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Writer's pictureJessica Ruth

East meets West

Hello my friends!


Welcome to DaoTong Wisdom. This being my first blog post about DaoTong Wisdom I'd thought give some basics on how to navigate understanding DaoTong Wisdom. DaoTong Wisdom is an ancient Chinese philosophy dating as far back as 5,000 years. As a Westerner living in modern day society, this sounds pretty intimidating. One may wonder how can such ancient philosophy help me and is this actually practical for the 21st century? The answer my friends is yes, however taken at face value it might not appear to be quite so obvious. It is my goal and mission for this blog to share DaoTong philosophy in a practical sense by interpreting deeper meaning. Now I will admit that I am no expert DaoTong, however I am fortunate to have a generous teacher and I am committed to sharing what I have learned with others. It is my hope that through this humble blog we create a community of DaoTong students that not only want learn more about DaoTong philosophy, but to use this wisdom to take actions to change their lives.


How to bridge the East with the West?


There are many aspects of DaoTong philosophy with many layers. How to explain this kind of philosophy on a simple blog can be tricky, but the more I thought about I this I was reminded of one my favorite 1980s movies...The Karate Kid. Now if you haven't seen the Karate Kid, I highly recommend watching it as it is a classic! The movie has a lot of east meets west themes and how the eastern practice of karate can be incorporated in all aspects of like and not only self defense practice. The scenes that resonated with me the most with the east meets west theme is when Daniel Russo, the main character, was doing all sorts chores around Mr. Miyagi's house, who is supposed to be teaching him karate. On the surface these looked like the average chores of waxing a car, sanding a floor or painting a fence. In fact Daniel finally gets totally frustrated with Mr. Miyagi and doesn't understand how these mundane chores could possibly have anything to do with karate. The next scene is fantastic where Mr. Miyagi has Daniel repeat the movements in each chore activity and low and behold it all comes together as he blocks Mr. Miyagi's punches and kicks. Mr. Miyagi was quite specific with how Daniel was to perform each chore and the movement of his body was actually building the muscle memory needed for him to perform karate. Daniel, not being familiar with the eastern ways of teaching, had no idea he was learning karate while doing these chores until Mr. Miyagi puts all the moves together.


This is much like DaoTong. You start with one piece, then add another and so on and so forth and before you know it you have a philosophy. It's only now that I'm able to look back and realize that this is how my teachers were building my knowledge of DaoTong. At the time I didn't understand everything, but because I wanted to learn and grow I kept at it. Finally I had enough pieces to not only understand DaoTong philosophy, but to also be able to incorporate its practical aspects. It is in the style of Mr Miyagi that I will share the pieces of DaoTong wisdom.


Every month I will be posting at least one piece of DaoTong wisdom or practical aspect of the XianTian practice. I will also be inviting other XianTian practitioners to share their DaoTong wisdom and experiences with their XianTian tools. I welcome you to follow and share your thoughts and questions. It is my deepest hope that this blog can provide readers it sparks of insights that may ignite actions to be taken to make positive changes in lives.


My deepest gratitude,

Jessica


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