Taoist Meditation Methods for Cultivating a Healthy Mind and Body

The ancient meditation techniques of Taoism encompass a wide range of practices--with an aim toward cultivating a healthy body as well as an enlightened mind. These selections from classic texts of Taoist meditation represent the entire range of techniques--from sitting meditation practices to internal alchemy. Most of the texts appear here in English for the first time. Selections are taken from the following classics:

- Anthology on Cultivation of Realization: A document from 1739 (Ming Dynasty) that emphasizes development of the natural, social, and spiritual elements in human life.

- Treatise on Sitting Forgetting: A Tang Dynasty text that sets meditation practice in terms familiar to Confucians and Buddhists.

- Sayings of Taoist Master Danyang: Wisdom of the Taoist wizard and representative of the Complete Reality School.

- Secret Writings on the Mechanism of Nature: An anthology taken from one hundred sixty-three Taoist sources, including ancient classics and works on meditation and spiritual alchemy, along with admonitions and teachings of the great Taoist luminaries.

- Zhang Sanfeng's Taiji Alchemy Secrets: A treatise on the inner mediation practices that are the proper foundation of the martial art Taiji.

- Secret Records of Understanding the Way: A rare and remarkable collection of talks by an anonymous Taoist master of the later Qing dynasty (1644-1911). Traditional teachings with a sometimes strikingly modern bent.