Living Life is a totally misconstrued taoist concept

[tulku]

[tulku]

Many posts have been written here on why the epitome of Tao is sitting at a beach side cafe, eating a cheese cake, enjoying your wine/coffee, holding the hands of a lover, ejaculating into a lover, caressing a child..

 

Too many deluded "taoists" have been mislead into thinking that indulging one's senses by even partaking in life's simple pleasures is the equivalent of "living life" according to the "Tao".

 

Little do they know that when you indulge in your senses, even in something as basic as enjoying the touch of a lover or child or even feeling the caress of a wind breeze by the seaside, you are actually creating more obstructions to your spiritual cultivation!

Edited August 21, 2011 by tulku

[tulku]

In the Vimalakīrti Nirdeśa Sūtra , Vimala was dancing with lots of hot working girls but he didn't feel the slightest bit of pleasure or aversion.

 

It is only when you put your mind in non-dual neutral mode by engaging in neither pleasure nor aversion then can you spiritually cultivate.

 

In these videos, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKDFsLi2oBk, it is proven that the basic and most addictive needs of man and woman are food and sex.

 

This why our world is built around the concept of materialism. Materialism is actually a way of life built upon our hunter-gatherer drives of food and procreation.

 

This is why women would waste so much time and money splurging so much on cosmetics, clothes, jewelery, handbags and cosmetic surgery. The desire to look good is linked to the basic female hunter-gatherer drive of bearing more babies and attracting rich, powerful males to provide for her and inseminate her.

 

This is also why men spend so much time and money on their career and of course, sexual pursuits like going clubbing, dating, spending money on women so they would have sex, etc etc. Men have this male hunter-gatherer drive to look for more resources so that they can have more opportunities to fertilize more women and create more babies.

Edited August 21, 2011 by tulku

[tulku]

As said in the vids, it is shown that a male rat, when presented with a new female rat, would rush to impregnate the female rat. But as time goes on, the male rat will gradually lose interest in the female rat and eventually stop having sex with her.

But when the male rat is presented with another new female rat, his sexual interest will pique up again and he will struggle valiantly to impregnate the second female rat before losing interest in the second one again.

This rat behavior works very similarly to the sexual drive in human males. We all want to impregnate many different females.

[Aetherous]

You used a Buddhist sutra to say something about Taoism?

 

Enjoying things in life is totally fine and doesn't hinder anything.

[ralis]

Another misconstrued fundamentalist rant based on fear!

[tulku]

You used a Buddhist sutra to say something about Taoism?

 

Enjoying things in life is totally fine and doesn't hinder anything.

 

The only difference between taoism and buddhism is in name.

 

The enjoyment of things prevent the cultivation on non-dualism and non-attachment of the mind.

 

Even the master taoist sages will retreat to caves when attempting the pinnacle of spiritual cultivation.

 

Check out Wudang, Emei and other taoist sects in China which seclude themselves in the mountains. Why do you think is so?

 

Why aren't most taoist masters enjoying life in the cities if it doesn't hinder anything?

[tulku]

Another misconstrued fundamentalist rant based on fear!

 

Yes I suppose most taoist masters who stay secluded up in the mountains and most buddhist monks who stay secluded in the forest monasteries are full of fear.

[Everything]

Yes I suppose most taoist masters who stay secluded up in the mountains and most buddhist monks who stay secluded in the forest monasteries are full of fear.

Yes they are, wise enough to know that city life is not a natural way of living. There are only few natural way of living, one of them is the way according to Tao te Ching.

 

Equally do alot of religions seek to reveal our inner nature, that which we all inhereted. The fact that we want to impregnate women is false. We have a desire for sex, not babies. The babies is the result that places us in a position of awe for nature. It is the ultimate gift to a human life. Sex-drive is somethin that is of our nature, and living in an unnatural world would simply take advantage of that nature against us. Thus, some people choose to walk the hard road of living with difficulties in very small groups and in nature. Some people choose to seek their nature in religion and others choose to meet their two milion year old self in their own dreams. No way that can be spoken of is the ultimate way. We can not tell exactly what we need in life to fully acces all our inhereted archetypes and live to the full potential of our beings. But we should certainly not give up trying. Suicide is simply a shrewd or naive thing to do, not wise.

