aridus

How about this one? Dogfish dog fish, fish dog dogfish dogfish dog. Fish fish dogfish, dogfish fish fish fish fish, dogfish fish dogfish.

My best explanation (even though I don't think the poem is actually asking for one, but that the question is part of the poem itself) is that perception is incredibly powerful. He wanted 'shi shi' but got 'shi shi' instead. Ten lions or stone lions. Which is it? Shi shi shi shi.

Oh. Ok. I'm not arguing either. Well translation relies on definition, otherwise there is no translation. Nor did I say that I thought anyone did. That was the point of my posts too. Nice to see that we agree. I do realize I was saying the same thing that the thread was about. That is why I said it. On topic, yes? No. It doesn't exist in my mind since I'm not arguing. That's what I did. That's what I did. Or so I thought, at least.

I don't know about vortices but I definitely feel energies in the earth. Some places this is more strongly felt, yes, but I can feel it anywhere. I also find that different things have a different feel and that changes the overall sense for me depending on what is around. Trees, rocks, dirt, water, air, all have their own 'flavor' to me. I can feel it more when there is less man made interference, but I can still pick it up at times just walking into my back yard also. I've also noticed that I can pick up energy from refined natural materials, such as cut hardwoods or stonework, but it isn't nearly as strong as the same material in its natural state.

Cool stuff! I once saw a video of a yogi who swam under ice in literally freezing temp water wearing only swim trunks. He had a crew cut holes in the ice, one for him to get under the ice, and one to swim to to get out. Has anyone seen this video? Was looking for it online but can't find it. He basically went as far as he could before his eyes literally began to freeze, but he wasn't permanently harmed. Medical technicians did watch over him while he slowly got back to normal temperature but he was just fine after. Was pretty amazing. Not just a story, they filmed the actual swim. They got a bit of his yoga practice which was pretty neat as well.

This is as true as another truth can be, but also has its limitations. Too strict definitions lose their usefulness. There is a back to the front. Too strict is the back of not strict enough. There's "too far" for both directions. Everything has a back and a front. I think the main thing that I zoomed in on with the "precision" thing is that first it was said that qigong is not thousands of years old. If we want to be specific about its current incarnation, and when use of the term began, then this is probably true. However, this conflicts with the statement about the idea that westerners did not have something analogous to qigong. What this says to me, that in order to prove a point, qigong is used in a stricter sense to say how long it hasn't been around, then a broader sense to include things analogous to qigong. If things analogous were also included in the first statement, it loses its power, because things that are analogous to qiogong have been around for an extremely long time. So to me this is semantics and flipflopping the view.

It is also ironic to talk about how gray and then say "things don't mean exactly this" (black) "but they mean exactly this instead" (white)

Clinging or craving is clinging or craving. A desire to eliminate desire is still a desire. That is why they get it wrong, not because of 'mistranslation' of the word, but because of misplacement of their motivation. Moderate skepticism is skepticism in moderation.

Sounds like semantics and word play to me. Making things dissimilar when convenient and similar when convenient.

Yeah. I was mainly referring to the fact that we operate on borrowed power, and what we use it for doesn't really alter this. The power doesn't directly object to anything. We are just as free to do "wrong" things with it as we are to do "right" things with it. Being able to alter one's self with chemicals is a borrowed power from nature. And it doesn't prevent us at all. There are consequences but we are still free to do whatever of our own volition. It could be a power to destroy ourselves if we wish, and it will not object or stop us directly, but we will be destroyed because it does not fail in consequence.

If it must be "wrong or right" then it always forces the right path because it does not get things wrong. But personally I'd say it does neither. Universe doesn't have problems with our problems, we do.

I apologize if I have not read enough into this. But to me, this is like a speed wobble on a motorcycle. A speed wobble has resonance. It's like a wave that gets bigger and bigger. The problem with a speed wobble is that trying too hard to correct it increases the resonance, which makes the wobble even worse, then you try even harder to correct it. Eventually you crash. A speed wobble is something you have to learn to ride out with finesse, relaxation, and experience. Trying to fight it can mean a crash or death.

Yeah. Other things always change too. You don't always experience chair the same way, and chair doesn't always experience you in the same way. Some forget this second half of it. The chair changes over time. We don't notice it at first, because of our concept of "chair", but eventually, over time, the chair can become a little crooked. Or become loose. Maybe it develops a squeak. Or the cushion is not as fluffy anymore. Upholstery gets worn. It gets stained. We don't notice some of this until one day it jumps out at us and we go "this chair, it's different now!" It was always slowly becoming different all the time with use. It could even be said that you don't sit on the same chair twice.

