de_paradise

Just wondering. How long does one do this for, and if there has been any noticable effects. This is one practise I cant really come to understand, as I dont know why harmonic would influence an organ. And if so, then why not just build one's normal speaking voice around the 6 healing sounds so that one can use the sounds in everyday speech.

I think chan and zuowang major difference and similarity depends on the meditators approach, such as the undescribed swirly feelingy stuff due to where/how you are putting your mind, and letting-go-iness, and as she says, what the meditator brings to the table in terms of their own evolution on a qi energy work level or mind insight level. There are so many ways to do a meditation that the printed word instructions become quite laughably simplistic. I think zuowang can be done with an immediacy that zen are famous for with their eyes-open type meditating, it just involves a little switch in the mind, ok now Im being more immediate, but there is still much room to fall through the levels of consciousness and sit and forget till the cows come home. I use immediacy as a gambit or trick, just like other tricks such as expansion type of mental state, I dont think it really defines the meditation or carries a person to another goal. It seriously enhances the efficacity of it though. I dont know about Krishnamurti, but to leave all techniques aside? Maybe he meant to not get so wrapped up in the written instructions bit, because the meditator has so much to explore beyond them.

yup, nothing special. The goal of meditation is the goal of alchemy or spiritual cultivation in general, which is to acheive the immortal mind, dissolving the boundary between your body-mind and the universes body-mind.In Buddhism, its to achieve progressively deep states which we could call samadhi or dissolutions. You know these states are just so completely alien to your normal human experience. Anyway, the 9th dissolution, the clean-clear or blue void would be a pretty decent goal. Im just casually summing up, you know, because often people ask me what the goal of my meditations is, since I meditate many hours per day.

Welcome Meditation and energy practises--tons of it. It transforms your mind and body that gradually relaxes things like cravings of food, sex, sleep, stimumalations, etc. I can say that for certainty because I feel it happen--one day wake up not hungry like used to be, for example. Of course this is the long road, and not going to help you in the short run. That is merely discipline.

Im still being influenced by Green Day, but when you really think about it, was influenced by Bob Dylan. Love the green ray hypothosis though. Green in general is my favorite color, and strangely enough green was really in style this summer, so perhaps theres a connection.

now that you've posted, you can't wuss out.

Somethings is wrong. Honestly I never thought Gold is heavy would ever consider that a garlic spirit was wanting to teach a lesson. The whole scenario of shooting the crap out of something and its not dying is pretty common in dreams, like lately I dreamt that I shot a "friendly", and even it was shot with a bazooka, it wouldnt stop. That was a weird dream that Im chalking down to past life issues. My feeling on your words is something needs to be really attended to urgently.

Interesting reply Scotty. I have sometimes mused that if I had gotten on the path earlier on in life, things would have advanced all that more quickly. Perhaps not. I think in general the readiness characterization is just observations based on what most people go through, a kind of ignorance at the beginning, and then an acceleration. Longer term over decades or if you add in actual attainments that should happen along with one's bhakti, this characterization would not be very robust. Another thing is that a Forest Gump would perhaps be charecterized as ready if he was told to do it and he unthinkingly did the practises. Anyway, I always appreciate it when a non-beginner is frank about their situation, feelings, pitfalls, not hiding behind some facade of uber-guru like some on this forum.

Sometimes when you think you are just moving a limb, or just thinking a kind of thought, you are also quite unconsciously moving or doing something else. I cant say I know exactly whats going on, but in general you are stimulating an energy center and then using your mind to spread it. I did similar to this for about a year, before I was on the path, I would get myself into a state of energetic bliss and stay there for hours and hours every day, just sitting in cafes watching girls walk by, feeling orgasmic. This itch, is how your crude body is perceiving the energy, sounds very strong. The general advice is to do it all you want, but dont mistake it for the goal. Im sure it is helping your path because raising the level of bliss in your body equates to raising the energies that are going to carry you to a higher level. So it could be considered a cultivation method. This is my opinion, I aint no guru, just been through lots of stuff.

Strange and difficult week, friends. Symptoms: -complete loss of apetite, the thought of food made me feel un-hungry -muscle tension (normally I do yoga and vocal singing exercises, so I am exactly aware of how many muscles should be, I could not sing due to the tension, and yoga was hard going) -nightmares, somehow caused by a base fear and negativity. -misery, negative thinking, torpor. -lack of concentration, memory and senses like eye function -energy getting vamped everywhere, want to avoid eye contact or proximity of people. Meditations: good Physical energy: good I deduced that it was perhaps detox symptoms, but I'd not have this kind of array of symptoms before, yet I've detoxed lots. My friend believes its a kind of machinations of a bad person, but I dont think its that either Steps I've taken: -Avoid eye contact and any person who is not pure and giving -create a clean environment in my apartment, burning scented oil (rose water) to gods and protectors -joined the gym, did lots of cardio and steam room, (which did not make me feel any better, but the heavy sleep seems to help alot) -taken it as easy as I could, distractions (even though its so hot and croweded here in high season.) There must be more steps one could take. I'm curious if anyone else has been out of whack lately, since a Kundalini friend tells me so as well. Also offer your theories on what may be behind all this.

Thanks dear. And thanks people for your input. Probably it was detox of a deep issue, or too much pressure from the climate and the semen retention. Theres alot of other details but, its mainly gone away. What a hard week it was, I really learned just how fragile our sanity can be when our energies are acting strange.

