Ming Stages/Replenishing Yuan Qi/Ming Gong

[awaken]

Ming practice is one or both of two things:

 

A. A marketing hoax in the western commercial neidan.

B. A sidegate practice in the low level chinese schools.

Completely agree with you.

 

But most people can't understand this, unless they spent 20 years at least to know the cultivation market.

 

I spent 15 years.

 

I am sure I am not the most stupid one.

 

I know some friends who spent 30 years.

[YiYinYiYang]

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Edited August 13, 2017 by YiYinYiYang

[awaken]

Chi is not the first one to cultivate.

 

Shen is the first one to deal with.

 

Nei jin said 治神，deal with Shen

 

黃元吉 huang uan jii said 滅動心，不滅照心，make the movement heart disappear, don't make the mirror heart disappear.

 

Enlightenment is the first step of daoist cultivation.

 

凡鉛 ordinary lead

真鉛 real lead

 

What is the difference between ordinary lead and real lead?

 

Enlightenment the true heart is the first step of dao

 

The right direction of your heart

[Taoist Texts]

 yet i doubt he's capable like the famous french actor of performing dangerous stunts  

 

Your WLP friend just called him a "taoist master of the Past'. Thats quite a stunt.

 

 

[Arkady Shadursky]

Ming practice is one or both of two things:

 

A. A marketing hoax in the western commercial neidan.

B. A sidegate practice in the low level chinese schools.

 

 

Completely agree with you.

 

But most people can't understand this, unless they spent 20 years at least to know the cultivation market.

 

I spent 15 years.

 

I am sure I am not the most stupid one.

 

I know some friends who spent 30 years.

I'd like everyone here to remember this point of view on Ming practice of these guys.

My personal understanding is that only the person who never experienced real Ming practice (at least WuLiupai one) could keep saying like this.

However my experience is not the argument.

Later we are going to see how Patriarchs are saying about Xing and Ming.

And we'll see if they are saying about most precious Ming method as about "lowest school's method" or as about "marketing thing".

---

Best Regards,

Arkady

[damdao]

I would hope so!

But all I heard so far from schools who assimilated the Secret of the Golden Flower doctrine is that it's just another Xing training and that previous Ming Gong is needed,

which leads me to the assumption that they did not fully understand the teachings of the Secret of the Golden Flower.

 

I don't know if you have a more solid base to state that but in longmen for instance (at least in theory) the ming work is needed because the xing work consumes yuan qi.

So, even in lineages where ming work is not so important, it is explicitly stateted that for this kind of xing work some ming work is needed in order not to deplet yourself.

[YiYinYiYang]

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Edited August 13, 2017 by YiYinYiYang

[Antares]

To Jean-Paul Re: masters of the Past.

 

Please, read that article CAREFULLY from the very beginning.

Beizong and Nanzong are the two main lineages that emerged in the history of Neidan (Internal Alchemy) between the 11th and the 13th centuries. This article contains a concise description of the lineages and their main teachings.

AND then:

 

 

Nanzong, or Southern Lineage

The second lineage is the Nanzong, or Southern Lineage, which places at its origins Zhang Boduan, the author of the Wuzhen pian (Awakening to Reality). The lineage is formed by him and four other masters:

● Zhang Boduan (Zhang Ziyang, 987?-1082)
● Shi Tai (Shi Xinglin, ?-1158)
● Xue Daoguang (Xue Zixian, 1078?-1191)
● Chen Nan (Chen Niwan, ?-1213)
● Bai Yuchan (Bai Haiqiong, 1194-1229?)

 

AND here http://www.goldenelixir.com/files/Wang_Mu_Foundations_of_Internal_Alchemy_SAMPLE.pdf

 

on PAGE number 4 we can read that:

 

 

While Awakening to Reality does not deal with the initial stage of the

practice, details on this subject are found in three other works by Zhang Boduan. One of them, the Secret Text of Green Florescence Qinghua biwen),

contains a systematic exposition of oral instructions on the foundations

of the practice. The other two, namely the Four Hundred Words on the Golden Elixir

(

give concrete details on the initial stage.

2

Nature (Xing) and Life (Ming)

. With regard to the alchemical practice,

Awakening to Reality

maintains that the cultivation of Ming (Life) should

precede the cultivation of Xing (Nature), and that “doing” (youwei) should precede “non-doing” (wuwei)

 

[damdao]

Chi is not the first one to cultivate.

