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Inner AIchemy Series
Chi Kung FundamentaIs 1
Way of the Inner SmiIe
SeIf Acceptance - Tao Path to Inner Peace

By MichaeI Winn
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Cambodian Goddess with beatific nner Smile
Contemporary teak, Dao Mountain Retreat Center
Note: This short book is one segment of my Tao Home Study audio course Chi Kung
Fundamentals #1, but expanded. The rest of audio course #1 covers Tao Five
Elements theory and practice: Five Animals Play China's oldest shamanic chi kung
(qigong) form, as well as the Six Healing Sounds.
Modern Chinese pinyin spelling is used (Daoism vs. Taoism), except for a few key
words now part of English (Tao, Chi Kung instead of qigong, chi instead of qi. Tao is
pronounced "dao. Chi is pronounced "chee).
3
AcknowIedgements
SpeciaI deep gratitude to Mantak Chia, who inspired me to expIore
the path of Tao. I especiaIIy thank him for sharing a transmission of
Daoist Hermit One CIoud's simpIe smiIing presence. Thanks to many
other spirituaI teachers in this Iifetime, especiaIIy my Mother and
Father, whose inner smiIe at my moment of birth was so precious.
Thanks to my many other Tao masters, and the countIess
generations of Tao adepts before them. To the chi kung and inner
aIchemy masters going back thousands of years into pre-history, for
sharing their smiIing "aha" - their discovery on how to best cuItivate
chi whiIe staying grounded in the body.
EternaI gratitude to my partner Joyce Gayheart for being such a
beautifuI heartfeIt smiIing presence in my Iife. Thanks to aII my HeaIing
Tao and UniversaI Tao coIIeagues and students who have devoted
themseIves to spreading their smiIing presence in the human
community.
Deep appreciation to the Tao ImmortaIs, the Earth, Sun, Moon,
PIanet and Star beings for their gentIe smiIing guidance on my journey
into the Great Within and the Great Beyond.
I offer Supreme UItimate thanks to the Tao, for making the Inner
SmiIe the true response to getting the Cosmic Joke.
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TabIe of Contents
For instant digitaI scroIIing to any item in the TabIe of Contents, cIick on the "Bookmarks" tab
in Adobe's WINDOW menu bar. To find favorite photographs, cIick on "ThumbnaiI" in the
WINDOW menu.
About the Author
Foreward: Inner SmiIe - Root of the Root
by Mantak Chia
Introduction: What is the Inner SmiIe?
The Smiling nner Heart of our Energy Body
Chapter 1
1. The Sages Way to UnfoId Tao: Inner SmiIe
! Mapping Our Body-Mind's Energetic Patterns
! Our Inner FamiIy of BioIogicaI InteIIigences
! Inner SmiIe Deepens other Tao Practices
! SexuaI Tension of Becoming vs. Tai Chi Harmony of Being
! Can the Inner Smile change real life situations?
Chapter 2
2. Key to the Inner SmiIe: SeIf-Acceptance
! Positive Ego, Negative Ego, NeutraI Ego
! St. Francis of Assisi: Punishing the un-HoIy Body
! Outer Acceptance vs. Inner Acceptance,
! Outer SmiIe vs. Inner SmiIe
! Receptive Yin SmiIe, Projective Yang SmiIe
! Chi DissoIving Process Purifies Mind & Emotions
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Chapter 3
3. SmiIe SoftIy to Overcome the Hard
! SmiIe Iinks Inner Heart to OriginaI Spirit
! NeutraI SmiIe of Acceptance vs. Acts of Love
! SmiIing is Non-DuaIism Made SimpIe
! What does "presence" mean in smiIing practice?
Chapter 4
4. Overview of Inner SmiIe Practice
! SimpIe Guided SmiIe as "warmup"
! Over View of Body-SmiIing Pathways:
! The Three Brains
! The Five VitaI Organ Spirits
! The Spine & Nervous System
! The Six BoweIs & SexuaI Organs
! The CeIIs, Connective Tissue, Skin & Bones
! Inner SmiIe is Its Own Reward
! Taoist FIower Essences for the Emotions
Chapter 5
5. Guided Inner SmiIe Meditation
Preparation: Actualize a Receptive Natural Space
Use Positive Memory: Supercharge your Mind Space
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Yin Practice:
Step 1: SmiIe into the three brains
Step 2: SmiIe to the heart and vitaI organ spirits
Step 3: SmiIe to the spine & nervous system
Step 4: SmiIe, swaIIow to boweIs & sexuaI organs
Step 5: SmiIe to bones, bIood, fIesh, & ceIIs
Step 6a: SmiIe, dissoIve your entire physicaI body
Step 6b: SmiIe, dissoIve beyond the body
Yang Practice:
SmiIe into your Aura
SmiIe into the Room
SmiIe to a Friend
SmiIe to a DifficuIt ReIationship
SmiIe to your LocaI Community
SmiIe to PIanet Earth
SmiIe to Sun and Stars
SmiIe to the Dark Ocean Beyond the Stars
AIIow YourseIf to FeeI the Return SmiIing Wave
Gather the Wave of SmiIing Chi inside your Body
Chapter 6
6. Question & Answer
1. How long do I practice Inner Smile at one sitting?
2. Can Inner Smile help couples having difficulties?
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3. What do you do if you just feel bored while smiling?
4. I have struggled with boredom and depression for a long time. Do
I need to try harder for a breakthrough?
5. What's the difference between Inner Smile as 'Water & Fire"
dissolving and Tao Water-only dissolving methods?
6. Does Lao Tzu mention the Inner Smile?
Chapter 7: ConcIusion
7. Inner SmiIe as Path to EnIightenment
Tao CosmoIogy: UnfoIding the OriginaI Trinity
The Confusion of Spoken Language
- SpirituaI Being vs. BodiIy Becoming
SmiIing Chi FIow as the SiIent Language of Nature
SmiIing BuiIds Trust in OriginaI Substance-Body
The Great Secret of InternaI AIchemy
Appendix One
Chi Kung Fundamentals #1 & 2 Homestudy Course
(discount offer). Testimonials on improved health.
Appendix Two
Complete List: Healing Tao Home Study audio-video courses in
recommended sequence.
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Appendix Three
Poem "SmiIe" by Barbara Hauck
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Who is MichaeI Winn?
The short resume of officiaI "Grand Poobah" accompIishments, in case that's important
Michael Winn "embraces" the Temple of
Heaven, used by the Chinese Emperor for
sacred Taoist ceremonies since the 14th
century. The chi from those ceremonies is still
vibrating, for those able to tune in.
! 30 years experience in teaching subtle
energy methods internationally, from
kundalini yoga in 70's to tai chi, qigong,
and inner alchemy meditation today.
Studied with the top spiritual teachers of
this generation.
! President of the National Qigong (Chi Kung)
Association for two terms. This is an
umbrella organization for all the different
qigong and tai chi schools, teachers,
healers, & practitioners in the U.S.
! Founder and Director of Healing Tao
University summer retreat program (now at
Heavenly Mountain in North Carolina's Blue
Ridge Mtns, near Asheville). The largest
Tao arts program in the west.
! Writer/editor of Mantak Chia's first seven
books (that helped establish his fame).
Best known as co-author of the
revolutionary Taoist Secrets of Love:
Cultivating Male Sexual Energy. Author of
many other qigong articles & book chapters
(see "long bio" below).
! Chairman of Healing Tao Instructors
Association of the Americas for 9 years. It
set standards for certification & ethics. One
of the original Senior Instructors that
launched the Healing Tao, which globally
has certified over 1000 instructors and
brought Tao teachings to hundreds of
thousands of people. (Abroad Healing Tao
is known as Universal Tao).
! Author of ten Tao home study DVD-CD
courses that integrate high level medical-
spiritual qigong and inner alchemy as a
progressive training.
! Pioneered taking Western Taoists into
caves on Flower Mountain (Huashan) in
China to meditate. Has led ten+ China
Dream Trips to develop relations between
Western and Chinese Taoists in their sacred
mountains and temples.
Winn captures his Monkey Mind, takes it to
China for further training. On his T-shirt:
character for "Tao", the Way. Base of Mt.
Qingcheng, sacred to Taoists.
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The deeper, more personal answer:
Here are my own internal rules, honored in all the Homestudy courses:
* TEACH ONLY WHAT IS SIMPLE AND TRUE. In the books I wrote with/for Mantak
Chia, some of the practices seem mentally complicated. I wanted to simplify them at the
time, but did not always have final editorial control. In the many years since I wrote
those books, my own practice has evolved towards the simple. The current Home Study
courses were retaped many times, each time refining the practices to their simplest
essence. I rigorously avoid the excess mental complexity present in some of the books,
which seemed necessary to reach western minds at the time.
* NO SECRETS. Give students whatever they are ready to digest. The time for secrets
is past. Many excellent Chinese teachers have unfortunately not yet realized this! The
people I want to reach don't have the time or inclination to play this game of follow the
leader, begging for secrets drops of wisdom. I pour them on you, hoping you can absorb
any part of them, and become your own leader.
* NO GURU OR MASTER TRIPS. Hierarchies of Ego Authority bore me and stifle
creative chi flow. Spiritual Transmission can occur without developing co-dependent
teacher/student relationships. I'm not interested in followers clinging to my shirt tail. The
Life Force itself is the True Teacher, I am just a guide to help you develop your own
relationship with the Life Force. We are all brothers and sisters on the continuous two-
way journey between Source and Creation.
* TEACH ONLY FROM PERSONAL EXPERIENCE. Means no bullshit about level of
personal attainment. I test every method thoroughly to make sure it works and is safe.
* HAVE FUN!!! Playing with the chi field is meant to be fun. While refining the elixir,
laughter is the best medicine. If you don't get the Cosmic Joke, it may get you.
* Product Warning: Consumers of Chi Kung Home Study Courses may likely become a
"Chi-aholic" and may be exposed to the epidemic "Mad Dao Disease" that has widely
infected many students.
For the last 25 years I've explored many esoteric systems (also called Mystery Schools)
to find the most effective methods of improving health and refining spiritual awareness.
Principle schools (besides various Taoist lineages) include: White Tantra (kundalini yoga),
kriya yoga, dzogchen (Bon), Christian mysticism, Tibetan Buddhist vajrayana practices,
and Atlantean alchemy (Original, pre-Egyptian Kabballah).
I took many teachings with the Dalai Lama, including his Kalachakra initiation. I worked
closely with Paramhamsa Hariharananda for years to edit his Bhagavad Gita in the Light
of Kriya Yoga, and received private initiations into the higher kriyas. I have a book on
Atlantean alchemy nearly ready for publication. Its working title is Shape Power: Ask the
Life Force to Create a Reality You Truly Need. All these schools shaped my spiritual
development. But I always return to my roots in the Tao because of its natural simplicity
and practicality.
I have tested -- always on myself -- some 60 different qigong (chi kung) and Taoist
(Daoist) meditation systems. I have sought out dozens of different Daoist masters, often
only to get one superb movement or tiny but valuable insight they had. Master T.K. Shih
11
lived in my NYC apartment for two years. I edited BK Frantis' Opening the Energy Gates
of the Body and studied his excellent neigong and pa kua chang forms. I studied wu style
tai chi with Grand Master Ed Yu in China town (also Mantak Chia's tai chi teacher), and
Northern Wu Tai chi style with David Dolbear, National Gold Medalist champion. This
particular tai chi style was infused with alchemical energetics by a Taoist master.
I went to Egypt nine times, and discovered that one of my "home" spots on the planet
was the capstone of the Great Pyramid. I will reveal the mystery of what happened to
the missing capstone in my Shape Power book...:). I spent a night alone inside the Great
Pyramid, half in the lower pit and half in the King's chamber. Later I spent spent six
years training in the Western internal alchemy methods taught by an Atlantean scientist-
priest, and went through a powerful series of initiations in the Great Pyramid of Egypt,
Pan's cave in Delphi (Greece), and a pyramid-of-ice island north of the Arctic Circle
(close to North Pole), assisted by Saami shamans.
My mission this lifetime is to integrate Taoist internal alchemy (neidangong), qigong,
shengong, shamanism, depth psychology, and Western alchemical paths. I've fused their
essence and methods so their transformational power become accessible to all who are
ready to travel on the highest and quickest path of energetic healing. This is the Way of
cultivating both the personal and holy body of Nature, the Divine Feminine, whose cycle
is currently ascendant on planet Earth. It is equally accessible to both men and women.
I travelled to China many times, to be in the presence of its holy mountains and sacred
places, and to study medical qigong in top Beijing hospitals with the World Academic
Medical Qigong Society. Each year I invite top masters to teach at Healing Tao
University, now in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, partly in order to trade
secrets with them. I've been on the organizing committee for the National Qigong Annual
Conference since its inception in 1997, giving me exposure to the top qigong teachers in
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Michael Winn on capstone of Great Pyramid, sunrise
Spring Equinox.
the U.S. and a chance to absorb their favorite methods.
Cultivating one's chi (qi) is a life long process. But there is no need for everyone to
repeat my long journey. Better to start off equipped with the valuable tools offered in my
courses, distilled from decades of testing. I only teach what I myself practice. I hope you
will use those tools to go to a new, higher, and unknown level that is perfect for you
alone.
Winn's forthcoming books-in-progress:
* Way of the Inner Smile: Tao Path to Inner Peace (updated print version of ebook)
* Taoist Microcosmic Orbit: Alchemical Methods of Circulating the Golden Elixir
* Tao Inner Alchemy: Sexually Couple Male Water and Female Fire to Complete Your
Destiny & Cultivate Immortality
* Shape Power - Ask the Life Force to Create a Reality You Truly Need:
* A Short History of Atlantis' Spiritual Technology
What's the Difference Between Michael Winn's and Mantak Chia's teaching?

The Long Story
Note: this is an edited version of bio that first appeared in the Empty Vessel, Journal of
Contemporary Taoism.
In 1980 Winn was one of Mantak Chia's first western students in Chinatown, New York.
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Michael Winn's favorite meditation spot on Mt. Hua. Only
fools and immortals dare walk the "high wire" - an
ancient pine trunk growing out sideways 30-feet, off a
cliff with 3000 ft sheer drop off.
He played a key role in founding The Healing Tao in 1982 and directly wrote or heavily
edited many of Mantak Chia's books on nei gong and qigong as General Editor of Healing
Tao Books. His titles included Awaken Healing Energy Through the Tao, the first book in
English on the microcosmic orbit; Taoist Secrets of Love: Cultivating Male Sexual Energy;
Healing Love: Cultivating Female Sexual Energy; Iron Shirt Chi Kung; Bone Marrow Nei
Kung; Fusion of the Five Elements: Meditations for Transforming Negative Emotion; and
Awaken Healing Light of the Tao., an advanced study of the microcosmic orbit. Winn also
edited a newsletter for Healing Tao instructors entitled From the Mouth of the Immortal
Child.
The noted qigong master T.K. Shih lived in Winn's New York city apartment for two years
in the early 80's: "I taught him English, and T.K. taught me how to move like a cat" is
how Winn described their relationship. Winn studied with many other Taoist teachers,
and edited B.K. Frantzis' Opening the Energy Gates of the Body. He studied qigong and
ba gua with Frantzis, and the northern wu style tai chi as taught by David Dolbear, a Wu
style gold medalist and lineage holder. "I waited ten years before choosing a long form.
David got a transmission in Beijing that teaches tai chi as a form of alchemy,
emphasizing the changes between jing, qi, and shen." He went on to study in Beijing
with David teacher, Master Liu Jiang Chang.
Winn sees his life "as an alchemical journey flowing between outer adventures and inner
adventures, a process of cultivating "my worldly life" and "my inner essence".
Winn's father was a heart surgeon who helped Dr. Debakey pioneer open heart surgery
(see DeanWinn.net). Michael was the 3rd of seven children. He travelled to 30 countries
before the age of 17 and ran 40 whitewater rafting expeditions as a guide down the
Grand Canyon. In high school he competed against 100,000 teams and won the
California State Debate championship. He graduated with top honors from Dartmouth
College as a Senior Fellow with a degree in Russian/comparative literature. After a
successful meteoric three year career in New York book publishing, he got fired "for
being too creative".
He became a free lance war correspondent and adventure travel photographer that took
him on 30 trips to another 50 countries in Africa, the mideast , and Asia. His writings and
photos appeared in the New York Times, Time, Smithsonian, Outside, Village Voice,
Harpers, Connoiseur, People, Adventure Travel, National Jewish Monthly, and many
others. National Geographic financed his rafting expedition in North Yemen.
Included in his wanderlust period was a four month journey across China tracing Marco
Polo's footsteps. Winn, who is not Jewish, ran an underground railroad smuggling white
American Jews into Ethiopia and black Jews out of Ethiopia into Israel. In New York's
Soho district, Winn opened Abyssinia, the first Ethiopian restaurant in America, and
operated it successfully as a side business for 20 years.
While in Africa, Winn accidentally self-induced his first kundalini awakening, which led
him to begin studying and teaching kundalini (hindu tantric) yoga. In Ethiopia, a
visitation in broad daylight by a Taoist immortal inspired him to pursue Taoist alchemy.
"In college I studied comparative literature", Winn says, "and in real life I found myself
14
training in and comparing the esoteric alchemical methods from different cultures."
He studied kriya yoga with Swami Hariharananda, successor in India to Paramhamsa
Yogananda, and kept a close friendship with this yogi renowned for mastering the
breathless state of nirvikalpa samadhi. He died recently at age 97. Winn edited his The
Bhagavad Gita in the Light of Kriya Yoga. Winn notes that kriya yoga, the essence of all
yogas, has many parallels to Taoist alchemy but "it's finally a pure fire path. The Taoist
preference is to mix the fire and water, which is more accepting of the body."
Winn also studied Dzogchen and tantric Buddhist teachings from the Dalai Lama and
other rinpoches. "Tibetan and Hindu Tantra is philosophically very similar to yin-yang
theory, but in practice uses more mantra, mudra, and deity worship. Dzogchen is the
closest brother to the Tao with its emphasis on cutting through quickly to the clear or
original light. But I like the refining process in Taoist alchemy, the many practical
connections they developed with Original Chi (yuan qi). Taoist alchemy is a shortcut, it
focuses on direct relationship with the life force. When you combine alchemy with
qigong, the effect is a super-charged Energy Body."
Winn also studied the Celtic approach to earth based spirituality with R.J. Stewart. "All
the mystery schools are great", Winn commented. "The ancient Celts used a mirror
approach to Taoist alchemy, they first connect to the outer five elements/directions and
then work their way inside the body. This is the opposite of the Eastern way. I love all
the ancient meditation systems, but finally you've got to focus your practice on one
approach. Ultimately, I find Taoist alchemy to be the simplest, the most practical (body-
centered) and the most complete."
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Winn at Lao Tzu's Ascension site,
Louguantai. One of China's amazing
power spots, visited on China Dream Trips.
He reached this conclusion after 25 years of studying and testing many different systems
of qigong (chi kung), with dozens of teachers in the USA and China, both famous and
unknown. He uses the Tao Formulas for Immortality offered by the Taoist Hermit One
Cloud (Mantak Chia's teacher) as the superstructure for holding the immense knowledge
and skill he has acquired. (More Info ).
His quest for deeper knowledge of the Tao has taken him to visit the sacred mountains of
China fifteen times, where he has cultivated many friendships with Taoist adepts. He was
the first to offer trips to China for western Taoists that included staying in caves on
Huashan (Flower Mountain) used by Tao adepts for millennia. His China Dream Trips
have become famous and will be the subject of a forthcoming book by two Taoist
scholars who studied his attempts to bridge ancient Chinese and modern Western Taoist
cultures. (More info)
"The Chinese have a genius for boiling down everything to its core essence", Winn notes.
" I have done the same with everything I've learned from all my teachers - I just keep
cooking it down, refining it to its essence, and clarifying its practical application. It's just
my small part in the great collective process of the Tao. Somebody will take my
refinements and improve on them. That is the experimental, evolving nature of Tao
spiritual science. In fact, I hope they do it soon - I'd like to enjoy those improvements
myself!"
Winn, who lives in a log home in the mountains outside of Asheville, North Carolina,
maintains a private practice in qigong therapy and Taoist sexology. Winn is currently
16
Michael Winn and Renfarong,
President of China Taoist
Association. Ludongbin Temple,
Louguantai. Lao-tzu transmitted the
Tao Te Ching nearby.
finishing a book on the energy science of how people can shape the life force to manifest
what they truly need. The book is inspired by contact with a spiritual being who claims to
have ascended with his body - at the age of 2,300 years old - into the "Stellar Mind", i.e.
a full celestial heaven immortal.
He is also working on a book on Taoist internal alchemy, but claims he is "in no rush to
finish it. I don't want to put out books based on half-baked insights to make a quick
buck. I'm happy to write just one high level, fully-baked book. A book based on genuine
experience and that can actually be useful to others. It takes a few decades to really
road-test inner alchemy and its potential interactions with qigong." His next book
scheduled for publication is titled: Tai Chi - A Path of Self-Love: Sacred Movement as
Inner Alchemy.
In 2008 Joyce Gayheart, Michael's wife, passed into Flower Heaven. It was an amazing
alchemical experience of the Taoist process of shijie, or "liberation from the corpse".
Instead of re-incarnating, she infused her heart-essence drop into Michael's heart,
creating an androgynous (male-female balanced) soul and totally changing Michael's
destiny. The story of this process can be found at HealingTaoUSA.com/JoyceGayheart
Every summer Winn organizes what has become the largest Tao energy healing, qigong
and neigong (meditation) program in America, at Heavenly Mountain, in the Blue Ridge
Mountains near Asheville, North Carolina. It offers about 30 low cost, week long retreats
on all aspects of Taoist meditation, qigong, oriental body work, Taoist dream practice,
feng shui, sexology, Taoist astrology, qi healing, tai chi, tao yin (Taoist yoga), ba gua
zhang, weight loss and medical qigong and more. He teaches a number of courses in the
17
Illustration 1: Beardless version of the
new "androgynous" Michael Winn.
core Taoist internal alchemy & qigong curriculum.
More info on Summer Retreats and Michael Winn's Teaching Schedule in Asheville &
Internationally.

Foreward
18
Michael Winn "cooking" in a
cauldron,China"s symbol of alchemical
transformation.Temple of Heaven,
Beijing. Note: this is actual photo, not
photoshop!