 

You say that livig life is wrong. Then it sound that we should kill our selves and that sounds reasonable. But do not misinterpret the wisdom that can be found beyond your given words. Death is temporary, facing it will be hard and cannot be done by holding fast to life. Thus, the hero boys were killed symbolically in ancient times, only to be rebornd as warriors who were no longer immortal. Mortality comes after immortality. So that we may be vulnerable once again, love and be loved. A hero cannot love, for he cannot relate to women, he is in sollitude, with a mask, ready for death to be reborn again.

 

Every piece of knowledge is relative to something. You cannot take one text and say that that is the way of living for eternity. No, it is a temporary place from which higher potentials of life can be reached.

 

Eventually, you will learn that you chose to live. But your will be clueless to that knowing untill you will have faced death. Your will to live is your deepest nature, even deeper then sex, freedom, succes, or happiness.

Edited August 21, 2011 by Everything

[Marblehead]

Everyone knows that Tulku is talking out of his ass right now, don't Y'all?

Edited August 21, 2011 by Marblehead

[lifeforce]

Tulku, your view of a Daoist living a secluded life up a Chinese mountain, eating nothing but berries and having nothing to do with society, is an over-romanticized western way of looking at it. An escape from life and not an embracing of it.

The Dao is everywhere, as are it's cultivators. It could be the checkout girl, a random guy you bump into at McDonalds, the guy sitting on his own on the bus, just as much as it is the Chinese Taiji instructor or the acupuncturist.

People of the Dao also lead normal lives. It is over-indulgence which ruins everything.

I had never even heard of the Dao when I got married and later had children.

I like a beer now and again, a ride on a rollercoaster and an occasional burger.

Does that make me less of a Dao cultivator ? Does it hell.

[Desert Eagle]

It is only when you put your mind in non-dual neutral mode by engaging in neither pleasure nor aversion then can you spiritually cultivate.

 

Being one with the universe in a sense. Very good point but can't it be done meditating, isolating the senses in a private and quiet place? Doing it sometimes on a nature outing such as the beach or wilderness?

 

The way you say definitely helps. Perhaps in the future, Technology would advance enough to allow easier hermeticism or temple groups. Or it would be possible to live without food for longer periods.

Edited August 21, 2011 by Desert Eagle

[Kali Yuga]

Tulku next time you try to talk about Taoism at least get your sources right. What you did right there is the equivalent of quoting the book of Matthew and starting preaching about Judaism. I can't even be bothered to explain how non-sequitur that kind of logic is.

 

I know you like to be the fundamentalist know-it-all source of everything, declaring everything is THIS and definitely is NOT THAT, but you don't even have a clue about what you are talking about most of the time. all you do is make brash sweeping general statements about everything which reference your belief that you think everything has to be hard core, one thing to the exclusion to all other things, and that to be something you must always be living out in the mountains in a cave, eating berries and stuff like that. or other crack statements like that the Chinese are all losers in chi, and only people in Indonesia have true mastery of chi, or that the Chinese don't know shit while everything up in the Himalayas is all perfect and the only true masters ONLY live there. How arrogant can you be? You're the only one who can't see the way you choose to think is flawed, which is why you generally meet with large amounts of opposition on a lot of the threads that you make. It's like you're some bible belt redneck talking about Jesus with the dogmatic statements you make sometimes - you tend to stereotype everything, while lacking the subtlety and wisdom to actually see the holes in the way you think, and neither do you seem to have the ability to have the humility to second guess yourself and admit that maybe you don't really know what you're talking about.

