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Hello. I started to study the Tao Te Ching when I was an art student round about 1987. Some years later I began Chen Taijiquan with Jan Silberstorff in Hamburg. After stopping for almost 20 years, when I was focused in Qigong practices like Fan Huan Gong (my main practice for 20 years) and Jing Gong (I have in Jing Gong a complete training), I returned to perform daily Chen Taijiquan round about 7 years ago. I also perform some time Xiang Gong 1 & 2. I have read many Daoist Classisc, also about Internal Alchemy and several translations in different languages of Tao Te Ching until today. My personal site is https://www.fanhuangong.com/ Have a good day and night, Yours Hans

Hi Folks, Been out of sight for a while due to personal reasons. Over the summer, my brothers and I recorded many videos covering our practice regimen and some short(ish) talks about how we approach Taijiquan and Dao, Daogong, and so on in our system. Feel free to share your thoughts here or on the youtube channel. Subscribe if you like We hope to make these an ongoing podcast series - the idea is, life is short, time is limited and we want to get some information out there on what we consider to be a powerful system. As the saying goes -- "proof of the pudding is in the eating", so we've shared some drills, etc, we use for training and teaching.

Hi all, My question is, what is so different about taijiquan and qigong, such that I struggle to do even 3 minutes of Spring Forest Qigong or zhan zhuang (or even Flying Phoenix Chi Kung), but I can do 5-10min of the tai chi? Not only that, but tai chi is the only practice that has actually given me a sort of buzz. It seems to me the active opening and closing movements, along with feet movements, are helpful, but I lack knowledge of the inner workings to understand this. The form of taijiquan I'm doing is Bruce Frantzis wu style. As a follow up question, given that my body/mind seems to have an affinity for tai chi, should I focus less (if at all) on qigong and practice tai chi almost exclusively? Or does this mean I need to endure it and keep practicing qigong? My goals are health and "spiritual progress." Recently I've been struggling with health, in particular movement, and some (diagnosed) zen sickness. I can only manage one 20-30min walk per day for example. Although I'm making lots of progress, one thing that eludes me is a consistent practice right now. In that past, before my zen sickness, I was able to do anapanasati or open-awareness type meditations for an hour or two everyday, in addition to being very phyiscally active. My background is almost two decades of inconsistent (self-taught) buddhist meditation and (self-taught) hatha yoga. Thank you in advance.

https://www.amazon.com/LET-GO-PRACTICES-SPIRITUAL-ASCENSION/dp/B09DMTQZVQ/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr= Hey, all. I've been here a long time and this is the book I wish I would have had when I first started my Eastern spiritual journey. Book excerpt: THE TAOIST ALCHEMY OF 100 DAYS BUILDING THE FOUNDATION MY PREPARATION Diet – I ate no meat, but I ate eggs, fish, and dairy. Meditation – Emptiness four times a day for twenty minutes to an hour until July, then I was doing 8-12 hours of meditation a day, which included several hours of Taiji. The Firing Process – After having gathered enough qi in the lower dan tien through a good diet, Taiji practice, and meditation, you need to “fire” it so it moves upwards and transforms into shen. Normally, the firing process happens naturally if you have enough desire or if you’re young or going through puberty. If your older, you will need an outside agent, and this has been one of the greatest secrets of alchemy in the east and west. Three things fire the qi, and that is pain which means ascetic practices such as self-flagellation, sexual arousal without ejaculation such as is found in Tantra and fasting. Any will work, but use sexual stimulation only on days you do the breathwork. Fasting should be extreme, but don’t kill yourself, and if you’re going to use pain, then do it every day. Breathwork – Bone breathing with closed eyes lasting twenty minutes once a day, and I did this several times a week but not every day. This is done by inhaling ten times into your belly and focusing on pulling qi into your belly on each inhale and storing it on the exhale. Then with an inhale, draw the qi from your dan tien to the bones of your left hand. Exhale and visualized compacting the qi all the way into the marrow. Do this same routine in all your bones, starting next with your left forearm, upper arm, right hand, right forearm, right upper arm, left foot, left lower leg, left upper leg, right foot, left lower leg, left upper leg, pelvic bone, collar bone, spine, jawbone and lastly cranium. Then ten more deep breaths, drawing qi into your dan tien, and on both the inhale and exhale, draw the qi up your spine and into your head to lead it to the pineal gland at the center of the brain. After the last ten breaths, you should hold your focus on your pineal with your attention, and it should feel like you are “reverse gazing.” My 100 Days Start: April 24, 1994 (Full Moon) I practiced the firing, and then I practiced bone breathing with breathing energy up my spine and then in meditation and had a powerful vision of interior light. Every time my perineum would begin to pump furiously, the interior light would blaze forth before my inner vision. June 8, 1994 (New Moon) I did the firing process and then the bone breathing. While breathing energy up my spine, the perineum began pumping with pressure/pain was felt in the third eye area. My testicles were also in pain. I was using forced willpower to move the energy up the spine. I tried to relax but couldn’t. I tried to leave my body several times unsuccessfully. Then I seemed to come out of my forehead. It was like I was in a little body a couple of inches tall. I could only get out of my forehead up to my waist. 100 Days End: July 27, 1994 It was incredible. My normal vision was replaced with a new vision. Instead of seeing with my fleshly eyes, I became aware I was seeing from my spiritual center, my soul. This spiritual center within me was the same spiritual center within all things. This “Unity” filled me with awe and peace. I also seemed to be eternally caught up in the now. I wasn’t thinking or feeling anymore. I was just being. Looking at the trees did not reveal leaves and bark. I saw an explosion of light. It began where the seed sprouted originally. The explosions then flowed upwards and downwards. I saw into the earth. It was a golden-hued transparency. The trees were like flowing golden fountains of living light that were continually being born anew every moment. It seemed purely accidental that water and dirt were carried along with the exploding fiery light. It did not diminish the glory of it in any way, though. I thought modern science was absurd because it studies the accidental shadow and not the actual substance. I knew everything from the beginning of time. I saw it all. At the same time, I was so peace-filled that I did not desire to know anything. With this expanded perspective, human understanding of everything, including metaphysics, seemed worthless. All the books I had read paled miserably in comparison to this. All the spiritual anguish I had been experiencing for the past few weeks vanished. I felt desireless, completely free, and at peace with all. It was as if I woke up and was seeing reality for the first time. I was released from this universe of light after a few minutes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d7a7z2HvvL0&ab_channel=DarinHamel

