Zen and Chi?

[DanC]

I have read a couple of books on Zen Meditation and they never seem to mention the effect

meditation has one ones Chi flow, I have read many books on Taoist Meditation and they seem to

focus more on Chi flow, why is this???

[sean]

My guess is because Zen is an attempt to focus almost as exclusively as possible on the everpresent stillness and inherent emptiness of all form, no matter how subtle or gross that form may be. From this perspective qi flow is not fundamentally unlike any movement of form ... blood flow, taking a walk, cooking breakfast, sleeping. It's all still "the world of manifestation".

 

Not to say that qi flow cannot be presented with perhaps equally skillfull means though. IMO when qi is framed like this, as movement itself, as thoughts, desires, perceptions, emotions, etc., all an endless flow of qi that will never be finished and simultaneously the question "what is Silently Aware of movement?" is held until the separation between the imagination of yourself and That Which Is Aware falls away, then we have a spiritual path and not just healthful qi exercises. Not that there is anything wrong with healthful qi exercises of course.

 

If you pm me your email address I'll send you an mp3 of a Zen teacher talking about energy flow like this although I don't remember her ever saying qi outright.

 

 

Sean

[cloud recluse]

DanC,you might want to check out SAMADHI:SELF DEVELOPMENT IN ZEN,SWORDSMANSHIP,AND PSYCHOTHERAPY by Mike Sayama.While Chi is not the books main emphasis,it points out that a balanced chi flow allows for smoother intergration of Awakening into the personal bodymind.Of course,chi cultivation in itself does not guarantee Awakening,but the Inquiry into ego,to go really deep & become effective,seems to be more likely if some degree of cultivation has allready taken place.Ones psyche is somehow more "receptive" to Inquiry.

 

Sayama draws attention to the case of Hakuin Ekaku who combined Daoist circulation techniques with ardous Sitting to Awaken,and the Hara practice of Zen is definetely a basic cultivation technique without which Inquiry may never be stabilized(in the average individual at least).

 

Anyhow,it would seem that chi cultivation both prepares one for the deep Inquiry that Awakens,and also for the subsequent intergration of that Enlightenment back into the everyday bodymind.BUT none of this is to say one cannot Awaken without chi,chi just makes it a lot "easier",for want of a better word.I suppose it just that Zen is extremely wary of any practice that might take precedence over Sitting & Inquiry,and one can certainly develop an "energy-miser" approach to cultivation ,and thus recreate another ego-image around ones practice.

 

As far as I can see,Emptiness makes room for a more blanced chi,and chi stabilises your day-to-day expression of Emptiness.

 

I also may have missed the point alltogether.

 

Regards,Cloud

[Ian]

DanC,you might want to check out SAMADHI:SELF DEVELOPMENT IN ZEN,SWORDSMANSHIP,AND PSYCHOTHERAPY by Mike Sayama.While Chi is not the books main emphasis,it points out that a balanced chi flow allows for smoother intergration of Awakening into the personal bodymind.Of course,chi cultivation in itself does not guarantee Awakening,but the Inquiry into ego,to go really deep & become effective,seems to be more likely if some degree of cultivation has allready taken place.Ones psyche is somehow more "receptive" to Inquiry.

 

 

I've been starting to think that one main reason for chi cultivation is that it's the easiest way to experience yourself as something with wider boundaries than your skin-bag.

 

Clear your channels enough and you start to connect with stuff outside, in a manner kind of tangible and not too nebulous.

 

Body is too lumpy and spirit often too hard to train for this sort of connecting outwards. Chi kinda works.

[hagar]

Read "The inner Teachings of Taoism" and see how taoist meditation include both Chan inspired meditation and chi cultivation. What is deemed as emptiness in alchemical terms is also defined as cultivating essence, which is what Zen meditation mostly emphasizes. Taoist meditation often attempts at a combination of cultivation of essence and "life" which is the term for chi or energetic body. "Life" is mainly reffering to Jing, chi and Shen.

 

Zen underlines the illusoriness of all form-based practice, but this does not mean that there is no chi involved in Zen meditation. It is there, but is not emphasizes as a focus of culitvation. The sole focus of Zen is just to sit. After a while sitting expands to life in general, and the small mind becomes the big mind.

But ALL sitting meditation will sooner or later include quite profound chi transformations of the body. If you force yourself to sit still for an hour you will realize why. If you didn't move, you have to die to the chi. In all sitting practive, there is a moment where the chi takes over. Also in Zen. What I truly like about the zen approach is that any "chi phenomena" is seen as no big deal. It's like "So, you have esp? That don't impress me much!"

 

h

 

I have read a couple of books on Zen Meditation and they never seem to mention the effect

meditation has one ones Chi flow, I have read many books on Taoist Meditation and they seem to

focus more on Chi flow, why is this???

[el_tortugo]

It's been a while since I read it but this book covers taoism and chan and goes into very nice detail.

 

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/087728542...glance&n=283155

[cloud recluse]

So would it be fair to say that Zen,being ostensibly "Buddhist",has more of the salvific imperative of an institutionalised religion,with attaining Nirvana becoming a moral obligation,while Daoism is happier to play around in the subtler energetic aspects of phenomena (ie,Chi ) until the desire to Awaken kicks in of its own accord?

 

Now ,thats not to say that Chi cultivation from initially dualistic motivations wont still interrupt the usual ego programs in and of itself,but more that the Daoists see Awakening as far less of an imperative than orthodox Buddhists.

