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June 27, 2005
Qigong as a Training in Physical, Mental, Emotional and Spiritual Letting Go
"Much of our life we spend in frustration grabbing at
handfuls of sand."
Knowing how to "let go" is one of the very greatest secrets for
spiritual, mental, emotional and physical health. And my personal
experience in the energy and consciousness based practice of
qigong, convinces me that qigong is a superb practice for
developing this skill.
Last night in qigong class we were holding a still posture on one
leg from the Deer Frolic. After a few minutes, the one leg begins
to "ache, shake and bake."
The tendency for our minds when faced with these physical
sensations, is to panic and to persuade us not to continue.
The secret to standing staying power, though, is to remember
that, for all its perceived physicality, this qigong practice is
99% an activity of consciousness, of mind in the expanded sense.
Once you let go of your interpretations of the physical
sensations as uncomfortable and just observe them, staying
relaxed and breathing gently, a curious transformation takes
place. The mind sharpens to a great clarity, there is a sense of
substance and vitality, and of power.
The stillness practice, while building energy, begins to dissolve
our usual distinctions of body, mind, thought and emotion. The
method is to continually let go and simply be a witness.
Much of our life we spend in frustration grabbing at handfuls of
sand.
And of course, the harder we grab, the tighter we make our fist,
the more the grains of sand trickle and escape away between our
fingers.
The open, relaxed palm cups a large mound of sand in safety. The
fist that closes begins the process of loss.
See each cell in your body as either being a tight fist or an
open hand. How much money can you give to a closed fist? How
much water can a fist hold? How much happiness can enter a
clenched brain, a clenched heart, a clenched soul?
Certainly there is a time for closing, tightening and toughening
up. However, we need to be able to instantly release out from
that tension. Buddha is reputed to have said: "the only
difference between you and me is the speed with which I let go."
So, practice qigong to unclench "the tight fist" of your holding
patterns, for greater overall health and well being.
I will be teaching many wonderful qigong methods for letting go,
at Dragon Door's upcoming Unlock! Workshop.
If you can't make it to the workshop then check out my various
qigong resources.
Posted by james at 6:05 AM | Comments (0)
June 20, 2005
The Mysterious Relationship Between Movement, Breath and Qi
To illustrate the relationship between movement, breath and qi I sometimes have my students open and close a fist very rapidly while observing what happens to their breath. I then ask them to observe their breath when they switch to opening and closing that same hand very slowly.
Try it for yourself.
What you will notice, normally, when your fist is opening and closing rapidly is that your breath becomes relatively fast and shallow. The breath will also have a tendency to be focused in the mid or upper chest.
However, when you open and close your fist very slowly, there is a dramatic shift: the breath slows down, becomes deeper and sinks to be focused in the abdomen. If you have some prior training you become aware of a strong link between the hands and the abdomen. The whole body seems to inflate from your core as the hand opens, and gently contract as the hand closes.
Before we come to qigong or tai chi, most of us breathe at around fourteen breaths a minute (a breath being one inhale and one exhale.) Extended qigong practice brings the cycle down to around six breaths a minute, or lower.
Slower, deeper breathing is more healthful and energy efficient. The reason you’ll see tai chi and qigong practitioners practicing their movements slowly a lot of the time is because they are training their breath through movement. They are also training themselves to move with minimum tension and blocks in their limbs, which allows for a freer flow of qi.
The idea is that when you then have to move with speed and vigor you can retain that open, relaxed movement and maintain a relatively smooth breath. Small children and wild animals possess this quality naturally. As we age and become crudded-up with residual tensions, our movements and breath lose their smoothness, elasticity and range, leading to all kinds of health problems.
I sometimes hear folk idealize that “real qigong” doesn’t or shouldn’t have to involve actual movement-practice. “Real qigong” is an ongoing act of consciousness, of highly attentive living.
Well, how many of us human animals can really maintain that refined state moment by moment, without falling into some level of stagnation or energy imbalance? Let’s get real!
If you really want to achieve and maintain both vibrant health and a strong spiritual presence, then make sure to include movement-breath-qi training as a daily practice.
Check out John Du Cane’s Qigong resources here.
