Greetings,
Sorry this may be a bit offtopic, but I want to learn the taoist practices of ‘big cosmic wheel’ and ‘small cosmic wheel’. I know the words may not be the same as commonly used but perhaps somebody knows what I’m talking about? I’m having trouble finding any concrete info on these practices. Anybody have any links/books you could recommend?
Warm regards,
Chiron
Hi Chiron:
Here are some Taoist resources from the AYP book list: http://www.aypsite.org/booklist3.html
Some of the clearest writings on Taoist practices are by Mantak Chia. Two more of his books are shown on the sexology list: http://www.aypsite.org/booklist13.html
Useful stuff to know, but you will not find much on deep meditation in any of these books, and that is a major shortcoming.
All the best on your chosen path!
The guru is in you.
Chiron–macrocosmic orbit and microcosmic orbit. If you study that, please do not also do AYP (advanced yoga practices) pranayama (spinal breathing) or any other yoga pranayama at the same time. One at a time, please! And, yes, Mantak Chia is the guy for this.
hello,
i don’t often reply to forums, but this is one of my interests and so i’d like to comment on a few of the points people have made. my background is in a taoist practice that uses sexual energy that was taught to me through my martial arts lineage.
my understanding of the process of the macrocosmic orbit is that the practitioner cultivates energy through different practices. actually, any of the martial, kung fu, tai chi or chi gung practices could be used because the different types of energy they cultivate is considered to be on the same spectrum. maybe they just differ by density. jing- chi- shen is the formula with jing being the most dense. the exercises cultivate, focus, and then transforms raw energy into spiritual energy, shen. with the taoist tantric practice, sexual energy, jing, is built and directed through the macrocosmic orbit to move from the base through the crown. this activity opens and balances yin and yang in each energy center. my system refers directly to the chakras but i think you could also use other points basically along the spine.
my experience of this sounds very similar to what is described in the AYP lessons. maybe i’m not understanding the ayp process correctly. aren’t you trying to bring the energy up from the root, through the sushumna, and out the crown? or did i miss something?
another thing i wanted to say is that taiji practice IS very grounded, as was pointed out. but i think the meditation aspect of it is not being fully recognized. “you must find the stillness in movement and the movement in stillness.” you spoke of how yoga has been fragmented and that has certainly happened to the taoist practices, especially when they hit the american audience. i have heard a school say that people can’t understand the intricacies of taiji and so why bother teaching them? that school has a large thriving business in my town
(that incidentally heavily focuses on the religious aspect of their “taoist tai chi.” An important practice in taiji is called standing post (matak chia anyone?) and you can’t have good taiji without it. it is a standing meditation. that is one piece that you learn, the form is another, and specific drills on technique are another, etc. all of those parts are taught seperately, or not at all sometimes, and the practitoner puts them all together. but the way eastern philosophy works is that each piece has a part of the whole already inside it.
i think the reason we place so much emphasis on the dantien is becuase it is the energetic and physical center of the body. focusing on it is one of the best ways to shift the mind consciousness out of the head. in taoist yoga, energy is cultivated there and then goes through a complex process of transformation that processes energy through the center of the body along the spine and out of the head.
and yes, the inner smile is a lovely practice!
take care, sunflower
Hi Sunflower:
Thanks much for chiming in on this one. You have added some nice perspectives.
There can be no doubt that both Yoga and Taoism have wandered somewhat from their roots. That is a combination of market demand and the withering of the message over the centuries of being passed down.
The good news is that the “roots” are in us, and we can rediscover them by testing the means at our disposal and refining our way back to what is true in us. Open communications are the way, so phooey on the esoteric approaches, I say. 
As for Taoist versus Yoga methods, there are some significant differences, and thank you, Jim, for reminding us on the breathing techniques especially (spinal breathing versus microcosmic orbit).