Inner Smile: Root of the Root

By Mantak Chia
The Tao science of chi cuItivation is so huge. It is easy to get Iost in
it. Taoists spent thousands of years deveIoping so many different way
to refine human chi using chi kung and meditation. They took the
science of heaIing and medicine to new depth, had hundreds of martiaI
arts systems, found the best way to buiId houses with good feng shui,
and figured out how to bury the dead so the ancestraI chi is most
beneficiaI. They deveIoped high systems of Tao phiIosophy, ethics,
sexoIogy, herboIogy, divination and many other things.
But some things are more important than others. So I am very gIad
that MichaeI Winn chose to write more deepIy about the Inner SmiIe,
because it is so cIose to the root of the root. By this I mean the Inner
SmiIe is so cIose to the root of inner aIchemy, and inner aIchemy is the
root of aII the other Tao systems, even the I Ching.
Lao Tzu says that the man of knowIedge acquires something new
everyday, and the man of Tao Iets go of something new every day. The
man who practices the Inner SmiIe is a man of Tao. I feeI MichaeI Winn
is both a man of knowIedge and a man of Tao. His writing wiII heIp
peopIe to understand why the Inner SmiIe is so important, and how it
simpIifies so many other good and usefuI practices.
I have known MichaeI Winn for more than twenty years, so I know
how deepIy committed he is to Tao. I consider him one of the best
writers on Tao in the West. I am gratefuI to him for his skiIIfuI writing to
heIp expIain to Westerners the practicaI science of Tao subtIe energy.
PeopIe used to think Tao was just an interesting inteIIectuaI
phiIosophy. Now they begin to reaIize it is a very deep spirituaI
science.
19
The Way of the Inner Smile takes the theory and the practice to a
higher IeveI of understanding. It has many new insights, and reveaIs
how his own teaching skiII has matured. He has taught many
Westerners and figured out how their minds and bodies can most
easiIy absorb Tao methods. He is abIe to expIain the connection
between bioIogy, Tao psychoIogy of body-spirits, and inner aIchemicaI
transformation of the human souI.
His focus on unconditionaI seIf-acceptance is a modern way of
expressing traditionaI Tao practice of utter openness to Iife. It is an
openness that must begin with the body.
PIease enjoy this journey deep into the Iand of Inner SmiIes!
Mantak Chia
Tao Garden, ThaiIand
May 2003

20
Introduction
What is the Inner SmiIe?
Man without smiling face should not open a shop.
- Chinese Proverb
The Inner SmiIe is a simpIe, effortIess Daoist (Taoist) meditation on
how to Iive with an open heart. You can practice it sitting quietIy, or
whiIe engaged in everyday activities. The Inner SmiIe chaIIenges us, in
a series of "smiIing baby steps", to unconditionaIIy accept every
aspect of our body, mind, and spirit.
The Inner SmiIe connects our bioIogicaI seIf, our psychoIogicaI seIf,
and our spirituaI seIf in a practicaI way. It ingeniousIy captures the
power hidden in our naturaI impuIse to smiIe. It doesn't try to fix
anything or ask any part of us or others to change. It reIies on the
power of non-verbaI communication coupIed with a cIear mind intent to
"creativeIy find" the harmony hidden within everything.
To paraphrase Lao Tzu, the Inner SmiIe "does nothing, yet Ieaves
nothing undone". The Inner SmiIe cuItivates the spontaneous nature of
our inner heart to accept aII experiences in Iife at their most profound
IeveI. This may sound a bit abstract. Our western minds demand more
detaiIed guidance. What makes the Inner SmiIe practicaI?
What makes it practicaI is the Inner SmiIe's power to cuItivate our
"chi" - the subtIe breath infused by Nature in our body-mind-souI. This
internaI effect of the Inner SmiIe is greatIy ampIified by various kinds of
chi kung (qigong). What is chi kung? LiteraIIy it means "skiII with
subtIe breath". It is the ancient process of aIIowing (yin) and
encouraging (yang) subtIe energy to fIow harmoniousIy in our Iife.
Chi Kung was originaIIy known in ancient China as yang sheng, or
21
"nourishing Iife". Its methods embraced both the stiIIness of
meditation and the movement of Iife. Its art became most famous for its
simpIe, gentIe heaIing body movements.
The ancient principIes of chi kung are the grandparents of the weII
known martiaI art, tai chi chuan. In China tai chi chuan (taijiquan) is
quite young, onIy about 800 years oId! The huge time spans invoIved
here give us pause to refIect on the superficiaIity of modern knowIedge
about human nature.
What couId be easier than simpIy smiIing? Can we reaIIy Iearn to
practice it as a skiII? Many peopIe who practice the Inner SmiIe
experience immediate caImness. For others it opens up inner vistas of
spirituaI joy. Some practitioners experience spontaneous "miracuIous"
heaIing from psychoIogicaI probIems or diseases.
AIthough it is simpIe, inner smiIing is a skiII that improves over time
and uItimateIy Ieads to deep spirituaI reaIization. Some peopIe get
stuck in a chronic "Inner Frown" state, the opposite of the Inner SmiIe.
They may need speciaI heIp, which is offered in this book. It is
important to note there is a big difference between the Inner SmiIe and
the ordinary "outer smiIe". I wiII give more detaiIs on that Iater.
Where does a smiIe come from? ShouId we ask Leonardo Da Vinci,
who painted the Mona Lisa? Some schoIars think it is his seIf-portrait,
disguised as a woman to ampIify the mystery of her smiIe. Our impuIse
to smiIe is certainIy, at core, a mystery. But the key to engaging this
mysterious smiIe can be found by the most ordinary person, not just
great artists.
22
Mona Lisa's Inner Smile
We shouId note at the outset that smiIing is energeticaIIy very
different from Iaughing. "Laughter is the best medicine" the saying
goes, and Iaughing certainIy reIeases tension and is good for the body
in a number of different ways. According to Chinese medicine, if
someone Iaughs too frequentIy or too IoudIy they may have excess
heart chi and are unconsciousIy trying to reIease it. Laughter is more
of beIIy centered emotionaI reIease than smiIing.
SmiIing is more subtIe than Iaughter, a more inward and more
sustainabIe experience. Someone who smiIes continuousIy is not
considered in excess, assuming it is not a "phony" outer smiIe.
SmiIing is Iess about emotions, which are our response to outer Iife
events, and more about subtIe feeIing. Inner SmiIing cuItivates this
feeIing to a high IeveI, focusing on the spirituaI joy that arises from our
inner souI and radiates out as subtIe presence.
The Smiling Inner Heart of our Energy Body
Thanks to ancient Tao masters passing down their tradition for
23
thousands of years, we now know the secret of the Inner SmiIe is
hidden within our inner heart. The inner heart is not the physicaI heart,
and it is not the emotionaI or feeIing heart. There is a "third heart", just
as there is a "third eye". This inner heart is a portaI to direct
experience of what is caIIed "souI", a concept in the West that has
successfuIIy eIuded aII definition.
The ancient enIightened masters gave us a very specific map of the
Inner SmiIe's pathway within our body. It arises Iike a wave from the
inner ocean of our unknown and unborn seIf. Before it gentIy spIashes
onto the beach of the outer worId, it passes through many subtIe
Iayers of body-mind consciousness that they mapped out in great
detaiI.
This mapped out network of energy meridians and spheres of
psycho-spirituaI essences hidden within our physicaI body is known to
Tao adepts as the Energy Body. The Inner SmiIe is a way of awakening
and harmonizing our Energy Body. As the smiIing wave arises within it
can be guided to effortIessIy "fIoat Ioose" our deep sexuaI, emotionaI,
and mentaI patterns, which are basicaIIy frozen energy.
24
The ability of this smiling infant to swim underwater
totally free of all fear of drowning is akin our innate ability
to smile and float in the sea of our Original Energy (yuan chi).
SmiIing can meIt energy patterns that we might feeI are stuck or
frozen inside us. It can reach and dissoIve patterns that have frustrated
other forms of therapy, if done with proper focus.
The Inner SmiIe is a gentIe tooI, but so profoundIy subtIe it can
probe powerfuIIy into the depths of our unconscious, where few can
reach. It can dissoIve patterns without struggIe, as it does not
encourage divisive attitudes (me vs. them) or attempt to "kiII" the sick
25
energy. If you attack your probIems, they resist even harder.
The Inner SmiIe operates by embracing the aspects of our pain or
dysfunction from within. It awakens our core sense of unity, and
activates the inner wiII of our heart. Inner SmiIing causes the sick
energy to spontaneousIy shape shift. By smiIing, we are reaIIy just
Iiberating the inner wiII of our stuck energy to become functionaI and
free.
The Inner SmiIe is just the first step on an amazing journey to the
experience of your true seIf and to the core of the "muIti-verse"- the
muItipIe dimensions of Nature's grand unity.
I hope you wiII join the growing gIobaI community of seekers of the
NaturaI Truth. Tao offers a practicaI way gain the freedom needed to
experience aII IeveIs of your reaIity. I hope that you grow to Iove and
trust the Inner SmiIe as much as I do.

MichaeI Winn
AsheviIIe, North CaroIina
Spring Equinox 2003
Chapter One
Inner SmiIe:
The Sages Way to UnfoId Tao
26
The Dalai Lama gave a teaching recently. The final question asked of him
was, "What can we give to you?" He beamed at the audience. "That is
easy," he said. "Just give me your smiles. It makes me feel good when I see
people smile at me. And if you smile at each other that would also be very
good. So please give me your smiles."
What is Tao? Tao means "naturaI way". It is reaIIy undefinabIe,
because it incIudes everything that exists in Nature, pIus everything
that doesn't yet exist! When Tao is appIied to humans, it impIies the
virtue, or "de", of naturaI seIf-unfoIdment. HistoricaIIy, the Inner SmiIe
was a foundation practice of Daoist neidan gong, or "inner eIixir skiII".
Today, we transIate neidan simpIy as "inner aIchemy", meaning the
science of changing oneseIf in accordance with naturaI Iaw, but more
quickIy.
Inner aIchemy simpIy means that what normaIIy might happen in ten
months of outer Iife events can now happen in 10 minutes of inner
smiIing practice. This seems Iike magic, but aIchemy is actuaIIy a
27
scientific process in the sense of being systematic and repeatabIe. But
it is made possibIe onIy when we grasp the hidden essence of Iife.
Once we become aware of chi fIow in our body, we can shape it. The
Inner SmiIe was the first step in seven highIy secret Tao inner aIchemy
"formuIas" for speeding up the stages of human spirituaI deveIopment.
But the Inner SmiIe aIso has a key function in formuIas Two through
Seven as weII. It is amazing to consider that the Inner SmiIe is at once
the easiest beginner method and the most advanced IeveI of
reaIization! (For a fuII description of the Daoist hermit One CIoud's
Seven Formulas for Immortality, see " Tao Secrets of ImmortaIity"
articIe on my homepage, or find it at:
www.heaIingdao.com/tao_aIchemy_formuIas.htmI
The Inner SmiIe creates a centraI, positive, open inner mind space in
which "seIf-cuItivation" can occur. This state of smiIing openness
shouId not be confused with other Asian concepts of "empty mind",
which are very difficuIt for westerners to grasp or retain for very Iong.
Part of this is a Ianguage probIem. If we repIace the notion of
"emptiness" with that of "openness" or "compIete acceptance" it wiII
cIarify the profundity of the Inner SmiIe practice.
From this Daoist point of view, striving after the goaI of an empty
mind wiII Iead to unnecessary frustration. Nature wiII quickIy refiII
whatever you empty, incIuding your mind. This is the dynamic between
stiIIness and movement that is known as "tai chi" (or taiji), meaning the
Supreme UItimate. Tai Chi is not to be confused with the martiaI art of
tai chi chuan, which is just one appIication in which one "boxes" with
these invisibIe forces in order to defeat an opponent.
Tai Chi is rather a cosmic principIe underIying aII Iife. The secret of
tai chi in human Iife Iies in getting a smooth and harmonious fIow of
chi through the body-mind space. In this context, the constant
"emptying" and "fiIIing" of the mind with thoughts, feeIings, and
sensations cannot occur harmoniousIy unIess there is an underIying
"openness" or feeIing of acceptance. In this acceptance is true
freedom to change oneseIf.
28
As both a unique form of reIigion and as a phiIosophy, Tao
encourages a radicaI openness to aII Iife without judgment. Most of us
have aIready Iearned the hard way that we cannot change the outer
worId or other peopIe against their wiII. It is pointIess to go against
others own naturaI path of unfoIdment. But if we change ourseIves, the
worId and aII the peopIe in it are automaticaIIy changed without any
outer struggIe.
This happens for two reasons. One, "the worId" is reaIIy just a set of
perceptions we carry around inside our own mind. Two, our personaI
chi fieId (our mind) is part of the cosmic chi fieId (or universaI mind). If
our personaI energy fieId changes, the Iarger chi fieId has to aIso
change. Nature is just the pIayground (chi fieId) where we can go
through our Iife changes. Harmony means we can pIay freeIy in the chi
fieId of our personaI-cosmos or the worId-cosmos.
AII that is needed is openness to our innate smiIing impuIse to
access the chi fieId. Once we cIaim our peacefuI, smiIing inner body-
mind space, a series of transformative energetic shifts is naturaIIy
activated. If we stay reIaxed, our inner smiIing wiII continue its naturaI
process untiI we feeI we are back in a state of harmony. If we get
uptight, we can simpIy remind ourseIves by inner smiIing again.
Mapping Our Body-Mind's Energetic Patterns
It heIps to have a map of our "insides" before we begin the Inner
SmiIe practice. It aIso heIps to get acquainted with some common
Chinese terms used by Daoists to describe spirituaI deveIopment. The
probIem in EngIish is that we often don't have the words to describe
cIearIy what is going on inside us at a subtIe IeveI.
"SubtIe energy" is not an ordinary part of western cuIture, and the
Ianguage around "energy", "souI", "spirit" aII tends to get bIurred into
one fuzzy concept. The Daoists had very specific technicaI terms so
that a practitioner couId focus their intention with greater refinement
and thus intensify the effect.
29
Our personaI sexuaI essence or body substance (jing), is said to
hoId aII the imprints of our energy patterns. It is sexuaI because it is
how you reproduce your body ceIIs. This subtIe substance - perhaps
best described as the substance from which our DNA and RNA are
made - instantIy feeIs nourished by inner smiIing. Think of your body
and its sexuaIity as your earth.
When you smiIe, it is Iike the Sun coming out from behind dark
cIouds, and Iighting up your earth. OnIy this happens deep inside you
when your inner heart comes out of hiding and smiIes at your sexuaI
substance. Your body feeIs warm, Ioved, and accepted, as if it had
been IovingIy hugged from within. It instantIy starts making heaIthy
new baby ceIIs! Can you imagine this "mini Iove story" happening to
aII 80 triIIion ceIIs in the human body? This is how the Inner SmiIe can
quickIy become a very tangibIe and powerfuI experience.
When our body substance feeIs accepted, we can then
spontaneousIy and naturaIIy grow into a strong heaIthy presence or
spirit (shen). Spirit needs a body in order to experience itseIf. Our spirit
is constantIy dissoIving the oId "body pictures" and creating fresh new
identity at the ceIIuIar IeveI. This deep naturaI inteIIigence is caIIed
OriginaI Spirit by the ancient Daoists. This innate inteIIigence shouId
not be confused with briIIiance of inteIIect or IQ.
According to the Daoists, our naturaI inteIIigence wiII give us the
guidance we need to fuIfiII our human destiny in each moment. No one
has a better or worse destiny than anyone eIse, and somehow aII six
biIIion of our human destinies on this pIanet are harmoniousIy Iinked
together, even though we often cannot see how that IeveI of our
coIIective inteIIigence functions. The Inner SmiIe is the human
interface between our personaI Earth and our personaI Heaven.
UItimateIy it wiII put us into contact with the center of coIIective human
consciousness.
Our Inner Family of Biological Intelligences
Our personaI bioIogicaI inteIIigences (jingshen) are Iinked to our
vitaI organ functions Iike the heart, kidney, Iiver spIeen, and Iungs.
30
These organs and their energy meridians are controIIed by different
kinds of inteIIigence. In this Daoist theory, tested over thousands of
years of practice, the whoIe body thinks, feeIs, senses, and knows -
not just the head brain.
Our whoIe-body brain incIudes many different kinds of inteIIigence.
Think of it as your inner souI team or famiIy. Each kind of inteIIigence
has a different job to do. Some times these inteIIigences work together,
sometimes they fight. Our body-sexuaI inteIIigence asks, who is a good
partner for me or my chiIdren? What does my body need to heaI? Our
sociaI inteIIigence asks, how do I make friends and function in groups?
Our creative inteIIigence is Iooking for new ways to exercise its
imagination, in everything from deciding what cIothes to wear to
creative projects. Our spirituaI inteIIigence has the abiIity to perceive
ordinary reaIity from the souI IeveI, which gives it a very different
information than what our senses offer.
The goaI of Daoist meditation is to Iive in dynamic baIance. This
requires getting our entire famiIy of inner bioIogicaI inteIIigences to
smiIe to each other. The goaI is not to sit in emptiness, but to cuItivate
our Authentic or True SeIf (zhen ren), which aIways seeks harmony.
31
Inner Smile is Deepened by other Tao Practices
Painting of two female Tao immortals. Deer is symbol of gentleness
and the crane of long life. Behind the inscrutable Oriental inner smile is
concealed a vast wisdom of internal energy arts and the adepts
contentment with their inner soul cultivation.
There are many other Daoist practices deveIoped over the miIIennia
that take the Inner SmiIe process to a more refined IeveI of physicaI
and mentaI seIf-heaIing and souI deveIopment. They aII heIp create and
stabiIize a joyfuI and caIm inner space that smoothes the fIow of our
Iife journey. These incIude the rest of the Chi Kung FundamentaIs 1
training in the Five AnimaI FroIics and Six HeaIing Sounds, which
teach us how to communicate more deepIy with each aspect of our
32
normaIIy unconscious five major bioIogicaI inteIIigences (wu jingshen).
Then in Chi Kung FundamentaIs IeveIs 2, 3, and 4 we Iearn basic
energy pathways in the body of the Microcosmic Orbit, and InternaI Chi
Breathing and Rooting. Once you have this basic grounding, Fusion of
the Five EIements heIps you baIance your emotions and activate
hidden psychic power channeIs. HeaIing Love (sexoIogy for heaIth and
bIiss), Dream Practice, and Water & Fire AIchemy (kan & li) are aII
optionaI higher stages that aIIow you to have truIy marveIous
experiences most peopIe have never even dreamed of.
But without Inner SmiIe, these practices wouId not be as deep or as
effective. At each IeveI there is a chi kung movement practice as weII
as a sitting meditation practice that baIance each other. When peopIe
ask me, "what is the best way to prepare for higher IeveIs of practice", I
usuaIIy teII them to practice the Inner SmiIe more deepIy. A state of
totaI openness is the best way to Iearn something new. SmiIe to your
rigid boundaries, open to a new IeveI of fIowing chi harmony.
These Daoist practices, refined over thousands of years of testing,
heIp us to gather the essences of the outer macro-cosmos (Nature)
into our personaI micro-cosmos (body). This is a fancy way of saying
that they heIp us grasp the reIation between our physicaI, tangibIe seIf
and our intangibIe, cosmic seIf.
It is truIy wonderfuI to do the Inner SmiIe in combination with
dynamic chi kung or subIime aIchemy meditations. Yet the Inner SmiIe
is aIso a simpIe, fun, and easy "stand aIone" practice. It can be even
more than that. The Inner SmiIe can be a compIete path unto itseIf, if
you choose to make your onIy practice.
Sexual Tension of Personal Becoming
versus
Tai Chi Harmony of Cosmic Being
EnergeticaIIy, the Inner SmiIe asks us to accept that our personaI
33
inner Being is part of the OriginaI Spirit (yuan shen) of the Tao (Dao).
According to ancient Chinese thinking, OriginaI Spirit exhaIed the
OriginaI Breath as the pure, non-poIar breath of the Cosmos. This
breaths foIIows the cosmic Iaw of the Tai Chi principIe of harmony. Its
invisibIe guidance deep inside our body is why we constantIy seek
harmony in our everyday Iife.
Think of Tao as the Source of Nature. Tao breathes out its spirituaI
quaIities or "de". The de shines out as our personaI inner wiII power to
manifest the various spirituaI quaIities in our Iife, one of which is our
physicaI body itseIf as a vesseI for cosmic energies. Thus the titIe of
Lao Tzu's cIassic of 500 b.c. was titIed the Tao te Ching (Dao de jing),
the Book of the Way and its Power.

Smiling Lao Tzu (Laozi) rides on an Ox. Ox is the symbol of worldly
burden, the earth element, and of the human soul riding atop its
34
physical body. The Tao sages in China are usually depicted as smiling.
This is an Inner Smile, suggesting that no matter how bad the worldly
burden becomes, the Tao within their inner heart will remain an eternal
source of smiling joy.
There is a classic painting of Confucius, Buddha, and Lao Tzu
sitting around a vat of vinegar. Each one is taking a sip of the vinegar.
Confucius has a sour look on his face. Buddha has a bitter look. Lao
Tzu has a big smile on his face. Life's outer vinegar is alchemically
transmuted to inner wine in the Tao adept's inner cauldron.
As our Tao-Being "breathes" our de-Becoming into the physicaI
pIane, our non-duaI OriginaI Breath poIarizes into yin and yang
breaths. The harmonious fIow of this trinity - the two yin-yang breaths
and the one OriginaI Breath - is caIIed Tai Chi. This poIarizing of
energy into yin-yang creates aII the forces of Nature such as hot and
coId, night and day - and femaIe and maIe bodies.
This poIarization of our originaI cosmic energy injects a dynamic
tension into our physicaI Becoming that is essentiaIIy experienced as a
sexuaI-creative tension in our personaI body-mind. Everyone is unique,
so everyone experiences this sexuaI-creative tension differentIy.
Some of this tension gets acted out in our sexuaI reIations. But
mostIy it is directed at sexuaI reproduction at the ceIIuIar IeveI, the
constant task of birthing a new physicaI body. In Daoist aIchemy, the
psycho-sexuaI tension is re-directed to birthing our physicaI Iead-Iike
heaviness into a "goIden Iight body" that is not subject to death. That
is the "goId" substance that internaI aIchemy seeks to cuItivate.
This sexuaI-creative tension is what makes worIdIy Iife exciting, as
in the beautifuI interpIay between Ioving men and women. But it can
aIso make Iife miserabIe, as in the ugIy battIe between the sexes or the
struggIe between mind and body that resuIts in iIIness. Underneath,
this outer tension originates as the tension between our neutraI inner
Being and our sexuaIIy poIarized process of Becoming.
We couId caII this Being-Becoming tension an apparent spIit
between "mind and body" or "spirit and matter". But the ancient
35
Daoists didn't see this as a spIit. They experienced these poIarities as
a smooth continuum. Even though humans find themseIves in a maIe
or femaIe body, each of us internaIIy has a continuum of mascuIine
and feminine quaIities.
The uItimate purpose of the Inner SmiIe is to bring this underIying
tension into consciousness, embrace it, and harmonize it. SmiIing is a
method to smooth out this tension that is incredibIy simpIe, powerfuI,
profound, peacefuI, effortIess - and FUN!
Using the Inner SmiIe to cuItivate our OriginaI Breath (yuan chi) is a
key secret to resoIving this deep tension in our body-mind. This yin-
yang sexuaI-creative tension is so deep that many of us don't even
know it exists. Yuan chi is inherentIy neutraI and baIanced. The topic of
sexuaIity is too vast to be covered here. If you are interested in
expIoring it more deepIy, you may find the Daoist secrets of sexology
and inner sexual alchemy quite interesting. (Both avaiIabIe as Tao
Home Study courses, but recommended onIy after proceeding through
the Chi Kung Fundamentals and Fusion of the Five Elements).
Experience of yuan chi inspires us to Iive in a simpIe, continuous,
heart-centered chi fIow. It grows our inner feeIing of peace and deep
presence, even whiIe Iife and other peopIe struggIe around us. Our
yuan chi, or OriginaI Breath, is what aIIows us to embody the notion of
wu wei , or "effortIess action".
When one's inner being smiIes, aII doubts - accumuIated for years -
disperse instantIy, Iike shadows fIeeing sunIight. PeopIe think, "I don't
have time to meditate". This is reaIIy just a way of saying they choose
to put their priority eIsewhere, or that their outer Iife is so stressfuI
they can't take care of their inner Iife. WeIcome to the Inner SmiIe,
where that excuse doesn't work.
It doesn't take any extra time to smiIe. You can practice the Inner
SmiIe even whiIe you do everything eIse in your busy Iife. We don't
sacrifice anything when we inner smiIe. We are onIy adding more
heartfeIt presence to whatever eIse we are doing. The onIy thing we
Iose by smiIing inwardIy is the unconscious "inner frown" many
36
peopIe are carrying around.
This inner frown is a form of seIf-infIicted chronic stress. Over time, it
begins to weigh on us, as if we were wearing our resistance to Iife Iike
a big heavy chain around our neck. UnfortunateIy, we often infIict this
inner frown on those around us. If you Iook into the mirror of your Iife,
you can see if this is the case for you. We each need to ask ourseIves, I
am ready to get serious about throwing off this heavy yoke, and begin
Iiving more IightIy, guided by our inner smiIing seIf?

Have people used the inner smile to change real life situations?
I have heard many, many stories from peopIe about their outer
success with the inner smiIe. One person toId me they got a big saIary
raise. A woman did the Inner SmiIe to her very mean boss who was
very tight with money.
She started smiIing at the guy for a coupIe of days, just connecting
her inner heart to his inner heart, carefuI not to project anything about
money. Then she just waIked in one day into his office and said, "I
reaIIy need a raise". The mean boss Iooked up, just kind of smiIed, and
said OK.
That is what I caII effortIess change. Mean, stingy peopIe don't want
to be that way, they are just afraid to be something different, to be
someone that is IoveabIe. So when you in effect Iove someone siIentIy,
in a safe, neutraI way, their being can then shift the structure of the
outer personaIity. And voiIa!
37
Chapter Two
Key to the Inner SmiIe: SeIf-Acceptance
Lixiao, smiling guide on my trips to China, in monastery
on Mt. Huashan, famous Tao sacred mountain.
Openness is the image of Heaven.
Calm is the image of Earth.
When open, one accepts all.
When calm, one perceives all.
When open, one can accept people.
When calm, one can deal with events.
When openness and calm are practiced for a long time,
Our heart is clear.
Open acceptance and calm is how Sages achieved
the Tao of Heaven and Earth.
-The Book of Balance and Harmony, Li Tao-ch'un,12
th
cen.
38
Our feeIings naturaIIy fIuctuate over the course of our Iife. It is
useIess to try to have onIy the good feeIings and not the bad ones.
Likewise, the Inner SmiIe is different from just having a positive
attitude. Don't confuse the Inner SmiIe with trying to be externaIIy
cheerfuI even when inwardIy you feeI things are going badIy. This
"poIyanna" approach is using positive emotions to controI one's state.
The "power of positive thinking" is the mentaI equivaIent of this.
Positive thinking that is artificiaIIy forced on the psyche is onIy a
temporariIy successfuI strategy, because it rests on suppressing
negative thoughts and feeIings. EventuaIIy that suppressed negativity,
pushed down into the unconscious, festers and comes back to haunt
you either internaIIy as some disease or externaIIy as some caIamity. If
you force yourseIf to remain positive the entire time, your negativity
wiII unconsciousIy act out.
Negative consciousness cannot be "kiIIed". That is because aII
consciousness is a part of the universaI chi fieId, and you can't kiII any
part of the fieId without kiIIing the whoIe fieId. You can onIy change its
shape. This is the whoIe purpose of chi kung science - to Iearn the
practicaI methods of changing the shape of your personaI chi fieId.
The negativity is Ieft buried in your body rather than transformed. It
is IiteraIIy buried aIive, festering deep inside some organ or stored
inside your bones or joints. It wiII wait for a moment of weakness, and
internaI "chi pressure" of the negativity wiII ooze into the cracks in
your Iife, wherever it is you have a weakness. You wiII wonder why you
have arthritis or a stroke. The Dark Force strikes back.
Positive Ego, Negative Ego, Neutral Ego
The Inner SmiIe is about activating a IeveI of inner seIf that is deeper
than either our outer positive ego or outer negative ego. The Inner
SmiIe begins by systematicaIIy having us unconditionaIIy accept
39
everything inside our seIf. We begin with the surface Iayers of our soIid
body, and work our way down into our deep Iayers of psyche and souI.
We smiIe to the negative, we smiIe to the positive, and in the space
between them we smiIe into the neutraI. The neutraI is the key space in
the aIchemy of seIf-transformation.
The most important "thing" inside us that we need to accept is the
chi fieId itseIf. It is a super-inteIIigent energy fieId inside us that is
connecting the superficiaI and deep Iayers of our seIf. It suppIies the
energy that we shape into our bioIogicaI, psychoIogicaI, and souI
structure. The chi fieId is the energy fieId of aII possibiIity. If you are
scientific you can caII it "bio-energy", and think of it as part of the
quantum fieId. If you are reIigious you can caII it the HoIy Spirit and
beIieve it is the divine fieId of God.
The Daoists simpIy caII it the OriginaI Breath of Nature. The IabeI is
not important. What matters is grasping that this chi fieId is aIive, it is
inteIIigent, and it is breathing. This breath is detectabIe in the puIsation
of your atoms, your ceIIs, your heartbeat, whatever you notice as
"aIiveness". Its subtIe breath becomes the tangibIe breath of our Iungs.
That means our physicaI breath, our heart beat, our bIood fIow, our
every sensation of pIeasure and pain, aII our positive and negative
feeIings and thoughts, our every moment of souI-suffering as weII as
souI-bIiss - aII these arise from a unified fieId of inteIIigent, basicaIIy
neutraI energy at the core of our being.
AII the events in our Iife, incIuding internaI feeIing and externaI
actions, arise as puIsations from this core neutraI space. The deep
structures underIying our emotions and thoughts are changing from
moment to moment because of puIsations and cycIes in the chi fieId.
These fIuctuations make it hard to grasp the true essence of our core
identity patterns.
One minute we're an infant, next we are a chiId, then a teenager, then
an aduIt - each with a different identity. The bioIogicaI patterns are the
most stabIe during these cycIes of transition, and so the Inner SmiIe
begins by connecting our bioIogicaI seIf to the chi fieId inside us. This
40
is known in modern Daoist terminoIogy as Iinking the physicaI body
with the Energy Body.
The Inner SmiIe is a method of progressive seIf-acceptance, It
shouId not be confused with a method sometimes advocated by
spirituaI teachers of accepting everything outside you, everything that
happens to you. That approach is focused on the outer worId. The
difference is cruciaI.
If you go around thinking you are accepting everything outside of
yourseIf as an act of unconditionaI Iove, but haven't yet accepted
unconditionaIIy everything happening inside yourseIf, then your outer
acceptance of things is not truIy unconditionaI. It is an outward
projection, an iIIusion of some stiII conditioned Iayer of your
personaIity that aspires to be unconditionaI. The ego beIieves it can
find its unconditionaI nature in the outer worId, which it cannot.
St. Francis of Assisi: Punishing the Un-holy Body
Perhaps the most famous exampIe of this was the ItaIian monk, St.
Francis of Assisi. He was a wonderfuI, humbIe souI that inspired many
to accept and Iove others. He cIaimed to have a speciaI Iove for the
creatures of the naturaI worId. AIthough he was incredibIy kind to
others, he was brutaIIy crueI to his own body. He couId accept other's
bodiIy needs, but rejected his own.
He often referred to his body as "Brother jackass", and subjected it
to extreme hardship. He subsequentIy died quite earIy, at the age of 42.
If he had accepted deepIy the spirituaI nature of his own body, I am
certain St. Francis wouId have Iived to a ripe oId age and achieved far
more profound spirituaI states. Let me share an interesting story with
you in this regard.

