David Fuess, internal optimist

Interview

David Fuess is a long-time friend of Justin Stone. They knew each other in California, where David still lives, and where David was accredited by Justin Stone in the early years of Tai Chi Chih. David comes to visit every other year or so. In November of 2003, he was in Albuquerque for Justin’s birthday party and gave a slide show of his travels to holy places from India and Tibet to Japan to Mexico. This year, in February, he gave two talks, one a slide show on Tibet, and another called, “Twelve Acupuncture Points That Could Change Your Life.”

VFJ: Twelve Points to Change Your Life. So why just 12? There are lots of acupuncture points.

DAVID: Many times when acupuncture is presented, too much information is given and people feel overwhelmed. What I do is I teach internal body energetics. What I want to do is take people inside their own bodies in what I call the Home Entertainment Center.

VFJ: How amusing!

DAVID: The human energy body is organized and intelligent. Most western medicine treats the body like it’s stupid. I treat the body as if it’s divine, as if it’s holy. I believe it is everyone’s right to wake up to themselves. One of the ways to do that is to feel the Chi flowing in your body. One of the great powers of Justin’s form Tai Chi Chih is that 99.9 percent of people feel the Chi flowing in their body, often for the first time.

VFJ: Is it hard to break down people’s armor to get back to the basics?

DAVID: You take them inside with techniques of breathing, or tai chi chih, or yoga, or meditation. I teach them what to look for, how to pay attention, and, obviously, how to be quiet.

VFJ: Is that something you can describe in three or four minutes right now, like how to do that?

DAVID: Well, first of all, most people don’t spend much time in silence in their whole lives. The society is geared toward stimulus of all the senses. People get uncomfortable with silence. You have to make people comfortable with being silent, and then I teach alternate nostril breathing, which I think is the greatest way to get into feeling energy or chi inside your own body. The Indians say there are 72,000 nadis in the body that end in the soles of the feet. When you do alternate nostril breathing, you are purifying three channels, the main channel of your spine, which is called the shushumna, and on the right nostril the pingala, and the left the ida.

VFJ: And the nostrils correspond with channels?

DAVID: Those are the three main channels of the body, and those three channels end up linking with the 72,000 nadis.

VFJ: Which end up in the soles of the feet.

DAVID: Right, and tai chi chih is directly linking to that system, because the right nostril is positive, or male, or yang, and the left nostril is negative, or female, or yin.

VFJ: Oh, so did you come up with that, or…?

DAVID: It’s old yogic knowledge. When you are yinning and yanging in TCC, you are balancing those two forces, and when you’re done, you unite them in the center in a neutral pose where everything integrates. Essentially, you are breaking into duality as you yin and yang, and then you are coming back to one. It’s a very powerful experience. The greatness of tai chi chih is that it is easy to do, easy to remember, and has fantastic results if people want to do it, whereas many of the other forms are too long, too complicated, too difficult to remember. People forget and then they don’t do it, so there is no point in the practice.

VFJ: Do you suppose Justin knew he was on to something?

DAVID: Oh, I think Justin knew right away a long time ago. He’s very humble about what he has done. He is saying, here, just do the practice and have your own interior experience. He’s not going to describe it for you.

VFJ: Of course everybody wants him to reveal what they are supposed to be feeling.

DAVID: But he’s not dogmatic, which is a rare thing. And he’s not interested in making lots of bucks; he’s interested in people awakening.

VFJ: You’re kind of bringing forth ancient yogic knowledge and adding it to what we are all doing with tai chi chih?

DAVID: I also do what’s called polarity therapy as part of my healing work. This November I’m teaching at the Pacific Symposium in San Diego, an acupuncture conference, and I’m going to teach how I interact polarity therapy with acupuncture.

VFJ: So how does acupuncture relate to something like chi flow? Is it comparable?

