Urban Daoist in English

Searching, Finding, and Accepting (by Henning)

2010-10-29T13:34:00.000-07:00

here is another text from one of my students :

Henning says :

I want to share my story that started around 30 years ago. As a boy, I was very dreamy and I am still that boy I guess.

I loved to make up stories for myself and put them into my reality about trolls, sorcerers, and the rest of the supernatural. I also was a very adventurous kid and a lot of things that I did I realize was not always something that my parents would appreciate ;)

If they only knew………….

You can say that I loved feeling the adrenalin. The only thing that seemed to calm me was all the time me and my family spent outdoors, in the mountains especially .Outdoors I could run around barefoot and feel the wind and weather touch my skin. I just loved the nature. It made me feel free and very much alive. Here I could talk to the animals and summon strong winds and thunder without anyone laughing at me. I could also be the hunter that fought off evil spirits like trolIs, ghosts and the undead.

Living in a small apartment in Oslo I was brought up in a family with Christian values and morale. Therefore, until I was 8 years old the Sunday church was something of a must and not something I really wanted to do. I just did not like the Church. Anyway I think it’s around this age I became more aware of an inner uneasiness that was difficult to handle and understand. Something I felt……..was missing.

My parents divorced when I was 8 years old so me and my brother moved to a new place and continued school. My period before high school was very up and down. There was always someone that wanted to bully me because I did well at school and always did what my teachers asked me to do.

Up to now I actually did not like to fight because I did not like to hurt people. Well, at least that was my excuse. But I loved martial arts and starting training Shotokan karate. Strange…loved martial arts and at the same time not liking to hit people. This was definitely going to become a problem ;) The karate period that lasted until I was almost 27 heavily influenced on how I confronted things. Around the age of 13 my karate teacher was fed up that I was not able to apply my techniques in fighting. I actually was pretty good but I had made myself to believe that I was some kind of make love and not war kind of person. Well, my teacher killed that vision of myself in about 30 minutes of beating at the dojo. Probably not the best or healthiest way to teach a kid to strike back, but something woke up in me that would not take crap from people anymore. Actually, at the age of 13 I knocked the air out of my teachers that were 10 years older than me. That moment felt really good !!!!!!! The downside to how I was taught in the dojo made me quite headstrong and from there on I confronted anything with force, even writing essays at school.

So high school started and here it’s where I started to struggle a lot with the language subjects making it very difficult for me to excel in courses of chemistry and biology that I really liked. It was not the easiest part of my younger days….but strong support from my mum and my share will of not wanting to give up I finished high school with just mediocre grades and lots of frustration. I started the university, but found out early that this was not something I should do right now and therefore I joined the military. I simply loved the military. I was back in something I felt was right. Being a part of a recon team that hunted for enemy tanks to destroy was just a lot of fun!!!! Even though I was very content in the military it did not settle the uneasiness that I felt for real the first time at the age around 6-8.

I went back to the university and continued my studies. I tried out several martial arts in addition to my karate training. Thought that I could learn real sword fighting at the kendo school but after I had almost wacked the head off a senior student and was told that I could not strike people that turned their head away from me I realized that kendo was not for me….how the hell can you say that you are practicing the art of the sword when the natural laws of battle are not allowed……go and figure.

Well, after been training karate for such a long time I was rather fed up with the politics in karate and started to train Brazilian jujutsu. This I loved. It was soft and strong and at the same time people there were interested to learn and gave the shit about politics. Yeah, politics in martial arts it’s just a sorry excuse for not using their energy on training how to fight…they are just very much scared of the reality…that people do get hit !!!!

After I finished my master degree in biochemistry I was lucky enough to get the opportunity to apply for the special forces…finally I thought that I could learn more about myself. Luckily my good friend Arne whispered something in my ear that changed my view on going into the special forces……It was truly a fun selection period, but I realized that my way was not in the special forces. It was somewhere else……

So instead a good friend of mine offered me to take a PhD in Chemistry and that I did. I do not regret that for a moment.

I started to read books about the internal arts….this started to catch my eye…a system with inner alchemy….the possibility to evolve just made want to find a teacher. Before this I had been very fortunate enough to visit China several times, but no teacher that I met had the fighting arts or the skills in inner alchemy. Finally, I came by the book, Esoteric Warriors, authored by Alex Kozma. In the introduction of the book he has a paragraph about a teacher that is lineage holder to the very old daoist system called Ziranmen. Just something about Ziranmen made me want to meet Serge Augier and see who he really was. I started to get an idea what I was really looking for. It was not only a fighting system but something that could balance ME. Something that could help me find myself……I was frustrated of not being able to tell myself….who am I and what do I really want in life? So off me and my brother went to meet Serge. We were greeted by Serge at his home and after a short introduction about ourselves we were given single man exercises and partner drills for two whole days. We were allowed to ask all kind of questions and a lot were quite stupid (sorry Serge…)…Lot of the questions we asked seemed very easy for Serge to answer and for us to understand…he simply just hit us from all kind of angles and distances and it was beautiful…Funny how pain can be such a liberating and pedagogical factor.

Finally we had met a person that could apply the internal arts for real (Well now you know the story behind the pandas that Arne me). Besides the obvious that we had found a person that knew the fighting arts there were something else that made us want to meet Serge again…..I just seemed right…sounds maybe a bit corny, but that’s what it felt. Still it took a couple of years under the tutelage of Serge Augier before you actually started to understand what the daoist system is all about………

Over the years with my teacher you realize that what you were looking for all those years is your Way. The way you want to live your life and evolve until you pass on. And after having searched and found the Way it’s a small thing that need to be solved…….you need to accept your Way and take the deep plunge. Now that I had found my way you believe that it is very easy to just jump into the practice…but it’s not. I have my demons of laziness and bewilderment that just removes your attention from your Way. Women, partying, fighting etc you name it it’s all a part of the confusion package.

Six years has gone by and I realize that it takes time for the Way to be accepted by you. Funny…..your own ego makes it difficult to accept change. You should think that changes that are for the better would be accepted by yourself quite easily. It’s like something deep inside of me is just afraid of going into to the unknown…….To accept the big changes. Well, for me the big changes came through the break up with my girlfriend and confrontations in my life that needed to be solved. The big changes forced upon my daily life have somehow released me and made me accept my Way…..it’s a voyage were I will experience new things all the time….It’s an adventure beyond what I have found anywhere else !!!!! The uneasiness has started to fade and I finally start to feel the sensation of freedom. Funny enough after been so many places to find the cool thing in life it’s always been with me. It’s actually just YOU nothing else. It is only about YOUR perception of the world and how you decide to be a part of it. There are actually no boundaries to what you can do, just YOU!!!! Ain’t that cool……

To my fellow brothers and sisters I can only give a most humble advice….Let Go and enjoy the wonders of your Way.

Henning

THE REAL DEAL! from Arne

2010-10-20T13:46:00.000-07:00

"Here is a text from one of my student and friend Arne.

it's always motivating to read about other people story.

Enjoy, Serge"

Yesterday I stood in a forest close to my home training Tai Chi when it HIT me…

I`m doing IT.

I am finally training an internal art for REAL!! I had to pinch my forearm.

Mind you, this was not a new discovery. I guess one can understand something in theory, and then there is a different understanding when you understand it physically. And put together it makes another level of understanding.. and so on.

But understanding is one thing and appreciating it for what it really is ..is another. I guess the more you understand it, the more you will appreciate it.

A LITTLE BACKGROUND HISTORY

I was born as far north in Norway as you can possibly travel. The winters are harsh with no light whatsoever. Between December and February there is no sign of the sun. But then again you have the sun 24hrs in summertime. The midnight sun.

My mother said I was very kind as a child, but was very hot tempered. So I guess I hit my head a bit too much during those early childhood years. University was out of the question. They used to tie me with a dog leash to the house, so I wouldn`t run too far and hurt myself.

I was very physical and had a lot of energy like most kids do. I guess I was a bit extreme as a kid, and still are (although we will try to balance that now). I loved cross country skiing, and in the winter time my father would have to run after me and force me back into the house after dark. I was 6yrs and went ballistic if anyone tried to stop me from becoming a famous skier.

When I was 9 yrs old, we moved to a small town near Oslo. Having a funny northern dialect, other kids would tease me. Being very hot tempered, I got into a lot of fights. But soon the older and bigger boys respected me and I didn`t have to fight that much. I lacked the understanding of the phrase “to give up”, and they simply gave up fighting me. Not because I was any good at it, but I guess they were afraid that they had to kill me to make me yield. And I guess they would have to kill me to make me surrender.

We never heard of martial arts back then. We had only heard of western boxing and greek roman wrestling, and if you didn`t train soccer, some of us, including myself, did cross country skiing. I remember running for up to 2 hrs straight with some adults in my club when I was only 10 yrs old. We didn`t have X-box back then (we had to do something).

My parents got divorced when I was 13, and I stayed with my father together with my younger brother Trond and my two year older sister Anne. My father was never home, so we had to manage on our own. This was not too unusual for me, since I had been working in the farm fields since I was 9 every summer and fall to be able to buy my own skies and running shoes etc.

But my sister became addicted to drugs, and every now and then I would have to throw people twice my age out of our “house” that I found in our living-room smoking hashish and other drugs. It was not easy for any of us. I guess my running helped me to stay away from trouble.

When I was 14 yrs old I was at this party with some classmates. It was in this lonely house in “nowhereland” with just one lonely gravelled road leading up to it. In the end of the evening I walked home together with a girl from my school. It was really dark and no streetlights.

A car came towards us and stopped. 4 “big” guys in their early/mid twenties jumped out and started to threaten us with baseball bats and iron chains. I wanted to run, cause I knew none of them would be able to catch me. But I couldn`t since I would then leave the young girl alone. So I took her hand and tried to negotiate with the gang. This was useless and they were really aggressive towards us. I was skinny and was no match for any of them, but we were saved by the bell when some adults came up the road, and the gang jumped back in their car and sped off.

It was just good old fashion luck that saved that evening. And it was so humiliating to not be able to do anything. I did not want this ever to happen again. I think that for the first time in my life I felt really scared.

If there was any martial art clubs in my area at that time, I would probably have started early the next morning. But since we didn`t have any, I just continued running. I stopped skiing because I couldn`t afford it.

When I was around 18 yrs old, I read a little book on different martial arts. There was very little written stuff on internal arts, just a small chapter on around 3 pages. But this sounded too cool to be true. To be able to work on energies called qi sounded magical ( and still do ). When I talked about it to others, most of them would shake their heads and called it superstitious. I believed in it and thought it sounded quite logical, and a hell lot easier to believe in than the bible (that for some odd reason half the world think is a fact).

I really wanted to learn some of this, but as time went by, I got the understanding that this would be impossible. Finding an internal arts teacher was like looking for the needle in the haystack (a haystack with the size of China). And IF you should be so lucky to find one, he would probably not teach you any big secrets if you weren`t asian. Being asian alone wouldn`t help you. The needle in the haystack is one thing, the next challenge would be that you had to be born “in the needle in the haystacks home as his son”.

Ok! So I gave up this idea and continued running until my knees screamed at me:” STOP running you idiot!” in a really painful manner. So I stopped. I was 23. I was among the top 7-8 long distance runners in my country as a junior, and it was depressing to have to give in because of injuries. Today I am really glad I stopped.

Then I moved to Oslo, and Oslo had some martial art clubs, so I started with karate. I didn`t know much about karate, but I thought that at least I would be training something to develop good coordination and balance. It was through karate that I first met Henning and Henrik. They were in their early teens then.

I remember asking one of my karate teachers if the school had any methods for developing qi.

He scratched his head, looked a bit confused, but answered boldly:” Yes, I think so, but only the old and advanced students are allowed to train it”. I asked if it wouldn`t be better if one started with this kind of training as soon as possible (stupid me, I thought it would take many years to develop qi ). He then said that these were secrets in the school and only the most advanced and trusted students were allowed to train it with the master. Ok?

Some years later I asked a 5^th degree black belt the same question. He told me that his master had not yet shown him anything, but lately he had opened more up to him and started to show him a lot more..bla..bla..bla..

So a 5^th degree blackbelt in his mid 40s wasn`t trusted to get the healthy training of qigong?? Come ooon !!

That was it for me. I stopped training karate. I was 29 yrs old and my hips yelled out loud to me ”STOP this for heaven`s sake” in a really painful way. So I stopped.

I had been training a Japanese traditional weapon school for around 20 yrs, when I was asked by an Tae Kwon Do teacher to teach sword to his group once a month. I asked him WHY? He said that many beginners were asking if they had some weapon training in their system, and since they hadn`t any, he thought it would be good with some Japanese sword training once a month. Mind you, they had all the rest. Everything from high to low kicks, and they did meditation too. Oh yeah! Two times a week, before training started, they all sat down on their knees and shut their eyes for as long as a whole minute. These people were hmm.. really into it.

I had by this started my career in the police force, and I was now working as a diver in the nations anti terrorist force. This was fun. I soon became involved as an instructor in hand-to-hand combat in our troop. It had to be simple, without any fancy pansy tricks.

Because of all my hip problems I had to stop this career after 6 yrs, and started to work as a bodyguard for the royal family. I was still very able, but had a lot of pain in my whole body these years. I now still work as a bodyguard, but spend most my days instructing the younger bodyguards in shooting, tactics and hand to hand combat.

I had some contact with Henning during the period when I was working on the Hostage Rescue Team. He was applying to get into the Special Forces in the military and wanted me to be his reference. I was glad to do this. During our talks around the Special Forces, he told me about his and Henrik`s trips to China. They had found a teacher in Tai Chi, and had stopped their karate career (thank heaven for that!!). It turned out that this teacher in China wasn`t the real deal, but this was the start of their search for a good teacher.

I could feel Henning`s desire towards the internal arts, and I think I talked him out of doing something serious about the special forces. He got through the whole intake and was ready to start when it hit him that this wasn`t such a good idea after all. There is a huge difference to work in a hostage rescue team than joining a special force in the army. It is much more difficult to keep to your values in a war situation, than if your job is to get rid off the bad guys who threaten to kill innocent people, like in a hijacked airplane for instance. Besides, it would really take its tool on your body carrying 60kg backpacks for 10 yrs or so, and throwing yourself on your knees to the ground every day (with that same 60kg backpack AND heavy armour and weapon). Not to forget the emotional scars you get from being in wars.

I have no emotional scars from my job (or little), because we had a normal life between the fighting, and we were the good guys remember. The situations when we had to shoot someone were pretty much black and white. In war they are most of the time pretty grey.

These were gooood years, I tell you.

But if I had the choice back then, and if I knew that the needle in the haystack was in Paris, I would easily have traded all those good years in to be able to start my journey earlier.

YES!! THERE ARE PANDA BEARS IN NORWAY!!

Around 7 yrs ago, I got a phone call from Henrik and Henning, telling me to come over to Hennings apartment because they had something to show me. Actually I didn`t have the time that day, but I went anyway.

We were standing on the outside of Henning`s place, and the guys were eagerly showing me techniques that some professor in Paris had shown them… JAAAWWN!!!???

