Understanding Taoist Classics


Interpreting the Ancient Codes

Interpreting the ancient codes shrouding the esoteric Chinese arts is one of the great challenges facing any serious student or teacher of Taoism. Download the free paper now.

Qigong State and Five Animal Frolics Presentation at AHNA Convention

The Qigong State and Five Animal Frolics medical Qigong were part of the Qigong credit courses that we taught to holistic nurses at their annual convention this year. All forms of higher cultivation including meditation and Qigong benefit from the Qigong state.

This video introduces you to the Qigong state and the Five Animal Frolics form [...]

Ignorant Peasants

One phrase you might occasionally hear in China is “Wu Zhi Nong Min” or “Ignorant Peasants”. This phrase has two meanings. The first and older one is used to refer those people, usually farmers, who have very little formal education and lack the inclination to view things in a larger perspective. They do not understand [...]

Moving with Change

Today I moved. I had sold my house before we went to China. When we returned, I packed up and moved to a new place. The process of selling, finding a new house, packing, moving and unpacking can be very stressful. But it is also very liberating.

This is change. Things are moving. Things are changing.

The [...]

Forbidden City, Hutong Tour and Yi Jing Medicine

The Forbidden City was our next destination. Our group enjoyed walking though the very halls and courtyards where the Emperors of old China lived. At one time, such insolence would have gotten you and your entire family killed. Now you get to take pictures of the Emperor’s wedding bedchamber.

After a delicious lunch we jumped in [...]

Do Nothing and There is Nothing Left Undone

“Do nothing and there is nothing left undone” is a pearl of ancient Chinese wisdom inspired by chapter 48 of the Dao De Jing (Tao Te Ching) written by Lao Zi (Lao Tsu)

The Dao De Jing is considered one of the most important classics in all of Chinese culture. The book has been utilized by [...]

Easter Sunday Meets Rebirth in the Tao

Today is Easter Sunday in the west. For those of you who don’t know what this means, Easter Sunday is perhaps the biggest holiday in the western calendar (after Christmas). It is perhaps considered more important than Christmas by the Christian churches (although not by secular retail standards….)

Easter Sunday is significant because it is the [...]

Radiate like the Sun, Reflect like the Moon

Taoist thought suggests you should “Be like the Sun and Moon.”

This saying means several things, but one important one is that the sun radiates outward and the moon reflects.

The sun is full, so it radiates, asking nothing but giving everything. The moon is empty; it has nothing, so it receives everything.

The sun does not give [...]

Cultivating Xing and Ming

Chinese Internal Alchemy, or Nei Dan, aims to cultivate both Xing and Ming. Xing can be roughly translated as “Essential Nature” and Ming as “Eternal Life.” By essential nature, the Chinese are referring to the spiritual aspects of your being. When you cultivate Xing, you take out emotional garbage and refine your very spirit. We [...]

Why Free Healing is Never Free

A student recently asked me a question about why the eastern healing arts are not offered for free in the US like they are in China and India. You could tell by the emotion in her voice that it’s the type of question that really seriously bothered her.

She asked, “How can these Reiki people charge [...]

Beautiful, Deadly, Silent

Beautiful, Deadly, Silent – No, not a catchphrase for a new femme fatale, a hunting tigress, or an excellent Kung Fu move – I’m talking about the mountain of snow here in Washington DC. In case you don’t live in the US, or have been meditating in a cave, the nation’s capital and surrounding states [...]