Is "The Secret Of The Golden Flower" part of the water method of mediation, or the fire method?

[Drifting_Through_Infinity]

Is this a good section to begin in?

So I experienced the actions of ordering the secret of the golden flower and am wondering which method it is:

the fire or the water.

Edited September 10, 2016 by FreeThinker

[Marblehead]

Sure, this is a good place to start.

 

I can't help with your question but I am sure there are some who will as soon as they see it.

[Cheshire Cat]

 

Is "The Secret Of The Golden Flower" part of the water method of mediation, or the fire method?

 

The Golden flower method existed long before the water/fire methods were invented, imho.

[Drifting_Through_Infinity]

Oh

Edited September 10, 2016 by FreeThinker

[thelerner]

Hope this isn't too tangent.   Is it too much of a simplification to say the bulk of the Golden Flower is keeping a quiet mind and concentrating your eyes on the tip of the nose? 

[Cheshire Cat]

Oh. Do you know if it would interfere with the water or fire if both be done?

 

In my opinion, it wouldn't because -in a sense- it's aim is to harmonize the body by means of stilling the mind. It's an old meditational idea: you cannot have a truly concentrated mind if the energy movements inside your body aren't properly shaped (for example, the MCO).

In the golden flower (Cleary's translation and Wang LiPing translation), the student is instructed to work solely on stilling the mind and not to manipulate the energy system. In the Golden Flower (Wilhelm version - which is imho a later transformation of the original text), the initiate reads clues of a system which seems to be close to the fire methods with actual engagement of the mind in MCO rotations.

 

 

Hope this isn't too tangent.   Is it too much of a simplification to say the bulk of the Golden Flower is keeping a quiet mind and concentrating your eyes on the tip of the nose? 

 

The bulk of the understandable part of the Golden Flower is this, indeed.

But what about the chapter VIII ? Is it about a dantien meditation? Or is it a poetic description of subtle phenomena which takes place in the quiet mind? To be honest, I don't know.

[Drifting_Through_Infinity]

thanks folks

Edited September 9, 2016 by FreeThinker

[thelerner]

I'm a better note taker and researcher then Understanderer.  I took some pretty good, incisive notes from different sources and edited them down a while back.

 

Here's the link: http://www.thedaobums.com/topic/37570-golden-flower-thingamabobs/?p=607715

Worth looking at if you're interested in GF.   I should probably go back and take a gander, so my queries can run deeper then, it's alot of looking at the nose. 

 

from the section concerning the nose: (note this source is from Osha, a very controversial teacher, not one I generally recommend but I found this writing to be clearer and more direct then most)

 

'..THE SECRET OF THE GOLDEN FLOWER IS an alchemical process. These are the words of those who have known.  The Golden Flower blooms in you when you are utterly empty. It is a flower in the void. In the lake of the void the golden lotus blooms.
 

ONE SHOULD LOOK AT THE TIP OF ONE’S NOSE.
Now the practical point of the whole sutra – very simple, but try to understand it correctly, because mind wants to distort even simple things. Mind is a distorting mechanism.

Why? – because this helps, it brings you in line with the third eye. When both your eyes are fixed on the tip of the nose it does many things. The basic is that your third eye is exactly in line with the tip of the nose – just a few inches above, but in the same line. And once you are in the line of the third eye, the attraction of the third eye, the pull, the magnetism, of the third eye is so great that if you have fallen in line with it you will be pulled even against yourself. You just have to be exactly in line with it so that the attraction, the gravitation, of the third eye starts functioning.

Once you are exactly in line with it there will be no need to make any effort. Suddenly you will find the gestalt has changed, because the two eyes create the duality of the world and thought, and the single eye between the two eyes creates the gaps. This is a simple method of changing the gestalt.

ONE SHOULD LOOK AT THE TIP OF ONE’S NOSE. BUT THIS DOES NOT MEAN THAT ONE SHOULD FASTEN ONE’S THOUGHTS TO THE TIP OF THE NOSE.

That’s how the mind can distort it. The mind can say, ’Okay, now look at the tip of the nose. Think of the tip of the nose, concentrate on it.’ If you concentrate too much on the tip of the nose you will miss the point, because you have to be there at the tip of the nose but very relaxed so that the third eye can pull you. If you are too concentrated on the tip of the nose, rooted, focused, fixed there, your third eye will not be able to pull you in, because your third eye has never functioned before. Its pull cannot be very great in the beginning.

Slowly slowly it grows more and more. Once it starts functioning and the dust that has gathered around it disappears with use, and the mechanism is humming well, then even if you are fixed on the tip of the nose you will be pulled in. But not in the beginning. You have to be very very light, not a burden, without any stress and strain. You have to be simply there, present, in a kind of let-go.

 WHILE THE EYES ARE LOOKING AT THE TIP OF THE NOSE, THE THOUGHTS SHOULD BE CONCENTRATED ON THE YELLOW MIDDLE.

