YIN YOGA - KIDNEY SERIES for Enhancing the Jing

Yin Series to purify, cleanse and heal the Kidney, Urinary Bladder Meridians

The JING is  our CREATIVE ENERGY. It is one of the three treasures of Taoism which include Jing, Qi and Shen. Although there is no exact translation for Jing, Qi and Shen, they are best translated as Essence, Vitality and Spirit.

The most concentrated or densely-vibrating energy is Jing. Jing is the treasure that is most associated with the physical body. The home of Jing is the Kidney Organ System (the lower Dantien). Jing is considered to be the root of our creative vitality, the physical substance out of which our life unfolds.  When depleted Jing can be restored through diet, supplements, yoga and qigong.

BEGIN SEATED IN JALA MUDRA

LOW CROCODILE (30 sec to 1 minute)
MOVING COBRA (1 minute)
TV WATCHING POSE (2 to 5 minute)
SPHINX W/ Crossed Legs (2 to 5 minutes)
SEAL (2 to 5 minutes)
FLAPPING FISH - COUNTER POSE (1 minute each side)
SADDLE w/ Variations (2 to 5 minutes)
DRAGON and VARIATIONS - High Flying Dragon, Low Dragon, Winged Dragon (2 to 5 minutes each variation)
WINDSHIED WIPER - COUNTER POSE (2 minute each side)
SINGLE LEG BOW - (30 sec to 1 minute each side)
BRIDGE (2 to 5 minutes)
SUPPORTED SHOULDER STAND WITH A BLOCK (2 to 5 minutes)
FISH (2 to 5 minutes)
PAWANMUKTASANA - (2 to 5 minutes)
RECLINING TWIST - (2 to 5 minutes)
KAPALBHATI
JASTIASNA
NADI SHODHANA
BHRAMARI
SAVASANA
YOGA NIDRA

END SEATED IN JALA MUDRA
"With greater fluidity at all levels of my being, I move through life smoothly and easily"

Alan Watts - Tao-The Watercourse Way

                I was first introduced to Taoism in college in my third year architecture design class.  Every student was given a part of a poem by Lao-tzu and was asked to use this poem in the design their building. I don’t remember the building I designed by I do remember my phrase, “to yield is to conquer, to grasp is to lose.” Intrigued, I bought a copy of the I Ching and my roommate and I used to flip through it and read random pages to each other and giggle. Our giggling didn’t come out of antipathy but, I think out of a strange sense that we were reading something very profound that we did not understand but wanted to and was way out of our life experiences.  We didn’t have the words, the language, the sensitivity, the maturity, but we did have the interest, so we giggled.

                The first Chapter in Tao-The Watercourse Way is about the Chinese language.  Watts sets up a framework for the reader in which s/he understands that a people’s philosophy comes out of a world view and world view is expressed through the uniqueness of language. He explores the distinctiveness of Chinese that uses characters and ideograms instead of an alphabet. These characters and ideograms developed from pictures of conventional signs that over centuries have been abstracted from their original identifiable forms.  Watts argues against the movement to alphabetize Chinese, and enumerates its advantages.

He writes that “Chinese has the peculiar advantage of being able to say many things at once and mean all of them . . .” (p.10). I think this is why it is a perfect language for Taoism and why Taoism developed in China. He elaborates, “Just as Chinese writing is at least one step closer to nature than ours, so the ancient philosophy of the Tao is skillful and intelligent following of the course, current and grain of natural phenomena-seeing human life as an integral feature of the world process, and not something alien and opposed to it. (p. 16)” He further elaborates that “At any moment, nature is simultaneity of patterns. An ideographic language is a series of patterns and, to that extent, still linear – but not so laboriously linear as an alphabetic language. (p.7)”

                Alan Watts discusses the need to teach Chinese in secondary schools in America “not only because we inevitably learn how to communicate with the Chinese themselves, but because of all the high cultures, theirs is most different from ours in ways of thinking.”  He also talks of an experiment at the University of Pennsylvania in which children in second grade who were behind in reading were easily able to learn to read Chinese. Reading Chinese is what communication technologists call “pattern recognition.” He goes on to say that, “Chinese is simpler than it looks, and may be both written and read more rapidly than English. (p.8)”

               

Yin and Yang

Alan Watts devotes a chapter to yin and yang. Yin and yang are the opposite poles of cosmic energy. Their ideograms depict the sunny and shady sides of a hill. The art of life is to keep yin and yang in balance.

