This week was the third of the third (third day of third month of the lunar calendar), the Peach Immortal Festival, when the goddess Xi Wang Mu “ Queen Mother of the West” is celebrated, she is said to live in Mount Kun Lun, the western paradise, and to oversee the gardens where peaches of immortality grows. Every thousand years she makes a banquet where the guest she invited will receive the peaches, she also passed on the the scripture of purity and tranquility which she received from Jin Que Di Jun (Sovereign of the Western Wach Tower) who received it from Dong Hua Di Jun(Sovereign of the Eastern Florescence). Besides this is also the day when the Five Immortals are celebrated.
Together with the Chinese New Year Spring Festival this is the busiest time in all year in Bai Ma Shan for the great amount of worshipers who climb up the path to place incense ask for advices and to take a break from the busy life in the peaceful environment of the temple.
This year the atmosphere very joyous, many old friends came to help us and the visitors where numerous, we shared food with all of them and we had the occasion to meet many from old worshipers to young couples, from the countryside and from the city, each one coming with their friends and family.
We have all been very busy in this days in our duties of taking care of the temple to protect this environment and to welcome the people. Especially when there are no courses, this is a big part of our life and a very hard task, especially because at the same time we are all working hard to achieve improvements in our areas of study and it requires a lot of time and constancy. This may be frustrating sometimes but on the other side what kind of cultivation would we ever achieve if instead of taking care of the worshipers we would hide to practice? Li Shifu always says that worshipers are number one and to put ourselves in the last place, he also uses the example of a stone smoothed by a river to explain the character cultivation: we are the stone and time and difficulties we have to endure is the water. In fact the aim of practice is in the end to improve our character to help as many people as possible and this is an occasion to do so, in small affairs of common life. In the process of elevating oneself, mastering the method is only one part while the other one is to increase our love and compassion, one could also say that the method is like knowing how to tune to the right TV station while love and compassion is the power of the signal, the television receiver is your life.
The weather has finally stabilized and now we are finally having a period of warm weather and all the flowers are blooming, the temple is surrounded with beautiful colors, the sun rise in the crystalline sky and a delicate breeze make the atmosphere clear and fresh. The life is getting more active and we train jumping kicks lower stances and review our forms, especially water and fire Tai Chi.
Since the weather is warmer we can now perform fire healing without the risk of cold entering the body This is a wonderful method for stimulating the movement of qi and blood and get rid of stagnation of the old, we are now specially using this method to heal from old injuries of joint, bones, tendons and muscles. It is very practical and effective and it combines the power of fire to the power of our medicinal alcohol and the power of methods from the old masters. It can expel what has been stuck for years and heal chronic illnesses that seemed incurable, the student who has received the treatment says: “The Fire Method is a part of the process of healing that Li Shifu gave me. My entire body and nervous system has to be balanced, as it has been weakened and disrupted from old injuries and a long stressful time. The process of recovery is a slow process as we must let go of our old thoughts and habits. But it is also a deep process and I understood that I have to communicate more, fully trust the master and open my heart if I want him to help me to get rid of this old blockages and retrieve a strong and healthy body, stable and emotional state and a quiet and clear mind.”
At the same time the works for the front of the temple continues and now is the time for the building of a new praying paper burner which will be much bigger( more or less 5m) but with the same shape as the old one, here some pictures of the construction.

The post Birthday of Xi Wang Mu appeared first on WUDANG FIVE IMMORTALS TEMPLE.

This week has been dense with Daoist festivities: the birthday of Lao zi (and anniversary of ascending of Tao Shifu the previous Abbess of Five Immortals Temple), the Tomb Sweeping Day (a day to honor spirits of the dead and to give help to those who lost their way) and finally the birthday of GuanYin (Bodhisattva of Compassion the “one who observes the sound”).

The numerous ceremonies have been an occasion to elevate and learn about how to relate with outer forces using those ancient Daoist methods witch include singing, recitation and offerings (incense, prayer paper, food, tea) as well as an occasion to study together and to deepen our bonds, to pray for our families and friends.
Since the weather has been very rainy it has been a good occasion to spend some time together around the fire, to exchange, to watch and comment videos and to discuss about the relation of humans, animals and other being in the universe.

