GrandmasterP

Paradoxically would not an omnipresent God be spatially and temporally proximal to everyone all the time? If deific proximity were contingent upon the actions of a believer then the God must surely dissolve being by definition non omnipresent and certainly not omnipotent.

Said it before. Never ever recommend fasting to another person. None of us know if it might be harmful to them. For example someone on medication,with diabetis known or unknown or a recovering anorexic. Anyone thinking of fasting needs to take qualified medical advice first. It isn't to be recommended and to do so is actually against the law in some jurisdictions.

If the idea catches on the knock on effect to the guru business could be devastating. Most of the pro gurus make their money from ticket sales for giving satsangs or similar direct transmission-opportunity events.

Or trolls ;-) We have a union and in house fortnightly trade paper [Psychic News you can look at headlines online] here in the UK. Mediumship is not quite so well organized elsewhere. 'Demons' are seldom a problem. It's people on this side of life who tend to cause the biggest headaches. Goes back a long way does mediumship in Taoism. Still a very popular service, brings people in.

Cracking post Shanlung. All respect to you for it. So what happened to that guy after he fled the monastery?

Nice story but not sure it illustrates Wu-Wei accurately [were that possible]. The gentleman in question whilst undoubtedly merciful in this particular instance still accumulates Karma in 'fighting for Allah'. Being on the side of 'God' in assurance that any opponent is less happily situated [maybe even an 'infidel'] might well attract a karmic shit storm. Intention for merit tends to negate 'merit'.

If the transmitter thinks so and the reciever believes so then yes. Meeting such claimants one tends to think ,not really but transmission is invariably a subjective experience when discussed. Empirical assessment along the lines of.... ability before transmission compared to ability after.... is hard to see internally. Not a better/worse critique what follws simply a contribution for debate. Student cultivating a QiGong form vis DVD gets so far and is stuck. Comes to a class and after one hour has overcome any barriers and has demonstrably 'got it'. That to me is transmission. Anything less than that being merely talking about transmission.

Osho's book When the Shoe Fits has some classic Taoist tales plus the old scallywag's trademark gags. Well worth a look. Older cheaper editions maybe best. I've heard but don't know for sure that the latest versions have had some his the less PC gags edited out.

Old PL story on the threefold nature. Mrs. Chen is called Mommy by the Chen children. Darling by Mr Chen and Daughter in Law by Grandmother Chen.

Tigers might be a bit much in a small house. Maybe one tiger chilling at one foot. But two.. Just say the tigers didn't like each other. That could be tough on one's slippers if a tiger fight kicked off. Delusional or not I find cheery inner smile sorta approach to cultivation is cheerier than going into it miserable. I'm a naturally grumpy old man but hopefully you'd not know that cos positively cheery cultivation does seem to more or less dissolve grumpiness. Probably too insensitive to over analyse that [being a man and all] it just seems to work. Grumpiness is still 'there' somewhere but it doesn't own me. IMHO QiGong cultivators feel better than non cultivators and we get lots of students telling how they feel better and more energised. Has to be good for you.

Well you never know maybe she will get to come to UK. We'd certainly be interested in having her teach at our centre.

Kung Fu the Legend Continues is on Sat n Sundays here on CBS freeview. One hour Slot but adverts take up about a third of that. Box Sets on DVD are our best alernative. BBC TV has no adverts but a lot of the programmes are pretty dire. Advertising is eveywhere just look at top of this forum. Everybody there is selling something or other. Good luck to them but what happened to sharing freely or giving stuff away? I saw an ad in the trade paper for UK holistics [Cygnus Review. It is excellent and free to the trade] for cultivation DVDs 'Buy two get third free'.

Life is pretty much life [taking dead as the opposite] but everybody living it is different. Amithabha Buddha is showing a new arrival round Pure Land. Guy asks.... What's behind that big wall over there? Amithabha Buddha replies....... 'Christians. They think they are the only ones here'

Maybe I am out of touch and this is what these gigs cost. Not saying someone is not worth any amount of money just saying there is a limit to what most folks can afford to spend and in hard economic times that is less than it was in better times. I know Mantak Chia's upcoming gigs are expensive but he pitches to an existing market and only works in relatively affluent areas. You either need few paying a lot or a lot paying less. Either way you need a venue and plenty of pre publicity and without someone organizing that in the host market then it's near enough impossible to break even let alone make it worthwhile to do. Full board in a veggie small hotel with spa facilities in Scarborough costs £70per person per night. On top of that you have expenses for workshop leaders however many of those there are. Merchandise brings in exra profit but the fewer attending the less you sell. Our summer school three night weekend costs £250 which is good value but not for profit. To run something similar in a swish venue or anywhere in the expensive SE or South coast resorts would cost a lot more simply because accomodation prices are so much higher.

Good luck and best wishes for a fruitful retreat.

Trouble with these sort of gigs is that if you ask for expressions of interest you may not get many. If you go ahead and book avenue and dates then advertise you may get more but possibly not enough to cover overheads. Mantak Chia is in London this weekend and his London centre has been pushing that for months all over the place. It needs that sort of local backup for success to be more or less guaranteed that or a professional booking agent and they cost serious money. I would love to see Sifu Jenny Lamb here in the UK but times are hard. Recently I had an email invite to an exclusive transmission one day workshop by one of the big names and the ticket cost was £350. There is no way I could justify spending that sort of money.

