Qigong Movements as effects rather than causes

Re: Qigong Movements as effects rather than causes
From: jimbo

>I can agree with the notion that it works both ways. What I have trouble with is that a given motion creates an effect…

>And that brings me to the heart of what i’m suggesting: it’s not the movement that does the healing/opening/energizing. It’s the intention. The movement is an aftereffect, a relic, an empty pattern in and of itself.
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Jimbo,
thanks for opening up this interesting discussion. Lots of posts with penetrating perceptions about the Process being multi-directional. But maybe your use of the term “intention” is key here, and could be expanded upon.

Where does the Intention to move arise from? From the Shen or from the Jing? You are really raising a cosmological question – where does the impulse to manifest in 3-D arise from?

I will skip here to my own conclusion: the impulse arises from the Yuan Jing. Jing is what gives us free will, aka intention. It is what individuates us. The direction and purpose of mvoement from source to physicality is to explore individuation.

So when you say the movement is empty, perhaps you are implying the free will arises from a deeper or hidden level of self, which I personally would agree with. And as qigong and tai chi players know well, when the movment becomes fully spontaneous, it is the most profound experience of life. So the “empty” space is really just an open space, awaiting activation.

The deep level of Original self is implanted in the physical 3-D body, and it is the physical movement that re-awakens our awareness of the yuan jing, the Original Essence. That is a long process, to get it to open like a flower here in the physical plane, and without movement it would never happen (as you noted).

But do I detect a slight hint of judgement about physical movement being empty, that reminds me of Hindu/Yoga predeliction for dismissing the reality of the body? Maybe it would help here to remember that movement is not only bi-directional between jing-chi-shen, but also multi-dimensional. And the “physical reality” of 4th, 5th, 6th, etc. dimensions is no more or less real than the 3rd dimensional body. Having a faster vibration doesn’t make it more real, just different.

I think the question really bugging you here is: can I accept the reality of intention arising within my 3-D body?

Or to make it more concrete: you are standing in a road, and a truck is bearing down on you. You decide to jump out of the way. Did that impulse to move arise in your 3-D body, or in your soul/energy body? Can you really separate your intention from your need to fulfill your worldly destiny?

I think its impossible to separate the continuum of body-mind-soul, although we do it for pruposes of knowing the self from all angles. But the Chinese apparently exist to remind us that we can live at a much deeper level of embodiment that is physically present and spiritually fluid.

I think its because the Chinese race arose from within the Earth, and hold earth as their central element. You are viewing movement from the perspective of Ether/emptiness as being the center. It is a beautiful mirror, but is one image/reflection more real than the other?

michael