We also had time to discuss the priorities of the construction works and Li Shifu seems willing to postpone the building of the towers (witch he said will be up to 7-8 meters tall) in order to give the priority to the building of new rooms next to Guan Yin temple, after the completion of the front courtyard.

We also have been practicing recitation of scriptures and also massage methods on each other in this days to put into practice our studies.

The post Birthday of Lao Zi appeared first on WUDANG FIVE IMMORTALS TEMPLE.

Cheng Jiu on his way to Five Immortals Temple – Daoism

White Horse Mountain is a place that has given me more that I could ever expect and answered questions that I was nearly resigned to never finding an answer to.
Since a few years I have been looking into Daoism as I started to realize that I would have been able to find in it answers to the impellent questions which where troubling me since ever, troubles that where beyond the pure curiosity but where vital since I knew that from the success or unsuccessful of this process it would have depended the possibility or the impossibility to live a meaningful life, to have any criteria from which I could decide when to go right and when to go left.
I have travelled in search of a master but the more I looked the more I had the feeling that I would have to surrender to the fact I was alone in this journey, I thought that other people even If they had the same problems they didn’t want to take them in discussion and so, with all the romantic sense of a teenager I thought I could take all on myself but in this youthful dream of discovering the truth and saving the world, as many others, I got soon stuck.

I couldn’t organize all the knowledge I managed to find and it ended up to be a heavy and unstable tower of contradiction that was in risk of falling on me, my practices of qi gong where stuck between fantasy and reality, with all the weight of my expectations and doubts, with all the vanity and insecurity, with all the awesome experiences and all the delusions I encountered my character became instable between anger and depression and since I found myself with more problems that when I started I just let go of everything for a few months.
The problems that are in the air now in the west are great and anyone who will try to find its way out in it with a sincere heart will encounter endless difficulties.

I realize now that everybody is facing this situation inside himself end everybody feels this kind of “existential discomfort” and I also realize that many people are taking advantage of this.
Evil forces take advantage of fear and promise relief from this particular type of sufferance not only with all the means we all know from the materialistic society but even inside the spiritual teachings there are some who are not sincere and since they want money they try to sell their product and so seduce people who are already in a path with the prospective of achieving extraordinary powers once again using the power of desire, this leaded me to once again avoiding the real problem, shutting the door for the knowledge, for the character cultivation and for the real elevation.

Anyway I couldn’t figure out what this sufferance was about, I just regarded it as “unnatural” but I couldn’t explain to myself how something unnatural may even exist: where is the problem coming from, why every time we don’t have something we want it so badly and then when we have it we don’t want it anymore why is not enough for people to live a common life?

When I came to the Five Immortals Temple I was nearly broken, trying to build myself back from scratch, all my failures prepared me to accept a master as a guide and to trust him, they say that when is the moment the student and the master find each other, I suppose this was the case also for me.
The first night, after the welcoming dinner me and shifu where the last in the room and I really wanted to ask him many things, he said: if you want you can ask, I put together all I could with my basic Chinese and I asked; why are there people who are not natural? He said: I don’t know.
Since that day every day I thought of the right question to ask him never being able to get to a conclusion, in the meanwhile I already realized I could found the answer here and I decided to stay longer and put aside my university.

Training my body was my manly occupation and my thoughts where growing but with the growth also the contradictions where getting stronger; I told him that every day I thought about a question and I could never come to grasp it and he said it was good, and he said it was because I had common person’s thoughts and non-common person thoughts.
What are common person’s thoughts and non-common person thoughts?

More or less one more month passed until I asked Li shifu again about society and the problem of naturalness.
He told me something like: the way you put the problem is wrong: there are two natures: one is the specific nature of our kind, human, the other one is the great one, and it comprehends human nature but also everything else. It is not true that in society they are unnatural, they are very natural, and we are unnatural.

