so I am reposting a few things to get this rolling.

during the course of talking about kiai masters getting owned and the uses of chi a couple things came up

witch posted about being easily hypnotized and something to the effect of being vulnerable to people with either suggestion abilities or chi abilities or both.

I replied that the best way to remedy being easily hypnotized is to volitionally control your own presence and remain completely aware at the level of consciousness and chi.

In the process you remove the gaps in your attention and awareness that make it possible to be hypnotized or trances rendering you immune to either.

In addition, the practice will allow you to detect other people gapping out and to take advantage of it.

There are several practical reasons for degapping yourself.

From a meditation point of view, it is necessary to be fully present to apprehend the mindstream as well as the various energy bodies.

From a healing point of view, it will allow you to detect energy imbalances in your own body in and in others.

From a martial point of view, it is both a defense and offense, you prevent people from slipping in between your gaps while you make, use or exploit their gaps.

This brought up channeling and trance and the nature of gapping and not gapping.





I want to focus on this sentence.

" When your local conscious mind takes a backseat to whatever you're channeling."

This is absolutely antithetical to taoist energy arts and genuine meditation. The entire concept is anathema.

witch added




So my first question is why? Why trance? Why channel?

If you trance or channel, what is the exact purpose? What do you think you are channeling? How can you tell what you are actually channeling versus what you want to channel?

I have some personal experience with the subject as I was involved with channeling since I was a child.

The first channeling I ever saw with my own eyes was in a private Third Order Franciscan prayer meetings.

Our group would channel the Holy Spirit and Speak in Tongues and Lay On Hands. I was fanatically and unshakably Catholic for some years as a result of being exposed to that as a child.

When I deconverted from Christianity, the first thing I became involved with was the occult. I stayed with the occult from the age of 13 to about 23 when I had to make some major decisions about paganism as it pertained to me ongoing spiritual development.

" I am surprised that taoist alchemy would disconnect a person from astrological influences; usually with alchemical practice it is the opposite."

Taoist Alchemy and Taoist practices in general, put your life and the energy around you under your own personal influence. You become 100% responsible for everything about you. It is not possible to be influenced or effected by the mere energy of distant planets once you have come into contact with your spirit through meditation. You become the master of your own destiny and for every thought and action that comes up inside you. You take full responsibility for your karma and your energy and you start writing your own ticket rather than being subtly influenced by astrological influence.

At the more intense levels of nei dan, you very much connect with the sun, the moon, the planets and the stars. You decide, at the level of energy, whether or not you will be effected by anything in outer space.

Clearing your central channel and gaining control of your own chi will make it all but impossible to trance, be hypnotized by or influenced by anyone else's mind or energy. There is no reason to be subjected to or effected by other people's energy or intent.

When you trance, you create gaps in your mind stream that you later have to connect to be totally present.
When you channel anything but chi into your body, if your mind take a backseat to anything, you are installing gaps in your awareness and your mind.

It is like sprinting in the opposite direction of being fully aware, awake and alive be being present continuously.

It is not much different than getting passed out drunk, being stoned out of your mind, taking presurgical sedatives that leave the hours preceding the surgery vague or foggy, it's like being hit in the head hard.

Each and everyone one of those things puts gaps in your mindstream that you have to connect up to make all your levels of being awake and present at the same time without gaps.

Which brings us to practicing the occult in general.

Why practice the occult at all? Taoist nei gung and nei dan directly connects your mind and heart to the elements and your inner and outer worlds.

When you do Taoist Alchemy, you were working on the level of energy with your conscious awareness. It is not vague or random or maybe.

There is no need for a robe, a candle, a bowl, an altar, standing stones, a full moon or a solstice. You can perform all the ritual circle casting in your mind without moving if you can control your chi. You use your own chi to consecrate and charge a space to work the occult in.

One of the reasons I got involved with Ba Gua was the description of it in action. Walking a circle projecting chi from your hand and creating spiraling vortexes both inside your central channel and in the center of the circle that combines earth energy, heavenly energy and your own chi. It sounded like Taoist Wicca

In casting the circle you face a direction, your receptive hand faces your body or the ground while your projective hand extends outward and you build a magic circle by creating circles and spirals and spheres, You walk clockwise and counter clockwise or widdershins. You open your energy channels to the sky and the ground and channel various energies into you, through you and then out of your body into space around you. You build the circle up and then dissolve it away when you are done.


Anyway I am curious about why people channel or trance, what you think you are getting out if it.

I also made a video about the nature of the occult practices and spirituality you can view if you are interested.