DAVID: It is totally based on the flow of chi. The body is organized intelligently. The Chinese understood how that system worked and they got all the basic principals correct almost 2,000 years ago. The Chinese understood the idea of chi. They got it from personal experience. During the Cultural Revolution when they were arresting everybody, all the old guys were out in the park doing tai chi, living in their own world, separate from the disaster of the society. What I teach people to do is how to have a strong interior electromagnetic system, so that they won’t be frazzled by all the craziness of the world.

VFJ: I guess I think I have an active interior life, but I’m still frazzled by the craziness of the outside world.

DAVID: Don’t base your experiences on the outside senses — that’s what all the spiritual teachings are about, that is, don’t go outward with all of your senses; go inward. Close your eyes and sit in silence. Don’t stimulate your hearing all the time. Don’t talk all the time. Don’t eat all the time. Go inside and see what’s going on, because this is an extraordinary world. The teachers will say that there are universes vaster inside your body than there are in the exterior universe. It sounds strange until you have the experience, so we have to listen to the masters, listen to the past pioneers who are telling us, look, pay attention, go inside, read in the Bible where it says, “If thine eye be made one.” That’s basically the third eye, where you take duality and turn it into one, which is the awakening of the kundalini energy in the spine so that the divine descends into you and you ascend to the divine.

VFJ: Makes me want to go meditate.

DAVID: Well, that’s what it’s about.

VFJ: So, going inside, and feeling inside, is that something anybody can do without props or masters? Is it just a matter of sitting down, being silent, and being aware of what you feel?

DAVID: It helps to have a teacher, always, to guide the way.

VFJ: Shall we move to acupuncture points? What are some of the 12 that change your life?

DAVID: Number 36 is called 3-mile point. They say if you needle this point, you can walk three more miles. It’s the most commonly used point in acupuncture.

VFJ: Is to walk three more miles metaphorical, or… ?

DAVID: You strengthen the legs, and really seriously strengthen the digestion. Spleen Six, which is called 3-yin crossing, is the yin channel on the inside of the leg, the crossing point of liver, kidney, and spleen, so with one needle or massage on that point, you can stimulate all three channels — very commonly used because you only need one needle.

VFJ: And then… ?

DAVID: Large intestine Four, which is in the webbing between your thumb and your index finger. It’s probably the most popularly known point, because it’s referred to as a point for headache. It’s used for headaches, for opening up the sinuses, for teeth, and if you were to cross-reference that with polarity, the left side releases the heart and the left side releases the liver.

VFJ: Releasing meaning?

DAVID: It starts to open up that energy. In my system, soreness indicates blockage. If the soreness diminishes or disappears, then the chi flow is moving through your body. Most health problems come from stagnant chi. You develop an excess when you have stagnation. Or you have too little chi and you have a deficiency. All of those lead to problems in the system, many of which are fixable.

VFJ: Fixable with acupuncture and tai chi chih and …?

DAVID: And diet. I would take people off sugar. I would lower people’s stress levels, and I would have people speak kinder words to each other.

VFJ: Is kinder communication difficult for people to catch on to?

DAVID: Well, the Christ’s message was the idea of love. You’ve got to see it through example. Divine Mother, Amritanandamayi Ma, comes to New Mexico every year in late June. She is probably the most enlightened woman in history. She is the manifestation of unconditional love. Mother is ultimately a non-dualist. Essentially when you practice tai chi chih, you become a non-dualist; you merge with the One. You’re balancing your male and female, your left brain and right brain, your front with your back, your inside with your outside, your top with your bottom.

VFJ: Are your 12 acupuncture points comprehensive, a kind of “in” to your greater teaching? Does it stand alone?

DAVID: It gives people a way to access their body’s energy, and these are major acupuncture points very commonly used.

VFJ: Your 12 points, are these the ones that we could apply ourselves, as in acupressure?

DAVID: Sure. If you’re sore, you massage in the webbing between your thumb and your first finger and tease the block out, stimulate it for 30 seconds and then leave it alone. Often if you’re massaging that point, and you’re really paying attention, you can feel the flow of chi streaming in your body. Every time that you feel that chi flowing, you’re being purified and you are healing yourself.

