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Which means they were not dead, "clinically dead" does not mean anything. Have you ever heard of a "vegetative state"? Do you know what vegetative nervous system is? Do you know where the "vegetative" word comes from? From "vegetable". Are your vegetables in your fridge dead or alive? What do you think, do they dream? Do they think? They think they are dead or alive?

When one says "just" a dream, I think its their view that a certain validity is, or would not be ,present. I think he did not apply this judgement. The passage, to me , shows us he equates the validity of either perspective relative to the other. We presumably know there is both the experience of the woken man ,and of the sleeping man.,, if we dispense with judgement about validity , there's no uncertainty in the view one would have, and it would be a moot point,, if the life we are experiencing is that of the woken or sleeping.

Because equality is a pipe dream of collectivists, of Mystics of both sides that refuse to accept the reality that consciousness has identity. That every person is not a soul trapped in a piece of meat, but an individual person. Part of the individualism is that men and women are uniquely different and must be in order to procreate. It is not simply a physical difference, it is a spiritual difference which manifests as masculinity and femininity. Humans are not rutting beasts attracted by pheromones, they are the product of their minds. Men necessarily have different values from women. For a woman it is to sexy and feminine and to be regarded in that sense so she can be free to express it and the best way she can do so is with a man she values as her equal. A woman shines in the light of masculinity as a man does in the light of femininity. A woman wants a hero and a man wants a heroine-these things are not equal, they are complimentary.

^^ i saw them once @ the cow palace on the gemini dream tour. i was sitting in the next to the top row, at the cow place there are no bad seats, acoustically tight place. if i had been any closer i probably would have exploded interesting group to be sure

IMO, TCM is part of the journey of a living path... discovered over millennia, many are called but few are chosen, in a sense. If you're not born into it, then adopting or absorbing it is challenging... if it comes slightly more easy or natural then your path is tracing. If it feels like study and indoctrination, you can still pursue it but it comes with road hazards. My path took me through TCM and I was quite gun-ho to get into acupuncture and meridian theory... was asked to do a single fill-in class at a local acupuncture school, on Taiji, but ended up teaching Qigong by request of the students in the moment. To make a long story short, my Medical Qigong master showed me that TCM is good up to a point but if one is able to sense Qi, then why do you need to know the point when you can feel the point; meaning, deviation is not always exactly at the theoretical point in question. This distinction is more about what leads your interest and path rather than what is right vs wrong. Follow your deepest desire and if it comes with academic instruction, so be it. China is still home to ancient traditions, just go there and with some help you'll find it. Ignore the comments of folks who talk about it from afar. I've meet more ancient wisdom in china than I can recount here or in a book. And most of it is with everyday folks but several about the ancient arts. Try a practice within Taiji or Qigong to get practical application of Qi in the body to understand TCM better... just a thought. Never give up your dream and desire but realize the road is sometimes less traveled and you should just follow your path.

About "Falling Water": Several years ago I shared on this thread my experiences of lucid dreaming and the exchange of "dream modalities" with a classmate and fellow FP Practitioner after our group did a guided meditation and exercise at two remote locations under GM Doo Wai in the early 1990's. Thus this comment about mind-control through the dream state is relevant to FP Qigong practice for it is a capability that can be attained through advanced practice. The subject of mind-control through the dream state came to mind tonight while I was watching the pilot episode of the new tv series, "Falling Water." In trying to attract a mass tv audience with the kindergarten hook, "What if your dreams are trying to tell you something?", the show's producers are making much ado and creating hype over a very commonplace theme, precognitive dreams, that just isn't esoteric--certainly not for artists at least, nor for anyone who meditates properly. But that's showbiz marketing. So far, the show appears to be well written, acted, and directed. The one of several story lines where the heavy bearded guy wants to monitor the dreams of the female photographer who he thinks has an instinct for the archetypes of the collective subconscious in order to research (psychic) interconnectedness and then exploit "dream-control" for obviously evil purposes looks stupid and ludicrous to me. For throughout human history there have always been strong psyches with the ability to invade weaker others' dreams or to mesmerize and control the behavior of a person in the waking state in broad daylight. Psychic warfare methods were developed by the two superpowers back in the 80's. If individuals with strong Will and psychic awareness (or "shen" as we say in Chinese yogic arts) choose to use control or influence their subjects' behavior by interfering with their dreams, then they are taking away free will and by definition are committing evil...and buying a ticket for themselves to Hell. As Aleister Crowley put it in Book Four: It cannot be too clearly understood that such is the nature of things: it does not depend upon the will of any persons, however powerful or exalted; nor can Their force, the force of Their great oaths, avail against the weakest oath of the most trivial of beginners. The attempt to interfere with the Magical Will of another person would be wicked, if it were not absurd. One may attempt to build up a Will when before nothing existed but a chaois of whims; but once organization has taken place it is sacred. As Blake says: "Everything that lives is holy; and hence the creation of life is the most sacred of tasks. It does not matter very much to the creator what it is that he creates; there is room in the universe for both the spider and the fly. It is from the rubbish-heap of Choronzon that one selects the material for a god! -- Book 4 by Aleister Crowley (1913) Several of my past high-level Chinese kung fu and Tai Chi masters who can teach their students telepathically across short distances (and usually within line of sight) can also communicate with them through the dream state. Two have done so with me in the past. Another teacher who has passed from this earthplane occasionally visits me in my dream state and teaches me how to handle strong evil adversaries on this plane while he works on them from the other side. The ability to do communicate telepathically with others--in either waking state or dream state-- is simply developed by mastering the Mind through Yoga--any authentic system of Yoga from any culture properly taught by a genuine master. Unfortunately, one of my early kung fu teachers in the 70's (who was mid-level), and one Tai Chi master in the 80's (who was very high level and potentially very dangerous) did use their strong psychic powers to mesmerize and control others for their own ridiculously selfish and perverse purposes. And both have a long stays in a deep circle in Hell as their karma. For no matter how powerful or exalted, no one can escape who they are and what they do. So, as one progresses in Flying Phoenix Qigong practice and experiences the brain activation, the tangible reality of the FP Healing Energy, and the unlocking of latent psychic and healing ability, it is important to take to heart the admonition that Aleister Crowley clearly laid down to protect the Dharma: "If your Work is not 100% given up to the Almighty, then it is black magic." Sifu Terry Dunn www.taichimania.com/chikung_catalog.html