Depending on the replies, I may or not share my experience with channeling, shen and out of body experiences as well as near death experiences. If you guys are interested in hearing about that, let me know.

That's pretty cool. I think I read something to that effect in Paramahansa Yogananda's books. I wonder if one can get out of the gravitational field of Vaastu/fengsui related influences?

Well, what if you are channeling your "Higher Self/Oversoul?"

In which case you (little you) are simply switching to You (big you).

As far as why - well, "higher" sources often have better information that can be harder to get in your normal Beta state. I mean, is it not like seeking out better teachers or masters in the flesh here?

Also, you mentioned something about the 8 energy bodies here. What are they exactly?

Well all this long email (greatly appreciate though) can be summed up in one word according to Taoism....

NON-ATTACHMENT. When you attach to things your mind will manifest it.

Tao Bless,

Wudangspirit

v,
They are a part of BKF's system. He calls them Taoism but I think they are from Tiantai. They are: physical, energetic, mental, emotional, psychic, causal, individuality, and Dao.

My goals are very different than the goals of most people here. I am not looking for non-attachment, I am not looking for total actualization or enlightenment. I'm also not looking for power. From what you posted in the other thread, you became a witch to gain power. With me it was the other way around, I became a witch to lose power. I've had some unusual experiences in my life, but the thing that finally convinced me was during my divorce, one day I was so angry at my husband I cursed him out loud while he was at work. That day a tree fell on his car. So I thought I had better brush up on witchcraft, because if it was imaginary, no harm done, but if it was real, like taking a gun to a practice range and learning how to shoot responsibly.

My only goal from a religious point of view is to follow my north node, and that involves following Venus and Mercury, the two silliest lighthearted gods. I go into trance because I enjoy the company there. It's nice to converse with like minds.

I don't want to be an immortal, I don't want to be enlightened, I don't want to win martial arts fights--I just want to make enough money for a comfortable retirement and to send my girls to college, have enough free time for fun, not hurt anybody, stay reasonably healthy, enjoy as much sexual pleasure as I possibly can, and watch The Colbert Report. That's about it! If I can help out in a small way to fight global warming and help social justice at home and abroad, I'm there too, but only in a very laidback way.

I do the regular esbats and sabbats. Mostly my practice is spent giving away energy rather than trying to build up energy.

I guess what I'm trying to say is I am a witch. I was born that way, and finally accepting who I am has made my life a whole lot easier. The moon really does influence me hugely, and the rest of the planetary transits too. It just is a good fit with me.

I would definitely love to hear about your views and insights concerning these topics!!!

In kind regards,

Adam.

This definetly needed its own thread. Here is my post from the Kiai-thread:

I would say trance is a pretty dagerous thing unless you really really know what you connect to. Some people do know, but most dont. We have guys like Edgar Cayce, JK Knight(or something like that), that are able to keep it real. But all the reiki-new-age-people all around the world channeling every master they see a picture of are really only harming themselves and their listeners.

Ive seen many channelers and what they connect to is definetly not jesus(or sananda as he is popularly called in channeling communities), Melchizedek, Sanat Kumara, Metatron, etc. It is someone else that is avaiable in other realms. Could be anyone, but because the channel is in trance he wouldnt know. Too often will channeling sessions leave people spaced out, feeling all warm and full of love, but with no grounding in reality. And then whats the point of felling love if not for fulfilling your own egos needs?

Notice especially how so many channelings start with things like "greeting beings of light", "you are the chosen ones", etc. It adresses the ego. Peoples aura and energysystems are blasted after channeling sessions. They are not expanded into the "unlimited universe of love", it is destroyed and left open like a wound for anyone in any realm to poke on. They are not awakened and ascended masters of love, they are pushed into a corner leaving themselves open to be manipulated by anyone.

But the ability to let go is ofcourse important, but you dont need trance-states to practice that. The trance-state in itself has not much to offer us.

But...how do you know that you really are channeling your higher self? I would say it is much better to meditate and achieve a stable awareness of your higher self than to channel it.

The three states; hypnosis, trance and meditation can all be differentiated from several physiological parameteres. Hypnosis and meditation is seen in the body as alpha brainwaves. But hypnosis dosent have all the metabolical and hormonal changes that happens in meditation. Trance has a higher brainwave frequency than alpha and is not physiologically healthy at all. And as explained in my previous post, it is not spiritually healthy either.

Awareness and stillness meditation on the other hand is healthy in every way. You become more aware, conscious and awake. People that are awake dont channel, they dont need to use someone else to convey their message, or to have a message to convey. This goes both ways, both the channel and the channeled are not knowledgable enough, they are not masters enough(even though they say so), to convey their message as normal people.