I told them just to stop it actually. I wasn`t interested. I was living in a relationship with an awful lady who tormented me everyday. And at this time I was afraid of ending this awful relationship by getting myself into another “hobby” that would make her complain even more.

And for me it had to be something more than learning some new tricks. It had to be more than a martial art for me to start all over again. This better be good.

Henrik pulled of his T-shirt and showed me all his bruises and blue marks. He was smiling so wide that you could probably see the teeth in the back of his scull. Henning did the same thing. And they stood there like two smiling runaway panda bears. How they got through customs looking like that is a mystery.

It didn`t convince me, but in the end I got tired of all the “tryinghard togetmetogotoPariswhining”, so I went just to shut them up actually.

It was a real pleasure to meet Serge, and I soon found myself flying through mid air in his apartment and landing on the floor behind his sofa (my rooting wasn`t going to be the headlines in Guinness books of Records that year either). I woke up with Serge standing over me with a grin that would make Las Vegas look blunt. “You like this technique?” or something like that, he said.

He was showing me An from Tai Chi.

I was convinced enough to start my training, but it was not before a couple of years later when we participated in one of his seminars in French Countryside, that we started to understand what we had gotten ourselves into.

This was an internal school.

Holy crappers..

Henning and Henrik had found the needle in the haystack, and the name of the place was Paris. The professor was a nice young man who spoke perfectly good English and was eager to teach someone with a good intention to learn.

What more can you ask for? Really! Not even language barriers.

After some months of training every day, I went for my annual physical check up. I do this every year, since the doctors found out that I had rheumatism (ankylosing spondylitis) about 8 yrs ago. My back was getting stiffer, and they could see some change in the bone structure in my x-rays.

But when I went this time, the doctor shock her head and she said:

”Strange thing has happened Arne… hmm .. seems like your lower back is getting more flexible.. and this never happens with patience with your disease”.

I told her that I was training Tai Chi every day now, and that I felt much better, except for some really painful hips.

OH THOSE HIPS HURT!!

2 yrs ago, I changed my old hips out with some really nice new metal implants. After and between surgery, I couldn`t train standing up. This was no problem, because Serge had given me exercises to do in bed as I was healing.

Amazing stuff.

I didn`t miss one day of training in this period. Although I must admit that the first time I did shen gong after surgery (yes, right after I woke up), my head was spinning so much from the morphine that we can hardly call it shen gong (I saw pink pandas everywhere). But I could do my physical training.

The doctors were amazed of how fast I recovered. I trained 4 times 1hr every day with the exercises they gave me, and still did 2-3 hrs of the wai gong, chi gong, and shen gong.

I was back to work 100% after 4 weeks after the last surgery. 6 months later I passed the physical tests for the bodyguards (we have annual tests in shooting, medical skills and a lot of physical tests including 3000m run, and 400m run were you finish with lifting a guy of around 85 kg up on your shoulders and carry/running with that load to the finish line another 30m more). And of course a lot of other tests as well.

STILL A BIT DROWSY

Time goes by, and as it does, one easily slips into a zombie state of mind. It is so easy to get back into those daily habits, and forget about what you set out to do in the first place.

But slowly I feel like I am starting to wake up again. As I stand in this wonderful forest it hits me in a different way than before. This is what everyone wants to learn.

Who DOESN`T want to learn about life, health, the mind and how everything works together?

Who doesn`t want to be free?

I AM really doing it.

It IS real, and I have an opportunity to make a very important change in my life now.

It will NOT be easy, and it will take time.

But it WILL be beautiful. I pinch my arm once again..

Yess.. It is Real

Blowing on a Violin

2010-05-24T07:25:00.000-07:00

Teaching can be rather like talking into empty space, or like talking in public when the possibilities of being heard are slim.

It is not out of nastiness or through a lack of interest that the pupil does not listen, since in general it the pupil’s own will that has led him or her to seek to hear. However, any teaching has to pass through certain filters:

- Acceptance by the pupil’s ego

- Limits imposed by the pupil’s prejudices

- The pupil’s capacities for comprehension

- The quality of the pupil’s attention

These four “riders of the apocalypse” will pose certain challenges to the ease with which information can pass.

Whenever information directly threatens the omnipotence of the pupil’s ego, or confronts the fundamental values of his or her person, the information will be transformed, or even ignored.

Whenever the lesson goes against what the pupil has fantasised about practice, the information it contains will not bet through, or very little, being transformed along the way.

Any information that is to be received will pass by way of the filter of the intellect. If the intellect is limited or if it occupies to important a place within the pupil’s mental activity, the teaching will be unable to penetrate.

With the spirit perpetually stimulated by what the modern world offers, one’s capacity for attention is often very restricted. The “zapping” of the news, superficial forms of knowledge, and the constant boredom that goes with these do not encourage the development of openness towards the world.

The capacity to grasp a lesson is rather like lighting up an object with the beam of a torch:

The torch must be working (intellect available and disposed), it must be pointed in the right direction (towards the instructor or teacher), it must illuminate for a sufficiently long tie the same spot (focused attention), and the object of study must not be obscured by an obstacle (the wall of the ego).

If these different elements are united, then information can easily be grasped.

Teaching often means furtively pointing an oil lamp towards a wall which is concealing an object buried in the passageways of prejudices.

But if one keep’s one’s bearings, if one perseveres, little by little the lesson will become clear.

And this is what constitutes the joy of teaching: seeing a pupil progressively grasp what is obvious to the teacher; finding the other in a shared knowledge, and observing that there is a genuine unity in knowledge.

This communion partakes not of the domain of the intellect, but more broadly of the conscious experience of humanity.

What needs to be accepted is that the understanding of a lesson represents only a small part of the process. It is an illusion to believe that what is known is also understood. If it is not “directed” by a lived, felt, visceral experience, knowledge remains nothing but a collection of concepts lacking practical application… as useful as a stamp collection.

Some will be tempted, in order to understand a subject better, to get distracted by alternative ways; others will fail to get far… but will come out of it with a nice stamp collection at least.

One also has to be honest: there are those who are happy to “know”, but who are not happy in their practice. This is honourable in its way, but it needs to be borne in mind that practice alone is transformative. It is not the acquisition of a slimming product that makes one thinner, even if one knows about dieting; rather it is the effort linked to the process.

Teaching is marvellous but it requires one not to be rushed.

The return of the good weather permits one to benefit from a strong energy. Let us therefore make the most of it by training to be more-than-ever present to the reality of daily practice.

In order to practise well, it is advisable not to forget one’s first lessons, not to underestimate one’s capacity for transformation, and to find an openness from within the imbroglio of one’s own prejudices.

Happy practice, one and all!

To walk in step with the world, one must learn to walk alone

2010-05-16T13:34:00.000-07:00

For this year of the tiger, let’s review together a short summary of our practice.

The teaching method and its traps.

The five factors in practising:

At the outset it is necessary to find a way of practising individually. The ancient texts cite for us several criteria that must be met: it is indeed necessary to find a Way, a Teacher, a Group – and all this in a time-frame and a space that suit our personal stage of development.

From the start one needs to engage with the teaching that one has chosen. Whether this is the fruit of an encounter or of an active search, it needs to correspond to one’s need.

It is useful, for example, to be aware of the origin of any spiritual path before stepping down it. If this path is one of renunciation or of religious isolation, it is unlikely to be compatible with the civic life of anyone who has a job.

It may be hard to verify this fact, but techniques for spiritual relaxation which consist in withdrawal from the world are unlikely to prove effective when urban life needs to be confronted.

It is important to find a path, or way, which ties in with one’s lifestyle.

Say what you like, it is just not practical to be obliged to wear orange clothes every day of one’s life…

Having chosen the Way, it is necessary to find the teacher.

A teacher who is a scholar may well be capable of discoursing upon and teaching the texts of the way, but a teacher needs to be more than a scholar… he needs to have practised what he is teaching; better yet, he should still be practising.

If one day you go into the mountains in some remote region, you will be more inclined to choose a local guide who is familiar with the terrain than some erudite individual who has written a book about the region…

A teacher must be not only an accomplished practitioner, since the fact that it is working for him does not necessarily make him a good teacher and does not guarantee that he is able to pass on his knowledge.

The teacher should ideally be someone who is happy and who has followed the teaching that he is now transmitting; who lives according to his chosen Way. And it is preferable that he still be practising actively.

It is important also when following the Way, that one’s fellow practitioners, male and female, get on well together and that the group dynamic be one of open exchange rather than of competition.

It is impossible that everyone should be friends, but an “entente cordiale” should at least prevail. A member of a group who is unable to integrate will never feel right; a group which contains individuals who perturb it will not develop well.

The three elements necessary for healthy individual practice are now in place.

What needs to be added to this is the component of space/time: it has to be the right moment and the right place.

When the conditions are favourable, then one needs to plunge in, get involved, invest oneself.

It is important to realise one’s luck in finding a practice for self-discovery which one enjoys, and to be responsible enough to take it seriously.

The chance to question oneself: a way towards the real

Questions about the human condition, a refusal to settle for slim rewards, the desire to know one’s true place in the world – these are all good reasons for entering into the Way.

In fact, all expectations, even the most misdirected, are good ways to be prompted into a personal search.

One’s initial expectation, which is always a fantasy, needs to be overcome through serious practice. The reason why one starts to follow a teaching is always a bad one – without fail. But this is a truth which reveals itself only in the course of practising.

Daily practice helps the dispelling of illusions and the gaining of a better perception of what is real.

One’s perceptions are always coloured by one’s prejudices and emotions: there is no such thing as an extrinsic perception.

Whatever the stimulations to one’s senses, that are then interpreted inwardly, these amount to merely what one accepts that one should see.

Look at the way one’s mood and feelings are able to change how one takes a compliment, an insult, or a piece of news.

Through balanced practice, one can eliminate a significant part of one’s prejudices and thus perceive the real world more correctly.

This meeting with reality is a journey that can only be undertaken alone, since sensations are uniquely internal.

Practice means learning how to train

It is important to understand that practice requires discipline – but a discipline that is joyous and enthusiastic.

This discipline should not be forced, but discovered through the benefits gained by direct experience, through one’s daily engagement with the Way.

The path that leads to self-knowledge leads also toward whatever is not of the self, toward the world, and toward sharing; but the inner work needs to be undertaken alone.

One’s relation with what is other than the self – with the other – will have an enormous impact on one’s relation to oneself.

The most important thing is to be enthusiastic about one’s daily practice, and to seek for an intimacy with every aspect of the Way.

The accumulation of knowledge without the work of assimilation that takes place in daily practice adds up to nothing: only direct experience, itself linked to an acting-out, has value for the practitioner.

Just do it..! For it is only in doing it that “it works”.

The teacher shows the Way, the practitioner does all the rest

It is clear that the role of the master, of the teacher, is cardinal: he gives the information that reveals the method and gives corrections which assist the pupil to practise properly.

What is more, if the teacher is a “good” teacher, he always has an answer to his pupils’ questions.

The teacher need not be erudite when it comes to practice, but it may be that he likes to be well informed about matters of the Way. The teacher should not just be a good practitioner himself, but needs to have passed through the stages that he is himself teaching.

The advantage of a teaching that has its roots in antiquity is that it has had a chance to grow through information and responses gathered over time, which help make it adaptable to all and sundry.

What the teacher gives should always be in proportion to what is being requested, following the principle of equilibrium.

But be careful with the role you ascribe to the teacher. He should not be permitted to obscure the importance of the pupil’s own common sense, or the pupil’s responsibilities towards his or her daily life. While he should be available, the teacher is not there to shoulder the pupil’s burdens or to organise a daily crèche. Yet if the teacher does not know the pupil personally, how will he ever be able to help him?

The Fantasy of Three Types of Laziness

In our tradition, there is talk of three types of laziness: “grumbling, loitering, and pretension”.

Grumbling, moaning, and making a running commentary should be forgone in favour of practice.

But careful: it’s not a matter of bottling everything up or of withholding communication from one’s fellow practitioners or one’s teacher… Most important is not to go round in circles complaining about false problems, while all the time looking to be reassured.

Life is not a reassuring experience, and nor is the Way.

“Loitering” is a friendly way of saying “sulking”. Despite being aware that practice is doing one good, one may fail to practise, assured of one’s own intellectual and physical superiority.

This is fair enough, in that everyone is free to do what he wants. But if one does not practise, then it’s not going to work out. One will sooner or later find oneself in a deep and dark abyss, mired within one’s fantasy of greatness and unable to respond to whatever the world is offering.

And then there is pretension…

This is the most devious form of laziness: one tries to come more frequently to class but only in order to “seize upon” titbits of information (maybe a secret that slips from the teacher’s lips when he’s a bit distracted!); or one tries to read on the subject of practice, to swot up on what others are doing and verify that it’s not better than what one is up to oneself; one debates and changes one’s mind; one weighs things up and undermines the Way, wasting one’s time in doing so – but subtly.

So subtle is the method that sometimes one notices nothing whatsoever, and it is possible to get away with this throughout one’s journey on the Way if one fails to broach the subject with one’s teacher… The Way which, as a result, will offer only a superficial form of knowledge.

One of the founding concepts of our tradition is that of the natural cycles: Everything in good time.

Even with the best teacher in the world and with all the qualities of an ideal student, time is going to be of the essence.

There can be no real practice without digestion of what is being taught: the time of learning is what permits the passage to real practice, but one needs to be capable of making what has been learned one’s own.

The Way is a path for life which helps one to understand oneself, to encounter the other with openness, and to go with the changes happening in the world around.

It needs to be accepted that nobody – nobody – can do this work on the pupil’s behalf.

As it is stated in the Daozhang:

“Not to practise when one knows the Way is idiotic;

To train too much is a way of avoiding life and its responsibilities;

To seek through 50 ways is the way to ensure certain impasse.”

Usus Magister Est Optimus.

Simplicity in practice

2010-05-10T14:41:00.001-07:00

Busy training: practice or distraction?

It too often happens that under disguise of daily training one is amusing oneself more than practising. Indeed, the exercises which suit us are often those which amuse us while those which disturb us are ignored. When one follows this tendency one runs into a mental complexity and confusion that is draining on the spirit.

But what is one really doing when one is training?

Avoiding issues and real questioning, one may even be feeling from reality…

What is the goal of practice?

What are we doing when practising?

Needless to say, a frank discussion with one’s teacher can help…

It is not important to know the goal of the exercises one is practising, in that this does not help one to progress more rapidly; rather practising becomes simpler if it retains something spontaneous and natural.

Learning and practising

It is not possible to practise without learning. Nor is it possible to practise properly without learning from one’s teacher. But it has to be understood that neither learning nor practising is in itself the goal of teaching.

What one is aiming for in learning, and then in practising, is a rediscovery of freedom, spontaneity, naturalness.

The fact of “learning” spontaneity and “naturalness” is a very Taoist paradox…

To be constantly learning new things has a meaning only if one is practising, otherwise it constitutes a distraction.

Practising without following right through on what one is being taught means limiting the depth of the teaching.

But learning and practising without going towards an embrace of a certain form of freedom is a waste of one’s time.

This liberation, this “formlessness”, is rooted in the precision of one’s practice.

