light body skills

[TenTigers]

does anyone practice this? There are many ways,supposedly from standing on bricks, to walking on posts, to digging holes and jumping with inceasing weight/deeper holes. I am interested in your methods and results. Also interested in changing earth element to air. yeah, gimmie all yer secrets! Maybe Air Jordan Kung-Fu shoes.

[TenTigers]

oh yeah, modern methods as well-plyometrics-etc. Do you know the world's record high jump? about 8-9 feet! Long jump-about 30 feet! Everything is possible

[mad taoist]

Yeah, spoke about this briefly to my shifu the other day... lightness qi gong, and it includes similar jumping excercises.... though he said that to use it, you need friction of some sort, like kicking off a wall or something, you can't use it from a standing jump...

[IronFist]

Originally posted by TenTigers
oh yeah, modern methods as well-plyometrics-etc. Do you know the world's record high jump? about 8-9 feet! Long jump-about 30 feet! Everything is possible

Was that 8-9 feet up with the body being vertical? Or was it like one of those olympic jumps where your body turns horizontal (the Fozzie flop or something?) If so, that doesn't count in this context, I don't think :)

IronFist

[jun_erh]

I have a book "72 consumate arts of Shaolin" that covers that. It's a crazy crazy book. some of the 72 arts are like running on a wall, different body hardening things, the light body stuff. I'll go find it later and do a better post.

[TenTigers]

the vertical jump is probably using the Finley Flop, but let's see you try to get your body up eight feet horizontal,vertical, or upside down! dang! eight feet is eight feet! I can jump eight feet, but only eight feet down.

[jun_erh]

i think one was filling a big tub thing with water and walking along the edges then gradual removing water and adding sand or something. there ya go!!

[IronFist]

Originally posted by jun_erh
I have a book "72 consumate arts of Shaolin" that covers that. It's a crazy crazy book. some of the 72 arts are like running on a wall, different body hardening things, the light body stuff. I'll go find it later and do a better post.

I have that book. I don't think it's really useful for training, but it's interesting.

IronFist

[yu shan]

Hey Ten Tigers,

Fellow dinosaur here, we try landing with no sound, while doing forms with aerials, cat-like! Get my drift? Like you have shared, many ways to practice.

[Tainan Mantis]

The so called light kung fu, which I have never seen, requires no jumping practice, It is a type of meditation technique where you change your body weight. This skill is done by people who don't learn to fight since they don't need to. It is supposed to have existed at one time, but at present can not be accepted by science.

Of related interest is lightning kung fu. Monks in Tibet, in the ancient past, meditated as the enemy army approached. Their meditation caused lightining strikes to hit the approaching army.

[Merryprankster]

FOSBURY flop, you chowder heads!!!! :D

Before that was the lateral roll and before that, the side scissors :)

Ain't I just a font of useless info?:D

[Stacey]

I beleive it with the monks...read "The holographic universe" Life is but a dream.


Anyways, I find sets help with lightness. Of course it has to do with balance. I also try walking on thin ice. Ok so its not the chi kung way, but if we do chi kung for roots, can't we do the converse?

I can already run off of walls. I know ghetto kids that can flip off of them. For wall running you get an incline and increase the angle daily and run up it. That will do the trick.

I used to get up past 10 feet and climb onto the set up of the b-ball hoops. The trick is to get the initial spring without pushing yourself back....I could get 4 steps. A lot easier when your 13 I suppose.

[IronFist]

Do you need good traction on your shoes for that?

IronFist

[No_Know]

At least one book mentions two types of Lightness Skill. Lighten the body and moving your weight more easily.~

To move your weight...just do all sorts of movements (so-to-speak; shake a can).

[TenTigers]

anyone know about changing the elements in your body from earth to fire? esoteric stuff, but that would make interesting posts-anyone?

[Tainan Mantis]

Different cultures may use verbs and nouns with different meanings, but that are still describing the same effect.

As a person matures different aspects of consciousness emerge.
For the most part they can be described as emotions.

Some examples you may have noticed in yourself when you were very young:
Knowingly telling a lie
Becoming jeulous
exerting great will power
feeling love
desire to understand your existance.