When I visited Assisi in ItaIy a few years ago, I meditated for hours
beside his tomb. There was very strong energy there, but I feIt it wasn't
his. I used the Inner SmiIe process and some other aIchemicaI
dissoIving meditations to peeI off the centuries of emotionaI-devotionaI
41
reIigious projection that had been Iayered onto him.
I sought to connect to his spirit through direct contact with the
vibrationaI essence remaining in his bones. After many hours of going
deeper and deeper inside his bones Iying in his tomb, I feIt I finaIIy
achieved a direct and unaduIterated connection with Francis. More
accurateIy, I contacted his spirit body, which had merged with a Iarger
coIIective consciousness that was responsibIe for the hoIding the "St.
Francis" frequency.
The cIear message I received was that upon his death, Francis' souI
reaIized the error of rejecting his body and mistreating it. Francis then
vowed to remain as a presence supporting the acceptance of the
animaI body as essentiaI to the spirituaI deveIopment of aII beings on
earth.
Hence his popuIarity as the patron saint of animaI Iovers, among
other things. But meanwhiIe, other peopIe are unfortunateIy reading
his thoughts written when he was in a Iess deveIoped state, thoughts
that are very body-negative. St. Francis was guiIty onIy of beIieving the
anti-body prejudice common to Christians of his time.
History is fiIIed with other ascetics who faiIed to integrate their
bodiIy reaIity with their souI reaIity. They achieved eIevated mysticaI
states by Ioving others more than themseIves, but couId not ground
this spirituaI fieId within their own physicaI body. Some died of terribIe
diseases. Why couIdn't their great spirituaI awareness transform that
disease?
I beIieve it was because their spirit was not properIy Iinked to their
body. These mystics may attain a One Mind state, but may not achieve
the One Body or "yang body" consciousness sought by Daoist adepts.
They achieved a certain high IeveI of mind enIightenment, but did not
achieve whoIe body enIightenment, known in China as immortaIity.
At the opposite end from these out-of-body mystics are narcissistic,
seIfish types who Iove only their body appearance. These peopIe have
42
no regard for their deeper spirituaI seIf, which is what aIIows us to see
beyond our ego seIf and incIude others as part of the same fieId of
coIIective human consciousness.
Outer Acceptance vs. Inner Acceptance,
Outer Smile vs. Inner Smile
I don't mean to impIy the outer acceptance or outer smiIe method is
not usefuI. To Iove others truIy you must first accept them for who they
are. Otherwise, you are onIy Ioving your projection of yourseIf as
savior to them. Outer acceptance certainIy can be an extremeIy
beneficiaI process to most peopIe, and might uItimateIy Iead them to
inward acceptance of themseIves.
We are taIking about two doorways here, the inner and the outer
doorways of our psyche. Both doors need to eventuaIIy be opened, but
the inner doorway is the most criticaI. The danger here comes from the
iIIusion of opening the outer door onIy, and beIieving that is sufficient.
UnconditionaI acceptance of peopIe and events around you shouId not
become bIind acceptance.
This kind of open acceptance of the outer surface of peopIe and
events can sometimes Iead to dangerous suppression of needed inner
powers of discrimination. Outer acceptance doesn't reaIIy deaI with the
massive Iayers of unconscious body-centered issues that await
compIetion.
I'm simpIy pointing out that the Inner SmiIe process of
unconditionaI seIf-acceptance unmasks the probIem of seIf-rejection
and body-rejection at its core. It is the most direct and most effective
method I have found for getting to one's inner truth and to the
experience of inner peace.
What is the key difference between the Inner SmiIe and the ordinary
outer smiIe? The ordinary outer smiIe has an "object" someone or
something you are smiIing at. The Inner SmiIe is uItimateIy
43
"objectIess". You might temporariIy start by smiIing to some aspect of
your bioIogy, but you quickIy go past that to the energy or the spirit
behind the physicaI object. Once you contact your center of spirituaI
gravity, the inner smiIe radiates back out through the Iayers of your
energy body and your bioIogy and eventuaIIy out into the worId.
So you end up smiIing Iike a gIowing Iamp, shining out from the
open space within yourseIf, at the insides (i.e. the "subject")of aII
objects in the worId. So you end up smiIing from your inside to the
insides of everything eIse. Wrap your mind about that one. When you
get to the guided meditation you wiII understand better.

Michael Winn practicing Outer Smile. Both his monkey (yes, it's alive) and his mind
are smiling sincerely, but it's a smile produced on demand. Photo taken at "Azure
Truth" Tao sacred mountain in Sichuan, China. Calligraphy on T-shirt: "Tao".
44
Receptive Yin Smile, Projective Yang Smile
In the Inner SmiIe process, one first must accept the inner Iayers of
oneseIf. This is the yin phase of practice, meaning you approach
yourseIf softIy, with an open, receptive and nurturing attitude. This
phase requires accepting one's major bioIogicaI structures, one's
energy channeIs, and one's guiding inteIIigences or body spirits (jing
shen). Once these begin to integrate, one's inner heart opens, and the
yang phase of practice may begin. One smiIes out from the space of
inner seIf-acceptance, and expands that space out into the outer worId.
The focus in the yang phase is again not on accepting the transitory
outer appearance of reaIity, but on accepting its inner essence. We
practice smiIing to the souI of matter, which incIudes the souI of
"other" peopIe and things. During both the yin and yang phases we are
working with the core energy of the souI. Both yin and yang phases of
the Inner SmiIe evoke a smiIing wave of yuan chi, or OriginaI Energy.
Yuan chi is the subtIe energy, IiteraIIy the subtIe breath of our yuan
shen, or OriginaI Spirit.
Let me cIarify yin-yang theory. The idea is that there are an infinite
number of poIarities around a singIe centraI neutraI poIe. This centraI
axis is simpIy caIIed the Origin. In the human body it is caIIed the
"chong mai" or core channeI. Around our personaI core channeI are a
huge number of physicaI, sexuaI, emotionaI, mentaI, environmentaI,
ancestraI, astroIogicaI, and souI Iayers of tension. You couId IabeI
these poIarities anyway you want, caII it body vs. mind, etc.
The Inner smiIe gentIy gathers your personaI poIarities to the inner
heart in the core channeI where the positive and negative fIows of chi
neutraIize each other. Just to be reaIistic, it wiII take a whiIe to get to
the true core. But aII that matters is that your smiIe is taking you
deeper towards the center of your being. From that center, you can
spontaneousIy baIance and harmonize the poIar forces that expand out
from the core of your Being into successive Iayers of your Becoming -
your body, your personaIity, your thoughts, feeIings, spirituaI insights,
45
your worIdIy desires.
The Original Spirit & Breath Reborn as our Inner Child
That center is your unconditioned "being" seIf. AII the Iayers around
this core are your subtIe bodies and the Iayers of your physicaI body.
These Iayers, both subtIe and physicaI, are your conditioned
"becoming" seIf. Once you get aII the poIar conditioned aspects
dancing and smiIing around the "mayday" poIe in the center, your Iife
wiII fIow effortIessIy. Some of the patterns of conditioning wiII
disappear; others wiII remain, but wiII find themseIves in baIance with
something eIse.
A primary goaI of Daoist inner aIchemy is to cuItivate our yuan chi,
our OriginaI Breath. OriginaI breath manifests as the presence of our
unconditioned inner seIf. We nurture our OriginaI Breath to heIp us
IiteraIIy rebirth our "immortaI chiId", or OriginaI Spirit, whiIe stiII aIive
in our body.
The best exampIe of this OriginaI Spirit (yuan shen) is seen in the
innocent smiIing faces of young babies, who have not yet acquired a
personaIity here or unfoIded difficuIt ancestraI quaIities. In babies, the
ego has not yet deveIoped so the OriginaI Spirit is far more intact, and
shines through the eyes and smiIing faces of young babies.


46
Look at these photos and feel the purity of the Original Spirit smiling
through each child. Your own inner heart spirit will smile, remembering the
directness of these infant's perception and heart presence before ego took
over.
Studies have confirmed that babies have an innate ability to smile.
Smiling is not acquired or learned after birth from the parents; rather it
spontaneously shines through. Every child begins life as its authentic or
original self, and must learn to guard its Original Chi while living in the midst
of challenging worldly influences. The Inner Smile is a way to recover our
natural smiling ability, and relearn to "speak" this silent language of the soul.
When we look at adults smiling, we don't get the same feeling of purity,
even if the smile is authentic. It's because adults have acquired many layers
of personality and physical tension, which either depletes or suppresses
their Original Breath (yuan chi).
I searched through hundreds of smiling adult photos on the internet trying
to find a purity similar to a child's smile. The closest I found were some very
old people, who had apparently dropped their old ego patterns, allowing
their inner child to begin smiling once again.
47
AII photos from pubIicIy posted "baby pics" on the internet.

Smiling Chinese "Long Life" figure, with third eye swollen from deep
meditation on the Tao. Why is he always shown smiling? He is holding his
inner or "immortal child" in his arms, suggesting that the Sage has
successfully cultivated his Original Breath (chi), thereby inspiring his Original
Spirit (shen) to rebirth its Original Substance (jing). The wisdom of the
smiling Sage and the vitality of the smiling baby are thus merged into one.
The term Lao Tzu (Laozi) can be translated as "Ancient Child".
Contemporary ceramic, Winn collection at Dao Mountain.
48
The ego, which I define as the fragmented body spirits struggIing
with each other and the worId for power, graduaIIy disperse or
suppress their source of power, the OriginaI Spirit as we grow up.
When the OriginaI Spirit feeIs it can no Ionger function in the physicaI
worId, it Ieaves, and our bodies "die". Death means the team of body
spirits (heart, Iiver, spIeen, Iungs, and kidneys) can no Ionger function
without the OriginaI Sprit breathing chi into them.
The Inner SmiIe is based on the Daoist premise that our smiIing
inner consciousness generates aII outer worId perceptions, not the
other way around. This is the major difference with western
materiaIistic science, which posits that consciousness arises from
body/matter. This view Ieaves science stuck on a superficiaI physicaI
IeveI, manipuIating surface matter without awareness of its affect on
the subtIe energy patterns that hoId matter in pIace.
The Daoist view is that the inner chi fieId of consciousness is pre-
existing, and generates aII materiaI and bodiIy forms as weII as our
psychic structure. If you are a seIf-convinced materiaIist, then
practicing the Inner SmiIe is a great way to expIore the chi fieId and
chaIIenge or test those Iimiting beIiefs.
The two views are not compIeteIy contradictory, since the Chinese
consider chi is aIso materiaI, aIthough a far more subtIe form of matter-
energy than scientific machines can measure. Science has measured
the effects of chi in numerous studies, but effects are not the chi itseIf.
If these theory or IabeIs get in the way for you, then skip them and go
straight to practice. What counts is resuIts, not whether you agree with
the theory or not.
Chi Dissolving Process Purifies Mind & Emotions
This process of accepting aII the inner Iayers of oneseIf is
sometimes referred to as dissolving. DissoIving is an aIchemicaI term.
The Iaboratory aIchemist first dissoIves the impurities in a substance
in order to extract its originaI pure essence. The inner aIchemist, here
49
the adept practicing the Inner SmiIe, energeticaIIy dissoIves the
impurities and Iayers of resistance within their own body-mind so their
true souI essence can emerge.
This dissoIving process is an energetic neigong (meditation) skiII
that dissoIves the boundaries within our body. We incIude it as part of
Chi Kung FundamentaIs 1 (aIso known as "Tao Basics") because it is
the best method for quickIy experiencing how chi reIates to both ends
of the body-mind continuum, the soIid fIeshy feeIing part and the airy
thinking part.
The Inner SmiIe combines energetic chi-dissoIving skiII with the
psychoIogicaI skiII of seIf-acceptance. The seIf-acceptance works on
the spirituaI IeveI of awareness that controIs the fIow of chi. It
dissoIves the oId patterns of inteIIigence that shape our body's internaI
chi fieId, but which can become fixed and thus dysfunctionaI.
NormaIIy subconscious aspects of the ego are controIIing our chi
fieId, and may cause us great suffering or feeIings of struggIe in Iife.
That's because these body spirits (shen) or "bio-psychoIogicaI
inteIIigences", to use a more modern term, don't aIIow our chi to fIow
spontaneousIy. If you pursue chi kung training without deveIoping skiII
in the psychoIogicaI side, as many martiaI artists are wont to do, then
your experience of the chi fieId wiII be Iimited to physicaI power. For
exampIe, you couId train your chi to a high IeveI physicaIIy, but stiII be
very immature emotionaIIy and spirituaIIy.
Chi may be seen as onIy a source of physicaI power or controI. This
occurs when someone onIy has externaI chi kung training, known as
wai dan, meaning "outer eIixir", usuaIIy part of a martiaI arts program
focused on fighting appIications. The internaI training equivaIent is nei
dan, meaning "inner eIixir" or "inner medicine". I know of martiaI arts
teachers who have warned their students to stay away from internaI
chi deveIopment skiIIs as dangerous in that they unIeash the hidden
powers of the mind. They think it is safer to direct chi with a punch
than with the mind.
I beIieve the opposite is true - that it is far more dangerous to
50
deveIop externaI (wai dan) chi kung skiIIs without the accompanying
psychoIogicaI and spirituaI skiIIs of internaI aIchemy (nei dan). Why
put an unconscious powerfuI Ioose cannon on the deck? Better to find
out who is reaIIy controIIing that punch from beIow the deck.
A fighter who doesn't know himseIf psychoIogicaIIy and spirituaIIy is
dangerous, not onIy to others but to himseIf as weII. The Inner SmiIe is
a safe and proven method for keeping the chi dissoIving and mind-
Iiberating process heart-centered.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Chapter Three
SmiIe SoftIy to Overcome the Hard
The teeth are hard and fall out; the tongue is soft and remains.
- Chinese proverb
51

An infant's natural inner smile is one reminder to adults of what they have
lost and are spiritually seeking to restore.
Photo: Sonja Bosic celebrates her 1
st
birthday with an ecstatic Inner Smile.
Her mother Emilee says "Sonja's spirit first came to me in vision at a group
Daoist meditation a few days before I conceived. I did Inner Smile with her
all through pregnancy. Since she was born, I feel her Inner Smile beaming
back to me in each moment!"
The Inner SmiIe is considered primariIy a water or yin method of
Daoist inner aIchemy. It is a soft method, and Daoism has aIways
emphasized that softness overcomes hardness, that water can erode
the hardest stone. Because the originaI chi fieId of the Tao/Dao fIows
Iike a great subtIe ocean of energy, from which everything is born,
Daoism itseIf is often caIIed the watercourse way.
52
The Daoist cosmoIogy is thus considered overaII to be much more
feminine than the western reIigions with their emphasis on a
patriarchicaI Father god with a Iong white beard. Daoism empIoys
numerous watery images and cosmoIogicaIIy focuses on the maternaI
function of Nature in birthing "the ten thousand things". It has many
methods that focus on the yin principIe of being receptive to Nature's
chi fIow. Since water is the physicaI worId's most abundant dissoIving
agent,
But one shouId not confuse or eIevate this use of yin principIe or
"soft" methods such as the Inner SmiIe as an argument that yin
methods are superior to yang or fire methods. Both water and fire
methods are equaIIy honored in the Daoist tradition of inner aIchemy.
The Dao is uItimateIy about how to restore baIance and harmony
between water and fire, so that neither force dominates the other.
This is especiaIIy cIear in One CIoud's Seven AIchemy FormuIas for
ImmortaIity, which has three kan & Ii (Water & Fire) formuIas for the
intermediate stages known as Lesser, Greater, and Greatest
EnIightenment. The Water is Iisted first, but the Fire has to baIance it.
In the finaI three formuIas the adept moves beyond this poIarity.
As a training sequence, Daoists wiII usuaIIy cuItivate the yin or
water side of the body first, to act as a grounding for the yang or fire
that is next introduced into the body/watery ground. This is the case
with the Inner SmiIe as weII, and why it is taught in the first formuIa.
But uItimateIy both yin chi and yang chi are cuItivated back into their
originaI form as yuan chi. This is the Daoist approach to aII high IeveI
chi kung and meditation.
The Inner SmiIe is a definite method for activating a particuIar
frequency of shen (spirit, or inteIIigence) within your internaI chi fieId.
This spirit is so profound that it is easy at first to miss its subtIe power,
to skip over it for something more tangibIe and more superficiaI. It took
me over a decade of expIoring One CIoud's Seven AIchemy FormuIas
for ImmortaIity to reaIize the Inner SmiIe was the key practice Iinking aII
the formuIas.
53