Since the conversation we had that day and many other we had in the sequent month I was able to understand that the sufferance and the un satisfaction we experience come from the gap between the human and the great nature, the fear we feel in front of this sufferance is our human nature who is afraid for its own survival, this pain we feel is the process of change that leads to the great nature, fear of the silence, fear of the solitude, fear of failure fear of sufferance and fear of death all have to be faced more and more times if one wants to elevate to refine its character and to open the space for great love and compassion.

There is a sentence in Daoism that says:
When the human heart dyes the heart of the great Dao is born
Actually there isn’t a negative connotation on the idea of human nature as it is part of nature itself and there is nothing wrong in deciding to live according to the human nature, been able to have a good life as a good man is already a great achievement for a person, in the case of the person who want to cultivate this requirement is even more valid, you cannot hope to become an immortal if you don’t even know how to be a mortal, you cannot go nowhere if you didn’t finish the work you have to do on earth. The great nature doesn’t exclude the human one but it comprehends it and as humans this is where we start from.

Anyway I believe that observing our society (especially in the west but more and more also here in China) it can be noticed that this particular discomfort is not a marginal event, everyone feels it more and more, un satisfaction, depression, mental disorder, drugs use, suicide as well as unjustified waste and anger are all factors in growth and even if these are definitely scary factors I believe that these are the signs of a change.
Many spiritual traditions as well as many spiritually accomplished persons agree on the imminence of a great change in the situation on this planet.

In Daoism it is said that there are no immortals on the heavens anymore, many believe that many of the great masters from the past are actually returning in human body and more and more people are elevating and opening their thoughts more and more.

Here in the temple we have seen and discussed many videos of these kind of people from all over the world and they all agree in the importance of this historical phase and in the importance of make use of our lives to higher the vibration on the planet, this thru cultivating our own love and compassion and helping others to receive the necessary knowledge to do it themselves, when there is knowledge there is no fear and fear is what stops us to be able to raise ourselves. This also includes giving compassion to who spread fear and hate in the past but has genuinely the desire to change. Nobody can be changed if not for his own desire.
This is an incredible moment to be here and an occasion for all the souls who are here now to elevate.
Since I was ask to write something about my stay at the temple I wanted to take the occasion to share this as I hope that what helped me so much to find a direction in my life will have the same effect on others who share the same questions.

In conclusion I want to expressively say that all the change that I was able to make in my life was possible due to the guidance of Li shifu and the support of my brothers here in the temple ( besides of course my family from home) so I would like to recommend Five Immortals Temple to anyone who is in a genuine search for answers because in the months I have been here I have already been able to see many people recover from illness and find a direction, because I know that the point of view is never too far away and different here since every occasion is good to open our thoughts and to put together knowledge from different cultures and periods and because I know that everyone will be welcomed as a family member here as the doors are open.

If you have any questions about my experience here or the life in the temple in general I will be very happy to answer you on e-mail.
(saltelligiulio@hotmail.com)
Thank you very much
Giulio

The post Daoism appeared first on WUDANG FIVE IMMORTALS TEMPLE.

Five Immortals Temple

Herb picking in Five Immortals Temple

A few days ago loads of brick have started to arrive up here via donkey for the construction of the bell and the drum tower as well as the new burner for the courtyard which will be soon covered in tiles.

Now the front of the temple is very messy and it will be a lot of work but everything will be completed in time for the taiji quan course.
Our cat Mengmeng has disappeared since more or less a week, the mostly accredited theory is that he went to look for a girlfriend since the one we got him( bai nu) is still to young, but it may also be that he was sick of being made fun of since his hair was cut very short. We hope that he is doing well and be back soon.

The post Return of Xiao Bo appeared first on WUDANG FIVE IMMORTALS TEMPLE.

Making Moxa stics in Five Immortals Temple

The work on the webpage is going on with the contribution of everybody and some pages will soon be available also in French and Italian, slow by slow we plan to translate the entirety of the website. Also videos will be available about every content, this week we have been working on the Da Gong( hard qi gong) and Fu Zhu Gong(trademark skill) video that will be uploaded soon.
We are also working on the painting of the main gate and Ling Guan Ye hall and of the main courtyard.

