Sahaja

About 18 years ago visited a temple in rural Myanmar with my family that had ceremonies led by what appeared to us as transgender “priest/priestess” mediums. Dance and music were a big part of the ceremony. The local people attending (the vast majority in attendance) appeared to treat the mediums with a great deal of seriousness and respect. In our personal interactions with the mediums they were very open, light hearted/quick to laugh, and were kind to us offering to pray for our daughters’ then upcoming school exams.

to work with opening the ren, one may want to explore releasing/relaxing tension from the Tian Tu point in the upper chest as I understand this is a common sticking or blocking point for many people. This relates to the instruction “sinking the chest” which per my understanding means releasing/relaxing of tension vertically down inside the body from that point.

Curious whether there is any impact or change at the chromosomal level to transition. - xx to xy or xy to xx. I realize there is a small percentage of the population don’t fit into these general chromosomal categories.

I think an important part of it is moving from intention (conscious, subconscious and unconscious) to pure attention (without desires, goals, discursive thought) to states beyond this. There are conditions and methods that facilitate this. Imagination is a form of intention or discursive thought so it’s not a tool for this practice in my understanding. While there is likely similarity between apothetic methods across traditions as many deal with moving beyond the acquired mind to a unitive state, I think it’s better to keep them separate in application so one doesn’t miss important nuances unique to each tradition.

I enjoy reading the academic works on Daoist apophetic methods such as by Harold Roth, Stephen Eskildsen , Louis Komjecky and others. I would say that my view is somewhat different on the translations of the Chinese terms into the English terms like “breath” and “visualization”. Visualization (cun or cunxiang) maybe alternatively translated as paying attention to and see what actually arises as opposed to imagining something. This translation is more in alignment with the Daoist concept of wu wei or non doing particularly in the context of sitting and forgetting. Qi is not just the breath in my understanding, it is much more.

Maybe some wood qi gong would help with moderating excessive judgement. The five elements model of cultivation includes the path of balancing the emotions (at the initial level). there is a difference between our natural tendency to categorize things and the ego driven need to compare. It’s important to understand the difference. Both arise from being a limited self, but the first is useful for our survival as a physical entity the latter is more about the reinforcement/survival of the ego.

Perhaps the probability of attaining enlightenment is near zero when we have an intent to achieve it. Perhaps the probability of reaching enlightenment is near zero when we don’t have something/someone outside of ourselves pointing out when our intent to achieve it arises. Perhaps the probability of reaching enlightenment is near zero when we don’t have a useful method to help us reach our potential. Perhaps the probability of reaching enlightenment is near zero when we believe the chosen method and helper is more important than the qualities inherent in the first statement. as much as it can be depressing to see so many people searching and not finding, the existence of the energy driving this search to me is quite a hopeful sign as it seems stronger and more resilient than both logic and intent.

It can also be translated as skill from the self. Meaning it’s something from inside that’s not at the conscious level. It’s usually associated with active or yang qi getting freed up in a practice like releasing tension that hits a blockage in one’s body which results in involuntary movements, involuntary speech or sounds, shaking, involuntary prostrations etc. it can be innocuous or it can be quite dramatic but it’s really only the body opening up under the influence of active qi. Some “masters” get this initiated in their students and describe it as something magical or demonic taking advantage of its unusual involuntary nature to influence students to follow them However in more serious lineages they treat it as more mundane, more like passing gas, that the teacher politely ignores. If you are doing qi gong with the mind absorbed deeply inside there is a good chance something like this will arise. Sometimes it can be triggered by something very simple, like a doing a hand mudra. It’s just a phase that will pass so it’s best to let it do its thing (open you up more) and not to get too attached to it. Of course there is always a next phase, lol.