Oh yes I used to do the Middle Pillar ritual as well, it brought intense feelings. But then again it isn't anywhere as close as what I've experienced through deep meditation (even breath meditation) or simple dharani recitation (cundi/avalokitesvara). Yeah, that's the confusion I have. So is what Jenny-Lamb teaches the same as what Max teaches? From his latest book, he teaches: - Refined KUNLUN method posture with yin/yang hand (the ball posture) - Laughing/Smiling - Gold Flower Method of Maoshan - Three Ones Meditation of Maoshan - Taoist Traveling Hands of Maoshan(Dream Yoga) - Maoshan Five Elements (five different postures) It looks to me like they are all mainly maoshan practices. Can you explain to me the relationship between the hormones and Kundalini, if you don't mind? (I'm a little new to this perspective) Isn't jing related to hormones? I thought kundalini (yang chi/sambhogakaya chi) was more of the fire element in the body, while hormones are the 'water element'. So it's fusion at the "Mother Light" (in the heart), right? Basically bringing upper "Child Light" (in the head) down? When I do anapanasati (breath mediation), I get to the point where the breath stops and then there's tons of heat and energy rising throughout my body. Would that be a fire or water practice? According to Nan Huai Jin, this is when yang chi rises when we get into extreme Yin. It's strange because the way Max describes it is that fire is intentionally trying to start up the heat/kundalini, like in Tummo practice/Wim-hof, and water is more of a spontaneous, flow-with-the-moment, vipasssana kind of thing. And breath meditation, translated from Pali is anapanasati, sati meaning 'mindfulness' or simply what people commentarily call vipassana, since it also involves all four mindfulness cornerstones (body, sensations, thoughts, mental qualities). Yeah, I'd like to know that too. Are there any problems that people face by mixing this 'yi gong' and red phoenix? Haha and that also reminds me of SpringForestqigong, because chunyi lin is more focused on healing physical ailments from what he presents, but behind he still teaches higher levels for self-enlightenment. --- Also, if anyone knows or has experience, does anyone know if it's possible to mix breath meditation (anapanasati) with kunlun? Assuming that they are done a few hours apart of course.