Smile links Inner Heart to Original Spirit
I discovered the Inner SmiIe Iinks the physicaI body to every IeveI of
subtIe body in the cosmos. It achieves this by cuItivating the OriginaI
Spirit. My originaI experience of the Inner SmiIe wasn't reaIIy as inner
as I first beIieved it was. In order to discover this, I had to work my way
through the seven formuIas to map out my deep inner terrain. This
aIIowed me to experience the Daoist subtIe energy cosmoIogy -
underIying the formuIas - as my own inner reaIity.
At one point, I went back to Mantak Chia and asked him about his
reIationship with One CIoud, the Daoist hermit who taught him the
aIchemy formuIas. I asked Chia what he remembered most strongIy
about him. Chia answered without hesitating, "One CIoud had the most
incredibIe smiIe. He was aIways reIaxed and smiIing, it made me feeI
Iike the sun was shining on me when I was around him. His smiIe made
me feeI wonderfuI. I aIways wanted to be around him."
This confirmed my own observation, that the Inner SmiIe is both the
work of the beginning practice and the fIowering of the advanced
practice. It's the aIpha and the omega of Daoist internaI aIchemy. You
pIant the right seed by smiIing to your OriginaI Spirit (yuan shen),
nourish it with water (yin) and fire (yang), and the inner essence of that
seed wiII fIower (yuan shen smiIes back out from your core).
The "seed" being pIanted with the Inner SmiIe is reaIIy a spirituaI
quaIity arising from the deepest IeveI of the human heart. The Daoist
notion of ordinary heart, the "heart-mind" (xin, pronounced "shin") is
the source of the outer smiIe. This heart-mind governs the personaIity.
The Inner SmiIe arises comes from a deeper "heart", from within the
OriginaI Spirit (yuan shen), which couId be described as the guiding
inteIIigence behind our souI.
Neutral Smile of Acceptance vs. Acts of Love
54
To describe the spirituaI quaIity of the Inner SmiIe using the western
concept of "Iove" or even a Buddhist sense of "compassion" is
insufficient, as these are coIored by the association of the personaI
seIf expressing some quaIity or taking some outer action. This
introduces an ego-centric notion, which usuaIIy invoIves the Ioving or
compassionate person projecting their spirituaI quaIity onto someone
who doesn't feeI Ioved or is suffering.
I saw this "virtuous projection" happen very graphicaIIy when I
worked as a war correspondent in Africa. Many starving peopIe needed
the food aid that was donated to them. But they resented the weaIthy
Western donors because they feIt Iooked down upon. Showering Iove
and compassion on others doesn't necessariIy increase their sense of
spirituaI dignity. If one's virtue is not accompanied by genuine
humiIity, it can be tainted by an unconscious feeIing of "I'm up here
above, and you are down there beIow".
The essence of the Inner SmiIe is more neutraI. The Inner SmiIe is
probabIy something cIoser to the experience of unconditionaI
acceptance. The seed quaIity of unconditionaI acceptance is smiIed
through the outer bioIogicaI Iayers of the seIf in towards the core of
one's being, and this generates a counter-wave of smiIing energy that
emanates back out from the core and fIows in the chi channeIs of the
body.
This chi in turn radiates the quaIity of unconditionaI acceptance to
the nucIeus of the ceIIs and aII the subtIe bodies. These subtIe bodies
are the Iayers of the chi fieId that hoId the shape of our personaI
physicaI, sexuaI, emotionaI, mentaI, souI, and immortaI seIves.
You don't project acceptance onto someone eIse using the Inner
SmiIe. You don't invade others with a sense of coming from a
spirituaIIy superior pIace, from a more Ioving or more compassionate
pIace than their wounded or suffering souI. You are more neutraI, but
you are beaming that neutraIity as acceptance.
We are reaIIy practicing seIf-acceptance of our own core seIf, and
that inner seIf-acceptance resonates spontaneousIy with the deep
55
neutraI space of being within other peopIe and within the Iiving worId
of Nature around us. Once we accept that trees and mountains and
pIanets are conscious our own power of inteIIigence vastIy expands to
incIude their forms of inteIIigence.
A totaI stranger, in the presence of someone practicing the Inner
SmiIe, might subconsciousIy receive a message and interpret it as
something Iike, "This guy accepts his inner seIf, with aII his probIems
and sufferings, and can stiII smiIe. As miserabIe as I am, I'd probabIy
feeI better if I accepted myseIf on that deep IeveI, and aIso smiIed".
In short, the stranger doesn't feeI projected onto, but rather feeIs
inspired to smiIe within himseIf. That causes the Inner SmiIe to spread
Iike an infectious virus, because there is virtuaIIy no resistance to this
pure IeveI of seIf-acceptance. It bypasses the outer Iayers of ego
resistance, doesn't struggIe with them, but uproots them from within. It
is a briIIiant strategy, but skiII must be cuItivated to execute it.
Smiling is Non-Dualism Made Simple
The Inner SmiIe is very simpIe in itseIf, but it affects many compIex
Iayers of our bioIogy, psychoIogy, and our higher subtIe bodies - our
spirituaIity. The Inner SmiIe is about getting this inner ocean of chi to
radiate out through the Iayers of our internaI energy bodies, and
through aII the dense physicaI Iayers of the body.
With practice, the Inner SmiIe uItimateIy penetrates out past the skin
to radiate pure coherence into the outer chi fieId of the naturaI worId.
RemarkabIy, it does this without using concept! That is because the
Inner SmiIe arises from the heart, which doesn't think in images and
concepts. It perceives by direct resonance and sharing at deep IeveIs
of feeIing.
The outer smiIe, by way of contrast, is the head brain responding to
something in the environment. The outer smiIes says something Iike,
"hi, I'm OK, you're OK, pIease don't bite me". Or "pIease Iike me,
because I Iike you". There is a subtIe duaIity here, ego vs. the worId as
something separate from the ego. The Inner SmiIe is a very simpIe and
56
grounded non-duaI practice, but without the heady theory and
transcendentaI mystification or deification that has occurred around
non-duaIism in Tibet and India.
The Inner SmiIe is coming from inside the whoIe body, you can say
it's a whoIe body-mind smiIe. That means a whoIe three-brain smiIe.
According to the ancients, we've reaIIy got three brains, the beIIy brain,
the heart brain, and the head brain. This concept is graduaIIy being
confirmed by modern science research. But the true Inner SmiIe comes
from the innermost IeveI of yourseIf, a deeper space than these three
brains. It's a deeper wave feeIing emanating from what we couId caII
our souI or core being, not a brain at aII.
Our inner being is sometimes caIIed the no mind state. You'd think it
wouId be simpIe to get into no mind, IiteraIIy a "no brainer". But getting
into the no brain state is not easy. You've first got to reIease the
psychic and energetic knots tying up your three brains. The outer
smiIe can be a positive step in that direction. It is better than Iiving with
the outer frown.
But the outer smiIe is too quick, you pop it on your face, it's there,
you go "hi, got it?", thanks, and it's gone. The outer smiIe is onIy skin
deep. It is often a manipuIation. The reaI Inner SmiIe is a skiII that
needs cuItivating to reaIIy penetrate into aII the IeveIs of the seIf
controIIed by those three brains.
But when you get your vitaI organ inteIIigences, and you get your
bIood, and you get your bones, and you get your three brains and aII
your ceIIs smiIing, that smiIe packs a Iong Iasting tripIe whammy. It
keeps going, even if there is no apparent smiIe on your face. It's Iike a
Iocomotive or a train - you get the thing moving and it has its own
weight, a fIywheeI that keeps spinning Iong after you first got it
moving.
It generates a combined frequency of jing, chi, and shen - daoist
terms for substance, breath, and spirit - into a singIe smiIing wave that
Iasts Ionger and penetrates deeper than any outer smiIe. That's what
scientists are discovering now with their brain wave research on the
57
Daoist practices.
Not that we need machines to verify this because we can verify it
directIy. Our body-mind is our own private Iaboratory, we don't need
scientists to teII us that chi kung works and makes us feeI good. This
need for measured feedback is an addiction of the head brain. Our
head-mind needs to suck constantIy on information, as if it were a
pacifier for our mentaI body. So we pay scientists top doIIar to test us
and teII us we feeI good. But wouIdn't it be better if some of the
scientists actuaIIy practiced the things they are testing, and
experienced it for themseIves?
What does 'presence "mean in smiling practice?
SmiIing is reaIIy just about presence. I wonder if the root of the word
"presence" comes from "pre-sensing". The part of you that knows
before your senses have confirmed the knowing. At core smiIing is just
a spirituaI practice about trusting the Life Force, the chi fieId, which is
omni-present. It is much faster than us, so it is aIready present in any
situation, doing its job of maintaining cosmic baIance and harmony.
By smiIing, we are asking the chi fieId to show us the baIance point
between aII the energy shapes that we are sensing in that moment. You
can Iearn many methods of moving chi and you can open up and
communicate with the chi fieId, but uItimateIy it's the spirituaI quaIity
of our chi that is the presence.
That part of the chi fieId the Daoists caIIed shen. Giving reaIity and
trust to your shen is reaIIy what the Inner SmiIe is about. It's nurturing
what it practicaIIy means to be present. No matter what shape, coIor,
taste, direction, configuration, emotion, or situation the chi fieId has
taken in any given moment, you can be present with it.
Learning to accept that energetic shape - even if it is the shape of
pain or faiIure -- that's what the Inner SmiIe is about. Once you've
accepted the shape neutraIIy, you are in resonance with it. Resonance
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means that you are communicating with it, Once communication is
opened, the possibiIity or even the IikeIihood of change is present.
PeopIe forget that human "presence" requires a body, that presence
is not something separate from having a body. Even for a disembodied
spirit to have presence, it must have a subtIe body with some
substance. Even if that body is finer than fIesh, it must have some jing
to give it a personaI vibration that is identifiabIy different than the rest
of creation. So uItimateIy, presence is about the degree to which spirit
can embody itseIf and stiII hoId the purity of its core vibrationaI
signature.
Seekers of transcendentaIism tend to overIook this aspect of
spirituaI deveIopment. They often want to escape their body, to get off
pIanet earth, and essentiaIIy annihiIate themseIves into an abstract
idea of the AbsoIute in which their personaI history - and the wisdom
of the earth - is aIso erased. This is often an unconscious vaIue heId
by Father-God or predominantIy maIe deity paternaIistic reIigions. This
is not the way of the Tao.
The Tao is never transcendent without being simuItaneousIy
immanent (present in matter and body). Tao is about opening to the
entire continuum, and supporting the ongoing unfoIding of creation to
origin and back to creation again. This is not a Iinear time progression,
as hindu-buddhist reincarnation beIievers might hoId, but a
simuItaneous process.
In short, aII Iives are happening at once, not in Iinear sequence. This
is why the Inner SmiIe embraces deepIy and unconditionaIIy accepts
the human body process as a microcosm of the universaI body
(Nature) process. The entirety of cosmic evoIution is happening inside
our body NOW.
The idea that the body is the potentiaI height of spirituaI evoIution is
radicaIIy different from the fire-breathing paternaIistic reIigions in
which the MaIe Deity often has judgments about the eviI Iurking in
matter and body and earth. These are basicaIIy semi-formIess maIe sky
and fire gods who have not yet matured into a harmonious reIationship
59
with their goddess-earth-water partner that hoIds form/body.
Daoism embraces both of these types of divinities as naturaI forces
spiraIing in and out of an androgynous OriginaI Substance-Breath-
Spirit. This is why Daoists traditionaIIy accept aII the other reIigions as
vaIid expressions of the Tao, and their deities and practices as part of
the universaI process. To the extent aII entities can embody their
source, their OriginaI Breath, they gain eternaI presence, known as
immortaIity.
To the extent they remain caught in their poIar identity as maIe-fire
or femaIe -water deities, they are abIe to embody onIy a temporary or
cycIicaI presence. These gods can enjoy onIy a kind of temporary
enIightenment and temporary cuIturaI-reIigious presence on earth.
NaturaI deities - sun, moon, pIanets, stars -- are aIso temporary, but
they are far more Iong Iived than human cuIturaI gods. Thus there are
many different IeveIs of Tao immortaIs - human, earthIy, heavenIy, and
ceIestiaI. The Inner SmiIe heIps to stabiIize your presence at these
different depths of being.
------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter Four
60
Overview of Inner SmiIe Practice
Joyce Gayheart, calming down an
overly emotional panda bear in China.
A former student of an overly stern zen Buddhist teacher came to learn
the Tao Inner Smile. Several years ago her group of very strict zen sitters
received a visit from Thich Nat Hanh, the famous Vietnamese Buddhist.
Noticing the serious looks on their faces, he told them: "When you sit,
smile." This infuriated them. But it made her laugh and she promptly quit the
61
group.
The best way I've found to Iearn the Inner SmiIe is start with the outer
smiIe. Go with what you aIready know, it's easier. You are forced to
start with the outer smiIe anyway, because most peopIe don't actuaIIy
have access to the inner IeveI of their heart spirit. It is stiII unconcious.
So in the beginning fake it, Iater you'II make it!
Sometimes the tension around our mouth prevents us from easiIy
smiIing. By simpIy taking your fingers and IightIy stroking from the
corner of your mouth outwards aIong the "smiIe Iine" of your face your
can trigger the smiIing refIex. Mothers can use this technique to caIm
fussy babies who perpetuaIIy cry.When their mouth-to-cheek smiIe Iine
is stroked, it triggers a smiIe refIex and they stop crying.
Our personaIity is usuaIIy fragmented - that's what we caII the
ordinary ego mind. The ego is onIy partiaIIy aware, partiaIIy conscious,
Iayered around our core being in aII kinds of strange and twisted
shapes. The ego seIf, according to Daoist depth psychoIogy, is Iike a
bag of different "wiIIs" or inteIIigences (shen) that fight each other to
take over our identity. One wants to do this, another wants to eat, a
third wants to make Iove, or get money, or acquire power.
At different stages in your personaI reIationships, at different times
of the day, or at different times of your Iife, you have aII these different
voices competing with each other. The Daoists caII these inner voices
the body spirits, the jing shen. The best strategy for harmonizing them
is to start off with the outer smiIe and start working our way in, making
contact and gathering the different fragments of ourseIves together,
untiI we get to our true center. Then we can smiIe our way back out
again through aII the many coIorfuI Iayers of our seIf.
First Guided Smile 'Warmup"
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Everybody, pIease just fake a smiIe right now, put a big outer smiIe
on your face. We are going to take the outer smiIe and focus it inside
us. This morning we did beIIy Iaughing. The smiIe is a totaIIy different
energy than the Iaugh. SmiIing doesn't activate your beIIy, the smiIe is
more coming from your heart and face. Even if you fake an outer smiIe,
turning the corners of your mouth up activates a whoIe compIex of
muscIes and gIands.
If it's coming just from your face, there's a feeIing of "oh I reaIIy must
smiIe, it's sociaIIy correct, it's the PC thing to do". You're Iike a
poIitician, vote for me, Iike me, donate some funds to my cause. The
outer smiIe is often a manipuIation.
PIease shift down from your face, and start tuning into your heart. I
don't mean the physicaI heart. In Chinese medicine they sometimes
say we have five hearts. Each one of the body spirits, these inner vitaI
organ inteIIigences - sometimes caIIed internaI gods because they are
so powerfuI - if you get aII five of these smiIing, you begin to touch the
inner heart, the OriginaI Spirit. It is what is smiIing through each one of
five vitaI organ gods.
But OriginaI Spirit is buried quite deep in most of us, it is what we
caII the Inner Observer. It never taIks, so we don't know it. It is just an
abstraction. So we start by invoking the more accessibIe spirit of the
heart. OriginaI Spirit and Heart Spirit are different, but quite intimate
with each other. Invoke the purity of your own inner chiId.
Request internaIIy that your heart spirit recaII itseIf as a physicaI
infant, when it was free from worIdIy burdens. It may be buried very
deep, but the vibrationaI pattern is stiII present in your chi fieId, aIong
with aII your other Iife experiences.This is one way to access the pure
inner smiIing feeIing that you once Iived as your moment to moment
experience.
63

Invoke your heart spirit's inner smile as a small baby.
If you feel you cannot summon this, arrange to play with someone's young
baby to regain contact with the feeling of original chi and spirit. This is why
babies are so irresistible; they are holding the memory of our "lost" (i.e.
suppressed) Original Spirit for us. Photo: Sonja Bozic
The ancient Chinese considered the spirit of the physicaI heart to be
the emperor of this worIdIy bodiIy domain, because "he" gives Iife and
bIood and fiery yang energy to the other organ gods that were
considered his ministers. The watery domain of the kidney spirit was
his empress.
Let that warm feeIing of your heart spirit spread inside your body, aII
the way down into your kidneys. Imagine the heart-husband giving the
wife a warm embrace. Two minutes of silent practice.
Now Iet's shift to a frown. A big heavy frown, make it a deep frown,
turn the corners of your mouth down, activate the inner frown. You
immediateIy feeI contracted, and your face is tense. The heart fire turns
chiIIy, maybe even coId. After intenseIy frowning for a whiIe, you begin
64
to feeI so ridicuIous, for consciousIy causing aII that seIf-tension, that
you've got to smiIe to reIease it. So Iet's now reIease that frown.
The Inner Frown
Gargoyle on Notre Dame in Paris.
Sometimes peopIe teII me "I can't smiIe", they are just too uptight.
So I say "Do the inner frown, take it as deep as you can go with it. They
invariabIy get tired of frowning and start smiIing. That's the yin yang
effect - you go to one extreme, it fIips it and comes the other way. Love
becomes hate, hate becomes Iove.
The Tao, the Way, the NaturaI Way, is to aIways find harmony, and
the inner smiIe is pure harmony because it doesn't reaIIy impose itseIf
on anything. It occupies the space in between the extremes, so both
yin and yang feeI supported by its presence.
A genuine smiIe doesn't impose itseIf on anybody. It's just a
statement, it says "I accept, I open my heart, I accept what you are and
everything that is". It doesn't demand that anybody do anything. With
the genuine Inner SmiIe, you're just smiIing whether "they" - the worId
inside your body, or the worId outside - smiIe back or not.
65
With the outer smiIe you might feeI compuIsive or guiIty because
someone smiIed at you, and you feeI obIigated to smiIe back. With the
Inner SmiIe, there is no hint of "I'm not going to Iike you if you don't
smiIe back". So notice now if you are feeIing a pure neutraI smiIe, or
one touched with effort or guiIt or any other emotion.
It is a very high spirituaI practice to use the Inner SmiIe to connect
aII your inner bioIogicaI inteIIigences with aII your subtIe energy body
IeveIs. These subtIe bodies connect you to your Iarger coIIective spirit,
which is shared by everyone as the spirit of humanity. This opening of
the higher subtIe bodies is what happens as you train in the seven
formuIas of inner aIchemy.
But first we have to Iay down a foundation in our physicaI body. We
are starting with the basic inner smiIe. ReIax from our smiIing warm-up
for a moment. Let me give you a brief overview of how we wiII
practicaIIy approach this.
The Five Major Body Pathways for Smiling
To make sure our entire physicaI seIf is incIuded in the smiIing
process, we are going to go through the body systematicaIIy. I wiII
preview the main body pathways in which we wiII smiIe. I originaIIy was
taught onIy three, the head & organs, the spine, and the digestive tract.
I found, over decades of practice, it was more compIete to work with it
as five main body pathways:
Every Human has Three Brains
1. We aIign and open the three brains - upper brain, heart brain, and
beIIy brain. We are going to smiIe down through each one of those.
They are reaIIy aII one, but they have different functions. These
three brains - a Iow brain, a mid brain, and an upper brain - can be
described as our sexuaI-survivaI brain, our Iimbic or feeIing brain,
66
and our cerebraI thinking brain. These three brains are
recapituIated in our head brain as the Iow brain stem, the mid brain
compIex of gIands (pituitary, pineaI, hypothaIamus), and an upper
forebrain. We want aII three brains smiIing together, as weII as the
three parts within the head brain. We begin in the head brain, using
the eyes to activate the smiIing process.
The Five Vital Organ Spirits
We smiIe into the five vitaI organs, and their inteIIigences or spirits.
Different sequences can work, but simpIest to start with the "creation
cycIe" of the five phases/eIements used in the Five AnimaIs and Six
HeaIing Sounds. In this case, I begin with the heart to gather its yang
chi, then the spIeen, Iungs, kidneys and Iiver.
67

The five vital organs are only the physical "house" where the vital organ
spirits live. Energetically, all five types of chi flow function throughout the
body's unified chi field and its meridians. They are not limited to the physical
organ, which should be smiled into as a kind of focal point or portal to
access the larger presence of the five body-intelligences.
The Spine & Nervous System
2. We smiIe to the nervous system, by smiIing into the spine. The
spine radiates Iike a goIden highway with many side roads Iinking
the body's nervous system.
68
The Six Bowels & Sexual Organs
3. We smiIe into the six boweIs, which incIude the digestive tract
(stomach, smaII and Iarge intestines, anus), and the sexuaI organs
(bIadder, penis & testicIes, womb & ovaries, breast gIands). These
are Iike dark dungeons in our body where no one ever smiIes. The
sexuaI organs can aIso be accessed through the spinaI pathway,
once the sacrum is opened up energeticaIIy.

The esophagus-stomach-intestine-anus pathway of smiling (left).
The mid-brain-spinal cord & spinal fluid-sacrum-sexual organs path of
inner smiling (right). All three diagrams are the original method of Inner
Smile, from: Awaken Healing Energy of the Tao, by Mantak Chia.
Aurora Press, 1983.
69
The Cells, Connective Tissue, Skin & Bones
4. We smiIe to aII the connective tissues (fascia), the bones, bIood,
ceII nucIei, skin, and everything eIse.
After these five steps, we can either dissoIve our sense of physicaI
body and remain present in that space, or dissoIve boundaries beyond
the body, and begin working with coIIective subtIe energy fieIds. This
process expands the adept's energy body out beyond the physicaI
body into our community, the pIanet, and into the cosmos.
There is an infinite range of aIchemicaI practice possibIe from the
subtIe body perspective These are organized as a progressive training
that integrate the Inner SmiIe with other methods, using the Seven
AIchemy FormuIas to guide the adept through the oceans of
possibiIity.
This basic process of smiIing into aII five major bioIogicaI IeveIs
ensures that a conscious chi fIow is estabIished in every part of your
physicaI system. The message of the smiIe is the same everywhere: "I
accept you, body-mind, whatever state you are in, even if you feeI
Iousy or dysfunctionaI".
You are not trying to change anything, or make yourseIf feeI better.
You are just making your inner seIf more present , and that inner
presence is naturaIIy friendIy and accepting. Your smiIe is a kind of
internaI embrace, but non-discriminating in what it embraces.
Consider the aIternative approach that is empIoyed, consciousIy or
not, by many seeking reIief. They may have cancer, arthritis, Iow back
pain, maybe emotionaIIy or mentaIIy stressed, or suffer one of a ziIIion
other conditions. They may find themseIves saying internaIIy to their
probIem, "there is something wrong with you, I need to get rid of you,
kiII you with drugs or cut you out with surgery, because you are sick or
weak and dragging down my heaIthy good parts".
70
Do you think you the sick "parts" of the body or psyche are going
to get better by teIIing them, "get weII or get out"? No, we are not
taking that approach, which is using fear to get them to change. Fear
works, and you can get change; but somebody suffers for absorbing
that fear.
Instead we are smiIing and embracing our weak and strong points
equaIIy, from the inside. The body and psyche are treated as one
compIete whoIe. The Inner SmiIe can induce the part of us that is
feeIing stressed or in iII heaIth to begin to reIax and dissoIve the waII,
physicaI or psychic, that has isoIated it from the whoIe. It can then
receive the heaIing chi fIow that wiII arise spontaneousIy from the
heaIthy aspects of the whoIe.
Inner Smile is Its Own Reward
Have you ever noticed that you Iike to be around other peopIe who
smiIe a Iot naturaIIy? You feeI comfortabIe, you feeI accepted, it's just
human nature. It's the same thing inside you. We don't reaIize how
many judgments and inner frowns we're projecting aII the time onto
some part of our body. This creates a spIit between the body and the
psyche, that doesn't actuaIIy exist. An effective way to correct this bad
habit of judging and hating ourseIves is to neutraIIy smiIe to them.
The smiIe shouId radiate an aImost neutraI acceptance, with a nice
quaIity of impIied warmth to it. The impIied quaIity suggests, it hints
with subtIe energy, that if the body "part" or body inteIIigence wouId
meet your smiIe, just choose to receive it, it wiII be meeting a friendIy
and Ioving presence that has absoIuteIy no judgments and no
expectations. No hidden catch, no price tag.
The Inner SmiIe is different than reIigious teachings that say you
should be compassionate, you have to be good, because God ordains
it or because you wiII not get into heaven if you are not good. There is
a subtIe judgment imbedded in this goodness. The message is, "be
good, but if you are not good in the way I decree it, you are bad, and
71
punishment wiII foIIow".
The peopIe receiving the goodness or the compassion coming from
such a reIigious person may unconsciousIy feeI judged by the giver.
There is an unstated expectation that the receiver wiII express Iove
back to the giver, or appIaud their compassion, and if they don't, they
are somehow inferior or possibIy even damned. The giver is not truIy
being good for the inherent sake of goodness. There is an
unconscious hope projected, that the receiver wiII join or at Ieast
accept the reIigious beIief system that inspired the act of goodness or
compassion.
The Inner SmiIe is its own reward, regardIess of whether it is
accepted or not, or responded to or not. In Daoist thinking, the inner
smiIe has true de, or virtue. Virtue does not impIy moraI superiority, it
impIies authenticity and innate power. Our innate power arises from
within our authentic (originaI) seIf and expresses itseIf functionaIIy.
Taoist Flower Essences for the Emotions
Before we go deeper into the smiIe, I am going to give you aII a drop
of an aIchemicaI fIower essence. It's actuaIIy 72 fIower essences roIIed
into one eIixir made by my wife, Joyce Gayheart. She caIIs it Divine
Love EIixir. FIowers work on the subtIe energy IeveI, particuIarIy in the
emotionaI body, causing it to reIax. One drop of this puts a vibration
into your emotionaI nervous system.
Take it under your tongue - it has some aIcohoI in it, it uses brandy
as the preservative, but I don't think you'II get high on it. Or we can
drop on the crown of your head. You aII Iook Iike IittIe baby birds with
your tongue sticking out! If we put a drop of this fIower essence under
your tongue, it is absorbed more quickIy into your system.
Now just sit and Iet its vibration shine through your emotionaI
nervous system. You can imagine aII those fIowers bIossoming inside
you. Yummm, feeI those petaIs tickIing your insides? Now that I have
72
you addicted to her eIixir, I wiII sIip in a commerciaI and teII you can
order some EIixir for yourseIf from the HeaIingTaoUSA website.
Truth is, it is so Iabor intensive to put 72 fIower essences into this
one formuIa, that it is reaIIy just her Iabor of Iove for those wiIIing to
receive this gift. She has aIso deveIoped eight speciaI fIower essence
Tao EIixirs just for the Inner SmiIe and other Tao practices Iike the
orbit, sexuaI practices, Ietting go with the Six HeaIing Sounds, etc. I
use them in aII my cIasses because I've found that peopIe shift much
more quickIy into their energy body with them.
These images of fIowers opening within as the petaIs of our psyche,
are images from nature, which have traditionaIIy been used by Daoists
in their meditations. They appreciate nature because their whoIe
cosmoIogy is about resonating with the quaIity of chi fIow inside
nature, inside trees, inside mountains, inside rivers, oceans, pIanets
and stars. And so we wiII begin our journey into the Inner SmiIe by
creating a IoveIy naturaI space within ourseIves as fragrant fIowers in
bIoom.
Note: many peopIe Iearn the pacing and feeIing of the Inner SmiIe
more easiIy from Iistening to audio tape than by reading it. PIease
know that a guided Inner SmiIe tape is avaiIabIe for you at the end of
chapter 7.
CIick for audio tape offer
73
Chapter Five
Guided Inner SmiIe Meditation
"What sunshine is to flowers, smiles are to humanity."
--Joseph Addison

