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I’m slow. I’ve spent a couple years on the Basics. A few on Fusion. I assume Kan and Li is next.
Isn’t Kan and Li working w/ and switching the hearts/warmth and the kidneys/water to create steam?
Please let me know your experiences and thoughts on it.
Thanks
Michael
Kan and Li is interesting. Here are some thoughts about the reasons it is good.
1. Why do we invert?
When doing Fusion, the light fire is on top and the dense water is below. When considered at the physical level, they will tend to separate – water energy will drip away below you and fire energy will drift away above you. By inverting the energies, they don’t just waste away, but they do something useful – they create steam.2. Recovery of the prenatal condition?
The inversion of fire and water also helps go back to a prenatal state, because we are typically then inverted, with our head and heart down and our feet and kidneys up.3. Why do we want steam?
The steam is a state that occurs when water and fire are brought together. It is yuan chi, a neutral state. No, not really a neutral state, but a change in dimension, a shift from this highly differentiated physical plane to a less differentiated astral plane (I don’t use later and early heaven terminology, because I remember that it puts you, like my wife, to sleep).4. Why do we want to shift dimensions?
It is sublime. It releases worries about this dimension. It shows freedom.5. Is this difficult?
I find it very tricky. To make an analogy: if cooking is like making a sandwich, kan and li is like making a souffle. When making a souffle, the mixture of ingredients must be just right, the temperature must be just right and so on. You have to be attentive, and you have to have “the touch” like a master chef.For me, the difficulty with Kan and Li was/is the tendency to “do” it. To make the energies go here and there and invert and shift. When I do that it does happen, but some other part of my being goes “Hey, who said you could take that heart energy- that belongs here!”. My solution has been to not move the fire energy from the heart to the new position in the cauldron, but to find fire energy there.
Enough, I hope others answer as I am interested in what are their thoughts and experiences.
Chris
Kan and Li is a method devised by Chia (claims it was transmitted from a Taoist hermit) where one takes the mind-will and moves the coarse chi of the body into certain positions such that they will draw together and release a third force which Winn calls the neutral force.
Winn, realizing how exhausting and fruitless it is do this with the mind-will, devised a method where one gets into “communication” with the shen and asks them to “assume the positions.” While this method is a wonderful step towards emptiness (because one gives up the need for the false ego to always be the boss) and the main reason I embraced it in the past, one has fallen into what I have become fond of calling semblance dharma.
This is because the type of internal alchemical transmutations that are described in the Taoist texts occur on their own without any need for guidance or asking the shen to do anything.
They are a result of emptiness meditation.
Sages described what happened to them via emptiness and then those who followed thought they could produce these transformations through the will.
Such actions do produce results but they are not the correct results.
This placing of the cart before the horse is semblance dharma.
“Understanding Reality” is one of my favorite Taoist books that has been translated into english. The commentary from Liu-I-Ming is an example of a Taoist scholar who has no clue what is going on and explains the original verses from Chang Po Tuan incorrectly.
A great example of confusion in alchemical texts is how others define lead and mercury.
This is very critical: Lead is your chi, and mercury is your mind.
Anyway, when one is empty, then the yang chi arises out of the extreme of yin (emptiness).
If the mind is filled with shit, then you have to see what needs to be done in order to empty it. Here are some good examples:
1. Your body stores lots of tensions and mental attachments. Scott Sonnon’s materials help you to discharge all of that and get quiet.
2. If you are depressed, it is probably because your life sucks. Stop taking meds and take responsibilty for making yourself happy.
3. If you have issues with sex, go out and fuck. Learn Dr. Lin’s wonderful methods and fuck. Slowly stop ejaculating entirely.
If Michael doesn’t want a debate (and he can’t debate now), I will remain and continue to post of my wonderful experiences. Let my experiences speak for themselves! People can think I am making them up–they can believe what they want.
I shall behave myself. BUT, if Spyrelx or anybody else (especially women) attempt to insult my success I will probably answer back, so if you are easily offended, please don’t read my posts.
See, you have to look at yourself honestly and say “what do I want” and “am “I getting it.”
Then everything is apparent and words mean nothing.
The act of reversing the fire and water shen of the vital organ spirits after combining all the yin and yang spirits has a very powerful dissolving effect that gradually increases in dissolving power and substance as one progresses with their practice through the years. It dissolves your inner personal emotional, sexual, physical and spiritual issues and will eventually also dissolve ancestral and collective issues of humanity, as well as accelerating your outer life and physical destiny.
