Taoist Meditation

[Taomeow]

37 minutes ago, turtlehermit said:

 

The original question wasn't necessarily about the origins but of the basic, time tested methods that seem to work for people.

 

Which people toward accomplishing what has to be considered.  Taoism is huge.  You need to decide what you want, then find out which methods are the "basic, time tested" ones toward getting that.  E.g. I have some basic, time tested methods of taoist female alchemical practices.  Going all the way to the immortal Sun Bu-er.  Part of what they are is applicable to anyone, not just women.  E.g., Sun Bu-er's poem advises to "rest your mind on your breathing and rest your breathing on your mind."  Yup, that's doable and "works for people" but then what?  Then comes the bulk of the specific instructions for taoist women ISO specific effects or goals. 

 

Your handle does not reveal if you are a male or a female.  Assuming you're a man (most daobums are), what can you possibly gain from Sun Bu-er's time tested breast, uterus and ovarian meditations?   They do work for people though...  just not all people.  

 

45 minutes ago, turtlehermit said:

 

 If you could explain how the big dipper and north star help in your meditation that would be appreciated.

 

OK...  Taoism rests on a turtle and a horse.  Or rather, a magical turtle of celestial origins and a dragon-horse, longma, of the same origins.  The dragon-horse was sent to the founder of taoism, Fuxi, and he copied, and contemplated, and meditated on, the pattern of nine marks on its back, and came to the revelation that they represent the pattern of tao in the universe, tao fa, and that this pattern corresponds (don't ask me yet how, but it does) to the nine (sic -- two are invisible) stars of the Big Dipper. 

 

From this realization he quickly figured out the structure of the source, or should I say the Source, tao itself, and to introduce it to the human world, he interpreted the odd and even numbers of the marks he copied, in what became known as the Hetu diagram, as yin and yang, and proceeded to invent the eight trigrams as further elaborations on the map of the Source.  It was all about Xiantian, the origin, tao-in-stillness.  But then...

 

...then Emperor Yu got to meet, at river Luo, the magical turtle with another set of nine marks on its shell, standing on the back of a bigger one, a dragon-turtle that was an aspect or a manifestation of the earlier longma, and from that pattern, contemplating and meditating and grokking it, he realized that it represents tao-in-motion, Houtian, the qi dynamics of the world of manifestations. 

 

The Luoshu, the map drawn from that pattern, the magic square of nine, is again related to the Big Dipper and stands for the motion of qi between its stars that sets in motion all tao-in-motion in our manifest, Houtian world.   

 

Thus a mystery/science/practice was born.  Thousands of years later it was named "taoism," after a word in a book "about" it that became very popular for a number of reasons, one of the main ones being that it was very simple. 

 

Now that I've given you some background, I'll have to tell you this.  Between my first discovery of the origins of taoism and my first practical skill of applying the former to the latter, fifteen minutes elapsed, it was enough -- once you understand the fundamentals, you can apply them to anything.  But between my first discovery of these basics and my uprooting their connection to the Big Dipper, fifteen years had to pass -- the information was not readily available, seldom understood by those to whom it was available, and even more seldom revealed to those who didn't come to a place where they need it in order to pass through a certain "gate" in their cultivation.  I needed it.  I got it when I needed it, and not sooner. 

 

I don't think you do at this point.  If fifteen years later you find you do, get back to me, I'll show you.   

 

[Aletheia]

9 minutes ago, Taomeow said:

I have some basic, time tested methods of taoist female alchemical practices.

 

Do you know any good books I can get for my sister concerning alchemy training?

[mrpasserby]

3 hours ago, Aletheia said:

 

Yes, the video is literally the original garden of eden -- It's the dao manifest and beyond my understanding really.

 

mrpasserby I think there's more going on in the video then most people can understand. voidisyinyang knows about it but he's banned at the moment. There are psychic energy exchanges going on between the men and the women and the women are on the ground singing in stillness while the men are dancing.

 

The women also have their menstrual cycles synced with the moon too which we see in the video and they're sublimating the energy then the men and sucking up the energy and are celibate too and then combining all the energy then leaving their bodies and astral travelling, communicating with distant lands, climbing the ropes of the gods and all kinds of other stuff I have no idea about.

 

All I know is the thing is super high level!

Aletheia, I redid my earlier post It sounded better in my head then on paper. I have to tell you that I want to learn more about both; taoism that embodies so much of the focused becoming that I admire, and now I can see clearly that if the Bushmen were going farther into the collective mind then that is the one area that I have not discovered yet in taoism. I have held back on posting about it so as not to cause anyone offense.