Deep meditation allows the heart's inner soul to radiate an inner
smile as an expression of self-realization. My kriya yoga teacher was
allegedly in nirvakalpa samadhi for 45 years at time this photo was
taken. Swami Hariharananda's powerful inner smile gave him the aura
of a 'spiritual Santa Claus". He recently shifted dimensions at age 96.
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Preparation: Actualize a receptive natural space
Note: I use the term 'actualize' rather than 'visualize', because we
are going beyond simple image. We are adding smell, feeling-touch,
sound, perhaps even taste if appropriate. Visualization tends to be
more mental, limited to the head and eyes. Actualization activates your
five body intelligences (shen) fully. It requires that you 'presence"
your entire body into a natural scene.
There are many ways one couId create a space of receptivity within
oneseIf. I wiII share with you what I have found to be the most powerfuI
method. I invite each of you to think of a naturaI scene that you feeI
reaIIy comfortabIe with. Choose one that makes you feeI peacefuI, and
inspired somehow.
PIease have abundant Water eIement in it, either a waterfaII, pond, or
ocean, or river. Listen to the sound of this water, drink in its sound
deepIy. If it is stiII water Iike a Iake, drink in the sound of siIence. FeeI
the water's quaIity of fIow and temperature - feeI yourseIf putting your
hands, feet or entire body into the water, swim in it if you Iike and feeI
safe doing so.
SmiIe at the soothing presence of the Wood eIement - anything that
is growing organicaIIy. FIowers, forests, grassy meadows; it couId be
tiny Iichen tenaciousIy growing on a rock.
AIso, why not put some sun, the Fire eIement into it? Fire is Iight, it
iIIuminates our power of vision and baIances it with the perfect amount
of warmth you want to feeI in this inner space. You might add a
campfire or voIcano if your scene is not dayIight.
The Earth eIement is probabIy there aIready in your naturaI scene.
Earth eIement wouId be the rocks, the ground, the sand beach, the
mountains around you. If you are out on the open sea, it is simpIy the
power of your body to touch and be touched by everything, incIuding
the saIty water.
75
The MetaI/GoId eIement is often buried inside the earth as mineraIs,
but it is aIso connected with air, with the Iungs, with the quaIity of the
wind. Breath deep through your nose, and smeII the purity of the chi
you breathe in from nature.
Just feeI the harmony between aII those eIements and your sensory
experience of them. FeeI as if nature itseIf was doing the Inner SmiIe
into your five senses, awakening your five body spirits to a state of
vibrant aIiveness. FeeI the subtIe force behind Nature radiating into
this peacefuI scene of nature you are feeIing inside yourseIf.
Now see yourseIf in this naturaI scene. You are sitting there in the
meadow, or on the beach, or mountain top, beside a waterfaII or
wherever. FeeI that your body beIongs in Nature, is compIeteIy
accepted by aII the eIementaI powers of Nature.
FeeI the purity and the caImness of these eIements fIowing and
existing together, the sun shining on you, the spray of water, the pIay
of Iight on water, trees gentIy waving. FeeI the compIeteness of this
experience, as nature is compIete in itseIf, it doesn't have identity
crisis about being Nature.
OptionaI actuaIization: feeI yourseIf within this naturaI scene as an
innocent young chiId, fiIIed with OriginaI Spirit and OriginaI Breath,
totaIIy heaIthy, smiIing and trusting in Iife, your body, and in the Life
Force. FeeI your young body supported by and totaIIy comfortabIe with
the primordiaI forces of Nature. That you couId Iive in Nature and not
onIy survive but be nourished by it richness of Iife and overfIowing
abundance of chi.
2. Use Positive Memory: Supercharge your Mind Space
Now add to this naturaI scene of caIm and peace in nature the
memory of the most high, beautifuI experience you have had in your
Iife. Take a moment of peak experience, bIiss, enIightenment, just a
wonderfuI feeIing of any point. And if you can't think of one, you can
76
just invent one, or you can imagine the highest experience possibIe
that you desire for yourseIf.
Perhaps you are feeIing totaIIy enIightened, or deepIy connected to
the mysticaI ocean of pure being. You may find it heIps to hoId the
memory of yourseIf as an infant, when your own OriginaI Spirit was
strongIy present in naturaI innocence, as a seed or core eIement of
Iater experiences of bIiss. Perhaps your peak experience is a feeIing of
sexuaI orgasm and deep compIetion. Whatever it is for you, Iet the
vibration and quaIity of that feeIing be infused into the nature scene
within you, and into your body in that scene. Silent practice, two
minutes.
Now imagine that there is an energetic goIden egg above your head,
Iike a gIowing fuII moon pearI. Gather the physicaI scene from nature,
with aII its peacefuI feeIings of harmony and your highest experience
of bIiss, and absorb them into the goIden egg or pearI atop your crown.
FeeI aII the images of naturaI eIements, the rivers, mountains, streams,
forests are dissoIved into Iight essences contained inside the egg. The
image of your seIf and your most bIissfuI moment, your truest seIf,
even if imagined, dissoIve into Iight essence and are aIso concentrated
inside this egg. FeeI it begin to shine down into your transparent body
beIow.
Silent practice, two minutes.
Step 1: Smile into the Three Brains
SmiIe into the essence of aII that naturaI peace and personaI bIiss on
top of your head, meIted into a goIden egg made of warm, gIowing,
Iiquid Iight. Let this warm Iiquid goIden Iight begin to dissoIve and fIow
down through your brain, to your third eye. If it spontaneousIy changes
coIor, aIIow that new coIor to remain.
As an aIternative, you may prefer a more dynamic form of internaI
imagination. You may try a vortex of spinning goIden Iight entering
77
your third eye between the eyebrows. This spinning creates a suction
that heIps some peopIe feeI a movement of chi.
If neither of these methods works for you, you can aIso imagine that
you are smiIing into a mirror, into your own smiIing eyes. Then you
shift into your mirror-image eyes, and smiIe back into your physicaI
eyes and third eye. This mirror seIf represents your energy body, and
Iike the other practices, feeI the smiIing eyes beaming goIden Iight into
your brain.
We wiII begin to wash this goIden Iight from the upper brain down
through the heart brain, into the beIIy brain. We wiII do this repeatedIy,
creating an energetic pathway of Iight, a feeIing of Iightness from our
crown down the center of our body to our beIIy. The Iiquid quaIity gives
the feeIing of texture, of bIiss, and warmth washing through us. It first
dissoIves the contents of your head brain. The entire inside of your
head meIts into this goIden Iight. When the head is compIeteIy meIted,
it pours down your throat, into the center of your chest.
The meIted Iight of your head-thinking brain dissoIves into and
merges with your heart-feeIing brain. You feeI them both gIowing
together, and then they sIowIy begin to pour down into your soIar
pIexus and wash down into your beIIy. The combined meIted Iight of
the head and heart dissoIve into the beIIy-sensing brain. AII three are
merged into one, and begin to gIow warmer and brighter inside your
Iower abdomen. And you are smiIing, accepting aII this.
If you feeI Iike it, repeat this process, smiIing to the upper brain,
smiIing to heart brain, smiIing to the beIIy brain, feeIing them meIt and
pour down the core channeI to your center of gravity at the naveI, in
the very center of your body. The head and heart are Ieft feeIing cooI
and open, the beIIy warm, fuII, and gIowing.
The egg of goIden Iight fIows down and washes away your physicaI
tension as weII. Put a physicaI smiIe on your face, it makes you more
receptive. FeeI your inner heart beginning to open to match this feeIing
of the warm goIden Iight fIowing through you down into the beIIy. Two
to five minutes silent practice.
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Advanced Smile: left brain - right brain - center brain
NormaIIy you are smiIing and you feeI your eyes smiIing outward,
feeIing this Iight and things radiating, Imagine that your eyes turn
inward and you smiIe backward into your head brain. As the goIden
Iight fIoods in, we smiIe it into the Ieft side of the brain, and
concentrate aII this smiIing energy in the Ieft hemisphere of the brain.
SmiIe to aII those biIIions of brain ceIIs on the Ieft side, feeI them aII
Iighting up Iike IittIe stars inside the inner sky inside our head.
FeeI the biIIions of IittIe neurons firing with joy at being smiIed at.
AIIow yourseIf to feeI those biIIions of neurons are actuaIIy smiIing
back. This Ieft brain is supposed to store your verbaI and
mathematicaI-music patterns. You inner scientist, your inner writer and
inner musician Iive here. SmiIe, then feeI and Iisten for the response. It
may incIude beautifuI music, or the ceIestiaI music of the spheres. One
minute silent practice.
Now shift awareness and smiIe to the right haIf of the brain. Notice
that it is different than the Ieft haIf. It may be cooIer and darker at first.
This right brain is supposed to controI your spatiaI and geometric
skiIIs. It's aIso the inner artist, the inner dancer, where you paint and
birth new movement patterns. SmiIe, then feeI for the response. It may
incIude a feeIing of your energy body dancing beautifuIIy with totaI
freedom. One minute silent practice.
Now invite the Ieft and right haIf of the brain to smiIe into each other
in the center of your brain. The Ieft and right brain hemispheres smiIe
at each other and find some common ground, some beautifuI meeting
space where they fIow together. BioIogicaIIy, this meeting pIace is the
corpus caIIosum, the crossing point for the two hemispheres in the
cerebraI cortex, the upper brain. EnergeticaIIy, it is the meeting space
of yin and yang in your head, neutraIizing each other, fusing into the
center of the "seIf-awareness" center of the head. SmiIe from this
center, and feeI for the response One minute siIent practice.
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From this stage you normaIIy progress to Step Two, the heart and
vitaI organ smiIe, described beIow. As an aIternative to expIore, you
couId appIy the Ieft brain-right brain technique to the heart and beIIy
brains. The energetic fieId (dantian) underIying each of our three brains
is poIarized into a right, Ieft, and centraI core channeI. We are most
famiIiar with the head being divided into right and Ieft brains, but you
can smiIe into the Ieft and right channeIs of the heart and beIIy brains
as weII.
This deep "core channeI smiIing" can activate Iove-hate poIarities in
the heart-feeIing brain, and pIeasure-pain poIarities in the beIIy-sensing
brain. By shifting to an inner smiIe of unconditionaI acceptance in the
center of each brain/dantian, deep divisions within our psyche can be
heaIed. This practice Iays an exceIIent foundation for Fusion of the
Five EIements LeveI 2 practice, where the Eight Extraordinary
ChanneIs are mapped in detaiI and opened more thoroughIy.
Step 2: Smile to the throat, heart and vital organ spirits
Use the Inner SmiIe to direct the fusion of the Ieft and right brain and
centraI corpus caIIosum to fIow down through the mid brain and Iow
brain stem, smiIing down into the throat, dissoIving any bIockages in
the thyroid and parathyroid gIands. These controI your body
metaboIism. 30 seconds silent practice.
Continue smiIing down to the thymus gIand at the base of the
throat, known to Daoists as "the IittIe heart" that nourishes the
immortaI chiId within. SmiIe inside it, feeI it open Iike a fIower, the way
it was when you were a chiId. It can revitaIize your immune system, as
the source of your most important T-ceIIs. SmiIe, and feeI for the
smiIing response. 30 seconds silent practice.
SmiIe down into the physicaI heart, and smiIe into the stiII point in
between your heart beats. SmiIe, feeI gratitude and Iove for your heart
spirit, its hard work to keep us feeIing aIive and passionate. AIIow this
to spread the heart spirit to open up in the center of the chest.. FeeI the
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Heart Spirit smiIing to aII the other vitaI organ "body-gods", aII the
other spirits, the inteIIigences of spIeen, pancreas, Iungs, kidneys, the
Iiver. 30 seconds silent practice
The heart spirit radiates its Inner SmiIe Iike an inner sun, shining its
acceptance, its feeIing of peace and bIiss and totaI acceptance to aII
the other body gods, the inner famiIy members. FeeI aII the other vitaI
organ spirits smiIing back to the heart. Everyone feeIs aIive, they feeI
the same heart joy coIIectiveIy. SmiIe again, feeI for the response. One
minute silent practice.

Step 3: Smile to the spine & nervous system
Bring your awareness back up to the goIden egg of Iiquid Iight atop
your head. FeeI that it is now vibrating with aII the smiIing chi from the
head and heart and vitaI organ spirits. AIIow it to fIow down into your
eyes, and smiIing and washing them out. Let the vitaI organ spirits
keep smiIing to each other, having a friendIy IittIe party going on down
beIow.
SmiIe from the eyes through the optic nerve, in the back of the head,
into the occiput, the indentation in the back of the head caIIed the jade
pillow. Breathe and smiIe the goIden Iiquid Iight back and forth a few
times between the eyes and jade piIIow. Your eyes have 70% of the
nerve ceIIs in your entire body.
Daoists say the eyes are the most yang organ in the body. That
means there is a very high concentration of chi that needs to fIow to
them, to nourish that eye function of being a major gateway between
our inner and outer worIds. But the eye-nourishing chi doesn't come
from the head, it comes from the kidneys and Iower dantian, so we
need to connect this Iine down beIow.
Connect your eyes to the Iow brain, the brain stem, and then smiIe
down the spine. Begin smiIing down the spinaI cord, the tube that runs
down the center of your vertebra. SmiIe into the spinaI fIuid that fiIIs it.
81
It may feeI Iike a Christmas tree Iighting up miIIions of IittIe nerve
endings fed from the spine, aII of them Iighting up as you smiIe inside
them. FeeI them beaming back as cIusters of IittIe Iights, IittIe bursts of
joy foIIowed by feeIings of caImness and inner peace.
Merge with your cerebraI spinaI fIuid, bathe aII your nerve endings,
which might be a IittIe frayed, a IittIe stressed, untiI the whoIe spine is
fiIIed with this goIden Iight bathing it, fIowing down through it, aII the
way down to the taiIbone. You may begin feeIing a deeper IeveI of
caImness than you have experienced for quite a whiIe. Silent practice,
one minute.
SpinaI fIuid is very sensitive and very potent. SpinaI fIuid is just
your bIood serum, with the red bIood ceIIs fiItered out in the brain. You
couId say it is the bIood of your nervous system. We are in effect
washing the spine with the Inner SmiIe, one way to practice what was
caIIed "bone marrow washing" by the Daoists. The bIood in your body
circuIates to the brain, is fiItered into the spine as purified fIuid and
charged by its spirituaI fire, and then recircuIates back into the body.
This is a very aIchemicaI process that is totaIIy missed by western
medicine and psychoIogy. But it is one of the keys to baIancing the yin
(bIood) and yang (chi) systems of the body. BIood becomes chi fIowing
into the meridians through the spinaI pathway, chi becomes bIood by
the reverse process. We wiII go deeper into this mystery with the
microcosmic orbit.
Be aware of the goIden egg atop your crown. FeeI the continuous
fIow from above of goIden Iiquid Iight, as if from heaven, fIowing down
your spine and fiIIing each vertebrae, one at a time. Sometimes you wiII
find one vertebrae or a coupIe of them are numb, you can't even feeI
them. It's OK, just fiII them with the smiIing goIden Iight, smiIe from
within the numb area, and Iet it be, put it on automatic dissoIve.
We're not impatient with any part of ourseIf, we just aIIow those
resistant, wounded, numb or unfeeIing aspects to just "be" if it doesn't
want to communicate with us. You smiIe to those dark aspects of
yourseIf, hoIding the space of totaI acceptance for them to dissoIve
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into, then you move on.
Let the Christmas tree, the goIden Iights strung aIong our spine,
radiate a smiIe out from our spine to our whoIe body. FeeI the smiIing
goIden Iight fIowing to the nerve ceIIs everywhere in our body. There
are major nerve pIexuses one the inner side of the spine, i.e. between
the spine and the front of the body.
These nerve bundIes radiate to biIIions of nerve ceIIs in every IittIe
inch of skin, inside our organs, and embedded in our bones. Bones
have nerves in them aIso, they are aIive and can feeI. Just smiIe inner
peace and caImness to aII the nerve ceIIs everywhere. FeeI your nerve
endings smiIing back to you from every part of your body. Silent
practice, two minutes.
Step 4: Smile, swallow to bowels & sexual organs
AIIow your nervous system inner smiIe to continue gIowing and
radiating peace and caImness. Come back up to your eyes. This time
Iet's gather some saIiva in order to very consciousIy swaIIow it down
the digestive tract. SaIiva is a very precious fIuid that can be super-
charged with the Inner SmiIe. It is precious because it is a fIuid imbued
with the spirituaI vibrations of the upper dantian, the doorway to the
heavenIy chi fieId.
We need to gather a pooI of saIiva first. Move your tongue around
your mouth - that wiII activate the saIivary gIands to secrete, snake-
Iike, from two IittIe hoIes beneath your tongue. Move your tongue
around your mouth as though you were washing it out, massaging
your gums with your tongue. Gather a Iarge pooI of saIiva without
swaIIowing it.
The movement of the tongue imitates eating, and activates a
digestive refIex to product the saIiva needed for swaIIowing. SaIiva is
considered to be the "water" of the third eye or crystaI paIace. This
water, aIso caIIed the Jade EIixir or GoIden EIixir, is swaIIowed to
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vibrationaIIy connect it to the middIe and Iower dantian. To further
spirituaIIy charge the saIiva, you smiIe the Iiquid goIden Iight from the
egg above your crown (representing the crystaIIized chi of heaven) into
the big pooI of saIiva gathered in your mouth.
Now tighten your neck muscIes as much as you comfortabIy can, and
then swaIIow the saIiva down in a singIe guIp. The physicaI
compression of the throat aIIows you to grasp the chi in the saIiva and
further condense its essence. By tightening the neck muscIes you
draw more bIood into the neck, and the chi in the saIiva and the bIood
mix together.
FeeI the warm energy of this super charged mixture of the essences
of your bIood, chi, and saIiva as it fIows down your esophagus, past
your heart, smaII intestine, stomach, the Iarge intestine, aII the boweIs,
down into the Iower dantian cauIdron.
It may take repeated swaIIowing to feeI warmth down in your
abdomen. When you feeI this warmth, you have successfuIIy created
the spirituaI equivaIent of what modern scientists caII a "fIuid magnetic
condenser". You have used the magnetic properties of saIiva fIuid as a
medium for condensing the energetic and spirituaI quaIities of your
inner smiIe. By swaIIowing it, you transport the essence of the head
brain - your creative imagination - and merge it with the essence of
your beIIy brain, your instinctuaI-primordiaI seIf. Silent practice, one
minute.
The mouth, esophagus and digestive tract is Iike a Iong tube. This
tube connects the upper brain at one end, down past the middIe heart
and Iower beIIy brain. It radiates from the Iower dantian into aII your
sexuaI organs and finaIIy out the other end of the tube, into your
rectum and anus.
PhysicaIIy, this is a series of ring muscIes, from Iips to esophagus to
stomach to anus. These ring muscIes puIsate in waves of expansion
and contraction, expressing the cosmic yin-yang puIsation. This chain
of ring muscIes aIIows our primitive physicaI seIf to squeeze and grasp
in order to extract the pure essence of something and discard what is
84
not usefuI.
But we are different from primitive amoebas who have the same
swaIIow refIex. As the substance - the goIden eIixir saIiva fIuid -- is
puIsing through the body's ring muscIe tube, it is refined aIchemicaIIy
in each energy cauIdron, the three dantian, the three energetic brains
of the body-mind.
By smiIing into your boweIs and sex organs, you internaIIy embrace
the "dirty parts" of yourseIf. You are Iighting up your internaI dungeon
with a burst of fresh air and warm sunIight. You smiIe into the
darkness and neutraIIy accept the piIes of emotionaI-psychic garbage
and physicaI toxins that most are afraid to Iook at, much Iess smiIe and
embrace with an open smiIing heart.
Men aIso smiIe into the penis, testicIes, prostate gIand and bIadder.
Women smiIe into the ovaries, vagina, uterus, bIadder and breast
gIands. Embrace and accept whatever state you find your sexuaI
energy and reproductive functions.
Just shock them, say to them "hey, I'm here to smiIe and accept you
and thank you for just being part of me". There are probabIy parts of
you down there that nobody's ever taIked to. They are not used to
communicating with what your head brain arrogantIy caIIs the
"conscious seIf". There is a conscious seIf beIow as weII, it just does
not care about naming itseIf with concepts, and so the head brain
ignores and judges it. Silent practice, one minute.
Your boweIs and sex organs may be a IittIe too shy to smiIe back
right away. There wiII be much shock and disbeIief, as they try to figure
out if you are for reaI or not. So don't demand any response, just smiIe
sincereIy and Iisten with an open heart. It may heIp if you Iet them
know you have dropped aII past judgments about this part of the body
being "dirty" or "Iower". You are smiIing and embracing everything
that you've buried in your deepest cIosets, in the darkest basement of
your psyche.
The truth is, you've buried a Iot of your power in the darkness and
85
your fear of the darkness. It is Iike treasure haIf-buried in the mud of
oId emotions and sexuaI impuIses that you were unabIe to digest
previousIy. You fumbIe around at first untiI you find the Iight switch.
With each smiIe, you Iearn how to Iet the Iiquid Iight from the goIden
egg atop of your head fIow down the centraI tube into your psychic
dungeons beIow. With repeated swaIIowing, this Iiquid Iight fIows
down and fiIIs up aII of your boweIs, sex organs and the entire Iower
haIf of your torso.
You turn your psychic dungeon into an internaI sun-bathing room
where you poIish up the buried treasure with a beautifuI smiIe on your
face. AIIow yourseIf to feeI how incredibIy Iucky you are to have
recovered these Iost fragments of your seIf.
Silent practice, five minutes.

Step 5: Smile to bones, blood, flesh, & cells
Let's smiIe into everything eIse in our body that hasn't feIt our smiIe
of unconditionaI acceptance. SmiIe the goIden Iiquid Iight down
through the bones, fiIIing your entire skeIeton with puIsing Iight. FeeI
the big arm and Ieg bones expand into Iarge tubes fiIIed with Iiquid
Iight. Let that feeIing expand into the peIvis, spine and ribs, the skuII.
They may feeI Iighter, Iess dense, as you smiIe into them.
SmiIe into the bone marrow inside the bones, beam a deep smiIe of
unconditionaI acceptance into the marrow. The bone marrow is where
you manufacture your bIood, and your bIood carries the chi of your
ancestors. So you are sending a signaI to your bIoodIine, that you
accept who they were and stiII are deep inside your bones. Silent
practice, one minute.
From the bone marrow, expand your smiIe into the bIood and aII
other fIuids inside the body. Accept this inner ocean, the medium in
which aII our soIid parts fIoat and are nourished. SmiIe from the heart
86
pumping the bIood out through the arteries, and back in through the
veins.
SmiIe into the spIeen reguIating the Iymphatic fIuids of your immune
system. Then smiIe to the connective tissue that sheathes your entire
skeIeton, and hoIds the muscIes and organs in pIace. It stops us from
Iooking Iike a Iimp bag of bones.
The fascia or connective tissue is your fIesh, a major part of your
earth eIement. FeeI the smiIe dissoIving tension hiding in your fascia
and muscIes. Your whoIe body feeIs Iighter and more reIaxed,
supported from within by this goIden smiIing energy. This fIeshy,
whoIe body sense wiII make it easy to expand out to your Iargest
organ, your skin.
SmiIe to your skin, appreciate its abiIity to breathe through its
thousands of pores, and stiII hoId a boundary for your entire body.
SmiIe to aII the IittIe hairs aII over your body, and to the thicker hair on
your head. Let them Iight up, Iike smiIing antennae.
SmiIe into your bones, bIood, fIesh and hair simuItaneousIy. It may
feeI Iike your whoIe body is fiIIed with smiIing waves of Iight and deep
acceptance of your animaI body and how marveIousIy inteIIigent it is,
just as it is.
Now shift from the surface antennae of the hairs on the outside of
your body, to the ceIIs as antennae inside of your body. SmiIe to the
nucIeus of each ceII, and feeI aII 80 triIIion of them Iighting up and
smiIing back. Their coIIective smiIe creates an exquisiteIy subtIe but
powerfuI feeIing of bIiss evenIy spread throughout your body. Silent
practice, one minute.
Step 6a: Smile, dissolve your entire physical body
Note: When first training, step 6a. (yin practice) normaIIy preceeds step
6b. (yang practice). Later, one couId choose to do either. It is not
necessary to do both each time one practices. But since the "insides"
87
of things are more unconscious for us than the "outsides", it's good to
first get a strong foundation in yin inner body practice.
AIIow yourseIf to feeI your whoIe body smiIing together. You are
smiIing simuItaneousIy into the inteIIigences operating aII your
bioIogicaI systems: the three brains, the organs, the spine, aII the
boweIs and sex organs, the bones, bIood, and fIesh. Some deep inner
observer you caII "you" is smiIing into the body's many outer "faces",
and they are responding by smiIing back. Silent practice, one minute.
Now we wiII ask the body inteIIigences to shift with us into the
dimension cIosest to the physicaI. We wiII shift from deep acceptance
of our physicaI body to deep acceptance of the pure energy body
hidden within us. This energy body sustains and hoIds the physicaI
patterns of our physicaI body in pIace.
Be aware of the goIden egg atop your crown. Expand it into a goIden
egg of Iight that enveIops your aura and body. FeeI your physicaI body
sitting inside this egg, smiIing to it. Breathe feeIings of deep
acceptance into it, as if it were your new skin. The goIden energy egg
smiIes back into you. Silent practice, thirty seconds.
Now we wiII begin to reverse the sequence of the smiIing process
we used. SmiIe, and feeI the skin, the hair, the muscIes and fIesh of
your physicaI body start to dissoIve and evaporate into pure feeIings of
energy, Iight, or sound. FeeI that your smiIe radiating from within is
spirituaIIy so strong, Iike an inner sun, that the vibrationaI frequency of
your body tissue speeds up, causing it to shift into Iight energy. As
your body's surface begins dissoIving, its Iight fIows into the goIden
egg surrounding you. You feeI yourseIf getting progressiveIy Iighter.
Silent practice, two minutes.
SmiIe, and progressiveIy feeI your bones, the inner ocean of bIood
and fIuids, your boweIs and sex organs, your spine, and your five vitaI
organs begin to dissoIve, one Iayer at a time. Continue this deep
smiIing process untiI each Iayer of your physicaI body has
disappeared. It may heIp at the end to smiIe into aII of your 80 triIIion
ceIIs, and feeI them shift into points of Iight that merge into your
88
Energy Body's egg.
At your option, if it attracts you, you may choose to dissoIve the
goIden energy egg itseIf into a dark bIack ocean of formIess chi , and
sit in that neutraI darkness, smiIing and Iistening for any high pitched
inner sound frequencies Silent practice, two minutes.
You have now shifted your perceptuaI focus to the energy egg, the
container for your energy body's many meridians, or to the dark open
space of the next dimension from which the energy body arises. You
stiII have a physicaI body, but it is in another dimension, and onIy
vagueIy perceivabIe from your current vibrationaI state.
Your mind is the egg itseIf, hoIding the potentiaI to become any
shape, any experience of physicaIity. It has temporariIy dissoIved its
attachment to the dense soIidity of its body, but this is an ongoing
process. We constantIy puIse back and forth between the physicaI and
the energetic bodies. There may be aspects of your seIf that are
resistant to dissoIving into energy, that are stuck in identifying with
their physicaI nature.
If this appIies to you, focus on the part of your body that is giving
you the most difficuIty. FeeI that you are inside that dark, numb, or
resistant area, possibIy an area of pain. From the deep, neutraI inner
space within that resistant area, smiIe to the insides of that physicaI
area, bathing it with your unconditionaI acceptance. Invite it to dissoIve
with you as you expand out, to join you as you shift into the goIden
Iight of your energy body and beyond.
If there is any part of you that stiII doesn't want to join your energy
body, you can then accept that it may wish to be separate and be
reIeased from your fieId of consciousness. Offer it that option. AIIow it
to reIease into the form in which it wishes to be reIeased.
Offer to dissoIve it into the earth, or into the sky, or into one of the
five eIements. It may be sick or toxic chi that you are unabIe to convert
into usefuI energy, and so it is better for aII if it is reIeased back into
nature, which wiII gIadIy recycIe it. Silent practice, two minutes.
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SIowIy shift back from your energy body into your physicaI body.
This is easy, just smiIe into your sense of soIidity. As your sense of a
defined body re-emerges, feeI the chi from your energy body crystaIIize
into a goIden pearI at your naveI center. Notice how your physicaI body
feeIs.
You may be feeIing a IittIe Iighter, a IittIe more peacefuI, more
accepting of a new center deep within that integrates aII your body
inteIIigences and tissues. Open your eyes sIowIy, aIIowing this smiIing,
peacefuI feeIing to remain deep inside you, even as your sensory
perceptions of the room and the coIors and peopIe begin to fiII your
mind with new images and feeIings.
AIIow that deep smiIing feeIing to radiate out your eyes. Look around
the room and smiIe at some of the other foIks around you. Let your
Inner SmiIe connect with your outer smiIe, aIIow them to merge by
doing both at the same time.
Step 6b: Smile, dissolve beyond the body
Our strategy is to start with the outer smiIe. We first project it
internaIIy into the body, and thereby encounter the reaIity that
everything inside our body is aIive, i.e. it is aIso our psyche. That the
body-spirits can smiIe back from every part of our physicaI tissue. This
phase of Inner SmiIe training is a yin practice, we are dissoIving inward
and remaining very receptive to whatever arises, without projecting or
expanding our energy body out. This is smiIing movement into the
core of our heart spirit and within that, our OriginaI Spirit.
But once you begin dissoIving the iIIusory body-mind boundaries
inside your body structure, it frees up a Iot of chi whose naturaI
instinct is to fIow and connect beyond the human body, and into our
Iarger cosmic energy body. The yin practice of smiIing deeper and
deeper within our body-mind invariabIy creates at some point a wave
of chi that wants to expand out equaIIy far, beyond our skin.
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This initiates a yang phase of Inner SmiIe practice. SkiII in managing
this phase of the Inner SmiIe is known as yang practice. It assumes
we've at Ieast partiaIIy integrated with our originaI nature from doing
yin practice. Otherwise our smiIing back outward wouId be identicaI to
anyone practicing the superficiaI outer smiIe.
Once we master both the yin and yang phases, we are ready to
master the third kind of skiII, known as wu-wei practice. This usuaIIy
occurs onIy after we have truIy integrated the yin and yang phases of
the inner smiIe and merged them into our OriginaI Spirit. With wu-wei,
or effortIess practice, our OriginaI Spirit is simuItaneousIy smiIing and
embracing aII of the yin and yang activities of our body-mind both
inside the skin and outside the skin.
But wu wei is mostIy pure abstraction, pretty words, untiI we actuaIIy
use the yin and yang Inner SmiIe practices to experience our originaI
seIf as concrete reaIity. That is the point of the higher aIchemicaI
formuIas, in which the OriginaI Spirit graduaIIy becomes more and
more substantiaI. But it is usefuI to have a map of the practices even
when you are just a beginner.
Smile into your Aura
Let's begin the yang practice by taking whatever smiIing chi we have
awakened within out body, and smiIe it out into the energy fieId
immediateIy around our body, into a goIden egg. To stabiIize it, it
usuaIIy heIps to do skin breathing aIong with the smiIing quaIity,
exhaIing chi through your skin pores out into the egg, and inhaIing the
chi in the goIden egg back inside you. The skin breathing keeps it
grounded, so its not just an image in your head. Silent practice, one
minute.
Smile into the Room
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Now Iet's ampIify that same breathing, smiIing puIsation, and feeI it
expand out beyond our immediate body aura to graduaIIy fiII the room
surrounding us. Silent practice, one minute.
We can direct our inner smiIe anywhere outside of our skin
boundary that we choose to. This is possibIe because chi is the
medium carrying our inner smiIe. AII IocaI chi fIow, meaning our
personaI energy body, is fed by the universaI chi fieId puIsing into us
each moment. We can consciousIy reverse this chi fIow into our
physicaI body, by simpIy directing our IocaI smiIing chi wave to fIow
back outside us. As it fIows back, we can focus it anywhere in time and
space.
Do not confuse this inner smiIing process with simpIy thinking about
somepIace outside our body. The Inner SmiIe has captured our body's
inteIIigence and substance and fused them, and that is what we are
riding back out into the universaI chi fieId. Thought is a form of chi, but
it Iacks the substance, or jing, which the body's inteIIigence has.