People that are awake speak from their own knowledge and experience of the universe, not someone elses. And why would a "Master" or an "ascended being of light" need someone to speak for him? As a true master of the higher realms of the universe, are you still that limited? If someone is pure consciousness, why can he then not just speak directly to the other consciousnesses he needs to speak to?? All channeling is ego, pure ego. Both from the channel and the channeled.

I think a lot of people find channeling and trance states fun because it is something tangible, something mystical and experiencable. But it is only childs play. The more awake people get, the less they need to channel.

Great hé

I dont have that much to say on the subject of the occult, people tend to look strange at you when you even mention it, probably because its such a loaded concept. I assume channeling and trance are yust a small part of the occult, also seems to depend a bit on wich part of the world you are in, literally.

I couldnt resist posting because above quote is the first practical reference i noticed here that shows that bagua isnt yust a great martial art but way more.

Thanx SFjane, nice post.

The different bodies are described in many traditions, but with slightly different hierarchy and names. Ive never heard of it in taoism and has actually missed a taoist reference to them.

Buddy, could you please elaborate a little bit on what you know? What is tiantai?

When I go into trance I don't "channel higher beings." More like using a cosmic cellphone. It's just the 12th house, nothing all that spooky. People go there when they go to sleep; I just go there when I'm awake. It's just a community of people, that's all. I mean, I can feel the planets there too, but I can feel those out of trance when I'm awake too. The only "beings" I've met there are creatures of my own creation, tulpas. Other than that, just fellow humans. I'm not seeing what the big deal is, and I certainly don't think it's harmful in any way, at least to me. Frankly I think the eleventh house, including the Internet, can be a scarier and more harmful place, in some ways. Certainly more addictive!

Crowley saw both mysticism and magick as useful persuits and as essentially two routes to the same thing. He described mysticism (yoga, taoist techniques, jesuit meditations) as going ever inward to reach "mastery" and magick as going ever outward to do the same. Because infinity is infinity in either direction, the end result is the same. As another poster on another thread pointed out, most "mystic" traditions are essentially the same once you reach their pinnacles.

Hi Taoist81!

Can you describe what you mean by Jesuit meditations? Do you mean meditations done by the Jesuits, an Order in the Catholic church? They are the interllectuals and academics of the catholic church, as I understand it, and have historically attacked and argued against Christian mysticism; so I would be surprised if that is who you are referring to.

Many thanks!

In kind regards,

Adam.

Meditations of Ignatious of Layolla. I don't have the spelling correct. I believe the whole order is based on his meditations. They just don't want lay people into mysticism, they would claim it as their domain.

The occult doesn't necessarily include channeling. I like the example of Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche who is a Bon Dzogchen master as well as a Bonpa shaman, working with the elements in nature and in healing work with humans. Soul retrieval etc. He teaches this alongside his Dzogchen training so its not as if he holds the view that you must be established in the natural state first before doing shamanic work. Trance channeling of "beings" is for those who are lazy and don't want to work on themselves and have said beings do the work or inflate the ego so it thinks something is being done. Bardon's critique of the difference between Magic and sorcery in his Evocation book is a great resource.

I agree with witch that its not necessary to loose awareness in working in neighboring realms.

Tiantai (J-Tendai) is a form of Mahayana Buddhism that Kumar's last teacher, Liu Hongjieh, studied in his early years.

I guess it would be hard to "prove" exactly what you were channeling, yes.

I would seem to agree that trance is a hi-fi state. It felt that way to me, although I have no idea if I was technically in trance according to whatever the technical definition of it is. So, I can't even be entirely sure we are talking about the same thing here. But, I don't see why a higher frequency would be harmful. In fact, the gamma state has been associated with inspiration.

Why would ascended masters "need" to speak through us? Well, I don't think they have to - they can also just be communicted with separately. There's many ways to skin a cat...

But if anything, wouldn't channeling be LESS about ego, since you have to subjugate your local ego in order to allow another consciousness override it?

BTW, I didn't intentionally try to channel - it just happened spontaneously. And I have a feeling this is the case for many others as well..

Oh, my reason for saying it is harmful is not about the gamma frequency. You are right, the gamma its about inspiration, clairity of mind and concentration. It is also seen when people do vivid visualisation or inner work on traumas and difficult emotions. But that state dosent have any hormonal or metabolic positive effects.

The trance state is not recommended as a way to heal stress or other diseases like meditation is. And it leaves your energy systems open and receptive of anything, not just what you focus on, the master you want to channel, but anything from the subconscious patterns of the person sitting next to you to hungry ghosts in other realms.

