Kunlun:4 Years later

[Cameron]

 

Off to Xian and Hua Shan tomorrow. Talk to you guys again in a couple weeks.

[Ulises]

I don't want controversy with Kunlun. People are drawn to this practice by common resonance - "like atract like". And that is great.

But I have to say that, having practiced Autokinetics/Seiki-jutsu/Shaking Medicine formally for a few years (after it showed up spontaneosly through series of intense holotropic breathwork workshops) and then trying kunlun for a while, I strongly feel the potentially problematic issues of the "energetic Maserati effect": I felt I was forcing the opening/s, it felt very "unnatural", too much forced (being specific:one let the innately arising patterns of sound, movement, energy, emotion...to unfold by itself, according to the individual enrgetic situation, "one size doens't fits all", and the deep intelligence knows better than any teacher), the forms, special breathing, etc...were written down from this spontaneous unfolding, the natural "Prana Path" (Stuart Sovatsky) of the Pashupatis, Bushmen and other indigenous Primordial lineages worldwide...)

(personal note: while in the shaking, many times arise patterns of Qi gongs - unknown to me at the moment - that sometimes I can recognise later through DVD's, youtube and the like...anyone can tap in these "fields of information")

http://www.shakingmedicine.com/bushmen/video.php

 

I feel more much more natural to trust in the innate intelligence of the Energetic Mystery to cook me in Her own terms ( and believe me, it's deepening incrementally for a time now), with any spontaneous Kundalini no-practice, such as seiki-jutsu/autokinetics ("The Energy Break", Bradford Keeney), spontaneous Qi Gong, Seidr, Pizzica, Shaking Medicine and the rest.... of course, this is my subjective feeling, if you feel happy with Kunlun, congratulations!

 

From my experience and from what Bradford Keeney told us about the strongest spiritual teachers, these words from the master Chulyi Lin point to the key, not arcane techniques or empowerments...: the secret is a heart opening to the Heart...

 

"Again, and I cannot emphasize this enough, the most important factor in your energy development is opening your heart and connecting with the unconditional love of the universe and learning to live your life in this love, powered by this love and radiating this love to help others." Chunyi Lin

 

 

 

 

A group of elder women n/om kxaosi were asked what made them so strong in

matters of n/om (Keeney 2010). They replied, “we are this way because of the tears we

have wept for the ancestors who have passed on.” The deepest longing human beings

experience often comes from the loss of a loved one. Rather than trying to emotionally

get over it, these Bushman elders keep the longing alive, feeding it until it breaks their

hearts wide open in an awakened way, bringing them inside a more expansive and

intimate relation with their ancestors. In this connection tears flow along a channel that

keeps their relationships strong and permits a never-ending expression of love and soulful

guidance.

Another intense form of longing is familiar to all lovers who fall deeply in love. In

this infinite ocean of Eros we find there is more than simple love. There is loving love.

When we become lovers of loving, the ropes are inseparable from us and carry our hearts

into the highest realms.

~CIRCULUS: Journal for Creative Transformation. Volume1, Issue 1

Edited October 8, 2011 by Ulises

[Ulises]

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Edited October 7, 2011 by Ulises

[Ulises]

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Edited October 7, 2011 by Ulises

[de_paradise]

[humbleone]

Great thread. Thank you for sharing Cameron.

 

A beginners prospective: I started learning Kunlun from Max's book about 10 months ago. Then attended a one day workshop by Max's student. Followed by the DVD by sifu Jenny Lamb.

 

I am extermely sensitive, so I have come to terms that I can (some may find this amusing) practice kunlun only 4 minutes a day! Then i spend another 3-4 minutes in closing. This seems to be enough for me. Even this brief snippet of kunlun every day seems to bring about interesting effect.

 

I have not seen the dark side of kunlun. I agree with the poster who said kunlun seems to bring up and release whatever negativity is stored up within the practitioner.

