konchog uma

http://www.thetaobums.com/index.php?/topic/7795-secret-of-the-golden-flower/ awesome thread by the same name.. 17 pages of good info and in answer to the OP, i would read both and lu yen http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1595479198?SubscriptionId=0QCHRJVSKG6F3BRGBNG2&tag=pbs_00004-20&linkCode=xm2&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=1595479198 and JJ semple http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0979533112?SubscriptionId=0QCHRJVSKG6F3BRGBNG2&tag=pbs_00004-20&linkCode=xm2&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=0979533112

hi flowing hands, one of my teachers can walk on hot coals. He isn't a daoist proper, but he says its shen that allows one to perform such feats. Refined shen that makes the jing of the physical body adamantine as it performs feats like that. To him the whole physicality is jing, just energy at its densest phase-state. So he doesn't mean semen or hormones or marrow, etc. He means everything physical. I don't know if i can offer much more than that, but i am glad to hear that temple daoists do that crazy stuff!! I thought that was a shamanic ritual but i guess that is what you are talking about.. shamanic roots of daoism. Very nice to learn! blessings

Happy Shivaratri everyone! Bless you all Aum Asato mā sad gamaya Tamaso mā jyotir gamaya Mtyormā amtam gamaya Aum śānti śānti śānti From ignorance, lead me to truth; From darkness, lead me to light; From death, lead me to immortality Aum peace, peace, peace OM NAMAH SHIVAYA

i'm gonna go meditate on that for a while. in fact, (ahem...) i'm taking a break from the taobums (you're all too negative!!!) to meditate on that. See you in 2013

hehehe sorry for my mood up there i have my moments with some time to think about it, i do think that its good to respect tradition. But i also wonder who originally laid the restrictions on chanting it? was is avalokitasvara? or was it later commentators? if it was later commentators, did they give a reason? some things are more powerful than my knee jerk reactions give them credit for, and sutras can affect their readers in subtle and powerful ways. Even if i am correct so to speak, the subject deserves more respect than i gave it there so apologies to all

bonus: you won't be killed by mediumistic insects!! or landslides whew!

hahahaha if you want to recite the Great Compassion Dharani, do it!! don't let vegetarian buddhists stop you, thats an american thing anyway... in asia many eat meat. As noted, the Dalai Lama eats pork and other meats!! hahahaha dogma be damned, don't take orthodoxy and tradition that seriously is my advice. Open your heart's wings and follow it where it flies what kind of buddhist deity would be offended at you reciting it?? "look there! He's not a bodhisattva! OH NO!!" hehehe call the karma police he's getting away

I talked to my teacher today, and he says kujiin just passed through china from the himalayas and that its from india originally, but he didn't know what tradition or if any indian yogis or tantrists or other ascetics still use it there. Did anyone ever notice that its on the cover of "Qigong Empowerment" by Shou Yu Liang and Wen Ching Wu?? look to the left

awesome chidragon, i like your translations thanks!!

yes totally lacks perspective trunk, i admit, an idiotic way of thinking. Getting into Mark's teachings has been a great lesson in my own prejudices and expectations. I remain essentially skeptical, but i am much less inclined to judge a book by its cover part 4

Master Yierh went to see Hsŭ Yu. Hsu Yu asked him: "How has Yao aided you?" "Yao told me," said Master Yierh, "You must dedicate yourself to humaneness and righteousness, and speak clearly about right and wrong." "Then why have you come here?" asked Hsii Yu. "Yao has already tattooed you with humaneness and righteousness and lopped off your nose with right and wrong. How will you be able to wander on the path of untroubled and untrammeled evolu- tion?" "That may be;" said Master Yierh, "but I'd like to wander along its borders." "No;" said Hsŭ Yu, "he who is blind has nothing to do with the charm of human features; he who is sightless has nothing to do with the attraction of colorfully embroidered garments?" "Unadorned's disregard of her beauty;" said Master Yierh, "Bridge Support's disregard of his strength, and the Yellow Emperor's abandonment of his knowledge were all due to a process of remolding and reworking. How do you know that the Creator of Things may not erase my tattoo and restore my nose, enabling me to avail myself of wholeness so that I may become your disciple?" 'Ah!" said Hsu Yu. " That cannot yet be known. But I will tell you in general. My teacher, oh my teacher! She blends the myriad things, but is not righteous; her benefits reach to a myriad generations but she is not humane. She is senior to high antiq- uity but is not aged. She covers heaven, supports earth, and carves out a host of forms, but is not skillful. It is in this that one should roam?'