This is why we need to know and be aware of our inner worlds. We need to be awake and aware of why we feel the way we feel, why we have this or that impulse, where it orginates from, how it is expressed in the inner bodies, etc. Just opening up to some feeling isnt enough if you are trying to be fully awake. Its ok though. We have all been through these things. And to those who havent experienced it, you will someday


True masters communicate directly to the ones they want to speak to. And to them it dosent matter if the reciever is aware of it or not in his waking life. The reason I mention this is that very often a channeler starts of with "Oh, I feel I have Metatron, the highest of all angels, here by my side. He says he has a message to us so Ill let him speak through me. "Dear beings of light. You are the chosen ones for this special message I bring now to the world. Bla bla bla"" It makes everyone in the room feel like they are the center of the whole universe and the only ones to bring truth to the world, when they in reality is just another human being on the planet earth having economic and realtionship problems just like the rest of us

Most people think that our waking consciousness is the most important part of consciousness. It is not. But this is one of the reasons we seek big feelings and sensations like the ones channelings give us.


I was a little off there, too harsh a statment. ALL channeling is not pure ego. Sorry, got carried away. But A LOT of it is. And probably more than we know of when we are in the middle of it. We are so easily fooled by good feelings when we channel. And when we let go of our local ego, we might as well just be opening up to a bigger ego. hahaha. A lot of people do just that.

It is also a natural law that states the more you try to loose your ego, the more ego you get


Yes, I guess so. Dont take my word for anything I say when I say that trance states are harmful. Get your own experience and get it 100%. But my point of view might help you or others be a little more aware next time and notice a more of what is happening. You will learn a lot more by being awake on all levels of yourself than by loosing yourself in a trance. Dont you agree?

I would agree that a very open, I suppose trance, state could leave you vulnerable to negative entities (at least at first, before you can protect yourself).

Fortunately, I was protected by the close presence of others at the time.

I also never used it for self-healing. I believe theta state is the one for that.Well, I can see your point about showboating, lol.

However, I think they can also communicate directly to people, or 2nd-hand if they so choose. It's like say you're on the phone with John, and Jane is right there. So, while you're talking to John, you ask him to pass a message on to Jane. This is no big deal IRL, so I don't see why it would be in any other dimensions, either?Could be - but I wasn't trying anything. It all just happened to me. Hell, I didn't even really know what trance was. And I certainly wasn't planning on channeling anything.

No harm in taking things cautiously, though.

Just as Tumo said, the Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius of Loyola. He was the founder of the Jesuit order and as such his Exercises are introductory and ongoing practices. Laypeople may also practice them. You are right though that the Jesuits are known for their pursuit of knowledge. They are still spiritual priests though.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiritual_Exe...atius_of_Loyola

hmm, actually physical, energetic, emotional, mental, psychic, causal, individuality, and Dao.

Sorry, just couldn't shut up. And yes, according to Bruce they are common to both the Water taoist tradition, (maybe also the fire), and (some?) buddhism.

The causal is also called karmic.

One of the thing that came out with Alan just yesterday, is that even though both Taoism and Buddhism has the 8 bodies, they don't necessarily agree on what is possible to be done with them.

They have a number of applications. So for example at you start from your skin, and you go in toward your central channel you meet them one after the other. The same as you go from the skin out. As you go through the various layer of your aura.

Now if you take all the bodies up to the karmic they essentially have an extension in space. As such you can basically run a microcosmic orbit through them (not that micro in some cases). As such you have basically 11 layers of microcosmic orbit. (just count). I suspect the 12th would then be the central channel, but this is moving into philosophy, as my experience of the body of individuality is very very limited. (If existant at all)

I don't believe in entities, and I don't believe in hungry ghosts. Ghosts cannot feel hunger--people feel hunger. It's just other people, flawed human people, maybe simply asleep and dreaming. Sure, basic protection is a good thing to have, just like wandering around in any new lawless place--but it's just people, like you'd meet anyplace else.

I don't know, maybe I'm all wet. I'm going on feel here.

Yeah,, Pietro's right. Although Bruce is the only one I've ever heard speak about this with respect to Dao. My current teacher studied a lot of Dao Gong in his younger days. He started to want to "be away from the world." He realized he didn't want to feel that way.

Buddy, maybe we should start a new thread for this, but...
I know you went looking for some of the original sources of Bruce material.

Did you also investigate in the Tiantai form of Buddhism? I would be interested in some of the results of that investigation.

