About the first principle
Yin and Yang are One for eternity.
Talk about soulmates.
Wu Conghan, 101 years old, and wife Wu Sognshi, 103 years old.
They've been married 88 years and decided to get a new wedding photo.
A picture is worth a thousand words.
One World.
Yin and Yang, the two levels of reality.
All things are one.
Dreams
Shadow (Yin) and light (Yang) are one, the same thing
linked with one another.
In Taoism
It comes down to two aspects of lighting : exposure and shadows.
Reality and illusion are the same thing, as are oneness and duality.
Duality refers to having two parts. It is a concept that states that there are two forces, warring against each other.
Everything has two poles, everything has its pair of opposites. Western cultures focus on differences. West's characteristic
splits between mind and body, in and out, theory and practice, Yin and Yang. Duality is a lie the intellect has created,
and we have accepted. How do we know that duality is a false perception? We can know through the process of identifying and
verifying the Universal Laws in our lives.
By contrast, people in East Asian cultures focus more holistically on relationships, similarities and Yin-Yang balance as shown
by the yin-yang symbol. It can do this because Yang is present in Yin, and Yin is present in Yang. There is balance, but the
relationship goes beyond balance to 'one of harmony'.
Having a harmonious balance of both Yin and Yang forces will create the quality of energy you need in order to live a healthy life.
"According to the Taoists, Yang and Yin, light and shadow, useful and useless are all different aspects of the whole, and the
minute we choose one side and block out the other, we upset nature's balance. If we are to be whole and follow the way of nature,
we must pursue the difficult process of embracing the opposites."
Conny Zweig: Meeting the Shadow
In Taoism
Reality and Illusion are one and the same thing.
Once upon a time Tswang Tse dreamed he was a butterfly.
"I have been disturbed since morning."
he said.
Photo : Pascal Mannaerts
"If a man can be a butterfly in a dream,
a butterfly can also be a man in dreams.
Now I cannot decide whether I am a man who dreams he is a butterfly,
or I am a butterfly dreaming I am a man. Who is to decide?"
Osho : "What we see outside is also a dream with open eyes; for the outside world vanishes
as soon as the eyes are closed. We are transported to a different world as soon as the eyes
close; and the world we see with open eyes has no greater value than this. We have lived our
lives - some for fifteen years and some for fifty. If we look back on the years gone by, the
past events seem no more than a dream. It is at times, hard to believe those events ever took
place! So what is the difference?
The first fact to be understood is that life, as we normally take it to be, is not real; and as
long as we consider it to be real, our eyes will never turn in the direction of Truth. Those
who wish to set out in quest of Truth, have perforce to know that this life is no more than a
dream. This long journey from birth to death - is it a reality or a dream? We shall have to
ponder on this. Normally we take it as real but that is because we have never thought much on it."
Future, present, past.
Every existing thing
is connected to every other thing in past, present, and future existence.
Under this law,
all things are required to cooperate
with the infinite creative intelligence of the universe named Tao.
Duality is a perception of man, created by man and is derived from man's own mistaken concept of his own being.
Yin and Yang are one.
All things are one.
We can compare different or equal things :
this is superior to that, this is equal to this.
But when you are one and the same thing, how could you compare ?
From a Taoistic point of view not only a superiority complex is wrong,
an inferiority complex is wrong, but an equality complex is also wrong.
The complex of equality can bring suffering also, to yourself and others.
Brothers and sisters, as far as we can see
woman and man are not *equal, they are one/the same
balancing each other.
Yin and Yang are not equal, they are one/the same.
In Taoism the Yin-Yang balance is applicable to all situations in nature,
it refers to both sides of the same coin, not different coins.
*Equality is a staple moral value for western democraties. Taoism tends towards pluralism and complementarity,
it tends towards the idea of balancing male and female energies. Who made male and female ?
From a Taoist point of view Wuchi gave birth to Tai Chi, and Tai Chi divided itself to two different poles:
Yin (female) and Yang (male). In fact Yin and Yang are 2 different charges of 1 and the same Wuchi concept.