 

Shen is the first one to deal with.

 

Nei jin said 治神，deal with Shen

 

(...)

 

I think that you are speaking about this:

The opening sentence of chapter 8 of the Ling Shu is: Fan ci zhi fa, xian bi ben yu shen 凡 刺 之 法 先 必 本 于 神 and the words mean literally “every needling’s method first must be rooted in Shen”. This sentence is usually translated as: “All treatment must be based on the Spirit”. The implication of this sentence is that all treatment must be based on the Spirit (of the patient), whatever interpretation we give to the word “Spirit”.

 

http://maciociaonline.blogspot.com/2011/09/famous-chapter-8-of-ling-shu.html

Here we can see the whole context of that statement and decide if it is relevant to the discussion or in what measure.

[Daeluin]

I would hope so!

But all I heard so far from schools who assimilated the Secret of the Golden Flower doctrine is that it's just another Xing training and that previous Ming Gong is needed,

which leads me to the assumption that they did not fully understand the teachings of the Secret of the Golden Flower.

 

From The Secret of the Golden Flower, chapter 8, section 3, we have:

 

From beginning to end, the great medicine depends on one thing: the metal in the midst of the water, that is, the lead in the water-region.

 

The ming / yuan qi / yuan xi we are speaking of here is none other than the metal in the midst of water.

 

凡鉛 ordinary lead

真鉛 real lead

 

What is the difference between ordinary lead and real lead?

 

Ordinary lead is the external medicine, which is ming.

 

True/real lead is the (small) reverted elixir / small elixir / golden elixir.

 

 

From Liu Yiming's xiuzhen houbian (tl Fabrizio Pregadio in Cultivating the Tao) chapter 8:

 

However, these Lead and Mercury have two meanings, which cannot be ignored. When you cultivate the Reverted Elixir, you take the Black Lead to control the Red Mercury. Lead and Mercury seize one another, and coagulate forming the Reverted Elixir. This is the difference between the two Medicines, one of which is "internal," and the other is "external."

 

After its coagulation, the Reverted Elixir is also called True Lead. When you take this True Lead and ingest it, it transmutes your own Yin Mercury, which instantly dries. Then you take again this dried Mercury, and with it you "nourish warmly" the True Lead, which coagulates and forms the Great Elixir. This is another difference between the two Medicines, one of which is "internal," and the other is "external."

 

...

 

Alas! How could the Way of the Golden Elixir be easy to know? Essentially, with regard to the Reverted Elixir there are the Small Reverted Elixir and the Great Reverted Elixir. The Small Reverted Elixir is called Golden Elixir (jindan). The Great Reverted Elixir is called Great Elixir of the Golden Liquor of the Seven Returns and the Nine Reversions (qifan jiuhuan jinye dadan).

 

What we call Small Reverted Elixir consist in returning from the postcelestial to the precelestial. Lead controls Mercury; Water is in accord with Fire; the Lord of Metals couples with the Lovely Maid; the Black Tiger harnesses the Red Dragon; the Dark Turtle swallows the Vermilion Sparrow; and the "other house" (tajia) controls "my house" (wojia). You revert to that old thing in "my house," and return to the fundamental reality of "my house." Therefore this is the Way of reverting to the Origin, and for this reasons it is called Reverted Elixir. It is also called Golden Elixir. A scripture says:

 

When Metal goes back to its initial nature,

then you can call it Reverted Elixir.

 

This refers to the Small Reverted Elixir.

 

This Elixir is called "small" only because you revert to the Origin and return to the original foundation of times past. It is as if what was lacking becomes again plentiful, as if what had left comes back. But although this Elixir has "reverted," it has not yet gone through refinement by Fire. If you are careless for only one instant, you will obtain it and then lose it again. Therefore it is called Small Reverted Elixir.

 

[Daeluin]

Also, I'd like to ask if we can all try to work together in harmony here.