Nothing unusual in the mundane life. Just after I posted this, I meditated on my bed doing the Tara mantra and made up a little meditation on the way, staying so long because it seemed to be going good. Then I somehow found myself in a voidness, and I started flying down. But as I flew I realized that I was going to ejaculate, so I tried to pull out of the state. Alas I spooged in the void, not sure how that works. But I didnt wake to consciousness, but into a dream state, and later finally I emerged back to this apartment. Not really sure, but I hope this is Tara or my higher mind helping a guy out. I was already seemed to be near the end of the "flu", but now feel much better. Draw your own conclusions about semen retention making a guy go nutty in the high summer, about Tara, about it all. Who knows.

He gained enlightenment in a flash before (as in Zen awakening), but did the wall staring to solidfy it, as in allowing the biology catch up. Its funny how non cultivators look at this story as some kind of dread to stare at a wall, OMG, what a waste, what if you stare at a wall and nothing happens. You could have been at the bar chowing down on buffalo wings and staring at the cleavage of drunk chicks.

If you were to hang around with blood thirsty wolves, a successful yang time would be to claw into some deer guts for the fatty acids. If you were to hang with some giraffes, then, a nice bunch of leaves would be just grand. For a Taoist, or any spiritual person,the aim, the highest goal is too keep your ego in check, show patience, tolerance, lack of greed, dont look for fame, dont look for peer esteem. In a corporate society, there is greed, one upmanship, envy, need to look good before the boss (the alpha) and peers. Not always, but usually. From what I see, your "yang"is confused with ego dominating behavior, which to me is not yang. I am a cultivator, when I see people greed, need to be recognized, this is errant behavior because it reinforces the sense of seperate self. Walking down the street, I am virtually a "doormat", getting out of the way of anyone. In my own eyes, I am not a doormat, I am just being patient with the people who are stuck in their own high sense of self. In the end, the spiritual set of values trumps those of the pervasive general society, and they can feel it. If you cant get out of you corporate job into a simpler lifestyle then at least it can be a method of cultivation to adhere to Taoist values while in the fire.

Many of us have qi experiences, but shen is pretty high up the cultivation ladder. I wonder if anyone has any first hand knowlege to share.

You have an incomple understanding of how the body forms a fully formed qi body. It is formed in stages. We can sometimes feel some events taking place, such qi lifting from the leg and moving up. The reason is that the left side of our body is known as the qi side and the right side of our body known as the blood side. Most people start to feel energy sensations on their left side, say ear, or leg, etc, its just the way it is. But no, the whole process is not something you control, your part is only mininal. This goes with meditations and energy practises alike. The meditation that you already do is really safe, and since you are making progress, you are barking up a needless tree looking for something else. The fact that you feel something already means that being a skeptic of an energy body is illogical, but it may take your mind to catch up to that reality. Skepticism is based along the lines of what is taught us in conventional life, not along the lines of alchemist reality, which makes conventional reality look like children's games in a sandbox. You seem like a good guy, and also spot on about the pretentous Buddhist debater type. If you are looking for energy practises to augment the vispassana, the teacherly people who posted already Im sure can help you.

I dont read many books anymore, but I do like to memorize things. I was wondering if anyone has a suggestion of what could be very beneficial and help with ones path.

Nobody really taught me this but to stillness like some kind of anapana breath, one can add the elixer fields generated by the good emotions and states. Like love, gratefulness, boddhisattva precept, expansion of self, no self. In my opinion these will take me where I want to go, because the fields strengthen as one progresses. The meditation simply becomes a route to a deeper meditation state, but if augmented by some emotion or thought-state, then the results become all the better.

Do they got them cajun potato wedges in the 5th?

The smile on pictures is just because you are closer to a subconcious or dream state while you are waking. Like in dreams, or lucid dreams, pictures form and morph along with your thoughts. So your eyes are scanning a head, and then creating a picture with the data in your bio-computer. Its nothing. Same happens to me when I meditate and then go out and see signs that seem to change words. The ghoulish guy in a forest is probably similar type thing, a pathway created by your subconscious, maybe in childhood, of the fear of being alone in the deep forest. Once the path starts, it will end up at the beast, and the triggers may be numerous. But I am just guessing. Maybe you can pray to a deity to help clear you of any beasties, just to make sure. So you took drugs, and was doing spiritual practise and got accelerated results, and now you are having trouble adjusting to all the energy. What you describe is likely you had an opening, and now the spiritual energies are rushing, helping you as fast as they can to clear out and create your energy body channels to support the new situation. As you can see, the mind can only control a little amount of a certain kind of energy, not the kind thats doing the work in your head. Good thing for that, because you wouldnt be making progress otherwise.

The siddhis worth having are the ones that further your path when you otherwise would not. Probably the ones that focus you on the exterior world would distract more than help you along the path, unless you have already the maturity or bhakti to handle a siddhi like x-ray vision, and can parlay that into furthering your path. At the end of the day, you sit down and meditate, qigong,etc., siddhi or no siddhi, is going to be the best outcome.

I know how you feel, its hard to pin down just why. When I think of my parents, I think of them as children. Or if I think of certain elderly people, I feel that they are younger when me. Its just some kind of f e eling, probably having to do with the behavior that reflects closeness to the Tao and the behavior that imply this. Or maybe something else, like a closer understanding to past lives and the lessons learned.

Dunno if this interest you, but the word 生 is derived from 土, earth, with another horizontal level, and the vertical bit cotinuing up, meaning to break through the earth. Like a seed sprout breaks through the earth. Then the other bit, like a comma, is where the newborn meets the sun, and forms growth or branch to the outside world. I was just wandering around and met my friend who is a Taoist preist and he was explaining word origins to another guy, and I asked him this word.

There was stage in my Kundalini where I would sweat loads, yellowish brownish sweat rings all over my pillows and sheets. That stage lasted a few weeks. Great detox. Good thing I was in a hotel that changed the sheets each day.