Wu Ming Jen

I would not worry about it. Enlightenment is not something to achieve. Trying to archive things creates desire and cravings lots of trash. If you can accomplish a peaceful tranquil mind that is a good place to start. Just remove all thoughts of spiritual traditions and be your self. Remember you are complete at this very moment and do not let things steal your peace or take your power away.

Lao Tzu’s Conception of Ultimate Reality: A Comparative Study By Sung-peng Hsu Originally published in International Philosophical Quarterly, June, 1976 Collected in Classical and Medieval Literature Criticism (Gale Research Inc., 1991), Volume 7, pp.182-190 This is way to long to post but may help with your paper. I have practised Taoist arts for long time because it has benefited me personally in every facet of my life. In my view it is a very healthy way to see your relationship with everything around us meaning we are everything around us. At the same time there is many twisted roads and byways influenced by buddhist and new age "translations". what is important are the principles IE what works. Meditation is one of many combined methods then everything becomes meditation even in crisis or in a flurry of activity or peacefully still. enlightenment is a buddhist term and not a "thing" to achieve. When we discover that we are all complete and interconnected with all things the profound effect is the beginning without end.

Proof is in the pudding. The exercises we do to maintain a good energy system shows itself in our flow of life, in our relationship with ourselves and the universe meaning on all levels,inner true wealth, health and happiness. Correct practice leads to all these things. No speculation of death when we leave our bodies because if things are right NOW they will also be right latter, always present, aware of danger and changing loss into gain. What has been gained in some instances should be lost. So is that loss considered a gain or a gain that was lost? Now I am confused.

Our train of thought should move from the center of the compass, shift and change according with balance and harmony of our current situations and be a peace with it. our world view can create harmony or conflict. There is much peace with the words of the great sages like no mention of killing, rape, genocide, us against them, good vs evil and other lovely things that other systems relish and feed off looking for ultimate destruction of armageddon. Thank you great sages for the breath of fresh air.

men are yang on the outside, yin inside with one point of extreme yang. so all tough on the outside and weak inside. Women are all soft and cuddly on the outside but internally very strong with a point of extreme of yin. To strengthen a balance deficiency of too much yin is overcoming emotions to balance to much yang overcome ego or the illusion self.

This God, according to the Bible, is directly responsible for many mass-murders, rapes, pillage, plunder, slavery, child abuse and killing, not to mention the killing of unborn children. I have included references to the Biblical passages, so grab your Bible and follow along. It always amazes me how many times this God orders the killing of innocent people even after the Ten Commandments said Thou shall not kill. For example, God kills 70,000 innocent people because David ordered a census of the people (1 Chronicles 21). God also orders the destruction of 60 cities so that the Israelites can live there. He orders the killing of all the men, women, and children of each city, and the looting of all of value (Deuteronomy 3). He orders another attack and the killing of all the living creatures of the city: men and women, young, and old, as well as oxen sheep, and asses (Joshua 6). In Judges 21 He orders the murder of all the people of Jabesh-gilead, except for the virgin girls who were taken to be forcibly raped and married. When they wanted more virgins, God told them to hide alongside the road and when they saw a girl they liked, kidnap her and forcibly rape her and make her your wife! Just about every other page in the Old Testament has God killing somebody!

How many ppl yawned as they read this thread? I had to for fun and it felt awesome, Correct breathing will oxygenate the entire organism when the body lacks oxygen it converts sugars into energy with a by product of metabolic waste. When exhale is longer or shorter then inhale body may stabilize with a yawn. regulate breathing so the ears cannot hear the breath slow. smooth, deep like tracing the Tai Chi symbol with breath. Regulating is not going from one extreme to another so breathing at full capacity inhale or exhale is not recommended should be a smooth transition with reserves left over. Lung capacity increases so what was once a full breath becomes 3/4s

If you practice any of these disciplines you will be benefited thousands of times over and all illness will vanish to dust. you will be practicing neigong even of it is not your aim then you will be the true source of understanding, no outside authority needed by simple physical practice.

True emptiness is not empty. when emptiness is empty that is called the ghost cave and should be left immediately or never entered. The tigers cave is something very different we must enter that place to overcome what ever fear and snatch the peril of wisdom. People face the wall and wear out their cushions in meditation with out attaining any thing, yes another ghost cave

Phantom-immortal or ghost-immortal - Gui Xian ( 鬼仙 ) Gui Xian. Literally - the immortal among devils or the immortal devil. It was believed that this achievement is a characteristic of shamanic practices, the late Chan Buddhism, the pseudo-Taoism, different meditations. Withdrawal of Yin spirit in a state of no breath and palpitation. The practitioner remains mortal, despite the practice of spirit withdrawal and possible capabilities. Moreover, he may not be reborn after his death and stay a ghost forever. This was not practiced in Taoism, it was forbidden (meaning the serious study, not just jingzuo).

Thanks for playing I knew you guys would be all over it quicker than I thought. my post was not creating balance and harmony but separation and harm. My experiment was promoting one sidedness and we are not one dimensional people. Happy holidays peace and harmony with all things.