 

For example, have you ever bothered to even examine Taoist culture? What do you know about the stories of the Eight Immortals? Probably little to nothing, even though they permeate Taoist culture thoroughly. They are at best an oddball bunch of people who one way or another, through sheer foolishness and coincidence stumble one way or another into a way of becoming an immortal. They are generally portrayed as a nonchalant bunch who are fond of food and drink, and represent spontaneity just as much, if not even more than austerity. You will find these things if you dig up the stories. The Eight Immortals transcend sterotypes, being that they all are from different walks of life, and represent pretty much any kind of average person - not even half of them had to go into the mountains, give up food or regular life or any of that stuff that you're preaching about. But then again you probably would not know of these things, being that you had to quote something Buddhist just to talk about Taoism. Buddhism can approximate, but it can never represent the true essence of Taoism. Buddhism does not equal Taoism and I would not be as arrogant as to the conclusion that I know everything about Taoism just because I read a scripture from Buddhism.

 

You want to be an authority, tulku? Go and achieve something with all that knowledge you believe you have. Go away to those mountains that you so desperately believe hold the truth to everything you think is there. And get away from us mundane regular chi folk posting here on taobums. Go and live in that cave, and dont eat food and use the internet like all us regular folk. Do you practice what you preach? This is the question. You like to lecture us all and teach us about these things which you think you know so much about. So I'm guessing as you are such a master you should go and set up your own school. Go around and try to teach people your own system of chi. let see how well you hold up to the likes of Ya Mu, Li Ping, the people from KAP or fivelementtao or hundun. Let's see how well you do then.

[Audiohealing]

Threads like these truly make me wonder where the future of this forum is headed...

[Dainin]

Since the initial posting was about Taoism, shouldn't this have been posted in the Taoist Forum?

[suninmyeyes]

Life is full of diversity.

Developing a good rhytam in order to dance with life in all circumstances is a very helpful non exclusivist tool.

[Marblehead]

Since the initial posting was about Taoism, shouldn't this have been posted in the Taoist Forum?

 

Absolutely not!!! The initial post suggested that Taoism is all fucked up and we all need to convert to Buddhism. What a bunch of bull shit!!!

[Dainin]

Absolutely not!!! The initial post suggested that Taoism is all fucked up and we all need to convert to Buddhism. What a bunch of bull shit!!!

 

You're right, I didn't read it closely!

[Marblehead]

Threads like these truly make me wonder where the future of this forum is headed...

 

Don't fret about that, my friend. Taobums is immortal (as long as Sean keeps paying the bills).

[Marblehead]

Life is full of diversity.

Developing a good rhytam in order to dance with life in all circumstances is a very helpful non exclusivist tool.

 

Hehehe. You are so sweet. I enjoy having you around.

[tulku]

http://www.daoistmagic.com/info.php?i=2131

Reclusive Training: This type of Daoist training is sometimes regarded as the higher path of the Daoist Right-Hand school of training. It requires the mystic to remove him or herself from society becoming a lone sage. After recognizing the flaws of ritualistic forms of worship and giving up the politically ingrained patterns of religious dogma, the mystic generally retreats to a cave for internal introspection. Although ritualistic forms of worship are essential for purifying the mind, any form of external oriented action can also keep the mind bound to the external world. Therefore, in the highest stages of Daoist mystical training, the individual releases all attachments to material objects (people, places and things) and spiritual powers (controlling the Elements, the Six Transportations of Shen, etc.) and strives only to attain "oneness" with the eternal Dao through self-introspection.

 

There is fundamentally no difference between taoism and buddhism. All religions and spiritual paths are created and improved upon by countless men cutting off their mundane senses to experience the void.

 

As shown above, it is said that the highest path of daoism involve cutting yourself off from the polluted material society and more importantly, cutting your attachments off to attain oneness with the Dao.

 

This is virtually the same concept as Dzogchen and Mahamudra in Tibetan Buddhism. Not to mention Jhana Meditation in Theravada Buddhism.

 

I have said before I have know numerous Taoist masters. The highest Taoist masters I know are Buddhist as well.

 

http://www.nanhuaijin.org/

Master Nan Huai Jin (Nan Huai-Chin) is one of the most renowned and revered lay Buddhist Masters in China. A great teacher in all three traditions of spiritual cultivation in China, namely the Confucian tradition, the Buddhist tradition and the Taoist tradition, he has written more than 30 books in these subjects.

