Dao gives birth to unity,
			Unity gives birth to polarity,
			Polarity gives birth to trinity.
			Trinity gives birth to the myriad creatures.
             					   Dao dejing, v. 42  (11)

If alchemical meditation is the actual practice of speaking a deep cosmic language, daoist cosmology should reveal the foundational grammar of that language. All religions have a deep language structure buried within their cosmologies, but the priesthood may keep it secret, and teach out only the surface language to the religious followers as beliefs, sacred images and statues, or holy writings of some deity. This level of language can be acquired by anyone, i.e. a jew can convert to Catholicism and immerse themselves in Catholic religious language/imagery/belief. The surface religious language may spontaneously trigger a "mystical" communication with Nature, as it arises from a deep language structure. The experience is likely to be shaped by the surface language of the believer as that religion has patterned it (a christian will see Jesus, a buddhist will receive proof of Buddhist doctrine, etc.).

Daoist teachings typically have no dogma or theology; aligning with the cosmological cycles of nature is its salvational process. In One cloud's alchemy formulas, there are no deities named. Instead you are given a map of personal "deity hood" (immortality) and the energetic language skills that allow one to converse intelligently with all deities/entities, whether invisble or in natural form as humans, planets, stars, etc. The alchemy adept is not asked to believe anything other than to accept the possibility of regrowing their Original Self in the physical plane by deep communication with the Dao. The assumption is that all deities must communicate through the same qi field of Nature; if you merge with that qi field, you know what those deities know. What follows is my interpretation of daoist cosmology, shaped by study with many teachers and texts, but mostly clarified by practice of the first six of One Cloud's seven alchemical formulas for immortality.

The Dao is the undefinable, unknowable organic wholeness of everything. It embraces non-being and all dimensions of space, time, & intelligence. From its womb, the Supreme Unknown (wuji), three heavens are birthed. The first to birth is chaos (hun dun), the Heaven of Primordial Origin. There is no need for communication in the dark ocean inside this cosmic egg, as there are no separate aspects to communicate with each other. The cosmic egg is also depicted as a gourd filled with yin-yang elixir in taoist art and myth (12). The cosmic egg hatches, a kind of spiritual big bang marked by thunder, and the wheels of creation begin turning. As order crystallizes out of the unbounded chaos of oneness, the Dao communicates with itself through a field of Original Energy (yuan qi). This infinite ocean of life force holds three potential charges: negative, positive, and neutral qi (yin, yang, and yuan). This triune stream is the core grammar of the deep language of Nature.

In the unborn primordial ocean of qi, the triune stream of the Dao is shaped and evolved by the three-fold intelligence latent within it. As Original Spirit (yuan shen) shapes Original Energy (yuan qi), the patterns formed are encoded in a matrix of Original Essence (yuan jing). The continuum of this original inseparable trinity -- yuan jing, qi and shen -- is the cosmic seed or potential state of all form, all energy, and all imagination (yi), will/virtue (de). In Primordial Heaven these three remain as one.

With the hatching of the cosmic egg/gourd, the unified ocean of awareness holding this trinity increasingly polarizes itself into yin and yang forces as it steps its universal qualities down into the second heaven, an intermediate dimension called Early Heaven (xian tian). This act of original trinity-in-one dividing itself while maintaining unity requires a deep level of self-communication. In Early Heaven vectors of yin - yang polarity exist, but they communicate a pattern of perfect harmony and balance by virtue of the yuan qi in the center of its spherical container. (Yuan qi is invisible, thus is not symbolized in the I Ching's eight trigrams of Early Heaven). Yuan qi sits silently in the middle of the bagua and in the space between the yin-yang pulses of the eight polar forces. Original Qi holds the presence of the Origin as the 9th and central mediating force within creation.

Early Heaven acts as a cosmic pre-natal womb, where the seed virtues/creative powers of yuan shen are gestated before being shaped in the human realm into more defined spiritual qualities of kindness, trust, love, etc. Since yuan qi is the "unconditioned energy" of the universe, all "unconditonal virtues" of the Original Spirit such as unconditional love, unconditional truth, unconditional acceptance, etc. are communicated through yuan qi. Early Heaven divides the triune unity of yuan qi into the five phases/elements (wu xing) of cosmic time. (See Illustration ) This five phase intelligence shapes the matrix of cosmic space as it unfolds rhythmically on a web of eight yin-yang forces. These sacred directions and time cycles, imbued with their "de" (inner powers or spiritual qualities) are symbolically mapped on the ancient Ho Tu and Lo Shu diagrams, the precursorrs to the I Ching and cornerstones of chinese spiritual culture. But even the symbolic relationships of the Ho Tu and Lo Shu can be seen as deep language communications from the qi field, as simple numeric expression of the eight channels and 5 elemental cycles through which Nature communicates with itself.