So, What do you do with all this space?

[Anonymous]

At this point in my practice I can create emptiness at will. A simple twist of my hand or foot or a movement of my chi with my mind, and there it is. I’ve found roughly eight distinctly different ways to create emptiness. These may or may not map to the trigrams of the I Ching, but I’ve connected each to a trigram for the purposes of training. Each has thousands of applications. They are more akin to abstract models. Similar to Dirac’s bra-ket notation which can represent an infinite number of matrixes but is encapsulated with two simple parts.

On the “Strings of the Tao” CD, Bruce says something like understanding the tai chi space is the basis for the trigrams. This makes sense to me and I think the different ways I create emptiness are the energies of the trigrams. Think about that. Bruce is basically saying that you can’t understand neigung or the trigrams without understanding the tai chi space.

So, what do you do with all this space?

Previously, I used neigung elements to approximate the general sense of what the trigrams represented and used those ideas to train the 16 part neigung in my Bagua practice. That’s all you can do at that level. Now, I’m starting to incorporate emptiness to create the neigung better, to smooth out everything, to rout out gaps, and connect more and more to the central channel. I haven’t gone beyond the etheric boundary. I’m just clearing and connecting everything within it and letting the emptiness naturally grow.

[Anonymous]

Great food for thought.

What is “space?”

What is “emptiness?”

My understanding of “emptiness” from a Buddhist point of view involves the doctrine of dependent origination.
Nothing is independent.
All is impermanent.
Each thing is dependent on something else.

You can’t have Yin without Yang.

Sounds like “relativity.”

The New York Times just ran an editorial on Einstein’s theory of relativity.
(Dennis Overbye, Nov.24, 2015.)

From a scientific point of view the concept of “space” involves Einstein’s theory of general relativity.
(He formulated it 100 years ago.)

But,
“Quantum mechanics soon invested empty space with energy.”
(I think that Taoism also gives “emptiness” the infinite potential of energy.)

Science now, however, sort of throws a monkey-wrench into the concepts of “emptiness” and “relativity.”

Overbye writes,
“In fact, most cosmologists agree today that not quite all motion is relative and that space-time does have an existence independent of matter, though it is anything but static and absolute. The best example are gravitational waves, ripples of compression and stretching speeding through empty space at the speed of light.”

What?
Space-time does have an existence INDEPENDENT of matter!
un-Buddhist.
So, then how can one create an “emptiness” independent of matter?

How can a concept of “Tai Chi space” fit into this view by current science?
(I recall the Dali Lama saying, that if science contradicts a doctrine of Buddhism, he’ll just change that doctrine.)

It’s not like I’m not trying to reconcile some of the ideas you have:
Every morning I, myself, walk the bagua/I-Ching circle.
I go point by point, trigram by trigram, through each direction/element/energy (North/Water: water trigram, fire trigram, heaven trigram, earth trigram: and so forth.)

Doing this, of course, takes both “space” and “time” to execute.

Earth, for example, is very symbolic.
I associate it with exhalation (natural breathing–which gets into neigung–Bruce’s Neigong Component #1–Taoist Breathing).

From a Zen Buddhist viewpoint “exhalation” is very important and allows one to “fade into emptiness.”
(Shunryu Suzuki, “not always so,” at page 6,
“Exhaling, you gradually fade into emptiness–empty, white paper.”)
Can “fading into emptiness” be said to create “emptiness?”
How could this be done “at will?”

Does this mean that at the end of an exhalation, one enters a state independent of matter, space, time and willful thought?

“Tai chi space” is pretty hard for me to understand, as in science:
” The stars might be actors on a stage set, but every time they moved, the whole stage rearranged itself.”

I’d be interested in how you organize the trigrams to train the 16 part neigong.

How could something that is truly “empty” or even truly “non-empty,” which is truly independent of matter, grow?

I’m trying not to be critical, I’m just probing for understanding.

Take care,

Bob

[Anonymous]

I’ll give some more thought to how to genuinely answer your very legitimate questions. I answered this flippantly in my post “Where are you looking?”.

