manitou

(Hi Old Green! So nice meeting you last weekend...) From the void The sound; From sound The manifest. From manifest The sound returns To the void.

Would someone else be willing to start this off? What an incredibly rich chapter...

I'd have to go back to Steve's idea of judgment. If we feel that we are being judged, it's because we are judging others. The trick to not feeling judged is to stop judging. Even the nazarene said something like that - judge not, lest ye be judged, something to that effect? This goes directly to that inner dialog that is streaming by at any given moment, our thoughts and reactions to people shaping the person we are. I do something here in Ohio that is just awful to people passing by - I pick up 'pretty' road kill, scoop it up in my arms, and take it over to a natural area where buzzards and other animals can put it back into the chain of life. I set it down and apologize to it (for us humans going way too fast for their pace of life). I just KNOW that people gasp in horror as they pass by - but the trick is not to look at them. Just get into the One and do it. Kind of like the ostrich hiding his head in the sand, but it works. This action keeps me on intimate terms with death, which is where I need to be for what I do.

I find that a very helpful question is "Why am I manifesting this?" It is from this question that triangulation of vision can occur.

SEVENTEEN For all who practice this Way: You must coil, you must contract, You must uncoil, you must expand, You must be firm, you must be regular (in this practice). Hold fast to this excellent (practice); do not let go of it. Chase away the excessive; abandon the trivial. And when you reach its ultimate limit You will return to the Way and the inner power.

You must coil, you must contract. This reminds me so much of the Qigong movements I recently learned. It's as though Qigong is an outer manifestation of the inner self, an expansion and a contraction. But the Qigong dance, along with dancing in the wu-wei, is a constant stillness movement. Our reactions to life's stimulus, if we're adept, is a constant stillness movement as well. There is no rigidity in the Sage, as there is no rigidity in the physical stillness movement. There is no differentiation or judgment of others in the Sage, but this does not mean he cannot See and differentiate. He can, but he chooses to see all others as himself. If one is regular in their inner and outer practices, and they come to a point of alignment, then wu-wei is with us all day. Life takes on a mysterious harmony; we come to realize that we are One with Nature, and all outer stimulus is answered with love and truth, as we perceive it. The Sage lets life come to him. He no longer feels the necessity to make things happen; he knows enough to let things happen. The highest path is the one he will always take relative to all stimulus. When one is consistent in taking the highest path, particularly in one's own thoughts, (which is surely a choice we make daily), then things are aligned of their own accord. Magically.

It's funny how we wax and wane on this forum. I just hate it when Straw Dog wanes (which is actually what I seem to be doing at this time, as he waxes). All is One, in my understanding, is the self-realization attained after doing years and years of self-examination. It's not an intellectual question. It is a Knowing down in your belly who you actually Are. We are all the same Being with many different arms.

MassTaoism - your name says it all. we are but One of the 10,000 things, and we are the great manifester as well. I'm thinking the strata is reinforces the illusion of separation from each other and from the One.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN If people can be aligned and tranquil, Their skin will be ample and smooth, Their eyes and ears will be acute and clear, Their muscles will be supple and their bones will be strong, They will then be able to hold up the Great Circle (of the heavens) And tread firmly over the Great Square (of the earth). They will mirror things with great purity, And they will perceive things with great clarity. Reverently be aware (of the Way) and do not waver, And you will daily renew your inner power, Thoroughly understand all under the heavens, And exhaust everything within the Four Directions. To reverently bring forth the effulgence (of the Way): This is called "inward attainment." If you do this but fail to return to it, This will cause a wavering in your vitality.

Hi Angela - I'm so glad you made your way to this thread! Thanks! I was feeling pretty lonely. Someone else's description of alignment might be different, but the sense I was speaking of is stilling the mind (no inner dialogue going on at all; if you've been a long-term meditator this should be second nature for you). Stilling the mind, combined with relaxing every muscle in the body so there is no resistance to the inner realization that we are indeed the Great Manifestor, at some level. This is achieved through the process of inner work; going into one's own personality and straightening out the contortions that have been imprinted since childhood. Different traditions of spirituality have different modes of doing this. The study of the Nei-Yeh, the book we're talking about here, is a Taoist path for getting to the inner Self. The Buddhist might find his inner self by years of meditating on non-attachment, which would most likely accomplish the same thing. My particular path to inner realization started the first day I walked into AA and started working the steps to recovery 30 years ago. Seems like it's a life journey, regardless of which path Spirit has placed us on (or we've placed ourselves on, to be more accurate). One of the best guides I've ever seen as a template for the inner journey was a Yogi philosophy book, in which it refers to character foibles as different animals - the peacock, the pig, the monkey, etc. It seems like true inner clarity can only be achieved by the process of self-realization; otherwise, it's all left brain education and not self-realization of who we really are. It's when the two are in alignment, the left brain and the right brain, is perhaps another way of putting it. Thanks so much for joining the thread! Barb

Funny - don Juan Mateus repeated told Carlos Castaneda over and over during the series of books to get rid of his self importance to get to the place of the shaman.