 

I do not know Nan Huai Jin personally but as you can see, he is a master of buddhism and daoism and confucanism.

 

So for those of you who try to malign me and put words in my mouth, this is the only point I am trying to put across.

 

Whether it be Taoism or Buddhism or Hinduism or whatever, one still have to cut his material senses in order to reach the highest stages of cultivation and that means no sex, no good food, no fun which stimulate the senses.

Edited August 21, 2011 by tulku

[tulku]

Mantak Chia described why it is important to seal the 5 senses.

Our senses are like antennas which receive waves of vibration,sound and light that come to us. If that wave makes sense, ourbrains will start to think. Thinking consumes more energy than anyother bodily activity. As humans we can not stop thinking, lookingand listing nor stop fantasizing. This sensory-linked brain functionin reaction to the external world is known as the monkey mind

 

Mantak also described the importance of sealing the 5 senses in dark room retreats.

All spiritual traditions have used Darkness Techniques in the pursuitof enlightenment. In Europe, the dark room often appeared in under-ground form as a network of tunnels, in Egypt as the Pyramids, in Rome as the catacombs, and by the Essenes, near the Dead Sea in Israel, as caves. In the Taoist tradition caves have been used through-out the ages for higher level practices. In the Tao, the cave, the Immortal Mountain, the Wu San, represents the Perfect Inner Alchemy Chamber. Meditating and fasting in the cave is the final journey of spiritual work. The caves are the Earth Mother and its energy lines. Like the hollow bones, caves contain the earliest information of life stored inside the Earth. Caves contain the vital essence of the Earth Power. The Tao says: ‘When you go into the dark and this becomes total, the Darkness soon turns into light.’

In the Darkness, our mind and soul begin to wander freely in the vast realms of psychic and spiritual experience. When you enter this primordial state or force you are reunited with the true self and divinity within. You literally ‘conduct’ the universal energy. You may see into the past and future, understand the true meaning of existence,and begin to understand the order of things. You return to the womb,the cocoon of our material structure and Nature’s original Darkness.

Complete darkness profoundly changes the sensory sensibilities of the body/brain. We are deprived of all visual reference. Sounds begin to fall away as we lose contact with the external world and turn the senses inward. The effect of darkness is to shut down major cortical centers in the brain, depressing mental and cognitive functions in the higher brain centers. Emotional and feeling states are enhanced, especially the sense of smell and the finer senses of psychic perception. Dreams become more lucid, and the dream state manifests in our conscious awareness. Eventually, we awaken within ourselves the awareness of the Source, the spirit, the soul. We descend into the void, into the darkness of deep, inner space

 

As you can see, even the Taoist masters advocate non-indulgence of the senses in order to reach the Void or Pure Consciousness.

 

Nan Huai Chin, the buddhist/taoist master, has also repeatedly asked all to engage in various style of stillness meditation in order to connect with Pure Consciousness.

 

So why anyone would say Taoism is higher than Buddhism or vice versa is beyond me.

Edited August 21, 2011 by tulku

[Marblehead]

Okay. This is a decent post so I will respond to it in a civilized manner.

 

http://www.daoistmagic.com/info.php?i=2131

Reclusive Training: This type of Daoist training is sometimes regarded as the higher path of the Daoist Right-Hand school of training. It requires the mystic to remove him or herself from society becoming a lone sage. After recognizing the flaws of ritualistic forms of worship and giving up the politically ingrained patterns of religious dogma, the mystic generally retreats to a cave for internal introspection. Although ritualistic forms of worship are essential for purifying the mind, any form of external oriented action can also keep the mind bound to the external world. Therefore, in the highest stages of Daoist mystical training, the individual releases all attachments to material objects (people, places and things) and spiritual powers (controlling the Elements, the Six Transportations of Shen, etc.) and strives only to attain "oneness" with the eternal Dao through self-introspection.

 

As shown above, it is said that the highest path of daoism involve cutting yourself off from the polluted material society and more importantly, cutting your attachments off to attain oneness with the Dao.