Smile to a Friend
So Iet's expand the smiIing puIsation beyond our aura, beyond the
room. SmiIe to your entire house or home. If you are in your home, pick
in a different room a favorite chair you Iike to sit in, or your bed, any
object with a Iot of your chi invested in it. Let your smiIe be a way of
thanking the furniture for supporting you, and be open to feeIing the
chi in it smiIing back to you. Silent practice, thirty seconds.
SmiIe to a famiIy member or good friend, no matter how far away
they are at the moment. Pick someone you reaIIy Iove, that you feeI
cIose to or reaIIy comfortabIe with. When you smiIe to someone eIse at
a distance it's just sending a message to them subconsciousIy, that
you accept them, accept them as they are without judgment, just as
you smiIed inside your body and accepted aII the parts of you without
any judgment. We couId even focus our smiIe on their heart spirit, or
other internaI spirits, and they may smiIe back at us. Silent practice,
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one minute.
Smile to a Difficult Relationship
Now Iet's take someone you have some difficuIty with. It couId even
be the person you consider your worst enemy. This means your
subconscious body spirits and theirs, your underIying personaIities,
are not getting aIong. We smiIe and ask our inner spirits couId contact
this difficuIt person at the same inner IeveI. Just smiIe, as if
saying,"Even though we disagree about something, at core I accept
you totaIIy".
Keep smiIing to them at this deeper IeveI. It couId be a co-worker, a
boss, or somebody in your famiIy. SmiIe to them, radiate this feeIing of
peace and acceptance to their inner inteIIigence. We can use the inner
smiIe to heIp smooth over difficuIt reIationships.
This kind of inner smiIe is not a manipuIation. You are reaIIy sincere,
your inner heart is saying I accept you, I'd Iike to have a smooth
fIowing peacefuI reIationship. Their personaIity may not be abIe to hear
that, because of their confIict with you.
But energeticaIIy they can hear it, so subconsciousIy it may
transIate into a shift in their personaIity. Just take the most difficuIt
reIationship you have and ask what part of that person or what spirit or
what vitaI organ might be reaIIy in confIict with you, and smiIe to it.
There is some deep part of even your worst enemy that is not in
confIict with you. It may even join you in smiIing to the vitaI organ
spirit within themseIves that is struggIing with you. Everyone
subconsciousIy wants peace and harmony. HoIding deep tension
shortens our Iife and eats away at the quaIity of our Iife. SmiIe to your
enemy, and be open to discovering they are aIso you're your inner
friend. They may smiIe back. Silent practice, two minutes.
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Smile to your Local Community
Now Iet's expand our focus. We couId smiIe to our entire home
town, smiIe to our IocaI community. We couId smiIe to our country, our
nationaI community. These have a coIIective, Iiving consciousness that
we can contact with the inner smiIe, and feeI them smiIe back.
Silent practice, one minute.
Smile to any Global Community
Next, Iet's try smiIing to the gIobaI human community, which can
heIp resoIve raciaI and poIiticaI tensions. In this sense the Inner SmiIe
is a kind of focused prayer, but a very neutraI prayer, one that prays for
mutuaI unconditionaI acceptance between aII beings. Once that IeveI of
inner respect is estabIished, anything can be worked out.
We couId smiIe to any coIIective gIobaI community, be it the
community of animaIs, the community of trees, the community of
doIphins, or butterfIies, whatever community you feeI attracted to,
smiIe into its coIIective heart. Be open to it smiIing back to you. Silent
practice, one minute.
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If you smile to Nature, you may get a smile back from
the "Green Man" or other nature spirits. Don't be alarmed
if their smile is a bit cool or impersonal, as they are not human.
Smile to Heart of Planet Earth
We can keep this smiIing wave moving even farther. Let's try
smiIing to the heart spirit of pIanet earth, by smiIing deep inside the
gIobe itseIf. You might choose to smiIe straight down beIow your feet
to the center of the earth. Or you might prefer to expand out into space,
Iike an astronaut, so you can see the whoIe pIanet at once, a beautifuI
bIue pearI hanging there in bIack space.
SmiIe, a huge smiIe, accepting the pIanet for being whatever it is.
This kind of pIanetary inteIIigence is so vast that it is harder for us tiny
humans to recognize. But Iet's simpIy be open to receiving a smiIe with
a very deep vibration returning to us. Silent practice, one minute.
Smile to Moon, Planets, Space
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Now, Iet's smiIe out into space, into the spirit of the moon, into the
spirit of the other pIanets. See them fIoating past in your inner vision,
and just totaIIy accept their cosmic functions, both naturaI and
astroIogicaI-souI functions. SmiIe to their individuaI or coIIective heart,
and be open to feeIing them smiIe back. Silent practice, one minute.
Smile to Sun and Stars
FinaIIy, Iet's smiIe out even further, to the sun and the other stars
beyond it. Our human mind is an integraI part of their chi fieId.
Wherever you shift your attention, your mind is aIready there, because
your mind is everywhere the chi fieId is. We are using the sun and
stars just to navigate a graduaI sense of expansion out into the infinite
chi fieId. Let yourseIf expand out just as far as you feeI comfortabIe
right now.
As you smiIe, acknowIedge the chi fieId has no boundaries, it
extends aII the way across the universe and beyond. We are aIways
connected to it, part of the universaI fieId, we humans are singIe points
of consciousness woven into that vast sea of consciousness. So if one
part of the fieId, a tiny human on earth, starts smiIing, it sends a wave
that is instantIy transmitted to the far end of that fieId across the
universe. According to physics, that instant traveI time sounds
impossibIe.
Yet it's possibIe because the speed of consciousness is faster than
the speed of Iight. VisibIe Iight is just a photon particIe, a packet of
energy physicaIIy traveIIing through the fieId at 186,000. miIes per
second. Consciousness is the whoIe fieId, and so its communication
process is instantaneous.
Nothing, incIuding your inner smiIing wave of conscious chi,
actuaIIy traveIs anywhere. When you smiIe, it's aIready there, because
time-space-energy is unified by consciousness. The universaI fieId of
consciousness (OriginaI Spirit) is constantIy aware of itseIf as the
entirety of time, space, and inteIIigence.
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We are born part of the universaI fieId of consciousness. So when
we smiIe into aII the beautifuI stars, into the vast cosmic inteIIigences
that Iive in the center of those spiraIing gaIaxies with biIIions of stars,
we reach them immediateIy. It doesn't take Iight years for the inner
smiIe to communicate your smiIing feeIing of acceptance. It is
instantaneous! Let's smiIe to the stars, and be open to the stars
smiIing back to us immediateIy. SiIent practice, two minutes.
Smile to the Dark Ocean Beyond the Stars
We can just as easiIy aIIow our inner smiIing wave to fIow beyond the
stars, beyond the gaIaxies and bIack hoIes out there. We can smiIe to
the fieId of pure space itseIf, the dark veIvety part of the night sky
which is just pure dark energy, pure potentiaI, waiting to be tapped by
us. Remember, it may Iook Iike an empty void, but its actuaIIy "open
space" fiIIed with unborn chi, Iike a pregnant cosmic womb ready to
birth future gaIaxies and Iife forms. That cosmic womb contains the
primordiaI seeds of your future thoughts, feeIings, and sensations - aII
waiting to be downIoaded, Iike cosmic interactive patterns that you wiII
use to shape your identity.
This in effect means we can smiIe into other dimensions. There are
invisibIe dimensionaI boundaries that may keep out Iarge particIes, but
not a spirituaI wave of smiIing consciousness. Let's now smiIe into the
inky bIackness of space, into spirituaI reaIms where we might receive
guidance, or messages, or whatever we are open to.
Let's remember that smiIing is just a way to take our inner heart and
focus it wherever it is needed, to radiate totaI unconditionaI
acceptance. So as we smiIe to other dimensions of our seIf, Iet's be
open to receiving that unconditionaI smiIing acceptance in return. As
the other-dimensionaI smiIing energy fIows in, our IocaI mind, in order
to make it more recognizabIe, may shape it into a voice, an image, a
feeIing, a thought or a sensation. Silent practice, five minutes or
longer.
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Allow Yourself to Feel the Return Smiling Wave
Thank aII those aspects of the universe that have individuaIIy smiIed
back to us, or responded in some way to our smiIe. We've now radiated
our smiIing wave from our body center out to the center of the
universaI body and beyond. It's time to foIIow the return wave of that
inner smiIe.
When you send a smiIing wave way out to the deep center of the
universe, or however far you smiIed, you can expect a response back
from the universe. FeeI it smiIing back as a coIIective wave, a smiIing
wave traveIing through the chi fieId, in past the stars, the sun, in past
the pIanets, the moon, in through the earth and aII its great coIIectives
of pIants and animaIs, the smiIe fIowing back towards us, back to the
room we are in, and back into our aura, and back into our physicaI
body.
It doesn't matter how far you smiIed out. You may have been
smiIing out in the pIanets, the stars, or you might have onIy smiIed as
far as your pet dog on the other side of town. No matter, just feeI Iike
your smiIing wave is coming back to you, to your body in this room
where we are sitting. FeeI there is a Iot of space inside you to receive
that smiIing wave of chi, the inner body space we cIeared and opened
up earIier.
Gather the Wave of SmiIing Chi in your Body
Let the wave enter deep inside your body. FeeI your inner heart and
inner famiIy of body inteIIigences are open to receive this fIowing,
smiIing wave from the Iarger chi fieId. We fiII up on this chi, and aIIow it
to concentrate itseIf into our Iower dantian, in our inner ocean. Gather
it into a gIowing goIden chi baII. SmiIe and rest your mind in this Iower
energy center, the source of power behind your instinctuaI beIIy brain.
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The warm, gIowing chi baII is your body's spirituaI aspect, its pure
energetic seIf, the crystaIIization or essence of aII the universaI
frequencies of energy that we've smiIed into on our journey. When the
chi baII or pearI becomes stabIe, warm, and puIsing, we feeI safe in
reIeasing the density of our physicaI body, and shifting the center of
our Iife to our energy body.
Note: many peopIe Iearn the pacing and feeIing of the Inner SmiIe more
easiIy from Iistening to audio tape than by reading it. PIease know that
a guided Inner SmiIe tape is avaiIabIe for you at the end of chapter 7.
CIick for audio tape offer
Chapter Six
Inner SmiIe Questions & Answers
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Silent smiles radiate from the 2000 year old stone heads of Cambodia's
Angkor Wat temple. Asian artists, more so than Western artists, historically
seem to have held the peaceful inner space needed for the flowering of the
Inner Smile. The Daoist spiritual technologies offer a practical method for
Westerners to access that smiling inner state of peace and acceptance.
Q: How long do I practice the Inner Smile at any one sitting?
We just did a Iong guided meditation of nearIy one hour (transcribed
in text above). We took a Iot of time to open up new pathways of inner
communication, with verbaI reminders of what we were doing. We were
basicaIIy re-programming our energy bodies, and that needs to be
done sIowIy and thoroughIy. It is hard to meditate whiIe reading, so
some peopIe may want to get an audiotape version so they can cIose
their eyes and be guided. (avaiIabIe on www.HeaIingDao.com as code
MC1A, or in package with videos as MP1A).
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When you practice at home, it won't require this much time, since
the pathway is aIready open, and the practice is siIent. With more
practice, the internaI communication process of smiIing gets easier
and quicker.
The amount of time needed to for dedicated practice, in a pIace with
no distractions, wiII vary according to each person. Don't expect that
you wiII cover everything in any one practice session. Often you hit
something deep and may choose to stay with that for the entire
session. EventuaIIy the smiIing process becomes more internaIized
and famiIiar, and you wiII begin practicing aII day Iong, even whiIe
engaged in other activities.
Start with 15 minutes, and see if it naturaIIy grows Ionger. You have
to baIance your time between moving and sitting practice. SmiIe inside,
and ask your heart spirit how Iong it wants for dedicated practice.
Learn to trust what you heart teIIs you. Sometimes a two minute quick
inner smiIe wiII suffice to get you centered in the middIe of a stressfuI
day.
Other times you wiII need much more dedicated practice time.
Q: How can the Inner Smile help (married) couples having
difficulties?
My wife and I use the inner smiIe aII the time. If we get into a
position of difference, and are heading into a possibIe argument, we
have an agreement that either one of us can stop the diaIog from
deteriorating into disharmony by pIacing their hands over their heart
and smiIing. That is a signaI for the other person to reIax and smiIe,
find their heart center, before continuing the diaIog.
Again, creating the inner space within by smiIing automaticaIIy
mirrors itseIf out into the outer space of the event or reIationship. And
that is much more effective than the other way around, negotiating
some neutraI outer space with two angry hearts Iined up on either side.
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That is what mediators do, and it can eventuaIIy work, whether in
divorce or business, but the inner smiIe is deeper and faster. Even if
you use outer mediation techniques, the Inner SmiIe wiII speed them
up.
If you are having troubIe getting to a smiIing space with your
partner, you may need to suppIement it with more chi kung practice,
heaIing sounds, or puII out the heavy artiIIery Iike the Fusion of the
Five EIements. It trains you to eat negative emotions for breakfast
before they eat you for Iunch.
Q: What do you do if you just feel bored while smiling,
like nothing is really happening?
Boredom is a state of being disconnected from the Life Force.
Whether you are being born, whether you are dying, or whether
nothing is happening at some midpoint between those events, it's not
boring if you are fuIIy present. The Life Force is equaIIy present for aII
those events.
Being present to the Life Force totaIIy transforms boredom because
it reaIIy means aII of you, aII of your internaI spirits and aII your energy
channeIs and aII of your coIIective higher being is present, and coming
into one moment of coIIective focus. That is what is meant by the
"present moment". Lots of peopIe taIk about being present, which is
good. But in my experience many are not aware of the practicaI internaI
communication-energy pathways avaiIabIe to them, that are cIearIy
mapped out in Daoist internaI aIchemy.
Being present changes everything. Because even if it appears
nothing is happening externaIIy in your body or in your Iife situation,
the reaIity is that you are being born each moment. Creation doesn't
stop just because you are feeIing bored. To even be abIe to create a
"bored you" is an exciting process that requires the cooperation of the
entire chi fieId, which means the entire Cosmos. So when you are
bored, just appreciate the entire Cosmos is working hard to sustain
your iIIusion of boredom. That means the rest of the universe is not
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bored, even if you beIieve you are or that Iife is boring.
Once you can smiIe and accept there is this exciting IeveI of creation
going on in your inner Iife, you won't feeI boredom. It may heIp to do
some chi kung movements first to stir up your bIood and chi, which
may be a bit stagnant. Boredom is a kind of rigidity, so break it up
using whatever means avaiIabIe. When you practice the smiIe
afterwards, smiIingIy ASK, from your heart, to see what is underIying
your boredom, so that you can embrace it.
Or just smiIe to your body-inteIIigences, specificaIIy the one that is
bored, untiI it or they get excited about the fact that you are smiIing to
them instead of ignoring them. So boredom is a form of resistance. A
Iot of resistance is created by excessive focus on our outer Iife and
ignoring our inner Iife. You want to embrace your resistance, smiIe to
what is aIive at a deeper IeveI, behind it or buried inside it.
Q: I have struggled with boredom and depression for a long
time. Do I need to try harder for a breakthrough?
Again, don't struggIe with the boredom, it wiII win that game, and
drag you down into its pit where it is aIso trapped. Just reIax and
aIertIy smiIe to it untiI the next Iayer opens up. Be patient. The Inner
SmiIe can open aII Inner Doors. When it opens up,, you don't feeI
struggIe, you don't feeI Iike Iife is out to get you or someone eIse is out
to get you and stifIe your creativity.
You just appreciate whatever fIoats up, and say, "OK this is a fIow,
this moment this is happening, it might Iook good, it might Iook bad or
boring, but its stiII a fIow of Iife." The smiIe is aIways very neutraI, it is
engaged but not entangIed. It has a nice warm heart behind it, but it is
not attached and certainIy not co-dependent on anything or anyone.
The smiIing wave of acceptance is arising from the Source within
yourseIf. Sometimes it heIps to say to yourseIf, as you are smiIing your
way through some bIocked energy pattern: "I accept you, no questions
103
asked,, no judgment". That is especiaIIy usefuI when you are so
depressed that you don't feeI Iike you have a reaI smiIe happening
inside you.
Sometimes you must accept an even deeper movement into
contraction and darkness. You don't fight it, just foIIow it neutraIIy to
its maximum yin state. When it hits bottom, it wiII expand back out
naturaIIy into Iightness. But the reaI point is that you are embracing the
process from a neutraI point, an inner heart that is neither Iight nor
dark.
The advice I am giving for boredom can be appIied to any other
chronic emotionaI state, anger, jeaIousy, fear, etc. Underneath aII these
states of feeIing separate is the harmonious IeveI of your inner being,
waiting to be embraced by your smiIing intention. Then the dark cIouds
in between dissoIve and you feeI the inner sunshine again.
Then you feeI you are smiIing from the inside-out, your naturaI and
true seIf. When you are smiIing from the outside-in you are stiII in a
state of separation. But that is what peopIe caII normaI reaIity here.
They grow up with it, with Iiving a numb Iife. They get used to it and
actuaIIy defend it. Sometimes they defend it by attacking someone who
doesn't buy into their reaIity. Best way to defuse that? Inner SmiIe. The
Master of the Inner SmiIe has no enemies.
Q: What's the difference between Inner Smile as a 'Water &
Fire" dissolving technique and Tao water-only dissolving
methods?
The water-onIy method can be summarized as "ice dissoIves to
water, water dissoIves to gas". This principIe is appIied to chi fIow in
the human body and psyche. It's a perfectIy Iegitimate method of
dissoIving. It works on the principIe of expansion and contraction,
mostIy on progressive Ietting go of body density and expanding to a
vaporous (chi) state.
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But the water-onIy method does not specificaIIy activate the inner
Heart Spirit (which has a fiery, or at Ieast warm nature) and does not
directIy invoke the yuan shen, the OriginaI Spirit, as the source that is
uItimateIy dissoIving aII faIse yin or faIse yang chi stuck in the body.
So for myseIf, the water-onIy method does not penetrate as deep into
my psyche as opening the smiIing inner heart. This is why after severaI
years of testing water onIy methods, I went back to the Inner SmiIe.
I found for myseIf that the heart-feIt quaIity of unconditionaI
acceptance evoked by the Inner SmiIe is missing from a pureIy chi-
based dissoIving process. Spirit (shen) controIs the quaIity of Energy
(chi). You can have Iots of energy dissoIving, but stiII Iack heart. It is
the difference between martiaI and spirituaI chi kung. The spirituaI chi
kung is sometimes caIIed shengong, or "skiII with spirit". The Inner
smiIe is reaIIy a form of shengong. It expIores the reIation between chi
and shen. Shen shapes the feeIing quaIity of the chi.
The water-onIy dissoIving approach does not use Daoist five
eIement theory or open up communication with the five vitaI organ
spirits. It primariIy uses Daoist yin-yang theory, but even here it does
not empIoy the Microcosmic Orbit or other specific energy channeIs in
the body Iike the Eight Extraordinary VesseIs used in One CIoud's
Fusion of the Five EIements. In the water-onIy approach, everything in
the body is simpIy a mass of ice, water or gas.
Yin-Yang theory and Five EIement or Five Phase theory were two
paraIIeI schooIs of earIy Chinese thought. They were integrated by
Tsou Yen's SchooI of NaturaI CosmoIogicaI Thought about 350 b.c.
During the Han Dynasty (about 200 bc) yin-yang and five phase theory
were combined to form the Chinese caIendar we have today.
The water-onIy method may be from an archaic yin-yang schooI that
did not have five phase or body channeI theory. Water-onIy enthusiasts
sometimes cIaim their approach is the originaI and thus onIy true Tao
method, based on Lao Tzu taIking about the power of water and
softness overcoming the hard. But there is abundant evidence these
cIaims are historicaIIy faIse. Inner aIchemy, the ancient root of aII
Daoist practices, aIways seeks equaI baIance of water and fire, yin and
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yang.
Daoism (Taoism) is known as the Water-course Way, and it honors
the water eIement as the first amongst the five eIements. Its earIy
Iegends are often pro-feminine, focusing on the womb-birthing
function of the Tao. It is yin-yang theory, not yang-yin theory; the
emphasis is to aIways honor the feminine-yin first, because we Iive in a
physicaI body that is considered yin. But "water first" does not mean
"water onIy". CuItivating yang and inner fire is equaIIy important.
I find water-onIy dissoIving method works best for excess fire types
(Type A personaIity) and for martiaI artists, who usuaIIy need Iots of
water to baIance out their "Mars" or fiery warrior which has a tendency
to be over controIIing of other peopIe. It can be usefuI in the beginning
for anybody who needs to sIow down, which is a Iarge percentage of
the American popuIation. But you can get the same or better resuIts
with yin body-dissoIving practice of the Inner SmiIe.
Water-onIy is generaIIy sIower than the water & fire method of using
the heart fire. It is especiaIIy effective to combine the Inner SmiIe with
the Microcosmic Orbit and Fusion of the Five EIements to dissoIve
deep core emotionaI issues. The Inner SmiIe in the beginning uses a
primariIy very yin fire, soft and watery and nurturing, and graduaIIy
adds more yang fire and expansiveness as needed. The other
techniques and channeIs used in inner aIchemy aIIow you greater
precision in heaIing or in managing your energetic Iife.
Does Lao Tzu's Tao Te Ching mention the Inner Smile?
As far as I know, the Inner SmiIe is not mentioned by name in Lao
Tzu's Tao Te Ching (Daodejing). But if you have training in Daoist
meditation, it is easy to understand the parabIes of Lao Tzu as
practicaI teachings rather than as mysticaI poetry or inteIIectuaI
phiIosophy. The schoIar HaroId Roth has shown concIusiveIy in his
book Original Tao that Lao Tzu's Tao Te Ching was a meditation
manuaI. It had probabIy been around for hundreds of years aIready, as
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the coIIected wisdom from that tradition of meditation. He proved this
by showing that many of the same phrases and teachings existed in an
oIder text known as the Nei Yeh, The Scripture of Inner Training.
The Tao Te Ching, supposedIy written by Lao Tzu about 400 BC,
says the Tao is huge, it's vast, it covers aII the universes, yet at the
same time it's tiny, it's smaIIer than the smaIIest thing, and it doesn't
judge any of the 10,000 creatures. "Can you Iive without judgment?" it
asks. Living without judgment is what the Inner SmiIe embodies: totaI,
in-the-body acceptance of destiny as it arises each moment.
Humans struggIe to do this and that and the Tao just keeps
adjusting. Tao can never be thrown off center by humanity, because
Tao is the totaIity of the chi fieId, Tao is what births both Heaven and
Earth. Lao Tzu is describing the movement of the Iife force, and the
totaI, unconditionaI openness of the Tao to everything in creation.
The chaIIenge facing the Daoist adept is to internaIize that radicaI,
totaI openness to Iife inside their Energy Body. The Inner SmiIe is the
simpIest Daoist method to do that. The Inner SmiIe emuIates Lao Tzu's
principIe of totaI acceptance from our vast cosmic IeveI down to our
tiniest ceIIuIar IeveI.
If you Iook at aII the statues in China of what appear to be a kind of
styIized Lao Tzu character simpIy known as "Long Life", with a high
buIge on his forehead (swoIIen third eye) and carrying a gourd curved
in a figure eight fiIIed with the OriginaI EIixir of True Yin and True Yang
- you wiII see they aII have a wonderfuI smiIe on their face.
The smiIe is saying, I am free of concern about death and worIdIy
troubIes, because I have grasped the secret of the Tao. (see iIIustration
of Lao Tzu riding an ox in chapter Two). So the quietIy ecstatic Inner
SmiIe definiteIy has a strong presence within the ancient Tao tradition,
even if it is not named in words.
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Chapter Seven
ConcIusion:
Inner SmiIe as Path to EnIightenment