In my experiences: establishing the collective mind with the proper focus is what produces the direct connect to the higher realms (opens the door). In my experience: This collective process, of opening the door (in this case by the Bushmen), does not take away from the process of a person embodying the dao but serves to accelerate an individual's being absorbed into it. 

Edited August 26, 2017 by mrpasserby

[Taomeow]

11 minutes ago, Aletheia said:

 

Do you know any good books I can get for my sister concerning alchemy training?

 

For an overview: Immortal Sisters: Secret Teachings of Taoist Women/ Thomas Cleary

For a serious inquiry: Art of the Bedchamber: The Chinese Sexual Yoga Classics Including Women's Solo Meditation Texts/ Douglas Wile

Edited August 26, 2017 by Taomeow

[Wu Ming Jen]

‘The Dao of Internal Refinement’ is utmost easy and utmost simple.
Only strive to descend the heart-fire so it enters into the Cinnabar Field. Retrieve the intent to the Cinnabar Field whether one is able or not will depend on the level of Gong and the level of self-refinement. It may take ten, twenty or thirty years or an entire lifetime.

Because the Cinnabar Field is the Palace of Kan, it therefore belongs to water. The heart is the Palace of Li and therefore belongs to fire. Fire enters inside water, water and fire intermingle. The fire must travel downwards into the lower Cinnabar Field.  And the True Yang is produced. The ancient people called the ‘Heart and Kidney’, precisely ‘Kan and Li’.

 

“I awakened to the principles of everlasting life:
Tai Yang –Supreme Yang- immerses in Tai Yin –Supreme Yin.
The Sun subsides in the moon.”

 

“I will reveal the methods of my family traditions and their purposes.
Tai Yang moves inside the Bright Moon.”

 

The Pre-Heaven Original Spirit
-the void spirit’s character luminescence- is safe in its centre
as if a turtle is hidden in its shell, as if a snake in hibernation.
Non-oblivion, non-assistance;
As if surviving, as if perishing.
In the centre of yin and yang, in the centre of existence and non-existence, in point zero.
One deviation to the left and one is gone;
One deviation to the right and one’s thoughts are running off.

[turtlehermit]

14 minutes ago, Wu Ming Jen said:

‘The Dao of Internal Refinement’ is utmost easy and utmost simple.
Only strive to descend the heart-fire so it enters into the Cinnabar Field. Retrieve the intent to the Cinnabar Field whether one is able or not will depend on the level of Gong and the level of self-refinement. It may take ten, twenty or thirty years or an entire lifetime.

Because the Cinnabar Field is the Palace of Kan, it therefore belongs to water. The heart is the Palace of Li and therefore belongs to fire. Fire enters inside water, water and fire intermingle. The fire must travel downwards into the lower Cinnabar Field.  And the True Yang is produced. The ancient people called the ‘Heart and Kidney’, precisely ‘Kan and Li’.

 

“I awakened to the principles of everlasting life:
Tai Yang –Supreme Yang- immerses in Tai Yin –Supreme Yin.
The Sun subsides in the moon.”

 

“I will reveal the methods of my family traditions and their purposes.
Tai Yang moves inside the Bright Moon.”

 

The Pre-Heaven Original Spirit
-the void spirit’s character luminescence- is safe in its centre
as if a turtle is hidden in its shell, as if a snake in hibernation.
Non-oblivion, non-assistance;
As if surviving, as if perishing.
In the centre of yin and yang, in the centre of existence and non-existence, in point zero.
One deviation to the left and one is gone;
One deviation to the right and one’s thoughts are running off.

Where are you quoting from?

 

1 hour ago, Taomeow said:

Now that I've given you some background, I'll have to tell you this.  Between my first discovery of the origins of taoism and my first practical skill of applying the former to the latter, fifteen minutes elapsed, it was enough -- once you understand the fundamentals, you can apply them to anything.  But between my first discovery of these basics and my uprooting their connection to the Big Dipper, fifteen years had to pass -- the information was not readily available, seldom understood by those to whom it was available, and even more seldom revealed to those who didn't come to a place where they need it in order to pass through a certain "gate" in their cultivation.  I needed it.  I got it when I needed it, and not sooner. 

 

I don't think you do at this point.  If fifteen years later you find you do, get back to me, I'll show you.   