Yogananda called what you are referring to as cosmic consciousness. He wrote a poem titled "Samadhi" to give a glimpse of his earlier experiences. Vanished the veils of light and shade, Lifted every vapor of sorrow, Sailed away all dawns of fleeting joy, Gone the dim sensory mirage. Love, hate, health, disease, life, death, Perished these false shadows on the screen of duality. Waves of laughter, scyllas of sarcasm, melancholic whirlpools, Melting in the vast sea of bliss. The storm of maya stilled By magic wand of intuition deep. The universe, forgotten dream, subconsciously lurks, Ready to invade my newly wakened memory divine. I live without the cosmic shadow, But it is not, bereft of me; As the sea exists without the waves, But they breathe not without the sea. Dreams, wakings, states of deep turiya sleep, Present, past, future, no more for me, But ever-present, all-flowing I, I, everywhere. Planets, stars, stardust, earth, Volcanic bursts of doomsday cataclysms, Creation's molding furnace, Glaciers of silent x-rays, burning electron floods, Thoughts of all men, past, present, to come, Every blade of grass, myself, mankind, Each particle of universal dust, Anger, greed, good, bad, salvation, lust, I swallowed, transmuted all Into a vast ocean of blood of my own one Being! Smoldering joy, oft-puffed by meditation Blinding my tearful eyes, Burst into immortal flames of bliss, Consumed my tears, my frame, my all. Thou art I, I am Thou, Knowing, Knower, Known, as One! Tranquilled, unbroken thrill, eternally living, ever new peace! Enjoyable beyond imagination of expectancy, samadhi bliss! Not a mental chloroform Or unconscious state without wilful return, Samadhi but extends my conscious realm Beyond the limits of the mortal frame To farthest boundary of eternity Where I, the Cosmic Sea, Watch the little ego floating in me. The sparrow, each grain of sand, fall not without my sight. All space like an iceberg floats within my mental sea. Colossal Container, I, of all things made. By deeper, longer, thirsty, guru-given meditation Comes this celestial samadhi Mobile murmurs of atoms are heard, The dark earth, mountains, vales, lo! molten liquid! Flowing seas change into vapors of nebulae! Aum blows upon the vapors, opening wondrously their veils, Oceans stand revealed, shining electrons, Till, at last sound of the cosmic drum, Vanish the grosser lights into eternal rays Of all-pervading bliss. From joy I came, for joy I live, in sacred joy I melt. Ocean of mind, I drink all creation's waves. Four veils of solid, liquid, vapor, light, Lift aright. Myself, in everything, enters the Great Myself. Gone forever, fitful, flickering shadows of mortal memory. Spotless is my mental sky, below, ahead, and high above. Eternity and I, one united ray. A tiny bubble of laughter, I Am become the Sea of Mirth Itself. http://www.yogananda.com.au/pyr/pyr_samadhi.html I think the image you related to that of Satan was actually Lord Shiva.

Fake morality. but then again thats what we idolize. Fake outrage over words caught up in the quagmire of shit throwing until one doesnt know wether they are coming or going. he said she said until the actual platforms either one is running on are nothing but vague shadows in the ether. a nd the beat goes on....no worries. we all can go back to sleep after november and remember or forget it was all a bad dream, or in this case a play. Dance puppets dance!!!

Hi guys, I just began studying Acupuncture at University and although I've been a huge fan and practitioner of Taoism since 2012, I'm starting to get a bit "oversaturated" with Chinese medicine and the sheer amount of theoretical knowledge in our curriculum. I'm halfway through my first semester and I'm starting to get sick to the stomach at the thought of having to memorize all the theory. With all due respect, a lot of it (TCM) seems to be slapped together in a kind of non-chalant way, is completely subjective and is at the end of the day, moderately effective at best. I find it bland and boring as hell. At least with science you get the excitement of discovering something new, but with TCM it's like studying religion. Yes, I'm viewing the pessimistic side of the coin, but I am wondering if I should just commit and/or revivify my relationship with TCM or choose another career path altogether... This is coming together with a deeper longing of abandoning all these so-called ancient traditions; ALL the religions, all philosophies, and dream up something much bigger and more embracing of our current times.

>>> If a God made this, then who made God ? If the answer is that no one made God, then it stands to reason that no one made this. As no God has been found, nor is one needed, we can go with what is already and have no further regressions.<<< I don't understand this, first of all it is very naive to believe that there is a separate creation when God is defined as everything. Whoever sees the creation needs to find the answer on their own. If you believe that God made world, then you fail to recognise that God is both immanent and as well as transcendent simultaneously. It is just like the dreamer is the source, cause and support of the Dream, the dream world, dream objects, dream beings and dream experiences. Just as the dream world vanishes when the dreamers wakes upto the waking state and realizes that the individual he/she alone is responsible for the dream world, dream objects, dream beings and dream experiences, the waker must realize it is God and god and god alone which is the reality underlying our waking state of consciousness. Our waking state in which we claim wrongly about creation is God's projection. You are nothing but that God from within your personality. Upanishad says realize that "That Thou Art" and not this limited, material aspects of body mind, intellect and Ego that goes through the cycle of births and deaths from one experience to another. The waking world is just another more realistic dream projection of your own God or supreme Self, just another flimsy imagination.