Spontaneity and naturalness, if they depend on one’s confused perception of worldly things, are merely illusory. Perceptions reach consciousness only after passing through the filters offered by our egos and our unexplored psyches… One’s perception of reality is anything but a matter for cheering, as things are at present.

The three elements of training (learning, practice, and liberation) are the “three treasures”, and are in relation with the three inner treasures: Jing (essence), Qi (energy), and Shen (spirit).

Simplicity in practice: San Bao

You have a collection of one thousand and one exercises; for my part I have ten times that number; but the whole stack obeys a simple logic:

“The study of the Three Unities permits oneness and full consciousness with the goal of a perception of changes in reality”

To sum up: an understanding of the three parts will permit one to unite one’s body and one’s spirit.

What are the three parts which need to be worked (for those who are having trouble following)?

- The body

- Energy

- Sprit

The body: relaxed, strong, and grounded

Work on the body is above all work on one’s health. One can work only when in good health, especially as practice makes demands on one’s time. Good health is expressed in three ways:

- Relaxation: leading to a easy circulation of organic fluids. It can be tested and educated first and foremost by coordination

- Strength: leading to a body which is resistant to aggressions coming both from without and from within. It can be developed by the “wai gong”, external exercises

- Grounding: leading to a capacity to understand Reality. It can be developed in several ways…

The circulation of energies: fluid exchanges

A fluid circulation is the source of good health, physical and mental, and requires that one go somewhat further than mere relaxation of the body. There exist three important stages in the “nei gong”:

- Coming to consciousness of inner sensations

- Mobilisation through will power

- Natural and fully conscious exchanges

Consciousness of the spirit: present but unconcerned

Failure to know oneself is the source of a constant distress; yet it is the rare person who is what he thinks himself to be. Exercises in taking consciousness of the spirit exist so as to help one to identify and encounter the person one really is. There are, of course, three stages:

- Self-observation

- Observation of the world

- Global perception

It is futile to hope to comprehend everything immediately, but it is advisable to examine one’s practice to see if it contains these three parts.

Once again, an honest exchange with one’s teacher is the origin of clear-minded practice.

The natural state: learning, practice, and freedom

In any practice that is complete and enlightened, little by little the exercises will be understood in their precision, and from the mastery of them freedom will be allowed to emerge.

Freedom demands a certain structure, it demands a spontaneity nourished by properly educated relaxation, an intuition fed by knowledge… with the ensemble opening out onto naturalness.

Practice is not contained in a particular movement or way of breathing. Yet without learning this movement or this way of breathing, there can be no practice… Hence the paradox.

- Exercises in the arts of combat are not combat

- Exercises in coordination are not relaxation

- Exercises in inner alchemy are not alchemy

- Exercises in Qigong are not an exchange

- Exercises in meditation have nothing to do with the meditative state

There must be no confusion.

In conclusion, therefore, understand the following:

“The entire putting into practice of one’s teaching must go in the direction of relaxation of the body, of circulation of energy, and of settling of the spirit – and at times the three together. You cannot practise without an awareness of this. Having achieved this awareness you are already in the simplicity of the Way.”

The Devil’s Greatest Ruse

2010-05-09T13:19:00.000-07:00

There exists a danger in practising that can become a source of time-wasting, though natural enough as a phenomenon. If one’s adherence to the Way allows one to develop one’s body, one’s spirit, and one’s general circulation, it may also develop one’s ego. This inflation of the ego may well pose problems, and can even thwart one’s evolution.

The worst thing that can happen is for one to believe that one has understood, to feel as if one has well and truly arrived. By definition, the Way is an endless journey, a limitless evolution.

It can happen that as one perceives an increase in one’s strength, one finds oneself transformed into a threatening idiot; just as it is possible that as one achieves a feeble grasp of some minor point of practice, one can be metamorphosed into a mouthpiece spouting presumptuous expressions.

The Way is a school of life that permits an improved exchange with others and lets one embrace a joyous life as well as benefit from a deepened apprehension of changes in the World… It is not a “factory for producing pompous fools”.

You, engaged practitioner, do not let your ego carry you towards the dark side of the Way, do not let your mind draw you towards the trivial nastiness of vanity, resist any “dirty foolishness” which already has more than its fair share of proponents.

It is possible to feel oneself truly changed thanks to practice, yet this change is not always an end in itself… it is a passage. These successive passages are going to lead you towards a clearer consciousness of yourself. This process is not necessarily to the taste of your mind or of your ego; it directly threatens your worldly masks and deceptions.

The best defence against this is to let yourself believe that you have arrived, that the Way holds no more secrets for you, that you are coming close to achievement…

Here’s news for you: total achieving never happens!

We are often taken up with our daily worries and only rarely are we even partially conscious of this. But thanks to practice of the Way it can happen to us to taste moments of union and completeness. Trying to achieve is a method in which the proportions are inversed, which is to say that it encourages one to continue to operate with what remains of the idea that one formerly had.

The more you get used to practising, and the stronger you become, the more important it becomes to be conscious of the significance of relations with others. It is in your relation to the world that you express your capacity for the Way in your life, not in your own head or in the privacy of your cellar.

It is important in daily life to make the most of the benefits of the Way so as not to let “fellow travellers” put you off. Yet it is far from indispensable to show yourself as disdainful, pompous, or full of yourself.

What we are practising is a Way for life, a practical teaching which allows one to make the most of changes in the world and with others. One learns to ignore superficial worldly satisfactions, while judging the quality of one’s development through one’s relation to others.

In this Spring season, when energy is strong and often hard to control, it is easier to spot one’s inappropriate behaviour, when it is vain or overly critical.

The anger and frustration that it is possible to feel towards everyone and everything, the feeling of difference of superiority, all the phenomena linked to one’s figure as “me the practitioner” – the whole lot is rooted in our weaknesses and fears.

In this state of ego inflation, nothing can evolve, nothing can develop. It is possible to remain for years in such a state, and it is also possible to decide once and for all that one is right… from which time it becomes impossible to progress.

Often it is very hard to know where one has got to, to regard oneself without prejudice, even when everyone around one is perfectly aware what is happening. In the Way, this is the job of the teacher, yet one still needs to be capable of speaking to him…

Baudelaire has written: “The greatest ruse of the devil is to make us believe that he does not exist”. So do not let ourselves be tempted by the dark side of our minds.

Practise with an exemplary openness and freedom, observe your relation with others, the masks and the deceptions that take hold, the emotions projected onto an often innocent environment. No longer accept to allow yourself to be dominated by a jealous ego or a fearful mind: react, and step onto the long road that leads nowhere…

“The Way must be practised in a Cycle (of jing) to be understood,

It is refined on the following cycle and is thus integrated,

The third cycle permits one to master one’s destiny,

Until finally, vanished, it is possible to live.”

Attentiveness

2010-05-09T13:18:00.000-07:00

For those who practise daily it will be useful to give some thought to refining the use made of time on the Way…

In concentrating, which is useful in the beginning to avoid distraction, what is established is a “tunnel-vision” sort of focus: nothing exists apart from the object of our concentration; yet even so this lasts for nothing more than two or three seconds at a time.

This “closing in” upon our action automatically reduces one’s other perceptions; as a result, a particular movement will become the focus of attention of all our perceptions, as well as of our determined thought, for the duration of our effort.

This works well enough, but in general concentration cannot sustain itself for long… and when it ceases everything else disappears along with it. The eruption of distractions can even go so far as to make us forget the original object of our concentration.

Important though it is, concentration is a “tension”, constituting a means of working “by force”. And this when no method that works by “constraints” can last for long, since its lack of naturalness makes it unsuited to life.

When we are learning a physical movement, without first having passed through the acquisition of “gong fu”, we need to employ concentration in order not to lose ourselves. We also need to repeat a gesture sufficiently often for it to “enter” us. For most people, a movement made with a certain degree of tension will be more easily felt, and this because tension gives rise to a stronger sensation.

In general, a movement which is unknown to us will create tensions within us and will require an effort that is not in realistic proportion to the real physical effort required: we use force in order to manage to copy the gesture, exerting resistance against the limitations of our stiffness and coordination. When the movement has been learned, we will normally use only the degree of force that is appropriate to the effort required.

If we were to retain the same physical tension every time we execute a movement that has been learned we would end up stiffening and injuring ourselves. If this does not happen it is because physical pain brings us back to our senses, fear of pain sufficing to remind us not to push things too hard.

For the mental, emotional, and intellectual aspects of the learning process we have recourse to a form of “tension” in order to acquire the gestures, and this tension is called concentration.

What is more, it is easy to stay “concentrated” throughout one’s practice, indeed throughout one’s life, even though one is doing oneself harm, since inner difficulties create a different sort of pain from that of physical suffering. This is a pain that we are quite capable of sustaining and accumulating because it is less physical and for that reason may appear to be less serious.

Concentration, useful as it is for entering into practice, can become a source of tension and stiffness in the Shen (the spirit) and can even be detrimental to good health (or it can at very least limit the benefits of a practice that is oriented towards health).

No practice that is focused on too many details at once, or that aims for perfection in the execution of gestures, can bring relaxation. In the learning stage, it is very important to progress gently but constantly. If what is sought is perfection, one’s practice will be conducted in the void, since perfection does not exist: it will never give rise to anything except a certain unhealthy rigidity.

On the other hand, if one is unable to focus, to feel or reproduce movement, one’s tendency may be to seek out compensatory mental satisfactions, watching videos or hunting for “advanced levels” in secret hidden arts… All the time forgetting the most important thing of all, distinguishing one’s left from one’s right.

The present text does not intend to encourage anyone to think that it’s enough merely to relax (to do nothing!) for everything to come of its own accord. Not at all. There should be no confusion possible, given my introductory remark: “For those who practise daily it will be useful to give some thought to refining the use made of time on the Way”.

“Attentiveness” is relaxed concentration.

In “attentiveness” is to be found the advantages of concentration, but with an openness far greater than to be found in “tunnel-vision”. Of course, at the outset it is this very openness that constitutes the problem, being the probable source of distraction.

In daily practice, the gesture that has been learned requires a modicum of effort. It requires concentration so that it be “understood”, and a certain measure of tension during its initial executions. Yet it should soon come to require diminishing effort, and for practice to be really profitable this economy of effort needs to be maintained.

One’s practice needs to be integrated into one’s daily life, yet what is habitual must remain attentive rather than concentrated. The build-up of tension is thus reduced as relaxation is gained.

It is easy to get used to tension, as tension permits one to feel more strongly. This is a form of laziness of the senses and it is easily developed. Think of the fondness for intense sensations, big emotions, bungie-jumping, body-building… All such ways of “feeling more alive” can become ways of preventing one from fully apprehending the simple perceptions of one’s daily life.

In our Taoist approach, relaxation during practice encourages a sort of silence in the mind and relaxation in the body, which in turn allow one a full enjoyment of life. The simplest perceptions come to amaze one, and constant attentiveness develops as one comes to be fully alive.

By contrast, training through concentration and in a certain overall rigidity does away with the benefits of physical practice and condemns one to flattering one’s ego in order to achieve some intellectual satisfaction at least. But it is a harmful and illusion-bound form of practice.

Being attentive to what one has learned, while accepting the need for a certain concentration upon which progress depends, one must aim for relaxation and simplicity: body and spirit should not remain in a state of tension under pain of heightened suffering; one should accept the structure letting-go offered by the Way, and go on practising.

If we are unable to find a harmonious form of practising, there is every chance that the problems which arise will derive from our failure of understanding than from the Way itself.

The Teacher's Role

2009-09-01T13:38:00.001-07:00

Between the Internet, vcd and dvd, all the main information on the internal arts are almost in the public domain. If we are intelligent and we are sufficiently investigate, there is no practice that can remain hidden. In a world where information is king, where knowledge becomes horizontal and generalised, where everyone knows a little about everything and nothing in depth, it is possible to believe that this is enough to have a great self taught practice... Yet no! It is not possible!

We see more forums where both sides display their knowledge and ideas of revolutionarily mundane secrets perfect for training the basis with magical machines or restorative hormones or stimulants. We share to openly trick in order to reassure our obvious superiority on the strength of our discoveries and our secret vcds (not less than 15 000 copies!).

On these forums, some publish their CVs, other pictures or videos, but why this need to talk about practice? Why spread these arts when they've treated themselves otherwise to a comfortable discretion? Is this a need for reassurance or to check what is believed to be true? A commitment to openness and sharing with the rest of human beings or an opportunity to get their hands on new recruits?

If these forums are not "traditional" they are our new tradition and we have to go with it. I am the first to love reading these posts of practitioners its the same "voyeuristic" side which urges us to watch "Star Academy". The vcd or dvd which reveals the secrets of China's millennium are also of our time and they are sometimes useful, thus saving the endangered arts. These media are often like a virus in a river: they poison everything in their path imposing death to life (but it is one way to see). Often the films are a way to strengthen the illusions: the Chinese keep a sense of humour and remind us of that saying which is in the middle of the empire: "you can always fool a foreigner."

That is a lack there today in the world of Chinese internal arts? The lack of teachers.

There are professors, con artists, artists, acrobats, practitioners, experts, thieves, historians, liars, psychotics, humanitarians and sometimes even humanists ... but where are the teachers?

No teacher, no wrong answers, we are ready to do anything the moment when you follow a direction or there is a validation of our practices built between Gandhi, Bruce Lee and the series "Kung Fu" (the spiritual aspect ).

What is the definition of a master, you ask yourself, recognising your guide in the list of qualifiers above?

A teacher is an expert who has trained all that he speaks of, he is the holder of a “compete” style. This style, often old, is complete in itself and meets the needs of the life of the practitioner. It does not need to look in other traditions, for what it lacks, or to prove anything: it is a reflection of what is said. It is in his practice and his life it is an expression of his path. He lives in the world and he does not have to train in pajamas. Every movement is a technique and is training for the teacher. He is not 25 years in general and does not have sex with his disciples (ha bon?).

Basically, he is pretty cool!

We often hear in discussions that teachers are hard to find when it is so easy to go to a club around the corner. It's true! But if it sounds like, why work if you can fly? Why meditate when you can pray?

But if one retreats into a world that is not what we really want, that style is not one that we really like and that the teacher is not extraordinary for our taste but it is located not far from our sofa, it is not surprising to feel the need to go rant on the Internet at two o'clock in the morning.

Again, it is necessary to know what you really desire. Why choose a warrior or meditative path in a century like ours? Why take refuge in the energetic and meditative? What does it really search with the excuse of a spiritual practice? Is it not a strange practice? (fleeting meetings or our 'colleagues' work often remind us). Are we in another reality or just a fashion victim of spiritual-Energetical-bizarre?

It is illusory to believe that our path is random and stupid to think that it is a "hobby": who are we to be in this practice and how do we recognise? It is the role of the teacher to guide us to find ourselves, sometimes we meet, in an ancient tradition, reflecting on the identity of human beings. The same words and gestures that have liberated the masters of yesteryear are the practices of today. It is certainly possible to name them differently, let them grow with machines and elastic bands, to save time by doing weight training, using hypnosis or drugs, but the arts have been there for a long time and they act in the sense of tradition. They are complete in themselves and need nothing more than to practice. Maybe it is easier to hide his ignorance of revolutionary innovations in, but everything that is acquired quickly and effortlessly is often suspect or even useless.

