Protected: Book Excerpt #2 – The First Guardian
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What Does It Mean?
I’ve gotten some interesting responses to some of the posts on this site. Most are very supportive and helpful. Then, of course, there are people who like to type before they think. This must be the modern internet version of speaking before you think…
All good entertainment in any case. I really want to thank those who’ve commented and sent interesting emails. I read every one.
You might, by now, be wondering about the title of this post and where I’m going with it. Glad you asked.
By asking, “What does it mean?” I’m referring to the calligraphy you see at the top right of every page on this site. Have you noticed it before? If not, take a look at it now…
Here’s a bigger version:
Pretty, isn’t it?
I especially like the way it flows from one stroke to the other. This is taken from a calligraphy scroll I got in Shenzhen in 1996. I was there finishing my doctorate and doing hospital rounds, but in the meanwhile, a group of us went to a street market. One of the vendors there was doing custom calligraphy.
After watching his work for a while I thought that he’d do a lovely job making this, so I asked him to make a scroll of the words, “wu wei.” Wu wei, for those not familiar, is commonly translated as “not doing.” This image is a dragon form calligraphy of these words.
But even knowing that doesn’t answer the question, what does it mean?
I would love to get your thoughts on the meaning of the idea of “not doing” and how it might relate to qigong or life in general. I’m leaving the comments open for this post so feel free to chime in.
Be well,
Dr. Bruce
Outside vs. Inside: Hard and Soft Qigong
If you do much reading on qigong, you’ll eventually run across the idea of “hard” versus “soft” qigong.
Each has teachers that prefer it and each has its place in the overall scheme of qigong practices. I’ll offer my opinion on these two, but first I’d like to clarify what they mean.
The simplest way to describe hard qigong is to say that it focuses on strengthening the body in various ways. There are exercises for strengthening muscles, ligaments and tendons as well as improving endurance and stamina. Hard qigong is especially popular with martial artists and others who rely on physical strength in their pursuits.
Soft qigong is more focused on the internal aspects of health. It includes exercises for stretching, deepening breathing, massaging and balancing the internal organs and even psychic development. It supports a healthy life and increases longevity. People of a more contemplative nature tend to like soft qigong better.
So you can see that each of these have a place in the ‘world’ of qigong. And depending on your personal goals, one or the other may be more appropriate.
However, if you had to make a choice between them, I’d recommend soft qigong. The reason is simple. By emphasizing health and longevity you are improving the overall quality of your life. And soft qigong offers an outstanding complement to the more ‘external’ disciplines such as martial arts, etc.
This isn’t just my opinion either. I recall visiting with a very highly trained kung fu (gungfu) master in the San Francisco area many years ago. He’d spent most of his then 50 years of practice focusing the harder, more external arts.
The conversation turned to the hard vs. soft question and he said, “I now wish that I’d spent more time doing the internal practices. After all these years emphasizing the external arts, my body and health have suffered.”
This means that if you practice hard qigong, you must practice soft qigong to heal and balance yourself. But if you practice only soft qigong, you may or may not want to practice the more external forms.
Be well,
Dr. Bruce
What Is The Best Way To Practice Qigong?
I often get asked what the best way is for practicing qigong. And I have several answers to the question. Here they are:
- Practicing is better than not practicing. I say this to emphasize the idea that you get no benefit from not practicing.
- That being said, if you can practice at a consistent time every day it will help. Partly this is because developing a regular habit supports the progress you’re making. For many people this will be in the morning, first thing on arising. You’ve done your practice for the day and kicked off your day by increasing your balance, energy and focus. What’s not to like?
- Sifu Lew had us start practicing twice daily – once first thing (and I mean first thing) in the morning and once before bed. This is a great way to begin and end your day.
- Be mindful when you practice. If you remember from an earlier post on “mind,” letting yourself become totally absorbed in the movements gives them additional power and effectiveness.
- Avoid overdoing it. Some people, particularly beginning students, think that if a little is good, a lot is better. Not necessarily so with qigong practice. In fact, using the “pieces of paper” analogy from before, it’s actually better to do just a bit at a time, but be consistent with it over time.
Hope that helps!
Be well,
Dr. Bruce
If you didn’t get the password…
If you didn’t get the password for the previous post, I’m sorry, but it’s too late. Passwords are only sent to people on the announcement list.
I will be posting more excerpts from the upcoming book. These future posts will also only be viewable to those on the list.
Are these going to be worth signing up for the free announcements? Here’s a comment offered by Angie B. after reading the last excerpt:
The truth unveiled.
Thank you
Here’s what you do to sign up:
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Be well,
Dr. Bruce
A Qigong Story…
Some readers will know that I’m in the midst of writing a book.
It’s about a specific qigong set from the Qing Yi Pai (School of Pure Intent) tradition. This set of movements draws it’s effectiveness from the Chinese 5 Phases, also called the 5 Elements.
