Microcosmic Orbit: Taoist Yoga Style

[Neophyte]

[joeblast]

None that I've come across, but studying Taoist Yoga is also a study in grasping the pearl in the muddy water

 

Steven Chang had a cool bit on it at the end of his book of internal exercises, from which I found a diagram on Immortal Breathing, which appears to be a 3 dantiens breathing internal dynamo mechanism to drive the MCO. Was in b&w when I found this, the color was what I saw - trigram pairs are inhale/exhale, yin/yang at associated dt. You need proficiency in 3dt breathing before being able to do the complex pattern here, this isnt just placing awareness at the 12 points.

 

From what I've gleaned reading taoist yoga, this is also the method to do the 36 ascents of positive fire & 24 descents of negative fire.

 

[effilang]

Shouldn't the second cauldron be opposite the second gate?

 

I have never quite understood what is meant by 36 ascents of positive fire & 24, but being the way i am never pursued an answer.

Now that someone else has raised it, i wonder if anyone can explain this.

How is it that you have unequal numbers of ascent and descent in the MCO.

By fire the cycle is up the DU and down the REN, so how does one complete a cycle unevenly?

Edited April 29, 2011 by effilang

[joeblast]

I suppose that depends on how you interpret the middle dantien If interpreted as the celiac plecus, that is what this picture is consistent with. But the second gate is opposite the heart at T5(iirc), indicating something as to the nature of it in relation to the heart. On me, opposite the lower cauldron also seems to be quasi-gate-ey, but not quite the same as the t5 gate.

 

The ascents & descents are a specific part of the alchemical process to take the refined energy and basically clean the channels, the extra on the back are indicative of the relative ease of flow and how much is needed to really open it up. Again, its not necessarily "just doing the MCO" having the 36/24, that is "ascents of positive fire & descents of negative fire" that has a more specific purpose, at least that is my understanding of the difference between the two right now.

[gendao]

Shouldn't the second cauldron be opposite the second gate?

 

I have never quite understood what is meant by 36 ascents of positive fire & 24, but being the way i am never pursued an answer.

Now that someone else has raised it, i wonder if anyone can explain this.

How is it that you have unequal numbers of ascent and descent in the MCO.

By fire the cycle is up the DU and down the REN, so how does one complete a cycle unevenly?

When you pop a nonsexual boner...I believe at that occasion you may progressively raise jing to 4 increasingly higher points along your du mai from your huiyin to your baihui - taking 9 breaths during each stage while rolling your closed eyes from left to right. Going down your ren mai you follow a similar process - except with only 6 breaths per stage and rolling your eyes right. Hence there are 36 ascents and only 24 descents..

 

Or I could have some of that mixed up, but that's the basic gist. And it may also be that your body may have a tendency to do this naturally as your MCO opens and jing starts transmuting to qi. But I don't really know as I stopped trying to do this a long while ago, lol..

Edited April 29, 2011 by vortex

[deci belle]

It's good that you want to circulate energy through the passes alternate ways, Neophyte! Once you have opened the channels and used different routines to massage and saturate the different organs, you can carefully experiment yourself by watching where energy wants to go. Please continue to be very careful in breath/concentration-related practice. It is a very dangerous affair to obsess on procedure-driven programs. Just watching the breath in a relaxed natural way is sufficient unless it is for purposes of grafting or induction under direct, expert supervision.

 

Once you do open all the passes and channels, it's not so important to make the exercises an issue. You can now experience deeper and more subtle workings of energetics as your breath mirrors the degree of stillness of mind. Relaxed, natural and serene is most effective. Don't take any chances!

 

And I forgot to mention that the exercise is different for men and women. Mantak Chia covers this well in his volumes and there is an exquisite rendering in the alchemical style called Immortal Sisters.

Edited May 1, 2011 by deci belle

[Neophyte]

None that I've come across, but studying Taoist Yoga is also a study in grasping the pearl in the muddy water

 

Steven Chang had a cool bit on it at the end of his book of internal exercises, from which I found a diagram on Immortal Breathing, which appears to be a 3 dantiens breathing internal dynamo mechanism to drive the MCO. Was in b&w when I found this, the color was what I saw - trigram pairs are inhale/exhale, yin/yang at associated dt. You need proficiency in 3dt breathing before being able to do the complex pattern here, this isnt just placing awareness at the 12 points.

 

From what I've gleaned reading taoist yoga, this is also the method to do the 36 ascents of positive fire & 24 descents of negative fire.

 

 

Thanks joeblast, I'll check out that book. I don't think I know what 3dt breathing is, but you say I should know that before doing mco?

