Darkroom Retreat 2025 : In-Depth Taoist Practices
In-Depth Taoist practices
8-24 February 2025
Tao Garden Workshops in Thailand with legendary Master Mantak Chia
About Mantak Chia
Grandmaster Mantak Chia is the world’s foremost Taoist Master. He is the only Qigong Master who received The Qigong Master of the Year Award twice. He is the author of 60 books and has 49 years of teaching experience —online and onsite. Students of Master Chia especially like the clarity of the explanations, the many repetitions of practice, and his slow pace.
The classes with Mantak Chia are unique, thanks to his ability to transmit energy to his students, online or in the classroom. Many students practicing with Master Chia not only witness the wisdom of primordial violet light during his Energy Transmissions but also begin their initial healing processes.
About the Darkroom Retreat
This is the most awaited event for anyone willing to try and experience in-depth Taoist practices with Grandmaster Mantak Chia! These workshop practices take place in the Darkroom designed according to Taoist traditions. During the workshop, you will be completely free from any external light source (except Day 1) and you will have 3 meals a day according to Taoist Pi Gu diet.
In the darkness, you can enter a primordial state —accessing spiritual and psychic realms of consciousness and reuniting with your true self. You become a conductor of universal energy as the darkness activates the deepest centers of the brain, the glands in the Crystal Palace.
Pi Gu Fasting Diet includes Taoist practices, energy meditations, and specific ways of chewing food. This Darkroom Pi Gu state gives tremendous healing power.
You will get step-by-step explanations and guidance on meditations to quieten your mind and give your body an incredible rest, supporting its natural rejuvenation.
Join us for 1, 2 or 3 weeks in Tao Garden, Chiang Mai (Thailand).
During the Workshop, you will get:
- The chance to experience the legendary Darkroom and Master Chia’s energy transmission
- 3 meals a day, herbal detox tea and supplements according to Taoist Pi Gu diet
- The opportunity to ask Master Chia all your questions during a Q&A session
- Ebook “Darkness Technology”
- E-booklets
- Lifetime access to all provided videos and materials
This Retreat is for you if you are:
Looking to experience complete stillness in the darkness to reset your biological clock and to access higher states of consciousness and wisdom.
Willing to deepen your meditation practice and start to see the Primordial light
Looking to experience Advanced Taoist meditations and spiritual transformation through higher level practices
Master Mantak Chia will teach in English. There will be no translation furing the Darkroom retreat in order to keep the full darkness experience for our participants.
Recommendations for the Darkroom Retreat
Basic knowledge of Fundamental practices such as Cosmic Inner Smile, Six Healing Sounds, Fusion of the Five Elements, Microcosmic Orbit, Iron Shirt Qigong, and Tao Yin, which bring the body into a state of balance and tuning. A physically fit vehicle is the foundation stone from which to launch astral travel into multi-dimensional orbits and higher cortical activity. If you haven’t already taken Fundamental Practices earlier, we recommend doing so and attend Winter Retreat. Learn more about Winter Retreat.
During the darkness retreat, you will be completely free from any external light source and all types of animal and dairy protein except for egg-whites to cover your body’s protein and calcium needs. Chlorophylle will be provided daily. Juices, sesame, herbal detox teas, vegetable broth and fruits will be provided to you 3 times per day.
All participants are encouraged to engage in a healthy preparatory diet and bowel cleansing process starting 4 weeks before the retreat. Diet should be rich in Vitamin D, beta-carotene like choleric, calcium (2,000 gm), magnesium (500 mg), and zinc (20 mg/day).
We recommend eating less food 1 week before arrival and check-in at the Tao Garden at least 2 days before the retreat (for additional fee, please contact [email protected]) to prepare the body, clean the colon and do the recommended blood tests (optional).
Darkroom retreat Program
Week 1 | 8-13 February | Darkroom essential meditations.
Prerequisites for this week: Fusion I, II and III.
Schedule
- - Sat 8 February | Introduction with lights on and Energy Transmission
- - Sun 9 – Wed 12 February | Darkroom essential meditations. Creating an Energy body. Pearl of Consciousness
- - Thu 13 Feb Review class with a Senior Instructor (10.00-12.30)
During this week you will practice Fusion I, II and II in the darkness under the guidance of Grandmaster Mantak Chia. There will be no theory, only practice.
Fusion means mixing and fusing things to create something new. In our Taoist practices, we combine emotions, natural forces, life forces, etc., into one energy we can use.
Fusion of the Five Elements I allows you to control the energy of your inner universe to facilitate the connection with the energy of the Grand Universe. You will focus on capturing negative emotions and merging them. You will then bring in all the positive emotions and combine everything to create a better energy balance.
Fusion of the Five Elements II allows you to learn to move the “pearl of radiant energy” (created in Fusion l) through your internal organs, multiplying the natural virtues that reside there. With this vital energy, you can open the Thrusting Channel Routes, which run through the center of your body, linking the “energy centers”, and open the Belt Channels, which spiral around the whole body, strengthening the auric field and providing a form of psychic protection.
The Fusion III meditation opens the Greater Bridge and Regulator Channels, Spinal Cord, Head, and Heart, using cutting and drilling techniques to clean out any energy blockages. The student learns to protect the body from external energies by Sealing the Senses and Aura and receiving the higher frequencies of the Universal Force.
Week 2 | 15-19 February Lesser Kan & Li
Prerequisites for this week: Fusion I, II and III.
Schedule
- Fri 14 February Check in to Dark Room building from 2pm
- Sat 15 – Tue 18 February | Lesser Kan & Li
- Wed 19 February | Review class with Instructor
Lesser Enlightenment of Kan & Li involves cleansing and rejuvenating the glands and organs using neutral energy (steam) generated by the inverting and coupling of the primal polarities of Fire and Water. The higher Inner Alchemy Formulas, which traditionally were practiced in caves, are taught in a complete darkness environment, which has been specially created to facilitate the teaching and practice of higher-level Taoist Alchemical Meditation.
Week 3 | 21-25 February Greater Kan & Li
Prerequisites for this week: Lesser Kan & Li
Schedule
- Thu 20 February Check in to Dark Room building from 2pm
- Fri 21 - Mon 24 February | Greater Kan & Li, exit from Darkness on the evening 24 February
- Tue 25 February | Review class with Instructor (with lights on)
Taoists believe that the soul and spirit come from the stars and ultimately must return to them to find their origins. To do this, one must first gather and refine the energies of the soul and spirit until they are as pure as the Original Force. By harnessing energy from the Earth, the planets, the Big Dipper and the North Star, we gain spiritual power and the ability to merge with stellar forces. These meditation practices are targeted upon strengthening the body and the spirit on all levels.
You will learn to activate the cauldron at the Solar Plexus and increase the amount of energy that may be absorbed into the body directly from Heaven and Earth.
Pi Gu is an ancient Taoist method of fasting for spiritual and healing purposes. It translates from Chinese as “stop eating grain.”