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My short definition of internal alchemy: a systematic process for changing oneself from the inside out. By contrast, a behaviorist would try to change your outer actions and hope to stimulate an internal change.

A second definition: Inner alchemy is the science of self-transformation that results in an individual evolving into a higher level of vibrational balance and harmony with the whole of creation.

A third meaning: Inner alchemy is the art of turning matter into spirit, and spirit into matter. Hence the famous alchemical saying:

"As Above, So Below. As Within, So Without".

Internal alchemy is mirrored by external alchemy, which accomplishes the same transformations using herbs, minerals (turning lead into gold), breathing exercies, sexual fluids or other external substances.

In modern times, all empirical or scientific materialism could be classified as a school of external alchemy. All modern technology involves manipulating some fundamental level of matter in order to change it into something else. Dupont turns petroleum into nylon stockings, a seeming feat of magic that requires re-arranging the molecular structure.

Some internal alchemy writers think external alchemy should be called the "spagyric arts" so as not to confuse it with the inner process of transmuting consciousness into its pure and original uncorruptible "golden" nature. But both are designed to speed up the evolution of matter.

No one is certain as to the origins of the word "alchemy". I accept that it may derive from "al-kemi", Egyptian for "dark/fertile earth". What scholars do know is that alchemy is far older than our modern notions of religion by many thousands of years.

Alchemy seems to be one the earliest systems of spiritual knowledge on the planet, as recorded in myths. The renowned scholar Mircae Eliade wrote an excellent book detailing the dominance of alchemy and its sister, metallurgy, in all of the myths of ancient human culture. Read Eliade's book, "The Crucible and the Forge", for a definitive study on the origins of alchemy in China, India, Egypt, and Africa. He found Chinese alchemy to be the best preserved and that its principles are still intact within Chinese culture.

I have studied Western alchemy, both internal and laboratory, and the principles are identical. But most western inner alchemy knowledge has been lost, i.e. how to transform the mortal personality-body into an immortal being. But there are extensive and excellent Western laboratory alchemy texts and websites.

"Science" is originally derived from the Latin verb sciens, "to know". Spiritual science is thus simply any systematic method for knowing or experiencing oneself spiritually. How does it differ from modern empirical-materialistic science?

Material scientists try to "prove" their hypotheses about physical reality by conducting experiments with results that are verifiable and repeatable by any other scientist.

Spiritual science makes the opposite assumption: every human being is a unique experiment. If you give a group of humans the same method of meditation or other technique of spiritual cultivation, even though everyone conducts the exact same "experiment" on their body-mind, each person has a unique result that cannot be duplicated by anyone else.

Taoist spiritual science is a set of consistently teachable methods of "knowing", developed over thousands of years. But these methods are designed to help each person unfold their unique essence or destiny.

There is no assumption that everyone will have the same experience of the Tao, or Way. Rather, the process is one of each Taoist using similar methods to realize their unique worldly and spiritual destiny.

One Cloud's Seven Formulas for Achieving Eternal Life

Empty Vessel Interview with Michael Winn on Taoist Internal Alchemy

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It's about unfolding who you already are. Unlike most religion, you are not asked to believe in something or someone else who is long dead, that you can't see or feel. You are not trying to eradicate your unique self into oblivion/void/oneness. You are growing the uniquely creative individual nature of your soul at the same time you expand your awareness more deeply into the common ground of primordial oneness that all beings in this cosmos share. You are giving the Original Oneness (actually a trinity) a fresh opportunity to embody and co-create with the Life Force.

A Taoist first trains in chi kung (qigong) to feel the chi field and understand how it shapes your body, your worldly destiny, and your spiritual destiny.. You regulate your breathing, your posture, and calm your mind. This level heals physical disease as your physical chi field comes into balance. Different chi kung forms affect your chi field in different ways. It is good to learn more than one, then you natural have the pleasure of variety in your daily practice.