The master is the guardian of a tradition, often of a road he travelled, he can guide the newcomers and the way back for those who are lost. He does this: guiding and recognising the best path for everyone, when they come to him. He should not be "nice" or gentle, he does not show what people want, but what they need. He must be like what he teaches. This is not a tourist guide, it is a mountain guide.

The teacher should not ask you to like him, but to recognise you and meet you. He offers a return to yourself, not a practice illogical and constraining, with no risk except that of success. But he does not work, this responsibility is yours.

It is not necessary to dazzle the master or to flatter, to become his friend (which can happen, but has nothing to do with the evolution). It is useless to talk too much or too describe, it is an illusion to hide. The only thing to do is practice. We must not do too much, one should not be locked in inaction or laziness: "If we do, it works if you do not, it does not."

Any intellectual research in isolation can feed the spirit, all physical practice without any tradition is likely to strengthen the body, any discovery of energy causes changes in the vitality, but only a path with a teacher can guide us towards the changes that will be the source of our "return".

The Way, the Pain and Misery.

2009-09-01T13:37:00.001-07:00

Suffering that may exist in everyday life is not fatal. They are insidious, borers or deaf, the the different states of "ill-being" should not be accepted.

We are used to fighting against such suffering in several ways:

* Displacement,

* Concealment,

* Pity.

Other ways are subsets that we will not detail here.

The displacement of suffering is easy to implement, just find something to blame and curse.

By this lack of recognition of his state of unhappiness, by this projection on another object, we will delude ourselves.

Find any trauma, an enemy or his work, and move our frustration onto this subject. Our unhappiness is identical, except that we add our anger and feelings. In this state of suffering but strengthened by de-placing, we have eliminated the most important thing for our ego: I suffer “yes” , but it's not my fault and I can't do anything.

Versus, if we recognise that the state of unhappiness is ours, we must react and that's much more difficult!

Concealment is a method developed to not see the problem. This is the shopping, television or any other activity that moves our attention and prevents us from thinking. The growing unhappiness with the material comforts of the 20th century and the following methods of distraction and being multiplied to distract the unhappiness that's expanding ...

The pity is a way to recognise and identify himself by his unhappiness. It is the continual and irreversible complaint that leads only to more pain and an immobilisation in the suffering. He is determined by his problems and everything revolves around his suffering.

As you can understand, they are not aware, or rarely. We develop ways of responding to reality in the functions of the internal state, its education and its genetic heritage.

But whence does this evil come and how to explain the evolution?

The simplification that follows is not a comprehensive explanation of historical processes that led us to today. It is a gross simplification for a general idea of what happened in our evolution. The example is also targeted to enhance my topic, however nothing is invented.

In the beginning, was the survival.

The first men, too busy with escaping predators that run faster than than them, did not think about their moods. Furthermore, with the different forms of survival, hunting-gathering to agriculture, the work of horticulture and of the land, left little time to spend thinking about thinking.

Later, the settlement, the product of the evolution of survival, allowing time to look at the universe. Animistic beliefs which gave way to the practice of magic, men must please the gods. No room for complaints, it all depends on God. It is very clear in Homer, with frustration and anger always latent.

Plots are formed in small estates that make up the kingdoms and empires, small gods give way to various "One God". The magic becomes religious and man seeks the meaning of life in the hereafter. The art, the state and everyday life are managed by the divine. We suffer, but it will get better when you are dead, whether poor or rich.

In anticipation of a second sign of the different one god, man seeks to expand his knowledge and wealth. He will consider (but not too much otherwise its the stake) and it will travel (to bring more or less finely the truth). It's time for a revival of old values and the territorial conquests.

Suffering is everywhere, because the barbarians do not know the truth. The conquistadors, they will show how to firmly be happier. And in their case, it was a good example of de-placing their unhappiness to incessant massacres.

Tired of not finding and always unfortunate, men then turned to the only source of progress they have established: Science.

God is dying because we have invented better.

People turn away from religion, seeking comfort in the outside for what is inside. Industrialisation and the service sector provide more time. This time is no longer the gods to be filled, and we start to gather in a single awkward silence. The unhappiness is still there and we realise it was all the time.

Fortunately through the science, radio, television and video games arrived to fill the silence. And man is finally happy, he is in a continual and nervous occupation to agree not to suffer.

But that will never change the fact that the problem is still there and if he does not deal with it, the body will speak louder. This is the golden age of therapy, psychoanalysis and other ways of projecting on the outside oneself, but on a professional this time, his unhappiness.

Is it better?

The problem is the recognition of this internal split that requires a practice of non-intellectual introspection and non progressive. The Spiritual Path, which has nothing to do with religion is a personal way to look beyond the limits of the mind, in an ignored non-duality. Beyond his ego and his daily life, it is possible to go and meet himself.

It seems simple, the solution is within reach of us all, we'll all be happy ...

Yes, but ...

Everyone understands that the problem is internal and that to try to resolve it by shopping (external) does not solve anything ... Yet there are more people who are "shopping sick" as practitioners of spiritual paths.

Everyone knows that it would be more profitable to spend a few hours to building each day, rather than watching TV ... Yet there is more presence to the "wheel of fortune" than for buying books of philosophy or history.

Everybody accepts the importance of a healthy body and misery of disease ... Yet there are more people at Mc Donald's than in gymnastics clubs.

This is not because the majority believes in something that is right.

We can't recognise normality by what is vomited on television.

Go to seek what's within us and what is, and see that this reality is global.

In this encounter with the real, the unhappiness has disappeared.

The simplicity of the practice.

2009-09-01T13:36:00.001-07:00

Busy training.

Too often, under the cover of a daily practice, one can be having fun more than practicing. Indeed, the exercises that suit us are often those that amuse us, while those that bother us are forgotten. We take pleasure thus in a complexity and a confusion which occupies our mind.

But what are we doing here, in fact, in training?

What is the aim of the practice?

What do we do in it?

It goes without saying that a good discussion with your teacher can help…

There is no use in knowing the goal of the exercises that we practice, it does not make us progress more quickly, however the practice is simplified if one introduces spontaneity, naturalness.

This naturalness can only come into a relaxed body and a peaceful mind… achieved by training.

Training and practice

We cannot practice without learning. It is even impossible to practice properly without learning from a teacher. But we need to understand that neither the training nor the practice are the aim of the teaching.

With training, and then with practice, we aspire to get back freedom, spontaneity, naturalness.

The point of "learning" what is spontaneous and “natural" is a very Taoist paradox…

Always learning new things is meaningless if one is not practicing, it is a distraction. To practice without going to the bottom of our training limits the depth of the teaching. But to learn and practice without going towards a certain form of freedom is a waste of time.

This release, this "formlessness", finds its root in the precision of a clear practice.

The spontaneity, the naturalness, which rely on our confused perception of things and of the world, are mere illusions. Perceptions only get to the consciousness once they have been through all the egotistic filters of our unexplored mind… perception of reality at its most afflicting stage.

These three parts of the training (training, practice and release) are the "three treasures”, and are in relation to the three internal treasures: Jing (essence), Qi (energy) and Shen (mind).

Simplicity of the practice: San Bao.

You have a collection of a thousand and one exercises; I, myself, have ten times more, but all this jumble follows a simple logic:

"The study of the Three Units allows union and complete consciousness, with the aim of perception of the Changes in Reality”.

In short, the understanding of the three parts will enable us to unify our body and mind.

What are the three parts to work on (for those who aren’t following at all…)?

1. Body

2. Energy

3. Mind.

The body: relaxed, strong and rooted.

The work of the body is mostly work on health. We can only work while in good health, especially as the practice requires time. The good health expresses itself through three aspects:

1. Relaxation: for a fluid circulation of the body liquids. It is tested and learnt mostly by coordination.

2. Strength: for a body resistant to external and internal aggressions. One can work on it through “wai gong", external exercises.

3. Rooting: for a capacity to understand Reality. One can work on it in many ways…

Energy circulation: fluid exchanges

A fluid circulation is source of good physical and mental health, and requires us to go a little further than the relaxation of the body. We have three important steps in "nei gong":

1. Realisation of internal feelings

2. Mobilisation by will

3. Natural and conscious exchanges.

The knowledge of the mind: present but not affected.

Not to know ourselves is the source of constant discomfort, however we are rarely the one we think we are. The exercises of the knowledge of the mind are there to identify and meet that which we are. We have, of course, three stages:

1. Self observation

2. Observation of the world

3. Global perception

It is pointless to want to understand everything now, but it is an advantage to examine one’s practice in order to see whether it contains these three parts.

Once again, honest exchange with your teacher will provide you with a clear practice.

The natural state: training, practice and freedom

In a complete and clear practice, gradually, precise exercises will be understood and, in this mastering, freedom will be able to emerge. Freedom requires a certain structure, a sustained spontaneity of educated relaxation, an intuition fed by knowledge… The whole of it, leading to Naturalness.

The practice is not locked up in a move or a breathing. Without the learning of this move or this breathing, there cannot be practice… there is a paradox.

1. The exercises of the arts of combat are not combat.

2. The exercises of coordination are not the relaxation.

3. The exercises of internal alchemy are not alchemy.

4. The exercises of Qigong are not the exchange.

5. The exercises of meditation have nothing to do with the meditative state.

One should not make the confusion.

To conclude, understand this:

"All the practical application of the teaching must go in the direction of relaxing the body, to allow energy to circulate or bring peace to the mind, sometimes all three together. You can only practice with that in mind. Without realising this, there is no practice. In this realisation, you are in the simplicity of the Way".

The Paradox of Practicing

2009-09-01T13:35:00.001-07:00

In the process of learning, in the Taoist way and any personal practice, we are confronted with the paradox of practicing ".

Why do some not feel evolution in their practices or they feel "trapped" in their evolution?

In learning, not to be confused with practice, it is possible to affect the relaxation to guide the practice itself. This confusion is the source of the paradox.

He who learns, who seeks to integrate a gesture or an exercise, is focused on technique. This focus may not need the benefits of practice, but it is an obligatory passage for the storage and digestion of a practice.

Once the act of memory and body relaxation is acquired, the exercise can leave "what one learns" to go to "what we practice:” The difference is that there is no need to make any effort to "recall" what to do and we have acquired the habit of the exercise.

In practice, where we crossed an act of concentration to an act of attention, the effort is in the feeling and in the "internal alchemy", than in the art of gesture, in the effort of memory (the mind).

We're here in practice.

After some time, through repetition of a practice with which we become intimate ( "which is engraved in the depths of our being"), we are in the mastery and in the liberation of the form (gong fu) This is ... what we occupy ...

But this increase (which it is in fact not) is not linear, hence the complications.

In learning, if not to reach liberation of the concentration, you can always try to find more details and variations without ever practicing: one who seeks, without a firm and intimate basis of practice, does not practice, he does not apprehend.

The researcher, who “goes around to find "is not in the practice, " one who is inside. " An intensive research permits their learning and choice of practice, but this is by no means practice.

This is attractive, but not in practice, there is no possible way. There is accumulation of knowledge and congestion of the brain and heart. We're here in the way of letters, not the practitioner.

In the practice contains, intimate and mastered, it is important to try and refine its understanding of the way through knowledge, but it is only for entertainment, not to help the practice.

Whoever is in the learning phase, after a while, just enjoying the moments of presence which leave the tensions and doubts: these are fleeting moments and clear memories, they are a "waste of time ".

The only thing left is the feelings of extreme relaxation and ease in his practice, in a very short time. This fluidity comes from a temporary lack of strong intent and a total presence on the exercise and the cessation of sneaky mind. It is a relaxation that comes from a "lack" of something, a "less": a lack of tension, absence of mind, a gesture without internal reviews.

After this state of grace, we wake up wanting to find this facility risen, we will try to replicate what we lost with more attention, more concentration and of course more tension.

It will not work: we replace a "less" by "too much". We try too much, we want too much, we are looking too much: then he must let go, let go and forget to look.

But this "non-research, that absence of waiting must be done in daily practice.

We also experience a normal process that goes from the non-understanding to master exercises and concepts, all passing through intermediate stages of various confusions.

We are experiencing that whatever happens, we always arrive with time to adjust to different practices, yet we can not judge our inability to perfection in the first few seconds of learning something new.

Successful one day to understand a movement, we refuse to not understand everything right away. This will occur on all new exercises over the years of practice.

Stuck in a boiling ego, focusing on our failure and convinced of our inability, we stay there, the arms swing, instead of practice.

We have experienced this progression in learning, but we are slowing down a bad concentration and need to do: we try too much, we do more.

Understanding this: in learning, we can touch the way, but we must not leave our work, "its not because we see the land in the distance that we can leave the ship."

We must continue, without paying too much attention or deny the phenomena that occur in research and fresh tension with the sole ambition of an aimless repetition. In the learning phase, we only build the foundations of a solid practice.

If we focus on phenomena, if we look for the feelings, if we try to reproduce or simulate fugitives statements, we are bogged down in endless waiting.

It is very difficult to get out of learning, often impossible to pass into a real practice, if we're looking for the easy pleasures of illusory sensations.

The phenomena in our learning the way, are stumbling blocks for us from our practice. They are pleasant or painful, short-lived or sustained in any case irrelevant ... except for the teacher.

The more we feel "things", the more we can attach, the less we practice. This slows us waiting like horseshoes on the feet of the prisoner.

It is interesting to notice what is happening to his teacher, because it allows us to "discharge" of these details and return to our practice.

Immersion in a constant search for phenomena, superficial gratification without issue, only allows the mind to rescue struggling with the progress of practice.

It is therefore ironic that what stimulates the practitioner, phenomena, or what will prevent them from moving towards the search for sensations can easily oust the true feelings.

It is therefore useful not to look, not try to replicate what is no more: the states come and go and we still need to remain stable in our practice.

This stability is the internalisation of feelings and move towards the knowledge of our reality.

The Connection to the Training

2009-09-01T13:34:00.001-07:00

It is normal when one is immersed in a practice to ask questions ... but not normally useful.

The change that will start with daily exercises will multiply with an awareness of the depth of the Way.

The failure not to compare with other practitioners or the teacher will lead us into total confusion.

It is in this period of transition, sometimes confusing and even painful, to remember to practice: only the practice has value.

Engulfed in large sentiments, tied by excessive sentimentality or paralysed by his endless questions, we forget to practice.

He frames the citations of his teacher, read books which "give the truth" and trys to validate his progress with other practitioners, but does not practice much.

In this state of any latent power and probable realisation, we do nothing.

The new pain, a source of concern and questions, the connection changes to the body, which is most neglected, and this new capacity to not accept a certain form of stupidity we have a problem. So we sit down to digest this mass of information and we miss the training.

To keep things simple and use the first lines of Lu Bong Bin on its "hundred characters":

"Nourish the chi and guard the silence"

The practice gives the energy and intimacy which is the answer to all our questions.

Often, too often, we do not look, but we want to find. We want the result, but we do not spend enough time in the process of accessing it. Basically we would like to be accepted as the wisest and strongest in the world, but we would prefer not to have to work for it. Or "a little", since this does not change too many things in our lives.

