MogaDao Qigong Classes with Zhenevere Sophia Dao
AUGUST RECESS in the Online ETHEA SERIES
Zhen’s Online Introduction to MogaDao’s ETHEA will pause in August (no classes) and pick up again in SEPTEMBER with:
ETHOS PROGRAM IV: NUMINA: RITUAL AND COSMOLOGY
THE SPIRITUALIZED BODY
MogaDao
Zhenevere Sophia Dao, originator of the philosophy of Post-Daoism and founder of the MogaDao practice tradition.
Please scroll down to access the standard homepage of MogaDao, which page has been displaced by the necessity of this STATEMENT.
MOGADAO'S STATEMENT OF SOLIDARITY WITH BLACK LIVES MATTER
AND THE PROTESTS AGAINST POLICE BRUTALITY AND SYSTEMIC RACISM
The recent murders, in quick secession, of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Ahmaud Arbery, by the police force, the ostensible protective strong arm of justice and safety for us all, has ripped the veneer of “health” and “evolution” and “equality” from our collective fantasy, and chaos is the response. And without condoning some of the affects of chaos, chaos is understandable. I would even go so far as to say it is justified as a movement in the soul, as the instinctive response of the collective unconscious to an oppression so unrelenting as to seem to close off all hope. For the discrepancy between the calm, the rational lie of the status quo of American society—that racial relations are essentially “good” in 2020, that the country has been “on the mend” since the tumultuous sixties—and the reality of the unrelenting genocide of black people, is untenable and enraging. For this is a genocide never-ending, one that began with the mass perishing of sardine-packed African bodies in the festering bowels of the slave ships, then the lynchings, documented and undocumented, then the mass incarcerations today which are deaths of the soul if not the body (though usually both), and the deaths at the hands of our police, right now reaching their apogee in visibility, but always having been there—never not having been there, and far, far more numerous than we have been brave enough to want to see.
So I write, as the founder and therefore the spokesperson of MogaDao, to say categorically that we as a practice tradition are utterly, absolutely in alignment with the Black Lives Matter movement and the spirit of protest erupting all around the country. Every aspect of our practice tradition supports the outcry of pain ripping through the country at this harrowing hour. To respond to that slogan, “Black lives matter,” even in the private recesses of one’s soul, with the easy, flattening retort, “All lives matter,” is, at this point in history, to commit an atrocity of denial. Black lives matter. Black lives matter. We in this tradition will cry that phrase out, along with all of the anti-racists that are rising up and crying out all around the world, of all colors and nationalities. We are among these; we are as close to the pain as we can get without appropriating it as our own, unless it is our own.
A few years ago, as part of what is now called the Heartmind Warriorship Ethos Program, at the MogaDao Institute we had a class called RACE AND EXISTENCE. In that class we read some exceedingly important material treating of the topic of racism in America, some of which, and more, I’d like to recommend to you now. For becoming anti-racist is a spiritual and intellectual labor; a responsibility; a fundamental task of being a human being; it is not a given just because one is good-hearted—and it is a never-ending process. I would recommend beginning the education of anti-racism with these books:
STAMPED FROM THE BEGINNING, by Ibram X. Kendi. This is the most unflinching treatment of the history of anti-black racism in America that has ever been written. Kendi offers no concessions to what might be called late democratic liberalism; there is no place for liberal self-congratulation in this book. It is the education that one did not receive in high-school or college, and it should be required reading of every citizen of this country.
Mr. Kendi also has an ANTI-RACIST READING LIST, published by the New York Times, which can be found here: https://chipublib.bibliocommons.com/list/share/204842963/1357692923
THE NEW JIM CROW, by Michelle Alexander
WOMEN, RACE, AND CLASS, by Angela Davis
WHITE FRAGILITY: WHY ITS SO HARD FOR WHITE PEOPLE TO TALK ABOUT RACISM, by Robin DiAngelo
WHITE LIKE ME: REFLECTIONS ON RACE FROM A PRIVILEGED SON, by Tim Wise
Thank you for your time in reading this statement of solidarity. And thank you for standing together, as a tradition, in strong and unflinching solidarity with all of the black citizens of this deeply flawed, manifestly un-great, but yet hopeful nation.
Zhenevere Sophia Dao
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MogaDao is an original tradition of graceful, medicinal, and ensouling qigong, spiritualized asana, and somatic meditation, created by Zhen Dao, based on a radical faith in the mythopoetic and archetypal power of somatic experience. The MogaDao "techne," or practices, represent dynamic sacred architectures of human potential, nourishing and informing the fields of anxiety and trauma, imagination and vitality, essence and transformation, ritual and cosmology, sexuality, and sociopolitical responsibility. These techne are supported by the novel philosophy of Post-Daoism, originated by Zhen Dao, which combines the history of Continental thought with Eastern philosophical foundations, finding them both lacking in what Zhen Dao calls "justified ontology," or what it is to be an emotional, intelligent, complex, caring, sensual, and sexual human being within a larger frame of potential cosmological harmony.