As you get more advanced, you study neigong meditations in which your mind cultivates the chi. Taoist Water and Fire ("kan & li") alchemy is a special class of dynamic meditation that shapes and refines your chi field. It connects and harmonizes your Spirits. That's right, your body-mind has more than one spirit - (your soul is a collection of them). The challenge is to integrate your personality with its diverse voices into a unified soul team.

There are both yin practices (centered on receiving & building structure) and yang practices (centered on reaching out & dynamic movement). There is a third type of practice (yuan) based on stillness and spontaneity of interplay between yin and yang. This is an incredibly elegant and profound meditation path that leads to realization of the Mystical Body or Light Body,, as well as Music of the Spheres ("Stringless Lute" in the Tao tradition).

I love all spiritual systems, they all work, i.e. they advance your awaremess. But they don't "deliver" the same experience. I think a lot of people have the misconception that all spiritual paths lead to the same experience. I think it is exactly the opposite: we all begin from the same Oneness, and our path individuates us into the Many. This is why evolution in the physical plane moves towards greater complexity, i.e. greater individuation.

Many paths are designed to "transcend" by taking you out of your body. These paths often seek to end your individual uniqueness and creative potential. I discovered the hard way that this creates a body-spirit split. Your spirit wants to "go home" to the formless planes, while your physical body-mind wants to live longer in the physical plane. <

This kind of spiritual transcendence can become one-sided, a movement towards the formless only. It may devalue the physical plane as a "low" or "gross" place that one should evacuate as soon as possible. Unfortunately it can lead to a kind of spiritual suicide. The body is individuated and wants to continue exploring its physical experience. The personal mind-soul is connected to the unifying Original Spirit.

So some spiritual seekers mistakenly abandon their body, they sacrifice it, thinking they will then achieve oneness with spirit. But you cannot achieve oneness if you have a body-spirit split happening. I found the path of Taoist alchemy integrates the two. The goal of alchemy is to unite your body/matter and mind/spirit into a third, immortal being that is BOTH individuated and merged into the collective. It can travel between the physical and spiritual planes at will, because it has integrated the form (water) and formless (fire) aspects of the soul.

Taoist qigong and internal alchemy I fd to be the most practical in dialy life. Its principles are nearly identical to that of Chinese medicine, feng shui, and many other arts and sciences. Of all the paths i have explored, it is the most grounded, the most honoring of both sexuality-water as Divine Mother and the Divine Father heart-fire within the human soul. The integration of the two is the restoration of the Original Trinity, the primordial Spirit, Breath, and Essence.

Once you understand the Taoist alchemical language of "jing, chi, shen, and wu" - essence, breath, spirit, and the Unknown -- you possess a "spiritual language" for communicating with everything in nature and the Cosmos.

Most systems use complicated mantras in foreign languages or deities shaped by a culturally foreign imagination to do this communication. It can work ,but you must first merge with the imagination of the culture that created that pathway of spiritual communication with a system of local "gods".

The Tao is about direct experience of the universal chi field -- right under your nose. Its language is shaped by natural entities like herbs & flowers , animals, mountains and rivers, fire and water, sun and moon, planets, stars and space. The is little or no cultural filter between human culture and these natural "powers".

But all these natural beings talk to one another using a wave form language of chi. This moving chi field is what connects all of nature into a vast organism. It is so wonderful to learn to speak this natural language, and feel connected again to what is truly real!

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Note two important things. One, I have been exploring internal alchemy for 27+ years. Two, inner alchemy meditation by definition is an experimental energetic science. The process can be quite different for different people. Two people can do the same practice and have different experiences. I found out when I began travelling around to remote parts of China, that every sacred Taoist mountain even today has its own unique spiritual methods.

My research into ancient alchemical texts resulted in my developing some different interpretations of Tao cosmology than I was originally taught. Taoism does not have rigid doctrines, it is a vast complex with great variety in the nuances of its cosmology and practice. My study with many masters of both Eastern and Western alchemy resulted in my developing some new ways to practice the same seven alchemical formulas passed down to me by Mantak Chia from his teacher, One Cloud.