There's something rather synchronistic about Dr. Ruit bringing visual clarity to people who live in the highest place on the earth. What a beautiful soul that man has. He seems to exude joy and gentleness. Thank you for posting that video, CowTao. the fact that he's doing what would be an $8000.00 operation here in the West for nothing is certainly a manifestation of his Christ-like nature. But there's more to him than even that - hard to put a finger on it. His Boddhisatva nature... He knows exactly Who He Is. I think I'll make a donation. Thanks again.

This, in my opinion, demonstrates the principle that we manifest from the inside to the outside. We Are the Great Manifester, once we've realized the One and gotten down to our original nature. The nature without contorted ideas, without fears, without judgment, without ego, without defense, without arrogance, without pride. All of it. It's all in the alignment, and we are free to go to the trouble of aligning ourselves with the One by doing the inner cultivation, or we can stay in the purely intellectual mode and not get down to the One at all. It's our choice. This is so aligned with Castaneda that it's kind of mind blowing.

This is wonderful and insightful, Zero. The artist. Wow. The Creator. There are different types of artists; there are left brain artists and right brain artists. I was always a left brain artist, going for perfection and exact duplication of what I was seeing. That was then. Today my art starts usually with a squiggle that I honor and use as a basis for whatever jumps out of the canvas at me. It's completely right brain. The two can be merged easily if we need to. No, I don't see doing the work to develop a positive attitude as rejecting reality either. It's merely changing our reality.

One incredible topic, Otis. I happen to live in a part of the country where people talk their religious game and then squish each other to get ahead. As though there is no relationship between "Real Life" (money and job) and Inner Life. What does money represent? Is it power? Is it accumulation from yesterday that is waiting to be used tomorrow? Or is it a balanced way of meeting our needs one day at a time? The balance thing is a lot easier for me to talk about than someone with children who must be raised. There is a certain fear of lack that must certainly accompany child-rearing. If one is obsessed about saving enough money to make sure their 2 year old goes to Harvard, I'm not sure life could ever be in balance. My thinking, and I could be dead wrong, is that somehow Life takes care of us if we stay in balance within the Zone on a daily basis. If we're impeccable with our inner thoughts and don't let the negative and judgmental have sway. If our inners are impeccable, the outers will be too. The only thing I have to back any of this up is that my life has changed significantly in the money department, going from one who worried constantly about not having enough, to one who is relatively comfortable; but the situation seemed to improve as my inner dynamics improved. I don't know how this happens, but it just seems to. I think there's another hocus-pocus thing that happens too. When we develop gratitude for what we HAVE, as opposed to yearning for those things we DON'T HAVE, a new dynamic and subsequent manifestation seems to kick in too. To honor those physical things we do have - to keep our kitchen clean, to keep our lawn mowed, to love those we live with, to be respectful of those we disagree with....this outer manifestation seems to be a direct result of our inner selves. I go through spells where my house will be messier than other times; and whenever I notice this happening, I know there is something within that needs to be addressed. Our outer really does reflect the inner. Perhaps the same is true of money. The outer reflects the inner. Balance with money seems to be the operative principle, if you ask me. Again, a fabulous topic. Bringing all the headiness down to the realm of the here and now. I love it.

Nicely said. Thanks.

Kung Fu Hustle is the shizzle! We went to see Kung Fu Panda in 3D the other day. That'll get you to the zone too, lol. A surprising amount of Tao in that silly little movie. Of course the evil ruler was a peacock (pride).

The area I live in is rife with Tea-Partiers who are down and out bible-thumpers. Many are Palin-ites. As long as the bubbleheads are mouthing off about America and 'being free' like a mantra, it seems to appeal to these folks. They don't seem to see that they are lackeys for the big corporations, but it's disguised under that stupid mantra and they continually buy into it. Very few real thinkers back here. And the funny thing about the jobs you describe getting easier and easier, this is true in one sense. But in another sense, those high end jobs have more residual stress attached and it tends to carry over from day to day in the form of worry and anxiety. Where's the worry and anxiety in the man chopping wood and carrying water? He may indeed have some, but it's sure not from his job. The menial jobs are hard, true....but there is a sense of daily completion that is missing in the high end jobs. I think that stress takes its toll over a period of time.