 

Okay how do you apply the "origins of taoism" practically? And how do you apply their connection with the Big Dipper? I understand the Big Dipper, revolving around the North Star is symbolic for the qi revolving around the center. Is this what you mean? I'm hearing a lot of big claims, but still haven't heard any practical methods of meditation, in which this thread is all about.  

[Taomeow]

22 minutes ago, turtlehermit said:

Okay how do you apply the "origins of taoism" practically? And how do you apply their connection with the Big Dipper? I understand the Big Dipper, revolving around the North Star is symbolic for the qi revolving around the center. Is this what you mean?

 

No.

 

24 minutes ago, turtlehermit said:

I'm hearing a lot of big claims,

 

Um...  your hearing difficulties are regrettable. 

 

25 minutes ago, turtlehermit said:

 but still haven't heard any practical methods of meditation, in which this thread is all about.  

 

And you won't until you resolve your hearing difficulties. 

[Mudfoot]

From the viewpoint of my system :

 

You don't start with the dipper. 

 

You start with calming your body and your mind, and opening up stuff. 

 

Breathing, zhan zhuan. Maybe some cool movements. 

 

And you progress, symbols and mytologi becomes practical experiences. 

Including the dipper. 

[mrpasserby]

32 minutes ago, Mudfoot said:

From the viewpoint of my system :

 

You don't start with the dipper. 

 

You start with calming your body and your mind, and opening up stuff. 

 

Breathing, zhan zhuan. Maybe some cool movements. 

 

And you progress, symbols and mytologi becomes practical experiences. 

Including the dipper. 

Mudfoot, It sounds interesting but what is mytologi, and the dipper? Are you a Norseman?  My first initiation into the spirit world was with oden and the wild hunt -1967. 

[Taomeow]

2 hours ago, Mudfoot said:

From the viewpoint of my system :

 

You don't start with the dipper. 

 

You start with calming your body and your mind, and opening up stuff. 

 

Breathing, zhan zhuan. Maybe some cool movements. 

 

And you progress, symbols and mytologi becomes practical experiences. 

Including the dipper. 

 

Where you start depends on where you're starting from.  Taoism was created by folks who hardly needed to learn from scratch how to calm their body and mind and "open up stuff."   And their moves were already "cool" -- see Laozi Ch.15.  Different strokes. 

 

I started with the dance of Yu on my fingers.   Learned to "fly" the stars, something you need to practice in order to do classical (not mickey mouse) feng shui, and learned to fly them on the palm of my hand.  It means I started with the dipper, although at the time I had no idea it has anything to do with figuring out how to place your furniture.  Or your feet on the ground for that matter.  Or that it can be danced with your feet on the ground and your spirit among the stars if you know the moves.  Or that it was a taoist meditation, a very fundamental, basic, primordial, authentic one.  Like I said, took me fifteen years to connect the dots.

[Mudfoot]

Must be confusing for the casual reader, so many ways, and so many interpretations of what a term or a symbol means. 

 

For example, I wouldn't be surprised if taomeow is speaking of something else than I am refering to, and her way is probably way older. 

 

Meanings change, traditions adopt old symbols to explain what they are doing. 

 

 

[Wu Ming Jen]

9 hours ago, turtlehermit said:

Where are you quoting from?

 

 

I am quoting from the scriptures of the WuDang school.

The golden words are from the great masters black writing is commentary from those who have verified the way, every step.

 

Your name turtle hermit could be linked to wudang.is your name intentional or coincidence?

 

There are massive stone turtles housed in buildings with large open arches on all four sides on the mountain

Above you may have noticed the reference of turtle in its shell or snake hibernating.

 

Our systems has stories inside of stories so it is very interesting how it is all linked together.

 

Zhen Wu is one of the highest deities in the Daoist Pantheon, existing in the dimension of the seven stars (Big Dipper), displaying great power with his chest of golden armor, upright sword in hand, often sitting in a throne with the Gui She “Turtle and Snake” beneath his feet..

 

 

 

Edited August 26, 2017 by Wu Ming Jen

[mrpasserby]

'Gui She “Turtle and Snake” beneath his feet..'

Wu Ming Jen, thanks for considering us novelists in your comments. While trying to absorb the above symbology into my growing Taoist destany mural, I became confronted by two images from my current understanding.

Consider if you will that these are references to existing past destany mural understandings. 

A being standing above two creatures would represent the beings own two major talents, a being standing in front of two creatures would represent the being having two wing men or angels/spirits and their talents. 

