PLB
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Everything posted by PLB
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It is not a train, where you get on at one station and arrive at another after some time. It is a lover who wonders why you are so cold and insensitive but has faith that you will improve.
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Our lives are a lot more than vehicles of ego. What is egotistical is to not live that larger life. We have to defend our lives from ourselves and from others. Sometimes the work is similar to each other, sometimes it is very different. The Art of War says the highest and most excellent form of self defense is to influence yourself and the people around you in a way that causes the fight not to happen. This highest form of power is difficult to achieve and so the book describes a cascading series of strategies one should take in the face of falling short of that expression. You can only do what you can do. There will be a test.
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It took me a long time to get comfortable paying attention to what is happening with my body. I say with instead of in because it is not inside of something in relation to the attention that can live there. We have a simple direct access to ourselves that has no relation to the different maps we employ to talk about it. I don't want to disrespect Chia's teaching or defend it. But his work is a map, not the territory. You are the territory. Something in all this talk about feeling energies attracts you. There are powerful ideas that say the structure of those things are attained through this or that path. If you go some distance in cultivation, you will have to make choices between paths. But at the beginning, start with yourself. It can be boring at first. There is just yourself again. But what looked at the beginning to be a mirror is this place you have been living next to all your life and had no idea was there. The idea behind practice is to go to that place.
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Nungali, I haven't read Philemon yet. I have been shopping around because it is expensive with the reproductions of the images and I don't see any point in reading the text alone. I do remember the importance placed upon it in his "autobiography." When I get a chance to read it and think about it, I will post a review of sorts here and perhaps we can take up this subject again. Yes indeed, Jung went further in his adventures than most of his listeners were willing to follow. I will have to see if that includes me. PLB
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Nungali, Your cautionary note is appropriate and well received. It applies to the dream work you described as well. By saying responsibility, I mean the way Jung spoke of taking responsibilty for more than just what is identified through the ego. I see the "slotting into each other" as a Jungian idea too; There is a structure where seemingly disparate elements are connected to each other beyond the individual.
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Nungali, I see the path that would reconfiigure the dreams. With great respect for that method,I have been trying to accept responsibility for the things done in that other place as an alternate approach. Not sure where the path will take me. But the two shall be one.
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There is a diabolic quality to many dreams that seem designed to engender the greatest amount of anxiety possible within the context of unfolding circumstances and the choices made within them. There are times in waking life where this relentless quality emerges. Those are really bad times. There is some kind of connection between the two realms. It is hard to get the mind around the idea. What I have found to be most disturbing is when I awake from a dream where I have done something I don't want to have done and find myself asking: Did I actually do that thing? In that moment, the "real" is like an alibi clearing me of a charge made for a crime enacted by me in another life. Doppelganger.
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If someone could help me overcome a chronic condition that I have lived with for 30 years, I would give them a thousand bucks without a second thought. I have paid more for bad cars. But for myself, one of the big motivations that keep me solid with my practice is that I am done waiting for other people to fix me. I am always on the lookout for the healer who could help me and I have tried out different things without regret. Different skillsets can touch upon different problems. But I live my life like I am the only one who can make it better. Like Kafka said, I am the only physician to be found, far and wide.
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Distinguishing between the real and its illusion is like picking out a couple at a rave: They are linked to each other but are not together. A real beer will influence your system and heighten the activity of certain energy path ways. The illusion is that this change is a matter of happenstance and not an exchange. Nothing comes from nothing.
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Being consumed with anxiety about how others see oneself is certainly fraught with illusion and fear. It is good to move far enough away from that fire to avoid being burnt by it. But it is not a part of life that one simply gets over. Our ability to perceive what is happening with people is entangled with those images our "ourselves" that cause such intense feelings of shame and anger. That I can find a way to live beyond the bondage of those feelings does not make me their master. Cultivation is not a promise that all will be revealed.
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Lots of interesting points being made here. One aspect that hasn't been touched upon specifically is the matter of taking steps. A wide horse stance is great for opening up the kwa, relaxing the knees (if done properly) and revealing all the subtle angles of feet and ankles. But you are trapped in that position if you cannot shift your weight to one leg or another. The moment you try to escape the trap, you are doing tai chi chuan; Or using a prop or cane to help you stand up again. The first method is better.
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Jobs with a fair measure of responsibility have an interesting dynamic. The people selected to do them are making their own selections. In many cases, the latter group is actually neutralizing acts and intentions of their selectors; Not as a program of revolt and rejection but out of the interest of carrying out their obligations as they see them. When I read the classic texts of Taoism and the focus often placed upon what happens in Empires, this interesting dynamic seems to come up a lot.
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Great thread. Why is this in General? If this ain't Taoist then I am a small turtle.
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What's the best thing you learned from taoism?
PLB replied to Perceiver's topic in Daoist Discussion
It is hard to say what the best thing is. There is this from Zhuangzi that speaks to my heart: Shi-cheng Qi sidled away out of Lao's shadow; then he retraced his steps, advanced forward, and asked how he should cultivate himself. The reply was, "Your demeanor is repelling; you stare with your eyes; your forehead is broad and yet tapering; you bark and growl with your mouth; your appearance is severe and pretentious; you are like a horse held by its tether, you would move, but are restrained, and (if let go) would start off like an arrow from a bow; you examine the minutiae of a thing, your wisdom is artful, and yet you try to look at ease. All these are to be considered proofs of your want of sincerity. If on the borders one were to be found with them, he would be named a Thief." There are a lot of things going in this passage. There is a self denigration in some acts of humilty that make us the beast we are asking to be saved from. There is an arrogance that would declare embarrasment a payment of some kind that requires something in return for having brought it about. The passage points to certain kind of overwhelming futility while pointing to another quality that is present. Lao is not shaming Shi-cheng Qi but bringing his pursuit to an end. -
Yes, I am in it for the high. It is not like addictive substances because it is not automatic. One has to be a good house keeper of the soul to have the experience. The best high happens when one is very clear headed, rested, flexible and strong, gentle and fierce, and not seeking or evading revenge. But it is like an addiction when I spend too much time away and begin to Jones.