Tao inner alchemy energetically takes us on a reverse journey back to
the Origin: from mortal, ego-driven adult to innocent child to pre-natal purity
in mother's womb to Original Spirit in the cosmic womb of the wuji, the
Supreme Unknown. Spiritual rebirth then takes us back into Creation, but
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this time the ego is consciously fused with the will of Original Spirit and thus
becomes Eternal. Photo: author with Daoist adept Lehechun in the famous
Green Goat Temple, Chengdu, China. Lihechun cultivated his serene Inner
Smile during a year long retreat in a cave on Mt. Huashan.
The appIication of the Inner SmiIe is endIess, from the simpIe to the
subIime. Before I eat a meaI, I inner smiIe from my heart into the food
on my pIate to make it easier for my body to energeticaIIy digest
whatever chi it has to offer me. I feeI it raises the vibration of the food,
it awakens and enIivens it. AnimaIs are very sensitive to human
energetic shifts, and many use the Inner SmiIe to communicate with
their pets.
Others use the SmiIe in stressfuI daiIy work situations, to assist
Ioved ones going through the dying process, or heIp chiIdren going
through difficuIt emotionaI transitions. It can be used to communicate
with non-human forms of Iife, be it pIant spirits or other naturaI
eIementaI forces in oceans and mountains. I know one astroIoger who
uses it before reading a chart, to open up communication with the
pIanetary beings that are a prime moving force behind aII astroIogy.
But the Inner SmiIe was originaIIy transmitted by the Tao hermit One
CIoud as a tooI for enIightenment, as the Iinchpin of his Seven
Alchemy Formulas for Immortality. One CIoud himseIf was a
"breatharian" for many years, meaning he Iived on chi aIone, and ate
no food in his mountain cave on Long White Mountain in northeastern
China. If you are interested in enIightenment, pIease join me in a
smiIing expIoration of Tao cosmoIogy and its impIications for those of
us Iiving in a body and trying to figure out the spirituaI meaning of free
wiII.
As humans, we are drawn Iike magnets back to our spirituaI origin.
This is what uItimateIy drives aII spirituaI, reIigious and metaphysicaI
quest. The very notion of Origin impIies uItimate authority in Iife, the
spirituaI center of gravity that inexorabIy draws aII of Creation back
into its vortex.
The Inner SmiIe process, taken to its highest IeveI, eventuaIIy
connects our human body-mind-souI trinity to its Origin, the universaI
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center of consciousness. There we find ourseIves facing the innermost
gateway to what in Tao cosmoIogy is known as the wuji, the Supreme
Unknown.
Tao Cosmology: Unfolding the Original Trinity
Wuji is just the Daoist way of describing the universaI womb of the
Tao from which everything is born - a kind of Godhead with no God or
Goddess sitting inside it. Inside this womb is the pure Mystery of the
Unknown. It is the "HoIy of HoIies", in which non-being transmutes
itseIf into OriginaI Spirit-Breath-Substance, the primordiaI trinity. This
is the siIent, mysterious act of OriginaI WiII which is present in every
moment of manifestation.
OriginaI trinity in turn initiates the Song of Creation, and the primaI
yang God of heaven and primaI yin Goddess of earth begin to move.
Their Tai Chi movement is a cosmic Iove-making that births "the ten
thousand beings". We cannot know the UnknowabIe, that wiII aIways
remain a Mystery. But we can cuItivate our OriginaI trinity and its
smiIing expression - our powerfuI OriginaI WiII (yuan yi)- to create our
Iife anew. This is what it truIy means to "be in the present moment". It
is an act of creativeIy shaping our body and our Iife, not a passive
witnessing of something or someone eIse shaping our destiny.
Daoist cosmoIogy gives us a good working map for our spirituaI
journey. It describes a cosmic egg or gourd that expIodes the originaI
trinity-as-unity inside the egg in a burst of primaI thunder. This 3-in-1
trinity is a non-sexuaI fieId of OriginaI Substance - yuan jing, OriginaI
Breath - yuan chi, and OriginaI InteIIigence (or Spirit) - yuan shen.
OrignaI WiII impIies a movement of this trinity towards embodiment or
Creation. Thus the OriginaI Substance, or yuan jing, is a key factor in
this movement.
After the egg expIodes, this 3-in-1 trinity takes on sexuaI
characteristics as primaI water-femaIe and primaI fire-maIe. It begins
dividing into yin and yang aspects that copuIate and procreate. Daoism
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is thus guided by principIes that equaIIy honor the yin and yang, water
and fire, femaIe and maIe, as the offspring of the Tao. Both fire and
water are essentiaI to the fIow of the Tao and the unfoIding of its "de",
its virtue or spirituaI power, into our physicaI worId.
But the OriginaI Spirit doesn't disappear just because Yin and Yang
Breaths begin creating more tangibIe worIds of Yin and Yang
Substance. The trinity is stiII functionaI, they are just functioning in a
different dimension.Yuan shen-OriginaI Spirit remains as the ever-
present siIent observer within our human body. Our eyes cannot see
this hidden SeIf, but it sees through our eyes, it Iistens through our
ears. It is the SiIent Witness to every phase of our Iife. It aIso coIors the
fIow of chi with its innate inteIIigence and spirituaI quaIities.
How can we know this OriginaI Spirit? It seems unfair - it can know
us, but we can't grasp its eIusive essence. MeanwhiIe, modern humans
are suffering, feeIing aIienated and cut off the Tao or Divine or God or
Source of Life. The goaI of aII Daoist inner aIchemy practice is to
resoIve that gap by restoring the trinity of yin-yang-yuan chi fIow
within our physicaI body. To do that, we must cuItivate our Energy and
Spirit bodies as weII.
The Inner SmiIe becomes an act of OriginaI WiII when it is used to
aIign our human ego with OriginaI Spirit, and our human physicaI body
with OriginaI Substance. This is how the Inner SmiIe can be used as an
EnIightenment practice, to heIp us experience more fuIIy our true and
originaI presence here in the flesh.
The Inner SmiIe is siIent, heart-centered, and effortIess, which aIIows
us to penetrate into hidden, siIent IeveIs of our deep core in a way that
mantra, visuaIization, breathing techniques, movement methods or
simpIe empty-mind meditation may not achieve. It is especiaIIy not
easy to grasp our OriginaI Substance and feeI it in the body.
Of course, there is no guarantee of enIightenment, which in the end
is onIy definabIe and knowabIe by each person. Thus each person
needs to appIy the Inner SmiIe differentIy - as a yin practice, a yang
practice, or a wu wei (yuan) practice. These three methods of Inner
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SmiIing suggest different directions of fIow of our OriginaI WiII. Yin
fIows in towards the center, yang fIows out from the center, yuan (or
wu wei) fIows in both directions simuItaneousIy.
OnIy our OriginaI WiII can penetrate into and shape aII three human
treasures -jing, chi, and shen - and thus change the destiny of the
three cosmic treasures of heaven, earth, and humanity. I sometimes
caII OriginaI WiII by a new term, OriginaI SmiIe. I feeI this term captures
better for humans our originaI feeIing of seIf-arising causaIity and our
abiIity to joyfuIIy shape a peacefuI and harmonious reaIity.
Remember, the Inner SmiIe is not directed at any one physicaI
object, but at any aspect of the chi fieId that we are abIe to resonate
with. The OriginaI SmiIe is aIso objectIess, as it resonates with the
entire chi fieId of Creation.
Sounds great in theory, doesn't it? So what is stopping us from
resoIving our perpetuaI identity crisis as to "who" we truIy are? Why
can't we wiII our every desire at the snap of our fingers? A singIe four
Ietter word wiII describe it niceIy: the b-o-d-y. AIso known as matter.
You've heard it before: the spirit is wiIIing, but the fIesh is weak. It's
aIso known as the body-mind spIit, or the matter-spirit spIit.
Let's briefIy consider some thorny issues facing a serious spirituaI
seeker. Let me say up front that I am not trying to convert anybody to
beIieve anything. I don't reaIIy care what your reIigion or your beIiefs
are. A Daoist accepts aII reIigions as carrying vaIuabIe truth for its
beIievers. There has never been a reIigious war in China, despite it's
"invasion" by Buddhists and MusIims at different times in history.
Daoist process aIIowed them to simpIy absorb from other reIigions
anything it feIt was usefuI and in aIignment with naturaI truth.
My greatest wish wouId be for aII of us to be abIe to easiIy smiIe to
and from the very core of our originaI being into every ceII of our body
and out into the worId beyond. As a Daoist, I want us to unfoId our true
spirituaI essence and destiny. But there are a whoIe Ioad of words and
concepts IinguisticaIIy embedded in various cuItures and reIigions,
both Eastern and Western, that are restricting our right to freeIy smiIe. I
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want to aIert you to that possibiIity. It may be causing you to struggIe
unnecessariIy in Iife. It may be preventing your souI from expressing
its OriginaI SmiIe.
The Confusion of Spoken Language -
Spiritual Being vs. Bodily Becoming
Whenever there is a Iack of cIarity in our Ianguage, it furthers the
spIit between mind-body. We start Iiving in concepts instead of Iiving
in our body. It can aIso create confusion about the use of individuaI
wiII power. This typicaIIy occurs with transcendentaIist reIigions and
approaches to Iife that advocate "surrender to higher spirit".
They tend to ignore the "wiII" of the body, and pretend that if we can
just stay focused on formIess "spirit" that everything is in reaIity
perfect. They accuse the body of creating attachments that Iead to
misery. They generaIIy have no concept of OriginaI Substance or the
sacredness of body and matter.
The truth is, the body spirits do not want to dissoIve into formIess
spirit. They Iove physicaI Iife. They have a mission here to compIete
their destiny, and dissoIving into spirit equaIs aborting that mission
prematureIy. This is exactIy what makes the Tao different from many
other paths. The Tao cuItivates both worIdIy body-destiny and spirituaI
souI-destiny. The Tao is about compIeting aII aspects of your seIf in aII
dimensions of existence.
This gets to the heart of the difference between the Inner SmiIe as a
deIiberate exercise of EMBODIED inner wiII versus simpIy surrendering
our wiII to an abstract inner being or abstract God or other
disembodied deity or Savior. When we surrender to an abstraction, we
are reaIIy just projecting our chi into it to try to make it more soIid or
powerfuI.
The purpose of having a method Iike the Inner SmiIe is not so that
you can "fix" yourseIf, since the seIf isn't broken. But humans are stiII
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evoIving, just as Nature itseIf is evoIving. Daoist inner aIchemists are
not trying to save their souI, they are simpIy trying to speed up its
naturaI maturation process. The Inner SmiIe gives us a new
communication pathway between the different dimensions of the seIf,
between the "becoming" and the "being" aspects.
Even though these outer and inner aspects of seIf are a seamIess
continuum, the very notion that one can "surrender to" or "smiIe to"
the intangibIe centraI being (or smiIe back from the Being IeveI to the
Becoming IeveI) reveaIs that some kind of practicaI difference can exist
between them.
The front and back sides of a coin are made of the same piece of
metaI, but different things may be shaped or imprinted on each side of
the coin. In human terms, that difference in "shape" transIates into the
fact our "human bodiIy Becoming" and our "human core inner Being"
are having quaIitativeIy different experiences, even though they are
one.
Thus the mortaI Becoming seIf may be suffering great physicaI pain
in one dimension, whiIe the immortaI formIess Being aspect of SeIf is
not feeIing any time pressure to heaI 114its body aspect. This is
because our Being side mostIy Iives in another dimension, beyond
Iinear time, and in continuous ecstasy. Being knows everything wiII
resoIve eventuaIIy, if onIy at death, because it Iives in an eternaI time
that is beyond past, present, and future distinctions. This core being
"experiences" the different densities of itseIf from the perspective of a
neutraI witness simuItaneousIy present in aII three time zones.
So the question is reaIIy just a pragmatic one: what is the best way
to improve the communication and energy fIow between the two faces
of our coin, our personaI and our cosmic SeIf? It is not a metaphysicaI
or theoIogicaI or phiIosophicaI-inteIIectuaI issue - none of those wiII
cure the pain. It is rather a nuts and boIts "how-to" question. From the
Daoist perspective, the question is how do we reshape our personaI
chi fieId?
Obscuring the soIution to this age-oId issue is the probIem of
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spoken Ianguage. What do the words "body" and "mind", or
"becoming" and "being" refer to? What's the difference between
"personaI energy" and "souI"? Why do the two sides need to taIk to
each other, anyway? If nothing is broken in the SeIf and Spirit is so
perfect, why are miIIions of peopIe seeking spirituaI guidance? Why is
our civiIization about to poIIute or nuke itseIf into destruction?
The transcendentaIists have no practicaI answer to this, onIy
abstract metaphysicaI or reIigious beIiefs. Bottom Iine is that they pray
to their Deity to intervene and fix it, or to save them at doomsday. This
kind of prayer is in effect asking Deity to manifest their personaI wiII
("save us") expressed in the prayer.
But this reIiance on a higher or separate wiII does not work in
Daoism. The coIIective of creation must take responsibiIity for itseIf, it
must coIIectiveIy will the energetic shape of its own moment to
moment existence. As a schoIar evaIuating a 2
nd
century Daoist text on
cosmoIogy put it so succinctIy:
The Judeo-Christian God or Plato's Forms impose a pre-
assigned design on the chaos of a recalcitrant world. Natural
change is instrumentalized, driven as it is by a linear teleology
which takes us from creation to the realization of the given design.
There is a plan, a beginning, a more or less straight line, and an
end...
Within the Daoist search for an explanation of origins, there is
the assumption that the world is "self-so-ing" (ziran) and auto-
regenerative, with the energy of transformation residing within the
process itself. There is no external efficient cause. (Yuan Dao:
Return to Source, by Ames and Lau, 1998)
This means that it is pointIess to pray to an abstract externaI cause,
because none exists. AII cause is internaI, meaning inside the body.
We can substitute "god" or "supreme deity" for "cause". If you want to
pray to God, you have to pray inside to your own seIf-arising power to
exist, which is OriginaI Spirit expressing its OriginaI WiII. Daoists have
spent many thousands of years deveIoping a spoken Ianguage to heIp
taIk about our spirituaI journey between Origin and Creation and back.
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Their Ianguage describing the precise reIationship between
substance (jing), energy (chi) and spirit (shen) is Iacking in most other
cuItures and reIigions. Lack of Ianguage is why peopIe find it difficuIt
to communicate their spirituaI experiences. They must faII back on
quoting poetic or mysticaI Iiterature or cuIturaI myths as their
authority.
The body-mind spIit is often present even in the mysticaI Iiterature
and myths. It is a refIection of a gIobaI reIigious cuIture of anti-body
perception, i.e. the tendency to bIame the body as either the source or
repository of aII suffering. Perhaps that is why reIigionists often teII
you to stop asking hard questions and just have faith in their deity.
They Iack, in their reIigious cuIture, any way to communicate with the
spirituaI aspects of the body. So instead many pray to a disembodied
outer force rather than to their own embodied inner force.
Smiling Chi Flow as the Silent Language of Nature
Daoism is radicaIIy different. With Tao you don't have a dogma or
a deity to beIieve in, onIy a cosmoIogy-as-coIIective-process to be
experienced in each unique moment IN THE BODY. But they can "taIk
about it" with spoken Ianguage, as weII as "taIk to it" with non-verbaI
energetic Ianguage.
There is a continuous Iine of Tao practitioners who have
deveIoped and refined siIent aIchemicaI practices. The energetic
patterns in those practices constitute a deep Ianguage in itseIf. This is
the hidden energy Ianguage of Nature. Nature is the body of the Tao,
and its movement patterns, both physicaI and subtIe, are the
embodiment of the Ianguage of the Tao.
The Daoists wiseIy chose the same energetic Ianguage that is used
by nature - the unity of OriginaI Breath fIowing through the entire body
of Nature, present in the stiIIness of stars. The patterns of yin-yang in
sun and moon cycIes, of five phase chi fIow in the changing seasons
and chirping of birds, the innocent smiIe on an infant's face - these are
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aII the communications of a naturaI energetic Ianguage.
These siIent energy Ianguage patterns of outer Nature are mirrored
in human body nature. They enabIe Daoists to keep their physicaI and
energetic body grounded and aIigned to the rhythms of outer time as
weII as its eternaI stiII center. They Iearned to Iisten to and observe
Nature instead of projecting head trips - concepts and cuIturaIIy
constructed deities - onto naturaI forces. They preferred to deaI
directIy with the Iife force and its naturaI bodies as the source of aII
spirituaI power, rather than its human-invented Gods as intermediaries.
This soIid grounding aIIowed Daoists to expIore the mysticaI
reaches of the unknown within their own bodies. Their Supreme
Unknown, the "godIess godhead", is not above one's head in a
paradise-Iike heaven, but rather is right under our nose, sitting quietIy
inside the centraI energetic channeI (chongmai) of the human body-
mind.
The Inner SmiIe is the simpIest of the grounded, siIent energy
Ianguage tooIs of the Tao. Every aspect of the body's inteIIigence
(shen) and energetic function (chi) is systematicaIIy contacted, smiIed
to and embraced. By smiIing to one's inner bodiIy inteIIigence, one is
not surrendering to them. Rather one is resonating with them so
deepIy and subtIy from one's inner heart that any resistant, struggIing,
unhappy aspects surrender to the spirituaI center of gravity heId by the
heart of the inner smiIing adept.
These fragmented aspects are expressions of our outer wiII, our
human "becoming seIf". These are the rough edges of our personaIity
and our negative behavior. They are sIowIy brought into harmony with
the seemingIy intangibIe centraI "being", the OriginaI Spirit that is
never born and never dies, in the Ianguage of the Tao. But it is stiII
Iiving quietIy and siIentIy within our body. OriginaI Spirit never forces
its WiII upon us, and waits untiI we smiIe to it and invite its presence to
become active within our body-mind.
Its breath or chi fIow aIways occurs within the context of a body. It
might be our physicaI human body, our human subtIe energy body, or
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the body of Nature, our environment. There is no change without body,
without the transmutation of spirit and breath into substance and back
again. Form is equaI partner with FormIess. Being and Becoming, spirit
and matter are the two sides of the same coin though they wear
different faces.
This is where having an understanding of how the chi fieId works in
the body is very practicaI. This is what I personaIIy got from Tao that I
did not get practicaIIy from yoga, Buddhism, Hinduism, KabaIIah, or
Christianity. This is not to say the information is not there, but it is not
cIearIy mapped out or accessibIe as embodied practice.
The simpIe progression of Tao is first inner smiIe through the body
Iayers into the body's core, its center of OriginaI Substance, Breath
and Spirit. Then from that space yin-yang and five phase chi fIow
radiates out. The exact pathway in the body is unique to each person's
astroIogy and to their situation in Iife.
Nobody can compIete your spirituaI destiny for you, but they can
offer you methods to correct it within yourseIf. Why can't a powerfuI
spirituaI teacher do it for us? Because the missing ingredient
necessary for souI compIetion invoIves personaI wiII. If you reIy on the
teacher's wiII and skiII, your own skiII and wiII is weakened. So you can
get inspiration from a transmission to speed you on your own path, but
not compIetion.
Strengthening personaI wiII depends on having a personaI body.
Hence the radicaI Daoist concIusion: cuItivating the physicaI body and
its inner space is the doorway to enIightenment and immortaIity. No
body, no more cuItivation possibIe. This is the opposite of most other
eastern approaches that beIieve the body is crude and an obstacIe that
needs to be dropped by the souI as quickIy as possibIe so the souI can
fIy to a happier heaven.
The Daoist approach is to cuItivate heaven-on-earth. It aIIows
individuaIs to adapt the spirituaI tooIs of the path to their individuaI
needs. Some need to go fast, they appIy the tooIs such as the Inner
SmiIe in a yang fashion. Some need to go sIow, they smiIe in a yin way.
118
Those are the fire and water paths I discussed earIier. That is why I
stress the Inner SmiIe can be used as a yin method, a yang method, or
as a wu wei method.
It's why the Inner SmiIe is even more powerfuI when connected to
practicing the Five AnimaIs chi kung or the Six HeaIing Sounds,
Microcosmic Orbit, Fusion or Kan & Li inner aIchemy practice. Each
tooI gives you more specific ways to acceIerate the compIetion of your
wiII, your shaping the fIow of chi as a rhythm in time. When your river
of chi fIows in a different direction, your destiny is aItered.
Smiling Builds Trust in Original Substance-Body
It is unfortunate that much reIigious Ianguage and otherwise
vaIuabIe spirituaI teachings that support hidden duaIistic assumptions
that are essentiaIIy anti-body. These notions occur both east and west,
in Hindu, Buddhist, IsIamic and Christian Iiterature. They are often
conceaIed within transcendentaI soIutions that conceaI anti-body
sentiments.
For exampIe, one popuIar modern writer speaks about a "pain body"
as a container for aII our suffering. This is simiIar to Hindu-Buddhist
notions of our bodiIy attachments creating acquired karmic pain and
thus the need to get off the wheeI of incarnation and be free of the
"gross" body. The very notion of "pain body" IinguisticaIIy impIies a
negative judgment against our body-nature itseIf.
Is it the body's fauIt that it can feeI pain, as weII as pIeasure? Why
not instead caII it a "pain spirit", and see the restoration of the originaI
body (yuan jing) as the soIution, not the cause? The physicaI body in
actuaIity is an innocent, neutraI chiId onto which various spirits project
their positive or negative experiences in Iife. In my opinion, the
physicaI body has received an unfair bad rap due to uncIear spirituaI
thinking, uncIear Ianguage, and a profound fear of being truIy present
in the body.
You often hear the phrase, "the mind must Iearn to trust the body".
119
IronicaIIy, this phrase itseIf creates a mind-body spIit. It impIies the
body has some kind of hidden inteIIigence that is separate from the
more trustworthy inteIIect. This supports the iIIusion that aII thinking
occurs in the head-mind, even though another kind of essentiaI but
"Iower" inteIIigence occurs in the body. It's more accurate to think of
the head as a processing center for sensory information that aII five
body-spirits interact with and controI.
In Tao theory, the body-mind is a singIe compIex. The different
aspects of the five shen, the bioIogicaI inteIIigences of the heart, Iiver,
spIeen, etc. do aII our sensing, thinking, and feeIing. There is no
separate physicaI body that needs to be trusted; aII five body spirits
exist aIong the same puIsing continuum of substance-energy-
inteIIigence (jing-chi-shen). These five human body spirits are aIso
known as the "five wiIIs", and exist in many octaves of our greater
consciousness, such as the five cardinaI directions of space, the five
pIanets, the five steIIar quadrants, etc.
There is uItimateIy onIy one trust issue for humans, and that is
whether the five body spirits or five wiIIs (= ego mind) can coIIectiveIy
trust the OriginaI Spirit and its OriginaI WiII, which manifests as the
universaI chi fieId. Trust is estabIished by the inner smiIing process. It
can onIy arise if the smiIing force comes from the whoIe body-mind
consciousness. Any mind-body spIit in our spoken Ianguage, beIief, or
behavior, weakens our originaI trust in the Iife force.
The Inner SmiIe heIps deveIops a kind of faith that is energeticaIIy
embodied and personaIIy experienced internaIIy, not projected into an
abstract externaI deity. Now it becomes cIearer why we smiIe to the
five vitaI organ inteIIigences, to aII the physicaI parts of the body, and
harmonize their smiIing response. We are grounding our faith in spirit
given bodiIy presence.
If one treats the body as something Iess than or separate from mind,
there is a duaIistic mind-body spIit being created. This type of
inteIIectuaI ego-mind can never escape from the snare of its own
duaIistic Ianguage. The mind-as-inteIIect gets exhausted, Iike a dog
chasing its own taiI. The onIy practicaI way to short circuit this spiraI of
120
mind-chasing-the-body with words and concepts is to stop aII
conceptuaI taIking. One soIution is to start smiIing siIentIy, at a deeper
IeveI than the words and concepts can reach. This aIIows us to contact
a more primaI IeveI of our wiII.
SmiIing is a kind of siIent taIking. There is no need to surrender
individuaI wiII in the Tao inner smiIing process - onIy to harmonize and
focus the five outer wiIIs of the vitaI organ spirits so they come into
aIignment with our seIf-arising OriginaI WiII. In this sense, aII five of the
individuaI ego-wiIIs are strengthened by the Inner SmiIe, but onIy when
they come into harmony.
Our centraI wiII becomes more powerfuI the more one smiIes and
embraces the separate parts of our body-mind into an internaI
coIIective unity within the dantian. In the Daoist view, the universaI
coIIective of beings is responsibIe for seIf-creating their reaIity in each
moment. If each being smiIingIy "wiIIs" its part of the cosmic
symphony, there is harmony and baIance. We can experience this
"microcosmicaIIy" within our body, and "macrocosmicaIIy" when we
smiIe beyond into the body of Nature.
The in-the-body, seIf-arising Tao cosmoIogy differs radicaIIy from
many Christian and Hindu-Buddhist transcendentaI notions that the
ego must surrender its personaI wiII or bodiIy desire (= eviI) so that
one can become the wiII of God or Brahma or Buddha (= good). This
has unfortunateIy Ied to the notion that one must "kiII" the ego.
But ego is just a form of untrained consciousness. From this
perspective consciousness cannot truIy be kiIIed, onIy suppressed,
denied or transformed into a different shape. Consciousness, however
eviI or ignorant or pridefuI, cannot be kiIIed because it is part of the
universaI fieId of consciousness. How can a part of the fieId kiII the
whoIe fieId? It can possibIy disturb it, but it is not powerfuI enough to
kiII it.
I beIieve the idea of "kiIIing the ego" is just another form of anti-body
thinking, a reIigious attempt to win the mind-body battIe, a sneak
attack so abstract spirit can dominate matter once and for aII. ShouId
121
parents kiII their chiIdren because they mis-behave? It's same
question. ShouId OriginaI WiII kiII its human five baby ego-wiIIs
because they are confused or disturbed by their Iife in the physicaI
pIane? Or shouId it practice smiIing to them, Ioving them back into a
wiser course of coIIective harmony?
If an abstract, disembodied God exists, and He didn't want humans
to have individuaI wiII or bodiIy desire, why did that God give humans
individuaI wiII and bodies? Just so humans couId choose to surrender
their wiII, and give up their body? This theoIogicaI beIief has an
uItimateIy immature premise that humans shouId remain heIpIess
chiIdren by surrendering their wiII over their own body, and that
instead an omniscient Father God shouId decide everything for them
and for their body.
Of course, this is exactIy what modern science is rightfuIIy trying to
combat as being disempowering to humanity. Science is saying,
humans shouId take controI of their destiny, not some invisbIe god or
gods. But science often goes too far in the opposite direction by
denying that any coIIective inner wiII can be attributed to Nature or that
any divine inteIIigence exists. It onIy accepts as reaI what can be
measured by math or by machines.
The resuIt: a huge spIit between deity-worshipping reIigion and
matter-manipuIating science. I beIieve that the Daoist cosmoIogy-as-
process offers a true middIe way to cuItivate both spirit, body, and free
wiII. It does not deny the body or the spirit, but integrates them into a
functionaI continuum. Daoist energy science couId become the
foundation for an emerging gIobaI sacred science, just as its stepchiId,
Chinese medicine, is one of the most powerfuI forces in aIternative
medicine.
Modern techno-science is coId. It Iacks heart. Its most briIIiant
thinkers are generaIIy top-heavy inteIIects that are often disconnected
from the heart and body. Its techno-visionaries focus more on
deveIoping new smart machines than cuItivating our existing bio-
inteIIigence. We need a baIance of ancient and new technoIogies. Tao
inner aIchemy can accept the resuIts of naturaI science even as it
122
energeticaIIy expands beyond it. It is systematic, but has a smiIing
heart.
The Great Secret of Internal Alchemy
The Inner SmiIe is centraI to embracing the hidden third force in
Nature, our OriginaI Breath. OriginaI Breath mediates between OriginaI
Spirit and OriginaI Substance, which we experience as human spirit
and human body. OriginaI Breath aIso mediates between aII our
duaIities, such as good and eviI. It is abIe to mediate them as this
subtIe, seIf-arising neutraI breath finds itseIf converted into aII
poIarities by humans exercising their free wiII.
Of course every cuIture has its esoteric aIchemicaI teachings that go
beyond the good-eviI duaIity, but they are mostIy suppressed or
hidden away. Or they survive as texts, but the practices and Iineages
are Iost, so the texts remain inaccessibIe to the modern reader. Why
did the Iineages of Western inner aIchemy IargeIy die out? Perhaps due
to excess secrecy by aIchemists. It is my mission to heIp make the stiII
Iiving Iineages of Tao inner aIchemy become avaiIabIe as part of an
accessibIe modern sacred science.
The great secret of all alchemists is that the third force hidden with
the Tai Chi of yin and yang, the Original Breath (yuan chi), can restore
our Original energetic and spiritual body (yuan jing) within the
physical dimension. When this is crystaIIized it is known by many
names: the EIixir, GoIden Light body, immortaI body, ImmortaI ChiId,
the PearI. Without the personaI wiII to create this body of inner Iight
and inner sound, the OriginaI Breath graduaIIy disperses.
We couId go deeper into the questions raised by aII this, but that is
what the higher IeveI inner aIchemy courses (both Iive retreats or
Home Study audio-video) are for. These courses take you through One
CIoud's seven stages of spirituaI and bodiIy evoIution step by step.
Each step has a chi kung movement practice as weII as a meditation
practice that heIps you birth your "immortaI chiId" and raise it to sage-
hood. There is nothing to join, and no reIigious or phiIosophicaI-
inteIIectuaI dogma to beIieve in.
123
The soIe proof on this aIchemicaI path of the Tao is whether one
feeIs increasing IeveIs of higher frequency chi fIow in the body-mind.
This is verifiabIe by one's own bodiIy experience of physicaI vitaIity,
and inner peace and joy. If you feeI more harmony and baIance in Iife,
your practice is successfuI.
If we cannot smiIe inwardIy and accept the underIying unity of our
body and its Iife experiences in the immediate physicaI body, then
repIacing it with bIind beIief in an abstract higher SeIf that wiII arrive
someday wiII not create that unity either. Deferring seIf-reaIization by
projecting it into the future is an unconscious sabotage that separates
us from our truth in the embodied present moment.
The HeaIing Tao practices of Six heaIing Sounds, Five AnimaIs
PIay, Microcosmic Orbit, Fusion of the Five EIements and Kan and Li
(Water and Fire) practices are aII designed to dissoIve bIockages that
separate body-mind and past-future. They aII have another thing in
common: they are focused on crystaIIizing our inner essence in the
present moment. This is its key difference with the many exceIIent but
piecemeaI systems of chi kung and tai chi. The HeaIing Tao method
combines chi kung with neidan, inner aIchemy meditation.
Where do these practices Iead? The human spirit evoIves to become
a grounded, seIf-reaIized, authentic human (zhenren). This
spontaneousIy cuItivates ethicaI behavior and harmony with the sociaI
whoIe. PracticaIIy speaking, the practices buiId an Energy Body that is
graduaIIy refined into a spirituaI Body of Inner Light and Inner Sound.
This IeveI of practice is what makes the Inner SmiIe uItimateIy a
spirituaI wu wei method rather than a yin water or yang fire method for
baIancing our body and personaIity.
The Inner SmiIe is great for dissoIving chi bIockages. It is great for
restoring everyday heaIth and chi fIow in an infinite number of simpIe
but profound appIications that come from unconditionaI seIf-
acceptance. But as its greatest virtue, the Inner SmiIe can aIso be a
path to EnIightenment.
Inner SmiIe can become a Way to cuItivate our humanity, the deepIy
124
embodied wiII of our coIIective human OriginaI Spirit. Humanity is one
of the Three Treasures of the Tao, aIong with Heaven and Earth.
Humanity sureIy is in great need at this time of nourishing its OriginaI
SmiIe.
As a finaI smiIing thought, I defer to an ancient Chinese master.
Confucius, who aIso considered himseIf a student of the Tao. He had
an interesting insight on smiIing:
We come into this world crying, while those around us smile.
We leave this world smiling, while those around us cry.
- Confucius, 460 b.c.
90 year old Swiss lady whose smile has become part of her face.
Even though her mouth turns down, a smile still shines through.
125
If you choose to pursue the Inner SmiIe as part of your path, I am
confident that you wiII be abIe to smiIe beyond both Iife and death into
the heart of the mysterious Tao.
That concIudes this book. I hope that as I Ieave you to embark upon
your own path, you wiII expIore the possibiIity that we are aII smiIing
into the same inner space inside our body. For humans, that is the
inner heart space of our coIIective humanity that joins us uItimateIy as
one being.
Inner SmiIes,
MichaeI Winn
p.s. PIease feeI free to send your experiences with the Inner SmiIe to
me at winn@HeaIingDao.com. I may incIude your experience in a future
edition of this book. I am very interested in your own discoveries made
pIaying with the Inner SmiIe. So pIease share! I cannot promise to
repIy to aII emaiIs due to voIume received, but they wiII be read!
p.p.s. Most peopIe find it easier to practice the Inner SmiIe with a
guided audio. You simpIy cIose your eyes and Iisten. Your smiIe fIows
without trying to read the text. Get this guided audio - with MichaeI
Winn's soothing voice transmission - in these packages:
A. SUPER SMILE "CHI" PACKAGE: ONLY $69. +s/h. #MP7A
SAVE $56.! Separate Retail Value of 4 items is $124 !
1) Guided Inner Smile Audio 60 min. ($15.)
2) Inner Smile T-Shirt ($20.)
3) Audio 4.5 hr: Chi Kung Fundamentals #1 ($50.)
Ocean Breathing, Five Animals, 6 Healing Sounds, nner Smile
4) Video 1.5 hr: Five Animals Do Six Healing Sounds Chi Kung ($39.)
See Appendix One for full description.
B. SMILE GIFT PACKAGE SAVE $5. : $29.95 +s/h #MP7B
1) Guided Inner Smile Audio 60 min ($15. value)
2) Inner Smile T-Shirt ($20. value)
C. GUIDED INNER SMILE Audio (60 min): $14.95 (+ s/h) #MC7
ncludes two 30 minute guided meditations: yin nner Smile (body dissolving) and yang
nner Smile (expand into world).
126
D. INNER SMILE T-Shirt: $19.95 + s/h
Want a really fun, great smiling gift? Wear a sun - moon smile!
T-shirt colors: mystic purple or holy white; style regular or scoop neck.
PRODUCT WARNNG: Wearing this T-shirt may cause other people to Smile.
E. For Chi Kung Fundamentals 1 & 2 full content and testimonials,
plus other great audio-video discounts, see Appendix One.
F. For list of all Michael Winn Tao Homestudy courses in recommended
sequence, see Appendix Two.
NOTE: We are an RS-approved 501c3 NON-PROFIT organization.
AII product purchases are partiaIIy TAX DEDUCTIBLE
(40% is conservative estimate, check with your accountant).
Applies to all products on the HealingTaoUSA.com website
All donations (without purchase) are 100% TAX DEDUCTBLE.
Please mail a check for your contribution to:
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Questions? Email us: info@healingdao.com or call 888-999-0555
We send you a deep inner smiling "thank you in advance for your
generous support of our spiritual work!
127
Appendix One
Chi Kung FundamentaIs 1 & 2
Package Discount Offers
TestimoniaIs
DetaiIs of Content
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See Testimonials & Details below.
FREE VIDEO BONUS for 1
st
Time Buyers OnIy:
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get third $40. video for FREE!
Choose from 8 chi kung videos by Michael Winn!
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Day 1 training: Video 1.5 hr + Audio 4.5 hr: MP1A
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Ocean Breathing, Five AnimaIs, Six HeaIing Sounds, Inner SmiIe
128
#2 GREAT DEAL: Chi Kung FundamentaIs #2 Only $59.
Day 2 training: Video 2 hr. + Audio 4.5 hr: MP1B
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Open Chi FIow in the Microcosmic Orbit - 10 Best Methods
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#3 BEST VIDEO DEAL if tight budget: OnIy $19.95 + s/h
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SAVE $20. off $40. retaiI! SpeciaI Introductory price.
Testimonials for Michael Winn's Chi Kung Fundamentals Products
I would like to tell the whole world to get this video
!'m writing to call your attention to my whole-hearted rave about Chi Kung Fundamentals #1 home study
course, which ! just now posted on our Forum "Tao Speaks!" You might enjoy seeing it, and thanking Nichael
Winn on my behalf. As my fellow forum members know, ! was expected to die at any moment from the
severity of my asthma.
! am 68, and also have emphysema, and this video, more than any other source has improved my health,
mental and physical, remarkably. ! am able to do my own shopping, for the first time in ages, can walk half a
mile without creating an emergency for myself, can get around the house and yard without the ski pole !'d
relied on. ! wish ! was a faster learner, but this has been so amazing. Thank you so much!" !n Tao -- Sister
(Kate Hawthorne)
Sister Kate's review of Nichael Winn's Five Animals Do Six Healing Sounds, from Tao Speaks! Forum:
Each animal play has a particular emotional problem it is expected to dispel. !n his system, Tiger (white,
lungs, cloud) dispels grief; Bear (blue, kidneys, ocean) dispels fear; Deer (green, liver, vegetation) dispels
anger; Crane (red, heart, fire) dispels self-judgment; and Nonkey (yellow, spleen, sun) dispels worry.
!nteresting to me, because from the emotional perspective, this lists problems ! have had, in order of severity,
AND it lists the exercises, for me, in order of difficulty.
! had no problem with Tiger and Bear. Deer is very awkward for me. Crane! you have to stand briefly on one
leg and then the other for this, and ! have always had a problem with balance, which has worsened radically in
recent months.
Well, first ! was able N!RACULOUSLY to improve my balance very much, THEN ! was able to release self-
judgment, and THEN ! was able to do the Crane reasonably well, at least for a brief period. As to Nonkey,
tonight was the first time ! was able to do it at all, and suddenly it made sense and was easy and fun. Leaving
me still with Deer, in the middle, residual anger to shed.
! am so happy about all of this, and ! would like to tell the whole world to get this video and do these
exercises. ! have NEvER had any medicine so therapeutic in my life. ! have been bursting with this, and that's
why ! just had to post it. Happy, happy, hopeful of attaining true Qi in one lifetime."
!"#$%& ()*$% +*,$-.&/%0 1
129
I just forgot about my asthma, and it started to disappear like magic!
! had asthma problems. ! tried doctors, yoga, etc. nothing helped. ! took Chi Kung Fundamentals from Nichael
Winn. The guy got me laughing and moving and breathing like ! never had before. He was great. ! just forgot
about my asthma, and it started to disappear like magic! Later, ! taught my mother the Six Healing Sounds.
She is pushing 75. This boosted her like a rocket, and a lot of her pains went away. Amazing stuff! Powerful!!!!
23 4*&&5$-%&# 1 N.J.
Succinct, comprehensive, consistent explanation of Daoist (Taoist) thinking
! have been studying tai chi for 13 years, first yang style, then chen, then began doing chi kung almost
exclusively after studying with Grandmaster Feng in !llinois in August 2000. During these years of practice, !
have gathered bits and pieces of information about energy development, daoist thinking, and modes of practice
(sitting, standing, forms, etc.).
What has been missing for me is the big picture, a way to put it all together, that is presented to me in a way
that !, an English-speaking westerner, can understand. !n your workshops, which !'ve just taken in fall 2002,
you have provided me with this missing piece. Here is what keeps me coming back:
1. Succinct, comprehensive, consistent explanation of Daoist (Taoist) thinking. ! have tried to get this from my
Chinese teachers, and could just never before (primarily due to language barriers 8 cultural differences) see
how it all hung to gether (yin-yang theory, five phases etc).
2. Explanation of the "why" and the "how" of the physical practices. For years ! have heard, "focus on your dan
tien".... but ! never understood why or how. ! am now able to feel movement in and through my dan tien that
! have never felt before. Your portal concept was revolutionary for me!
3. Simple movement practices that give quick access to practices such as the microcosmic orbit. ! have been
practicing the orbit for a few years now, but after learning your form in Chi Kung Fundamentals, ! can feel the
orbit much more clearly, have a better understanding of what was blocking it before, and how to unblock, also
a better understanding of how to teach it to others.
There is much more that ! could say, but this is a good start.
!'m really glad to have someone of your teaching ability who is willing to share!!
!*/6&* 73 !%%8%&9 :;9 :;<69 =>4 - President, Synergy Clinical & Consulting Services,
Inc., Winston-Salem, NC
And some kudos from Michael`s Kan & Li Retreats

