Daoism and Sex (part 1)

Daoism's doctrine on sex and sexual practices is one of the most misunderstood aspects of Daoism.

I recently dove into the debates about gay marriage on some political blogs. I'm not going to link to them because I was just goofing around. But in the process of considering some of the strange and desperate arguments put forward against gay marriage, it suddenly struck me that many people actually don't know what sex is. Wow, what a shock.

So I thought I would try to shoot two pheasants with one arrow, and exposit both subjects.

The Daodejing has a phrase,

"If Heaven has a reason, nobody knows it."

I think this is a good place to start. We don't know why life exists. We are capable, however, of recognizing that there are two categories, "alive" and "not alive," and that we belong to the category, "alive." (I have talked about the blended categories of ghosts and other such "part alive, part not-alive" entities in previous posts--so I'll skip that part of the argument here.)

One of the distinguishing characteristics of the "alive" category is that we are capable of reproducing ourselves. The substance, force, and function which reproduces itself in all life is called in Chinese: Jing. The word therefore includes English words like, sperm or eggs, and underlays English functions like scabbing, and regenerating.

All living things ingest qi (air/water/nutrients/light) and transform some of it into jing. Plants and animals which reproduce themselves sexually also differentiate themselves (to some degree) into male and female genders (or parts of themselves in some cases such as worms and slugs). Sexual reproduction requires that the two genders of a particular species combine their jing.

All living things produce way more jing than they actually need for sexual reproduction to be successful, and way more jing than ever gets used in the sexual reproduction process. In other words, sex is very inefficient, A plant or animal can be extremely potent in its production of jing, and still not produce offspring.

Here are some examples. Some chickens lay eggs everyday. Cockroaches and mosquitoes produce eggs in the millions, with very low survival rates for individual eggs. During certain times of year, the grass and trees are constantly trying to have sex with my eyes and nose (pollen). Dogs hump people's legs.

You can fit a million sperm on the tip of a pin.

The process of transforming qi into jing has two basic routes it can follow:

1. Qi can transform into jing which regenerates and heals the individual living entity.
2. It can produce sperm, eggs, pollen or ovules.

Some Daoist practices seek to gain some volition over this process so that less qi will go down the sperm and egg producing path and more qi will go towards producing jing used for regeneration or healing.

Many plants produce beautiful flowers which take advantage of animal desires to help them combine their jing (pollen with ovules). Animal behavior which can lead to the combining of the jing of two animals of the opposite gender is, like jing production, incredibly inefficient in every species.

According to Joseph Needham in Science and Civilization, the three basic sex hormones were recognized and isolated into pure substances in China during the 5th century CE.

Daoist practices aren't concerned with hormones directly, but they recognize that certain foods, exercises, activities and even uses of the mind, can effect how much a person is concerned with or even obsessed with sex. More importantly, they recognised that no matter what we do, we are likely at any one moment to be transforming way more qi into jing than we actually need for producing a few viable offspring.

This natural inefficiency is inseparable in animals from the thorny issue of desire. Daoist practices can be divided into two categories.

1. Leaning how stop ovulation so that you ovulate only when you have decided to attempt reproduction.
2. Reducing or limiting desire.

Desire is a physiological part of our survival apparatus. It is also incredibly inefficient. When desire builds we become totally focused--to the exclusion of other information. To quote the huainanzi, "We run rough-shod over subtlety."

Thus, for Daoists, the physiology of efficiency takes on a moral dimension. Inappropriate behavior is not considered unnatural, it is simply excessive or deficient--misdirected or too strong.

The primary methods through which Daoism engages with desire, are the making of commitments and the refining appetites.

This always begs the question: How can we tell an appetite from a desire? There isn't a simple answer. Appetites generally include assessment and evaluation phases, they are more reflective and experimental-- less driven.

However, it would be a mistake to think that either appetites or desires are somehow rational. I guess you could say that appetites are to desire what reproduction is to sex.

Since all human sexual activity--from putting on lipstick to bumping chests with your male competitors, to vaginal intercourse itself--is naturally inefficient and rarely results in offspring, the desire to have sex with someone of the same gender, with a tree, or with a consenting gorilla, is all just part of this wild inefficiency and abundance we call life.

But if you've ever contemplated a rushing river pouring over a cliff, you already know this.

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Yelp* Reviews

A few years ago some inexperienced internet people came up with a great idea. They created a search-able review site for local businesses called Yelp*. Any business owner could list and describe their business and anyone else could write a review about it. Brilliant, they should have become billionaires by now.

Would that it were.

Yelp(ers) were the first people to get a site up and running, and they quickly cornered the niche, but they have had such poor business sense that years later they are still having problems.

First of all let me encourage you all to check it out. Secondly, if you've ever studied with me please write me a review. Lots of people in San Francisco use Yelp* to decide what businesses to patronize.

But...be forewarned...(because they won't tell you) if you only review one business or service, they will erase your review after a few days. Why? Because they are loony. They have some theory about the ethics of single-reviews. Whatever, if you take the time to write me a review (for which I will be deeply appreciative) also write one about a sushi restaurant, or a bed and breakfast, or a dentist.