Yin and Yang are associated with masculine and feminine, firm and yielding, strong and weak, light and dark, rising and falling, heaven and earth and spicy and bland. Chi in its ideographic form is a ridgepole in which two sides of a roof – yin and yang – lean.

 

Theory of the 5 Elements (Wu Hsing)

Within the Chapter on yin and yang, Alan Watts talks about the five elements in Chinese philosophy: earth, fire, water, metal and wood. Hsiang Sheng or Mutual Arising is the theory that the energy symbolized by wood as fuel gives rise to the energy symbolized as fire which creates ash and gives rise to the energy symbolized as earth which in its mines contains energy symbolized as metal which in mirror form attracts dew and gives rise to the energy symbolized by water which nourishes the energy symbolized by wood.

In contrast, Sheng or Mutual Conquest is describes a different cycle. Wood in the form of a plough overcomes earth which in its damming constrains water which by quenching overcomes fire which by melting liquefies metal which can cut wood.

The Taoist balances the five elements within.

The Tao

Alan Watts has a chapter on the Tao. He defines the Tao as the watercourse way because Lao-tzu and Chuang-tzu use the flow of water as its primary descriptive metaphor. But, Watts also stresses that “The Tao cannot be defined in words and is not an idea or concept . . . There is no way to put a stream in a bucket or water into a bag. (p.42)” In Taoism, everything exists in relationship to all others.  The sun would not be light without eyes to look on it. If everything is allowed to go its own way the universe will be harmonious. “ Our only way of apprehending it is by watching the processes and the patterns of nature and by the meditative discipline of allowing our minds to become quiet, so as to have vivid awareness of “what is” without verbal comment. (p.55)”

Wu-wei

                Watts has a chapter on the Wu-wei. Wu-wei is defined as non-action or non-forcing but it is not inertia, or laziness or passivity. It is likened to the willow branch that bends with the weight on snow but does not brake but springs back when the snow falls off. Wu-wei is the lifestyle of one who follows the Tao. “Contemplative Taoists will happily sit with yogis and Zennists for as long as it is reasonable and comfortable, but when nature tells us that we are ‘pushing the river’ we will get up and do something else, or even go to sleep. (p. 90)

                Wu-wei is also a dream-like state as described in this passage that I love on p.93

Once upon a time I, Chuang-chou, dreamed that I was a butterfly,

a butterfly flying about, enjoying itself.

I did not know that it was Chuang-chou. 

Suddenly I awoke, and veritably was Chuang-chou again.  

But I do not know whether it was I dreaming that I was a butterfly,

or whether I am a butterfly dreaming that I am Chuang-chou.

 

“Wu-wei is to roll with experiences and feelings as they come and go, like a ball in a mountain stream, though actually there is no ball apart from the convolutions and wiggles of the stream itself.  This is called ‘flowing with the moment.’  (P.96)” The now-streaming is the Tao.

Te

The final chapter of The Watercourse Way is about Te.  Te is the expression of the Tao in actual living.  It is defined as virtue or virtuality, the grace of living, which one achieves naturally from intuitive realization of being one with the Tao.  There are no rules or textbook for te one has to feel for te. As an ideogram, te is the unity of eye and heart.

In Sum

Tao-The Watercourse was a beautiful book to read.  It read like a love letter to Alan Watts because it was put together by his dear friend Al Chung-liang Huang after Watts’ death.  He describes Watts in the forward and afterward as incredible but imperfect man, highly charismatic and enthusiastic about Zen and Taoism and life in general. He seems to have been a man that I would have a love to have met and listened to and drunk up the energy of his presence.