But essentially the approach of Mantak Chia and myself harmonize with each other. It is more a reflection of different personalities favoring different methods. Ultimately, you can only transmit who you are at a deep level, and hope that inspires others to discover who they are.

Mantak Chia has a very powerful yang (expansive) energy, and thus he originally tended to emphasize the more yang aspect of practice. You have to be yang in nature to be the multi-cultural icebreaker and pioneer in the West that he is. Because he is so deeply grounded in his energy body, it was natural and easy for him to keep personal balance. But few Westerners have that kind of grounding or “innate or structural yin” to balance out such strong expansive yang energy. In recent years I've supported Mantak Chia in incorporating more yin methods into his teaching for Westerners, and they have been well received.

This "yin vs. yang practice" issue is complicated by the presence of "false yang" as an epidemic social disease, embedded into the very fabric of Western culture. We tend to "over do" and over-achieve and over-control. Over my decades of teaching I observed Westerners, being ungrounded, tend to eventually exhaust themselves with yang practices and then quit practicing entirely. What happens is that Western people try to visualize chi or practice from their head, and it doesn't work in the long term.

You need to "activate" chi, NOT visualize it. One needs to ACTUALIZE one's whole body-mind, not use the mind to dominate the body or its chi field. To avoid this kind of fallout amongst students, I discovered by testing over decades of teaching that Western students had much higher success using gentle yin practices, such as "soft" qigong typically used in medical and spiritual qigong.

I developed a progressive training, a series of qigong movement sets, customized to stimulate opening the deep channels in the energy body. I feel it has worked fantastically well, and really helped people to quickly "get" the deep chi flow activated within. Then you can really use your body-mind as an alchemical cauldron, and are ready to experiment with intensifying and refining the spirit-matter continuum within the self. The next question on "yin practice" will further clarify my ideas on this issue. Link below is to the Articles page, which has many interesting articles on Taoist (Daoist) inner alchemy meditation. The one linked here was a long paper presented at a conference of Daoist scholars and adepts in 2001, organized by Professor Livia Kohn.

Daoist Internal Alchemy: A Deep Language for Communicating with Nature's Intelligence

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In meditation, the yin side can be experienced as receptivity to the Life Force and the awakening of the intelligence of the vital organ spirits, which normally is subconscious in humans. One way to cultivate this is by simply smiling into each organ and opening up a conversation internally with them - in short, developing internal relationshiop skills.

This is really just a refinement of the Inner Smile. You accept that the dynamic process of the Life Force is collective, both inside our personal body-mind, and in society and Nature. But that means we have to develop relationship skills at all levels of our inner and outer self. This requires development of our yin side as we listen and empathize before we act.

Another yin method is personal surrender to and effortless absorption of one’s natural virtues ("de") into each of the vital organ spirits. This allows a gentle opening of the Inner Heart. This process of "downloading one's essential strengths" is developed to a high level in my version of Fusion of the Five Elments, which I think of as "Taoist depth psychology".

The yang side is equally important, as it involves directly shaping the flow of life force to express one’s will. Ultimately we all need a balance of yin and yang methods. Which method we cultivate our "heart-mind" with depends on our personal constitution. Yin types usually benefit from more yang methods, and yang types benefit from more yin methods.

This is also the approach of Lao Tzu: In the Tao te ching he advises to keep the upper yang center of the head cool ("empty the mind") and the normally yin, cooler belly full of warm vital chi. What does Lao Tzu's advice mean practically?

It means each student begins with accepting the desires of their body and mind as they currently are, rather than trying to mimic someone else's spiritual ideal. It means avoiding the Western male tendency to force fast results with a Fire or yang practice at the expense of the body/feminine. It means - for both men and women - to cultivate the “female fire” hidden within the yin. It means that rather than worshopping others as heroes or divine beings, you honor your own divinity within. We can absorb the essence of those we admire into our soul essence with making them our center.

I recognize that both the yang and the yin approaches have their virtues. The yang approach is sometimes very useful in the beginning, when one is first trying to feel the chi flow in one's body. Sometimes yang practices can help break up big blockages. I try to offer a combination of both styles of practice at every level of the alchemy formulas. That way, every one can choose for themselves what works best.