Any change, even the happiest, is making its dose of "friction", pain or punishment, and in any case, it is necessary not to neglect the factor of "time".

We can not rely only on our direct experiences as it is the result of our practice. This practice is the way known by the an experienced teacher who may guide his student at every stage of his evolution.

The changes are the fruits of intelligent work on a serious way.

But we are talking about "work", not questioning.

There is an order that must be followed for evolution of the way that is reality and not an illusion nourished by bad expectation: we must regulate many aspects of our nature.

We must regulate the body and this is done in three complementary steps:

* The root (the connection with the Earth)

* Strengthening (balance function / structure that preserves health)

* The relaxation (in conjunction with co-ordination)

When the body is at the point of acquiring these three conditions through an integrated practice and we can spend work breathing. There are three stages in this part of training:

* Recognition of respiratory movement (with the breath)

* Transformation of respiratory flow (rhythms and games of the breath)

* Liberation of respiratory constraint (exempt from any "technique")

In this body and the respiratory movement free, we have the tools to understand the emotional mind and facilitate internal silence. This work on the emotions will also include three parts:

* Discover the nature of emotions ( real and body)

* Feel the internal changes (linked to emotions)

* Relax its reactivity to emotions ( "surfing" rather than "drowning")

Only from that moment can we start a real energy work: how to feel "energy" in a tired body, fed by superficial breathing and inhabited by an almost constant fear? The work of energy is the beginning of the way, but without real foundation based on real practice, its only the wind. How to move this energy if it does not exist?

We can not use as the mass of energy that is available, the excess. If we do not practice enough, if we are in a phase of intense learning, if one is sick or if it is too contracted, there is not enough energy available tfor movement.

The learning phase requires a large amount of energy for the movements themselves but also to "become" news. Sometimes it is paradoxical to see that all his "practice", and no energy, but we must not forget that at this stage of the course, we don't do, we are learning to practice ... it ' is very different.

Can be seen as learning to drive a car: we use a large amount of energy and tensions in learning when it is possible to relax ... this is the phase of learning.

Whoever is in the practice does not have the time to ask questions or surmise ... he's training.

But who can train without questioning the practice today?

The problem of this connection with the practice is a relationship of trust, commitment. It is important to choose his own path and become totally immersed. The problem of choice and the questioning must come before practice at the time of choice (or no choice) that leads to the encounter with tradition. In practice itself and in his learning, it is wiser to stop rather than to return to any question: there is no way out and no lasting change.

The questions are important, but they are not practice: they are a part "relating" of the practice of the intellectual satisfaction, the food of the mind. The questions to calm his mind by giving him a bone to gnaw.

Be careful not to confuse the letter, "one who can speak" and the practitioner, "one who knows: one can speak of the practice, one can guide you on the way. Intellectual knowledge can never be a source of evolution on the way it can only guide them in ways that go through "divide and wander."

But in a clear and invested practice, it's very interesting to learn also about the mental data, to "cultivate" and "fill" say the classics.

Again, the teacher who can guide the practitioner.

It is important to communicate with him and it is useful to listen to his answers, concerned about the multiple issues and have already convinced the answer, ask one question to receive one validation.

If the teacher responds, it is important to listen to ... if only not to ask the same question twenty times.

Do not compare with others, do not watch the other practicioners, do not watch movies or documentaries on the way, do nothing, asks nothing more than your practice, do not have more, don't forget anything you're taught, do not ask easy questions , do not forget to ask the hard questions ... but practice.

True connection to practice is an intimate personal relationship where one is alone. One can not practice and only for himself. The rest is the result of that practice.

Until this relationship is established within the discovery of the enthusiasm and "bitter", we are learning. The way is the result of a practice that stems from learning, but is also the source of training ...

voila.

I thought the weather was going to be nice

2009-09-01T13:33:00.001-07:00

Our mind (thinking) continuously bases itself on beliefs which reassure it.

This information is stored in our memory and becomes the basis of what we think we know. To form itself, the ego assimilates what is perceived, like a neurotic eater. All is taken, stolen from the world, to become "his".

In owning what is perceived, as well as it can, the ego builds itself comfortable limits by eliminating "what which is not known" and which is source of anguish.

Thus, a new experiment will be compared to another already stored in our memory, as soon as possible. What is new, different or too far from what we know, will be transformed to be acceptable. This phenomenon, unperceivable and hidden, is incredibly subtle, which makes it difficult to test consciously.

The practice is often paved with attempts at innovations, direct experiments, which allow us to get our heads out of our preconceived ideas, to see things differently.

From childhood, we record information which shapes our ego. This "box" will become "what we believe to be". The environment, our education and our genes define this "character". With all of that, we put down prejudices which will enable the ego to own the world.

Reality, "what is", is interpreted by our perception and becomes "what appears to be". We perceive, the information is put in relation with our personal database, the ego monopolises it, and it is stored in a familiar form so as not to disturb the stability of our character. Thus we do not see a tree, a sunset or our partner anymore, but only the reminiscences of what is already in memory. Nothing new, therefore one gets bored, so one thinks.

If we try to explain to somebody what we believe to have perceived, it often becomes “what we are telling (ourselves)" … and from there, a deep gap is created compared to the initial perception.

What was already interpreted by our mind at the time of assimilation undergoes another egotistic interpretation with the regurgitation: The syndrome of the photocopy: the more we copy, the more we move away from the original.

When referring to what we have in stock (memories and beliefs), and not to that which we perceive, we cut ourselves from reality. In addition, with this habit of always referring to the known, we go towards the result of prejudice: calculation.

Knowing "what we believe", we offer the world a few sorted possibilities, based on the acceptable things which we condescend to perceive. We project so much onto the Universe, that we only perceive what confirms us mentally, that which flatters our ego.

In this jumble, we put our moods, our hopes, our regrets, and all of that “darkens our light".

We can summarise this by saying that the source of all this pathological functioning is Fear.

This functioning will spread to the world and more particularly to others. Thus, we will expect from our relations and our exchanges that everything goes in the direction of our ego. If this was not the case, we would filter the information perceived sufficiently, in order to only keep what confirms our gentle madness.

We will have also the capacity to avoid certain situations, more or less consciously, so that we don’t perceive what disturbs us.

The practice tends to remove prejudices in order to perceive clearly. It will go against all that has just been mentioned.

We will meet presence and confront our fear if we can bear it, to awaken us a little and move from a viscous unconsciousness towards a light version.

In this state known as "of awakening", we will have, thanks to the teaching, the moments of clear perceptions that will be a new basis for the beginning of the remainder of our life.

In the tradition, we start with ourselves. We will seek further than what we believe to be and we will try to get to know ourselves. This meeting with our mental functioning and our dissociation from it will give us a first approach.

Then, using precise exercises in a progressive evolution, we will go towards the release of our perception.

This capacity to perceive is incredibly pleasant, the benefits are numerous; for example, the disappearance of boredom and the capacity to discover unceasingly what is already known…

After this basic work, we realise, astonished, that there are things other than us: the World. After having developed this capacity to discover ourselves, we will apply it to "what is not us".

There will be a whole series of exercises which will enable us to perceive the world and others through this acquired freedom. The exchanges with others, our capacity to communicate and our respect for the world will change, thanks to these practices.

In an opening where I do not take my thinking mind as a reference, in this freedom of a new perception, each second; the whole of my practice will "crystallise" to take an unquestionable coherence.

It is tedious and illusory to believe that a spontaneous work and without structure can release the mind. In most cases, those who work without a teacher only manage to reinforce their already suffering ego.

How can one diminish the power of the thinking mind if one cannot even rely on a tradition and lighten the thought organ?

Some speak of a fear of being manipulated; actually, it is often just Fear.

Degrees of Simplicity

2009-09-01T13:32:00.001-07:00

It is often difficult to see what happens within the progress of our practice. The teacher is there, but it is useful to understand a couple of things.

Several things should be seen:

* Phenomena
* Levels of consciousness
* Stages of evolution
* Developed qualities

In training, one can feel phenomena of various intensity, which aren’t important at all, but which are real. Whether you feel this or that, within the framework of your practice, is always true, if you feel it more than you imagine it, obviously… but it doesn’t matter.

Within the framework of evolution on the Way, the pupil will go through stages, change level of consciousness, evolve towards a greater sensitivity to reality, but also, for a while, he will feel another reality. What you will be able to perceive will be analysed according to your understanding, to your progression within the great principles of evolutions; it is indeed only possible to understand with the mental tools we possess at any given time.

The developed qualities will be integrated within these perceptions with the level of awakening present at the time. They are different levels, different capacities, a different kind of work in order to evolve within each concept.

Phenomena:

When acquiring more energy, one can be prone to "flashes" of reality which might shock or awaken. The body being involved in this part of the training can give us new or old sensations on a perception level. All of that is real, you feel it, but you shouldn’t get too much attached to it.

To comment on, calculate of dissect these phenomena, is a waste of time, but it is also a way for your mind to get hold of your experience. It is very useful to share it with your teacher, in order to keep him informed, without expecting any particular feedback.

On all levels of practice, it is possible to be deluded.

Levels of conscience:

From the first day of practice until the last, one can get a taste of the Tao. It is possible, without practicing, to perceive the infinite, just as it is possible to practice unceasingly while remaining in the fog of our mind. In everyday life, we identify three basic levels consciousness: the waking state, the dream state and the deep sleep.

Within the framework of our practice, we will talk about nine states altogether, three in each basic level. Indeed, in the waking state, it is a euphemism to say that we are not always present, we often wander in states of unconsciousness which are more or less sticky. In the waking state, we speak of presence, of normal unconsciousness, and of deep unconsciousness.

In the dream state, we have the conscious dream, the guided dream and the unconscious dream.

But these incursions in the land of consciousness are not stable, there are only moments that come and go without knowing why. These little moments of clarity enable us to see that towards which we tend, that which we seek. It is useful for our search but it is not the search itself. The practice allows us to install this state of consciousness in order to make it normality.

Moreover, you will only be able to understand, interpret this perception of reality, according to your personal evolution.

Stages of evolution:

It is not a way of judging but a way of understanding: it is as the child who evolves towards language, it is not that it is "good", it is just an evolution. As opposed to the levels of consciousness, which can come and go, be unstable and changing; the stages of evolution, are permanent: the child who has access to language cannot go back.

It is only possible to go forward and when a stage is reached, it becomes unforgettable, acquired. One will always practise in the search to understand oneself. In this work, we will go towards knowing the other. In looking at oneself and the other, we will perceive the changes of the world differently.

The three stages of evolution go from our self, from one to the other, in the perspective to better seize the changes of the world.

We go from the one (us) towards the two (the other) then towards the world (all the rest).

道生一, 一生二, 二生三, 三生萬物

"The Tao produces the one, the one gives the two, the two gives the three and of the three (come) the 10.000 things."
Laozi, chap. 42

In practice we will talk about nine stages, three by basic level. The stages of evolution allow a different reading of identical elements.

The "great Taoist’s principles" have both: levels of consciousness and stages of evolution.

Developed qualities:

Whatever the discipline approached, and because people do not have the same education, the same ease or the same experience, each one will practice with his own strength and weaknesses. The idea here is simple: For the Way to be right, it must be balanced.

We must go into the aspects of the Way which we like and in those which underline our weaknesses.

The three basic qualities are body, energy and mind. We must go towards Qigong, Neidan (internal alchemy) and Shen gong (meditation) in order to cover all the facets of our being.

For the body, we work on the physical structure (strength), the relation to oneself in space (rooting) and the exchange between the body and the world (relaxation).

For Neidan, we practice the three stages described in the teaching.

There are also three levels to the work of Shengong.

It is not about working more, but about dividing our time of practice between the three levels of body, energy and mind.

That was for a finer understanding of our development in the Way, a dissection not very useful for the practice, but so satisfactory for our mind.

"A practice without concept evolves blindly, but concepts without practice are sterile”

(A. Einstein)

Body: Root of the Mind

2009-09-01T13:31:00.001-07:00

In Taoism and traditional Chinese medicine is known as the yang need the yin to take root. The nature of evaporation and yang is rising, which is yang demanding the counterpart yin to "incarnate". Yang is the spirit and the yin is the matter.

The stability of the mind takes its root in the body and flexibility of the body depends on level of the mind: the yin and yang aspects of our being are closely related, they are inseparable.

But for practice, it is useful to understand the interaction of one over the other.

Indeed, with a good knowledge of the overall body / mind, we can move easily on our way ... or get stuck for years on issues that we ourselves set up.

To take an obvious example (or stupid): since the body and mind are linked, we can act on one or the other to resolve all sorts of problems overall. If I disslocate a finger, it is certainly possible to push through with the power of my mind, but the pain is unpleasant, I can not decide to use a quick and physical manipulation. I deal with the physical with the physical.

Now, in my example, if I am relaxed during the process of replacing the finger, the pain will be anecdotal. So if I am tense because of the fear of pain, I can make it impossible with overall tension of the mind: I therefore am limited by the fear, the purely physical.

In practice, we must work on three major things:

* Relaxing the body to give it optimum function,

* Working with the energy to develop a global exchange,

* Soothe the spirit to establish a silence that allows you to touch the "true perception".

To achieve this goal, we use three methods:

* The exercises aim to relax the body, in conjunction with the spirit,

* The exercises of energy exchange which are the link between body and mind,

* The meditation exercises that soothe the spirit before the body is relaxed.

We are looking at the exercises of the body a relaxation based on a more accurate perception of our being. This relaxation will be three events:

* A natural root, without position or "technique"

* A suppleness expressed through easy co-ordination

* A force externalised by a united body.

The exercises have no energy without the preliminary work of the body: it is as complete a pierced seal, it takes a long time to try and in the end has served no purpose since the seal is still empty. The exercises have many energy topics:

* A "real" sensation of energy,

* An circulation of it (if it has been clearly recognised)

* A comprehensive and natural exchange with the outside of our being.

Concerning the exercises of the mind, which require minimal use of the mind, we will never use visualisations: they are only the mental noise and as powerful as the ones we seek to appease. "Soothe the mind with visualisations is like copulating to keep her virginity," said a wise man I know.

For the mind, there are a number of practical steps that build on previous work:

* An emotional work that frees us from sentimentality,

* A work of discernment of the function of compulsive thoughts,

* A simple work of perceptions, free from mental ego.

All of this requires a precise method and adaptable to suit everybody, it requires patience and work ... and all without expectation, of course!

It is important to recognise the value of working the body and especially the importance of co-ordination. It is not helpful to be well co-ordinated to live, but it is a ruthless demonstration of our internal state of relaxation.

I speak here of a natural co-ordination that is not tied to the repetition of a specific act: everyone arrives, after a time, to imitate a movement after they have worked at it.

In this way, we are the simplicity of perception, so that one day we can do what we understand and we can understand what our body is doing (in the capacity of our own).

An exercise has gained more interest, it's just a sign of a need for change in our learning.

Initially, the exercises have a lifespan of one week, but some can work for years. We do what frees us from this form of work, these exercises, we will not lock: it is useless to cling to some form of work if one is to teach later.