VFJ: Is there any interference between tai chi chih and yoga, or do they complement each other?

DAVID: I think they are absolutely complementary. I think you get better stretches in yoga, and maybe you develop a strong nervous system that complements everything you do in tai chi chih.

VFJ: So you would recommend tai chi chih, yoga, acupuncture, good diet, pranayama….

DAVID: In the old days in China, there was one doctor for 250,000 people. When you got to see the doctor, you’d get a little ticket to the tai chi class to take five classes and then you could have another appointment. First seek the natural way, and take responsibility for your own health. I tell people that nowadays you have to work on your health like a job. And don’t expect other people to do it for it.

VFJ: Seems like it’s still the other way around.

DAVID: Well, it’s changing. There’s enormous word of mouth about acupuncture; it’s become vastly popular. People are going to the movie, “Supersize Me,” and finding out that McDonald’s is not exactly the best diet to eat. Eat fresh foods that you buy at the farmers’ market and eat as much organic as you can. If you read, “Diet for a New America,” it will scare the pants off you. You don’t want to put all those hormones and antibiotics in your body. It’s very clear.

VFJ: Do people resist you? Do they cite increase in longevity and the like?

DAVID: It really doesn’t have to do with longevity. It has to do with quality of life. If you feel terrible when you’re older, what’s the point? The health statistics for the society are absolutely staggering. If George Bush wants to put 50 tons of mercury back into the environment by changing the coal-burning laws, then he is literally the Mad Hatter. The mad hatter was mad because hatters used mercury to make the hats. One in six children in the U.S. is mercury-poisoned. The people should be rioting in the streets. All the fish are contaminated. What are people thinking about?

VFJ: They’re thinking it won’t happen to them. It only happens to poor people in inner cities.

DAVID: Go catch a fish in any lake in the United States. For me, having traveled more than most people on earth, I consider over-population to be the absolute core problem. There will come a time when vast numbers of people will die on earth and it will happen naturally.

VFJ: Since a higher income correlates with fewer children, would you recommend raising the standard of living of people so as to relieve population pressures for the planet?

DAVID: Ultimately we have to share the wealth. It’s not happening. The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. One of the most fundamental teachings is that if you want to change the world, change yourself. You change your interior perspective on everything.

VFJ: So we’ve come full circle.

DAVID: That’s part of this whole process of teaching awakening from within, and then you become literally all-powerful. People of consciousness are going to be coming together in groups and becoming kinder to each other and evolving and everybody else will catch up.

VFJ: This is what you show your students?

DAVID: This is what I’ve been doing all my life.

VFJ: Was there a turning point there? You were never tempted to become an accountant or a baseball player?

DAVID: No, I started out as a China scholar.

VFJ: So you got into it immediately. You didn’t have to have to undergo hand-wringing anxiety about who you were?

DAVID: Well, that is a long story and a long evolution.

VFJ: How long?

DAVID: I had a little awakening experience when I was 12 years old in the hermitage of St. Francis of Assisi. Basically I saw the nature of space and time for about two minutes, and then it all disappeared. Then I discovered yoga, which was my salvation. I had great teachers. Then I discovered polarity therapy. All this time I was a meditator. Then I discovered about food and unconditional love. I was healed by acupuncture, then I became an acupuncturist. I became a tai chi chih teacher under Justin in 1979. I’ve been wanting to give information away all my life.

VFJ: So that chronology accounts for how many years?

DAVID: My whole life. I was initiated by an Indian teacher in 1970. I did some zen practices, some macrobiotic practices. I went to graduate school and then moved to California in 1972. I was editor of several magazines and newspapers. I wrote a lot about health. I taught history and photography in college.