Finally Yin and Yang are two aspects of Tao, the *unifying soul of all things.
The Taijitu (Yin-Yang symbol) is a manifestation of the energy of Tao, the unifying soul of all things.
Man can never be equal to wo-man
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Wo-man can never be equal to man.
Radjastan-India :
'Prince' and 'princess' of the desert.
Photo : Hugolorent
Man can never be equal to woman,
equality has no partner.
Women are not curvy versions of man.
“Men and women live in different emotional worlds using different words” (Carl G. Jung). There are some subtle differences
between the brains of man and women, there is no such thing as a unisex brain. Even in language polarity phenomenia are
pervasive, female conversation contains more emotional subject matters. There is a sort of duality between emotional and
rational language, male conversation is more competitive (yang), for women talking is often a way to gain confirmation (yin),
often they see the world as a network of connection, seeking support and concensus (Carl G. Jung). Male conversation
(left brain) is more planned, literal and speaking (yang). Female conversation (right brain) is more spontaneous,
figurative and listening (yin). Whether we come from Mars or from Venus, in the self-defense area women's intuition is
more biological then mystical. Most women identify more correctly unspoken messages conveyed in facial expressions,
postures and tones of voice. Women often use it to tell what men are thinking and planning. And, that's not so funny.
Tao Te Tsing: 28
"Know the masculine
but keep to the feminine
and you become the ravine of the world".
Man can never be equal to wo-man.
Equality between man and woman is undefined,
so, it's impossible to be equal. What kind of equality we're looking for?
As we develop a meditative (empty) state of mind that Tai Chi requires
we will imbibe a deeper understanding of 'equality'.
Only in the (empty) non-dual sphere of Wu Chi, all things are equal.
In Tao Tai Chi, Wu Chi is the state of absolute equality of all things.
Neither men nor women need to be equal to each other
in order to be happy with each other.
"Women are very complicated things. They go shopping, make men invade other countries".
"Woman over-analyse things. They start out with just five cells, but get complicated very fast".
"Don't stress about complicated stuff".
First principle: "All things are one"
Everything that lives, does not live alone nor for itself.
Yin attracts Yang, and Yang attracts Yin.
The greater the difference, the greater the attraction.
The male and the female energy belong together, they are two aspects of the one.
In Taoism the dance of the male (Yang) and the female (Yin) brings forth the fluctuating spectacle of created energy,
together they celebrate the joyful Yin-Yang manifestation that creation is supposed to be. A new reality can be created in
which everything can be explored and experienced in ever changing forms of Yin-Yang manifestations.
Photo : Hugolorent
Yin and Yang are one.
In the course of our history, the unity of the masculine and the feminine has been forgotten, and these two energies have
become opposed to each other. The underlying complementary energy was no longer recognized. Now that the female energy is
ready to rise from humiliation it is an urgent need for the rebirth of a new male energy. In the past we were not able to
create a new male energy, when something was repressed man became aggressive, he lost all female qualities. But, how can the
new man be born when he is old ? Well, he who has a new mind is a new man. The old mind was either aggressive or gentle,
muscles or brains, hard or soft, responsible or irresponsible, moral or immoral, materialist or spiritualist, sinner or
saint. The old mind was based on division, split, it created a schizophrenic humanity. Now we are waiting for
"Supermind-man". "And the new man will be a brave man, he will not hate life, as it happended in the past. This real
brave man will live in the world and yet be not of it". (Dalai Lama).
But.
The reality is that in all societies
some men continue to think that they are superior to women.
I hope I did not mislead anyone and be forgiven for any mistake,
I see both
Western cultures and Arab cultures as male dominated in different ways.
I hope we all benefit from my mistakes.
Taoism provides an important foundation for promoting the status of women. Perhaps It provides a metaphysical basis for feminism;
the female is the Tao.
It is only by thinking that the illusion of separation arises. Thinking makes you discontented with what you see around you.