The fact that the two creatures are a turtle and a snake would represent the two symbols used by dragons to represent themselves as being the unseen support of powerful beings such as Zhen Wu.

Does any of this symbology line up with Taoist symology in any way? Thanks! 

 

[Wu Ming Jen]

There is a lot interrelated for sure. Turtle and Snake together symbolizes spiritual Gods in traditional Chinese culture.  The Snake represents the element of metal is related to the lungs in Chinese medicine five elements theory.  
        The benefit of practicing is to maintain and protect the function of the lungs.  Snake Qi gong is to soften the body motion to help the energy flow.  This relates to a particular Chi Gung form turtle and snake

 

The reason Zhen Wu has his feet on the turtle and snake is another story of how demons posses the turtle and snake who are hurting humans. Zhen Wu defeats the demons and makes them his disciples. 

Edited August 26, 2017 by Wu Ming Jen

[turtlehermit]

Would anyone like to speak on the turtle or the Big Dipper in regards to meditation?

[mrpasserby]

3 hours ago, Wu Ming Jen said:

There is a lot interrelated for sure. Turtle and Snake together symbolizes spiritual Gods in traditional Chinese culture.  The Snake represents the element of metal is related to the lungs in Chinese medicine five elements theory.  
        The benefit of practicing is to maintain and protect the function of the lungs.  Snake Qi gong is to soften the body motion to help the energy flow.  This relates to a particular Chi Gung form turtle and snake

 

The reason Zhen Wu has his feet on the turtle and snake is another story of how demons posses the turtle and snake who are hurting humans. Zhen Wu defeats the demons and makes them his disciples. 

'The reason Zhen Wu has his feet on the turtle and snake is another story of how demons posses the turtle and snake who are hurting humans. Zhen Wu defeats the demons and makes them his disciples.'

WO Ming Jen, thanks, that is so Great you have just connected my practice with another Taoist one. In my practice we have to *defeat 6 spirits and then either replace them with better ones or repair the defeated ones and place them in positions of service.

*it is a lot more complicated process then I am menting. 

[mrpasserby]

5 minutes ago, turtlehermit said:

Would anyone like to speak on the turtle or the Big Dipper in regards to meditation?

turtlehermit, my apologies, I am learning about Taoist similarities to my philosophies, and I got carried away. I'll take it to another thread.  

[Marblehead]

41 minutes ago, turtlehermit said:

Would anyone like to speak on the turtle or the Big Dipper in regards to meditation?

Not that I would be able to participate in a discussion but I would enjoy you speaking of the significance of the turtle in Chinese culture/philosophy.

 

[oak]

On 14/08/2017 at 3:41 AM, turtlehermit said:

What are some of the main techniques in classic Taoist meditation? It would be very helpful to hear some simple explanations on some of the fundamental techniques. There are many different techniques that have been developed such as the Inner Smile and Micro Cosmic Orbit, but as I understand these are just thought forms given to processes that occur during meditation and the movement of energy through the body, and are just different ways to achieve the same goal.  Going back to the origins of Taoism, and man's essential nature, there are no words or techniques, just feelings. How did these masters meditate and achieve immortality? It is doubtful that they were practicing a wide variety of techniques and visualizations, each with their own catch phrases and number of repetitions. It is more likely that the early Taoists practiced a simple form of meditation, with little technique, just basic guidelines from experience masters, such as collecting the mind and breath in the lower dantian. What is the classic form of Taoist meditation? It would be great to hear some opinions on the basic steps. Thanks.

 

I think you'll find confirmation to your thoughts in chapter 4 of the following book

https://books.google.pt/books?id=NdwZBQAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=road+to+heaven&hl=pt-PT&sa=X&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=road to heaven&f=false

Bill Porter spent a good part of his life looking for buddhist and daoist hermits in deep China.

[Wu Ming Jen]

Revolving, rotating, moving, and changing. They are arranged in Wudang’s Heavenly Stars (big dipper), the Eight Trigram Palm (Ba Gua Zhang), Wudang’s Big Dipper Dragon-Heart Swordsmanship, Wudang’s Water-Fire Tai Ji and other physical exercises and stepping techniques equally pacing in circles and drawing circles. Everywhere these circular patterns are practiced: small circles, great arcs comprising small arcs, horizontal circles, vertical circles, oblique circle, silk reeling circles, eight shaped circles, and so on. 