 

If anyone is interested in learning kunlun, sifu jenny lamb's DVD is really excellent. She calls it Spontaneous Adjustment Qigong. btw she is also available for private consultation online via skype, so one need not travel.

 

I have found the 'precautions' that Max talks about in the book very helpful. Don't do kunlun and then fall asleep. take a break from it and have a restive period. proper posture, the smile, stool without a back. sheep skin. all good...

[Taomeow]

I am extermely sensitive, so I have come to terms that I can (some may find this amusing) practice kunlun only 4 minutes a day! Then i spend another 3-4 minutes in closing. This seems to be enough for me. Even this brief snippet of kunlun every day seems to bring about interesting effect.

 

I've heard the same thing from a couple of people! -- both experienced practitioners of other modalities. It's great to be attuned to yourself like that -- I do think experience with any "know thyself" modality is a prerequisite for mastering kunlun. You have to know how to read yourself first.

 

When I was practicing it, pretty soon it got really fast -- I would sometimes take a minute to "get there" and sometimes, a second. It's very individual. A family member was practicing at the same time and the effects were very mild, very soft, like a nice relaxation routine. Go figure.

 

I have not seen the dark side of kunlun. I agree with the poster who said kunlun seems to bring up and release whatever negativity is stored up within the practitioner.

 

Yes, but not only that. I think it also gives you a chance to become a warrior instead of an ostrich with a head perennially in the sand (or up one's own ass, on occasion, seeing only what's on display there and not much else.) It causes you to pull it out and actually see what's going on. Not just with you. With the world... But you have to see "you" first. "Know thyself" is the be-all end-all of all practices. If you run from yourself screaming "it's not me, it's THEM" in all cases and for all purposes, you will never learn to discern which part is "them" and which part is "you." It's all one big mess to a committed denial practitioner, and always, invariably, "someone else's" mess. I mean a generic "you," of course.

 

I have found the 'precautions' that Max talks about in the book very helpful. Don't do kunlun and then fall asleep. take a break from it and have a restive period. proper posture, the smile, stool without a back. sheep skin. all good...

 

Yes, very important.

 

I was doing a different practice today, my walking qigong, and a bird of prey (don't know which, it was too high to tell -- a hawk or an eagle) showed up and started circling over my head and a little in front of me as I walked, staying within the same field of visibility, circling and circling in a super slow deliberate manner (displaying, showing, demoing -- taosits do believe that birds are show-offs, by the way ), as though to teach me something. I watched and I got it. What it was showing was the way precision translates into perfection and effortlessness. I realized that one feather out of alignment would disrupt the gliding effortlessness, and one WING feather out of place would cause a crash!!

 

It's the most efficient practices that require the most precision in execution. You can jog sloppily. You can engage in "taiji for health" or "meditation for relaxation" sloppily. You don't risk much. But try flying sloppily... ...better stay home, order pizza.

[Cameron]

Good stuff

 

Max also does Skype btw. I was able to do so with him recently. Since Jenny was brought up, it has been mentioned before but just to repeat they do teach the practice differently. They are not the same system. but I feel I did get great benefit in doing Jenny's workshop. She is a great person.

 

For me, Max is a shaman. His teachings can be a bit "wild" at times. That is his style. But I can see how that stlye would not work for everyone. I can clearly see that. So you should try the practice on your own and feel deeply who you want to study with. I don't think this issue should just be glossed over. Although they may have similarities Sifu Jenny and Max do teach different systems. That doesn't mean they wouldn't complement each other however.

 

Taomeow, out of curiosity, how often do you still practice Kunlun? Do you find it mixes well with practices you learned from your other teachers.

 

And not to go completely off topic are you practicing what you learned from Master Wang Liping?

 

Cam

[Taomeow]

Cam,

 

that was my very first impression of Max -- "he's a shaman." You know, the bridges between taoism and proto-taoism, and between proto-taoism and shamanism, have never been burned... you can still walk all the way through if someone shows you where to turn... though some sects of taoism did intermix with modalities that put a flaming torch to those bridges the very first thing they did... but not all, thank god.