Posted by james at 6:38 AM | Comments (0)
June 13, 2005
How to Inhabit Your Body: Qigong as "Conscious Stretching"
Have you ever looked at a person and felt they were essentially "absent"? Not really inhabiting their body as a conscious presence? Almost dead to the world? Mystics from all spiritual traditions claim that ninety nine percent of humanity is "asleep". To all intents and purposes, zombies.
On the other hand, have you been around other people who seem to light up their environment, emanating a sense of conscious presence?
An ancient Chinese term for qigong was dao-yin, sometime translated as “guided stretching” or “guiding the energy and stretching the limbs”. I think another good translation would be “conscious stretching” to convey the power of qigong to help us fully inhabit our bodies.
Strange, but for a culture that appears to worship the body, most of us relate to our bodies like absentee landlords.
In class with my students, I compare the conscious movements of qigong with what you’ll see in a normal Aerobics class: a kind of mindless flailing around, like a bunch of drunks in a noodle factory. Or that travesty known as Tae Bo, which looks like a bunch of over-amped mechanized dolls let loose by a blind toymaker.
Most qigong is easy to learn but hard to practice. The outward movements are more or less simple. Even the instructions and methods for moving energy internally are not that complicated, really.
But the constant practice of being attentive to the inner quality of your movement, to being totally present within your body, that’s another story. It’s a lifetime of constant refinement, of subtle adjustments and dedicated cultivation.
And the older you get, the more you need a discipline like qigong to truly stay alive and conscious in your otherwise decaying carcass.
One of the absolute secrets to consciously inhabiting a vibrant body is to maintain open, healthy joints.
And to do that, I don’t care who you are, you had better be moving around a lot, and in many, many different ways.
If you get locked in to one type of exercise, one kind of movement pattern, or essentially no movement to speak of, you’re a health-disaster waiting to happen.
I don’t consider that any discipline on the planet offers a greater range and subtlety of joint-work than qigong.
If you want to experience first hand the amazing variety and impact of qigong for joint health, flexibility and mobility, then I strongly recommend you attend the upcoming Unlock! Workshop Pavel, myself and Steve Maxwell are putting on. Not only will you get a goldmine of my own favorite qigong techniques garnered from thirty years of qigong research, but you’ll learn from two other “Masters of Conscious Stretching”, Pavel and Steve.
Hope to see you there!
Posted by james at 6:14 AM | Comments (0)
June 6, 2005
"How Do I Integrate The Five Animal Frolics Qigong Program Into My Daily Life?" And Some Other Frequently Asked Qigong Questions.
This week I thought I'd address a few of the practice questions I have been asked and which come up quite regularly.
Question: What element and season is each animal in The Five Animal Frolics Qigong traditionally associated with?
Answer: I have seen books and tapes that don’t always agree on which element and season goes with which animal. In my Five Animal Frolic “lineage” The Bear is connected to Winter and the Kidneys, the Crane to Summer and the Heart, the Tiger to High Summer and the Digestive System, the Deer to Spring and the Liver and the Monkey to Fall and the Lungs.
Question: In the Animal Frolics book I have, it stated that although there is no limit, traditionally each movement is done nine times.
Answer: The Crane Frolic reps are nine as a traditional minimum. The Bear is five. The exact numbers are not that important. Do as many as you can manage in your time frame. A shorter-duration but consistent and frequent daily practice wins out over a longer-duration but sporadic practice schedule.
Establish a daily minimum for yourself that you will do every day regardless of your other commitments then increase that amount whenever you can.
Question: The only DVD I have is the Tai Ji Qigong. The additional techniques of internal sound and pulling up the perineum are covered there. Would those also apply to any of the Five Animal Frolics or any of the Qigong Recharge movements?
Answer: You can pull up the perineum for all qigong practice. When you practice qigong and tai ji without pulling up the perineum it is a little like trying to inflate an inner tube that has a leak in it. The Heng and Ha don’t apply to the Five Animal Frolics or the Recharge methods.
Unless you are practicing Iron Shirt Qigong, it is enough to place your attention in the perineum and have a gentle sense of pulling up and closing.
Question: In the simple standing pose with the hands crossed over the lower dan tien, does it matter which hand is above or below?
The man’s hand is right over left. Women the opposite. This is considered to lead to a better balancing of the respective Yin Yang energies. It’s a small refinement.
Check out more of John Du Cane’s Qigong resources here
Posted by james at 6:42 AM | Comments (0)