The Tao of Pooh

The Tao of Pooh  -  by Benjamin Hoff

I have been carrying the book Tao of Pooh around with me for more than 25 years, but, I never read it.  The book has lived in Philadelphia, Connecticut, and San Diego unopened. When I saw it on the reading list for Paulie Zink’s: Yin Yoga teacher training I thought now is the time.  It turns out that I was carrying it for a good reason.  In fact, it is a marvelous book about life and Taoism. 

I don’t remember reading any Winnie the Pooh when I was young. But, after reading the Tao of Pooh I think I will pick it up and learn more about the marvelous bear and his adventures.

The book goes over some concepts in Taoism: the uncarved block/P’u, the Cottleston Pie Principle/Inner Nature, the Pooh Way/Wu Wei and That sort of bear.

I have been taking a two year program on Buddhism at Insight LA, and I am struck to see the difference between Buddhism and Taoism.  The optimist in me embraces Taoism, while, my internal pessimist clings to Buddhism.  I was intrigued by Hoff’s parable of the vinegar tasters. When tasting the vinegar the Buddhist and Confucist look sour and bitter while the Taoist is smiling.  “From the Taoist point of view, the natural result of (this) harmonius living is happiness. (p.5)”

There is a Confucist saying “If the mat was not straight, the Master would not sit.”  It reminds me of my Iyengar yoga class when the teacher is so concerned about the fold in the blankets and the straightness of the mat that I think they forget the joy of actually practicing yoga. 

The Uncarved Block/ P’u

The first principle the Benjamin Hoff investigates is the P’u translated as the Uncarved Block.

“. . . things in their original simplicity contain their own natural power, power that is easily spoiled and lost when the simplicity is changed. (p.10)”

“. . . the Taoist ideal is that of the still, calm, reflecting “mirror-mind” of the Uncarved Block.

He says that Winnie the Pooh is a version of the Uncarved Block in action.

Anti-Intellectualism of Taoism or Spelling Tuesday or Being Owl

Hoff’s talks of the Confucianists as busy ants spoiling the picnic of life.  He quotes Lao-tse, “The wise are not learned and the learned are not wise.”  Owl represents these “intellectuals” in Winnie the Pooh.

“. . . you can’t help respecting anybody who can spell TUESDAY, even if he doesn’t spell it right;  but spelling Tuesday isn’t everything.  There are days when spelling Tuesday doesn’t count.”

I was taking a workshop with Dakini Yuan Miao about a month ago and people kept asking her these deep changes. And part of me was mad at myself because I didn’t have any “deep questions” I was just doing the yoga and enjoying her energy and her singing.  Maybe I was being a Taoist and just not concerned about how to spell Tuesday.  Maybe I just wanted to eat the honey like Pooh.

Cottleston Pie/Inner Nature

Taoism as explained by Benjamin Hoff is against cleverness. He claims that the lens of cleverness is superficial way of looking at things. The confuscists were very clever.

“Fortunately for everyone, the plan failed, as Clever Plans do, sooner or later. (p.37)

The Taoist believed that “ . . . everything has its own place and function. (p.40)

Hoff’s talks of people not respecting their inner nature and how because of this they are stuck in the wrong house, marriage, job, etc. . . He says on p. 41, “When you know and respect your own Inner Nature, you know where you belong.”

This is something I definitely have to work on because there are a lot of wrongs for me in my life right now.  Hoff’s also asks us not to blindly do what we aren’t designed to do.  He says this doesn’t mean we need to stop changing and improving but we need to recognize what’s there. 

In my yoga practice I struggle with my flexibility but when I push too hard sometimes I get tighter or injured.  I have to strike a balance between pushing but not going too far.