part 3

cool stuff trunk! when i first saw mark, i was like "uh really?"... not only was he "too big", it was the shades and the california cadence to his voice. I listened to a couple vids really skeptically thinking "i'm gonna debunk this guy" but as i did, what he was actually saying washed over me, and i realized that my thinking was shallow and that this guy was the real deal. I just signed up for his Deepen Your Practice program, i really get a lot out of his talks!!

kuji-in is truely awesome

part two om namah shivaya

you're most welcome

blessings cam, and good luck putting the sloppy sauce down. may you find clarity and natural contentment!

Hi mile83, I suggest not taking things too literally. And i second the idea of reading as many translations of the Tao Te Ching, and other classics as possible. It is written that the dao begot one, one begot two, and so on. However, to my knowledge, daoists never really concern themselves with why. The best explanation i have receieved is that "why" just leads to an infinite regression of "because..." to which can be asked "why" again and again. So some people will tell you that the dao gave birth to one because the old version of reality had come to a close and joined the void again.. that is just one cosmological interpretation, of course nobody was there! Some will say it just did, and thats that, and thats the camp i personally fall into. Some might say that the dao begot one because the universe is full of space and time and something exploded to fill that spacetime.. to me thats based on physics, but some people (like Frijof Capra) have done a lot of bridge science and mysticism. There are probably myriad other answers, but i suggest taking them all with a grain of salt. The dao isn't a logical reasonable thing, it likely doesn't do what it does for reasons that logic can grasp or language can elucidate. Its like asking why something happens in a dream.. you can get freudian or jungian or interpret it according to gypsy witchcraft but in the end, things just happen spontaneously, sometimes simply because they happen. No other reason needed or given. Another thing to remember is that in all likelyhood, time as we experience it has no beginning or end in any absolute sense. Even if this universe experienced a big bang which was its origin, there may be reality beyond the bounds of that explosion, or the universe as it is known. As the buddhist doctrine goes, this arose from beginningless beginninglessness. One last thing to remember is that nobody who gives you an answer knows for sure, so take it all with a shaker of salt.

i think thats a good point about selfless contribution, but i don't agree with you about the play being over with awakening. I don't think anything stops in a static sense when beings awaken. I have met, and we have all read, about dynamic beings who achieved their awakening and then lived a rich, full life, like the life they led before awakening, except more rich and full. If you are a frog in a well, it is hard to imagine what sunlight and a vast expansive field or a pond would look like and be like, but that doesn't mean that there is no reality outside the well. Awakening is like this. Reality does not fold up and go away when beings awaken, it only reveals greater and greater beauty and mystery, and enjoyment to be found in the most mundane of activities, and all things.