This is something that has resonated in me for as long as I have been aware. One of my earliest memories is not of waking life, but of a dream, which transitioned to an out of body experience as a child of 3-4. The dreamscape and that level of consciousness has always been a dominant force in my life experience, a constant living presence with an ability to impact my entire awareness just as intensely as the physical. My earliest memories of life are equally weighted be it waking or dreaming. Neither seems particularly more real, when immersed within them and in memory, each level of consciousness has demonstrated an equal impact on my ability to learn about myself through experience and to carry truth, benefit and merit, as well as sorrow and loss. So in that manner, each has an equal value to me as valid experience and always has, although the characteristics of awareness within each may vary. I become lucid in my dreams nightly and have learned so many truths about myself in those realms, just as I do in my waking life. In fact, I recall many of my experiences in the dreamscape, more vividly than I recall many moments of waking life. Which has more value? Which is more real? They both have impacted my awareness, taught me more depth of understanding of my own awareness and to me, they mirror each other so completely, it's like my perception of the surface of water and how it appears when looking at it from above and below. They are two varied expressions of one process. There is one key aspect of waking life which mirrors dream lucidity and resonates particularly potently of late though, I can't shake the abiding sense of it, even in my body there is the living sense of it... and that is how my earliest waking conscious memories of life mirror the way I wake up within the dream state. When I become lucid in the dream state, the dream has already begun. It was the same for my waking consciousness and my physical form. My first memories of conscious awareness of my life came after the process of life began. The dream world is flowing, is already unfolding, the dream is in process and then "i" suddenly become aware within the process and then begin to interact consciously instead of reactionarily. This is how my conscious life started, at some point, around the age of 3-4 I began to become aware within the waking world. Which one is more relevant? More intrinsically real? Especially when viewed and recalled in memory. It is a common sensation now in my waking life to also have a sense of 'waking up' while in the middle of an action. Walking down the street, suddenly, I turn and look at a tree and there is the vivid sense of waking up into the present moment. This sensation sometimes feels like I've been sleeping for days or weeks. It's also very common when I first go outside after being sick and indoors for some time. There's the sense of seeing things on my familiar street in a much more lucid manner. In my experience, I am constantly slipping between lucidity and non-lucidity in my waking life and my dream life, oscillating between auto-pilot and interactive awareness much the way waves and tides ebb and flow along the shore. There is an abiding sense in my very body, that one day, I will inevitably wake up fully in both, equally.

I wish you would have joined a couple days earlier. We are currently doing a study of Chuang Tzu and we just finished that section: Mair 2:14. There are many who believe as you suggested. I am not one of them and almost always argue against this thought. But for sure he does speak about dreams. For me he is speaking about our illusions and delusions. Others feel he is talking about reality as we understand it is only a dream. And he does say that perhaps we will wake up from our dream (illusions and delusions) and realize that they were all dreams. We can even relate this to life today. So many think they are living a life but in reality it is someone else living their life for them; just doing what they are told, following the herd, allowing society to take away more and more of our freedoms.

In Chapter 2 of the Zhuangzi, there are two sections where he writes about dreams. One is the famous section about the man and butterfly at the very end of the chapter. In the other section, close to the end, Zhuangzi states, "Eventually there comes the day of reckoning and awakening, and then we shall know that it was all a great dream. Only fools think they are now awake...." Did he believe that the world we are now in is actually just a dream? I keep coming across intellectuals who believe that the world we see is just an illusion of some type. Plato is one ancient example. It sounds like Zhuangzi might be another.

I agree to the terms and request owner permissions. I want to start a new thread about whether Zhuang Zhou believed that we are all living in a dream. It seems in Chapter 2 he implies that.

The energy body that was perceiving this red sphere was your dreaming body/astral body. This means that even if your physical eyes are open you can use "another self vehicle" to dream directly but of course only if you realize that you can be double. The part that was making conclusions and thinking about the red sphere was your dreaming mind and the part that saw the energy was the body aspect of the dreaming body/astral body self. If you grab hold of this energy it will be done by the aid of your dreaming mind but contact will be made with the energy body. Overall this dreaming astral body is the dreaming aspect of our regular mind energy body that we use while awake but when it comes to seeing energy while you are in astral it means you are seeing real things and real beings opposed to mental projections people usually dream about when asleep. The value of the dreaming/astral body is seeing energy and sometimes it might get weird but the universe is also full of surprising wonders worth exploring.