 

I don't practice Kunlun anymore because it took me across one of those bridges. I think I told the story but I don't remember if I told it here or at the Kunlun forum of way back when. Kunlun sent me to the shamans! There's an unbroken link between my shamanic experiences and my Kunlun experiences, and I know that if I touch one, the other will kick in. It's on hold because I have to wait... ... ...

 

As for Master Wang Liping, yes, I do practice what I learned, and I'm going slowly... This may change when Water comes... it's been ten years since I saw a Water year, and I know this about myself -- I can do ten times more in a Water year cultivation wise than in ten non-Water years combined. So, Water Dragon 2012 Opening the Dragon Gate is on the way and...

 

après moi le déluge !

[Cameron]

Cool, thanks so much for the feedback.

 

Would you call what you learned from Master Wang a water path like Kunlun(top down) or a fire path(down up)? Or does that system play by different rules?

[Taomeow]

Cool, thanks so much for the feedback.

 

Would you call what you learned from Master Wang a water path like Kunlun(top down) or a fire path(down up)? Or does that system play by different rules?

 

Thanks!

 

Different rules. The part that works with fire and water places fire under water... well, everybody knows you do that when you're cooking something. But there's lots more there... you don't start cooking by just playing with fire and water... you start with buying groceries, right? But if they aren't selling what you need, how about you go hunting gathering?.. So, there's preliminaries of a rather comprehensive nature, and then there's alchemical work.

[Cameron]

Thanks again!

 

Its interesting to hear about other systems but I will stick with the Kunlun path Max has shared with me and see where it leads me

[liminal_luke]

[Creation]

Ahh, talk about fire and water paths and immortality vs. enlightenment. All the old discussions of stuff like that is what attracted me to this place to begin with.

 

I'm happy to see it being brought up again.

 

Reading through all those discussion, I realized that people were categorizing things as fire and water for quite different reasons, but did not make the distinction within the discussion between the different methods of classification that were being used.

 

Here is my offering of six different ways people have labeled a system fire or water, grouped in pairs that I have seen conflated with each other.

 

1.a. Emphasizing the use of fiery energy vs. the use of watery energy

1.b. Emphasizing blasting through blocks by amping up the energy vs. dissolving blocks with awareness

2.a. Intending things to happen vs. allowing things to happen

2.b. Building, constructing, or adding to one's self vs. breaking down and letting go of one's self

3.a. Emphasizing the use of an upward flow of energy vs. a downward flow of energy

3.b. Emphasizing the cultivation of energy centers from lowest to the highest vs. highest to lowest

 

2.a. and 2.b. don't have to go hand in hand. There are many systems that build a dan tian by letting go and just residing in the lower field. Also, I wanted to point out that, IMHO, all complete systems lead to more letting go and allowing at the higher levels, so 2.a. is really only something that comes into play at the beginning levels.

 

3.a. and 3.b. aren't necessarily the same, because humans are not one dimensional. A system might emphasize the downward flow of heavenly energy, but work with the lower dan tian first, or emphasize the upward flow of kundalini to open the third eye, skipping everything in between.

 

Really, I think a practice can be any combination of these, and it can be both or neither on several counts as well. Moreover, the way you use a practice or combine it with other practices can make the overall system more or less "fire" or "water", or more "fire" by one definition and more "water" by another. Also, there are things that are both and other that are neither. And a system might change emphasis as a practitioner progresses, or it might have a certain flexibility to meet the needs of different types of practitioner.

 

I don't like to speak of fire and water methods anymore, because with all these distinctions it seems contrived.

 

So the next time you want to classify something as fire or water, those are some things to think about.

