Alternative Methods of Support

The Daoist Foundation has a variety of projects that require specific skills as well as financial support. Members without financial means to support our work may help by donating their time and skills to the following areas. Please note that each project requires high-level and refined abilities.

Archiectural Design: We are currently working on an architectural blueprint for the planned mountain retreat center.

Book Making: We plan to print literature produced by our directors for community members in the form of hand-crafted books.

Clothes Making: We have designed modified Daoist vestments for clergy members of the Clarity and Stillness Order.

Construction: We plan to build meditation huts at the Gallagher Cove Daoist Association modelled on traditional Daoist pure chambers (jingshi 淨室) and meditation enclosures (huandu 環堵).

Noren Screen Printing: We are currently designing transportable screens so that Daoist visual culture will be present at community gatherings. This will allow us to transform any place into a Daoist sacred space and to create a sense of familiarity and continuity at our meetings through the use of Daoist aesthetics and the presence of Daoist culture.

Retreat Support Staff: After the minimum number of retreatants have registered, we offer work-study positions for those without financial means. Typical duties include food preparation, dish washing and tea service.

Workworking: We have a number of wood-working projects. The first involves producing Daoist meditation benches. The second project focuses on creating objects for ritual use, with a lectern, audience tablets (chaojian 朝簡/chaohu 朝笏) and summons tablets (lingpai 令牌) being the most immediately needed. Finally, we plan to produce clerical chests to store the various paraphenalia of Daoist ordinands.