I've been following the travails of "The Martial Man", Keiren (I believe his last name is Krieger) since 2017. I must admit I truly appreciate the efforts this man has taken to seek out and interview so many great martial arts teachers. I hadn't logged on to the website https://themartialman.com/ in a while and when I did get there today, I find a very fascinating array of videos there dealing with Taijiquan, Wumei, 5 Ancestors Fist etc. I would say that it is a great resource for all bums who are interested in Martial Arts, and especially the Internal Martial Arts -- there's stuff one can learn from the videos too, but in general, from an informational perspective it is a great resource. Happy Holidays all..I thought I'd plug the website here. I'm not affiliated with it in any way except as a member who contributes a minuscule monthly payment (2.99$), and frankly gets significantly more return on this humble contribution.

Dear fellow Dao Bums, I have recently begun studying Chen’s style Tai chi after much research on different styles. It would seem to my personal views (which are limited to mostly Western/Hindu systems) that Chen’s style is the oldest and closely related to the original principles of TaiJiQuan. It encompasses movements of hard and soft. Tension and relaxation. Fast and slow. Unifying the polarities into a whole system. Chen’s style also has a great depth to the movement of chi and its movements. From what I have seen of Yang style it seems to only be soft slow movements. Now that being said, I have seen a few people express concern on any tension at all. I was hoping some practitioners of different styles could weigh in with their personal experience and start a conversation on the differences between the styles and the beliefs surrounding them. Cheers, E. S. A. The Wanderer

In meditation, we have the use of the term "staying centered" or "balanced" or "maintaining equilibrium". In taijiquan too we have the use of similar terms, or if we want to be more technical, "maintaining Zhong ding" or "being in Taiji". What does that really entail? Is it a mental state? Or is it a state of energetic balance? Or is it a combination of both? The best definition of "no-mind" I've come across is "The no-mind state is when the mind neither clings to anything, nor runs away from anything". This is where the key to remaining centered exists. The nature of the mind is to process information, to think. So even when there is no need for thinking to occur, the mind tends to preoccupy itself with thinking. Processing events that have passed, and extrapolating and projecting into possibilities in the future. The resulting effect is one of distress, even though there might not be the recognition as such, of the effect, under "normal" circumstances. This is true for all serious meditation (imho). If your mind is constantly vacillating between past and future, there is no point of rest any longer. So then how do we stop vacillating between the past and future? That is, in essence, the root of meditation. In order for that to be possible, first there must be total and complete recognition of our true nature and an understanding of what we are not. There are many ways to get there -- but the end result is a direct knowing of what we are not. What we truly are, cannot easily be grasped directly. Usually we have to go through the path of "neti neti" (or not this, not this), progressively and logically eliminating layers of not-self, until only the bare essence remains. Once we have spent time with the realization of our true nature as being that bare essence, then we can in earnest begin the process of 'letting go'. It takes a bit of effort initially, but to simply sit, without doing anything, is a good way to 'let go'. How do we let go of sand that we have held in our fist for a while? Just open the fist...and the sand falls out. Some grains still remain, just dust them off by rubbing the hands against each other.