Edited October 11, 2011 by Creation

[Taomeow]

Taomeow (and others that know about such things)--

 

Interesting about the "different rules" of Master Wang Liping´s teachings. I´ve studied Kan and Li through the healing tao from Michael Winn which sounds like it might be similar to Master Wang Liping´s system, albeit with less emphasis on the grocery shopping. (There is some of course but in my experience it´s more of a trip to the corner 7-11 than a hunting expedition.) My understanding from Michael Winn is that his Kan and Li formulas lead to immortality.

 

I´ve also studied Kunlun from Max and Jenny. Jenny talks about Yi Gong (her name for Kunlun) as leading to enlightenment. She also told me it´s not about the process of converting Jing to Chi to Shen (or, I´m just imagining, vice versa). It´s about awareness.

 

I´m now at a period where I´m wanting to re-commit to a practice, and as silly as it might sound, I think it makes sense to consider what my end goal is: immortality or enlightenment. So...I´m wondering what, really, enlightenment is? What is immortality? Do Kunlun and Kan & Li type alchemical practices really go in different directions (up different mountains) or is it just a matter of different paths up the same mountain? Can a person be enlightened but not immortal or vice versa, or do these two go together?

 

funny about 7--11! With WLP you go to a Chinese place of business, and if you've been to those grocery/tea/herbs/acupuncture/massage/moxa joints in Chinatown where you talk to the owner and discover he was a brain surgeon in China, you know what they can be like... you don't know anything about much of what they're selling, you don't know if you want it, you don't know what's there that you should be wanting but aren't aware of... but it smells good!

 

I am pretty decisively opposed to any and all ideas and practices of "enlightenment." I think they are reptilian obsessions that have nothing to do with our species. If your blood is cold you have to be a sun/light/fire worshiper, sit on a hot stone under the blazing sun in self-hypnotic immobility till you get some energy going. That's "enlightenment" stripped of PR. If you're a snake, a lizard, a chameleon... the sun goes down, darkness descends, your blood cools off, you can't do shit. That's when the hot-blooded, nocturnal cat comes out of her hiding place... and eats you.

 

So, immortality is in, enlightenment is out. An interplay of light and darkness -- that's in. Life is derived from both, whether temporal or eternal. Exclusion of one in favor of the other is a ruse.

 

MHO, of course.

 

More later, gotta go...

[Aetherous]

[Birch]

[konchog uma]

Ahh, talk about fire and water paths and immortality vs. enlightenment. All the old discussions of stuff like that is what attracted me to this place to begin with.

 

I'm happy to see it being brought up again.

 

ditto.

 

 

1.a. Emphasizing the use of fiery energy vs. the use of watery energy

1.b. Emphasizing blasting through blocks by amping up the energy vs. dissolving blocks with awareness

2.a. Intending things to happen vs. allowing things to happen

2.b. Building, constructing, or adding to one's self vs. breaking down and letting go of one's self

3.a. Emphasizing the use of an upward flow of energy vs. a downward flow of energy

3.b. Emphasizing the cultivation of energy centers from lowest to the highest vs. highest to lowest

 

that is really helpful, thanks

 

I don't like to speak of fire and water methods anymore, because with all these distinctions it seems contrived.

 

in the sense that kan and li are a yinyang pair, its misleading to say "this is a water path" or "that is a fire path", especially for experienced practitioner. But in the sense that there are generalities to consider and that scales tend to tip one way or the other, maybe those distinctions can be helpful, especially to beginners.

 

i have been experimenting with upward flowing energies in the morning, and downward in the afternoon. So i switched my meditations which could be called "fire" to AM and "water" to PM. I have been focused on counterclockwise movement in the AM and clockwise in the PM. isnt balance the true daoist ideal?

[Cameron]

I just call Kunlun a water path since that is the way Max describes it. But from my experience of course both Kan and Li are involved. I guess it would just be the overall orientation of the system and how you move through blocks.

 

Cheers!

[Sloppy Zhang]

(If I may expound a bit on Cameron's point)

 

B.K. Frantzis talks a bit about the distinctions between "fire" and "water" paths in his books like "Relaxing Into Your Being".