There's a house we looked at in North Norfolk had solar panels, heat pump, wind turbine (squeaky), huge rainwater cache etc. More or less paid its own way energy wise. Trouble was they were asking nearly 2-million pounds for it. At our ages the time we'll have to benefit would probably not be worth the cost of installation plus Mrs GrandmasterP wouldn't let anyone near her garden with a backhoe digger. Somethiomng I would welcome on the veg plot about now as I begin double-digging the horsemuck in. Takes me two weeks on and off if we get teh weather. Backhoe would do it in a couple of hours probably. Hey ho..... a man can dream. .

We show our student teachers (in my day job) a clip of interview with students who had participated in the notorious Stanford Prison Experiment. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_prison_experiment Stanley Milgram's 'Obedience to Authority' is another worth looking at. Those participants were not 'hypnotised' at all they just went along with what appeared to be the authoritative 'norm'. The scary thing is that most people in similar situations will do the same. hence we go to war, folk eat at McDonalds, allopathic medicine is seen as the last word in health assurance (in the west anyway) and so on. Interstingly what littkle research has been done on 'faith' groups (mainly by the TM people and a bit partial as a result) indicates that those withm a strong belief system or faith practice are LESS likely to succumb to corrosive obedience (doing something wrong because it seems to be right at the time) than those who have no firm faith-praxis basis. Hypnotism of teh Derren Brown vairiety is a trick in one sense. You sort out teh suggestible compliajnt by a series of short tests first and then further refine amongst the ones you get up on stage ujntil you get the ones you can work with. I demonstrate 'sticking' my year 1 students' fingers together (a 'first sift' hypnotists test). It keeps them from fidgeting and they do tend to pay more attention afterwards..

Good luck with it et. Your 'taking on a whole civilization' business sounds like a big job. I'll just stick with trying to change 'me' for the moment I reckon. Bit like dropping a pebble into a pool is personal cultivation. get it right and the ripples spread nicely.

. edited out duplicate post

Well that sounds pretty good to me bro. If it's constructive it aint a hungry ghost. I've never had anyone especially learned or holy coming through usually it's someone's old Grandad talking about former pets etc. just routine evidence but folk seem to like that so there ya go. I did have Joanna Southcott for a few years but she's moved onwards and upwards long enough since. there's a physical circle at ours on Friday eenings and they get materialisations and all sorts so i have no problem at all with manifestations, they are as real as you and me. On topic... this Female principle then... I can see where you are coming from in that ch 55 in one sense but in another I just feel that it's maybe less to do with physical aspects of male/female relationships and interactions as something deeper than that. Maybe as a metaphor boffing works but I don't know. Have always felt the same with the tantrists. When you see them at their get togethers there's not much to choose between what they get up to and what L understand to be what goes on at certain louche parties. Our family fest at Osho Leela was just after tantra week this year and some from that stayed on from that for our week. Anyy-hoo would love a copy of your Li Erh TTC so if you are able to send a link I'll purchase one. Waemest best regards. Pete

That is a cool icon / avatar against your name Merceless one. What does the pictogram in the flames 'say' . We spend a lot of time in the garden and vegetable plots around now 'enriching' the soil. The horse makes a huge and much valued contribution to this activity.

FH and this is just FYI. It is in no way intended as a status staement or anything other than for info... You asked me .... where is your training and your tradition?... On my last award certificate it says 'Passed Senior Duan Ranking 9' That's issued by an international organization based in China but with branches throughout the world. I'm insured via the Holistic Health Insurance Corporation (for £5,000,000 professional indemnity) as a QiGong and TaiChi Instructor. In 30 odd years we've never had a claim against us. This local centre has over 200 members of whom 30 or so come to QiGong along with about the same number of non members. We are a not for profit operation. It is i9n a poor area of the city and there are fish and chip shops plus kebab houses etc nearby. One such 'chip shop' owned by a Chinese family related to the famous Gok Wan donates fish and chip suppers once a month for the workers at our centre. That's the sort of people we get in Leicester, really nice. We're not a charity but not a business either. We are not religious Taoists, anyone can come along, there is no 'belief system, sect or lineage' to sign up to. However some who come do like to perform rituals such as chanting for Quan Shi Yin nembutsu and anyone familiar with a working Taoist temple would feel right at home . there afe martial arts classes, we have fortune telling, socials, there's all sorts going on. We are neither posh, exclusive nor 'holy', just some folk having a go. Doing what we like amongst the like minded. As I once attempted to explain to chums in the 'British Taoist Association' before its effective demise. Wearing a shiny rayon dressing gown and silly hat does not a Taoist 'priest' make. No more about us. That's it but HTH.

Yep I can see that Jeff. Not that one should but I have heard that text used (not by me) 'against' someone having a pop at cultivation in general and Taoists in particular. Along the lines of... "Well you go right on believing that young man.. until you wake up!"

I know that the swastika is an ancient symbol and all but I reckon one of the reasons they have not taken off in Europe to any great extent is that they have it all over their literature. People here have long memories and even those of us who were not born until after the second world war still perceive swastika as a negative symbol. Ken Cohen, to me; is one of the top chaps writing about QiGong and TCM and if he says Falun is OK then I'd defer to that. My own limited experience with one of their members was less than positive but one swallow does not make a summer.