I don't believe in god but the Christian God is a mass murder. Talk about idle worship some celebrate a mass murderer as their god. out of god's own self interest of the one and only, all others must join or die.. It is the ones deceived or actually benefit with profit and gain that do the actual killing. look at new york city 1972 looks just like beijing smog problem today. The science is that which introduces us to our true self a fully realized being beyond reality and truth. To benefit all humanity not just one group of people. personally I live a rich life full of many positive attributes and should be obvious not a Christian. The fun I intended is how christ became apart of pagan traditions. all people of the world celebrate winter solstice in one form or another throughout all time, the hexagram return in the I Ching. The other fun thing is how many jesuses their have been born dec 25th and have 12 disciples in western history (excluding the far east, this stuff does not exist). I mention fun because it really makes no difference to a self realized person well beyond the mud of this world and unaffected..

The 4th pope wanted to take Genesis out of the bible because science and that knowledge would nullifie the religion. I am all about the divine eternal aspects of life but a system flying under a false flag and makes the worst of human nature OK is not OK with me. western science is also biased, science for the sake of knowledge instead of Chinese science that is science to help all of humanity. It is no misguidance that we seek eastern alternatives to an evil god The Gods of old all had responsibilities, administrative duties that mimic a healthy way of life. now with one god we have self interest and all those horrible judgments and nastiness flying under the flag that morals are not apart of our divine being but must be instilled by an outside source very funny and sad stuff.

For me travailing to america that is a fear based society is extreme. I can see how these same fears could be amplified in a foreign country even if they do not exist in the country being visited.

Communicating with animals is a natural ability. Without the need for words there is no deception. Intention, the energetic qualities of our own being is known by all animals and respond to the fields that we produce. Working directly with specific animals would be the best training and the animal will teach us how to listen. Practicing energy work will give us a better understanding of our own energy then we will have understanding of other when other and self is the same we can accomplish the great work.

The major is English and superior in his own mind towards the ways of India. The softing is the reality his views are wrong. To avoid his world of perception to be shattered he pushes himself to maintain a hard yang view and to ignore the yin qualities that would set him free.The major chooses to trap himself in illusion, bounded forever, the opposite of free. This is not a valid fear in my opinion.

Remember that non-attachment is the best attachment. Give up your old identity. Break the illusion to create your freedom. Identifying with "I" past, present or future is a silly thing to do. The "I" is the formed character, a collection of ideas and descriptions that you and others know as "you"; your "I" has been formed since the day you were born. This can also include past or future but still an illusion.

Great, true and works (principle) the great image is imagless so this formless Tao that is a part of all forms is observable in the way nature "works" If sound comes into being because of no sound this is how Tao works. We must have zero for any number to come into existence The number is visible, the zero is un-measurable. The easiest way is to not attach anything to tao and let the mind rest with no image then the mind can be peaceful and tranquil being aware of all that is. This helps to stop naming this and that. This and that are all related and unified by Tao. Without transcending the human mind, the shinning mind is undermined. The human mind split into duality is the only thing that stands in the Way.

Awesome, now that we got that out of the Way can we get back to short skirts and bikinis? By that I mean philosophical discussions of the absolute beauty of the natural world, in any shape or form.

Return to simplicity. (we forget too soon how simple was made complicated) Return remember the beginning it is the gate of life the other direction is the gate of death most love to go this direction, armageddon, becoming dark energy, the pleasure of making it all end as an escape of heading in the wrong direction to begin with. We can all turn around at will.

I personally love the humor of chuang tzu the point of consciousness where there is no me or you or butterfly dream, brillant anything that challenges the intellect is most awesome Tai chi chuan capitalizes on the point of consciousness where people are not aware of movement they see the beginning and end, change the end and one is a incredible boxer. As far as tai chi chuan not being a complete system the name itself exemplifies wholeness. It is born from Taoist philosophy and applied physically. IE not being a mental concept.

It is great ability to see the shit, to give a shit and get rid of the shit. Some become the shit and others realize it is not even their own shit to begin with. Being overloaded with information everyday we do need to wash up after, go back to zero once you know where the shit thoughts came from your light of awareness shines on it and it dissolves back to where it came from, nowhere.

I guess i was counting backwards the 3 leading to 1. As far as fourth dimensional understanding that is the ability to see time and space. Newton sees the apple fall to the ground we see the apple rising into another tree that produces hundreds of more apples or the rain falling and we see the mist or rain rising as it warms and clears or the wood chair that once stood tall we are sitting on becomes dust. perpetual motion is interesting. The one unifying principle in taoist science is Tao, unseen but observable in nature. This concept allows us to move beyond material existence combining form with the formless chi or various manifestations of energetics. Example cancer is a self interested cell that has no regard for the surrounding cells. the energy of self interest is running rampant and spreading like a disease to all parts of the world. to clean up this pollution requires medicine that does not have a physical form.

I will try to keep my forces together and not be a shape shifter which implies I have a center and negative and positive poles, a demi physical force that has a direction.