 

Basically, it's a distinction made between modalities of thought and general philosophy when it comes to problem solving, and isn't a reflection of the content of the system.

 

So, yes, a fire path can have kan and li. So can a water path. But that doesn't mean that they are the same kind of path.

 

Frantzis mentions that water paths are more about relaxing, releasing, and allowing, whereas fire paths are more about getting energy to conform to your intent in more of a proactive way (because, yeah, in water paths the energy conforms to your intent too!)

 

So the example he uses a lot is how to deal with a blockage.

 

In a water path, you'd try to dissolve the blockage, to move energy through it gently, and if the energy doesn't go, you'd release around the area, and if the blockage still doesn't get released, you move on and try another day. You work on other areas. Sometimes working on other areas help relieve the blockage, and sometimes it's just a matter of time before the blockage can release healthily. Basically, "I want to go this way. Oh, there's something in my way. Can I get around it? No? Well, let's try something else."

 

Whereas in a more fire oriented path, if energy doesn't get rid of a blockage, you'd focus more energy into the blockage and vaporize it. You'd keep focusing energy/intent until the problem is solved. Basically, "I want to go this way. Oh, there's something in my way? Well I'm going this way and this blockage isn't going to be here at the end of the day."

 

I think it would be counter productive to try and say there is a "better" or "worse" way of dealing with things. It comes down to the person and the situation. Some people will benefit more from one practice and modality than another. Some situations will call for one modality than another.

 

Another thing, which I think Frantzis mentions but I've seen other people mention it as well, is that this distinction is usually made by the water paths. Fire path people will say "oh well we have kan and li, so we've got water too." Well... yeah. But again, it's not always the content of a system (and really, if your system is universal, then every system that produces results is going to be working with the same thing: the human body, yeah?), it's more about the approach of a system.

Edited October 12, 2011 by Sloppy Zhang

[Creation]

I just call Kunlun a water path since that is the way Max describes it.

Hey Cam.

 

I remember hearing about the downward flow / water path of Kunlun energy and wondering, "Is this something that comes from Red Phoenix? Because the spontaneous practice alone doesn't seem to be a downward flow practice." I always wondered about that.

 

how you move through blocks

Oooo! I would love it it if you elaborate on the Kunlun method of moving through blocks!

[Creation]

Facinating bit. I have always suspected this, never saw it articulated before

Yes, it is a very interesting to see that connection made by the Bushmen. That connection is also a major theme and driving force (one might say the major theme and driving force) in bhakti yoga. Much emphasis is placed on the sense of longing for God, as the beloved for the lover.

[Creation]

i have been experimenting with upward flowing energies in the morning, and downward in the afternoon. So i switched my meditations which could be called "fire" to AM and "water" to PM. I have been focused on counterclockwise movement in the AM and clockwise in the PM. isnt balance the true daoist ideal?

I definitely agree that balance is good, but there is another distinction that I think needs to be made here. There are the normal currents of energy in the body, related to ordinary processes of maintaining the function of the human form, and there are the more profound flows related to deep spiritual transformation. I don't think you can really deal with these two in the same way.

[Cameron]

Yes, it comes from Red Phoenix.

 

To use an example, I didn't practice the spontaneous qigong method at all for about a month after I met Max. Because it took me atleast that time(several months really) to digest the Red Phoenix transmission.

 

The first level of Red Phoenix opens the dormant upper tan tien. The second is all about the downward flow. I have a feeling of cool, magnetic downward flow(both upward from level 1 and downward from level 2 actually) pretty much all the time. From this deep level of moving into and opening your tan tiens you dissolve and let go of blocks. As Max says it's mostly about releasing the mind.

 

The path often feels like a 'no path' to me. Erasing and removing whatever obstructions exist. It's also tremendously healing.

 

You should see Max in the States or Kan San in Japan for the transmission.

[Aetherous]

The path often feels like a 'no path' to me.