Chapter 20 The principle of keeping one's senses and keeping one's mind

Because we talked about "preserving thoughts" and "keeping the orifices", let me explain the scene of "keeping the orifices" in the "dantian" by the way.I am not saying that the "dantian" should never be guarded, nor is it that the method of "guarding the orifice" is wrong.Some people may be afraid and deterred after reading the above-mentioned principles, but there is no need for that. "Keeping the orifice" has the need of "keeping the orifice", and "the pubic region" has the function of "the dantian", but you can't do it without understanding the principle, and keep it indiscriminately. In fact, the method of "keeping the orifice" is to "preserve the thought" metamorphosis. The function of "preservation" is a method to unify the "spirit" and make the mind and will absolutely concentrated.It has been mentioned above that what is guarded is the "aperture" and what can be guarded is the "heart". It has been pointed out that this starts from the concentration of the psychological will and finally reaches the state of "spiritual unity". Therefore, it uses the physiological parts of the human body, As a preliminary method, roughly speaking, there are two reasons:

(1) Everyone cherishes the life span of the body, no matter how ugly or embarrassing the body is, as long as it is born to belong to oneself, it will form a firm concept of absolute selfishness and possession of it.Therefore, it is advertised to achieve immortality by cultivating this physical body, so everyone is willing to work hard to learn from it. (2) The functions of physiology and psychology are indeed two in one, one in two.The physiology can affect the mind, and the mind can affect the physiology.It is not unreasonable practice for Taoism to use the relationship between body and mind to start from the intertwining of psychology and physiology to produce the magic of the spirit. The function of "Shouqiao", its focus, lies in "Shou". The so-called "Shou" must concentrate all the spirit and will.As long as the spirit and will can really be concentrated, the function of "shou" can achieve the goal.For example, there is a large pile of gold and silver treasures in front of you, and you need to concentrate on "keeping" them, then you can forget about eating and sleeping.Even, you can forget your body and mind and wholeheartedly "guard" this pile of gold and silver treasures. This is the best description of "keeping your senses".

But for those who want to learn to sit still and practice the Tao, can they really do a good job of "keeping the orifices"?To be honest, almost none of the ten meditation practitioners can do it well. Generally speaking, they use their senses to feel this part, but their thoughts and will must not be concentrated on this part.In other words, while he feels this part, it is the reaction of physiological nerves, but at the same time he is thinking wildly, or thinking about it, which is mental laxity, and he has the distress of being absolutely unable to concentrate. What is the reason for this phenomenon? ?Because spirit and will are a very wonderful thing, the more you want to concentrate it, the more scattered it will be. I often use the principle of "mechanics" to explain the analogy, that is to say, when the "centripetal force" is concentrated to the extreme. "Centrifugal force" will give a natural response in "centripetal force".On the contrary, when the "centrifugal force" reaches its peak, the effect of "centripetal force" will naturally arise.It means that when you clenched your fists to the extreme, your finger nerves will naturally relax.Therefore, Taoism regards the function of the spirit and psychological will as like mercury (mercury), its nature always tends to flow and disperse, and even disperses to a pervasive state.Therefore, it is not a simple matter to use "keeping the aperture" or "preserving the thought" to achieve a single-minded state of mental concentration.It is impossible to concentrate one's mind, but it is absolutely impossible to open up the Qi channels and achieve the desired effect of body and mind.The magic of the use of psychology cannot be exhausted in words.It is absolutely unreasonable to think that the energy channels have been opened up without achieving the magical effect of mental concentration.Some are just delusional sensations of fantasy, or special physiological sensations, not real qi channels.Because of the phenomenon of opening up the Qi channels, every step has a step-by-step symptom, and each step has a step-by-step phenomenon. If you look at it from the perspective of an ordinary mortal like me, almost no one can really do it.