dwai

54 minutes ago, EmeraldHead said:

you are cooking systems into one meat ball here

There is only one...but it’s not a meat ball  

5 hours ago, Spotless said:

Just finished reading the new book!

 

Looking forward to the sequel!

 

Congrats on a great book!

I’m honored and very happy that you liked the book  

I’m working on the sequel — will be published by end of 2020 most likely. 

4 minutes ago, Apech said:

 

The essence of Ancient Egyptian mysticism lies in the double soul. The two souls emanate from the absolute, which is itself ineffable and 'unknowable' but is sometimes understood as a kind of core or centre around which the universe rotates. But care has to be taken not to conceptualise the absolute and so this core should be thought of as being everywhere simultaneously and not as a distinct place.

 

Being, in the sense of 'a being' like you and me, or in the sense of 'being as such' arises from the interaction of the two souls. One soul can be said to be awareness and energy – or more precisely energy that is aware. Energy, or motion or vibration which has sentience. This soul is solar. In fact the sun itself is called the Great Eastern Soul. The other soul is substance/power which like water has no form itself but is capable of taking up all possible forms of existence. As 'substance' it lies behind all existence, it is what remains if all the veils of form are stripped away or dissolved.

 

When these two souls meet, they embrace, and their interaction is life. While the energy of the first soul is also awareness or light, when it embraces the second soul it becomes reflexively self-aware, it revives or wakes up whatever is latent in the substance soul and allows it to express or come alive.

 

Also as a result of this embrace two other 'fledgling' souls come into being. These two new souls are the result of awareness looking in two directions. One looks forward to the sun-soul as its origin and is said to face the East - towards the sunrise. The other soul looks back to the substance being – which is symbolically the West the direction of embodiment and death. The result of these two souls it to stabilize the embrace of the sun and water souls.

 

This has the effect of placing the moment of embrace in the flow of the two types of time understood by the Egyptians. One flow is continual re-presentation of eternity in the 'now' moment of the embrace and the other is the present moment seen in the context of a 'snake' of history stretching back to the 'first time' or beginning.

 

From this comes the idea of a journey – a movement from place to place over time. The type of this journey is the sun's movement from East to West during the day and from West to east at night. The fledgling souls who look East and West respectively not only can represent eyes but also boats (as the principal method of travel). One takes you to the East, to the origin – the beginning, and the other to the West, to death, the end.

 

This journey is the one we must all undertake, either in life or after death. It traverses both the earth and sky and involves terrains of all kinds, obstacles, dangers as well as places of rest and ease. While this journey occurs naturally of itself, for a being, such as ourselves, there are risks of getting bogged down, lost, obstructed, attacked by negative entities and so on. And even the so called second death where we as a being simply cease to be. This is why the Egyptians wrote guide books, maps, protective spells and so on to help guide and protect us on the way.

Any original (i.e., translation of some original Egyptian work, not new age stuff) reading material on this subject? Sounds very interesting. 

In the Hindu tradition we have four pillars of humanly attainments. Dharma, Artha, Kama and Moksha. 
 

Dharma is the way of being in harmony with nature, and upholding the natural order of the universe. 
 

Artha is the pursuit of value — things that provide value (including wealth).

Kama is the experience of the senses - including sexual fulfillment. 
 

Moksha is the attainment of liberation from the bondages of worldly life — namely craving and revulsion. 
 

When Artha and Kama are viewed with the context of dharma, they will help us attain moksha. Following dharma, the individual experiences the ups and downs of life, without any attachment or revulsion to what happens. Eventually when there arises perfect detachment, moksha is attained.

The 8 winds are called the four thieves  - kama, krodha, lobha and Moha. 
 

Here kama is Lust (for anything), Krodha is anger, lobha is greed (wanting beyond what is needed), and moha is delusion (being enthralled by transitory phenomena).

By following dharma, when one participated in samsara in the fields of Artha and Kama, the four thieves cannot rob them of their peace of mind. And little by little the four thieves become completely powerless. 

On 12/29/2019 at 3:18 PM, Desmonddf said:

 

And so on. Qi is more complex than just "energy", and for crying out loud, PLEASE, PLEASE don't call Qi "prana" or other forms of "esoteric energy"! If you feel Qi and then feel Prana, you'll be able to see HOW DIFFERENT those two are!

 

There are five types of prana  Called the panca vayu.

of these the one that I would call Qi that flows through the extraordinary meridians is prana vayu. Others have  other functions, like running the mind, heart, excretion and so on. 

1 hour ago, Earl Grey said:

 I used to spend every week here when I lived in L.A. 

 

Go to Santa Monica and 5th street to Thunderbolt Spiritual Books while you can. If you let me know in advance I can introduce you to some individuals of interest in martial, magical, and other related disciplines there.