If you’re unfamiliar with the 5 Elements, it is a map of relationships among cyclic natural processes. In other words, it describes everything from the seasons to times of the day. It also applies to medical issues since each of the five elements relates to a set of organ systems, foods, tastes, etc. There are entire healing systems based on the 5 Elements.
The reason I prefer the term 5 Phases is that the word “elements” usually refers to things. The 5 Phases aren’t so much things as they are phases of an ongoing process. Each phase is related to every other phase in a very specific way and there is constant movement and interaction between them.
Starting with my next post, I’ll be offering periodic excerpts from this upcoming book. The first of these excerpts is a story that I think describes a great deal about the deeper meaning qigong for self growth and personal development.
However, I’m only interested in sharing this with people who want to get a glimpse into this deeper aspect of qigong. Because of that, I’ll be password protecting these posts.
Getting the password for each post is easy – everyone who’s on the announcement list for this blog will receive a short email when the next post is ready, giving them the password for that post.
I’d also love feedback from readers about what they like and what could be clearer. You’ll be helping make the final book the best it can be. And only readers with the password will be able to comment.
If you’re not on the email announcement list, you can be. It costs nothing and I won’t be bombarding you with unwanted messages. If you sign up, you’ll only hear from me when there’s a new post, and you can opt-out any time you want. I hate spam email at least as much as you do, so I don’t send it.
Here’s what you do to sign up:
- Find the sign-up form at the top right of every page on this site. It’s below where it says,
Get Updates
Sign up below to receive
a short email each time a
new blog entry is posted: - Just below that you enter your name (first name is fine) and a valid email address.
- A few minutes later you’ll receive an email asking you to confirm that you want to receive these notifications. The subject line of that email will be:
“RESPONSE REQUIRED: Confirm your request for information from qigong-secrets@aweber.com”
- Within that email will be a link. You’ll find it just below the words,
CONFIRM BY VISITING THE LINK BELOW:
- Once you click on that link, you’ll start receiving notifications whenever there’s a new post.
I promise to guard your privacy and to treat your email information as if it were my own. And I think you’ll be very happy with the information you’ll get in the password protected posts.
Be well,
Dr. Bruce
Focus
Ever found yourself being overwhelmed?
Living in modern times it would be more unusual to not feel that way sometimes. And when we’re overwhelmed we often become unfocused. And yet focus is important for quality of life. The trick is figuring out how to focus, and what to focus on.
Before talking about that, it might help to think about what happens when we focus. In one sense, focusing is really the process of not paying attention to anything other than the object / task / person we’re focusing on at that moment.
Three Kinds of Focus
Think of something you love to do. You may not have ever noticed before, but when you’re immersed in doing it, you are mostly unaware of anything else. That kind of laser-like focus is very useful since it allows you to get things done.
When we’re engaged in an activity that absorbs all of our attention, for all practical purposes the rest of the world disappears.
When we’re not engaged in that sort of activity, we are usually paying attention to whatever grabs us at the moment. This is also useful because it gives us the ability to become aware of changes in our environment that might affect our health, well-being or even survival. If you can get a glimmer of movement out of the corner of your eye, then you have a better chance at avoiding the car coming at you from a side street. That’s why our eyes have more sensors for movement at the edge of vision.
In qigong there is a third kind of focus called “soft focus,” which is a mixture of laser-like focus and awareness of activity at the edge of our perception. I think of soft focus as taking laser focus and opening it up to encompass a wider area.
Think about the driving analogy. You want to be paying attention when you drive. Yet there are all sorts of other things going on around you, some of which might need your attention. This is good example from daily life of where soft focus is very valuable.
How To Practice “Soft Focus”
Like any skill you’re developing, at first it’s best to practice soft focus in a familiar and comfortable environment. Qigong practice is perfect for this.
Let me give you a quick exercise to get a sense of this.
Stand with your feet apart and your toes pointing forward. Relax your knees so they aren’t locked. Touch the tip of your tongue to the roof of your mouth and breath through your nose. Do your best to relax your shoulders while you breathe deeply into your abdomen.
Now, raise your hands out in front of you so that your fingers point towards one another and your palms face you. This is a similar position to that shown in the earlier post on The First Secret of Qigong. For convenience, here is the image again:
In this case, rather than shifting your eyes back and forth between your hands, slowly move your hands apart, doing your best to be aware of both of them at the same time. See how far apart you can move them and still be aware of them.
To develop soft focus even more, practice this every day for a few months until you can hold awareness of your hands while they are extended completely to the side.
This seems like a simple exercise, but it is very powerful for training your awareness. Do this for a while and leave a comment here about what you notice.
Be well,
Dr. Bruce
Energy Equals Qi…
Consider this equation:
Energy = Qi = Vitality = Breath = Life
In a sense, this summarizes what qigong is about. Remember when we talked about the meaning of qi? Qigong is really the path of cultivating a better quality of life. Along that path are many side paths, all of which feed into and support the core idea of cultivating energy.