It is important in all levels of practice to give enough time in between the formulas to let your energy body absorb and grow with the new levels of consciousness and energy that you are embodying.
When you learn a new level of meditation (lesser, greater, greatest Kan and Li, star, and heaven and earth alchemy), the previous level becomes easier to digest and complete. So if you feel like it is a long and difficult process to do fusion, doing lesser kan and li will help to accelerate the process of fusion, and amplify it.
The importance of actual practice cannot be overstated; as long as someone is consistent in daily practice, the inner personalities of their vital organ shen will continue practicing the meditation while you are doing mundane daily things, and you will progress and suddenly reach a new level even when you are not expecting it. It will be easier to achieve a fluidity and freedom in your practice where you can choose from many different meditations instead of feeling like you have to do the same thing every day.
Michael Winn has made a very good point below that the audio tape sets are good to get started but it is very important to recieve a live transmission during a live workshop from someone who has already achieved this. This is also why it is difficult to learn a spiritual practice from a book. The intelligence of your body shen learn from that of the other person, in the same way that if you take a martial arts class, you will instinctively learn things in your (energy) body from your teacher that you may not even be aware of but will manifest in your practice.
>See, you have to look at yourself honestly and say “what do I want” and “am “I getting it.”
another grammatical error…..
Chris,
c> For me, the difficulty with Kan and Li was/is the tendency to “do” it. To make the energies go here and there and invert and shift. When I do that it does happen, but some other part of my being goes “Hey, who said you could take that heart energy- that belongs here!”. My solution has been to not move the fire energy from the heart to the new position in the cauldron, but to find fire energy there. >
I’ve found the above in my own practice, and have seen one or two people mention it here as well. I find that the k&l version as found in “Tsongkhapa’s Six Yogas of Naropa” solved that, ime.
Trunk
Trunk,
That is what happens anyway once the caudlron is stabilized. The initial training of inversion – the first level of refining – is to communicate clearly to the shen what you want, that you are reversing direction. That is just the post-natal mind getting the message. The shen are not physically limited to the body location of the organs; they can create fire or water anywhere, that is why the cauldron is moveable.The second level of refining is to release the fire from the kidneys and the water from the heart – that is when the real alchemy begins. But the outer inversion has to happen first, to balance the excesses of our post natal 5 phase mind and link them to the pre-natal mind which functions as an alchemical trinity.
btw, I was in Tsongkhapa’s cave in Tibet last summer, and he was definitely on the same frequency – deep earth jing still cooking away. All the kan and li students who walked in there were able to tune right into the cauldron, and we did a standing meditation for an hour while tourists walked past, oblivious to what was still happening there…..
May your cauldron never crack,
michaelMichael,
We view things differently on a number.. well, on most of the points that you mention. I’m all for whatever works for each individual, that’s the bottom line – and I certainly make way for the fact that people vary. But, you and I differ on the nature of shen, what a cauldron is – the mechanics involved.
> fire from the kidneys and the water from the heart >
I agree that the above is part of it.
> – that is when the real alchemy begins >
Well, I suppose that someone could name any significant step for a person as the beginning of the real work. I have my own view of where things “really” turn around.
> btw, I was in Tsongkhapa’s cave in Tibet last summer, and he was definitely on the same frequency >
I find that comment to be an astonishingly glib appropriation of Tsongkhapa’s work to support your own.
I’m glad you had a good meditation in the cave.
Trunk
Ii’m not trying to limit or judge the process that works for anyone –
I say share it and explain why it works for you. As I’ve said elsewhere,
the Tibetan tantrics are using analogous processes to Tao alchemists.
My critique of Bodri/Nan is not directed at tantric buddhists, but rather their critics in the Chan school that think they can bypass all the generation stage yogas.Just pointing out that in taoist alchemy, where the rubber meet the roads is in the coupling of “yin within the yang, and the yang within the yin”. This second level of refining gives substance to the prenatal. It was just my speculation that you were into that level.
And definitely not trying to appropriate Tsongkhapa’s accomplishment for myself – I am not at his level. But I could tell from the frequency and direction of chi flow in the cave that it involved the center of the earth – and its deep jing – in the equation. Its a pathway familiar to me, and I hadn’t found it in most of the other monasteries in Tibet. That’s all.
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