My understanding of texts is they describe what had arisen at the end state, not the process to get there which comes from the teacher and from direct experience. The process is not binary and starts by charting out the route and is filled differently(yang qi, yin qi, light, the Dan etc.) at different stages of the process. Even at the earliest stages this is an unimposed non manufactured process that is quite strong somatically but effort is necessary to put the conditions where it can arise in place.Ultimately it even goes outside the physical body interacting with the yin fields around you. Actually I should not say ultimately, as I don’t really know how many levels there are (the “10, 000” levels back to the one maybe the way to describe it) The most important point is that it is a spiritual process anchored in a physical process based on moving beyond/releasing these contractions and colorings of the acquired bodymind. (Very analogous to yoga and Buddhist cultivation methods )The “doing” are these contractions and colorings of the bodymind - non doing or non governance is moving away from these intentions/contractions to pure attention uncolored by the acquired mind and then beyond this. When the tai chi masters talk about song and ting they are describing using these tools in a more prosaic way but in many ways it seems quite similar. Even at a beginners level one can feel the qi strongly respond to the “releasing” of both physical and mental contractions if one is “listening’”. When authors take an end state and reverse engineer it into a process to follow based on imagination or visualization of the end state, they are just encouraging more contraction of the mind and actually impeding the process as they are directing the use of energies toward more doing rather than the un doing of these physical and mental contractions which is the effort required. It may sound contradictory but letting go of the contractions takes work particularly when the ego and the physical body don’t want you to release the contractions. The ego in many ways defines itself through these contractions. It probably feels quite threatened when stuff arises it’s not directly controlling! i enjoy reading the texts and appreciate the work of philologists, academics and translators. When I read things like “supreme yin” in the really old texts I can see the connection to very important aspects of the process and it’s helpful to see that. I am grateful for the light they shed and they are doing something I clearly don’t have the skills for. They have done much good work that should be acknowledged. However I think errors can be made when outcomes are conflated with processes. ok Taoist texts - have at me! Perhaps it will help me release my own contractions to get some humility. I undoubtedly have a lot more to learn. (Only 10,000 more levels to go)

My understanding is that it arises when the correct conditions are in place. When it starts moving it’s pretty clear what is going on and that you are not directly governing it with your intention at that point.

I see in my FB feed that Max is teaching “kunlun” again - this week in San Jose. These days it seems like most any qi gong can produce zi fa gong.

My understanding is similar to silent thunders. The subtle anatomy and associated practices of alchemy has some marked differences from TCM though there are similarities. While I haven’t ingested alchemical herbs I know people who have and their effects can be quite strong. I guess it’s analogous to qi gong. You can practice qi gong at the level of health (more like TCM) or you can use qi gong to change the body(s) to support a spiritual practice. The latter is a lot more intense(much more than just waving your hands around). In terms of channels, some of the names might be similar (like the du) but size might dramatically change (become the width of your back or more) in alchemical applications of practice. I’ve found TCM herbs helpful from a medical perspective in my martial arts practices but my understanding is that it’s not the same thing. Because of common use of terms (and propensity for secrecy) a lot of confusion is created between TCM and alchemical/spiritual based approaches.

My first wife was born in the year of the green dragon. Our marriage was a bit of a disaster but like the dragon she regenerated and made a career out of the disaster(wrote her autobiography, TV shows, Oprah, etc.). Kind of a rough ride for me at the time but now just ironic and humorous looking at it from a distance through the rear view mirror. Perhaps the point here is that as we face the dragon this year knowing that time will help put its challenges into perspective changing them into lessons ( that might even make us laugh at some point!).

My understanding is when one has moved from intentional based thought into absorption in awareness, dreams stop. Dreams are another version of intentional thought based in the acquired mind/limited self, albeit at the subconscious or unconscious levels of intention.

While more qi does enable many things, I think a very important element isthe ability to soak the awareness into the body which enables one to both perceive and use qi more accurately as well as make more qi. I remember when I was young studying martial arts there was a lot of qi generated but my ability to internally connect with it and direct it was quite limited, more of an external application. Now more recently my practices have opened up the internal world much more through absorption of the awareness in the body (and applying the Yi Jin Jing principles) I think Freeform used to refer to the power of the absorption of awareness into the body in some of his posts and it certainly has been my experience. I think this changes one’s practice whether one is doing qi gong or martial arts or yoga. Perhaps someday this will evolve from absorption of awareness in the body to the body absorbed into awareness - this is where the game changes dramatically or so I’m told and takes one beyond regular qi to original qi. My understanding is that this requires releasing all intention, conscious or otherwise. Not an easy thing to do.