In Temple style Tai Chi, there is a meditation called "mother meditation". This meditation is aimed at helping the practitioner develop the ability to clearly separate substantial and insubstantial (along with other significant benefits). The meditation is modeled after the concept of a Mother and her child going somewhere (I was told 'going to the market'). Sometimes the child follows the mother and other times, the mother 'drives' the child. Does anyone know of similar practices? If so, please do share

My bro and I met after many days to play taijiquan drills. We worked with many things but recorded a small part of our session. Our videos are unedited and so be warned of some ‘sacre bleu’ moments. Feel free to comment or ask questions.

Here are some videos I took of my master demonstrating and explaining some concepts of taijiquan application.

I think I might have joined this group years ago, but I might have just looked at it. Anyway, I saw someone mention it today and I thought I might look at it again. One of my practices is "cloudwalking". This is a practice where a Daoist initiate leaves his home temple and wanders around investigating and studying other Temples, teachers, and, traditions---both in and outside of Daoism. So I thought I'd cloudwalk over to the Dao bums again. I've been consciously practicing daoism for about 40 years. Before that, I got introduced into "spiritual stuff" by a guy without a label that I met in a bar and who gave me a rapid initiation into mystical practices. Later on, misters Moy and Moi at the Fung Loy Kok Temple in Toronto initiated me into their lineage before I really understood what I was getting into. I left that group a couple years later, but the initiation "stuck" and I've been hooked on the specifically Daoist tradition ever since---even though through cloudwalking I've studied with Unitarians, various flavours of Buddhism, Jesuits, a Catholic hermit, and, a Benedictine nun, and quite a few others. I've pursued lots of different practices besides cloudwalking. That included sitting and forgetting, ritual practice, chanting, etc. Right now most of my practice involves taijiquan (I do open hand, sword, sabre, and, spear forms---not very well) and "holding onto the One" . I also have a Masters in Philosophy from a Canadian comprehensive university and try to amalgamate Daoism with Western understanding---including science and rational analysis. I've also spent a lot of my life involved in environmental activism and Green politics. I currently write a news blog for my local community and have published a couple books. One is on Environmentalism informed by my spiritual worldview: Walking the Talk: Engaging the Public to Build a Sustainable World. The other is about how an ordinary person can live a life in the modern world informed by the teachings of Daoism: Digging Your Own Well: Daoism as a Practical Philosophy. I'm currently retired and live in a small city in Ontario, Canada.

Had an interesting tai chi dream lesson last night. A teacher (don’t recollect who, wasn’t my master) expounded on the principles of taijiquan. He told me, tai chi is bone, mind and field. By bone i interpreted two ways - the skeletal structure and the bone marrow where jin(g)is stored. Mind is intent - Yi Field is the energy/mind field which forms the surface of our “bubbles”, and it’s surface tension is how our power works. Does any of this resonate with anyone? Would love to read your thoughts on it

This is an article I wrote many years ago (11) during my early days of meditation. https://www.medhajournal.com/the-i-of-the-storm/ I strongly recommend for anyone who is struggling currently to persevere and do more studying of nondual texts, along with their regular meditation practice. It might help you resolve these sort of “issues” sooner.

This is a recording of an informal conversation with my master from last evening.