At the higher levels, a third type of practice emerges, centered upon the Yuan chi, or neutral force. This is the Way of "wu wei", or spontaneous action. But true wu wei is invisible, intangible and virtually impossible to perceive in the beginning stages of Tao self-cultivation. Most people have ta lot of programmiing in their personality and energy body that they need to first clear.

At the higher levels of meditation, there are other differences between my approach and Mantak Chia's. I emphasize use of outer sound - toning to the elemental beings - and follow it with silent listening in meditation to the inner sound current. The celestial music of the spheres was described by the Taoist sage Lu Dong Bin as the "string-less lute". I find this is truly the most effortless yin practice - just listening to the tones of one's formless subtle bodies, the invisible half of oneself which is continuously flowing into physicality.

I have discovered that some of the methods I llearned from my study of Western internal alchemy integrate beautifully with One Cloud Seven Formulas. An example of this yang practice would include method of spinning special shapes in the chi field at very rapid speeds. So I include these methods in the higher levels of my inner alchemy training. These are very yang practices, and I offer them only after I feel adepts-in-training have a strong inner yin structure to really benefit from them.

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There is a saying in China: "Talk does not cook the rice". Likewise, reading Taoist philosophy or thinking "I am a Taoist" is not to be confused with the experience of Tao. Tao is more than a head trip. Scholars have shown Lao Tzu's classic, The Tao Te Ching (or "Daodejing" in pinyin) was not a philosophical text, but a practical meditation manual. Read "Original Tao" by scholar Harold Roth for a brilliant reading of this classic text that many translators who are not educated in Taoism fail to grasp.

Tao is a way of life, based on the natural spiritual science of chi (qi) flow. Cultivating chi flow unfolds awareness of one's original spiritual essence. Cultivating self-wareness or "waking up" to the flow of life is the first phase, It is sometimes called the "purification" stage of inner alchemy. In this phase we energetically clean our body, our thoughts, our emotions, and our sexual energy so that we can experience the essence of our soul.

The second or "refining" phase of alchemical self-cultivation empowers us to SHAPE our worldly and spiritual destiny. What exactly are we shaping? The Life Force, our co-creative partner. The Life Force is the chi field that exists inside our body as infinite Intelligence and love, and outside as the magnificence of Nature.

Everyone can and must find their own Way, their own process with the Life Force. Taoists traditionally start within the personal self (micro-cosmos), expand to embrace Nature (macro-cosmos), and refine the two to manifest our original nature (proto-cosmos).

We must each learn to express our free will or creative imagination, and use it to navigate our own destiny through these vast inner and outer realms. It is an axiom that internal alchemy cannot be mastered from a book. It requires an oral tranmission.

This is one reason I offer audio-video home study courses rather than books, as I found the recorded voice is an acceptable substitute for live tranmission. Certainly live voice and presonal presence at a retreat or workshop is more powerful, but many have gone very deep with the recorded oral tranmission on my homestudy courses.

Alchemy is not simply mental "information" that goes into our brain. Rather it is a magical transformation of our body, mind, and spirit. Books can guide and inspire us, they can take us to the open doorway of transformation. Transcripts of retreats can help us consolidate important details - but only after you have gone through the oral process. To step through the doorway of transformation, and cultivate deep alchemical wisdom is only possible with a teacher.

I have never met anyone who was able to learn alchemy from a book. I tried it myself, using Charles Luk's "Taoist Yoga and Immortality" . This book has very intersting and detailed procedures. Nevertheeless, I found it impossible to follow experientially. Mantak Chia told me he had the same experience - and we both had a lot of background.

It is even more hopeless for the average Western intellectual-armchair alchemist to try to practice Taoist internal alchemy from a book. this includes Chia's short booklets on alchemy, which are designed to stimulate interest and awareness in the process, but are not a shortcut to learning it. This is often very difficult for Western intellectuals to accept, as they are very deeply trained to mentally grasp for everything in life. But to succed at inner alchemy you must learn to "think with your whole body", not your brain. That is why qigong is the best preparation, not books (or even internet FAQs!)