In 1973, at the beginning of my formal studies with Sifu Lew, I ran across a book with a rather technical sounding name about Chinese medicine. It was called, “Theoretical Foundations of Chinese Medicine: Systems of Correspondence” by Manfred Porkert. The writing had the density you might expect from a book originally written in German based on Chinese texts, then translated into English.
At the time I first read it, I was way over my head. Years later I came to appreciate what he was talking about. One part in particular that sticks with me even today was the concept of the different types of qi (energy) described in the human body. Porkert described 46 distinct types of qi.
For example, there is the energy we get from our parents (pre-natal qi), the energy we get from our food (post-natal qi), the energy we get from breathing, etc.
In a larger sense, everything in the world has qi. Trees, rocks, animals, birds, sun and moon all carry and convey a kind of energy. The world is truly a living, breathing entity along with every part of it.
But what does this have to do with qigong?
One of the important aspects of increasing energy is recognizing the sources of it. If our parents didn’t have good health or died young, then we need to pay a special kind of attention to conserving our pre-natal energy. We always need to notice the quality of our food in order to extract the most qi from it when eating.
Similarly, breathing gives us qi. If we breath deeply and very shallow, there is no way to take in maximum energy. Qigong practice helps open the breath so you get more ‘bang for your buck’ when you breathe.
After about 15 years of qigong practice I had an opportunity to test this for myself. I was taking a physiology class at the local community college. In one section of that class we did a lung capacity test using a simple breath measuring device that told us our lung volume.
When my turn came to use the device, I took in a nice deep breath and then exhaled into the breathing tube. At the end of the test the machine measured my lung capacity at 50% more than ‘normal’ for my size and age. The professor thought the machine was broken…
Anyway, the take-away from today’s message is to pay attention to all of your sources of energy throughout the day. The quality of your food, water, exercise, relationships, emotions and thoughts all affect how much energy you have.
It can seem overwhelming to think about all of these at once, so perhaps pick just one and notice tomorrow (or today, depending on when you read this) how that aspect of your life adds or takes away from your energy and feeling of aliveness. Then pick another for the next day.
After a while you’ll begin to choose more of the activities and influences that energize you and let go of the others. Won’t you?
Be well,
Dr. Bruce
What is Balance?
The promise of this web site, “Helping you increase your balance, energy and focus…” reminds me that not everyone thinks about these ideas the same way. And since I want you to have the best possible experience here, I’d like to go over the practical implications of the concepts promised in this statement.
Let’s start with balance.
If you ask someone to describe what balance looks like, you’ll get a variety of answers. One of the most common is the “scales of justice” picture you’ve probably seen:
At first glance, you might look at this picture and think, yes, it does represent balance. After all, both sides are balanced and even with each other.
But there’s a problem with this viewpoint when applied to balance in our daily lives. Can you see what it is?
Go to the head of the class if you said that this image shows a static balance, while the events in our lives are always moving and shifting.
In fact, this kind of static “balance” is anything but balanced. Life is dynamic, not static. Therefore, real balance requires a much more resilient, dynamic response to life.
True Balance
A more accurate representation of living balance is the following image:
This is the Oriental symbol called the taijidu (grand ultimate symbol). There are many things to notice in this simple diagram.
For example, the two different colored areas within the circle are represented as moving, shifting. They represent yang and yin, the complementary opposites seen in every aspect of life. Here are some examples of these complementary opposites:
- Day / Night
- Summer / Winter
- Male / Female
- Sunshine / Shadow
- Sky / Earth
- Young / Old
- Hot / Cold
One thing to notice about each of these pairs is that you cannot have one without the other. If everything were the same temperature, you’d never know what hot or cold is. If there were only one gender, you’d never have children. Without sunshine you couldn’t have shadows.
Another interesting feature of this diagram is the little spot of the opposite color right in the midst of the larger swirl of both colors. This represents the fact that each of the complementary opposites carries the seed of its opposite qualities.
The easiest way to understand this is to note that the original meaning of yang and yin were the sunny and shady side of a mountain, respectively. In the morning, the eastern-facing side of the mountain catches the sun, and the western side is shady. But in the evening, the western side is sunny, while the eastern side is in the shade.
Every complementary pair of opposites is like that, constantly shifting from one phase to another. Even men and women change as they age – post menopausal women tend to have more testosterone when their estrogen goes down, therefore having more male qualities than before. Andropausal men tend to mellow and become more yielding and relaxed as their testosterone levels lower.
You can see from all this that balance isn’t just some static state, but rather requires us to be flexible, adaptable and to go with the flow of events. And qigong practice is an outstanding way to condition ourselves to be more responsive to events and therefore more balanced.
Next time we’ll look at the concept of “energy” as it relates to qigong.
Be well,
Dr. Bruce