Yet, it is not as different as it might seem, at least not in AYP. We do not go up and out the crown. That is regarded as dangerous in the AYP approach, due to risk of premature crown opening (many complications) and other things related to maintaining speed and balance of purification and opening. AYP merges both ascending and descending energies from root to brow (third eye, as we call it) in spinal breathing. Big difference from straight up and out the top. And we start with deep meditation, a separate practice, which is direct merging of our sense of self with inner silence from the very beginning. We keep deep meditation as the central core practice, even as we are adding many other things on. AYP is a dual cultivation of inner silence and what we call “ecstatic conductivity” in the nervous system. Together, these two merge to become the One within and around us. And that is experienced as outpouring divine love. The Tao (stillness) in action!
The cultivation of ecstatic conductivity involves direct application of sexual methods as well, with overlap with Taoist methods in the AYP approach to tantra.
Taoism as you describe it, with the stillness component (the Tao) cultivated, is not so different. Yet the methods are different, in Taoism aiming more for stillness in action (marital) from the beginning, which is something we arrive at in AYP along the way (stillness first, then action). Either way, it is the same nervous system we are dealing with, so the same capabilities will manifest in an order more or less according to the means applied. Assuming optimal application of methods in each system, the end result will be the same. That is why the traditions have so much in common – all are working with the same human vehicle.
I think it is good for Taoists to have some understanding of Yoga and for Yogis and Yoginis to have some understanding of Taoism. Which is not to say one ought be doing both systems at the same time. Neither can we be driving two cars at the same time. But the more we know about cars in general, the better driver we will be of our own car.
All the best!
The guru is in you.
Thanks for posting, sunflower; I hope you do it more!
I agree that this thread underestimated the meditative potential of tai chi and other Chinese practices. Just because you’re not sitting cross legged with eyes closed doesn’t mean you’re not doing a form of meditation. However, the meditation one does in movement (tai chi) is different. Better or worse? Who knows! But definitely different.
Not out the crown. AYP is very careful to avoid the crown entirely, due to the fact that premature crown opening, in Yogani’s estimation, is the cause of the scary kundalini symptoms we’ve all heard about. AYP directs it out the third eye, between the eyebrows. But I’m not clear on what your practice is, either. If you’re doing microcosmic orbit, then there’s no “up and out”…it’s “up and around”, no?
Standing post sounds interesting. I’ll try to learn more about it (though I don’t practice tai chi).
That is DEFINITELY true of yoga, as well. All these different yogas you hear about are different facets/aspects of the same thing. Except Bikram Yoga™, which is a facet/aspect of the American fast food system (sorry, Bikram adherents, just teasing!)
Again, there’s a parallel in yoga. But in yoga attention comes to reside in the heart (many yoga teachers instruct this; AYP just lets it naturally happen). Being less interested in strength and resolve (dantien) and more interested in empathy and opening (heart), that’s why I shifted from Taoist practice to yoga. It’s no more “deep” than a question of style, really.
Again, thanks for the great post!
yes, microcosmic orbit goes around, macrocosmic orbit goes up and out. i can be completely dyslexic at times.
“Not out the crown. AYP is very careful to avoid the crown entirely, due to the fact that premature crown opening, in Yogani’s estimation, is the cause of the scary kundalini symptoms we’ve all heard about. AYP directs it out the third eye, between the eyebrows. But I’m not clear on what your practice is, either. If you’re doing microcosmic orbit, then there’s no “up and out”…it’s “up and around”, no?”
maybe i can post an article i wrote later when i finish it.
“Standing post sounds interesting. I’ll try to learn more about it (though I don’t practice tai chi).”
i have never had any bad crown chakra experiences as of yet. i have been doing macrocosmic orbit for over ten years. i did notice that each chakra from the base upward went through a sucession of openings that lasted for several years each. the third chakra was the roughest and i am still working on that one (but i can see the light!!!).
i think that each person’s experience of chakra openings can be very different. some awaken large amounts of kundalini and have a hard time channeling/ managing/ purifying/ balancing or whatever and they have trouble. the way the macrocosminc technique was explained to me was that the energy is given a pathway to follow (through the center)and will balance out on it’s own. the technique smooths and directs. butmit has been my observation that most cannot handle the large amounts of energy that is built up in the early stages of tantric practice and so they stop quickly. maybe that’s a safety catch with the practices?