Five Immortals Temple

Painting at Five Immortals Temple

Five Immortals Temple

The post The temple is vibrant with life appeared first on WUDANG FIVE IMMORTALS TEMPLE.

It was 2013 when I heard about White Horse Mountain for the first time. I was curious but still had one more year to go in my previous school. The last year of my stay in China I decided to come for a visit to Five Immortals Temple on White Horse Mountain. I was lucky to get an invitation from Piotr and Jonas who had already been studying with Li Shifu. My first visit on White Horse Mountain impressed me a lot. Beautiful place, serious helpful students, friendly Chinese women who take care of the temple kitchen and other things around the temple, but first of all Li Shifu who encourages people to ask questions, explore life and look for the Truth according to Taoist way. At this place I found a master whose Way was so close to my own. I could hardly believe that such a place exists. This impression was so powerful that I kept visiting when I had time off in my school. My trips to Five Immortals Temple helped me clean and relax my mind. Students on White Horse Mountain where always like my family and so was Li shifu. Finally I decided to extend my stay in China for another 3 months after finishing a 5 year stay in Wudang Kungfu Academy. After such a long time my mind was very tired and my body was exhausted when I did not find what I was looking for on my spiritual path. The stay on White Horse Mountain was the only option and a great opportunity for me to get back to myself. I am very thankful for this chance given me by Li Shifu. I hope to come back and study more about love and compassion and help take care of the place and people. I recommend White Horse Mountain to all serious students.
With love and respect to Bai Ma Shan family

If you are interested in training Wudang Kung Fu in Czech Republic have a look at Oldas website.

The post Student Reflections – Olda – Bai Ma Shan appeared first on WUDANG FIVE IMMORTALS TEMPLE.

Studying around the fire in the cold winter months…

The post Studying around the fire appeared first on WUDANG FIVE IMMORTALS TEMPLE.

Last dump of snow and ice, spring is knocking on the door.

winter in five immortals temple is over

Construction is in full swing, the front wall has been rebuild for terracing later this year, the ground is nearly leveled and compounded at the moment. 7 workers starting at in early morning hours and finishing when it gets dark. It will never look the same again..

works at five immortals temple in wudang

hard work at Five Immortals temple

Front of the temple

The post Winter is nearly over and constructions time begin… appeared first on WUDANG FIVE IMMORTALS TEMPLE.

Before Cheng Liang, a new student from Ireland, came to Five Immortals Temple, he suffered from physical as well as mental problems that Western medicine labelled irreversible and incurable by any medicine. He came to the Five Immortals Temple on White Horse Mountain to participate in classes. Through the administration of Chinese Herbal Medicine, the practice of Qi Gong as well as the holistic and integrated regulation of his entire system, he now has already returned back to normalcy on the whole. He and his family members are all very thankful to Li Shi Fu for saving his life. Actually they are preparing to personally come to China to express their gratitude to Li Shi Fu. He is now gearing up to write a book about his extra-ordinary journey.

Fanyi, a student from France, suffered from disharmony of her endocrine system, internal bleeding, constipation and seven other ailments. After hearing stories about Wudang White Horse Mountain Five Immortals Temple, she decided to visit the place and check it out. Six days ago she arrived on White Horse Mountain, and on the first day she perceived the powerful energetic field here. She seemed to have found home and cried out of excitement. On the third day she begged Li Shi Fu to help her to get rid of the torment of her long term illness. Li Shifu compassionately poured her half a glass of “Qi” Tea and within half a day she had already passed four stools. Her original complaint of constipation being able to pass stools only once every four days had disappeared. Yesterday Li Shi Fu taught her four Daoist Yoga Longevity exercises; after she practiced them for half an hour she continuously burped for several hundred times, her past long term Spleen and Stomach pathology slowly felt relieved. She indebtedly said, ‘In the last ten years I have cried less than these few days here, I am very grateful Li Shi Fu.

The post Cheng Liang and Fanyi – healing progress review appeared first on WUDANG FIVE IMMORTALS TEMPLE.

Christiana Polites

The post Student Reflections – Christiana appeared first on WUDANG FIVE IMMORTALS TEMPLE.