I would like to do a second post on Yogananda's autobigraphy: From Preface: The value of Yogananda’s Autobiography is greatly enhanced by the fact that it is one of the few books in English about the wise men of India which has been written, not by a journalist or foreigner, but by one of their own race and training—in short, a book about yogis by a yogi. From Chapter: 12 Years in My Master's Hermitage: “All creation is governed by law,” Sri Yukteswar concluded. “The ones which manifest in the outer universe, discoverable by scientists, are called natural laws. But there are subtler laws ruling the realms of consciousness which can be known only through the inner science of yoga. The hidden spiritual planes also have their natural and lawful principles of operation. It is not the physical scientist but the fully self-realized master who comprehends the true nature of matter. Thus Christ was able to restore the servant’s ear after it had been severed by one of the disciples.” 11 Drifting_Throught_Infinity (and everyone else), what is found in Chapter: 14 An Experience in Cosmic Consciousness is super consciousness described? (I pasted the part I chose to paste from the chapter, but read the whole chapter). Sri Yukteswar struck gently on Yoganada's chest to open him up to the, can we call it,"super consciousness"?: Sri Yukteswar seldom indulged in riddles; I was bewildered. He struck gently on my chest above the heart. My body became immovably rooted; breath was drawn out of my lungs as if by some huge magnet. Soul and mind instantly lost their physical bondage, and streamed out like a fluid piercing light from my every pore. The flesh was as though dead, yet in my intense awareness I knew that never before had I been fully alive. My sense of identity was no longer narrowly confined to a body, but embraced the circumambient atoms. People on distant streets seemed to be moving gently over my own remote periphery. The roots of plants and trees appeared through a dim transparency of the soil; I discerned the inward flow of their sap. The whole vicinity lay bare before me. My ordinary frontal vision was now changed to a vast spherical sight, simultaneously all-perceptive. Through the back of my head I saw men strolling far down Rai Ghat Road, and noticed also a white cow who was leisurely approaching. When she reached the space in front of the open ashram gate, I observed her with my two physical eyes. As she passed by, behind the brick wall, I saw her clearly still. All objects within my panoramic gaze trembled and vibrated like quick motion pictures. My body, Master’s, the pillared courtyard, the furniture and floor, the trees and sunshine, occasionally became violently agitated, until all melted into a luminescent sea; even as sugar crystals, thrown into a glass of water, dissolve after being shaken. The unifying light alternated with materializations of form, the metamorphoses revealing the law of cause and effect in creation. An oceanic joy broke upon calm endless shores of my soul. The Spirit of God, I realized, is exhaustless Bliss; His body is countless tissues of light. A swelling glory within me began to envelop towns, continents, the earth, solar and stellar systems, tenuous nebulae, and floating universes. The entire cosmos, gently luminous, like a city seen afar at night, glimmered within the infinitude of my being. The sharply etched global outlines faded somewhat at the farthest edges; there I could see a mellow radiance, ever-undiminished. It was indescribably subtle; the planetary pictures were formed of a grosser light. The divine dispersion of rays poured from an Eternal Source, blazing into galaxies, transfigured with ineffable auras. Again and again I saw the creative beams condense into constellations, then resolve into sheets of transparent flame. By rhythmic reversion, sextillion worlds passed into diaphanous luster; fire became firmament. I cognized the center of the empyrean as a point of intuitive perception in my heart. Irradiating splendor issued from my nucleus to every part of the universal structure. Blissful amrita, the nectar of immortality, pulsed through me with a quicksilverlike fluidity. The creative voice of God I heard resounding as Aum,1 the vibration of the Cosmic Motor. Suddenly the breath returned to my lungs. With a disappointment almost unbearable, I realized that my infinite immensity was lost. Once more I was limited to the humiliating cage of a body, not easily accommodative to the Spirit. Like a prodigal child, I had run away from my macrocosmic home and imprisoned myself in a narrow microcosm. My guru was standing motionless before me; I started to drop at his holy feet in gratitude for the experience in cosmic consciousness which I had long passionately sought. He held me upright, and spoke calmly, unpretentiously. “You must not get overdrunk with ecstasy. Much work yet remains for you in the world. Come; let us sweep the balcony floor; then we shall walk by the Ganges.” I fetched a broom; Master, I knew, was teaching me the secret of balanced living. The soul must stretch over the cosmogonic abysses, while the body performs its daily duties. When we set out later for a