Supposedly in meditation as you reach higher levels of conscoiusness you become aware of energy centers in the body. By concentrating on them you may acquire some peculiar power.

It is said that the easiest power to acquire is to be able to generate beuatiful smells. One of the more difficult ones is to make yourself light.

If such a power ever existed and was taught to people it is not likely that you will find a teacher who would teach it.

More than a few of the meditation teachers warn that the pursuit of any of these powers merely take you away from the path of enlightenment.

[Cody]

The unfolding of self, becoming what one is and has the potential to be, for it's own sake, is the path I see.
I would think one engages in activities that permit further development. Some of the activities have side effects, such as increased physical vigor and clarity. There might also be abilities that emerge, unexpected from the self. As one develops the self, so too, these might continue to grow, or not, or even evolve into something else. Individual ability and circumstance play roles in this.

However, if the powers that come, or, those that are not yet there, but which are sought, are pursued to the extent that the original quest simply for self actualization is forgotten or becomes driven by them, then I would say one becomes lost. The original concentration has changed and gets twisted by pursuit of an effect rather than unfolding of self. I don't know if you are thinking along the same lines, but that's how I see it from a point of view which has no affiliation to a way of belief leading to any sort of enlightenment other than discovery of self to the extent that it can be discovered on this level of being.

Yet, if one is training in martial arts, the concentration could be easily split, and might not have the primary focus as a beginning, or ongoing process. I think it is important to realize the possibility that insofar as the quest is for totality of self, in my view (that is my reason for living), a negative result could be simply a matter of that (a not so good person, or one who is not well mentally), rather than a straying from one's course because of a distraction, fascination, etc.

The development of the emotional mind is very complex. Certain balances are established when we are very young, I believe, and we are born not a blank slate, imo.

Then, there is putting words to the emotions and differentiating feelings and decisions, and then going back and experiencing feelings without words. Oh, not just Not calling them something, but a more primal experience which is very intense. The word comes between. Then, somehow, a new balance between word and feeling is embarked upon. That is the point at which I find myself in that realm.

interesting thread.

Cody

[tri2bmt]

WHOA MAN!!
Hey cody pass the reefer!:)

[Cody]

haha. You made me laugh, just when I've been my most serious and that is a wonderful feeling. I see how you might think I'm smokin' (which I never do), cause the brain tries to go where no other brain cells ever fired, to be Trekian. :p

best,
Cody

[Tainan Mantis]

It sounds like we are on the same wavelength.
Tomorrow I go to the states. Talk again in June.

[Cody]

Have a fine trip. June is good. Looking forward to talking more.

Cody

[SSgungfu]

Maybe if you train hard in jumping, post walking, plymoetrics and other body weight exercises you will feel "lighter" by being more limber and strong. Who knows...

I would like to try the whole lightening striking meditation. But I'd have to change my username to Rayden...

---------

here's something else interesting about the monks in Tibet. Adolf Hitler had an incling that his ubermench, or the Aryan Demi-Gods he believed existed could be found in Tibet, "dwelling in the snowy mountains in the east". He had heard rumors of monks having the ability to project themselves in meditation to anywhere on the earth. He had also heard other godlike stories about these men. He sent teams into Tibet during his reign to find the ubermench, or if they could not do that: to learn meditation techniques, 'interrogate' the monks and see if they lived up to their reputations. Sorry about details but this is vague I read the article a while ago.

As far as I can remember, the team left a few months after declaring there was nothing to be found or learned. Apparently the monks had not heard about the Nazi-regime wiping out leagues of people for whatever reason: whether it be they had not started wiping people out or the monks didnt get out often. Either reason seems logical to me. So when the westerners came the monks greeted them with open arms and minds, and the nazi's were turned off by this approach. wow i just babbled for a while...

[Repulsive Monkey]

These by-products and side effects you talk of are merely just that. They are not meant to be followed up as they do detract from the the original destination that being comprehension of the Nature of the Mind. The smells you talk about are in fact quite rare and not easily attainable like you say. They are usually indicative of Saints and people who are highly spiritually advanced, people of extremely pure nature and intent. However, other skills like the unfolding of latent psychic abilities are not really a sign of spiritual superiority, these skills can be accessed even by those of not so high calibre. They have a method which only requires practice, being a devout and spiritual person requires something other than just methodology, it requires purity of heart.