There are a lot of pictures, in books, online, in charts and diagrams, that show where the dantian (or lower dantian) is located. Almost all of them are side views, almost all of them show no bones, or show them so symbolically as to not really allow identification. I'm hoping someone can definitively help with where the lower dantian is. Most verbal descriptions say, 3 fingers below the navel and 3 fingers inside, with the number of fingers for each varying, and some people actually using thumbs instead. The navel is roughly at the illiac crest, which is the bone pictured at the front of the top of the pelvis in the following picture, so the vertical location on this picture seems like it is correct. It would say the dantian is in front of the sacrum (picture from seeds of longevity): Quite a few pictures lead to a conclusion more like the one below, however, which shows the dantian below the navel, but also above the sacrum? The following picture is one I've seen quite a lot (this and the previous are from this site which has a ton of pictures including the top one). It does the triangulation more carefully, but it's unclear in the diagram on which it is superimposed what we are looking at for spine, but does seem to be again in front of the sacrum. I've seen diagrams with female torsos, and it seems to be put in the "womb space", which seems lower. I am also reading Damo Mitchell's White Moon on the Mountain Peak, which says that the dantian is vertically aligned with the baihui and the huiyin, which puts it far back, but also on a line between the mingmen and the qihai, which seems like it would be almost above the navel. I have always "left it indistinct" when doing my exercises, it has been sufficient that it was below the navel and inside, but that place only warms for me, it never gets hot, and multiple sources talk about the dantian getting hot when fed energy. I did his correcting exercise, moving up the line from the huiyin, and I did another person's exercise, using warm hands and moving slowly inward, Mitchell's put it against my sacrum, the other put it a little forward from there. I got my indications of these by feeling for the bones, and somewhat by comparing to the iliac crests, which are easy to find. For background and disclosure, I am trying to complete Mitchell's and some other's visualizations/meditations. I can't penetrate that area with visualizations for some reason, when I do a Tibetan style visualization of the nadi it fades in that area, when I do more Daoist visualizations the area responds but I can never seem to see it. So I'm looking for a more concentrated location point than what I've visualized in the past and want to know how to "narrow it down".

Thanx for accepting me at this forum! Hello my name is Douwe Geluk from Apeldoorn city in the Netherlands aka Holland. I saw this forum and wanted to become a member immediately. Many things that are on here have my interest. As said i live in the Netherlands and i work as an engineer. I love Salsa dancing, food and Asian cultures. Also i love daoism and i am.working on many aspects of daoism. With that i am a martial arts teacher in Apeldoorn city the Netherlands. My spiritual journey has many aspects with elements from.Buddhism, Daoism and others. My martial arts background: kyokushin karate, kickboxing, mma and Chinese martial arts such as How Chuen Monkey Kung Fu and Tai Chi Chuan with Qi Qong which i learned from shifu Fred Decramer. How Chuen is a standing tall Monkey art based on the Sasquatch, Bigfoot or Yeti. A very effective system of selfdefense and protection. Now i teach martial arts at my school de Bron van Geluk meaning: The Scource of Happiness. Tai Chi Chuan aka Taijiquan and Qi Qong have my main focus now those arts have so much effect on me that i will always practise them and do competitions on a high international level. I will read on this forum and post every now and then within some topics. ----- Thanxxx ------ Sincerely Yours Douwe Geluk

https://www.medhajournal.com/tai-chi-as-a-practical-tool-for-self-realization/

Hello . I am John. I train in multiple disciplines but my main one is Shing yi . I am in the Phoenix AZ valley.

Hi XingLik here. It's great to join Dao Bums. I've looked through the forums from time to time over the last few years and certainly found information and discussions that interest me. About me: I've been fascinated by the potential of human energy from an early age. I started martial arts at 8 and have been studying Shaolin (internal) and Daoist arts since late 1993. I have successfully been using Daoist healing techniques and teaching DaoYin TaijiQuan and QiGong since 2003. I am most interested in developing my understanding the practical wisdom of the sages, cultivating qi energy, improving my TaiJiQuan and becoming a helpful, balanced human being.

What is Jing (essence) from a Taijiquan perspective? If Chi (energy) is "internal movement", then what is Jing (essence)? How can Jing (essence) be cultivated from a Taijiquan perspective and by using the Taijiquan principles? This thread is about Jing (essence), not about Jin (power).

As I was reading through my teacher's notes recently, I came across this concept, which I thought I should share -- This comes back to the concept of Dao and De, and how De really is not different from Dao. If you connect with your De, you connect with Dao. Furthermore we are told, in Tai chi practice, we have to become aware of that which gives us the ability to think, feel, smell, taste, hear and see. Instead of focussing on the process of thinking, feeling, smelling, hearing, tasting or seeing, we should become aware of that which gives us the ability to do those things. That which gives us the ability to do all these things, is essentially empty, but full of potentiality. When we become aware of this "source", we are connected with the source of the universe too.

Hello fellow daobums, I was hoping for some taijiquan advice. I have the opportunity to study the 37-form taijiquan of Cheng Man Ching with an instructor in the Milwaukee area. I have no previous taijiquan experience, so my main question is, would this be a good intro form to learn? There are a few other advantages to this instructor, namely that I can study 3 times a week; the school is affiliated with Adam Mizner, and there is the opportunity to learn push hands. Any thoughts? thanks

I started lurking on the Tao Bums about 10 years ago (Wow, time flies!) and this is something that would have been helpful to me at that time. Hope this will answer questions for those just starting out on this journey.