stroll, I was still entranced in unspeakable rapture. I saw our bodies as two astral pictures, moving over a road by the river whose essence was sheer light. “It is the Spirit of God that actively sustains every form and force in the universe; yet He is transcendental and aloof in the blissful uncreated void beyond the worlds of vibratory phenomena,” 2 Master explained. “Saints who realize their divinity even while in the flesh know a similar twofold existence. Conscientiously engaging in earthly work, they yet remain immersed in an inward beatitude. The Lord has created all men from the limitless joy of His being. Though they are painfully cramped by the body, God nevertheless expects that souls made in His image shall ultimately rise above all sense identifications and reunite with Him.” The cosmic vision left many permanent lessons. By daily stilling my thoughts, I could win release from the delusive conviction that my body was a mass of flesh and bones, traversing the hard soil of matter. The breath and the restless mind, I saw, were like storms which lashed the ocean of light into waves of material forms—earth, sky, human beings, animals, birds, trees. No perception of the Infinite as One Light could be had except by calming those storms. As often as I silenced the two natural tumults, I beheld the multitudinous waves of creation melt into one lucent sea, even as the waves of the ocean, their tempests subsiding, serenely dissolve into unity. A master bestows the divine experience of cosmic consciousness when his disciple, by meditation, has strengthened his mind to a degree where the vast vistas would not overwhelm him. The experience can never be given through one’s mere intellectual willingness or open-mindedness. Only adequate enlargement by yoga practice and devotional bhakti can prepare the mind to absorb the liberating shock of omnipresence. It comes with a natural inevitability to the sincere devotee. His intense craving begins to pull at God with an irresistible force. The Lord, as the Cosmic Vision, is drawn by the seeker’s magnetic ardor into his range of consciousness. I wrote, in my later years, the following poem, “Samadhi,” endeavoring to convey the glory of its cosmic state: Vanished the veils of light and shade, Lifted every vapor of sorrow, Sailed away all dawns of fleeting joy, Gone the dim sensory mirage. Love, hate, health, disease, life, death, Perished these false shadows on the screen of duality. Waves of laughter, scyllas of sarcasm, melancholic whirlpools, Melting in the vast sea of bliss. The storm of maya stilled By magic wand of intuition deep. The universe, forgotten dream, subconsciously lurks, Ready to invade my newly-wakened memory divine. I live without the cosmic shadow, But it is not, bereft of me; As the sea exists without the waves, But they breathe not without the sea. Dreams, wakings, states of deep turia sleep, Present, past, future, no more for me, But ever-present, all-flowing I, I, everywhere. Planets, stars, stardust, earth, Volcanic bursts of doomsday cataclysms, Creation’s molding furnace, Glaciers of silent x-rays, burning electron floods, Thoughts of all men, past, present, to come, Every blade of grass, myself, mankind, Each particle of universal dust, Anger, greed, good, bad, salvation, lust, I swallowed, transmuted all Into a vast ocean of blood of my own one Being! Smoldering joy, oft-puffed by meditation Blinding my tearful eyes, Burst into immortal flames of bliss, Consumed my tears, my frame, my all. Thou art I, I am Thou, Knowing, Knower, Known, as One! Tranquilled, unbroken thrill, eternally living, ever-new peace! Enjoyable beyond imagination of expectancy, samadhi bliss! Not an unconscious state Or mental chloroform without wilful return, Samadhi but extends my conscious realm Beyond limits of the mortal frame To farthest boundary of eternity Where I, the Cosmic Sea, Watch the little ego floating in Me. The sparrow, each grain of sand, fall not without My sight. All space floats like an iceberg in My mental sea. Colossal Container, I, of all things made. By deeper, longer, thirsty, guru-given meditation Comes this celestial samadhi. Mobile murmurs of atoms are heard, The dark earth, mountains, vales, lo! molten liquid! Flowing seas change into vapors of nebulae! Aum blows upon vapors, opening wondrously their veils, Oceans stand revealed, shining electrons, Till, at last sound of the cosmic drum, Vanish the grosser lights into eternal rays Of all-pervading bliss. From joy I came, for joy I live, in sacred joy I melt. Ocean of mind, I drink all creation’s waves. Four veils of solid, liquid, vapor, light, Lift aright. Myself, in everything, enters the Great Myself. Gone forever, fitful, flickering shadows of mortal memory. Spotless is my mental sky, below, ahead, and high above. Eternity and I, one united ray. A tiny bubble of laughter, I Am become the Sea of Mirth Itself. Sri Yukteswar taught me how to summon the blessed experience at will, and also how to transmit it to others if their intuitive channels were developed. For months I entered the ecstatic union, comprehending why the Upanishads say God is rasa, “the most relishable.” samsarictravelling