In Taoism all thinking is problematic, you get rigid, you get tense. The mind creates all kind of problems, disconnected from who
you are, detached from reality, and you become a problem for yourself and for others. Like reality isn't really reality. Lao Tse:
"Stop thinking, and end your problems."
Tao is "the place" you get to when you’re tired of thinking. We all think more or less the same, and we exchange, borrow, steal
thoughts from one another. In Taoism It’s not our thoughts, but our attachment to our thoughts, that causes suffering, which is
the most fundamental of all feelings. Attaching to a thought means believing that what you think is true.
Attaching to thoughts
makes us disconnected with the world around us.
Emancipation from the bondage of the soil is no freedom for the tree.
(Rabindranath Tagore).
Taoism starts and ends with observation of nature. In this way, it is just like science, but it is different in that science
observes nature objectively, separate from the observer, whereas Taoism observes nature subjectively, seeing the observer and
the observed as one entire system. Your eyes are the eyes of the Universe. So this is the first principle of Taoism: oneness.
Sharing Oneness is one of the roads to peace. There is not "just us", or "just nature", but both. There is not "just man", or
"just woman" but both. It is only by thinking that the illusion of separation arises, judging and blaming. What divides people
is our relentless habit of categorizing and evaluating against the model of one's self.
The finger that points to the moon.
In order to go into Taoism at all, we must begin by being in the frame of mind in which it can be understood. The Yin-Yang symbol
(Taijitu) became the symbol of China's cultural genius, no doubt you have seen the symbol before. A symbol points to something beyond.
It's just a finger that points to the moon, when you point a finger at the moon, the finger doesn't look like the moon. Only a fool
looks at the finger. The map is not the territory, the messenger is not the message.
A symbol is an embodiment or manifestation of an energy, it can have more than one layer of further meaning. The more profound the
symbol, the greater the complexity of the layers of meaning.
Over the years, I have spent countless hours just staring at the Tai Chi symbol, and each time something new seems to grab me. The
Yin-Yang symbol it perceives, it seizes interactions, oneness and complementarity where my vulgar eyes see only isolated facts,
abstractions, substances or illusions.
It's amazing that the Taijitu, such a simple image can generate so much thought and analysis. Oneness, belief and incredulity are
here so closely bound up that I always find the one in the other, and in particular a germ of truth in non-truth.
The first thing to recognise is that Tao Tai Chi Chuan refers
to a Yin-Yang balance across the whole of one's life.
It refers to interaction and balance and not necessary
to certain practices, certain forms or to certain applications.
Until you value yourself as a part of nature
you will not value Tai Chi Chuan.
Until you value Tai Chi Chuan
you will not do anything with it.
We are one with nature.
We respect its rules…
But at the same time nature is our teacher: it teaches without words,
it shows without deeds, it does without doing.
Tai Chi Chuan is the experience of the natural way.
It’s more than moving.
As if by nature all things are one.
People don't differ very much from trees.
Both absorb water, both secrete water.
Both have their "branches" in the air, both are rooted in the earth.
Both trees and people have to take a rest.
Trees take in carbon dioxide (CO2) and produce oxygen,
people, however, produce CO2 and take in oxygen.
That way people and trees are complementary, they take care of each other's balance.
A tai chi application follows the same partner principle.
As if by nature all things are one
but we need each other to become one.
To live is to breathe
To breathe bad is to live bad (Chinese proverb).
As you practice abdominal breathing keep your awareness on the sensations of your third eye (yingtang).
Do not strain to do so.
(Yingtang is considered the seat of intuition, the seat of your "knowing without knowing")
Big brother.
My DNA is made of the same DNA as my big brother.
Dear old brother,
We often feel closer to distant generations
than to the generations that immediately preceeded us.
Our DNA is made of the same DNA as a tree. "Knowing without knowing" means living from heart consciousness, it's about
recognizing our oneness with all. We can finally put down our trivial differences that originate in our mind, and instead
to feel that ultimately all things are one.