Without a guide, you can waste a lot of time and effort finding out what is hidden at the core of Tao (Dao). You need deep centering and grounding on this path. The Healing Tao has been a pioneer since 1981 in bringing practical methods from China to the west, beginning with Mantak Chia's transmission of Taoist hermit One Cloud's Seven Alchemy Formulas of Immortality.

In 1981 there were virtually NO books or videos on Taoist alchemy or qigong. But today, the number of books and videos can be dizzying, even scary. I am also responsible, having co-written seven books with Mantak Chia. Plus there are hundreds of other chi kung (qigong) forms and meditation styles. How to choose, where to start? That is the purpose of this website - offer a clear sequence and path in this progressive training.

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Full question: Do you believe your inner alchemy path is supported by immortal beings?

On the personal side, I know there are immortals behind these teachings. Soon after I began studying with Mantak Chia in 1980, Taoist immortals began showing up in my field and affecting me in very powerful ways. I never believed in immortals previous to this, I had no idea they even existed. I am certain, however, that I was not hallucinating.

One of them zapped me in my navel center with a kind of "laser beam" of pure chi that set off an explosion in the different layers of my Energy Body. I felt like I became one of those mushroom clouds you see in photos of nuclear blasts. It was wonderful and ecstatic - but the immortal immediately disappeared. I figured out later they don't like to hang out in the slow, chaotic vibes of the physical plane - they want us to cultivate ourself up to their level, or at least meet them halfway.

Because of my experience of having contact with these ascended human beings, I personally feel a very deep connection with the Tao Immortals. But more important than chasing after human immortals, is that everyone get linked up to the immoral lineage of Nature.

The Earth, planets, sun, moon, and star beings are all immortal beings. Immortal doesn't mean they live physically forever - just that their spirit is consciously participating in the Great Way of creation. They are present in every moment, and are tranmitting chi directly to each of us. These Natural Immortals of the Tao are all around us, smiling through their radiant bodies and shining their subtle light upon us. Can you allow their light to smile through you?

The focus in Taoist alchemy is on becoming whole or Immortal yourself, not worshipping God/dess(es) separate from you. All ancient Mystery schools attempt to grow the divinity within each person, and thus have valuable techniques. In other Mystery schools into which I was initiated I made contact with their lineage of immortals/ascended masters. So there are immortals in many traditions. I have integrated methods from other schools into my alchemical teachings where appropriate. This is in keeping with the Taoist tradition, which was to use whatever method works, while adhering to Tao prinicples of cultivating the Life Force.

The ancient Taoists thus absorbed the most useful methods of Confucianism and Buddhism as long as they could be integrated into the core Tao principles. I know of modern Taoists who are absorbing elements from sufism, kaballah, and Christianity. I have done the same with my studies in various mystery schools, while maintaining the core integrity of the Taoist process.

Ultimately, following the Way, the Tao, means following the essence of your own inner being, doing qigong/chi kung and meditation to help it unfold naturally and effortlessly. There is really no one to follow other than yourself. It is the path of spiritual freedom, of balance and harmony with nature and society.

But at the core of this process is the slow but steady growth of our immortal inner self within. As this grows, our fear of death dimnishes. My mission is to develop a heart-centered energy science that empowers humans to discover this immortal authentic self, using primarily very practical Tao methods of cultivating the Life Force.

I completely accept that this is an experimental process that is unfolding in our unique time/space/culture. But I believe the “map” offered by this structure will speed our evolution, even as each of us adapts it to our personal constitution and path in life.

I hope Westerners will find ways to adapt these Tao methods to their current needs. It is impossible to live in China’s ancient past – the modern needs of humanity and of planet earth are very different. I believe that we can improve on the ancient methods by openly sharing them and creatively testing their applications.

My mission is to develop a heart-centered spiritual science that empowers humans to discover their authentic self, using primarily very practical Tao methods of cultivating the Life Force. I completely accept that this is an experimental process that is unfolding in our unique time/space/culture. But I believe the “map” offered by this structure will speed our evolution, even as each of us adapts it to our personal constitution and path in life.