Has to be next time. I’m flying back to Chicago now. I’ll reach out when I’m there next time  

1 minute ago, Pilgrim said:

You are welcome I am reading it a little at a time, and that is a good sign because when I read something like this it is with an attitude of savoring a fine dish not wanting the meal to end too soon.

 

Very much enjoying the first few chapters and how you are capturing village life and the attitudes and sentiments of the people of India, this very much matches with the Swami's I have learned from as well as the householders I have known,  this book may very well become something more than you ever intended.

 

Once I have read it all I will be certain to put up a 5 star review on Amazon as that is the direction this is heading in thus far.

 

Thank you so much for your time and effort and one of the more enjoyable books I have had the privilege to read in recent years.

Thought you might enjoy this — 

I’m in LA currently, and had the good fortune of meditating in the Lake Shrine temple yesterday. It is a powerful place and perhaps one of the most powerful places I’ve visited in the US. 

Sitting there in the temple hall, I was pulled into a deep stillness along with expansive awareness. Little by little I merged with the temple and all the people there. And then after a while as I came out of the stillness I saw a gigantic form of Lahiri mahashay standing in the hall.

Im certainly planning to visit again When I visit LA again  

Dispassion is the cessation of rāga-dvésha or the duality of craving and avoidance. When and as we understand what we are, dispassion rises correspondingly. 
 
it is a sign of maturity for sure, but only if understood in the context I presented above. It is a consequence of letting go of mentations. 

8 minutes ago, Brian said:

Just noticed this thread, Dwai -- I will join your mailing list, buy your book, read it and post a review!

Hi Brian, 

First of all, so wonderful to see you back here again! 
 I am honored and happy to see your note. I hope I won’t disappoint my fellow Dao bums with what I’ve written.

Your support means a lot to me. 
 

Best,

Dwai 

The tongue touching the upper palate (right in the ridge where your tongue touches When you say “life”) results in splitting your energy into yin and yang. When you don’t have your tongue up, yin and yang are “mixed”. When you have your tongue up, yin and yang are separated. 
 

Some types of practices require the separation of substantial and insubstantial for cultivation exercises. Some don’t. 
 

I do some meditations with tongue down when I’m working on the mind aspect (letting the mind settle). I have the tongue up  when I’m working on the energy aspect (taijiquan, neigong etc). 

48 minutes ago, freeform said:

Yes... although in certain traditions there are ways to further tune this knowing to an aspect of ‘the third eye’... You use the Shen Ming (or the light of the original spirit) that comes about from entering a certain ‘samadhi’ state to create this skill. It is beyond the ‘local’ mind - and accessing a kind of ‘causal’ knowing.

 

Ting, in the tradition I’m in is different and is developed differently - it’s closer to the process of absorbing awareness into an object (until the subject-object duality disappears) - but it’s functionally different for the above.

Subject object duality has to disappear in order to realize the oneness of all being.  

And once we are well settled in the fact that all being is one, we can simply let go of artificial separation of subject and object. 

What I’m referring to seems to be the same thing you’re describing. 

Direct perception is a very interesting concept — in order to perceive one has to use the mind. If the mind is involved it is no longer direct. Mind and five senses interplay — that’s why Qi is felt as different things by different people.

As someone who has synesthesia, the role of the mind and how it interprets and interplays with the five senses is only too clear to me  

There is another “direct cognition” or “knowing”, which is what ting to me is — but that is simply the result of experience (to call it intuition would be incorrect but somewhat close — but the words in the English language aren’t sufficient to express many eastern ideas).  It transcends time and space — simply knowing the oneness with another ‘person’ one can know what’s going on at an energetic or even a mental level. 

3 hours ago, dawei said:

This talk of Ting and what systems teach and what we have each experienced makes me think back to when I did Medical Qigong Clinicals.   The group was a rather diverse set of folks: Many were acupunturist but one was a Reiki master, another deeply into yoga, and I was the only one with a Qigong background.  I might guess that this would surprise folks, it surprised me.

 

But here is what I observed and experience: all of the practitioners had a sense of energy in a different way, like the five senses and then the sixth sense of each would also kick in.  It taught me a great lesson that we should not try to confine what it means to feel, sense, listen, know, or experience energy.   Each person is likely, like a destiny, draw to finding a system that fits their energy sensing.

 

I will say, working with others who experienced energy differently than me made me really open further that another's system should be valued if it works for them.   Some see colors; some see form; some feel the movement; some know there is something there.  We would rotate people through five patients and then compare notes...  In the end, we almost always agreed on sensing something specific.   It was the dark energy (not sure a good word for it) that a few of us encountered... like one cancer patient was radiant in her outlook to overcome it while another was accepting doom.   One patient was rather mild but caught me off-guard with something very defensive... well, it was attacking in response to my presence.   As this was my second Medical Qigong training and it was very formal with step by step, I realized there is not a formal plan with this one.  I went back to my previous system to deal with it.   This is all so long ago and left behind but it was a great foundation that systems different and have value.

