An Excerpt From An Giang's Accounts of His Time In The Red Dew Sect:
An Excerpt From An Giang's Accounts of His Time In The Red Dew Sect:
It was my second month as an outer disciple of the Red Dew Sect and I was filled with anticipation. Earlier in the week Elder Jiayi had shared an invitation for a lesson in the Fields of Contemplation. An opportunity such as this was valuable beyond words and represented a chance to advance my cultivation far beyond any effort I had taken up to this point. So I found myself at dawn in the cool mountain clearing in a formation with my fellow disciples waiting for the Elder to speak. As Elder Jiayi finished his opening words, we moved into lotus position and began to go through the meditation exercises we were instructed in during our initiation.
I sat in lotus position with my fellow sect mates and let myself open to the flow of the universe around me. Elder Jiayi drifted among us disciples and quietly corrected our flaws. I'm not sure how much time passed like that, but eventually I became aware of ebb and flow of energy of the greater formation. As the Elder said, we were part of the greater whole while we cultivated. It was as though we were all part of some great creature taking a slow deep breath. When the creature inhaled, I could feel the qi flow around and through me. As the creature exhaled, the qi drained from me and left a feeling of emptiness through out my body.
As the meditation drew to a close, we rose in unison, transitioning seamlessly into the prescribed katas. With each practiced movement, a surge of qi began to stir within me. The empty spaces inside my body were rapidly filled and a tension started to build within me centered around my eyes. I felt more and more resistance that strained my ability to focus on completing the motions without flaw. Suddenly, I heard someone cry out in a mixture of pain, shock, and elation. Then I heard another and another. My attention split between focusing through the pain and the breakthroughs happening around me masked the abrupt crossing of the threshold of my own breakthrough. Like a knot coming undone, the pressure around my eyes unwound and I could see wisps of faint light drifting around and through us. The disciple in front of me seemed to have a roiling cloud of qi emanating off of them. I felt rather than saw Elder Jiayi's presence as the sensation of resistance returned around my eyes. It somehow felt even more solid than the last time as the qi began to build once more within me. The Elder's attention was like a lens focusing more and more qi into me as I kept up the katas. My focus narrowed to just myself as the pain began to drown out all other sources of distraction. More and more qi flowed into me and more and more it felt like my head was going to burst before the resistance would give. I don't think I could have kept going for any longer when the sensation seemed to vanish. My eyes, clenched shut from the pain, slowly opened and everything was different.
The ethereal ribbons of qi, once mere wisps of light, now unfolded into a tapestry of revelation. A rush of awe and exhilaration surged through me, an overwhelming sense of being privy to secrets long veiled from my mortal eyes. It wasn't some new color, though there were new colors. It wasn't some new resolution of shape or pattern, though certainly I saw new textures and shapes in the qi around me. No, the only way it can be described is through analogy and metaphor. My sect brother, Jian Ke, moved in front of me and with each punch and kick threw off clouds of silver shimmering metal qi. I could see the mechanical precision of marching soldiers as it drifted by me. The glint of a drawn blade as the motions of the katas took me through the space Jian Ke had just moved from. The rest of the cultivation session passed unremarkably as the distraction of my new sense monopolized my attention.
It was my second month as an outer disciple of the Red Dew Sect and I was filled with anticipation. Earlier in the week Elder Jiayi had shared an invitation for a lesson in the Fields of Contemplation. An opportunity such as this was valuable beyond words and represented a chance to advance my cultivation far beyond any effort I had taken up to this point. So I found myself at dawn in the cool mountain clearing in a formation with my fellow disciples waiting for the Elder to speak. As Elder Jiayi finished his opening words, we moved into lotus position and began to go through the meditation exercises we were instructed in during our initiation.
I sat in lotus position with my fellow sect mates and let myself open to the flow of the universe around me. Elder Jiayi drifted among us disciples and quietly corrected our flaws. I'm not sure how much time passed like that, but eventually I became aware of ebb and flow of energy of the greater formation. As the Elder said, we were part of the greater whole while we cultivated. It was as though we were all part of some great creature taking a slow deep breath. When the creature inhaled, I could feel the qi flow around and through me. As the creature exhaled, the qi drained from me and left a feeling of emptiness through out my body.
As the meditation drew to a close, we rose in unison, transitioning seamlessly into the prescribed katas. With each practiced movement, a surge of qi began to stir within me. The empty spaces inside my body were rapidly filled and a tension started to build within me centered around my eyes. I felt more and more resistance that strained my ability to focus on completing the motions without flaw. Suddenly, I heard someone cry out in a mixture of pain, shock, and elation. Then I heard another and another. My attention split between focusing through the pain and the breakthroughs happening around me masked the abrupt crossing of the threshold of my own breakthrough. Like a knot coming undone, the pressure around my eyes unwound and I could see wisps of faint light drifting around and through us. The disciple in front of me seemed to have a roiling cloud of qi emanating off of them. I felt rather than saw Elder Jiayi's presence as the sensation of resistance returned around my eyes. It somehow felt even more solid than the last time as the qi began to build once more within me. The Elder's attention was like a lens focusing more and more qi into me as I kept up the katas. My focus narrowed to just myself as the pain began to drown out all other sources of distraction. More and more qi flowed into me and more and more it felt like my head was going to burst before the resistance would give. I don't think I could have kept going for any longer when the sensation seemed to vanish. My eyes, clenched shut from the pain, slowly opened and everything was different.
The ethereal ribbons of qi, once mere wisps of light, now unfolded into a tapestry of revelation. A rush of awe and exhilaration surged through me, an overwhelming sense of being privy to secrets long veiled from my mortal eyes. It wasn't some new color, though there were new colors. It wasn't some new resolution of shape or pattern, though certainly I saw new textures and shapes in the qi around me. No, the only way it can be described is through analogy and metaphor. My sect brother, Jian Ke, moved in front of me and with each punch and kick threw off clouds of silver shimmering metal qi. I could see the mechanical precision of marching soldiers as it drifted by me. The glint of a drawn blade as the motions of the katas took me through the space Jian Ke had just moved from. The rest of the cultivation session passed unremarkably as the distraction of my new sense monopolized my attention.