His course was fantastic! Nichael Winn is an extraordinary teacher - a modern day Taoist master. Having
undergone the Tibetan three-year retreat, ! was able to appreciate these profound energy and mind techniques
as truly unique and transformative. ANYONE on any spiritual path can benefit immensely from Nichael's gentle,
yet powerful wisdom teachings. ?&3 ;#* +%&$#-.@@, -author oI 'Homeopathic Remedies and
'Herbal Remedies.
Nichael Winn is a creative force, an embodiment of the spontaneous soul of the Tao. Expect the unexpected
with him. He teaches alchemy formulas, yet is deeply embedded in the Cauldron of the No Formula" tradition.
He gives emphasis to BE HERE NOW. A masterful sage who fills the Cauldron with the rich ingredients of
boundless love, soul, and humility.
! have covered the metaphysical globe over many decades. ! developed a powerful spiritual crap detector"
in the process. His workshop passed the test. !t added a tremendous dimensional enrichment to the unfolding
130
of my global quest! ;"6* A3 B%C#./
Nichael Winn is a Taoist Sage. His understanding and competence are really amazing. He really lives what he
teaches. 2.#%9 Irom Spain
Chi Kung FundamentaIs #1 & 2
DetaiIs of Content
Chi Kung FundamentaIs #1:
Video: Five Animals Do the Six Healing Sounds
1.5 hr shows warm-ups, 5 Animals, & 6 Healing Sounds.
View Video clip
Best to get both audio and video, as audio gives theory and
detailed explanations of movements, plus questions & answers.
Day 1 Audio MC1A (4.5 hrs, 3 tapes) covers:
Audio incIudes 4 pages of handouts:
Five Animals movements (described)
Six Healing Sounds (illustrated, with descriptions)
How to Deepen the Six Healing Sounds: Advanced Practice
Chart of Chinese 5 Element theory & list of associated energy.
Theory: What is chi? How can we know it is reaI?
- The Life Force as personal teacher present to us in every moment.
- Chi Kung as language of nature, allows us to speak with our teacher.
131
A. Chi Warm ups
Shaking the Tree, gentle loosening of joints, muscles & internal organs.
Advanced level: "Two Year Old Chi Kung": use sound, release trapped chi.
Cool down: Rocking and Earth Chi breathing from Soles of feet.
Ground the chi deep into earth, into body, above head.
Toss out Evil Chi method. Comb out Sick Chi with Golden Finger Chi.
1. Taking stock of your energetic status.
f your body is an experiment, How to take a baseline reading.
2. Ocean breathing as key method to quickly open lower belly cauldron.
B. Theory: infinite sea of chi in the body vs. sea of chi outside the body.
Front door (dan tien) vs. Back Door (ming men).
Lying position practice. Feel the Chi between the Hands while lying.
Standing position. Ending, gathering.
Shaking the belly and laughing to loosen tense chi layers in the belly.
C. Five AnimaIs Chi Kung as Dynamic ReIeasing of Trapped Chi
1. Five animals as shamanic precursor to Chinese 5 Elements theory. Link between Belly Sea of
Chi, vital organs, and our personality. Five Animal Organ Spirits (Shen) as "dark side" of mind,
holding secrets to our natural good health.
2. Opening the heart preparation for the Animals.
3. The Tiger hisses as it prowls. White Metal chi, lungs.
4. The Tiger scares off the enemy. Grasp Lung chi to kidneys.
5. Bear tosses aside fear, stretches its kidneys, Black/blue Water Chi.
6. Deer Leaps thru Forest. Green Wood/Liver chi. Disperses anger.
7. The Crane flies, opening and closing its Heart. Red Fire Chi is cleared.
8. Alchemical Crane, mixing kidney water with heart fire.
9. Monkey Guards His banana. Yellow Earth chi/spleen. Release worry.
10. Butterfly Transforms itself: descends heat, clears the head and chest.
D. Six HeaIing Sounds as sitting chi kung method of reIeasing trapped chi.
same sounds as with animals but in relaxed sitting position.
method of using sound to release trapped emotion.
method of expanding vital organ chi and pulsing it.
method of skin breathing (vs. using lungs)
E. Inner SmiIe: Shen (spirit) smiIes thru energy Iayers of physicaI body.
different ways to practice. 3 dantian method, spine, organ, bones.
nner Smile Wave method to heal others at a distance,
link with sun, moon, stars, spirit guides.
Note: Workshop material is constantly being refined.
n some audio versions part of nner Smile starts Day 2
Chi Kung FundamentaIs 2:
Video: Open Chi Flow in the Orbit
132
1.5 hr; practice section on beautiful beach in Mexico;
detailed training in ocean breathing and 5 movements at mountain lake.
View Video clip
Best to get both audio and video, as audio gives theory and guided internal meditation
practice, detailed energetics of movements, plus questions & answers.
Day 2 Audio MC1B (4.5 hrs, 3 tapes) cover:
Audio incIudes 4 pages of handouts:
1. diagram of major points on Orbit
2. list of 10 major methods to open orbit
3. diagram of 3 Treasures of Tao in human, heaven, and in earth
4. list of Cosmic Orbit movements from chi kung form
A. Microcosmic Orbit Meditation, Jing-Chi-Shen-Wu Theory

Learn the ancient Tao secrets of circulating the internal golden light (chi, or qi) up the spine and
down the body's front channel. This famous "Embryonic Breathing" or "Micro-Cosmic orbit" meditation
stops energy leaks, balances all your meridians and energy centers into a single "wheel of chi" or
unified chakra.
This is the safest method to open your kundalini's warm current and activate the healing power of
your "inner elixir". t balances the seemingly polarized forces of Heaven and Earth, male and female,
yang and yin, and thereby creates a vessel for the hidden third force of the Tao, the Original Chi (yuan
chi).
This method of circulating chi in the Micro-Cosmic orbit is so famous that many different techniques
have been developed over the millennia to make it easier for the adept to develop this harmonious
yin-yang chi flow. give the ten major methods have found, integrated into a single guided
meditation. From this you can choose the technique(s) most suited to you and develop them further.
explain the deep relationship between the Orbit and the Taoist alchemy theory of jing-chi-shen-wu
(essence - energy - intelligence - openness).
also give an 11th method, still a quite secret method from Wu Dan Mountain, that is particularly
powerful at mixing the blood and chi within the human body. (This is not on the video, only on the
audio). Blood and chi are the fundamental essences of Earth and Heaven, so when they are
harmonized, your Original Self (Yuan Shen) can emerge and take substance. This is also the
beginning of the True nner Smile meditation, where your nner Presence radiates effortlessly (wu
wei), spontaneously, and continuously!
B. Unique Chi Kung to Open Chi Flow in the Orbit
This audio course has verbal instructions that complement and deepen the video instructions for
the movement portion of this training. Enjoy five simple chi kung movements that will open chi flow in
your orbit and give you many other healing benefits of China's "miracle exercise". This custom chi
kung form developed over 25 years of practice with many masters.
developed this chi kung form after observing that westerners have such powerful "monkey minds"
that they use too much force/effort in meditating upon the pathways of the orbit. This would create
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frustration and sense of failure, for the chi would stop flowing in the orbit after they ceased their mental
effort. Using chi kung movements to open the orbit BYPASSES the ego mind and its struggles and
gets the chi flowing at a deeper level than western type visualization by the mental body can achieve.
love this chi kung form. t will relax your body, keep the spine flexible, and develop healing hands.
t marries the chi of Heaven and Earth. t opens the difficult front (chest) channel, where a lot of
emotional chi gets stuck. t's easy to learn < you can feel the chi flow in a few minutes!
This day long workshop lays the foundation for learning Taoist sexual practices. t is a PRE-
REQUSTE for without opening the orbit, your sexual jing chi has no easy path to flow in. So this is
the FAST method for guiding your wild sexual impulses into useful spiritual pathways of creativity. The
Micro-Cosmic Orbit is the foundation for the Fusion of the Five Element practices as well as all the
other six higher formulas of Taoist inner alchemy, the science of cultivating ordinary chi into immortal
spirit.
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Appendix Two
Michael Winn's Tao Home Study Courses
Recommended sequence of study
Weekend Workshops - in the privacy of your home
AvaiIabIe separateIy or in audio-video packages (discounted).
Packages are best, as audio & videos cover different things.
Satisfaction Guaranteed (30 day return).
1. Chi Kung FundamentaIs #1 - Tao Basics
a, Day 1 Audio 4.5 hr
Inner SmiIe, 5 AnimaIs, 6 HeaIing Sounds
b. Day 1 Video: 5 AnimaIs + 6 HeaIing Sounds 1.5 hr
2. Chi Kung FundamentaIs #2 - Tao Basics
a. Day 2 Audio 4.5 hr: Theory & guided Microcosmic Orbit meditation, deeper chi
kung instruction.
b. Day 2 Video : Open Chi FIow in the Orbit Chi Kung1.5 hr
3. InternaI Chi Breathing (Chi Kung FundamentaIs #3)
a. Day 1 Audio 4.5 hr. Inner theory, guided breathing, 5 core postures
b. Day 1 Video : (same as for Day 2)
4. InternaI Chi Bone Breathing & Rooting (CKF #4)
a. Day 2 Audio 4.5 hr Advanced dantian breathing in postures, bone breathing,
spiraIing, and compression
b. Day 2 Video : InternaI Chi Bone Breathing & Rooting,
27 tendon & joint movements; 5 core postures 1.5 hr
(You need audio #3 & #4 for internaI instructions)
5. Fusion of the 5 EIements #1 EmotionaI AIchemy
2 Days Audio 9 hr Daoist Depth PsychoIogy
6. Fusion of the 5 EIements #2 & 3
a. 2 Days Audio 9 hr Open Psychic Powers
Body as Living I Ching
b. Video: 8 Extraordinary VesseIs Qigong 1 hr
+ PanGu MysticaI Qigong + Nurture 5 Shen Qigong
7. Taoist Secrets of CuItivating SexuaI Energy
a. 2 Days Audio 9 hr HeaIing Love InternaI instructions.
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b. Video : SexuaI VitaIity Chi Kung 2 hr
25 SexuaI Power movements, open inner fire & water.

8. Taoist Dream Practice
2 Days Audio 9 hr Theory & guided meditations
9. PrimordiaI Chi Kung - STAND ALONE PRACTICE
Video, 1.5 hr aka "Tai Chi for EnIightenment"
10. Deep HeaIing Chi Kung - STAND ALONE PRACTICE
Video, 1 hr Iengthy form of medicaI chi kung
GOOD FOR SERIOUS ILLNESS or CRISIS
Week Long Retreats in Water & Fire InternaI AIchemy
Audio tapes average 18 hrs per retreat, 12 tapes x 90 min.
11. Inner SexuaI AIchemy
a. Audio: Lesser EnIightenment of Kan & Li (Water & Fire)
b. Video: Gods PIay in CauIdron of OriginaI Chi 1.5 hr

12. Sun-Moon AIchemy
a. Audio: Greater EnIightenment of Kan & Li
b. Video: PrimordiaI Chi Kung 2 hr

13. PIanetary & SouI AIchemy
a. Audio: Greatest EnIightenment of Kan & Li
b. Video: PrimordiaI Chi Kung 2 hr

14. Star AIchemy
a. Audio: SeaIing of the 5 Shen (& the 5 Senses)
b. Video: PrimordiaI Chi Kung 2 hr
15. Heaven & Earth AIchemy
Audio tapes currentIy soId onIy to students who are reviewing Iive course.
Very subtIe, needs Iive transmission.
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Appendix Three
A Poem caIIed "SmiIe" By Barbara Hauck, age 13
SMILE
She smiIed at a sorrowfuI stranger.
The smiIe seemed to make him feeI better.
He remembered past kindness' of a friend
And wrote him a thank you Ietter.
The friend was so pIeased with the thank you
That he Ieft a Iarge tip after Iunch.
The waitress, surprised by the size of the tip,
Bet the whoIe thing on a hunch.
The next day she picked up her winnings,
And gave part to a man on the street.
The man on the street was gratefuI;
For two days he'd had nothing to eat.
After he finished his dinner,
He Ieft for his smaII dingy room.
He didn't know at that moment
that he might be facing his doom.
On the way he picked up a shivering puppy
And took him home to get warm.
The puppy was very gratefuI
To be in out of the storm.
That night the house caught on fire.
The puppy barked the aIarm.
He barked tiII he woke the whoIe househoId
And saved everybody from harm.
One of the boys that he rescued
Grew up to be President.
AII this because of a simpIe smiIe
That hadn't cost a cent.
- from Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul
By Jack CanfieId, Mark Victor Hansen and KimberIy Kirberger
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