Refining the gold pill (Taoism)

Cauldron and furnace are action and stillness, water and fire are vitality and energy, the evolutionary mechanism is body and mind, the medicinal ingredients are essence and sense. Keeping centred on mindfulness of the celestial one finds the mysterious pass, gathers vital energy of the sense of essence at the appropriate time, and then withdraws into watchful passivity in the proper manner. Essence, sense, spirit, vitality and will are unified. Firmness and flexibility, creativity and receptivity, movement and stillness are kept in balanced proportion. Combining will and an inner sense of true essence one returns to the fundamental, goes back to the basis, reverts to the root, returns to life. With the work complete and the spirit prepared the ordinary is shed and one becomes immortal. This is the completion of the elixir pill.

The mysterious pass or "centre" is not a place but is when thoughts do not arise. It is the point of movement that arises when quietude reaches its consummation, and appears spontaneously when attention is applied to the point where the mind and active thought are roused. "Gathering medicine" is gathering the true sense of the essence of consciousness within one's self, by first quietening the mind so that impulses of arbitrary feelings are stilled. In perfection of this stillness there is movement of unconditioned energy, energy of true sense whose first movement arising from stillness is called return of yang. By fostering this, sense and essence, energy and spirit are united. Then there is withdrawal into watchful passivity - intensive concentration after the point of sufficiency means the work is wasted. The cycle of work is movement to stillness to movement to stillness. After persevering for a long time comes a gradual crystallization, stabilization of real consciousness. Non-substance produces substance, the spiritual embryo. As mind and body unite, spirit and energy merge, sense and essence conjoin, the elixir pill is completed.

Thus is the elixir completed.