if you study taoist alchemy, you will see that there are three dantiens- below the navel, at the level of the heart, and at the level of the head. dantien has many translations one of which is cauldron. the cauldron is heated through practices and a steam rises which then heats the one above it, thereby refining the energy until it reaches the crown where it becomes pure energy. i notice a loose parallel there between the actions of the dantiens and the elements associated with each chakra (earth, fire, air, water…).
i went to sleep last night thinking deeply about the idea of meditation, taiji, and mantak chia and wanted to comment. in all of the meditation practices i have studied, there is an object of focus with an intent to clear the mind. the object of focus changes and can be a mantra, the breath, a candle, whatever. i think that in taiji the object is the body, in particular, how the body is affected by the technique you are working on. so if you are trying to be rooted by placing your foot flat on the ground then you would practice having the foot flat while standing still, then while moving, and then while doing the form until eventually, the foot is always flat and you immediately know when you are standing on the front of your foot or the sides. that single pointed directed awareness seems to be meditation, eh? and it’s a nice way to bridge the gap from sitting in a monastery to a walking, living practice. i have always heard from world class taiji teachers that taiji is meditation, it is energy work, it is spiritual.
macrocosmic orbit and taiji have been my main practices for awhile now and i think they really parallel the ayp stuff outlined. and i do think i have experienced a growing sense of inner silence and ecstasy as a result. doing my practice always makes me smile. i guess that’s why i have followed the ayp information, but i haven’t been able to sit down and do the practice the way it’s outlined here. i just always figured we were on the same page and i look for pieces i may be missing.
i hope all of this is making sense because it really seems to be a stream of jumbled ideas coming out of my head. but, the main idea was that toaist and yoga practices do not mix. and i guess i’m wondering why. there are so many similarities. the “end result” (as if that were a possibility!) is described as being the same. and there is most likely a common root to all of these practices that have been fragmented and adapted to the needs and inclinations of various cultures. i have talked to my teacher about the various locks that have been described and they are all in the taoist system that i learned. why can’t i do ayp practices while doing all my other stuff?
here yogani sai:
"How Taoism became so CHI-oriented is something of a mystery. In chasing the CHI, the TAO itself (undifferentiated pure bliss conscousness) seems to have gotten overlooked. So TAOism has become CHI-ism. From where I sit, the question is not how to do more with CHI. The real question is how to get the TAO (inner silence) back into TAOism. Perhaps this is already covered in the line of taoism you are following. As mentioned, some taoist lines do include meditation. But not many… "
Tao is a merging of the two forces of yin and yang that exist in this world alone. all taiji practices emphasize the interplay and balance between these two activities/forces. when the two are harmonized, tao is accessible and chi builds automatically. i think people get caught up in how much better they feel after they do an excercise that builds chi that they get lost in that and forget the enlightenment aspect of things. that’s part of the fragmentation process as well. my teacher always says that the martial aspect of the practice is the hook to get people in and then they can learn the other stuff. but building chi is only the first step, then the chi needs to be used, circulated to bring balance and openness to all areas of the being. that is going on whether or not a person intends it to or not, but intention helps.
i always start off my practice with standing meditation and my form with a microcosmic orbit (with an I, for sure this time). and i close mmy class with a bow, so, i bow to you all now. thanks for hearing me out.
sunflower
“Why can’t i do ayp practices while doing all my other stuff?”
Hi Sunflower:
Well, deep meditation (sitting practice) may be a good addition to your practice. It is the first step in AYP. Beyond that, you may want to be careful not to be overlapping or doing cumulative time in related but different Taoist and Yoga practices. You especially should avoid “doubling up” on breathing practices (doing multiple kinds of pranayama or kumbhaka from different systems in the same session or day), which can lead to excessive energy flows and the unpleasant symptoms that go with that.