I first found out I was dealing with amateurs three years ago after I wrote a review of Mao's Village Restaurant, which used to be an annoyance around the corner from my house. The next day I got a call from a guy at Yelp* who sounded like he rides his skateboard to work (nothing at all against skateboards, he just sounded young and unprofessional). We talked for about half an hour. His reason for calling me was that he didn't think I had actually eaten at the restaurant, which was true and obvious from my review. I commented on the Chang Kai-Shek's Wife's Chicken on the menu as well as many Mao and Zhou Enlai references that just made me think about starving babies. I mean would you buy an oven from a store called Hitler's Stoves? I commented about the mess around the cash register and the fact that hardly anyone ever eats there. In fact, I was pretty sure that it was a mafia money laundering scheme. A restaurant which has no customers can invent cash receipts, then pay taxes on them, which makes the money clean. The only people I ever saw in there were partying and drinking whiskey late at night.

Anyway, they took my first review down off the site.

Then, last year they called me to say I had some pretty glowing reviews, perhaps I would like to have my business moved to the top of the search for a fee of $300 a month. They worked really hard to sell me on this, obviously having no idea how my business works. I mean, look, if I was in a competitive business like a restaurant, and I had 20+ customers a night, $300 might look like a good price. But heck, I'm happy if I get 2 new students a month! Their business model made no sense at all.

So just the other day I (and nearly every small business person I know) got this message from Yelp*

Hello,

I'm writing to let you know about our decision to close your account. Your user account was flagged by the Yelp community, and our Customer Service team has determined that your account has violated Yelp's Terms of Service (http://www.yelp.com/static?p=tos).

Specifically, the Terms of Service state that:
> "You shall not: create user accounts by automated means or under false or fraudulent pretenses."

We have determined that you have been using Yelp to improve your business' and your friends'/other small business owners' ratings on Yelp through review trading. We have determined that review trading does not reflect unbiased customer opinions which violates the spirit of Yelp.

We review every situation with detail and care and take account closure very seriously.

Regards,
Kris
Yelp Inc. User Support
San Francisco, California.

Did you notice that Kris spells his name like the spirit capturing daggers of Indonesia?

Don't worry, they didn't take down my business description itself, just the reviews I had written for others and my personal ability to comment on other people's businesses--Oh, and all of the reviews people had already posted about me, except for one.

See, by Yelp* Logicâ„¢, if I write a review for someone in my business network it must be fraud! Thus all my students and former students who have their own businesses are automatically disqualified from sharing their opinions because they might be biased in my favor.

Get a clue Yelp*! The majority of my clients/students run small or even one-person businesses. This is San Francisco! A whole host of technologies, starting with the answering machine and now including Yelp*, have made it possible for individuals to run their own businesses. The possibility of the one-person business is the greatest single institutional change in the direction of freedom in my lifetime.

I was prepared to ignore the whole thing and move on but then this article made it into the San Francisco Chronicle, and someone started up a site called Yelp-Sucks.com

Sweet.

UPDATE: My honey tells me that not only do you have to review some other business in addition to mine, you also have to add a picture--otherwise they'll just toss your review in the cyber-trash.

Accidents (part 1)

Accidents do happen.  The greatest, most effective, fast-acting medicine ever invented was invented by accident.

No, dear reader, I'm not talking about Viagra (although that was also invented by accident), I'm talking about anti-biotics! Penicillin! 

What happened was, someone was eating a sandwich in the lab where they weren't supposed to be and they dropped some bread crumbs into one of the cultures.  The penicillin in the bread stopped the bad germs from growing.  Dude, it like killed everything, but in a good way.  (Tell that to your teachers next time they complain about you eating in class!)

Oh, and by the way, did I tell you I reached the highest level of martial arts the other day?  Yah, it happened by accident. 

Ex-Romantics

I'm Mr. Negative (Mr. "Nego" for short) when it comes to Romantic ideas like; "You've just got to believe," or "Everyone has an inner Genius waiting to be revealed," or "Revolution now," or "Peace," or "How do you feeeeel about it?," or "I need a cleanse," or "Inner truth is found through embracing the mystery," or "Natural is better than synthetic."

There are a lot more of those slogans which define the rigid Romantic mind-set. I could go on ridiculing it all day, but I won't. Sometimes natural is better than synthetic, sometimes not. The reason I bring this up at all is that I used to be a Romantic, I used to believe all that stuff, so I'm sympathetic. I viscerally understand why this kind of simplicity is appealing.

Actually I'm more than sympathetic. As pathetic as this might sound-- being a Romantic was a gateway to learning about the body, the mind, martial arts, and Daoism.

If I can point my students in the direction of a bridge, that is preferable to gate, but if a gate is the only thing they see, then by all means, they should take the gate!

Golf

I've never played golf but I've heard from some of my private students that one of the secrets to a good swing is keeping your feet completely still and relaxed.