I don’t think this is easily answered. After all, Bruce has been trying to get everyone to find emptiness for decades knowing full well what it is. I’m just a poor slob who thinks he might possibly have stumbled onto it.

[Anonymous]

Neigung is a huge topic. It would be better to take each part of the 16 part neigung and start answering specific questions.

Regarding emptiness, Bruce has said that emptiness has many levels before you really get what it is. I think the really getting it translates to the great stillness that he describes in Relaxing into Your Being but that’s only speculation on my part.

I think the phrase “many levels” refers to how you get better and better at going into and staying in emptiness. It “grows”. At first it is vague but as you get better it gets clearer and easier. You get more connected to your chi both inside and outside the physical body. The central channel opens up. The body unifies. So, the sense of emptiness grows. At the Bagua & I Ching seminar in NYC, Bruce mentions that “the stillness amplifies the ability to feel inside the body.” It just gets easier and easier to connect to your mind, chi, and body.

The practice I’m doing now is settling into the bone marrow in the arms, legs, and torso. When I first started to find it, I only worked in my right forearm. It has taken a few weeks to get the hands, feet, arms, and legs to learn to do the same without gaps. I’m literally learning to move from the bone marrow.

So, contrast this to where I was when I first started learning. I had no idea what chi was. I couldn’t feel inside my body. Basically, my chi was inaccessible, random, and congested. Training opens up something the Taoist call energy channels. There are different types: some physical, energetic, emotional, mental, psychic, etc. It also helps you connect your mind to the channels so you can clear what is congested and begin aligning it.

All this means nothing if you haven’t experienced it. You’ll just get lots of mental thoughts, ideas, and images.

Similarly if you haven’t experienced emptiness the word can get in the way of understanding. Emptiness isn’t nothing. It is like neutral potential energy. It is completely ready to become anything but hasn’t committed yet.

Why two opposites create it is beyond my comprehension. That just seems to be the rule.

My guess is you just keep going. You keep training and getting better and better until you hit the great stillness. Then you start alchemy which I guess continues the process growing outward from the etheric body to the emotional to the mental to the psychic to the karmic to the body of individuality to the tao. I’m sure the Taoist figured out lots of tricks to help. My guess is that genuinely creating compassion is the key to staying sane and not getting sucked into a power trip. Who knows?

Let me know if this helps at all. The truth is I doubt it will at this time, but I hope when you get a glimpse it will help you recognize that you have and that you are on the right track.

[Anonymous]

Your thoughts are very helpful (as always). Thanks.

I think we are on a similar (yet individualized) journey.

“Space” is fundamental.
The nature of space is emptiness.
Nothing can exist without space.

I particularly share your experience with “settling into the bone marrow.”

It started for me in the fibulae.

I conjure up “creative” (read as “crazy”) metaphors.

My favorite bird is the common loon.
When it dives, it enters the space under the surface of the lake.
It dives, fish scatter.
Metaphorically, the loon is “yin” and fish are “yang.”

As one inhales, yin/blood condenses into the center of the inner space, yang/qi simultaneously scatters to the periphery.
(Think also: “Daoyin”/bagua energy Posture 9: Lion Holding the Ball/ Xun of the I-Ching.)

As one exhales, the loon/yin/blood returns to the surface of the lake and the fish/yang/qi simultaneously fade into the fullness of emptiness.

This “fullness of emptiness” I believe spawns the “rebound” energy that some players mention.

For me, this “fullness of emptiness” enters the marrow of the bones. From the marrow the Qi allows energy to be expressed.

Thus, I agree with you that one then literally “move(s) from the bone marrow.”

Bob

[Anonymous]

I have to believe that many of Bruce’s students are starting to find some of these more advanced topics. Bruce has been teaching for a long time.

The problem is no one is talking about them. The problem with talk is that it creates thought rather than experience.

We need a common vocabulary to communicate with each other. The Taoist already have it. We just need someone like Bruce to start translating for us and our communication needs to be coming out of our training and experiences.

[Anonymous]

I’m going to try to answer this question (“I’d be interested in how you organize the trigrams to train the 16 part neigong.”) in a post titled, “I’ve got it all backwards”. I’m working on it.

[Author]

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