Hern Heng

From what i can tell, John Chang is one of the higher level masters of Qi around today. There are, reportedly people who've grasped it better than him, but you are talking about a very small number of people. Seems to be a genuine guy, seems to give off a good and down to Earth vibe from what i've picked up on the videos. Magus and Nei Kung seem to have a lot of information in them that is useful to people who've already been working pretty extensively with Yang Qi. Personally, i think they describe more in about a dozen or so interspersed pages of Nei Kung, than most books do in hundreds of pages. Take the far out descriptions however you will, but the videos seem to speak for themselves that limits are only as real as we have been conditioned to make them. Beyond that, i would caution you that there are a number of charlatans who cannot replicate ANYTHING (not even common mastery of Yang Qi that any descent Kung-Fu teacher can demonstrate), and yet claim to have acheived levels of mastery parallel to advanced levels of the Mo Pa'i tradition. If someone is telling you that they can offer you this or that for a certain about, know up front that they are hustling you. You're not going to link up with Chang or his students (in any tangible way), on the Internet. Use those two books in conjunction with face to face training with at least a descent master of Yang Qi (not so difficult to find), and incorporate what they are saying into supplemental practice that you Shrfu gives you. This will take you further than folks charging you fees for internet forums, or thousands to hear about public seminars.

No, i actually just had a feeling (when i saw your name as the most recent post), that you'd have gotten to my comments. i had stopped checking after a couple of days (busy with a paper haha). Anyway, when practiced correctly it looks a lot like fast T'aiji with the sinking/drawing step of Xingyi and Mizong footwork of the Bagua Kuo bu and Bai Bu stepping (though not circular). It doesn't do any of these arbitrarily, but i see all of these in it. The style is very long and northern, and would otherwise look like very technical Wu Ye forms. A good practitioner is relaxed and full when doing these. You could perhaps characterize it as "Internal-External" as some do for Chen T'aiji and Bajiquan (though it is not "hard" breathing) like Baji training. These are forms that accentuate what are said to be more ancient techniques. i can't attest to how old the forms are, but the techniques, including the "missing" step footwork and a type of "radar" tracking is said to be from the T'ien Shan Szu fighting techniques. Check out the website for more descriptions beyond that.

Been flipping through Magus, looking for the page where Chang references Zhang, San-Feng dying at 200. Can someone direct me to the page number where this conversation goes down please? Thank you in advance for your help!

What's unfortunate is that fellas like David Icke (who is likely schizophrenic), and various "UFO Convention" types poison the well of cross-cultural information here. The subject is actually fascinating, as there are parallel descriptions, accounts, mythologies of Sirian origins throughout ancient world religious traditions. i can't attest to any truthfulness at all in where the "Convention" types have taken the subject, but there is a great deal of impressive information there that is written by non-nut-jobs.

Not suggesting the two are related at all, but T'ien Shan Pa'i purports to be from the T'ien Shan themselves. The deceased Great Grandmaster of the system lived in Taiwan as did almost all prominent Martial Artists facing Maoist persecution (he taught at the Central Kuo Shu Institute), and it spread from there by his students. Not sure what persecution he faced, but everything seems to be based out of Taiwan around the same time. The Pa'i doesn't claim to be from there though. The system teaches primarily Shaolin based Kung-fu early in the curriculum, but the Pa'i forms are purported to be Daoist in origin (as is the originating T'ien Shan Szu). Though it is quite likely that there is no connection between the two (whether they know it or not), i say this to point out that they both claim to be Daoist, both claim to be from T'ien Shan and both claim to be approximately the same age. That's all.

Dao Zhen, yes, this has been what i've seen too. Most of the aggressive, "physical" types (of any variety, "jocks" or even avid external martial artists), often take the longest to feel their qi. A good artist is using full body movements and expressions of qi when they paint, draw or whatever. There is no technique to master, techniques are used to express the qi. These sorts merely need to be told how to look for the qi (or that it is there to look for), and then how to retain and build qi. The Laozi says to be a like a newborn, like a woman, like water, like unhewn wood. All of these things are yin, to be acted upon and to "re"act in a passive manner that over comes the aggressor (e.g. newborns survive plane crashes while all others die, women defeat men in bed, water carves out canyons, wood is carved into masterpieces by yang tools that are blunt, ugly and express nothing but utility). Jesus said the man must be like the woman and the woman must be like the man. Just some food for thought.