Creativity (Not going with the Flow)

A few years ago I tried to teach a regular class out of a multi-purpose performance space. The place was not well managed, a few people lived in the adjacent spaces, and people kept interrupting my class, sometimes insisting they needed to cross through the middle of the room.
One day I got really pissed-off. I left my students, and went to chew out a bunch of "ravers" who had taken up relaxed poses on an outdoor sofa after having interrupted my class more than once. I don't remember what I said, but it must have been fairly direct, loud, and aggressive. The last thing the guy ever said, to me, was, "Hey maaaan, I thought Tai Chi was all about going with the flow!"

"Only dead fish go with the flow."

On the subject of where to train, check out this blog.  While you're there, check out the kind things Daniel has to say about his trip to San Francisco in the recent posts section.

The above quote comes from a book by a friend of mine who teaches improvisation. Check it out!

Push Hands: Small Circle, Big Circle

Small Circle push-hands is a rules set which can have moving feet, but really ought to be learned with fixed feet first.  Small circle push-hands allows no grabbing, slapping or striking.  You can only do peng, ji, lu, and an.  The reason it is called small circle is because you are trying to develop peng, ji, lu, and an (ward off, push/poke, draw inward, cover/contain) in a continuous circle, no breaks, no moments of intermittent force.  Small circle push-hands can be completely improvised or it can follow a set sequence.
Once you have established small circle push-hands there are lots of subtler games that can be played from it.

Big Circle push-hands gets it's name because to play it one must break the small circle.  The rule set allows for grabbing (chin na), plucking (zai), elbow strikes, throws, and traps (zhou), forward strikes with the shoulder (kao), and two directional attacks to the opponent's frame which can be light swipes, slaps or sudden jolts(lieh).

Most people learn both big circle and small circle at the same time.  I think that is a mistake, the two rule sets should be clearly differentiated.   The question remains, which is better to learn first?

Small Circle push-hands is the heart of the game, but to deal with an aggressor you must know Big Circle push-hands cold.

The Coccyx and the Xiphoid

I could not find an image of a whole human torso in the mid-sagittal plane on the internet. Perhaps that is the reason why I am writing this post. (This project to map the body will be great when it is finished.)

Everyone that has even peeked at Traditional Chinese anatomical concepts is familiar with the du and ren channels which wrap the torso at the mid-sagittal plane. (The term du meaning governing, and the term ren meaning conception.) Basically, one goes along the back of the torso and other goes along the front. The coccyx and the xiphoid process run along these meridians.

The coccyx, otherwise known as the tail bone, and the xiphoid process, located at the very bottom of the sternum, are simular in many ways. They are both bones which attach at one end to another bone and at the other end appear to be reaching out into the abyss. They are both joints. They are both capable of movement much like the tip of a finger. Most people have little awareness of either, and it is even rarer that someone would comment on their mobility, or mention the two of them in the same breath.

They are in fact connected together. A ligament extends from the bottom of the sternum straight down to the pubic bone which is then connected by a series of bifurcating ligaments to the coccyx.

The xiphoid process is involved with breathing and it touches the diaphragm. Ligaments also come down from the back of the diaphragm along the front side of the spine all the way to the tip of the coccyx.

If force along this plane is diverted to the left or the right by tension or irregularly shaped bones it will be diminished. Feel the connection between these two important bones and joints. Check to see if you transfer power directly between them along the ligaments. If not, you will want to improve that connection, it will improve your overall alignment and power.

Are Some Ideas About the Heart Trash?

In chapter eight of the Neijing Suwen we have the saying:

The heart holds the office of lord and sovereign.

The radiance of the spirits stems from it.

That translation is from Claude Larre and Elisabeth Rochat, The Secret of the Spiritual Orchid. Often called the Inner Classic of Chinese Medicine, this 2000 year old text is referenced occasionally in the modern teaching of Chinese Medicine. It is used more often when teaching esoterica because it isn't all that specific.

The expression translated above as "radiance of the spirits," is actually a common martial arts term--mingshen.

Mingshen is mentioned in the taijiquan classics as the fruition of practice. I think it is what I see in a young student's eyes when they are ready and eager to learn. It is also that quality you see in a great fighter's eyes which is capable of ending the fight before it has even started.

Mencius said: If a ruler has mingshen, when he and his army invade a country, its people will lay down their arms and join him. Now that sounds like either a really good reputation or very potent shamanic prowess.

Descriptions of mingshen in the martial arts deal with perception, consciousness, proprioception, and kinesthetic awareness. These descriptions often sound mystical. Mingshen is the ability to wield forces that seem to be outside your body, outside your opponent's body too. This "space power" gives liveliness and dimensionality to our movement, it is the main subject of the highest level martial arts.

You can't really be a "modern" person and not ask the questions with regard to pre-20th century ideas, "What should I keep and what should I discard?" "What can I use, and what will just hold me back?"

Everyone has to answer these questions for themselves. Are useless acts good for the heart? Does extraordinary martial prowess have any real utility?
Hardly any country in the world has done as much discarding in the 20th century as China has. But it hasn't always been honest or well considered discarding. Now they are looking through the trash to see what can be salvaged.

Tea

If you get down to Los Gatos, check it out!