VFJ: I’ve found that occasionally I hit a wall because of confusion between different systems. One is saying this, the other that. I wonder if it is contradiction, or am I not seeing the integration? Are the systems actually different? And then comes the dictum to dig one deep well rather than 30 little shallow wells.

DAVID: You’re absolutely right, but the bottom line is: RELAX! You take what information is useful and run with it; you don’t have to take the whole package. With teachers, you look at the teacher for 10 years and the teacher looks at you for 10 years. You know, you gotta relax. I can hold two contradictory points of view at the same and be totally comfortable. They can represent two different levels of consciousness.

VFJ: That could take some strength. The mind can be a trickster.

DAVID: I’m comfortable with all religions on earth, and I hang out with everybody, whether they be Muslim, pagan, Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, Hindu, Sikh — I’m comfortable with all aspects.

VFJ: Is part of your comfort that you are tolerant of differences, or that you don’t see any differences?

DAVID: Ultimately that’s true. I’m most interested in the mystical aspect of every religion. Justin — he’s very funny — he talks to spiritual people and asks how are things going and they say, “Receipts are down.” When Justin tells it, it’s hilarious. The organization and the dogma is not so interesting.

VFJ: How is it then that fundamentalism seems to have taken over again in all the religions?

DAVID: We have to presume that the Divine, or whatever we want to call it, is not stupid, even if we presume that things will probably get worse before they get better. That’s one of the good reasons to have a strong nervous system and a very alive interior world. And to be kind. I mean, what is the Dalai Lama talking about? He’s saying be kind. Have compassion. Understand why other people are the way they are. It’s a powerful, long-term teaching. Non-violence in thought, word and deed, what Gandhi called ahimsa.

VFJ: A noble goal, though I don’t do that well with non-violence when push comes to shove, no pun intended.

DAVID: The old joke, if we don’t hang together, we will certainly hang separately. There’s multiple triple entendres in there. From a Hindu point of view, they say this is the Kala Yuga, but from a Buddhist point of view, the worse things get, the more likely that the Divine will pluck another Krisna, another Buddha, another Christ, holy persons from any of the traditions and drop them on the earth in vaster numbers that have ever been done. Amazing things can happen, and things can change in a minute.

VFJ: How have you changed?

DAVID: I’m clearer. The real evolution has to do with day in and day out work. The great saint Baba Haridass in California said, “If you do the work, you’ll get the results.” You do your tai chi chih practice, your meditation practice, you eat organic fresh food — you will get the result. You just do it day in and day out, no matter what. Be kind day in and day out. Do the best you can, and you’ll get the result. It’s not always the acute, sudden experiences; it’s just staying with the program. The program is ultimately self-evident.

VFJ: No tenure track in your future?

DAVID: Wouldn’t interest me. I’ve been graced beyond all imagination. I tell people if I work 24 hours a day, seven days a week, until the moment that I transfigure, I couldn’t possibly give back what I’ve been given.

VFJ: The rest of us have these day jobs to get at benefits and pensions, causing worry about our future, insurance, yes, and then we die.

DAVID: Yes, but if you take care of your health… I haven’t seen a doctor since forever, and I haven’t antibiotics since forever.

VFJ: So what have you had? A cold sore? Earache?

DAVID: Well, you know, when you’re on the spiritual path, you never get sick, you just purify, ha.

VFJ: What about those older years when things start to break down?

DAVID: The real training is that you are not the body. It’s kind of a paradox. You work to create the body functioning in as clean and pure as you can to realize (a) that you’re going to let it go, and (b) that you are not the body. You always maintain that non-attachment to the body, because when you’re in dualism, separated out from the one, you’ve got problems. The more you merge with the one, give up your ego and your identity, things become a lot easier. And if indeed the Divine is as pervasive as everybody likes to think She is, then let Her do Her work. Get out of the way. Relax.

VFJ: We should all be as advanced and enlightened as you are.

DAVID: Well, ha ha ha ha. You can end the article with that. Ha ha ha ha.

VFJ: I’ll add my ha-ha, too.