Seems like David Verdesi and this guy could give financial seminars on scamming people with big dreams and little scrutiny.

Women and non-aggressive men have the easiest time feeling qi first. Do standing meditation daily for a few months and you should start to feel it. Continue this regularly and you should have no problem.

Very good opportunity! You mean one doesn't have to pay $250 per question? Amazing!

The Vampire and jinni-l-`amaar connection is a big chunk of the same book too. Yes, it's ALL connected. Just the myths themselves obfuscate things a bit, but at the core there is a common thread that runs through all of them. Order the book, you won't be sorry. i have an old article with Sufi Shuyookh claiming that George Lucas interviewed them in the early 70's. From Sufism Lucas got both Yoda (al-Khidhr), the story of Luke and Yoda by in Dagoba (Moses and Khidhr in the Qur'aan), and the term "Jedi" (Al-Jedi), itself. The "lightsaber" is based on ahadeeth about `Ali ibn Abi Taalib being given a sword that would "activate" with light when necessary. The sword was given to him by Jibreel (Gabriel), who is described as we would describe an extraterrestrial today.

Veganism is ideologically a kind ideal. It is more difficult to obtain proper heat with such a diet (but it is possible). Personally, i think the ovo-lacto vegetarian diet (with the ovo and the lacto being from "clean karma" sources, not from factory farms), is the all-around healthiest. i say this having tried an omnivorous, vegan and lack and ovo-lacto diet for years at a time each. i think most "vegans" are vegan because they disagree with factory farming and such more than they disagree with consuming animal products that do not harm the animals. In terms of "Dao"-ism, if one sees themselves as a facet of a symbiotic whole, then they must take into account the suffering of all; and if suffering need not be incurred then one should ask themselves why they chose to incur it. Is it to leach the qi from a big animal or from skinned alive rabbits at a David Verdesi seminar? This sort of power is no different than the famous TV repair man "qi" video; where the man "charges" temporarily with the electricity of the television's capacitors. This sort of power is limited to how much you can continuously absorb from "others" (a dualistic power scheme). Though Dao"ism" has had it's fair share of meat consumption historically, it serves to reason that the ideal behind abstaining from meat is as consistent with a Dao"ist" ethic of Oneness as it is with Buddhist doctrines.

You can build more muscle with meat, there is no doubt about this. You can boost your testosterone as well with meat, there is no doubt about this. The question is longevity. Steroids can make you very strong for a time, but long term they are bad for you. It is similar (though an extreme example), with meat. It is very steroidal, but it is ultimately the sort of thing that tends to tax the glands, and Kidneys sooner than a plant based diet. Again, i'm not just talking theory, i'm talking about documented instances of longevity. Cavity-wise, i've never come across any notion of vegetables causing cavities. Traditionally, pelu bark and miswak have been the sorts of vegetation-derived sources of CLEANING teeth before tooth brushes. This seems exaggerated. Meat can fit into any dietary balancing equation, but it is not essential. Again, if it was then ol' Li would have been dead a long time before he was and Sun would have had his ass kicked over and over. To me, real world examples speak louder than book theory.

Check out "Biogenesis: The Creation of Mankind by an Angelic Species" on newdawn.dharmahost.biz It has extensive quotes from a 7 hour interview with Credo Mutwa. Almost 500 pages and has Chinese-relevant correlations to the "Dragon Kings" as well. The best book on the subject in print.

There is no doubt that vegetarians in equal environments, with roughly equivalent exercise patterns, stress levels and the like are healthier in the long run than meat eaters. Human beings are primates. Primates are primarily equipt for a plant based diet. Our rabbit-horse-cow-like flat front teeth, long digestive tracts, our rotating jaw (for grinding), lack of panting (sweating), lack of instinctual urge to hunger for a living animal, and so on, are all natural indications that meat eating is contrary to how we emerged on the evolutionary scene. Some primates eat some meat, but none eat a lot. Still, though we "can" eat meat, it does not mean that we are appropriately equipt for it, nor does it mean that in the long run detrimental effects will not manifest. In the short term you do get benefit from limited meat eating, but in the long run the best effects are from a moderately hot plant based diet. If anyone can show me a meat eater who's lived into his third century then i'll gladly reconsider. Interestingly, the patriarchs of the Torah who were said to live for so many centuries did so (according to the text), on a plant based diet. i'd find it unlikely that all of this is coincidental.