Posted in Personal Power by Dr. Bruce
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
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Posted in Personal Power, Qigong by Dr. Bruce
In the last post I described my experience with a student who didn’t respond to the usual muscle testing procedure. I also asked you to see if you can figure out why he didn’t and what I did to change the test so he did respond.
Here’s the answer to that question:
This man was particularly well defended. He had probably been severely traumatized earlier in his life and responded by developing the ability to neutralize anyone else’s energy that might interfere with him. And he was very good at it! He confirmed this in some detail to me after the class.
Recognizing this, I realized that he couldn’t be ‘made’ to demonstrate a weak muscle test since he’d just neutralize any effort to do this. So I took a different approach.
The mental question I directed towards him before testing his arm strength went like this:
“Thank you for your willingness to participate in this testing process. Before we do anything more, I want to let you know that I would never do anything to harm you in any way. Your safety and well-being is of the highest importance to me.
“With that being the case, and only if it is 100% okay with you for the purpose of learning something valuable and useful to you, would you be willing to demonstrate what a weak arm test would look like?”
Then I waited for an energy response.
People ask me what that response is like. My best way of describing it is by saying that it’s like a blip on a radar screen. In other words, there is a short pulse in the energy that happens almost immediately after asking the question.
The moment I felt that pulse in the energy is when he looked at me and said, “You have good intent!” And then his arm went down easily.
The Real Lesson
This was a wonderful opportunity to see how powerful pure intention can be. By approaching him in a compassionate and receptive way, he was able to set aside his usual defensive response and learn something new about how energy works.
This experience reminded me of the saying from Chapter 72 of the Tao Te Ching, where it says, “When people no longer fear your power, this is a sign that a greater power is coming.”
It turns out that compassion is a greater power…
Be well,
Dr. Bruce
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Posted in Personal Power, Qigong by Dr. Bruce
The event I mentioned in the last post happened like this:
The class was studying all the various ways people have described human energy systems through the millenia. We addressed Chinese, Auryvedic and Native American healing traditions among others. As part of the class I introduced them to the idea of applied kinesiology (AK), also known as muscle testing.
If you’re unfamiliar with it, AK is based on the fact that our energy field is very responsive to both inner and outer influences. The classic example is having someone hold a package of white sugar and comparing the before and after strength of a particular muscle. In this example, the most common response is that the muscle becomes substantially weaker simply because the sugar is within the person’s energy field. They don’t even need to taste it.
There are other simple ways to get a weakened response when doing AK. I showed the students a couple of these, then had them practice with one another.
A few minutes later, one of the students came up to me and sheepishly told me that she couldn’t get the exercise to work. She asked if I could come show her what she was doing wrong.
Her partner was a good sized, muscular man. In my experience with energy work this shouldn’t have made a difference, so I thought I’d demonstrate to her how the exercise works by doing it on him.
Imagine my surprise when, for the first time ever, the simple techniques I used to get the weakened muscle response didn’t work! Most curious!
I looked at him and wondered why. A few seconds went by before in idea popped into my head about another way to do the exercise. So I asked him to hold his arm out horizontally and did a ‘neutral’ test, which is the usual way to begin the exercise – we want to get a general sense of how strong a person is before making any changes. He was very strong and his arm didn’t budge when I asked him to resist and then pressed down on his arm.
Then, for the testing part, I closed my eyes and did a short series of mental questions directed at him. When I got a response that seemed promising I opened my eyes and prepared to say, “resist” to him and push down on his arm. Just before I said it, he looked at me with astonishment and said, “You have good intent!”
I said, “resist” and his arm went right down with very little pressure on my part.
Okay, here’s the key question: What did I do when I asked the short series of mental questions that allowed me to push his arm down with almost no effort?
Think about it for a day or two and then come back for the answer…
Be well,
Dr. Bruce
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Posted in Personal Power, Qigong by Dr. Bruce
Master Lew, who is a very accomplished martial artist, once made the following statement:
“If ten men attack me, I win. If a baby attacks me, the baby wins.”
On the surface of it this sounds like a silly statement. Aside from in some horror movie screenwriter’s imagination, no baby would ever attack someone. (Queue reel from “Attack of the Killer Babies”)
But at a deeper level, there is a profound truth here. This goes back to the original Taoist teachings from the Tao Te Ching, where the highest level of development is compared to attaining the qualities of an infant.
Think about it – infants are innocent, vulnerable, open, curious and resilient. And they love everyone. Nothing lights up your heart like a baby smiling at you.
This is why the quality of compassion and open-heartedness is so important. Those moments in life when you feel best, the moments when you do extraordinary things, the moments when you shine, are all moments where your heart is open.
I once had the opportunity to learn very directly how powerful this kind of openness can be. It happened in a class I taught in L.A. where we were reviewing human energy systems from a wide variety of cultures and perspectives. This event made such an impact on me that it’s worthy of its own post. Stay tuned…
Be well,
Dr. Bruce
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Posted in Personal Power, Qigong by Dr. Bruce
As I mentioned last time, my original teacher, Master Share K. Lew, always gave the secrets of qigong very early in teaching. The four he talked about were eyes, mind, movement and breath. If you’ve missed the previous 4 posts, you’ll find my take on these secrets there.
Over time, it’s been pretty clear to me that there’s another secret, one that isn’t talked about as commonly. I don’t know why this is, but in the tradition of Master Lew, I’d like to offer it here.
Before I get into that, it’s important to remember that unlike the common saying, knowledge (or in this case “secrets”), is NOT power. At best, knowledge is potential power. If you don’t apply your knowledge, then it’s useless to you. Real power comes from taking action on what you know.
With that in mind, here is the fifth secret of qigong:
Heart
What I mean by this is holding a space of compassionate regard for yourself and others. This borders on empathy and can be described by understanding the difference between being open-hearted and bleeding from your heart.
Having an open heart energizes you. But if you are too open-hearted, then you become depleted. At the same time, if you close your heart it also makes you weaker. As always, balance is crucial.
For some people, it’s a scary idea to be open-hearted and compassionate. Usually this comes from a history of being hurt or traumatized. In reality, the kind of open-heartedness I’m referring to is amazingly powerful and empowering at the same time.
This is so important these days that I’m going to spend time over the next few posts addressing it. In fact, I may have a video demonstration of exactly how powerful this is in an upcoming post. I have to see how the video comes out before deciding to share it with you.
In the meanwhile, remember the 5 secrets of qigong and practice them. Ideally, every day.
Be well,
Dr. Bruce
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