 

 

I suppose that depends on how you interpret the middle dantien If interpreted as the celiac plecus, that is what this picture is consistent with. But the second gate is opposite the heart at T5(iirc), indicating something as to the nature of it in relation to the heart. On me, opposite the lower cauldron also seems to be quasi-gate-ey, but not quite the same as the t5 gate.

 

The ascents & descents are a specific part of the alchemical process to take the refined energy and basically clean the channels, the extra on the back are indicative of the relative ease of flow and how much is needed to really open it up. Again, its not necessarily "just doing the MCO" having the 36/24, that is "ascents of positive fire & descents of negative fire" that has a more specific purpose, at least that is my understanding of the difference between the two right now.

 

Taoist Yoga says that at the second gate (opposite the heart), Taoist Yoga calls it point 'D', one must slow down the flow, or pause, for cleansing. But I thought that the whole rise along tu mo was a cleaning process (and the whole descent along jen mo was purification). Also, isn't it dangerous to slow down the flow at that point, because it can inadvertently enter the heart, causing heart attack? Other books say one must speed up past that point. Taoist Yoga also says that point 'J' along the descent of jen mo, one must pause for 'purification', which is right in front of the heart.

Also, what does one do to cleanse and purify when paused at those points?

 

 

It's good that you want to circulate energy through the passes alternate ways, Neophyte! Once you have opened the channels and used different routines to massage and saturate the different organs, you can carefully experiment yourself by watching where energy wants to go. Please continue to be very careful in breath/concentration-related practice. It is a very dangerous affair to obsess on procedure-driven programs. Just watching the breath in a relaxed natural way is sufficient unless it is for purposes of grafting or induction under direct, expert supervision.

 

Once you do open all the passes and channels, it's not so important to make the exercises an issue. You can now experience deeper and more subtle workings of energetics as your breath mirrors the degree of stillness of mind. Relaxed, natural and serene is most effective. Don't take any chances!

 

And I forgot to mention that the exercise is different for men and women. Mantak Chia covers this well in his volumes and there is an exquisite rendering in the alchemical style called Immortal Sisters.

 

Thanks deci belle, I'll check out the Mantak Chia volumes about the Immortal Sisters style.

[joeblast]

Thanks joeblast, I'll check out that book. I don't think I know what 3dt breathing is, but you say I should know that before doing mco?

 

 

 

 

Taoist Yoga says that at the second gate (opposite the heart), Taoist Yoga calls it point 'D', one must slow down the flow, or pause, for cleansing. But I thought that the whole rise along tu mo was a cleaning process (and the whole descent along jen mo was purification). Also, isn't it dangerous to slow down the flow at that point, because it can inadvertently enter the heart, causing heart attack? Other books say one must speed up past that point. Taoist Yoga also says that point 'J' along the descent of jen mo, one must pause for 'purification', which is right in front of the heart.

Also, what does one do to cleanse and purify when paused at those points?

Well, you know what lower dantien breathing is - using all 3 is but an extension of that. You dont need to know that before doing MCO, I just offered up that as something which intuitively jumped out at me while studying these things - I havent figured out the extent of correlation of "immortal breathing" as referred to in Chang's book vs IB as referred to in Luk's book (I havent really taken a close look at those particulars just yet.) The 3dt-MCO is a bit more...integrated at a deeper level? I have investigated the results of qi flow with regard to these breaths and in my experience they are consistent - it is actually reminiscent of singing a bowl where once a sufficient wave is generated it can be kept up by a slow circular resonance...or, reminiscent of the internal mechanisms of the sun (root) manifesting sunspots (branch).

 

You seem to be getting processes from taoist yoga mixed up a bit with just doing MCO work. MCO work is part of the processes of taoist yoga but where you seem to be getting mixed up is the alchemical gatherings that take place after certain events arise. These questions you just asked are answered in taoist yoga - have you finished the book? Just reading through it for the majority of the book you do not really get a good sense of durations (rightly so for they are individual) but you get a better idea by the conclusion of the book. The very action being described IS what the cleanse & purify is, it just isnt really clear at first glimpse. Yang's descriptions, remember, are coming from primarily a martial artist. If you build superlatively abundant qi at the lower dantien and never do any MCO work and your spine is rather stiff and blocked, then that is where these dangers arise that Yang warns about - it is basically a call for a balanced approach, to circulate gradually because qi, like water, must be led, for if it is forced it will simply bust forth into the path(s) of least resistance - therefore time spent cultivating proper paths to become paths of least resistance is time well spent.

