In my experience as an adept and alchemy teacher, I find that terms like yuan jing, qi, and shen as well as most of the poetic and arcane alchemical terminology found in the dao canon, are virtually impossible for humans to grasp from reading books. Reading about alchemical formulas may be intellectually stimulating and allow a grasp of its principles, but is essentially useless in actually learning to speak the deep language of alchemy. Intellectuals will find it very challenging to shift from their skill in manipiulating concepts and words about alchemy to direct, full-body (physical and subtle bodies) experience of the silent language of the qi field. A structured framework of embodied experience is required. Perhaps because most westerners are left-brain dominant, this experience can arise most easily from qigong movement, breathing, and posture, later refined to a deeper level by initiation into sitting nei dan meditation. In this second phase the body is still but the qi field moves.

One Cloud's seven nei dan formulas are a practical, gradual, step-by-step method of returning to the natural spiritual center of gravity held by one's Original Self, the trinity of original jing-qi-shen. In my experience, if an adept receives transmission of at least the first two formulas, the alchemical language of the other five formulas may spontaneously reveal themselves in deep meditation. Many of my own students have had this experience. This is in keeping with my thesis that the formulas act as a catalyst for speaking a deep language of nature that unfolds spontaneously as one matures spiritually.

As humans have different natures, it explains why different forms of nei dan practice arise. My own practice of these nei dan formulas has unfolded quite differently from that of my first Dao teacher (Mantak Chia) for this reason. Experience has taught me these formulas are best learned slowly, allowing a minimum of one year practice of each to digest and stabilize the energetic shifts they initiate before "eating" the qi of the next level. Students who attempt to rush through them, stuffing their heads with information about then, invariably cannot hold onto anything and drop the alchemical practice completely.

Foundation Practice: Inner Smile. Internal alchemy begins with a wu-wei practice, the Inner Smile. The ordinary outer smile is reactive to one environment. The inner smile is an method of effortlessly opening the inner heart (yuan shen) and penetrating its gentle radiance into one's biology (and its underlying jing). The Inner Smile is the simplest and most basic practice, yet is found at the end of each level of alchemical cultivation as well. At the end of all the formulas, it becomes the most advanced practice - the adept merges into the mind of the Dao, effortlessly smiling into all dimensions of Nature. This merger of the adept smiling with the mind of the Dao implies that humanity's presence (as one of the three treasures) can elevate the Dao with its purity of heart.

Formula 1: Open the Orbit, Five Phases of Spirit and Eight Extraordinary Qi Vessels. How to communicate harmoniously with the qi field inside he human body. These foundational energetic practices encapsulate the entirety of classical chinese medicine, and are the main practices used for self-healing. Students often spend several years learning them. The Six Healing Sounds clear the stuck qi cycling through the five phases and three burners (head/upper chest, solar plexus, belly). The Microcosmic Orbit balances yin-yang flow of the spine and front chest and alchemically mixes the adept's qi and blood. Fusion of the Five Elements (Phases) I, II, and III is emotional and psychic alchemy. It helps one to absorb innate virtue and dissolve negative emotional qi, which is then crystallized into a pearl made of post natal yuan qi (source qi in TCM). The Macrocosmic Orbit circulates the clarity of this pearl in the Eight Extraordinary Vessels, which opens communication between the trunk (spine, waist & core channel) to all limbs/directions.

Formulas 2, 3, and 4 are the Lesser, Greater, and Greatest Enlightenment of Water and Fire (kan & li). This division of enlightenment into three levels is traditional. (20) These are three levels of the reversal (ni) phase, where the adept begins the internal sexual coupling of fire (yang body spirits) with water (yin body spiirts), then progresses to internally coupling sun with moon, and finally to a fusion of planetary spirits and coupling of inner earth with inner sun (yang within the yin and yin within the yang). Reversal means the adept's desires to pursue outer physical life in Later Heaven is reversed and all one's desires begin dissolving and flowing back into Early Heaven and the Origin. The Lesser formula completes the 5 phases of human qi (vital organ spirits), the Greater completes the 5 phases of earth qi (geomantic forces), and the Greatest completes the 5 phases of planetary qi (astrological forces that shape human destiny). The net effect of completing all three levels is to fulfill one's soul purpose, which dissolves fear of death and the unconscious drive to incarnate. This enlightenment of completing the qi of the individual's post-natal self is thus the requisite to attaining immortality in the following three formulas.

This alchemical "coupling" or "cooking" process reunites post natal jing-qi-shen and allows the adept's Later Heaven self to open a portal for communication with her Early Heaven self. These three formulas focus on opening an inner space where the adept can talk to core body intelligences (jingshen), the intelligences within the Earth, and the Sun/planetary intelligences. This allows the adept to absorb progressively greater powers of yin and yang qi. The second formula, sexual inner alchemy, is essentially an advaced practice of the Microcosmic Orbit. It involves self-intercourse within the adept of yin (inner female) and yang (inner male) body spirits, and variants of this nei dan practice are described in a number of Dao canon texts translated into English.