In the event it turns out not to be a physical problem, is there any chance it's Kundalini energy? Mine often sits real hot right under the skin of my shoulder blades. Seems to like to hang out there.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN For those who preserve and naturally generate vital essence On the outside a calmness will flourish. Stored inside, we take it to be the well-spring. Floodlike, it harmonizes and equalizes And we take it to be the fount of the vital energy. When the fount is not dried up, The four limbs are firm. When the spring is not drained, Vital energy freely circulates through the nine apertures. You can then exhaust the heavens and the earth And spread over the four seas. When you have no delusions within you, Externally there will be no disasters. Those who keep their minds unimpaired within, Externally keep their bodies unimpaired, Who do not encounter heavenly disasters Or meet with harm at the hands of others. Call them Sages.

Thank you, Straw Dog! I was feeling pretty lonely here. This is my first encounter with the Nei-Yeh too; I like it because of the emphasis on inner cultivation. Maybe we can just struggle through this thing together....

To get really metaphysical on you, hasn't it been proven that time and space are but an illusion? That both are actually curved and indeed intersect each other? I actually think the quantum physics description of the nature of matter being both a particle and a wave is a really interesting phenomena. If one aspect of matter is a particle (just taking up space) and the other aspect of matter is a wave (of probability), then the wave must be the component of Time. It would take a millisecond of time for the 'wave' to get from point A to point B to determine which probability is going to appear. I think we're sitting at a junction of time and space, but somehow yesterday, today, and tomorrow are All Now. We are our ancestors. We are our descendants. Only time separates us, and it's just an illusion.

There is something inside me that is just bamboozled and really bothered by the fact that people on the other side of the earth (and here as well, poverty is just so much more apparent in other countries) have to suffer as much as they do. Living in a horrible desert with no natural resources other than oil (just look at the natural resources of the US)....living under the conditions of a suppressive regime and being shot for expressing your opinion in the streets.....living with such abject poverty that babies' stomachs are distended from starvation..... The only thing that I can devise that allows me to live with this - the guilt of being so very fortunate to be born here - is that perhaps reincarnation explains the unfairness of all this. I'm only hoping this is the case - that I was once a child with a distended stomach, that I too ran around shoeless in a dirty street (actually, I have a recurring 'vision' of my own legs and feet as a child, being in a dirty street or someplace, only my skin is brown, not white). I just can't stand thinking things are so unfair; everything depending upon which continent one happened to be born on. The slavery issue drives me crazy. We (our ancestors, but after all, time is an illusion) kidnap people off their own continent, chain them in the hold of a ship where they're awash in their own vomit, buy and sell them like livestock, and then make them perform backbreaking labor to build this nation up. Oh my God. Do we honestly think we have no national karma coming as a result of this? Every single thing that we are today stems from the backs of those unfortunate souls that were forced away from their families and their land. And our karma is manifesting today, apparently. It was greed and hard-heartedness that caused the slavery situation, and it appears that we have created our own downward-pulling economy largely because of it. Here we are, 200+ years later, and way too many of the slave's descendants are still stuck in the master/slave relationship via the welfare system and their own 'belief' that they're not worth much. Well, what the heck did we expect? Can we not see the cause and effect of this? I apologize if I'm being too politically incorrect here, but it just gets my goat. And don't even get me started on the Native Americans and the smallpox-laden blankets we issued to them.

We might be talking about two different things, Goldi. You are saying that beliefs are more fundamental than feelings. Perhaps we're looking at beliefs and feelings as the same thing. When someone gets down to their inner 10 year old in doing the inner work, and purges themselves with tears to the point of having none left for the causative condition, then it's time for the person to look for the underlying fear, once the crying is done; it is then that the fear can be imprinted to the opposite. In a young child's case, it's usually fear of being smacked, or being made fun of, or not being good enough, fear of being abandoned...those sort of things. These are the very fears that self-encapsulate themselves so it won't hurt anymore, and start rolling downhill like a snowball. those fears are the ones that must be dealt with for healing when the contortions of the snowball get in the way of a balanced life for the adult. They say childhood is the very thing we spend the rest of our lives getting over. This has been my experience, and a necessary step for clarity of vision. Beliefs are left brain sort of things. Feelings certainly must stem from the right brain, but I'm just guessing here. But in this sense, I think feelings go down deeper than beliefs and lie at the very bottom of who we are, and they manipulate our actions today, and is often the 1100 pound gorilla in the room that the person can't even see. But perhaps our arguments tie together here. If the 'inner child' (or the actual child at that age) have a 'belief' that they are a piece of s**t, this is because this is the message he picked up from others. At the very very bottom of the child is the original pure Essence - the Dao, if you will. The snowballs all need to be melted and seen for what they are to get down to the Essence.