For the flow of information, everyone is searching for "advanced" or "secrets" exercises while almost no one knows truly the right from the left. This serves no purpose except to increase confusion about the practice itself: its illusion and the mind is forced to create what he may perceive, the imagination works more and thought is obscured in a ceaseless internal noise.

The return to the simplicity of the observation, the actual relaxation of the body for a quiet mind is our research.

Coordination: the training of the Relaxation

2009-09-01T13:30:00.001-07:00

Co-ordination is a process of monitoring and control of movement adapted to the situation. It is very clear to see the union between body and mind. The training of the capacity of co-ordination requires specific training, but it is also easy to see changes in his practice.

The gestures we understand and are in the spectrum of our physical capabilities. Often, we need lots of time to copy or "master" a gesture, yet we understand it intellectually: this is the manifestation of our internal "noise", our physical and mental tension.

Too much analysis, too much attention or just "trying", are safe ways to waste time on learning a movement. The action, linking the perception and ability, should be sufficient.

To gain access to more precise levels of listening to our body and mind, without going into complex practices, we have an arsenal of very subtle exercises for the co-ordination.

Our school uses co-ordination in training and throughout the practice, this capacity will allow a deeper understanding of oneself and his evolution.

The development of co-ordination requires a precise progression in the exercises and functions of the student, nobody will develop the capacity of co-ordination in the same way, but everyone reaches the same result.

To do this, the training must be precise.

Looking at all the characteristics of co-ordination.

Co-ordination is the capacity to control actions in predictable situations (stereotypes) or unpredictable ones (adaptation).

The predictable situations are grouped into actions related to our activities, our actions every day, our daily physical activities. Stereotypes are also our regular activities for which we have developed a certain level, sports, summer activities ...

Unpredictable situations are our ability to adapt to a new situation, sometimes stressful, and our ability to respond in a holistic way (body and mind) depends on co-ordination. This is where we understand better where our level of real relaxation is. The adaptation will be in learning (courses in Qigong, the art of combat) and will evolve measured by the calming of our minds.

In any case, co-ordination permits the performance of our actions with an economy of movement. Which we will carry out, almost unconsciously, how do more with less effort. co-ordination economising of our body and mind in establishing habitual patterns of adaptive reactions in function with the capacity of our body.

With a good development of co-ordination, we learn faster and deeper. We quickly learn new gestures and we will soon intergrate a way of "mastering". It is possible to remember something, but it takes time to find the place without tension, without effort, without "mental comment." A good level of co-ordination allows us to integrate the new movement almost perfectly, still a little work remains to be done over time.

We can therefore speak of two capacities of co-ordination: one specific and one general.

The specific capacity is linked to practice, to the habits of the body. It is a good way to work the basics of neuromuscular connections. But often, the specific capacity will be limited to a specific area that does very little to overflow on the daily life.

The general capacity is useful for all facets of life. It is one that will feed the adaptability of our body / mind to the stress of life. Stress is the mass of effort that must be done, consciously or not, to adapt to the movements of life, pleasant or not.

The specific capacity of co-ordination is faster to acquire. It can affect the general capacity for co-ordination, but this is rarely the case. When it relates to professional activities that are too far from the daily life (screwing bolts, surgery, stamping cards ...), we see almost no overflow on daily life.

This is especially true that if our profession is not really the result of our own choice and we do not like it. In this case, the qualities that will be developed will often be hidden in his life, "outside of his work."

A balanced practice, and one whose goal is a transformation of self, of course, will specialise in co-ordinating specific exercises that will quickly spread, soft and hidden, on the whole of his life.

co-ordination will allow us to acquire five important qualities

1. Above all a capacity to train, a capacity to learn. It is necessary to develop the co-ordination to be able to learn .... hummm, paradox, no?

2. co-ordination enables an economy of movement, which will enable us to achieve the same gesture with less effort and having removed all the parasitic movements. Thus potentialisation of physical capacity's and not by economy and not by development. This means doing more with less ... very Taoist ...

3. Well developed, the capacity of co-ordination is the ability to change his whole life in progression. In eliminating physical and mental stress, we see subtle changes in the world and we adapt globally, without effort (stress).

4. It is also the ability to understand every gesture and movement, a strong approximation of our perceptions and our physical abilities. The stage of "Xinyi", form and intellect, which allows us to combine what we see and what we do.

5. We have also in co-ordination a test on our relentless deep state: the linking of the body and mind will tell us about our internal state of real relaxation. This is the manifestation of the relaxation in work and the rapide evolution: we learn by a capacity of relaxed and attentive stability.

We can identify three aspects of the capacity of co-ordination:

* Listening to the body,

* Adaptability of the body,

* Learning from the body.

The training includes listening and adaptability, it requires a development of two other aspects together to evolve.

Listening to the body requires a certain mental silence and muscle relaxation, which in turn requires an ability of developed co-ordination. It is really difficult to attack and to relax the mind simultaneously. These are qualities that are difficult to access. However, with co-ordination it is easily worked, if we are in an intelligent practice. Listening to the body consists of four capabilities:

1. Listening to the body is above all the ability to unite the body in action. The united body enables this economy of movement, relaxation and this mental silence. The basic exercises that we are working within the school are working hard for this union of the body.

2. The ability of perception is an important quality, it allows one to measure the efforts based on need. It is the right force for the right movement, learning of the economy in terms of energy expenditure.

3. The capacity for mobility, as its name does not suggests encompasses the stability and mobility. It is related to proprioception (location of the self in space by kinesthetic). It is an expression of our quality of static balance whilst moving. This is the root, on the spot and moving. We work this a lot.

4. Proprioception and the vestibular system will allow the development of the capacity of space management. These are qualities that are too often dormant and covered with little consciousness. We will work very often this the work of us in space and the object in space (weapons, other ...). To know where you are in space with awareness is very important in Taoist teaching.

Learning includes four skills two which unite with the listening of the body. Learning gestures requires regular exposure to the exercises which must be repeated "rather than, one time in a hundred minutes, a hundred times that one minute” to apprehend correctly.

1. We find mobility and space management.

2. The ability of "timing" is not easy to grasp. It demands grasping an external rhythm whilst

imposing another which is internal. In the first case, it is a question of rhythm to be perceived in the action, in each case it must be given to objects outside the rhythm that we own. Uniting the two parts of oneself, in the action of perceiving, is in the capacity of timing.

3. We have the capacity of reaction that allows us to initiate a movement on a given signal (internal or external). This helps us to act quickly according to the perceived stimulus. In a acquisition of gesture or development of co-ordination, we need to grasp quickly and act accordingly.

4. The ability to change permits seeing, during the execution of a gesture, to change it according to the changing needs. In the action, on a different understanding of the action, is the possibility to make a change in gesture. Changing the force, an interesting by-product of co-ordination.

The practice of our school emphasises co-ordination. We know that we are trying to work on the health of the body, the circulation of energy and appeasement of the spirit. These three areas of self development are concepts that are difficult to access, but all three require good co-ordination to thrive. The capacity of co-ordination is something easy to work if you have good exercises and a competent professor, so this is our first choice of work.

This work is the way of relaxation.

Relaxation: the Explanation

2009-09-01T13:29:00.001-07:00

Relaxation and softness

It is very important not to confuse relaxation and soft. In the internal combat arts, we must acquire a certain force (as it is not sewing or ping pong), but without muscle tension. Practitioners must pass a "real" force stage and manifestations before they can “assimilate” this force and make it soft (as far as striking). The idea of an Internal, penetrating or vibrating strike, is soft for those who give, not for the receiver.

How to define the difference between "relaxed" and "soft"?

Relaxation: Action of relaxing

Muscle relaxation brings five interesting things to all practitioners:

* The availability of muscle for immediate use in a voluntary action (speed)

* A minimum use of opposing muscles that inhibit the action (power)

* An optimal recovery of muscle efforts (recovery)

* An economy of movement that reduces energy consumption (endurance)

* A possibility of “giving the force "(penetration).

The stage of "xin yi", the "thought form", is the ability to do what we want to understand how and what we do. We will create a link between our bodies and our minds, which will provide the opportunity to act without being paralysed by our compulsive thoughts. The reverse, ie to have a calm and available mind, is also necessary ... but this is not the subject of this text.

A contracted muscle should relax before being available for new action. And relaxing the muscle demands a delay in the action which slows it. However, if we reach an optimal relaxation, the muscle is always available for action. This allows us to obtain a greater ability to stretch and contract muscles, tendons and ligaments involved in the movement: thus having more speed.

Despite the muscular relaxation, any movement leads to a protective action by the opposing muscle. These muscles protect joints against sudden movements that might injure them. In an action of punching forward for example, if we look at the arm and forearm, we see that the triceps is slowed by biceps. If the bicep is very tense, very contracted, it inhibits the action of the punch. Being relaxed, speed and power are increased (to do so, tendons must be strengthened).

The regular training can tire muscles. The specific exercises “pull” on the muscle chains. In both cases, if tension exists, it will go to the result sought. The explosion of brief movements, which are desirable in the arts of combat, are repetitions of "anaerobic" effort . This means that the muscle can not take its energy resources by the way of oxidation (oxygen). For all these reasons, the relaxation is important, through muscle relaxation further work in the effort becomes easier, with reduced production of biochemical "waste" (avoiding injuries, muscle tetany and aches).

Opposing muscles are not contracted, the muscles for action are free of tension all the way until use and the recovery cycles of cycles being easier, we consume less energy. The internal energy will therefore be available in an emergency. In addition, any long and "forced" action takes place under better conditions. Our body/machine remains in better shape longer.

The penetrating force, vibrating force, and all "small delicacies" of internal arts require a certain relaxation "course through the body." We will not present this complex subject.

It should also be noted that throughout the world, China's past and physiologists of today agree that a contracted muscle is associated with some psychological tension and vice versa. Muscle relaxation is not just availability of the body, but also a form of psycho regulation.

Softness: "Whom yeilds easily to pressure"

Par excellence, we must not yield to pressure. In a very "new age" of internal martial arts, people tend to turn into soft. They often switch into a sensing of "fantasy" energy. In this amateur illusion, the "new age" practitioner has often forgotten that a strike is a level of reality, he must therefore be forced "real and relaxed" to adapt and avoid a premature departure for the "Other Side". it is not wise to practice whilst being in dangerous illusions.

Working without muscle tension

All strengthening exercises, all techniques must be done without muscle tension. However, there is no question of being soft or gentle. It is still the combat arts and we are seeking to incapacitate potential attackers. In a good and realistic training, practitioners will often go far in exploring the various pain related to internal strikes. It is painful and often bitter, but this must be done in the most relaxing way possible. It is amazing and sometimes unbelievable to see the damage that a strike that is relaxed but not soft can cause.

Repeat work: musculature "holding but not soft"

In a serious daily work of his art, the muscles will develop. This will not be a musculature similar to bodybuilding cultures. The muscles are still relaxed but energetic. The volume will be determined by his body and frequency of practice. In my school, we keep muscle mass up to the age 45 years and let it fall gently until his last years. If we are in a time of intense work of exercises, we will gain long and relaxed muscle mass. The feel of these muscles is very similar to rubber, soft but incompressible. If we train properly every day, it is not possible to be "without muscle" or "weak".

Strengthening exercises: without tension

The exercises are repeated at length without tension, never. The speed of execution increases for some, it is sometimes slow to work. The muscles thicken at first, then stabilise. The muscles are not dry, the body is not that of an athlete. We can describe three main types of exercises:

* The work on speed,

* The work of the technique,

* The work of force.

For speed, it is clear that work on the relaxation of body and mind is a priority. It is habitual to "rush" co-ordination exercises, yet it is one of the secrets of speed. The speed request us to move quickly from one point to another. The release can overcome the clumsiness. We must have an intimate connection between what we want to do and what we do. This link is the internal by-product of a co-ordinated body. These exercises are difficult and painful, they help strengthen the body. We can distinguish different types of speed to work: speed of action, speed, reaction time, speed of decision, speed of timing and speed of perception.

The martial techniques are at the heart of the two person work. Only the practitioner will prepare his body, but during the course, he will train techniques with a partner. In the two person work we trade blows in an acceptance and with limits that depend on the commitment and purpose. Those working with the idea of being in better health can enjoy the arts of combat without going into the depths of this discipline. For those who choose the way of the warrior, in keeping with his body, he must go "test" what we learn. This is probably the most useful training, but also the most difficult. It includes all facets of practice, when we will face fear and verify his "presence". We can distinguish three steps that will build gestures "correct" means a general preparedness to deal with qualities needed to acquire the techniques (motivation, attention, lateralization, learning ability ...), preparation of specific gestures in defined order (parades, moving, distance, impact ...) a versatile development in which priority is given to expanding the capacity of co-ordination. Blockages in learning techniques often come from when the basic co-ordination is too limited.

The power is developed in a priority in styles of combat. Whether to defend or attack, either to wrap or break the opposing force, it takes power. The exercises of power are absolutely necessary for a physical confrontation. All these exercises are in total muscle relaxation, or at least the most relaxed as possible. There is no tension in the exercises of our internal school , awareness without contraction. The types of force that are worked:

* Maximum force (possibility of uniting the entire body for a global force)

* The explosive force (capacity to achieve the greatest increase in force in the shortest time possible)

* The initial force (capacity of explosive force at the beginning of muscle contraction)

* The force of speed (neuro-muscular ability to overcome resistance with the highest speed and possible reaction).

* Co-ordination: Handling the unpredictable

The capacity of co-ordination is a process of knowledge of gesture and of movement that allows for

implement right actions in predictable (stereotypes) or unpredictable (adaptation) situations . The co-ordination is not skill. The skill relates to acts partially automated and not of our own liberty, they are stereotyped gestures. For example, a very good karateka blocks brilliantly powerful attacks from another karateka at a very good level. He knows the precise gestures of his style and knows the parrys (skill). The same good karate practitioner may be in difficulty in front of a good “punch from a thug", thrown randomly and nasty. It is no longer the framework of gestures they know and they must adapt their ability through their co-ordination to match the unknown.

Co-ordinationwhich is nourished and developed has a range of capabilities:

* Separation and union of the body,

* Ability to analyse,

* Balance,

* Sense of Space

* Rhythmicity,

* Reactivity,

* Adaptation.

The dissociation and union body is a necessity to achieve maximum force. For the chi kung, the art of combat and daily life, it is beneficial to work with the body in one effort. This effort, because it is spread over the whole structure will not be "difficult". The energy expenditure is the minimum and relaxation is maximum. Similarly, in an action that requires that part of the structure, there is no need to cause a contraction throughout the body. To do this, listening of the internal system can identify and use without being stressful to the rest of the body / mind. While the body will go to a coherence that simplifies the action. From experience, we see that it is easier in learning to dissociate than to unite rather than vice versa.

The capability of analysis is a harmonisation between the various phases of the movements and the movements of different body parts. This harmonisation is reflected in high precision and high economy of movement. The more relaxed, the more we can listen and hear the body in the context of a gesture fully in line with our intention.

The balance is a complex capacity which includes several types:

* - Static equilibrium (alignment)

* - Dynamic balance in transfer (straight line),

* - Dynamic balance in rotation (circles and curves).

