The Wim Hof stuff is interesting. It bleeds over into stuff I've been dwelling on recently with regards to the process/nature of consciousness itself and what it means for an individual's sense of purpose and their 'self-actualisation', which feeds back around to health in the end, either directly through some undiscovered process or indirectly through the kinds of general health decisions one ends up making.
You sound like you’d be interested in and open to considering the following:
Here is research on the practice (gTummo yoga) that Hof states is the foundation of his practice:
"During visits to remote monasteries in the 1980s, Benson and his team studied monks living in the Himalayan Mountains who could, by g Tum-mo meditation, raise the temperatures of their fingers and toes by as much as 17 degrees. It has yet to be determined how the monks are able to generate such heat."
Dr. Herbert Benson of Harvard Medical, also published in the journal nature.
"The researchers collected data during the unique ceremony in Tibet, where nuns were able to raise their core body temperature and dry up wet sheets wrapped around their bodies in the cold Himalayan weather (-25 degree Celsius) while meditating."
Where I believe this all leads, to your point about consciousness, admittedly flies in the face of much of what we are told about the world and it’s mechanisms:
In addition to the video footage, in the past westerners have been able to seek out Chang and train under him. A Greek engineer managed to find him and trained for a decade with him and wrote a book trying to apply a scientific approach to what he witnessed and experienced. This book really shines an interesting light on not just the what observed in the video, but investigates possible answers for the how as well. In addition, it's just a highly engrossing book if approached with an open mind.
Great, thanks for the links. I'll have a read when I can. On a quick skim, the Greek guy seems a bit overcome by fanboyism, but I don't consider that a reason to discount his whole account.
I'm more than just open to it, I'm actually fixated on questions of consciousness these days. I have a collection of reflections and ramblings in a text file which I feel some sort of moral responsibility to try and turn into a book or something some day, myself, though I have a poor record with following through with that sort of thing and no paper credentials to make it seem authoritative.
This could prompt me to look into the Tao/Dao some more since it seems like it could have a lot of overlap, cheers. Taoism remains in a blind spot for me unlike several other spiritual traditions I've come to take pointers from (much like the Perennialists). Who knows, maybe I'll go find this Chang myself.
Great, thanks for the links. I'll have a read when I can.
Cheers, I hope it all points you in helpful directions
On a quick skim, the Greek guy seems a bit overcome by fanboyism, but I don't consider that a reason to discount his whole account.
Perhaps, but given the perspective being presented (something a child of the modern world might liken to “finding master yoda”, or more accurately something like “finding master lao tzu”), like you allow for, I can see where it’s coming from and don’t hold it against either the book or the author
I'm more than just open to it, I'm actually fixated on questions of consciousness these days. I have a collection of reflections and ramblings in a text file which I feel some sort of moral responsibility to try and turn into a book or something some day
I feel like I know where you’re coming from. I too feel an urge to produce something like a series of articles on substack, diving in depth into specific subjects then hopefully ascending back out to link it all together cogently and cohesively, something which it feels like is only ephemerally present in my head. And I struggle similarly with committing myself to the task. One need only read into the life of someone like Chang to begin to understand the levels of commitment required to achieve anything approaching “mastery”, but I see value in even the uninitiated attempting to “report” what they’ve found in their studies.
This could prompt me to look into the Tao/Dao some more since it seems like it could have a lot of overlap
I really hope it does, I’ve personally found such astounding variety and amounts of wisdom in these traditions that I’m convinced they’re “onto something” - as opposed to the generic western explanation of “a stopped clock is right twice a day” kind of mentality towards “eastern wisdom” broadly speaking.
Because we are dealing with translation, I find referring to a variety of sources as important as for example biblical scholars might be. To that end, I’ve posted two English translations of the Tao Te Ching (“the” book of Taoism) in the past:
This version I personally find provides the most impactful translation which speaks more to me than the attempts at more literal or less esoteric translation often attempted by the “academics”.
This version is a comparative collection of 8 different translations hosted by Boston University. Quite interesting to use to dive into specific word and phrase choices.
