The Dan Dao Way was for me like a thunderbolt in a clear sky.
My interest towards Daoist practices started 3 years ago.
I had been studying and exercising the knowledge from different traditions: Philosophy, South American shamanism, European mystical traditions, Christianity, etc. A lot of these traditions share many common points in understanding human life, common practices of self-development and spiritual progression.
I had also started to have an increasing interest in Chinese traditional medicine and human science. Chinese culture is a big departure from the Western way of understanding life and the human body. It was extremely intriguing, as suddenly a lot of unanswered questions had started to make sense to me, especially in the field of medicine.
Then I came upon some Daoist textbooks, widely available in the West. I started practicing. Naturally, I wanted to find out more and if possible, directly from the source: China. So I started searching the web. I don’t even remember what I was looking for, but from the multitude of results about Daoist teaching centres, one place got stuck in my mind: the Five Immortals Temple in Wudang. So I looked at the course schedule. It was 2017.
I am a reasonably busy person, with commitments to work and family. August is the time of the year when things slow down and I can take a sabbatical month to explore new geographical and knowledge frontiers. The course running in August was the “DanDao – Inner alchemy”.
It took me a while to even understand what this course is about (although I had a bit of knowledge about the microcosmic orbit). So I applied… and got refused. It was too late and the course was filled up. So instead I took a trip to Bhutan and Myanmar.
But I continued to keep an eye on the website, read the articles and posts. 2018 was a year which I didn’t take any time out. In early 2019 I looked it up again to see if there were any courses available in August. It was the Dan Dao again. So I applied and got accepted. I was glowing.
Fast forward a few months, I arrived at the temple on the 11th of August, after battling the odds with the weather, as my flight from Shanghai had been cancelled due to a super typhoon.
The first thing that struck me is the fact that the place was exactly the same as I had imagined it in all those months of waiting and daydreaming. That was a first in my entire life. No dissonance, no disappointments, just pure joy.
Now, at the time of writing this, it gets difficult to express all the emotions I went through. It would take a million words. I got to meet a small group of young people (regardless of age, as they were all young at heart) with genuine interest in unlocking the secrets of existence. For the first time in my life I got to discuss matters that were concerning me for many years. Suddenly I had the chance to exchange and review my knowledge at the same time. We quickly became a small family. A family under the kind guidance of Li Shifu, the abbot of the Five Immortals Temple.
Together we were walking up at early hours, doing exercises, sharing Temple chores, attending classes, group meditation and sharing meals together.
It was like a school for super humans. The Dan Dao Way was for me like a thunderbolt in a clear sky. It is not about the microcosmic orbit. It is about life at its core, about reason and purpose of life, and above all – methods. We got a map, a unique and precious treasure, a knowledge body that exceeds common understanding… up to the point that it becomes scary and at times hopeless. Hopeless in common understanding, I need to review my whole life, to adjust it and make changes, to get it in tune with this knowledge, so that it is not hopeless anymore.
We cannot live without hope, I cannot.
It will be a long road ahead, full of bitterness and struggle. I hope that I will have the time and resilience to get to the end of it.
I now have a purpose.
I have seen the light at the end of the tunnel.
I just need to find my way through.
My way
The way
written by our student: Dimitrii