 

This is the highest path for only those who believe it to be so. I don't think it is. I don't know many people who live in caves. Actually, I know none. There must not be many of them.

 

There is fundamentally no difference between taoism and buddhism. All religions and spiritual paths are created and improved upon by countless men cutting off their mundane senses to experience the void.

 

There are significant differences between the two, especially if we consider only Philosophical Taoists. But then, if you consider only Zen Buddhists then you are correct because they have eliminated the differences in order to arrive at what they have.

 

This is virtually the same concept as Dzogchen and Mahamudra in Tibetan Buddhism. Not to mention Jhana Meditation in Theravada Buddhism.

 

I do not have the knowledge to speak to this.

 

I have said before I have know numerous Taoist masters. The highest Taoist masters I know are Buddhist as well.

 

Well, good for you. You should have listened to them. And that is great that all those Taoist Masters that you know are also Buddhists. Apparently they have found their own path and it serves them well.

 

http://www.nanhuaijin.org/

Master Nan Huai Jin (Nan Huai-Chin) is one of the most renowned and revered lay Buddhist Masters in China. A great teacher in all three traditions of spiritual cultivation in China, namely the Confucian tradition, the Buddhist tradition and the Taoist tradition, he has written more than 30 books in these subjects.

 

I know nothing of that person. I have read some books that should never have been written so quantity says nothing to me.

 

I do not know Nan Huai Jin personally but as you can see, he is a master of buddhism and daoism and confucanism.

 

No, I cannot see that. All I can see is what you have written or quoted.

 

But I will agree that there were, and probably still are, many Chinese who held or hold to all three of the belif systems. If it is good for them then it is all good. For those of us who do not believe in all of those but have chosen other paths to follow are surely following a path that is right for them.

 

So don't tell me about those who have run away from life to live in a cave but rather I would like to hear about those who have found a good way to live in today's world and still hold firmly to their inner peace and contentment.

[Aetherous]

A person who releases their attachments and aversions is free to enjoy life.

 

Only at the beginner's level of understanding does it seem like we need to isolate ourselves from the pollution of society, and not have any enjoyment. At an actual higher level, we bring the Tao into the world fearlessly (without aversion to anything)...and actually let go of all of the disciplined letting go...so then life is lived naturally. As if we aren't even Taoists.

 

At least that's my view.

[tulku]

Okay. This is a decent post so I will respond to it in a civilized manner.

 

 

 

This is the highest path for only those who believe it to be so. I don't think it is. I don't know many people who live in caves. Actually, I know none. There must not be many of them.

 

 

 

There are significant differences between the two, especially if we consider only Philosophical Taoists. But then, if you consider only Zen Buddhists then you are correct because they have eliminated the differences in order to arrive at what they have.

 

 

 

I do not have the knowledge to speak to this.

 

 

 

Well, good for you. You should have listened to them. And that is great that all those Taoist Masters that you know are also Buddhists. Apparently they have found their own path and it serves them well.

 

 

 

I know nothing of that person. I have read some books that should never have been written so quantity says nothing to me.

 

 

 

No, I cannot see that. All I can see is what you have written or quoted.

 

But I will agree that there were, and probably still are, many Chinese who held or hold to all three of the belif systems. If it is good for them then it is all good. For those of us who do not believe in all of those but have chosen other paths to follow are surely following a path that is right for them.

 

So don't tell me about those who have run away from life to live in a cave but rather I would like to hear about those who have found a good way to live in today's world and still hold firmly to their inner peace and contentment.

 

I have already presented everyone with the highest Taoist teachings and have proved that they are no different from the highest Buddhist teachings.

 

If anyone refuse to see the truth of my words, and wanna walk a mediocre path, hey it is your choice, not mine.

 

There is no way you can live as a married person indulging in your senses by partaking in the luxuries of the city and still expect to attain Enlightenment.

 

As previous taoist and buddhist masters have shown, one can only attain Enlightenment by cutting off your senses and living in seclusion away from the masses.

 

Me, I am walking the highest path and no one is gonna stop me.