Formula 5 is Sealing of the Senses. it seals the Later Heaven senses/mind of the adept inside the crown to open up and refine communication between the adept's personal soul (ling) and the Great Spirit (da shen) of the star intelligences. Thus it is also called Star alchemy. This engages the collective stellar level of nature's intelligence, defined by the Big Dipper and Polestar, and opens the portal of the central axis (chong qi, or cosmic yuan qi) of Later Heaven into Early Heaven. Formula 6 is the Congress of Heaven and Earth. It couples, as an act of cosmic sexual self-intercourse, the adept's Later Heaven soul essence with his formless androgynous Early Heaven essence. This final coupling opens communications with the chaos/original unity of Primordial Heaven. The circulation of qi between the three heavens is the True Macrocosmic Orbit. Formula 7 the Union of Man and Dao, has not yet unfolded for me. One Cloud did not claim to master it or teach it. He described it as the cosmicized human's jing-qi-shen merging spontaneously into the wuji, the Supreme Unknown, portal to the unknowable Dao.

The seven formulas offer a progressive experience of yuan qi as the mover behind all cosmic cycles of change. But what exactly is yuan qi? It is paradoxical, the very definition of undefinable energy. In learning to speak the deep language of qi, the ordinary mind can easily grasp the notion of yin & yang through its many tangible polarities in nature (light & dark, hot & cold, etc.) This is reinforced by spoken language, which uses words to describe these polar distinctions. By habit we fix these polarities into rigid dualistic concepts of black & white, right & wrong, self & other, etc. But beyond the tangible bi-poles of yin & yang, in nei dan practice the third force of yuan qi is ALWAYS present as an invisible monopole dissolving any fixity. As a simple metaphor for the mind to grasp, yang qi is white light (photons that refract into 7 prismatic rays), yin qi is dark light (gravity approximates this), and yuan qi is clear light that can be polarized into both white and dark light without losing its innate neutral property.

Between the yin-yang (north and south) poles of our planet is a monopole of yuan qi at the earth's.center. In humans, the heart center functions as a monopole balancing messages from the head (heaven) and belly (earth) poles. In the emotional field between two lovers, there is neutral pole that holds the essence of their love beyond the time and space fluctuations of their emotional relationship. Even if they divorce, the neutral qi field created by their earlier love cannot be destroyed by their subsequent hatred for each other; the yuan qi created from their emotionally polarized qi simply ceases to be active as their personal field of communication. This is why the innate virtue of love (as neutral acceptance or unity) ultimately triumphs over the learned force of hate (as separating impulse). Forced separation does not build any yuan qi, while unificationi of opposites grows yuan qi.

We fail to recognize original energy even when we are communicating through its matrix. Our brain, polarized into left-right hemipsheres, physically reflects the nature of our ordinary mind's polarized sensory perception. Thus we see with two eyes, hear with two ears, breathe through two nostrils. But yuan qi exists and is further generated at the crossing point of the corpus collosum at the center between the left and right brain hemispheres. Yuan qi is generated by the protons and electrons orbiting the the nucleus in each of our atoms. It is in the neutrinos that go whizzing past us without stopping because their is no "neutral force container" on the polarized surface of our earth that can hold them.

Original qi is the invisible monopole around which DNA spirals, serpent-like, in yin-yang pairs. DNA is the modern equivalent of jing, the essence that holds our shape. As qi converts into jing, the latent DNA patterns are activated. Thus the original trinity of jing-qi-shen is able to communicate with its human form and shape it moment to moment. The subtle qi field of a human being controls the timing of the unfoldment of these genetic patterns, whose encodings at the jing level form an unimaginably complex text three billion characters long. Some microbiologists admit that the gene code is best described as a "language text" of nature, even though their scientific paradigm prevents them from admitting that Nature is intelligent and thus able to "speak" or write a text in any language. (21)

In Primordial Heaven yuan qi is the cosmic parent that births yin and yang, but paradoxically in Later Heaven yuan qi is their offspring. In the physical plane yuan qi is re-birthed only when yin & yang come into sustained balance. This is the key principle of daoist internal alchemy. A neutral monopole is what allows communication and harmonious qi flow between any two poles or dimensions. A neutral matrix of original qi is what allows yin and yang to rhythmically flip their positions after reaching their extremes of expansion or contraction. To first experience, and later to shape the polarities of one's qi field from this neutral point of eternally balanced qi is to speak the deep langugage of Nature's intelligence. If you can find and stay centered in the awareness of this neutral balance point at every moment of your life, you have stabilized the effortless state of wu wei and the door is open to realize your immortality. If you can create a vessel - an energy body - that holds the yuan qi in later heaven, you have produced the elixir.

This seems simple, and yet is unimaginably difficult because of polarized language patterns of perception programmed into our mind and senses by generations of everyday life. The missing link is understanding the Original Spirit (yuan shen) as Nature's inner voice. Whenever the door between dimensions (early & later heaven) is opened, especially at moments of human birth, death and sexual copulation, our Original Spirit is actively present to assist us in communicating our inner will. These moments of grace allow our Early Heaven self to express its unconditonal nature within the physical plane as unconditional love, acceptance, or trust of the qi field. Nei dan internalizes these processes of birth, death, and sexual self-intercourse in meditation. They occur within the body-mind-spirit of the adept, who uses them to keep open the Mysterious Pass in each moment.