Here’s some interesting little tidbits I’ll leave you with that I’ve always found interesting:
Lao Tzu appears to translate most accurately to “wise old man” or when taken literally “Mr. Wise Man”
Confucius is a bit of a bastardization of his name. In this context, you might be surprised to learn his name is perhaps more accurately translated as Kung-Fu Tzu, or rendered literally “Mr. Kung-Fu”
Chang, if you take his words at face value (and I’ve found no reason not to), claims his lineage of “internal martial arts”, aka “qi gong / chi kung”, known as Mo Pai, traces its roots to a contemporary of Lao Tzu and Kung-Fu Tzu known as Mo Tzu:
You sound like you’d be interested in and open to considering the following:
Here is research on the practice (gTummo yoga) that Hof states is the foundation of his practice:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WajTafbG7II
https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2002/04/meditation-changes-temperatures/
https://www.nature.com/articles/295234a0
"During visits to remote monasteries in the 1980s, Benson and his team studied monks living in the Himalayan Mountains who could, by g Tum-mo meditation, raise the temperatures of their fingers and toes by as much as 17 degrees. It has yet to be determined how the monks are able to generate such heat."
Dr. Herbert Benson of Harvard Medical, also published in the journal nature.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/04/130408084858.htm
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0058244
"The researchers collected data during the unique ceremony in Tibet, where nuns were able to raise their core body temperature and dry up wet sheets wrapped around their bodies in the cold Himalayan weather (-25 degree Celsius) while meditating."
Where I believe this all leads, to your point about consciousness, admittedly flies in the face of much of what we are told about the world and it’s mechanisms:
https://communities.win/c/HumanPotential/p/141rVOZOu0/perhaps-the-most-important-video/c
In addition to the video footage, in the past westerners have been able to seek out Chang and train under him. A Greek engineer managed to find him and trained for a decade with him and wrote a book trying to apply a scientific approach to what he witnessed and experienced. This book really shines an interesting light on not just the what observed in the video, but investigates possible answers for the how as well. In addition, it's just a highly engrossing book if approached with an open mind.
PDF of the book:
https://www.sacred-magick.com/free/files/The%20Magus%20of%20Java.pdf
Great, thanks for the links. I'll have a read when I can. On a quick skim, the Greek guy seems a bit overcome by fanboyism, but I don't consider that a reason to discount his whole account.
I'm more than just open to it, I'm actually fixated on questions of consciousness these days. I have a collection of reflections and ramblings in a text file which I feel some sort of moral responsibility to try and turn into a book or something some day, myself, though I have a poor record with following through with that sort of thing and no paper credentials to make it seem authoritative.
This could prompt me to look into the Tao/Dao some more since it seems like it could have a lot of overlap, cheers. Taoism remains in a blind spot for me unlike several other spiritual traditions I've come to take pointers from (much like the Perennialists). Who knows, maybe I'll go find this Chang myself.
Cheers, I hope it all points you in helpful directions
Perhaps, but given the perspective being presented (something a child of the modern world might liken to “finding master yoda”, or more accurately something like “finding master lao tzu”), like you allow for, I can see where it’s coming from and don’t hold it against either the book or the author
I feel like I know where you’re coming from. I too feel an urge to produce something like a series of articles on substack, diving in depth into specific subjects then hopefully ascending back out to link it all together cogently and cohesively, something which it feels like is only ephemerally present in my head. And I struggle similarly with committing myself to the task. One need only read into the life of someone like Chang to begin to understand the levels of commitment required to achieve anything approaching “mastery”, but I see value in even the uninitiated attempting to “report” what they’ve found in their studies.
I really hope it does, I’ve personally found such astounding variety and amounts of wisdom in these traditions that I’m convinced they’re “onto something” - as opposed to the generic western explanation of “a stopped clock is right twice a day” kind of mentality towards “eastern wisdom” broadly speaking.
Because we are dealing with translation, I find referring to a variety of sources as important as for example biblical scholars might be. To that end, I’ve posted two English translations of the Tao Te Ching (“the” book of Taoism) in the past:
https://communities.win/c/Manna/p/17teNpuIaW/the-tao-te-ching/c
This version I personally find provides the most impactful translation which speaks more to me than the attempts at more literal or less esoteric translation often attempted by the “academics”.
https://communities.win/c/HumanPotential/p/141ra5FBnM/tao-te-ching-full-text-8x-compar/c
This version is a comparative collection of 8 different translations hosted by Boston University. Quite interesting to use to dive into specific word and phrase choices.
Here’s some interesting little tidbits I’ll leave you with that I’ve always found interesting:
Lao Tzu appears to translate most accurately to “wise old man” or when taken literally “Mr. Wise Man”
Confucius is a bit of a bastardization of his name. In this context, you might be surprised to learn his name is perhaps more accurately translated as Kung-Fu Tzu, or rendered literally “Mr. Kung-Fu”
Chang, if you take his words at face value (and I’ve found no reason not to), claims his lineage of “internal martial arts”, aka “qi gong / chi kung”, known as Mo Pai, traces its roots to a contemporary of Lao Tzu and Kung-Fu Tzu known as Mo Tzu:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mozi
Some really interesting things in there.