This is a natural law : "All things are one, when we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it reflected to everything
else in the Universe". We are part of nature, not rulers over nature. We still have time to change our mind, it's "now or
never". A natural law has no mercy, it's not about the end of the world, it's about the end of us. The world will be
regenerated because the world has all the time. Mother Nature reminds us of who's really in power.
There is a pervasive discontent in our society today, we seem to be suffering from duality. Maybe we cannot escape the
World Circus, but each of us must be able to find a little valley of peace, if we try. In a peaceful valley like that,
it would be amazed if a person is not attuned to nature.
Dear old sister,
We often feel closer to distant generations
than to the generations that immediately preceeded us.
The sea is my sister.
My sister is my sister, and my brother is my brother.
My sister has some yang aspects, my brother has some yin aspects.
Ernest Hemingway :
A man is lost at sea. The old man (Santiago) has a special relationship with the sea. He thinks of the sea as a human entity.
He notes that younger fisherman think of the sea as "el mar", masculine, their ennemy. But the old man always thought of
her as being feminine and as something that gave great favors, and if she did wild or wicked, it was because she could not
help them." The moon affects her "as it does a woman" he thought.
Ernest Hemingway : The Old Man and the Sea.
My sister is my sister, and my brother is my brother
But:
A tree eats like a tree,
The sea eats like the sea.
And a dog eats like a dog
(Chinese proverb.)
All things are one.
We should think before we follow blind some Taoistic advice
"to turn away from civilisation".
We are not talking about isolation.
We are talking about balance and complementarities in nature.
Static Chi Kung
Yang version
Yin version
Both versions of Chi Kung are complementary, balancing each other.
We have a deal between technique (Yang) and intuition (Yin),
between flexibility (Yang) and rigidity (Yin).
Chi Kung offers a framework for understanding similarities and differences.
We are managing the tension between objectivity (Yang)
and sensitivity (Yin)
trying to understand similarities and differences between Yin and Yang.
The way to know something about deeper understanding
of Yin and Yang is to experience it.
Both Yin and Yang are the condition for each other's existence
and thus they are not equal.
They are interdependent, opposing each other,
at the same time mutually on another.
They are balancing each other.
There are relative degrees of both, Yin and Yang. That means
in every single movement there is Yin within Yang and Yang within Yin.
Yin and Yang act as a whole, they act as one.
All things are one.
In Tai Chi Chuan the body acts as a whole.
Tai Chi preaches the intricate inter relationship of all parts of the body.
Many parts, one body.
Moving as one.
All things are one.
Body, soul and spirit are one.
Tao Tai Chi Chuan preaches the intricate inter relationship of
body-soul-spirit.
(Tao must be 'the universal soul of all things' witch resists the process
of the spirit wishing to find underlying theories or scientific explanations.)
Tai Chi Classics:
Everything is continuously revealing the negative and
the positive aspects of itself.
Everything in the universe is continuously
contrasting and complementing itself.
About the universal soul.
"Myths are the archetypical stories of the universal soul of all things".
Joseph Campbell.
Yin and Yang are relative to each other
All things are one, Yin and Yang are one. Yin and Yang are relative to each other, all things are relative to all other
things. We live in a relative world, knowing only relative truth. Even infinity is not absolute, we say "infinite"
because we cannot see the boundaries, so we say it is boundless. Does boundary exist or not ? We do not know because we
never see it, if we see it, then we say boundary exist. If we don't see it, the most human thing to say is :
"It does not exist, I don't see it, therefore it is not there". Even the universe is relative, it is bound by time and space.
But, time and space existed only after the big bang, the beginning of the universe. What existed before that ?
People would say "nothingness", but that is not exactly true. Scientists would answer that they simply don't know.
We don't know.
Something might exist before the big bang, but we can't perceive it because everything we live by, everything we know,
is bound by time and space. So, what happens if time and space do not exist? Or, maybe exist in another form which we
cannot detect with all of our senses ? Do we still say it does not exist ? We live in a relative world, knowing only
relative truth.
Stop it, better take a walk Walter!