I guess we said enough earlier on the challenges of mixing Taoist and Yoga practices. Deep meditation can help a taoist practice. Some of the taoist tantric methods can help yoga. A tai chi routine is very good for grounding wayward energies for yogis and yoginis. Some find the “inner smile” to be a nice addition to yoga. Further mixing becomes increasingly complicated. Beyond the few elements just mentioned it pretty much gets down to choosing one style of practice or the other. Otherwise, you can end up using two systems of practice trying to do the same thing, and overload the nervous system.
I think the key word is “complement.” What can we use from other systems to complement what we are already doing? How can we fill in any holes in our practice? We are looking for complementary elements of practice, not necessarily duplicate ones. AYP was built using that sort of logic.
And, lo and behold, we are ending up doing a pretty good job of filling in Patanjali’s eight limbs of yoga. And we’re not done yet… 
The guru is in you.
Hi sunflower,
I wanted to respond to this thread because it’s been something I’ve thought about for quite a while myself. My meditation background comes from kriya yoga which I’ve been practicing for a few years now, but I also practice Xing Yi Quan, an internal chinese martial art that although it’s not like taiji it is still considered one of the Big 3 internal systems in china(the other being Ba Gua Zhang) I’ve found that using kriya yoga as my sitting practices hasn’t conflicted with my practice of Xing Yi… I’ve also found that alot of the standing practices of Xing Yi, (Zhan Zhuang) also greatly help my sitting meditative efforts… I also think that the microcosmic orbit as I understand it is very similar to the 1st kriya in that energy is rotated from behind the spine going up then in front going down… And the settling of chi/prana in the lower dan tien creating the “heating sensation” that causes the “steam” is actually very similar to the description of the samana pranayama of kriya, which basically does the same thing just in different terminology… I must however say that I’ve always felt more at home with taoist philosophy as opposed to yogic philosophy, I suppose because I’ve been a martial artist for about a decade longer than I have a yoga practicioner… I’m glad to hear that there are other people out there who are combining yogic meditation with martial arts systems and also doing comparisons and studies between the methods of yoga and taoist alchemy … I’ve always wanted to study taoist alchemy to draw some reference between it and my own practices, but as of yet I haven’t been able to find the time for both…
Best regards in your practice and studies…
This thread was exciting to read.
Welcome Babaji and Sunflower, your inputs are insightful.
Tai chi has been beckoning me for some time since I began AYP (must be in sore need of grounding), but I have no access to it. I even asked somewhere whether falun dafa is a good alternative. But haven’t mustered gumption to explore it. Jim, since you seem to know about this, what do you think of falun dafa just for grounding as an add on to AYP practices?
Taoism became Earth oriented, because it sees this world as a perfect world, a perfect balance between matter and essence. It is heaven and earth together. Ancient Taoists would consider AYP methods, near death experience, to be avoided. Taoist view is that we are already fully enlightened but out of balance. If we attain balance through exercise, then the bliss consciousness of Tao will permeate you naturally. You will experience all the power, wishes and joyousness you can ever hope for right in your own body. Ancient Taoists also meditated returning to emptiness. “The nature of the Tao is returning.” For Taoists, we blend into nature.
In Yogananda’s method, the “real” Kriya Yoga techniques are not taught till at least 15 months of meditation practices, including Mantra Meditation and “an “Om Technique”. Only after this preparation are you given “Diksha” and taught Kriya Yoga”. So it seems to me to be similay to AYP in many ways, where "inner Silence’ is first sought to be developed, before tha process for raising the Kundalini is taught. Of course, in AYP, one of the Kriya Yoga practices (Chakranusandhan, I think it is called), is started early, presumably to clear the nadis first and then raise Kundalini,using Mudras and bandhas together with SBP. This is also the method followed by the Bihar School of Yoga, except that all the Chakras are also individually and sequentially purified, before starting Kriya Yoga.
Yogani, Jim, Sunflower, and others:
Thank you so much for this thread! I can not claim to be experienced in either Taoist or Yoga techniques, but I discovered Mantak Chia’s and Michael Winn’s material in the last couple of months and have been practicing Winn’s Five Animals Play qigong (not tai chi!) for a couple of weeks, as well as the Inner Smile (although not regularly).