Over the summer, my brothers and I were outdoors practicing taiji and meditation. We got started talking about nonduality, and one of them looked like he was going to collapse with pain in his chest. 
 

it was the middle of a big park so it was going to be a while If we called an ambulance. 

So the remaining three of us started working on him. We used the taiji hook to triangulate the problem area,  and started pulling what each of saw/sensed or felt as a dark blob of energy from there. 
 

After a few attempts it started trying to escape. It was looking to find a way to get out of his system and eventually it exited.  

We called for our teacher and he created a vortex into which it fell and disappeared.

The interesting thing is, just as you mentioned, each of of us perceived it in a different way. Two of us saw it as a black blob, while another felt it like a staticky, icky energy!

15 hours ago, freeform said:

Ting in the system I train in is quite different. I’ve explained it to a couple of people on the forum and if they choose to they’ll be able to attest to both the difference and the depth and power of working in this way...

What I’m suggesting is ting is a natural extension of listening. But it was interesting to learn that your system trains ting differently. In the system I’ve learnt, ting is developed by working with other people in push hands. 

5 hours ago, silent thunder said:

Mental models were convincing for a time while experiencing awareness in a certain perspective, but no mental construct seems able to hold together with any feasability lately (last six years or so).  Doubt has become a constant, (and relievingly welcome) companion to all mental activity as the process unfolds of itself in recent years.

 

Mom believed and taught me that the universe is a Pot, made by God who is The Potter.  He used magic to imbue the Pots with Life.  This was feasible yet wholly unsatisfying, inherently skewed to me, even as a young child, but for a time, I dutifully tried to accept it.  Eventually, by middle school, in an effort to put to rest my misgivings and to find answers to the questions none of the elders in my church were willing or able to answer.  I read the Bible for myself... and that was the end of my ability to pretend that the model presented by that type of mind, reflected truth.

 

Dad saw the world as the 'Dumb Machine'.  Inherently meaningless dumb particles streaking, floating, crashing and squeezing at immense pressure, eventually, through random statistical improbabilities of staggering proportions, resulting in life.  This pot never held water for me, due to certain experiences of a deeply intangible and spiritual nature.

 

Some friends suggested a blend, that God had made the Machine of our Universe, imbued it with certain laws, then left it utterly alone to its own devices to putter along on its own inertia toward some grand (or meek) finale.

 

Lately Doubt is my model.  I don't know, my mind in its localized awareness state, can't know... and that's just fine.

 

A most constant and deeply welcome mental companion (and interstingly to me, an unsought and unmanufactured companion).  I no longer have any ability to prop up certainty models of the universe, in fact, without seeking or straining, they fall away of themselves with simple observation and my own raw being.

 

When it comes to mentally ascerting the nature of all reality, certainty is untenable and rather inherently repulsive and whenever it begins to solidify, doubt infuses it with fluidity and it melts warmly, (like an inner smile though, not a bitter pill).

 

Visions of life, thoughts, smells, items I touch, trees, insects, mountains, people, animals... they have form to my senses, colors and textures... yet all are revealed as vaporous, passing intangibles in their essential nature, no matter how precious, or repulsive their form, smell and sound may seem.

 

Awareness is the only thing that abides beyond doubt... for now.

 

Awareness is... the rest... well, it takes care of itself. 

Fog rises in morning, dissipates in mid morning and returns pre dawn.

 

Awareness abides.

 

Maya is a compelling model, the innocent arising and play of senses and mental constructs.  It's a compelling play.  But inherently vaporous, insubstantial and without the awareness that seemingly fuels it... is...?

Beautiful  

1 hour ago, freeform said:

You may well be right... I’m not sure what’s more complex.

 

For me, the strength of the eastern approach is that it invites you to prove its premise by experiencing it in yourself by following a process...

 

Wheras you’ll have to take a physicists word for it when they say they can prove the existence of quarks, leptons, bosons and all the other weird and wonderful ‘building blocks’ of reality 

 agreed...

btw I read the “building blocks” you wrote as “building bollocks” and was chuckling under my breath and then re-read it correctly  

7 hours ago, freeform said:

Honestly - I’m not sure the eastern system is any less complex - especially once you get into the details within each system.

 

However there’s this funny clumsiness of science when it comes to studying living beings or processes... scientists claim to understand a lot, but in reality understand almost nothing.

 

When it comes to the less ‘alive’ aspects of matter, science is clearly exemplary. But living systems - almost nothing...

 

That to me is the bigger evidence for the materialist world view being flawed.

