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March 28, 2005
How Qigong and Kettlebell practices complement each other
I'm asked all the time: as a qigong practitioner, do you use kettlebells and if so, why and how? And kettlebell practitioners ask me the reverse: would qigong be a good complement to my kettlebell practice and if so, why and how?
What advantages does qigong offer the kettlebell practitioner? The advantages are in the areas of: joint health, flexibility, breathing, relaxation and detoxification.
While kettlebell practice will strengthen many of the major joints in the body, I’ve never come across any discipline of any kind anywhere that offers remotely the subtlety, complexity, variety and range of therapeutic joint work you will encounter in qigong practice. High-level qigong practitioners revere the joints as “spiritual gates” essential to all aspects of human health.
Human beings are the first “self-domesticated” animals. (More on this topic in next week’s entry.) Qigong aims at bringing back the “wild” to our bodies, while simultaneously cultivating and refining our sensibilities. Part of our “wildness” is the ability to be highly efficient in the use of our energy and strength. Kettlebells strengthen us magnificently, but can also leave us overly tight and knotted up, without compensatory relaxation and internal energy generation techniques. I have found that qigong practice superbly releases many of those stiffnesses and knots my body can take on from kettlebell use.
Qigong puts the limbs and torso through a constant series of expansions and contractions, creating elastic strength, an excellent stretch and the ability to release quickly out of tension.
Iron shirt-like qigong practice teaches forms of compressed breathing that help generate more power in the grind moves of kettlebell use. Regular qigong “natural” breathing helps with endurance for the dynamic kettlebell exercises.
Strength and health are not synonymous.
I know of many “outwardly” strong people, including kettlebell practitioners, who have succumbed to cancer, heart attacks, flu’s and pneumonia. Qigong, through its detoxification and activation of the lymph system — and through its balancing of the nervous system and meridian energy system — will complement hardstyle strength practices like kettlebells by fortifying and safeguarding your supply lines.
You will be less vulnerable as a human being when you possess not only “external” strength but “internal” strength.
I am not sure if kettlebell exercise is going to strengthen your kidneys, liver, spleen and other key organ systems (it obviously will help the heart and lungs). I can pretty well guarantee, though, that qigong will.
What’s the most powerful engine in the world going to be worth with filthy oil and lousy gas? With defective spark plugs? A crimped or leaking fuel line? A blocked exhaust?
Napoleon is famous for remarking that an army “marches on its stomach.” Destroy or weaken the base camp, disrupt or cut off the supply lines and watch what starts to happen to all those tough guys on the front lines…
In a later issue, I will revisit this topic to discuss the advantages kettlebells bring to a qigong practitioner.
Check out John Du Cane’s Qigong resources here
Posted by james at March 28, 2005 6:05 AM