Mo Pai threads, but I agree that they seem to be flame-bait. I've given a fair amount of thought to why Mo Pai, of all the systems out there, has earned this dubious reputation. My first inclination is to blame Magus of Java, and perhaps Ring of Fire, though neither of those works emphasized the sorts of things that Mo Pai seekers seem to desire. I suspect the exclusivity and mystery surrounding John Chang have helped a bit. If he lived in the west and taught westerners I think people would be far less infatuated with him.

Hey, I'm getting ready to submit some interview questions to Lee Holden. I've got a couple of previous interviews with him posted in the 'interviews' section here. I really enjoy his qigong videos and his Body of Light CD collection. His qigong is simple and effective. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zsbgidG4UNk

Well, I'm disappointed (but not totally surprised) to find that there was not a lot of interest in asking Lee Holden questions. I feel like he is a tragically undervalued resource (undervalued by the Bums, at least). I'm going to go ahead with the interview. I'll use the questions Harmonious Emptiness submitted as well as several of my own. If anyone would like to add a question, now is the time. I'll probably be submitting the questions tomorrow or over the weekend. Thanks!

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I think they had flares they would shoot over the enemy so they could see them when it was dark. I could be mistaken, everything I know about military operations, I learned from Full Metal Jacket and Apocalypse Now.

Thanks for the great resources! The muscles around the pelvis are big and stubborn! I know a lot of people hold their tension there, myself included. Always great to see some new techniques for opening it up. I spend a lot of time in squat when warming up to get the kwa open. Also, I really like the leg swings this guy does around the 10:00 mark. Looking forward to incorporating some new stuff.

Coming October 2014

So there was a 5- and 10-year program. I was thinking the 5-year program would be done by now and indeed they appear to be. The 10-year program will be done in 2018. They don't list how much time they will spend on Nei Gong, but they do include hours for meditation and medical chi kung. From the 10-year training program website: Qigong Theory -- 100 hours Grand Circulation -- 300 hours Qigong Massage -- 500 hours Meditation -- 800 hours Medical Qigong -- 200 hours

I keep hearing good things about jiaogulan, or gynostemma tea. Supposed to have all sorts of nifty health benefits and taste great to boot!