So don’t concentrate on the tip of the nose or – the second trick the mind can play... The Master is simply trying to make you alert to all the possibilities, to all the games that the mind is capable of. First it will say, ’Okay, so the Master says, ”Concentrate on the tip of the nose.”’ He is not saying, ’Concentrate on the tip of the nose,’ he is simply saying ’Look. Just a very light, effortless look.’ Or the mind can say, ’Okay, if you are just looking at the tip of the nose, then concentrate on the third eye.’

Mind is always in favour of concentration because mind feeds on concentration, lives on concentration. Hence in your schools, colleges, universities, concentration is taught not meditation, because they are all factories for creating the mind; they manufacture the mind.

WHEREVER THE EYE LOOKS, THE HEART IS DIRECTED ALSO. HOW CAN IT BE DIRECTED AT THE SAME TIME UPWARD AND DOWNWARD?

And then the mind can say, ’Look, this is impossible, the demand is illogical. How can you look in two directions simultaneously, at the tip of the nose and at the third eye? It is not possible, it cannot be done. Don’t be foolish!

’And another function of looking very lightly at the tip of the nose is this: that it doesn’t allow you to open your eyes wide. If you open your eyes wide the whole world becomes available. And there are a thousand and one distractions.

If the eyes are completely closed you fall into a kind of reverie, you start dreaming; you become feminine energy, yin. To avoid both just look at the tip of the nose – a simple device, but the result is almost magical.

And this is not only so with the Taoists, Buddhists know it, Hindus know it. Down the ages all the meditators have somehow stumbled upon the fact that if your eyes are just half open, in a very miraculous way you escape two pitfalls. One is being distracted by the outside world, the other is being distracted by the inside dream world. You remain exactly on the boundary of the inner and the outer. And that’s the point: to be on the boundary of the inner and the outer means you are neither male nor female in that moment. Your vision is free of duality; your vision has transcended the division in you. Only when you are beyond the division in you do you fall into the line of the magnetic field of the third eye.

That is very important to remember: you are not to pull the light in, you are not to force the light in. If the window is open, the light comes in of its own accord. If the door is open, the light floods in. You need not bring it in, you need not push it in, you need not drag it in. And how can you drag light in? How can you push light in? All that is needed is that you should be open and vulnerable to it.

And that’s exactly what happens when you are looking at the tip of the nose. Just looking, without any concentration, just looking, without any heaviness in it, without any strain in it, suddenly the window of the third eye opens and the light starts streaming in. The light that has always been going out starts coming in too, and the circle is complete.

And this circle makes a man perfect. And this circle makes a man utterly restful, relaxed. This circle makes a man whole and holy. He is no more divided.

LOOKING AT THE TIP OF THE NOSE SERVES ONLY AS THE BEGINNING OF THE INNER CONCENTRATION, SO THAT THE EYES ARE BROUGHT INTO THE RIGHT DIRECTION FOR LOOKING, AND THEN ARE HELD TO THE GUIDE-LINE: AFTER THAT, ONE CAN LET IT BE.

ONE LOOKS WITH BOTH EYES AT THE TIP OF THE NOSE...
Remember, you have to look with both eyes at the tip of the nose so that at the tip of the nose your two eyes lose their duality. So, on the tip of the nose the light that is streaming out from your eyes becomes one; it falls on a single point. Where your two eyes meet, that is the place where the window opens. And then all is well. Then let it be, then simply enjoy, then simply celebrate, delight, rejoice. Then nothing has to be done.

And remember, not concentrating but just remaining alert, just a slight alertness. Look at the tip of the nose and remain slightly alert to the third eye. In fact, the moment you look at the tip of the nose you will become alert to the third eye, because that is the other pole of the nose. One pole, the outer pole, is the tip, the end; the other end of the nose is joined with the third eye. The moment you become aware of the tip you will suddenly become aware of the other end too. But just remain aware, effortlessly aware.'

[Drifting_Through_Infinity]

Thanks, but I think I'l just wait til the book comes. I just hope this is the most efficient method. Argh, I want enlightenment now.

[Marblehead]

Thanks, but I think I'l just wait til the book comes. I just hope this is the most efficient method. Argh, I want enlightenment now.

 

Have you chopped the wood and carried the water yet?

[Drifting_Through_Infinity]

You mean, have I worked?

[joeblast]

no, just a reference to an old quote

 

before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water....after enlightenment, chop wood, carry water...

 

 

 

or was it after enlightenment, chop water, carry wood

[Marblehead]

You mean, have I worked?

I wasn't ignoring your question.  I just want you to find the answer.

 

Joeblast's response is good.

[Taoist Texts]

Hope this isn't too tangent.   Is it too much of a simplification

 

yes, way too much

[thelerner]

yes, way too much

and yet, if you seriously practice the Golden Flower, that's alot of what you'll be doing. 

 

 

later edit.   I copied some of the relevant nose info into my comment on top.