I thought I was set until I stumbled upon this site and Yogani’s work. What a treasure! What a fantastic site, full of clear, simple, direct information about powerful techniques for human spiritual transformation. I give great thanks to Yogani, and I agree with a caller on one of your first radio shows in saying that you definitely have a gift of relaying this information in such an accessible way. I was immediately inspired to start deep meditation the very first night I found this site! I have consequently been doing deep meditation for 20 minutes, twice a day, in the morning and in the evening ever since. OK, it’s only been 4 days, but there is no doubt that I am already experiencing benefits in my daily activities. I’m very excited about AYP practices.
Inevitably, I started to get antsy about whether I wanted to stick with the fundamental Taoist practices I had learned, or switch fully to AYP practices, or if I could get away with doing both for a while to see how it panned out (and make a decision then). So this forum and this thread in particular have been SO helpful to me.
Yogani, I have heard other experienced teachers say that systems should not be mixed, for the exact reason you state: it’s simply a practical consideration of effectiveness (and even safety, I suppose).
Jim, I immediately struck a chord with what you said about the matter of “style”. Wow, what an elegant statement. Do I need to worry and fret about which system is best, or about making the wrong decision or whatever? No, I don’t. I just need to go with what feels the best, and which I feel suits me. It’s a matter of “style”. Thank you for that!
Well, what can I say? I’m enamored by AYP practices and Yogani’s style, and have already reaped tangible benefits from only a few days of regular deep meditation.
At the same time, I always feel great after 20 minutes or so of qigong practice as well. My mind can’t reconcile the two systems, though…one subscribes to an inner map of seven major energy centers up the center of the body, and the other subscribes to that of three major centers (lower, middle and upper dantian). I can’t kid myself that the two maps won’t diverge sooner rather than later, and I’ll have conflicting philosophies (or as Yogani said, two cars).
That being said, I think it’s clear that I will be sticking with AYP practices. They’re fantastic! I am also inspired that Yogani has a regular tai chi practice that doesn’t interfere or conflict with the Yoga practices. I’m pretty sure, then, that I can continue with my simple qigong work with the same grounding results (and physical benefit). Perhaps that will be true with the Inner Smile as well (and maybe the six healing sounds). Never hurts to make friends with your major internal organs, right?
Anyway, sorry for rambling, thanks for everything, and keep up the good work. I will be checking out the rest of the forum as well, and devouring everything I can about the eight limbs of Yoga, particularly in the AYP framework.
Blessings,
Sean
Wuji Qi Gong (a.k.a. Enlightenment Tai Chi) brings the TAO (inner silence) back to TAOism. 
It really does. I have done it for some time and it often brings you to an even deeper and more stable silence then Deep Meditation.
http://www.taichi-enlightenment.com/
http://www.enlight-qigong.org/
It is so astonishingly effective - I really can’t describe it in words.
Enjoy.
Hi Darko
I’ve spent several hours researching this form since you posted. Andrew Fretwell comes across as very balanced and “sorted” in the interview and I see that he seems to share yogani’s altruistic streak.
It looks as though it could be helpful for grounding and integrating some wayward energy and I intend to learn it and practice for at least the 100 days that seem to be recommended, in order to find out if that’s the case. Thank you.
Could I also ask: when you speak of the “deeper and more stable silence”, are you accessing this purely from the form or are you practicing the “inner alchemy” meditation as well (or something else)?
Incidentally, how did you get on with Greg Goode? Is it helpful in integrating the awakening?
(Thanks also to everyone else who contributed to this thread - it’s extremely insightful and I found the previous conversations very helpful.)
Only this form and no other spiritual practice at all. After only two weeks of daily practice 2-3 times a day. The bliss and silence are experienced mainly AFTER you have done the form. It keeps you thoughtless and you fall in “automatic” meditation. You dont do anything, just keep automatically emerged in this silent bliss which expands more and more the longer you stay in it. Very sweet.
Btw.: Michael Winn says the form is “complete”, you do not need anything apart from it.