Not only does the balance permit the realisation of the training of the deep relaxation, but it is also the secret of sustainability of the practice. Indeed, the more the balance is more deeply rooted in us and the less we will face a deterioration of our level of technique and gestural. The principle of balance is one of the great principles of our system.

The “sense of space” to determine and change the position and movements in space and time. This is done according to the field of action (dojo, play, ring, metro) and the objects in this field of action (furniture, opponent, witness). The sense of space is linked to the vision, especially peripheral vision, and proprioception (sense of self in space managed by the kinesthetic, touch). It permits the evaluation of the distance and the evolution of gesture in time and space. The sense of time, what we call the "timing" is a determining factor in the success of the action.

What is meant by rhythmicity is the ability to understand a given rhythm from the outside and to reproduce them identically or follow a change internally. Understanding the rhythm of his opponent can disrupt, moreover, creating a rhythm one permits one also to position themselves for a right gesture. Relaxation is necessary for an immediate response within the moment of perception. Tension produces a dead moment which desynchronises the perception and action.

The reaction permits the intervening as quick as possible on a given signal. In making a conscious choice, we must have the shortest time possible between the perception of will and action itself. In the action, we need to unite as many possible qualities: strength, speed ...

It is possible that a practitioner has all the qualities necessary but has not developed the responsiveness: he is unable to act in response to external stimuli. This quality is one of the most important, it is related to working the co-ordination.

The adaptation is to turn the engine running to adapt to a new situation or continue in a different form. This "change" in the action should be relaxed but held to keep the qualities of strength and speed of the original gesture. The adaptation is closely linked to the capacity of reaction and anticipation that a decisive influence.

The work of the development of the co-ordination is done with three major components that influence and determine the capabilities we have just discussed. We will therefore:

* - Motor control (to distinguish his left, the right ,the up and down)

* - The ability of learning (to the right to the left, following an example),

* - Adaptation engine (reverse, modify or unite with an action known).

The illusion of relaxation

This illusion is seen in the non co-ordination and mental stiffness. The inability to adapt his gesture, move while accomplishing an action, are signs of tension. A health body over the long term depends on this relaxation. Joints, the health of muscles and spine will grow old in good conditions if we are relaxed. All the abuses, excesses, we will pay for, for many years. Nothing is free: if you do not need to defend your life every day, there is no need to destroy your body with a tough training for a confrontation that will perhaps never take place. The conditioning of repetition is sufficient, a hard and specialist conditioning is often dangerous. It is more useful to live long and healthy rather than malign for a few years and, then limping for the rest of his life or not to be able to use his hands.

It is impossible to physically remain weak if we follow a daily training without muscle tension. This training can be done over a long period in which the years do not have a regressive technique. It is a practice of living for the duration of it. Relaxation is the key to this sustainability.

Waiting

2009-08-10T12:52:00.001-07:00

Anyone who starts to practice awaits something. This is because in their daily lives, in listening to her body and his emotions, something is wrong. It is difficult to determine what "something", it is not defined, it is not clear but it is still there.

We can believe that everything is going well and that we are moving towards a practice to "refine" the perfection of our perfect ... but actually not, if all went well, if we were in tune with life, the phenomena and changes, we should not be looking for a practice.

We try to forget and cover this "empty" feeling by a feverish activity, many with sex, shopping, drink and food, but there is only pathological love relationships and dependency or television. This external "filling" cannot overcome our internal emptiness.

The discovery of an opportunity of another choice, to meet with a teaching that should "help", has created a new disease: waiting.

Now that we have found the solution in a spiritual practice or energetic (it's the same thing!), We want results! Like in the market, we invest 10 euros in carrots and we want a lot of vegetables ... unfortunately it is a little different with regard to the practice.

The latter must pass through three distinct stages that we tend to mix and and which lead to a real confusion (we should not be confused!).

These three stages are:

* training;

* Intentional practice or studious,

* The natural practice.

In the training phase we will work the exercises and practices which are not the Essence itself. For example, in the years of meditation exercises we learn to feel the "meditative state", but there are no exercises which are meditation (see "we should not be confused"). We must understand that in the training phase, we do not practice, we learn to practice. We seek to integrate intellectual exercises so that they become "habits" and are used with the minimum of intent and imagination. Take the subway, when you go for the first time in your life to a destination which will become a daily trip, like a new job or a new apartment, you are very careful on the trip. At each station you watch where you are relative to the destination, the route that you have and every step is a discovery. You stay on an alert and mentally: "I'm in the right place?" "will it be long?" ...

After two trips, two hundred or two million, you're sitting, relaxed, knowing every part of the progression of the train, and you can even have an activity, such as reading or work, without missing your stop. This is comparable to the end of the learning phase, which is more or less long according to the people.

We leave the training phase when we can do this exercise without thinking, without going to memory (or very little) and an soft and almost silent intention. "But I am never out of the learning phase!" I hear you say ... well yes! Hence the immobility of the practice that you undertake!

Thereby hampering the transition of training of the practice of awareness of these two stages. When we learn, we do not really, so do not wait. In the absence of waiting, you'll slip into the practice. Voilà!

When you start to practice, after a more or less laborious learning phase, phenomena may occur. These perceived changes are another possible blockage to the accomplishment of your training. In the phenomena, which do not matter, we have the unfortunate habit of attaching to a host of unnecessary thoughts. This attachments to the moments of perception of our practice reminds us that we "expect" something, the results ... "I am currently feeling this or that?", "Am I on track?", "Is this a sign of accomplishment? "... so many questions about phenomena that do not matter who we bring to this expectation, this need to know that it will get better, that we are good students.

In practice, and incorporated into daily life, we must seek our own. It is actually quite simple in theory, practice for anything than practice for any purpose, but the reverse is in fact the reality.

Our practices take us back to a loss of our mental structures, our structure separated from the world, our ego. This loss of structure is fatal to our mind, she blends into the rest of the universe and makes us lose our individuality. In our daily practices, our ego will survive on the basis of new limits in our teaching: hence comes our commitment to our certainties about our practice and our teacher, waiting to feel better and become better and all these recent defences of survival of our discriminative mental activity.

We can practice by strengthening our minds and our imagination, going to the opposite of what we release and amplifying the sensation of unease linked to our "me determined and unique", which will multiply our expectations because it is worse and worse, under the guise of mystical-spiritual-energetical confusing and destructive. As an example we can cite the bogus "non-violent" in some ways that are ready to kill "meat eaters", or beat up those who insulted their guru ...

To go in the direction of a peaceful practice, practice is the goal of practice. It is good to pass!

When practice begins, nothing changes. We're not going to transform into anything. It is unnecessary to grow our hair and to eat incense, we will stay as we are. All the changes that we are trying is a way to hide this expectation that we lack: the bright colours of our garments will alleviate the stiffness of the body and the sadness of our thoughts, forced sessions of "silent" meditation (in appearance) will parody an internal silence which we lack, the soft-spoken voice and the non-violence will conceal as much of our fear as of others and the world.

All attempts to visibly change to others is a way to demonstrate our performance, our mind tries to show that we are right, that we are better than others, different ... still waiting to be better!

But the practice does not change, the performance does nothing, we will remain what we were before our birth and which will continue after our death. In everyday life, we "work" just relax in silence and make us what we are, without the acquired blockages and without mundane conditioning.

There is nothing to seek, nothing to add. We will gently practice without expectation, to what we are. We will not add anything or learn, we will seek to return to a spontaneous phase with the changes of life. Without a morbid, compulsive use, for which the mind is used in everyday life. Without getting lost in the maze of our imagination, which is based on the past and projecting hopes in the future, we live free in the present. Leaving the time frame, we will enter the world of perceptions without the filter of the world of thoughts. Without this bad link to the time of past and future, we leave waiting: we abandon the fantasy of the imagination that comes from the past and we don't plan hope in the future, there is no more waiting, we practice, we live.

While the secret of the practice, is the practice. This simple practice that demands only that we follow what we are advised by our teacher, our feelings. By implementing these simple and practical teachings, we are moving towards a life with this clear sensation and devoid of compulsive thoughts. The relaxation allows us to live in peace and silence, without attachment to the images of an imposed separation from the world.

Oh, by the way, she lost the feeling of unhappiness ...

There.

Forms of Training

2009-08-10T12:50:00.001-07:00

In all traditional martial arts there is the idea of pre-choreographed movements that often symbolise a struggle in emptiness or boxing with his shadow. Apart from the style of sword and a few more rare styles, forms are a solo practice which aim to refine his technique and to better understand the movements that characterise his art.

The forms are done with bare hands or with a weapon and are supposed to help master his technique, his movement, breathing and changing his way of moving. The concept is very interesting; to practice exactly the movement that we will use in life can be very useful to enhance the neuromuscular patterns. But in fact the forms are of little value. They are important for competition and for demonstrations, not for combat or for energy work.

I will not dwell on the details of the competition or demonstrations because this is not what interests us here. Also as the work requires a high concentration of energy, it is recommended to use simpler movements than those that can be found in the forms. From the standpoint of the struggle, the idea of working combinations of strikes is interesting to loosen joints and muscles to work. However, it is a harmful practice where we seek to apply the same combinations in real fighting.

The idea of combat is close to the idea of chaos, nothing is planned and nothing is determined.

If one undertakes predefined movements quickly versus his instincts, the value remains certain in combat. There are several obvious ways to practice daily. First, it is important to relax using complex forms that will also coordinate the work of the body.

Repeating a form regularly helps to better position your body in space. Then, if the forms are long and dynamic it enables practitioners to develop a better physical condition. But we find the interests that I just listed in gymnastics. If this gives us the same opportunities that the arts of fighting, why we bother to practice the arts of combat?

You should know that 95% of forms that we know of date back 200 years or so, which corresponds to a time when martial arts are coming out of being secret to becoming a business. There are ways that show the essence of an art form, but adapted for demonstration. Moreover they represent a way to fight and combat concepts that are hopelessly out of date.

To mention just three: some jump kicks that were used against cavalry with complex movements to strip the neck of an opponent wearing armour or techniques of disarmament against a warrior equipped with a lance.

The forms that have a profound interest are forms with very simple movements and that are repetitive. Why not do a form not directly repeating these movements you say? Looking at the progress made by the athletes (to take this example) leading the 100 m race, the top Olympic athlete of the century and an athlete from last year did not have at all the same performance. The reason is that we have a much better understanding of physical training and methods than before. The best way to train the body to be in any order is to train the way we start with the body, we try to coordinate breathing with movement, it is only then that we will use meditative techniques that are intended to calm the emotions and multiply the intention. Therein lies the beginning of energy work.

See already how to train the body.

The latter consists of several segments and the logic dictates that you train each segment separately from the others and then unifies the entire body in each movement. To follow the logic of the Taoist arts but also to avoid turning her gymnastic into a practice of memory, the physical movements used in both meditation, chi kung, and the arts of combat.

To begin we take the muscles attached to the more static and more tense joints in the body (those seem to be the shoulders and hips). We will review each and every muscle group to achieve articulation on finer parts such as fingers or toes. Each series of exercises will be repeated each day over a period of two to three months (but could extend this period in case of underperformance).

These will be followed by other exercises tailored to the most important segments remaining in a specified time. The practice will be enriched by performing various exercises aided by objects, rubber bands or weights. Emphasis is on quality of training rather than quantity. For this, the exercises should be performed slowly to be felt fully and analyzed.

Limbs must seek to be in torsion / rotation to achieve the "sponge". They must be checked at every moment that the neuromuscular patterns are precisely in the sensory memory of the body and of course, to acquire, the exercises should be repeated every day for a given period. The slow exercises that are found in all Chinese internal arts and some yoga are a utility to bring the practitioner to a total control of the movement. Perform the exercises too quickly and we can not reveal the imperfections that we would if we do the gesture slowly.

We just look for movements that are perfectly aligned with the joints and respect the lines of force of the body. It is only when this movement will be fully integrated into the slow then with speed, then we can have gesture which is more aware than a conscious concentration. At this stage we can consider moving on to more important things like moving the energy, regulate breathing, or work on the emotions. Moreover, in the difficult conditions of a physical confrontation (I speak here of the arts of combat) or a period of serious illness (which joins the chi kung), the mind is disturbed.

When the mind can not focus perfectly, without interference, it must be able to rely on the body that can not be disturbed. This is the principle of habit: it takes months to successfully make a trip or something without thinking. However, it is very difficult to vary this movement or change its trajectory once the habit is ingrained in the body. It is the difference between an intellectual or mental repetition and habit infused into the cells of the body.

Torsion / rotation of muscle is found in all yoga exercises and stretching: the idea is to drain blood from an area by precise muscular movements "wringing" and torsion (the principle of a sponge that is emptied of its water), then let the blood fill the muscle again when you release the pressure. The repetition of these movements will increase the vascularisation of the target area. In traditional Chinese texts say that where there is blood there is energy and where there is energy there is the blood. Thus increasing blood flow means increased circulation of energy.

In contrast to the forms we have spoken above, we can already see that this is not gymnastics, but it is good chi Kung. The combination of all these sensations, these breaths, the movement of energy and the regulation of emotions can have a style of chi kung in all respects similar (externally) to the movement of the arts of combat. These are simple and precise movements that seek little memory as each movement of the body and all gestures of training are fluid and logical. It is clear that the movement for fighting will be anchored in the body as will the movements of chi kung.

Thus a movement of very advanced chi kung may resemble a simple external one, and a small martial movement will develop a high power at impact. The more we advance in the Taoist arts and more we realize that all external movements take the same directions in three dimensions.

Each gesture is moving in space in one of six directions.

Whether "separate the tail of the bird" or "white crane spreads its wings" in tai chi, "the shape of the horse" in hsing yi, "the sixth change of palm" pa kua, this remains in any case an uppercut at 45 degrees and nothing more. If instead of wasting his time to carrying out all these forms without really knowing why, we worked directly with the direction that we want (diagonal up) we would move more easily to the point. If we developed training methods for this movement in these dimensions is more precise and involves the whole body, we gain time.

This time saved could then be used for things more important than the physical movements. It could be used for working mental, and emotional energy. This would reduce the number of movements performed by increasing the quality and understanding of them. With the habit of working on the concepts, the three dimensions and six directions, there will be no limit to the number of techniques that can explain or use without losing time to practice forms without interest that are not applied in the arts of combat or in the arts of health.

This training can work the whole body and each part of the progress is using the same gestures with inner work. Each body part will be stronger and all of it will be in better health. Each motion will be an effective technique for the arts of combat and arts for health. Never will we ask: "If I made the white crane that eats the leaves, then I do the driving tamarind or should I opt for the deadly turnstile ".

Muscle "Contractibility"

2009-08-10T12:48:00.001-07:00

Muscle, like our mind cannot do two things at once. Either it is at relaxation, ready for use, or it is in function and therefore unusable. It is sometimes possible to find a median, which is pathological or transitional (aches or injuries). For a rapid response, without interference facing a stimulus ,it should be that our muscle are always in a state of alertness but relaxed ... hmmm, the paradoxes begin.

In such a situation, we are often mired in unimportant verbal jousts and we reach more to find words. Afterwards, we did not want to say this or that. During the altercation, our mind was tense due to a projection into the future or the memories of the past, too occupied to access the present, we were totally paralysed.