Yeah. I include doubt with lack of harmony. I also keep 'truths' more simple than a lot of people do, I find. I see that people who are "seeking truth" have a tendency to set the scope to the super mystical "unknown universe that is out there" and then, almost always without a doubt, if it is raining they will turn around and say "It is raining today." That too is a truth. It is a small one, but the large begins with the small.

Yeah. My rule has always been either commit and stick, or commit to getting the hell away and don't stop. Trying to do both is dangerous. I have not been in real fights except for only a couple times, but it's always been either stick and follow through everything, or get away. I've never thrown someone and not followed it, if I have your hands, I keep them and follow and don't allow them to be recovered to be used against me. If you are down I am right there on top.

Excellent stuff. Some don't see the value, and are confused by form (or lack thereof) but for me, form is organizing your tool box. With a good tool box, you take out what you need at the right time, and use it, without having to "organize it" (stick strictly to form) first. Practices have saved my life more than once, because my body was trained to react. In one case, when I used to work in construction, a 10 foot piece of angle iron that was being hauled up a scaffold slipped and fell straight for me. The thing weighed almost as much as me and was coming straight for my head, but I was not only able to deflect it, but stayed upright without severe injury. I got the angle just right so that I did not receive much of the force at all, only enough to save me. Was not seriously injured at all, only a bruise and scrape on my arm. That's good for deflecting a huge piece of iron. It could have killed me.

Something just came into my mind. There's 'knowing' truth, and being in harmony with it. Knowing without harmony can eat you alive inside.

I kind of get what you are saying. To me though, excessive avoidance of things isn't Te. I think we have to balance all things. Everything has consequences, including excessive adherence to principles. There is separateness, but being separate at inopportune times causes unneeded friction. It can inflame situations. It can stir up resentment in others, and saying "That's their problem, not mine" does nothing to solve it. Also, I don't think there is so much "giving up" right or wrong. It's more realizing that these are abstract notions. Excessive enforcement of these notions is another area of friction. It becomes idealistic, then ingrained, to the point where people don't even truly remember why it is right or wrong anymore. The matter won't even be discussed anymore, people simply begin to react with arbitrary value judgments, they may fight over it, and some times kill each other over it. Separateness isn't always 'good' if we want to look at the conventional perception of 'good and bad'. Some times it comes down to "You are in my space. Leave it or die." Animals do this, as well as people.

Unknown relates to what I like to call 'null'. Example: what is my bank account number? Hopefully you have no clue what it is. That would be one thing you don't know, on the surface. Below the surface though, lies another question: do I even have a bank account at all? It is quite possible that I do not. So that's two potential things that you may not know, and one is connected to the other. You might make a guess as to what my number is, but it is a meaningless guess if I do not in fact have an account to begin with.

Reference points are interesting. What is our reference? It is often only our self, which drastically changes perceptions. I look at it like this. Imagine you've parked a car between three other cars, and you want to get out. There is a car at the front of your car, and one to each side, so the only way to get out is what we call "reverse". The interesting thing is, even though the direction you have to go does not change, we call it differently depending on our orientation. Since you are sitting in the car facing towards the front, from your perspective, you have to go in the abstract direction of 'backwards' or 'reverse'. From the other cars perspective, reverse of the way you have to get out would be driving into the other cars. It's only reverse because it is the opposite of the way you typically face in a vehicle - but the way out does not change. It is 'absolute' you could say. If the car magically was turned around 180 degrees in its place, the way out would be then called 'drive forward' but the direction you are going has not changed - your relative orientation has. It is interesting because some people negate this, and others find the negation strange. Sailors for example have 'absolute' parts of their ship, there's the bow, stern, port and starbord sides. This is from the perspective of the ship itself, bow is always bow, port is always port, and people who are used to centering themselves in orientation get confused by this some times, because it is no longer 'front' or 'back' or 'left' or 'right'. Those are directions which depend on your orientation, and they will change which way you go depending on which way you face. The same is true of the ship's orientation, it is just one level removed.

I don't know. Never had this happen aside from the usual. I do feel power though. As in I sense a huge difference between a house that has power but nothing is turned on, and a house that has no power. It's very unsettling if I've been in either one for a while and then change from one to the other. It's almost as if I hear it or something.

Yeah. The map is not the territory. I think this applies to everything. This is what I mean by when I say "there is no 'I'" or "there is no 'reality'" I'm not saying that there literally is none, I'm saying that my map of I is not I, and my map of reality is not reality. They may come close, but I don't contest this. I simply acknowledge that I have no 100% complete understanding of either. My map is not the territory, and believing it is, for me, causes problems.

Lot more videos on this as well.