Is there a contradiction between Mantak Chia's description of the center of life energy and Zen's description?

In his book, `tao yoga,' mantak chia describes the center of life energy as being just two inches inside the navel. Is this a contradiction to zen, which says it is two inches below the navel? Or do they both mean the same?

It cannot be discussed and concluded; in fact, those two inches are only the average. When you breathe deeply you touch the center, and you can find whether it is two inches behind or two inches below. The person who has written TAO YOGA, Mantak Chia, does not seem to be an experienced person. When I say two inches below the navel, I am trying to take your consciousness as deep as it can go. Those two inches are not something fundamental. Your center may be only one and a half inches below the navel. Just as everybody's nose differs... there is no way of concluding which nose is the fundamental nose. Don't get into intellectual discussion. The navel you have, the consciousness you have... the path is clear, it is not far away. Just a little silence, peace and witnessing, and you will know where it is; it is…

A friend has asked: Osho, please repeat the instructions for the afternoon meditation.

In the afternoon meditation there is nothing to do. The afternoon meditation is a practice of absolute silence. I will sit among you; you will sit silently near me. In that silence, whatever happens, let it happen—dancing, shouting, crying, singing, the body swaying—whatever it is, let it happen. If someone feels that a longing has arisen within to come to me, then come and sit by me for two minutes and then get up and go. Come to me only if you feel it. Do not come because someone else is going. If the feeling arises within you, then come and then leave. Forget about others.

Last night you said that with the dawn of enlightenment, the space between the two eyebrows, the third eye, becomes all inclusive. The other day you said that all enlightened ones are centered in their navel, and on still another day you have explained about the silver cord in the middle of the spine. Thus, we know about three basic things as the roots of man. Please explain the relative significance and relative functions of these three things: the navel center, the third eye and the silver cord.

If someone should come from space, from some other planet, and he should see you, he will not be able to conceive that you have any sex center. If he should listen to your talk, he will not be able to understand that there exists anything like sex. If he moves in your society, in the formal world, he will not know that anything like sex is happening. We have created a division. A barrier is there, and we have cut off the sex center from ourselves. Really, because of sex we have divided the body into two. The upper means "higher" in our minds and the lower means "lower" -- it is condemned. So "lower" is not just some information about the location of the bottom half, it is an evaluation also. You yourself do not think that the lower body is you. If someone asks you, "Where are…

If enlightenment and samadhi mean total consciousness, cosmic consciousness, all-pervading consciousness, then it seems very strange to call this state of cosmic consciousness centering, as the word `centering' implies one-pointedness. Why is cosmic consciousness, or samadhi, called centering?

It is like small children doing arithmetic. They can always go to the back of the book and can know the answer. The answer is there; at the back of the book, the answers are given. They can look at the question, then they can go to the back and know the answer. And once a child knows the answer it is very difficult for him to learn the method, because there seems to be no need. When he already knows the answer, there is no need. And really, he will do the whole thing in reverse order. Then through any false, pseudo method he will arrive at the answer. He knows the real thing, he knows the answer, so he can arrive at the answer by just creating a false method. And this happens so much in religion that it seems, as far as religion is concerned, everyone is…

One friend asks how a person should find the internal centre that is mentioned by lao tzu and develop its hunger.

Sit with your eyes closed and think, "Where is the centre of my body?" We live through our body, but it is an unfortunate fact that we do not give any thought to the centre of our body. We are completely ignorant of the pivot on which the body functions. Many people believe the head to be the centre of all body functions because it is in the brain that all activities seem to take place. The fact is, however, that the brain forms much later. When the child is conceived, there is no brain and yet life functions. But that which is formed later, cannot be the centre. People who are emotional, like most women, artists, poets, feel the centre to be the heart because whatever these people have known and experienced -- love, beauty and the like -- are things that have had a direct impact on their…