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I don't like dissing schools or practices and my own learning process has been very haphazard and I am still in the search for a teacher but I do need to say some negative things about Moy Lin Shin as a Yang style artist: He bobs up and down, going from middle to high frame as it suits him. As a result of this mutable frame, he leans when opening in brush knee. A good example of taking a large step and working within its frame is well shown by Note the complete freedom of the unsubstantiated leg as it steps; the coordination of upper and lower; the sinking of the qi giving rise to the lifting movements. He does not lean.
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does anyone in here carry a kubotan or other weapon with them when out in public?
PLB replied to mewtwo's topic in General Discussion
I used to always carry an easily opened folding knife since I was 16 years old. It is a long story why I started then. But then I was arrested for having it in NYC when I was 57 years old. It is long story explaining why I stopped. I will tell it some other day. I did not realize how much I counted on it till was gone. Now I am really dangerous. -
I am not into jian. I am more interested in dao/sabre or One Sided sharpened sword or the long knives of Thailand. Turning the one edge to the new threat is more my thing. But this discussion of flexibility versus rigidity does call for some one to talk about the metalurgical qualities of folded steel. There is a resiliance in metal that is beaten out, folded on to itself, and beaten out again that is not like anything else. I have a very hard steel machete that I practice with and I like it very much. But it is not a folded steel object. It has very little deflection. It cuts things softer than itself with ease. It would shatter if it struck stone. The folded steel of China, Japan, and Toledo can be sharpened to an incredibly fine level and yet still withstand very gross blows made by all kinds of weopons, stone walls, or seashells that happened to get in the way. Now I suppose this observation may well involve how a sword is used in an internal art. But I only could say anything true about what happens to me. If I am correct in what I perceive.
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Yang style tai chi chuan, 108, via the Dong family. Wang Hao Da excercises, taught to me by Robert Tangora. Kojosho, an animal form with some roots in Okinawa. I learned it a very long time ago. I cut wood and stone for a living. Sometimes I don't do anything at all.
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My work as a carpenter and stone mason gives me a lot of weight to deal with so I come at the queston of the post from a keen interest in how to get the energetic body to help out whenever possible. I would make the rocks levitate after a hard look if I could. Something else is required. One thing about very hard work that is important to remember is how it functions as a line of credit. The body has an incredible capacity to defer cost. My exploration of where I am at is a lot like settling up. Paying off the debt while finding out what lentils taste like.
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Dante filled up Hell with a lot of people he knew or knew of. In that way, his narrative was a reflection of life seen through death. Not a mirror exactly, but a looking glass. Apart from analyses of comparitive depravity, the story of Hell emphasizes the fixity of repetition; Doing the same things over and over again. That is the water shed of many very different streams ending in opposite oceans, carving the land as they flow. I see the thing but know enough not to put it in a box with a cat or spread it out like pieces of yarrow on a table.
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The third video is a component of "Ten Daoist Exercises" as I was taught it. I looked to see if it was on youtube but could only find sets doing something different under that name. The Daoyin dragons work the earth to heaven and back again movement. The "massage the face nine times" component shows up in a lot of places. I learned it as part of a sitting set, combined with tapping on the back of the head. I have seen Shaolin players do a version of it as a part of their qi gong. I am not trying to say anything authoritative about sources; Just noticing how these elements are being used by many different styles and schools.
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Is talking about spirituality and practices useful?
PLB replied to BaguaKicksAss's topic in General Discussion
On the up side, I would never have found out about what I am trying to do if a lot of other people didn't talk about it over hundreds of years. On the down side, hell is other people. I have a small group of people I push with a lot. We all talk about our practice in different ways. Many times the words are all messed up together; A series of conversations we each wish were happening but doesn't. quite get there. Then we touch and something else is going on. I really like that something else. They like it too; The conversation that doesn't require a last word. We have hardly begun. Words and silence are the essence of grammer. Sometimes silence is a gift, joyfully received. Sometimes silence is war, answered in kind. There are whole histories of what happened or did not that are circumscribed between the extremes of possible responses. These words come so easily but are always more than themselves. I get why people feel they are living past lives. -
That has been my experience. I cannot do it to other people but I have received the shock that is like being electrocuted. It is much more disabling than getting shoved back some distance or getting a black eye. It gets inside.
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He is actually completing the requirements of a very slow form while also doing those quick things. That is what is most remarkable to me. I propose that such feats of combination are also a gong fu. Form is not an end in itself but it is also not an empty vessel. Who benefits more from one kind of training versus another probably comes down to factors only experienced by an individual. I have had my ass kicked by all kinds of different people. I oddly survived against others. The combination of qualities in the video are comparable to the gentleman greytowhite linked to in the video. Watch the leisurely footwork. Sometimes he seems to be levitating. He is showing quickness and slowness together. I cannot get involved in the discussion of jin and what it is or not. I have got some of it. But it would probably leave if I claimed to know much about it.