The Seven Ethea
of MogaDao
The Six Ethea are the foundational structure of the MogaDao practice tradition, and the MogaDao disciplines (called "techne" in the tradition)—MogaDao Qigong, MogaDao Yoga, and MogaDao Tripartite Meditation—are the enfleshment and ensouling, in practice, of these themes or ethea. The 6 Ethea of MogaDao represent an existential framework for a comprehensive approach to being—physical, intellectual, sociopolitical, and spiritual. The Ethea represent every techne of MogaDao and every aspect of Post-Daoism divided into thematic groupings for the purposes of immersive study. The MogaDao Ethea are:
The MogaDao Practice tradition
The MogaDao practice tradition proper began in 2010, with forms and practices and ideologies that Zhen Dao began creating at that time, a creative process which continues to the present. With the exception of the Morning Medical Qigong form, which predates the tradition's creativity and most current canon, and which has progenitorial movements derived from various sources, such as American acupuncturists and taiji masters, as well as clinical Chinese qigong, all of the MogaDao Qigong forms are original mythopoetic creations of Zhen Dao, with no derivation other than autodidactic research and practice. MogaDao Yoga employs classical Indian asana in terms of Post-Daoism's 5 Realms Theory, but many of MogaDao Yoga's asanas are original to Zhen Dao, in particular with regard to the recently innovated practices (2019-2020) of Primordial Yoga and Erotogenic Yoga, yoga practices which, in the case of Primordial Yoga, are designed to support SACRA Theater's acrobatic necessities, contemporary dance, and the martial arts, and in the case of Erotogenic Yoga, all aspects of sexual vitality. The three novel somatic MogaDao Meditations (MogaDao Tripartite Meditation), though naturally deriving from the historical diaspora of sitting practices, are also original to Zhen Dao and the MogaDao practice tradition.
post-daoism
The MogaDao practice tradition is experientially rooted in the three somatic technes of MogaDao Qigong, MogaDao Yoga, and MogaDao Tripartite Meditation. These technes, however, are indivisible from the revolutionary philosophy of Post-Daoism, which is the ontological foundation of the MogaDao tradition. The Six Ethea represent the codified relevance of Post-Daoism to psychospiritual-physical practice. Within the MogaDao practice tradition, it is the combination of the ontological perspectives of Post-Daoism with the most refined training in the sacred practice arts of MogaDao Qigong, MogaDao Yoga, and MogaDao Meditation that effectively revisions studies in trauma and recovery, the role of emotion, archetype, and the imagination, the theory of essences and change, ritual and the spiritual dimension of human being, and sexuality and eros, conceived not as "drives" but as pathways to human sovereignty, sociopolitical activism, and "justified ontology."
MogaDao's Ethos Program Immersions
Ethos Program Immersions are in-person intensives taught by Zhen Dao, spread throughout the 2021 year. So long as social distancing rules permit, the Ethos Program Immersions represent two-week, in-person study at the MogaDao Institute in Santa Fe, covering (in order, across the expanse of the year) the entire MogaDao ETHEA. The first week of these immersions, the EXPERIENTIA, is open to everyone; the second week, the PEDAGOGIA, is reserved for those admitted into the ETHEA Teachers Program, and for current MogaDao teachers who need to satisfy their continuing education requirements. The 2021 schedule of the ETHOS PROGsRAM IMMMERSIONS will be posted on this website beginning in July, 2020.
The MogaDao Institute, Santa Fe, NM
The MogaDao Institute, in Santa Fe, New Mexico, is the main location for training in the MogaDao techne, with a variety of certified MogaDao teachers, and for immersive study in the Ethos Programs with Zhen Dao. Additionally, certified MogaDao teachers conduct classes and workshops in various locations around the United States and the world; many also conduct online classes. Please see the Teachers page on this website for more information.
Taking Classes at the MogaDao Institute
The MogaDao Institute officially opened (with careful regulation with regard to COVID-19) on June 6th, with a limited schedule of classes, and a limited capacity of in-studio students. At this time, the only classes being taught at the Institute are on Saturdays and Sundays, taught by Zhen Dao. As restrictions continue to lift regarding the pandemic, there will be a much more fleshed-out curriculum. Please check the website for the latest developments regarding classes at the MogaDao Institute.
Certification to Become a MogaDao Teacher
The MogaDao teacher certification program consists of an extremely rigorous and in-depth trajectory of concentrated study in MogaDao techne, pedagogia, and the ontological philosophy of Post-Daoism, for a limited number of highly motivated and multi-dimensional individuals. The MogaDao teacher training program is currently under revision, and more detailed information is forthcoming here on the website, and on emails sent out to the MogaDao mailing list, by June, 2020.