I hope Westerners will find ways to adapt these Tao methods to their current needs. It is impossible to live in China’s ancient past – the modern needs of humanity and of planet earth are very different.

I believe that we can improve on the ancient methods by openly sharing them and creatively testing their applications.If you feel attracted to such a path, I welcome you as a companion on the journey!

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Inthe beginning, it is best not to mix teachings. Once you have made something your own, you've practiced it until it feels like it is part of you, then is the time to experiment with hybrid methods. I have done the same, as I studied many differnet systems. But I was careful not to mix them until I was absolutely confident of my mastery of the methods involved.

The One Cloud transmission of the Seven Alchemy Formulas was really just my starting point in exploring the alchemical process. It provided a superstructure for the many refinements I have since discovered along the path of cultivating the Taoist Energy Body. My Tao Home Study courses are the distillation of nearly 30 years intense searching out many different masters, and study of dozens of qigong and meditation systems. But those refinements are all now the "flesh" on the skeleton/structure of One Cloud's Seven Formulas.

I made 10 trips to China to study with Taoists and deeply attune to the source in Taoist caves and mountains. I found those sacred mountains are literally awake with the energy of the adepts who meditated in them for thousands of years. This was another line of direct transmission that I added into my alchemical process.

I understand that many people come to my website or my classes, after having spent years shopping around the spiritual marketplace. They want to know if they have to start all over. If you read each home study course description, in sequence, you will intuitively know if the tools I amoffering will assist your unique path though life.

There is a profound synergy between all the courses. The material was recorded AFTER 25 years of continuous refinement, so it is getting very polished. Yet I still honor the experimental nature of inner alchemy, that it is an open process and an evolving spiritual process. So I know that everyone will bring their own learning from other schools and practices into the alchemical process. I am fine with that, it can be very creative and exciting. But the process will evolve much faster and deeper if you first master what is offered.

Getting Tao ultimately means "getting to the essence of oneself". This requires diving deep into the Unknown Center of your chi field. Consider me a diving guide. The audio & videos contain a fabulous collection of pearls I've discovered and want to share with you. But most important, I want to help you develop your own diving skills.

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The simplest answer is lack of grounding, or inability to get out of their head and into their body. You cannot solve deep energetic issues from your head, you have to get into the whole body-mind, i.e. your Energy Body.

Underlying this, I believe the most common cause is because the practitioner did not get a solid enough foundation in the Qigong Fundamentals 1-4 and Fusion of the Five Elements. Basically, they need more time with the 1st Formula. Some are impatient and want to skip ahead.

Maybe they learned some sexual practices that stimulated them, but they never took the time to get inside to really connect deeply with the mechanics of their energy body. Or there was some deep sexual or emotional energetic issue that they really haven't come to grips with, making it difficult to work at the soul level of the Kan & Li. Our sexual demons can be especially powerful.

It's OK to move "quickly" to One Cloud's 2nd Formula on Inner Sexual Alchemy, the Lesser Kan & Li. Some may do this within two years starting qigong, depending on their background in meditation and how developed their power of internal concentration is.

But then most adepts need to go back and work on their physical, emotional, and sexual layers of their Energy Body. The Kan & Li level gives you a really valuable perspective on the basics of the 1st Formula. Kan and Li can help you go more deeply into the Inner Smile, Healing Sounds, Orbit, Rooting, Fusion, Healing Love. These are all aspects of integrating the heart-mind. Kan & Li begins the soul work.

That is why I encourage students to train to that first level of Lesser Kan and Li as soon as they feel comfortable. The Inner Sexual Alchemy process lies at the very heart of Tao self-transformation, as it works onresolving our core male-female sexual tension. This is a process, we'can never truly say "I mastered that, I will never deal with another emotion or sexual feeling again".

It's important to know that learning the Lesser Kan & Li will need to be followed by a period of re-consolidation and grounding in the basic practices.