That is what state our body is in much too often!

What we are looking for through the practice, a body that consumes as little energy as possible, not stupidly using it but one which responds instantly when it is appropriate. We are helped in life by natural 'drugs' manufactured by the body, they allow us to overcome. But our mind is so tormented by our compulsive thoughts and we are so ignorant of the mechanisms of defence that it cripples rather than helps us. Discharge of adrenaline that goes through our body in an emergency will often be interpreted as a feeling of weakness. In reality it is a feeling of lightness that is there to be followed by action, "contractibility" perfect our muscles to be ready for anything.

Our body should be relaxed to respond appropriately to these signals, otherwise it requires terrible effort to struggle between a desire to remain paralysed, and this "involuntary" (the principle of life of each cell) natural call to be ready to act. For this relaxation, it is necessary to have a daily practice that will keep our structure in its natural state of relaxation. The "relaxation" has nothing to do with softness advocated by the hysterical followers of the illusion of non-violence. It is a transient state between two actions of life, the simple or complex. The body is toned but not hard, the mind relaxed but not asleep.

Our mind is an essential factor for the relaxation of the body. In a spontaneous action, there is no unnecessary energy expenditure. In an action gavée thoughts contradictory and confused, the body is tense and frustrated in a packaging of "wrong doing". The work of the relaxation of the body through relaxation of our "box thinking". For an exercise to be useful, it must not be intellectualized early in the learning phase: This is it useful to just follow the advice of his teacher without asking too many questions. When the whole body / mind is relaxed in the realization of the gesture, suitable or not, then it is time to discuss. Too often young practitioners seeking to discuss the form and what they will do before they have outlined the slightest gesture. The professor who returned with them in a debate of ideas is a bad teacher: It flatters his ego in an argument through which he will spread his knowledge and spoil any chance of discovery of "young beetles. The professor who wishes to profoundly change his pupil not said anything except "to the job and shut up!".

The intention is to initiate actions, but it will quickly become a problem. With the intent, we all wait and hope in a gesture that would remain in the field of pure action. On a strike, the desire for power fantasies and the outcome will affect the success of it. The intention is a starter, as with a car of 80 years, but rolling out the choke with insurance is a very sad result.

The intent is useful in the learning phase, but still a handicap in the practice phase, while the use in the arts of combat, it is a disaster!

The achievement is a reflection of training and preparation is in the "Yi" (intent) will be useful. In practice it is a weight that clutters.

The exercises that have followed the stages of learning and practice will be ready for use. It will be unnecessary to add an intention, expectation or a prayer, it will be too late!

In Chinese medicine the liver is responsible for the smooth flow of all manifestations of energy in the body (blood, nourishing and defensive energy, body fluids). Tension of the mind or body hurts and then it is reluctant to do its job properly. Even from a cellular stress is tight and the cells that are less efficient for a given action. Too intentions reported number of practicing martial arts angry and sick, sad and a little crazy ... too much tension!

For their natural spontaneous gestures of a human being relaxed and healthy, we need to relax. The exercises without apparent purpose, the daily work on intimacy with our body and the work of recognition of our mind is what to do!

Time, Patience and Personality

2009-07-01T09:41:00.000-07:00

Most westerners are no longer in a situation of daily survival that allows you to forget the diseases of the soul. With time in relative comfort, we find that little background noise that reminds us that we have not resolved: the emptiness inside that sometimes we seek to be filled by external accumulation. A deep separation between "me" and "I", between us and nature. This feeling is a pain, often dull pain, sometimes violent, which is there.

We are going to practice, the way, means that we promise more or less miracles.

But what to choose?

Today, in so much information that we bathe in some confusion, we do not know exactly what to choose. We are approaching the clairvoyance to know, the art of fighting for health and to aikido to defend themselves in the street, we learn transcendental meditation for flexibility and strength to relax ... and watch television for culture !

Not knowing really what we do, we cannot go towards whatever. The teachers appear with the gurus and everyone knows how all: "horizontal" knowledge, comparable to a thin layer of jam on a sandwich which is too big, cannot respond to our questions. Everything should go fast, everything must be fast, we must transform ourselves and understand everything in a hurry to catch the other things to do ... more! quickly!

We are surprised not to be a living entity within fifteen days and that the essence of knowledge is not integrated into our soul in a month: it takes years to go in the painful condition that we seek to change, it will be the same in the other direction.

In practices that are available, we need to make our choice.

How to make a choice in what we seek? Often we are attracted by the costume, the hat or the smile of a seller of spirituality and we forget to look twice. We are seduced by the packaging, as in the supermarket, but we do not look at the label (which is a pity!).

The form obscuring the merits, the blinding brilliance of the search, we are going where television tells us to go, so we've found the method of yoga, karate, Tibetan Buddhism (thank you Richard Gere), the ' aikido, tai chi (if only people knew that it was a boxing ...) and all the other wonderful things pre chewed by the United States and regurgitated by a bulimic reflex, on Europe.

But what do we want? What do we seek? (and who are we, anyway?)

If we take the time to discuss, to seek and choose, we are moving towards what we want. It is often better to investigate and believe in yourself than to follow the advice of women's magazines. Does the body "know"? Maybe, but it still must be sure not to pay attention to a "sick" body. Our habits are fueled by our thoughts and compulsive reacton, our frustrations and our tensions, our body is no longer the relaxed entity of body/spirit and mind of our origin. We react and defend against a world we do not understand. We must return to some quietude to listen.

Without good health, mental and physical, how can we take our internal compulsions as knowledge and feel right?

An alcoholic in the morning, feels very clearly that he needs a drink ... but he must follow his desire for that?

In a by product of a very pronounced new age, we have seen many practices that seek to follow the impulses and desires, on the pretext that the body "knows" everything ... yes and no.

If the body, by practice and repeated introspections, is relaxed and the flow energy is fluid, then it must be taken very seriously. Listening to his body, in this case, is always a priority to know the actual state of the self, what we really think. In this case again, it is wiser to believe the emotions than his mind. It is possible to lie with the mind, the ego, while emotions are visceral in the body.

The idea of a practice, if it exists in a tradition, is to guide us towards a goal. This goal can be spiritual, psychological, physical or otherwise. But if we do not know the idea of the track, the need and tradition, it is difficult to engage. It is also a good reason not to engage ...

Training will always seek to develop qualities that are necessary for the purpose of the style: for example the strength of mind for combat, the heart for sport and peace of mind for the spiritual. Again, be careful not to develop qualities that are not in keeping with our practice (cardiovascular capabilities in the spiritual way depending on the spiritual peace of mind for example) if we leave the priorities of our path we lose time.

We consume the path the same as hamburgers, sometimes "organic", but we're rarely at the heart of a way. Tradition takes time and courage. We know how we're eager to "change" and how the changes make us flee. A very Taoist paradox.

The practice is too close to what we do not want to see: the difference between "who we are and the person we are looking to sell to the world."

This fictional character, which derives from our first and last name, we shape for years and we are proud of polishing presentable. This "false self" is nurtured by our mental rumination and our compulsive thoughts, "we are because we believe" (thank you to Descartes). This character, personality, (from the Latin "persona", the mask!) Is unbearable when we have to look through. In the way we go beyond, dropping the mask we are moving towards the "natural", spontaneous.

If we go to ten ways at the same time, we accumulate instead of reducing and eventually avoid with meticulous care all that can help us, we do not move our condition.

Our suffering makes us feel alive, to take a strong individuality (personality) that stands out at all, an illusion of happiness in a further strengthening of his ego, a separation.

Pushed between anxious and depressive episodes, between past and future, we continuously repeat endless cycles calmly paving pleasure / suffering endlessly.

It is obvious that peace cannot be found in this alternating disease which depletes us and makes us question the seriousness of life: must we do this for the rest of our days? Is there another way to live life to reach real peace? Yes, in a spiritual practice in an "internal alchemy" we "transmute" and "sublime" in a search of peace and silence.

It is a long process, but which bears fruit ... "if we do it, it works, if you do not it does not."

Our perception into the future, where "everything is going well", or the constant reminder of our past, where "everything was so bad, we forget the reality that time does not exist!

Our perception of time is distorted by our minds prevailing in a mad dance, a wandering in a surreal space.

We do not live in the present moments in the unconsciousness more or less deep. I repeat: you do not live and that moments are more or less unconscious, in the present, it is impossible to speculate on it. We cannot realise our unconsciousness, our present moments are moments that are "invisible" in the changing world, moments where we "disappear." A party (us) of consciousness cannot achieve everything (global consciousness).

We are always aware of our unconscious ... hummmm.

The more we are unconscious and the changes in the world will be screened in a scary future or past depression. The more we are in dissociation with us / world, the more our discomfort. The more we are in the frame of time, we are less happy.

In this denial of this, we must never be aware each moment of presence reminds us that we are separated from the union sought.

In the moment, a presence accepted, we can not be unhappy.

If this is overwhelmed by emotions or thoughts, it is not possible to be in the moment.

The practice puts us in the presence of the moment, the way we leave the time frame. The cycles can be repeated, we are moving towards a non-conscious choice.

To lay the foundation of our practice we must move in the direction of the initiation of past, rites of passages forgotten. "Laythe basis" represents in a Taoist way 300 days we enter the path. This entry is an important change in life and can cause problems. Any change causes "friction", movements which produce sensations (often unpleasant). Often we prefer to escape the way, we hide what we know, from our character and our known bad habits reassure us. We find various excuses and complaints that we will affirm our escape.

Some suffering is real defence of our ego at risk. The more we go towards a union with the changes in the world, them more our ego loses its limits, its security. But if we continue without paying too much attention to these phenomena, we will see them lose their strength to finally disappear.

The most evident after a escape is a repetition of the process: there is a new direction, a new master, a new dress and a scent of different incense. Stuck in our time cycles that are repeated again and again, leaving the reality of the moment, we are wrong in a spiritual hypocrisy and passivity disguises. Oddly, the suffering, softened by an appreciation of the ego is still there.

In knowledge of the process, the acceptance of a desire to "return", we must commit ourselves to work in one direction only. Moments of presence will densify, repeat and take root in our lives. They will gently envelop us in acceptance of this, which has nothing to do with resignation which borrows sentimentality, and we slide into the changes in the world.

This union with the movement of universal energy, the ability to go "with" and not "against", the relaxation that follows, this is the Way.

But before this result, we need to follow the exercises every day, without frills, in a discovery of enthusiasm to practice.

Breathing

2009-07-01T09:40:00.001-07:00

How could we meditate, visualise, travel in the astral spheres without breathing properly?

Breathing is not only attached to physical spontaneity, it is also a fundamental technique for relaxation and meditation. No fighting technique would be effective without the controlled breathing, as no emotional control would be possible in situations of stress. We see four major parties on the subject of breathing:

* The mechanics of breathing,

* Conscious Breathing

* The energetic dimension of respiration,

* Taoist breathing ( accumulation of the breathing described above).

Above all it is important to remember that breathing is a fundamental process required for life. The movements of inhalation and exhalation are not only a way to produce energy and to allow gas exchange, but also a way to get in touch with the profound.

We begin by the respiratory system mechanicalyl and anatomically. It consists of upper and lower airways. The system provides respiratory gas exchange in the body and helps regulate the acidic / base balance of the body. If a change occurs in the respiratory system, it will have repercussions throughout the body affecting the other systems.

The upper airway consists of the nose, mouth and larynx (speaking only). These structures are involved in warming and humidifying the air we inhale, but also taste, smell, chewing and swallowing the food.

The lower airway consists of the trachea, bronchi and lungs. This is where we find membranes that are responsible for gas exchange. The lungs are free in their movement, except at the median level in which they are attached by lung ligaments.

The inhalation and exhalation take place as follows: during inhalation, the diaphragm, intercostal muscles and external muscles constrict, thus increasing the volume of the thorax vertically and horizontally. While the thorax is remote, the pressure inside the chest decreases and the lungs swell to fill the chest that increases in volume in turn. During exhalation, the diaphragm relaxes and the chest slowly returns passively to its volume and its position. During a forced exhalation, contraction of the intercostal muscles, internal abdominal and it reduces the volume of the rib cage. The compression of the thorax and lungs makes intra pulmonary pressure above atmospheric pressure. Most of us has two to four cycles of inhalations / exhalations per minute in the waking state, and six to eight per minute during sleep. One notes that it is possible to vary our breathing dramatically. In the event of stress or physical effort, we can achieve a rate of 100 cycles inhalations / exhalations per minute. For those who do serious work on respiration, the rate can drop to 4 or 6 per minute, knowing that gas exchange are always more accurate and deeper. We have a total lung capacity of 5000 ml. Most of the time, the average breath is only 500 ml. Even if we really used our lungs still hold a reserve of safety of 1000 ml of air. It is interesting that in our daily lives we have very rarely attention on our breathing process. However, in times of stress, the first thing we feel is the difficulty in breathing.

The process of respiration and its fundamental role in our survival, nature, in its wisdom, gave us only a partial and limited control of our breathing. The respiratory system is connected to most of the sensory nerves of the body. Therefore, any sudden or chronic stimulation from the senses can have a direct impact on the magnitude, speed or intensity of our breathing. Thus a shock, the perception of something very beautiful, intense thoughts are why we 'stop breathing. "

Of all the respiratory muscles, the more important to our overall health is the diaphragm. It is rare to meet people who use this muscle effectively. Yet it is the focus of the breath. Normally when we inhale, the diaphragm contracts. This movement of a diaphragm pumps in good health. Compared to normal, an increase, however slight, in movement of the diaphragm downwards not only has an influence on our internal organs, but it increases the volume of air in our lungs.

Upon exhalation, the diaphragm relaxes back with its elasticity that helps to expel the air from the lungs. If we exhale completely, strongly supporting the diaphragm against the heart and lungs, providing a massage the of internal organs.

Unfortunately there are few people who can enjoy this natural movement. Indeed, muscle tension (tendon or ligament) of the rib cage disrupts the motion of the diaphragm. Negative emotions, fears and stress reduce the possibility of movement of the diaphragm. This leads us to conclude that in most cases, poor muscle does not move easily. In addition, health and mobility of the spine and pelvis are directly related to the mobility of the diaphragm.

This means that a bad position, bad habits, weak back muscles, are all reasons why the breathing is not in good condition. To try to compensate for our tensions and disfunctions of our diaphragm, we tend to breathe more and more often than what is good for health. In this hyper ventilation will result from feelings of oppression and tension that will themselves make the movement of the diaphragm more difficult. This is a vicious circle which is not easy to leave.

The more the breathing is rapid, the more it is done by movement of the upper chest. The more we breathe through the upper chest the more the feelings and emotions will be at the surface. Again, this does not lead us to serene breathing.

As can be seen here, before returning energy in a very complex magic visualisation, the very fact of looking at the mechanics of breathing means we can already breathe better. Being closer to the conscious movement of inhalation and exhalation already calm our emotions. Only in those circumstances is when we can take the next step which is the sensation.

The first thing to do is sit down and breathe thinking about inhalation and exhalation.

I encourage you to try this exercise, to sit all day enjoying each inhalation and each exhalation.