[Cody]

Interesting. Made me think, and much of this I am putting together for the first time, so I expect it will evolve.

In terms of the side effects or unexpected abilities, I would tend to agree that these can be accessed by a novice, for example. Or, by someone whose mind has such potential, and who receives a stimulus that triggers it. In a way, calling them side effects, as we have, can be misleading, as they are part of the package that the individual presents, possibly appearing as offshoots which can be bypassed or integrated into the whole as operative factors.

I would disagree that all side effects or powers are not meant to be followed up on, and also for the reason given for this:

1. How? Why? To what purpose? For what good? -- are some of the questions to be asked by any individual who encounters them in himself/herself. Sometimes the answers are unclear, but that's okay. The rational mind needs to be there, at the point of asking, always. To assume that one is beyond the point of needing to reconsider these factors is an act of unwarranted pride.
We could find ourselves presented by the fine line between leadership and domination. The possibilities for faulty judgment and abuse are myriad, but that doesn't make the whole endeavor out of bounds.

2. I don't agree with following up of mental or mental/spiritual phenomena (aka side effects) in the self as detracting "from the original destination that being comprehension of the Nature of Mind." They are Part of the nature of mind and have practical uses, even if their mere presence does not indicate more than these as skills. Some might pass by the wayside, due to lack of interest, and that's okay.

Combined with compassion and good judgment, these side effects take on a different light. This combination/balance of compassion and good judgment (coming with or without intellectual effort) I would take as a starting definition of purity of heart.

The beginnings of good judgment in most of us are sown when a person is Willing to separate out his own motivations and needs from those of others, and to understand the common good as some meshing of what is good for the individual and good for the community in the short and long run. Very difficult. Goes only so far without the concurrent development of compassion. It may or may not involve real sacrifice. Too many rules and undue domination, both in the political/religious or personal spheres, can be inhibiting and destructive.

I think you are meaning good things when you speak of a "devout and spiritual person. "

For me, this terminology leads to assumptions. To be devout "implies sincere, worshipful devotion to one's faith or religion." More simply, the word can mean "earnest, sincere, heartfelt."
I see a spiritual person, without judgment of the quality of the spirituality, as one who has made the connection between mind and spirit and lives according to that. Part of the definition of spirituality can include "much refinement of thought and feeling." Or, a religious link.

While you speak of the positive with good intent, the Definition of a devout and spiritual person Need Not require purity of heart, only physical/spiritual technique, which is often concurrent or thought to be concurrent with a strong religious/spiritual affiliation. In turn, the affiliation defines what is meant by purity of heart, possibly in great detail. Indeed, the crux of a spiritual and devout person might rest quite well with methodology and not much else. But, the person of whom you speak exists in a complete positive reality, in sincerity. I realize that. It's just that I would no longer tend to look at the overtly spiritual and devout as indicative of anything out of the ordinary in terms of purity of heart. Please do not take offense because I mean none. It's just how I feel.

Developing a pure heart need not, imo, involve spirituality or devotion to anything, except in the sense of being true to one's own nature, discovering it and maintaining its integrity.
In doing so, the connection to spirit of self might naturally become stronger. That perceived connection (either as a whole, or as side effects) does not, in itself, indicate a pure heart. For corruption can occur during self discovery, and some of it comes from within. It's not the side effects which are the corruption, but what we do with them. It involves the essence of self which is something I think about. The processes are independent, and yet not. I think that there is a lot of room for deception and misunderstanding. By "processes" I mean the development of an enhanced connection between spirit and mind, and how the self responds to this. How does the type of side effect relate to the self? rhetorical question. I reach a certain limit in this paragraph.

Purity of heart might be a state of being in Understanding and Compassion, and possibly capable of exercising judgment which is not necessarily governed solely by the intellect. This could be said to be the very basis of what we might call a good human being, without all the window dressing. Then you might add higher intellectual qualities and studies of all types. I would agree that purity of heart is required in this world, or all is lost.

I hadn't heard about the perception of aromas before. Maybe there occurs stimulation of the brain with certain kinds of meditation that could bring this about. That is my first thought.

that's all for now,
Cody