[Liulang Hsien]

I hope I'm not too late on this discussion. I hope this helps with the 36/24 question. On p.15 of Taoist Yoga the master instructs the disciple to breathe in 9 times(positive number) to raise the fire through the 4 phases(seasons) and 6 branches(6 phases of orbiting) = 216. The decent is calculated as follows: 6(negative number) X 4 phases(seasons) X 6 branches(descending from the original cavity) = 144. I'm not exactly sure why the 9 and 6 represent positive and negative numbers, but at least its a start. Those numbers add to be 360 and on page 35 the master explains that this is normally done with a single breath. The process on page 15 seems to be describing a method for the elderly to gather the agent. I wanted to say that sometimes the book Taoist Yoga is a little hard to understand, if you read it through a few times it should start to make sense. Also I found that the book "the way to eternity" by Hu, Xuezhi is an excellent resource and makes a great companion to Luk's book. It seems to be another translation of the same method.

[joeblast]

[Neophyte]

I hope nobody has forgotten this thread--I've been busy and so haven't added to it.

 

You seem to be getting processes from taoist yoga mixed up a bit with just doing MCO work. MCO work is part of the processes of taoist yoga but where you seem to be getting mixed up is the alchemical gatherings that take place after certain events arise. These questions you just asked are answered in taoist yoga - have you finished the book? Just reading through it for the majority of the book you do not really get a good sense of durations (rightly so for they are individual) but you get a better idea by the conclusion of the book. The very action being described IS what the cleanse & purify is, it just isnt really clear at first glimpse. Yang's descriptions, remember, are coming from primarily a martial artist. If you build superlatively abundant qi at the lower dantien and never do any MCO work and your spine is rather stiff and blocked, then that is where these dangers arise that Yang warns about - it is basically a call for a balanced approach, to circulate gradually because qi, like water, must be led, for if it is forced it will simply bust forth into the path(s) of least resistance - therefore time spent cultivating proper paths to become paths of least resistance is time well spent.

 

No, I haven't finished it--almost though. I've read up to and into chapter 14, and I studied the book closely up to chapter 11, inclusive. It's taken me so long because I had found it so confusing, but it all is making sense now. I'll finish excogitating the whole book ASAP.

 

I hope I'm not too late on this discussion. I hope this helps with the 36/24 question. On p.15 of Taoist Yoga the master instructs the disciple to breathe in 9 times(positive number) to raise the fire through the 4 phases(seasons) and 6 branches(6 phases of orbiting) = 216. The decent is calculated as follows: 6(negative number) X 4 phases(seasons) X 6 branches(descending from the original cavity) = 144. I'm not exactly sure why the 9 and 6 represent positive and negative numbers, but at least its a start. Those numbers add to be 360 and on page 35 the master explains that this is normally done with a single breath. The process on page 15 seems to be describing a method for the elderly to gather the agent. I wanted to say that sometimes the book Taoist Yoga is a little hard to understand, if you read it through a few times it should start to make sense. Also I found that the book "the way to eternity" by Hu, Xuezhi is an excellent resource and makes a great companion to Luk's book. It seems to be another translation of the same method.

 

Thanks for the info. I searched the internet for this book (amazon.com, barnes&noble.com, etc.) and haven't found an available copy anywhere. Does anyone know where I can find it??

 

 

If anyone has any more info for this thread, I'm eager to hear it!

[Guest sykkelpump]

http://www.damo-qigong.net/pics/workbook/workbook%20000-029.pdf

[joeblast]

[Creation]

http://www.damo-qigong.net/pics/workbook/workbook%20000-029.pdf

That isn't the whole book.

 

The full course can be found here; I don't think you can get the book separately:

 

http://www.taoiststudy.com/content/damo-qigong-home-study-course

 

I've been hoping for a while that someone around here would give this course a serious shot and review it for the rest of us. They also offer retreats:

 

http://www.taoiststudy.com/content/workshops-2010-overview

Edited May 20, 2011 by Creation

[DanC]

I always like simple techniques but have always found most explanations of the orbit to be too confusing, anyone know of a simple basic MCO practice..

[joeblast]

I always like simple techniques but have always found most explanations of the orbit to be too confusing, anyone know of a simple basic MCO practice..

Pick up the spring forest qigong level 1 material

[joeblast]

bump & a link

 

http://thetaobums.com/topic/25430-mco-3-dantiens-method/

[Isimsiz Biri]

Dear Sirs,

 

Without the guidance of a master, if you practice these techniques from books, you will give yourself harm. Please be careful