There are many hierachies of inner bodies.

My teacher teaches: element, physical, astral, causal(karmic), mental, etheric, soul, etc.
In Keys of Enoch they are physical, electromagnetic, epi-kinetic, eka bodies, gematria, zohar.
In theosophy they are physical, etheric, astral, mental, causal, logos, etc.
Ken Wilber has a set like this, Gurijief has one, most people who do spiritual cultivation do have a map like this.

I find it very interesting to compare different hierarchies and see how they describe the same, only through different point of views. And most mystic schools Ive seen have some sort of map like this. I havent seen a taoist version(unless BKF's count, but Buddy say it isnt taoist) and I think that is strange. Any body know why? Have I just missed it?

I think a lot of confusion on the inner bodies comes from the fact that they arent recognized as fractals(everywhere you zoom in or out you see the same pattern).

Here is a little bit of what I have learned. On one hand you have the physical world with all the inner bodies represented. Here the emotional would be the feelings and needs you experience in everyday life. The casual is memories, the mental would be the thoughts, etc. And like Pietro say, they are perpesented both inside the body, outside the body in the aura, and in addition to that every organ and bodypart has their consciousnss hierachy the same way. Wrote a little somthing on that here

Then we have the astral world where the physical part would be your astral body, the astral part would be the good feelings and so forth. Some traditions say that the astral world is a counterpart to the physical universe but with different laws of physics. It is explained as heaven, where everything is light, happiness, and you instantly manifest what you think of.

The casual is explained as where the karma is stored, where akasha can be found. Epi-kinetic, which means above movement, it is the place where the reasons for your choices are. Is is a lower part of the mental world(etheric is the higher part).

Ah, dont what to go through the whole hierarchy. My point is that each level is a world and a universe of its own, with its fractal counterparts expressed in the daily life we lead. And that it is easy to confuse the two because it all is a mess of constant expression of every level. We need to be very aware and still to be able to differentiate what is what.

Interesting, I don't know anything about Tendai Buddhism, but otherwise I don't think I have ever heard of this division in Buddhism. I will ask in a couple of days if I don't forget.

Dont witches work a lot with demons, entities and angels? If I remember correctly from my witch practises many yeas ago, the rituals was based on calling in certain angels, guardians or demons. Do you really not believe in these things Witch?

There are many kinds of entities. It dosent stop with demons or our regular house ghosts. It has a total spectrum of beings raging from the physical parasites to powerful beings in higher realms. I have seen many that are extremely powerful and that there is no way I can deal with.

I dont know if you heal, but people who heal others cant have missed it unless they have a very limited perseption and knowlede of what they are doing. Drew has told us his healing story many times, when he pulled this woman out of someones head They also jump on to the healers. Ive seen many healers who dont understand why they have nightmares or feel bad about themselves.

Entities are real. But it is probably better to be a happy idiot than to mess around with these things I certainly rather back away than to test my abilities to deal with these things. Ok, lets get back to the regular occult subject please

Well, you asked me some questions so I will answer before I drop the topic. I think that some people are more powerful than others in this realm, just as in the physical realm some men are stronger than others. I think those people who are very strong can do as you say, try to take control of others, and of course in this realm it is very easy to wear masks. So I think that regular people can seem like demons or what have you. And also there are human archetypes there, but they are creations of people, tulpas, not something higher than humans. It's the realm of the Jungian Collective Unconscious.

And also witchcraft really is a do-it-yourself religion--the complete opposite of taoism when it comes to lineage and things like that. So yes, some witches do believe in angels and demons.

I thought you had families in Wales, and Ireland with their own little stone circle on the back of their house.

Hey Buddy, I asked about this in a Tendai forum and they say it's not Buddhism.

Yes, please tell us about your near death experience.

since you and Adam have asked, I will do so. It is one of the hardest posts I have ever done mainly because it so personal. As some of you know I am actually writing my memoirs about this whole affair and I have over 50,000 words committed to the manuscript at the moment. The only thing I have not written about yet on my blog, talked about in my videos is this experience. So I actually need to talk about it. This all happened quite a long time ago. I think of all the message boards I could possibly discuss this with from the mental health forums to the martial arts forums, I think you taobums are possibly the best people to share this with. It could possibly help you in your own endeavors.

It is going to be a long post and fair warning in advance, it will be heavy. I was in love with death for a long time and it deeply effected my entire being. I have had not one near death experience, but several. Give me a bit to form the words for something that is somewhat beyond language to describe. There is a light at the end of the post because in the end, I had a near life experience and that experience healed me of the need to leave this life permanently.