Good piece courtesy of ZH and it says it all really (exactly what people in the UK felt during the Brexit referendum). Even now we are receiving platitudes from our new PM about ' reporting the number of immigrants working in companies' and creating a shame list WTF ! Brexit wasn't about immigration, it was about the growing disparity between one group and another after promises that things would get better, they got and are getting significantly worse. Listened To A Trump Supporter... Now I Understand" Tyler Durden's picture by Tyler Durden Oct 6, 2016 9:14 AM 75 SHARES TwitterFacebookReddit Submitted by Mike Krieger via Liberty Bltizkrieg blog, The following article by David A Hill Jr is simply outstanding. Here are some powerful excerpts from the piece: I Listened to a Trump Supporter I talked at length with a Trump supporter I grew up around. I wanted to understand. I respected her growing up. I wanted to know why a person as kind and compassionate as I remember her is voting for someone like Donald Trump. She was a family friend, a good person. In rural Ohio, everything was tight. Money, jobs. If you really needed quick cash, she’d put you to work doing landscaping. She’d pay fairly and reliably for the area. She’s voting for Donald Trump. I disagree with her choice, but I understand why she rejects Clinton so fiercely, and why she’s been swept up in Donald Trump’s particular brand of right-wing populism. I feel that on the left, it’s increasingly easy to ignore these people, to disregard them, to write them off as racists, bigots, or uneducated. I think that’s a loss for everyone involved, and that sometimes listening can help you to at least understand why a person is making the choices they make, so you can work on the root causes. For her, the root cause isn’t racism. In fact, I remember her as one of the only people in the area who proudly hired black workers, in a place where that was a huge issue. She fought over that choice. But that’s enough background. Let me relay a bit of what she told me. She’s a person who built her business from the ground up. She wasn’t rich, but was very comfortable for the area. She had a nice house, a nice car, and was stable. She achieved the American dream of not having to struggle. Things changed during the housing crisis. A landscaping business requires customers who need landscaping, and people who don’t own homes just don’t need landscaping. In some of these neighborhoods, one in five people lost their homes. That almost immediately turns a successful landscaping business into a struggling one. Then there was a domino effect. She couldn’t pay for her lawn-care equipment leases and loans. That hurt her work efficiency. Then, she lost her car. But that didn’t stop the payments. Then, she lost her house. She slowly had to let go all of her employees, until it was just her, hand-mowing lawns for cash the way you might expect a high school student in the summertime. She told me that every week, it seemed there was another default letter, another foreclosure, another bank demanding more blood from her dry veins. To her, that pile of default notices and demands for payment looked suspiciously similar to Hillary Clinton’s top donor list. She lost everything she worked so hard for. Obama swore he was going to help. The Wall Street bailout did seem to help Wall Street. But it did absolutely nothing for her. She turns on the news and sees how the Dow Jones is doing better than ever. But that didn’t bring her house and livelihood back. Liberals insist that Obama’s made her life better. But, now she’s driving a car that falls apart randomly while having to pay those same banks for a car she doesn’t own and never will. It’s difficult to convince someone whose life is objectively worse that their life is better. And it’s disingenuous to try. You can break down the specifics, sure. But when someone’s hungry, and you’re busy silencing their complaints by telling them how well world hunger is improving, you’re just going to upset them. This is not a person who is stupid or racist. She knows Bush caused the economy collapse with his irresponsible tax policies and wars. But she saw liberals as fighting for the banks’ recovery, to hell with her needs. She sees in Hillary someone who celebrates that approach. Who measures US success by the success of multinational mega corporations?—?corporations who undercut and destroy local businesses. This is a person who grew up in a town with a friendly neighborhood general store, a locally-owned hardware store, farmers’ markets, florists, and auto shops. All of these businesses closed when Walmart moved into town. All their owners now work at that Walmart for a fraction of their previous wages, no benefits, and no hope for something better, something of their own. And now, she sees a free trade supporting former Walmart executive about to come in to office, and it feels like salt in her community’s wounds. This is a wounded person. Insulting her or continuing to hurt her isn’t going to help. She’s swept up in Trump’s message because she feels someone’s finally listening. Right-wing populism is an awful thing. But desperate people with their backs against the wall will grasp on to whatever they feel will bring a change. Neoliberal capitalism is not sustainable for these people. Over the past few years, she tried getting back in her business. But a corporation moved in and is operating far cheaper, using undocumented immigrant labor. I should note: She specifically said she doesn’t hold it against the migrant workers. As she said, “They’ve got to take whatever jobs they can get. Just like we do. It’s not their fault. They didn’t choose to make prices so low that legal businesses couldn’t compete.” She was literally a “job creator”. And she wasbeing priced out by the very people Donald Trump insists are pricing her out. That hurts everyone, and it adds an air of authenticity to what he says. I asked her if she supports Trump’s Mexico wall. She told me, “It doesn’t matter if I do. Hillary wants a wall, too. That wall’s gonna happen.” She wasn’t simply making this up. She’s heard this from many sources, Clinton being one of them. So to her, the idea of a border wall is a non-issue. I pressed her on the issue, and she said she thinks, “It’s a waste of money. If someone wants to cross the border, they’re gonna cross the border.”… A few times, she seemed ashamed of things Trump’s said or done. I’d ask her to unpack her feelings. She said he sometimes upsets her, but “If you wait and wait for a flawless candidate, you’ll never find one.” She said she’d be much prouder to vote for Trump if he’d tone down his rhetoric. This fits into my strongly held belief that people are looking for an excuse to vote for Trump. All he has to do to win is tone down some of his more heinous and idiotic tendencies. I talked to her a bit about Bernie Sanders, to see what she thought of him. She told me, “He seemed like a nice enough guy. But I didn’t pay him much mind because there was no way he was gonna beat Clinton.” I talked with her about his platform, his policy proposals. She lit up. She told me, “It’s a real shame he didn’t make it.” She told me that if she knew him, his record, and his proposals, she’d have voted for him. I said that since the primary concluded, Hillary’s shifted some to adopt policies similar to his, and I asked if that changed her mind. She told me, “It doesn’t matter what she says. It matters what she’s done.” No amount of insulting her from an ivory tower is going to change her mind. No amount of guffawing about her lack of education, her self-deception, her racism, or her internalized misogyny is going to change her mind. The only thing she’ll listen to is a promise of real change to the system that’s hurt her. If the Democratic Party can’t offer her a viable alternative, we’re going to see another neck-and-neck election in 2020, and in 2024, and in 2028. These people need a populist answer. They need someone willing to listen to their very real concerns, and offer solutions that don’t look like Band-Aids on bullet wounds. If they had that on the left, we wouldn’t even be discussing Ohio as a “swing state”. Right now, this is the discourse we’re seeing about Trump supporters. This only emboldens those attitudes. To people like her, this feels like the left is laughing at her for her unwillingness to get in line and support the things that have left her broke and broken. The above excerpts are not the entire piece. You should read the whole thing: I Listened to a Trump Supporter. The more deeply I think about this election, the more I agree that the above sentiments motivate Trump voters far more than feelings of racism or hate. As I noted in a piece published a few weeks ago, The Status Quo vs. Donald Trump: This isn’t about me. This is about the American voter, and the more time passes, the more I understand the motivations of the vast majority of Trump supporters. It isn’t xenophobia or racism, it’s a vote against the status quo and the way they’ve strip mined and destroyed this country. It’s a FU vote and a major gamble, but it’s not as irrational or hateful as you might think. This doesn’t mean that Trump won’t betray his supporters and prove to be the Republican version of Barack Obama, but it does mean that the dominant media narrative characterizing Trump supporters as a bunch of racist, uneducated brutes is pretty much just dishonest, elitist propaganda.