 

Having said all that,I personally suspect Zen is really Daoism repackaged to survive in a new context,and the practice of Zazen is DEFINETELY a chi cultivation technique,amongst other things.But does anyone else out there think that,in terms of orthodoxy,Buddhism makes awakening an imperative whereas Daoism does not?

 

Would be interested in Bum feedback on this one

 

Regards,Cloud.

[rex]

But does anyone else out there think that,in terms of orthodoxy,Buddhism makes awakening an imperative whereas Daoism does not?

I liked Hagar's citing of essence and life.

 

Cultivating essence would attempt to develop some sort of wisdom into the nature of the mind. Cultivated to a high degree this wisdom would develop a non-stick mind that wouldn't grasp at experience with attraction or aversion. No grasping then no negative emotions stored in the organs and no need for practices like the healing sounds and fusion since these practices deal only with the symptoms and not the root cause of these negative emotions. This might be an orthodox Buddhist view.

 

This orthodox view doesn't invalidate practices like the healing sounds and fusion. The image of a glass of muddy water is often used to describe the process of letting the mind settle. Don't stir the water, leave it as it is and the mud settles to the bottom and the water becomes clear. Fine but the mud is still there and when the water is stirred the dirt will rise again. Practices of cultivating life will remove the mud. This seems to be the Healing Tao approach. I'm not sure if its the religious Daoist approach as it combines both cultivating essence and life.

 

Orthodox Buddhism and religious Daoism have the same goal. Daoism appears to have more pragmatic approaches. I think there are schools in both Buddhism and Daoism that emphasise cultivating essence; elements in Daoism that emphasise cultivating life; and elements in Daoism and Buddhism that emphasise the cultivation of both essence and life.

 

Now here's the rub: does cultivating essence only automatically cultivate life and does cultivating life only automatically cultivate essence? These questions lie behind most of monumental soap opera discussions over on the HT board.

[tumoessence]

I have read a couple of books on Zen Meditation and they never seem to mention the effect

meditation has one ones Chi flow, I have read many books on Taoist Meditation and they seem to

focus more on Chi flow, why is this???

 

In one of Maezumi Roshi's books he recommends circulating the orbit around before sitting practice.

[Trunk]

Having said all that,I personally suspect Zen is really Daoism repackaged to survive in a new context,

I stayed at Tassajara for a week back in the 80's, and had an interesting conversation with a modern Zen nun resident. She put Zen's pooh-pooh of energetics within the cultural context of old China where she thought that energetics were really well known and popular .. sort of thoroughly in the culture (medicine, martial arts, meditation, etc.) at the time. .. Perhaps excessively so, and so Zen's attitude against energetics should perhaps be taken in context that it was a response to too much of that in the culture at the time. And that, maybe, taking it to utterly disparage energetics entirely is perhaps taking it too far. That, in the context of modern U.S. culture - where stillness meditation and energetic qi gong are both relatively new - maybe the correct message should be somewhat different than what Zen said way back then, there.

Edited July 5, 2006 by Trunk

[cloud recluse]

In one of Maezumi Roshi's books he recommends circulating the orbit around before sitting practice.

 

Can you recall the title on that one?

[cloud recluse]

I stayed at Tassajara for a week back in the 80's, and had an interesting conversation with a modern Zen nun resident. She put Zen's pooh-pooh of energetics within the cultural context of old China where she thought that energetics were really well known and popular .. sort of thoroughly in the culture (medicine, martial arts, meditation, etc.) at the time. .. Perhaps excessively so, and so Zen's attitude against energetics should perhaps be taken in context that it was a response to too much of that in the culture at the time. And that, maybe, taking it to utterly disparage energetics entirely is perhaps taking it too far. That, in the context of modern U.S. culture - where stillness meditation and energetic qi gong are both relatively new - maybe the correct message should be somewhat different than what Zen said way back then, there.

 

Intruiging stuff Trunk.Its particularly important for Western students to get the cultural context in which an approach initially emerges.

 

I get the very strong impression that zazen itself has definite chi cultivation consequences.I mean the cultivation of Hara MUST constitute energetic work,surely! The energetic consequences only seem to be presented in terms of a spiritual tool,not a "personal" therapy.Would it be fair to say that while Hara provides a support to Inquiry,its not undertaken to improve a "self"?But its still an energetic phenomena,yes?no?

 

Is this borne out by your experience at all?I myself have only done Vippasana as a formal practice,in terms of being trained by a teacher,and am only going by what I have read of zazen.

 

Regards,Cloud

[Trunk]

Well, first off, I'm no Zen expert. I've read a couple of books, and briefly stayed at a couple of places (for about a week each).

 

I get the very strong impression that zazen itself has definite chi cultivation consequences. ... The energetic consequences only seem to be presented in terms of a spiritual tool,not a "personal" therapy.

 

A resident at Tassajara said that Shunryu Suzuki Roshi had a strong palpable presence (he'd passed considerably prior to me visiting), and I know that Maezumi Roshi had energy. So, probably zazen has energetic consequences, but Zen looks at it as a by-product (imo - they actually hardly mention it at all), not the main point.

 

And, yeah, Zen definately clearly goes for the transpersonal.

[Jack Elias]

When Professor Arthur Deikman first met my teacher, Suzuki Roshi, in the sixties and questioned him about consciousness, Suzuki Roshi said he didn't know anything about it, that he just tried to help his students learn to hear the birds singing.

 

Peace,

Jack

[tumoessence]

Can you recall the title on that one?

I don't remember the title. In fact it may have been an interview that I read in a magazine. Let me research my memory banks and other resources. It may take a few days. I am getting old.