 

The xing ming gui zhi (translation by Daniel Burton Rose) says:

 

For in regard to the Three Passes: those who from doing enter non-doing [practice] the gradual method; those who cultivate the Upper Pass concurrently with the lower two passes [practice] the sudden method. As for those who directly refine the spirit and return to the Void, at the critical moment when the Work arrives at the Void, the extremity of quiescence, essence transforms into qi of itself, qi transforms into spirit of itself, meaning Gatemaster Yin’s principles on forgetting essence and spirit and transcending life.

 

The Secret of the Golden Flower uses the method of cultivating the Upper Pass concurrently with the lower two passes.

 

The methods of different schools may work from fundamentally different directions, and it is terribly easy to treat different schools oppositionally if one does not have a perspective able to encompass the workings of all.

 

If this thread is going to bear fruit, which I think it could, it would help if we stop with the attitude that one method is superior to the other.

[Taoist Texts]

To Jean-Paul Re: masters of the Past.

 

Please, read that article CAREFULLY from the very beginning. AND then: AND here http://www.goldenelixir.com/files/Wang_Mu_Foundations_of_Internal_Alchemy_SAMPLE.pdf

 

on PAGE number 4 we can read that:

 

(sigh) now they quote venerable Wang Mu 王沐，84歲（1908—1992）in support of some secret ming practice which brings physical immortality and rejuvenation. Here is his pic from a WLP page. Good fella, just slightly lacking on the rejuvenation front.

 

[Wells]

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Edited March 2, 2017 by Wells

[YiYinYiYang]

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Edited August 13, 2017 by YiYinYiYang

[Antares]

Jean-Paul, I see, you want to say that Wang Mu, who was a board member of CTA and received Longmen ordination, either could not translate Chang Po-tuan's words or deliberetly misled readers, right?

 

Furthermore you want to say there is no such thing as Ming cultivation in Chinese schools, right? 

 

What about Zhang Sanfeng' words?

 

命要传，性要悟静功悟性

 

Ming must be transmitted, Xing should be realized... 

 

This quote says a lot about importance of method of Ming

Edited January 18, 2017 by Antares

[Antares]

Re: Zhao Bichen. He created his own offshoot of WLP and it did not have anything in common with WLP' methods.  

[Wells]

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Edited March 2, 2017 by Wells

[Taoist Texts]

What about Zhang Sanfeng' words?

 

命要传，性要悟静功悟性

 

Ming must be transmitted

 

Hmm Zhang is a heavy hitter. I am almost impressed.

 

Ming must be transmitted. Wow. Well Ming is apparently some kind of a very secret exercise. Pointless to ask for details because it is so secret.

 

But may be somebody can share the results of it? Like, you do this Ming thingie and what happens out of it?

[Wells]

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Edited March 2, 2017 by Wells

[Antares]

What does mean inherited? 

[Wells]

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Edited March 2, 2017 by Wells

[Daeluin]

Regarding rejuvenation, the replenishment of the ming / yuan qi to the body will keep the body healthy, but this is not to say it will prevent aging. To unwind the process of aging, the jade elixir (the golden elixir / true lead after it has been circulated up and then comes down into the mouth/saliva) must be used to refine the body. Not to say I know how this works, but this is my read on what is described in zhong lu quan dao ji.

 

However, this only seems important if one is interested in earthly immortality. Most seem more interested in spiritual or celestial immortality, so perhaps they do not worry about using up the golden elixir on becoming younger, but on refining it into the golden elixir of the Seven Returns and the Nine Reversions.

 

Rejuvenation through replenishment of yuan qi will improve one's health, but is not the same process used in becoming younger, making the hair turn from white to black, healing scar tissue, etc. This is a question I have pondered for a long time before discovering an answer that feels good to me. I've seen others here ask this question many times, so I share this hoping to contribute illumination and dissolve contention.

 

Masters may appear to be many things on the surface, but are any of us qualified to judge them without even receiving what they might transmit to an indoor student?

[Wells]

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Edited March 2, 2017 by Wells

[Taoist Texts]

Regarding rejuvenation, the replenishment of the ming / yuan qi to the body will keep the body healthy, but this is not to say it will prevent aging.  

 

 

There you go. But the seminar-sellers perpetrate a hoax of a rejuvenating and immortalizing Ming.

[Antares]

It means that you got it from your ancestors.

 

Everyone gets it from ancestors. But ZS says about alchemical method which boosts it. Whiout it further progress in practice will be impossible.