everything is related to enlightenment in my opinion check this: Charlie Morley is a Lucid Dreaming teacher and practitioner of Tibetan Buddhism specializing in the use of both Western scientific and Tibetan Buddhist dream practices with the aims of bringing mindful awareness into all stages of dream, sleep and waking life. He is the co-creator of a new holistic approach to conscious sleeping and lucid dreaming called "Mindfulness of Dream and Sleep". This new approach includes practices which aim to help us sleep better, dream more lucidly and wake up with more awareness, clarity and joy!

I just wanted to chime in that my dream practice is now feeling even more the distinct effects of Flying Phoenix (more can be seen of my overall practice in my personal practice journals). Extracted here: "I then dreamt of Master JR and his ex-wife, and he told me we had to train in a dungeon-like room in his castle. The world was black and white, and his ex-wife took his son while he took his daughter. Eventually, I flew around the castle in a panoramic manner, and looked up to see a larger version of myself doing Flying Phoenix's first seated meditation (5% 60% 80% 40% 30%), and every time the palms turned inwards and outwards, a flash of blue tinted the world." I had indeed been doing that meditation just before sleeping, and even as I am already practicing volumes one and two and just learned Wind Through The Tree Tops, that particular seated basic meditation still resonates with me very strongly for some reason. It was almost eerie to see a larger version of myself dreaming like the Red King of Alice in Wonderland and The Looking Glass, doing form and looking translucent, bringing color to the world, even if only the blue flame of Flying Phoenix.

From Buddhist point of view, lucid dream is far from Enlightenment . From Taoist point of view, even Enlightenment is only half of the job , the spiritual part, you complete; the highest Taoist achievement is to qi-lize your whole physical body , and then consolidate ( materialize ) it at whatever places you like ( ie , teleportation ) , not just in one place, but in many places simultaneously ; you can get many splits of yourself appearing in many locations and doing many things at the same time... Besides, Taoist or Buddhist way is totally different from the scientific one..

dream interpretation: and it will change but based on the image from the garments this morning-here is what I have come up with..... amy winehouse-valerie why not re post the olive oil poem? I really would like to see it. Awakening from the dream archives

Cool dream. You might want to check out Fuxi for info on retention and masturbation. There is a lot of good info there. Best of luck to you.

I last posted in June when I dreamed about seeing my master again. What I've realized is there is absolutely no dogma to cultivation. You develop your awareness of All that is. We are all capable of using the tools we were born with. I met my master again. This dream was preceded by a telepathic link about 4 days before. The reason he is guiding me is unknown. I don't really understand how he thinks. I am still on the fence as to whether my dreams are simply a products of my sub conscious or they mean something more. I am 23 on the path for 5 years. I began with drug induced kundalini psychosis. While on drugs I was obsessed with breathing techniques and meditation. Misunderstood and greatly unbalanced I learned this was not the true way. This took much time. Years after using drugs I came back into touch with meditation and breathing techniques. Very slowly over the course of two years I relearned how to pull energy without the aid of drugs besides a little caffeine. I have continued doing this breathing exercises til today. I don't really meditate. The way for me still involves balancing myself because of drug use. My master made a comment in a year I might possess the mental qualification to fully commit to the way. In the dream he was helping me understood this book. It was so incomprehensible with levels and drug aided cultivation. A whole chapter was dedicated to cannabis oil. I didn't read it though. It may have been a test to see if I would still use drugs. I don't know. What I thought the way was is not the way. My master gives no dogma and allows me to figure out what I want to do. Like I said I still do not understand if his existence is entirely created of my own mind. The beings I met in my dreams, I can touch them. But they are not real bodies. The words I heard from him told me next time I would be ready. I think I still do not possess the mental qualification of the true way. There is no dogma. Perhaps he is not a master but a guide. Not sure. Aside from the dream of meeting him, I had a breakthrough tonight. I was able to pull successfully to the point of engaging my temples. I have so many mental blockages which translates into pain when energy is pulled through under developed spiritual circuitry. I have been having a very long debate about how masturbation effects being on the way. This is part of what I wish to discuss. I have been thinking the associations of what orgasm mean is the actual hindrance.

Not in my opinion. It speaks to the thought that when we dream we think that our dreams are real. When we wake up at first we can't decide if the dream was real or if it was only a dream. Chuang Tzu did not transform into a butterfly. Nor did the butterfly transform into Chuang Tzu. The dreamer was real; the dream was not. Now, true, the caterpillar will transform into a butterfly. But Chuang Tzu likely never did. Had he it would have been a miracle. And actually, IMO the last sentence doesn't even belong in the section. Probably a later addition.