The complexity in the very first premise of materialism trumps all other details. Eastern systems that are more complex in theory are inherently less plausible than those that aren’t imho.  
 

Quote

Occam's razor (or Ockham's razor) is a principle from philosophy. Suppose there exists two explanations for an occurrence. In this case the one that requires the least speculation is usually correct. Another way of saying it is that the more assumptions you have to make, the more unlikely an explanation.

Occam’s razor can be used quite effectively to cut through bs that one will invariably have to deal with in spirituality.

A general rule of thumb I found to be effective is that any spiritual teaching or system that overcomplicates it’s understanding or practice is less effective than another which employs less complexity. 
 

The materialist model of reality is the most complex of all models out there. This employs lifeless matter organizing itself into complex patterns which mysteriously come alive and produce consciousness. 
 

On the other hand the traditional Spiritual eastern models of reality almost all suggest that consciousness is the basis of the universe and matter merely appears and disappears in it. 
 

IMHO the eastern models are less complex and require less assumptions. On that basis, the materialist model is less likely to be ‘correct’. 
 

Would love to see more discussions on this topic  

1 hour ago, dawei said:

 

I think the Qi ball is a great practice cuz you regulate breath with it...  But there is room to explore various Qi ideas and the sword hands is a good experiment.  I usually recommend moving the sword fingers in a very slow circle.   What becomes interesting is that the focus of the eyes can have an intention without realizing you are giving intent.   I think that is part of being soft too.

In our system it stems from that Qi ball. The Qi ball can be condensed, made into various shapes and given different characteristics (jin). It can be used as a blunt instrument or a sharp cutting tool.
 

Maybe for beginners,  sword finger is a bit harder. 

1 minute ago, freeform said:

Train with listening instead

 

Developing the skill to ‘listen’ is a pretty important one...

 

There’s a process to developing it - but even then you will have lots of sensations and experiences before your listening skill matures.

 

(I’m saying ‘you’, but I’m talking generally - I’m sure you have Ting by now, Dwai)

 

Most of my teachers made a point to discourage attaching any meaning, importance or significance to what you’re feeling on the Qi level in the early stages (early - meaning the first 5 to 10yrs of dedicated daily practice).

 

The reason is: experiencing the ‘8 touches of Qi’ is not a direct experience of Qi - it is the experience of your body’s reaction to Qi... 

 

That might seem like pointless semantics - but it’s important - because you might feel a warmth travel up your spine and think that Yang Qi is moving through the governing vessel - but what may actually be happening is your Nei Qi has touched some nerve that sends a warm sensation up the back... or it’s a tiny bit of Qi moving and you’re experiencing resistance that manifests as heat... but either way you’d be making an error in thinking Yang Qi is moving up the spine - and you might base further training on this error in judgement and cause yourself issues down the line.

 

When training with an advanced Neigong teacher you know you felt Qi because your body will react very strongly - with spasms, shaking, vibrating or other weirder experiences... but you won’t have the skill and sensitivity to know what actually happened on the level of Qi until much later... usually not until you can see it

Ting is feeling (There isn’t any difference between feeling and listening)  

To listen is to know. To feel is to listen (or see or hear...it manifests in many ways) 

17 minutes ago, freeform said:

Also - sensations or sensitivity to this stuff is both fraught with delusion - and not particularly useful at the early stage anyway.

A double edged sword — how does one train without feeling, how can one feel without trying. The problem is with trying too hard, or getting caught up in sensations.

for the OP - imho, better than sword finger, is to generate what we call a taiji ball (energetic ball) between your palms — like you are holding a basketball or soccer ball between your palms, with the center of Palms aligned. Breath in, expand that ball, exhale, contract that  ball. 
 

you have to be very soft in your movement and gentle in your intention. After a while you will feel the two palms push apart when squeezing the ball (like two like piles of a magnet push apart when brought too close). And when you expand you’ll feel a magnetic attraction between your palms (like pulling apart two like poles of a magnet).

Those of you who’ve got the book and read it, please do leave a note here and also amazon or goodreads If you can. Your support and help is much appreciated  

1 hour ago, Taomeow said:

Got it on my Kindle.  Thank you, Dwai.  Look forward.

I’m Honored! Hope you enjoy it  

1 hour ago, Pilgrim said:

Thanks Dwai. I just purchased the kindle version.

 

So your last name is Lahiri?  any relation to the Kriya Yoga founder,  Shyama Charan Lahiri ?  

Thank you so much for your support! 
Please leave a comment on amazon if you like the book  

All Lahiris come from the same common ancestor - Lokenath Sharma of Kanyakubja. But that was almost 2000 years back...

That said, I’m not from the same branch as Lahiri Mahashay  

Here’s an interview about the book  — http://www.thenewsnow.co.in/newsdet.aspx?q=97358