 

 relaxed and tranquil, peaceful and comfortable, soft and dynamic. One must establish one’s ‘Cinnabar Field’ (Dan Tian) and the ‘Gate of Life’ (Ming Men) as the core and nucleus of movement, transformation, practice and refinement. One must regard the free-coursing of one’s qi, blood and fluids in the meridians and a strong and robust body free from disease as the first prerequisites.

 

The Big Dipper is Heaven and Earth’s Upright Qi and the universe’s energy. Through specific breathing and Dao Yin methods, the practitioner is enabled to reach harmony of one’s own energetic field with the universe’s force field. 

[Wu Ming Jen]

44 minutes ago, oak said:

 

I think you'll find confirmation to your thoughts in chapter 4 of the following book

https://books.google.pt/books?id=NdwZBQAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=road+to+heaven&hl=pt-PT&sa=X&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=road to heaven&f=false

Bill Porter spent a good part of his life looking for buddhist and daoist hermits in deep China.

Thanks for the book link I love to read. Not done yet but enjoying it. back to reading for now.

[gendao]

On 8/25/2017 at 10:21 AM, Aletheia said:

Alchemy training was never really embedded into the Chinese culture the way it is for the San. For the San the whole thing is transparent to what they know. They are the original alchemists, as well as the original human culture. Everything else is deviation.

 

Where the bushmen live was literally not even on the map in the 1940s. When they were finally discovered it was realised that their ways had remained unchanged for 10s of thousands of years. Really heaven on earth had been discovered when the bushmen were found.

 

So Taoism is great, but bushmen culture is greater!

Well, not exactly... 

 

They had apparently already become genetically (and perhaps culturally) mixed with Eurasians a whole 3000 years ago...  So, who really knows what they were originally like before that, and what influence that later, ancient mixture had on them?

Quote

evidence of western Eurasian genes in Khoisan tribes living in southern Africa. This suggests, the researchers conclude in a paper they've had published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, that a migration from the Middle East back to Africa occurred approximately 3000 years ago.

Scientists believe humans evolved from ancestral primates in Africa several hundred thousand years ago, but it wasn't until approximately 65,000 years ago that they made their way out of Africa and into the Middle East and eventually the rest of the world.

researchers have found evidence of Eurasian genes in tribespeople who were thought to have a purely African ancestry.

Until now, they were believed to have the purest African gene pool due to their thousands of years of isolationist practices.

they've found what they believe to have been a migration back into Africa by people of the Middle East (ancestors of the people that migrated to Europe and Asia) approximately 3000 years ago. Those people made their way to various parts of the continent, including a part of eastern Africa from which the Khoisan tribespeople had migrated south approximately 900 and 1800 years ago.

It IS an interesting comparison though...because of their deep cultural and even physical similarities, appearance-wise. 

The question is if they started out like that...or if it was from the later mixture?

Edited August 27, 2017 by gendao

[Mudfoot]

14 hours ago, turtlehermit said:

Would anyone like to speak on the turtle or the Big Dipper in regards to meditation?

You might find that when you go from theory (or myth/story/Classic)  to the actual method to practice to feel what is spoken about, sooner or later you will get a response in the vincinity of :

 

This is precious information in my tradition. Please find a teacher qualified to teach his/her lineage, so you can learn that which that tradition can offer, which will include what you are asking for but in a context where you might have optimal use for it. 

[9th]

 

 

 

 

[turtlehermit]

On 8/26/2017 at 6:46 PM, Marblehead said:

Not that I would be able to participate in a discussion but I would enjoy you speaking of the significance of the turtle in Chinese culture/philosophy.

 

Well I don't know much, and that's a vast topic, but generally speaking I understand it to be a symbol of longevity and peace. It's interesting to note how the turtle's breathing is emulated in Taoist techniques, and how it utilizes the lower dantian. I'd love to learn more about it. Although ofcourse learning is discouraged. 

 

14 hours ago, Mudfoot said:

You might find that when you go from theory (or myth/story/Classic)  to the actual method to practice to feel what is spoken about, sooner or later you will get a response in the vincinity of :

 

This is precious information in my tradition. Please find a teacher qualified to teach his/her lineage, so you can learn that which that tradition can offer, which will include what you are asking for but in a context where you might have optimal use for it. 

That seems to be the brick wall. I've gone to many teachers and unfortunately in today's world most have an unreasonable fee for teaching. I believe true knowledge should be free and the world is at a point where we need all we can get for a more peaceful planet. It is a compassionate thing to share any grain of wisdom with a sincere student. A master who is not interested in personal gain, but teaches for the benefit of all, is worthy of listening to. If you know of any please let me know.