most of my experience has been with samatha-vipassana, which i was taught is the practice of peacefully accepting whatever arises in the mind, while maintaining awareness of the breath. One simply lets thoughts float away as they arise, without grasping or rejecting. It leads to insightful thoughts, or if it doesn't, it leads to the insight that your ordinary thoughts aren't really worth thinking for lack of a better way to put it. some of my experience has been with dzogchen, which is based on the foundational belief that one's own nature is already luminous and pure and that one doesn't need to do anything in order to cultivate that, but instead to let the conditioned patterns of thought and behavior shed themselves under the light of awareness as one sits, in order to "return" to the original state. much of the practice at one sangha revolves around deity practice, invoking with chants and prayers and mala rounds of seed mantras, the deities such as Tara, Manjushri, Medicine Buddha, Samantabhadra, Avalokitasvara, etc, and then visualizing them dissolving into light, and that light entering us, and then we are transformed into that deity. That sort of practice is particularly Tibetan, and the only other place i can think of right now (im sure there are more) is in shaivism, especially with the mantra Shivoham and the ideas that surround it. I have also learned some more basic buddhist meditations with the tibetan groups i practice with, like metta (loving-kindness generation), and counting the breaths til 7 and starting over again, among others. Many basic mahayana practices are found within TB, and some more esoteric vajrayana practices and tantric practices, as well as imports from Bon shamanism, like tsa lung exercises, which clear the subtle channels (ida pingala sushumna specifically) and the subtle centers (bon uses a 5 chakra system, one center for each element; space, air, fire, water, earth). Tenzin Wangyal has some free vids on youtube about tsa lung that are very good IMO

point taken, trappings can be more than just frivolous decoration. I am not sure i can say why enlightened masters might do what they do. I might have my guesses, but the enlightened i know of by readings and their words are not reasonable people. They aren't rational i mean. So i don't know if thinking about why someone who has attained their freedom might do what they do is really going to get me anywhere. I sort of feel that making blanket statements about masters is silly, but i take you to mean that a significant number of these masters behave that way. The only thing i can really offer is that when the cords of attachment to the world are cut, maybe they just don't find themselves able to care or invest themselves in the doings of people or the fates of the masses anymore.

I find him very smart, insightful, halarious even. Hard to put my finger on the exact quality of his excellence but i find him excellent, and recommend that you read something of his for yourself and form your own opinion!

the constant is change the face of the unchanging is ever in flux

Amen Creation. But i am not surprised by conflicting information. In the realm of subtle energy, what reveals itself to one culture is not what is revealed to another culture, and within those cultures, what is revealed to one individual might conflict with another's perception. It is common. I have read a fair bit about the chakras and from a yogic point of view (like the book i am finishing now, Layayoga by Goswami) there are definitely sanskrit symbols each each chakra and on each petal. Goswami will tell you "this is the nature of a chakra" but did native americans or egyptians see such a thing?! hahaha no of course not. I think the most important aspect of study isn't to find the "one right way" and exclude all others as wrong ways, the most important aspect is to study as widely as you can and compare and contrast, looking for overlap and similarities... those places where different continents and cultures saw the same thing inside are the places that interest me. the kali yuga entails certain factors of time and space to be acting on all of us from within and without, unavoidable pressures which affect neural pathways and intentions. IME one of those factors is the idea that once a so called authority has seen something their way, they present it as THE WAY. It takes a great scholar to write a book in which are different expositions of something, which conflict, and in which that author doesn't try to tell the reader what to believe. Interestingly Layayoga is one such book, giving 11 accounts in the chapter i just read of the chakra system (colors, locations, etc). But i am not writing to cheerlead for Goswami, just to say that its rare in these times that a writer can transcend their own personal viewpoint... perhaps one might think that in the area of kundalini it would be more prevalent, but if, as it seems, it isn't, then i will just apply the comparing and contrasting that i mentioned, looking for overlap and similarities, and noting differences as variations within the system. In a way, you can look at everything like that. If you look at spiritual paths and wisdom traditions, they all revolve around the central point of meditation/prayer with some various other cultural trappings and frills thrown in for flavor. So i discard all the trappings and frills, and i pray and meditate every day. I don't get caught up in whether my path is more or less enmeshed in ignorance than anyone else's path!! Hahaha i just walk it. So rambling aside, i think we can apply that sort of approach to everything we research, in order to save ourselves from a certain degree of frustration, and to distill the essence of the subject into a refined form

Shivaratri in Varanasi pt 1 of 4