“The wise know their limitations; the foolish do not. (p.43)”

He also brings up a Chinese saying, “One disease, long life; no disease, short life.(p. 48)”  Meaning people who know their weaknesses and work on them will live longer.  Weaknesses and limitations can work in our favor if we acknowledge that they are there. I have found this to be true with my knees.  If I never had the “unsuccessful” knee surgeries I wouldn’t have found yoga.  Whenever I leave yoga my knees ache again. The aching knees are keeping me consistent in my practice.

“What we need to do is recognize Inner Nature and work with things as they are. (p. 50)”

“The first thing that we need to do is recognize and trust our own Inner Nature, and not lose sight of it.  For within the Ugly Duckling is the Swan, inside the Bouncy Tigger is the rescuer who knows the Way, and in each of us there is something special, and that we need to keep. (p. 65)”

I think this is a powerful idea that we have this Inner Nature, who we are, and we can use this to our advantage and work from who we are.

The Pooh Way aka The Wu Wei

Wu Wei is translated to “without doing, causing, or making. (p.68).”  It also means no clever tampering or monkeying around.  Wei Wu Wei is doing without doing.  Things will happen by themselves spontaneously.  Things happen in the right way at the right time if you let them.

According to Chuang-tse, “the mind of Wu Wei flows like water, reflects like a mirror, and responds like an echo (p.85)”  Wu Wei is about following intuition.

This concept is truly difficult for me.  I always want to work hard to make things the way I want them to be. I am very clever in all my tampering.

“By the time it came to the edge of the Forest the stream had grown up, so it was almost a river, and, being grown-up, it did not run and jump and sparkle along as it used to do when it was younger, but moved more slowly. For it knew where it was going, and it said it itself, ‘There is no hurry. We shall get there some day. P. 67)’”

I am also often in a hurry and forget that I will get there someday.

Bisy Backson

I see myself very clearly in the Bisy Backson, a person who is almost desperately active.  Yes, I do too much. “The Athletic sort of Backson . . . confuses exercise with work.  He works when he works, works when he exercises, and . . .works when he plays. P. 94)” Yes, that’s me.

“The Bisy Backson is always going somewhere, somewhere he hasn’t been.  Anywhere but where he is. (p.97)”

The antithesis of the Bisy Backson is Li Chung Yun reported to have lived over 200 years. He said his favorite way of travelling was walking lightly. He advised those who wanted to be healthy to “sit like a turtle, walk like a pidgeon, and sleep like a dog. P.110)”

Enjoying Life and Being Special aka That Sort of Bear

“We simply need to believe in the power that’s within us, and use it.  When we do that, and stop imitating others and competing against them, things begin to work for us. (p.121)”

“The play-it-safe pessimists of the world never accomplish much of anything, because they don’t look clearly and objectively at situations, they don’t recognize or believe in their own abilities, and they won’t stretch those abilities to overcome even the smallest amount of risk. (p.122)”

Nowhere and Nothing or T’ai Hsu

T’ai Hsu in Taoism is the “Great Nothing.”  An empty mind listens to birds sing while a full of knowledge clever mind wonders what kind of bird is singing. But, emptiness is not the same thing as loneliness.

“To have no thought and put forth no effort is the first step towards understanding the Tao. To go nowhere and do nothing is the first step towards finding peace in the Tao. To start from no point and follow no road is the first step towards reaching the Tao. (p.143)

The 48^th chapter of the Tao says, “To attain knowledge, add something every day. To attain wisdom, remove things every day.”  We are urged to see like a child.  Find the clear minded, independent, all seeing child.  Too often it is our brain that sends us off in the wrong direction.

Conclusion

Although, it appears to be a little book, with its red edges and Pooh flying the kite on its cover, The Tao is Pooh is a big book full of life lessons and really important philosophy.  I’ve read it three times since the fall and I keep getting more and more and more out of it. I am glad a carried it for all those years.  And I am even happier that I opened it.  Now, can I absorb its teachings.  I hope so.