Archive for the ‘Wuji’ Tag
In the beginning:
The peacock spread his tail and pushed away the fairy crane, hands moving like clouds he strikes the tiger and parts the wild horses mane. Then the fair maiden saw the golden rooster bend his bow and shoot the tiger and carry the tiger back to the mountain.
Just a little Chinese poem to remember Dong Zeng Chen’s “Taiji Gong”
Peacock spreads his tail (Ward off)
Push
Fairy crane (White crane spreads it wings)
Move hands like clouds
Strike the tiger
Parting the wild horses mane
Fair maiden works at the shuttles
Bend bow and shoot tiger
Carry tiger, return to mountain
This poem helps to remember the Taiji forms repeated in the Taiji Gong Qigong. These nine movments capture the spirit of Taiji; this can be enjoyed sitting or standing. Warm-up,,,,start with zhan zhaung training, wuji. Then repeat each move left and right three, five or seven times each.
Sifu’s father also had a “Taiji gong” we’ve been doing for many years. See “Tiger Mountain”
Copyright Cory Williams 2016
Yiquan friends doing some Yi Jin Jing Qigong
Come and play with our Yiquan club every Thursday morning. Since Sifu Fong Ha comes here every September, a group of six or seven dedicated practitioners has began meeting every Thursday to continue working on his (and others) teachings. Since then it has become a great free-form “Internal Arts Day”
This is not a “class” because it is at Kamaole III Beach Park and the county will not allow a formal class: so I call it a club, there is no charge we just play.
Yiquan means “Mind (intention) Boxing” and it is a simple way to train martial arts and meditation skills. One of the main practices is just standing. There is a huge variety of postures used in standing work, also known as “Zhan Zhuang” lit. “standing like a post”. In Yiquan, there are eight main postures, you just stand and hold a posture, it is very simple.
Every Thursday morning starting at 6:30 AM with zhan zhuang, Qigong and Taiji walking, sometimes we take a break about 7:50 or so, look for us at a table at that time, then at 8:15 AM, we continue with Taijiquan until we are done.
The pre-dawn standing part is simple; just stand (or sit) in Wuji and if you want to, hold some postures or do whatever you want to! Try doing some “spontaneous qigong” also known as “Zi Fa Gong” or do the Yiquan postures.
The qigong that we originally did here consists of two sets and some “Taiji walking”. The first set is called “Yi Jin Jing” this is the famous “muscle and tendon changing classic” invented by Bodhidharma in about 520 AD. The second set is another classic qigong set known as “The Eight Brocades” or “Ba Duan Jin“. Most likely though, whatever we we do here now is pretty random, so many things we could do, it is never the same qigong at this practice session. “Taiji walking” in the sand is a favorite!
The Taijiquan part usually consists of doing the Dong (Yang) Long Form, we often do all three sections of the form or whatever we decide!
Come and play but know this is not a class…. I don’t do any real “teaching” I want to have fun with my friends, build some push hands connections, and keep the spirit of all of our teachers training active at Kamaole III
Overview:
6:30 AM to 7:50 AM
Wuji, Zhan Zhuang, Yiquan
Zi Fa Gong
Yi Jin Jing, Ba Duan Jin, or “Whatever Qigong”
Taiji walking
7:50 to 8:15 AM Break…
8:15 AM
Taijiquan
Tui Shou
See All Classes Here:
https://taijionmaui.wordpress.com/category/schedules/
"Tiger" from Dragon & Tiger Yiquan
“I don’t have time for Taiji!”
So many times, I have heard this, usually from “non believers”, but occasionally I myself am guilty of such thoughts.
Well now…… If you have been training with me, you have been exposed to a variety of Qigong and Taiji sets. It is important to keep in mind that eventually, as you assimilate the principles into your life, everything will be Taiji. Yet in the beginning, we all need some ‘forms’ to direct us in the Way.
This page is just a list of some of the forms that I have shown to my classes and some for advanced students. With so many options, it is easy to just pick one or more depending on your goals or time frame. All of my beginner students have been doing the first four or five on this list, and I consider these a “core group” of practices. Over time, I will show everyone all of these sets.
Now, I wouldn’t want anyone to get bored, so add the others in occasionally as you want to. There is always time to get in a quick “Soaring Crane” or some Zhan Zhuang practice anywhere any time.
Some of the Qigong and Taiji sets for beginner and advanced students
1.) “Wuji” a standing qigong for overall health, perform for one minute to as long as you wish!
2.) Dong Family “Warm up Qigong” strengthens the posture and opens the joints. Takes about 7 to 8 minutes to perform.
3.) Wudang Daoist Abdominal Breathing Qigong, five simple exercises that form the foundational skills for all qigong, taiji and meditation practice.
4.) Dong Family “Basic Qigong Set” builds and distributes qi through the whole body. Takes about 7 to 8 minutes to perform.
5.) Taiji Walking
6.) “Dong (Yang) Style Taijiquan” The first section of the long form of Taiji (Tai Chi). A total body and mind Qigong and martial art form. Takes about 6 minutes to perform.
7.) The Dong Family “Hard Qigong” A zhan zhuang practice that builds structural integrity in your physique. These ten postures can be done in as little as 5 to 10 minutes or as long as you wish.
8.) “Dong (Yang) Style Taijiquan” The second section of the long form of Taiji. Takes about 12 minutes to perform.
9.) “Soaring Crane 1” is a medical qigong set to strengthen your overall health. Takes about 5 minutes to perform. See video here: Soaring Crane with Master Dong
10.) “Tiger Mountain” AKA “Taiji Gong” an assemblage of some postures from Yang style Taiji set. Takes 5 to 10 minutes to perform. See video here: Tiger Mountain
11.) “Zhan Zhuang” or “Standing like a post qigong” Strengthens your stances and internal energy; I suggest just picking any of the postures from the Taiji form and stand still as long as you can comfortably. Take at least 2 to 10 minutes or as long as you wits to perform. See photos of Yang’s Taiji postures here: Yang Cheng Fu
12.) Yiquan Zhan Zhuang. Eight basic standing postures and a few other simple postures designed to open the hips and strengthen the legs and back and build structural integration into your physique Takes from 5 to 40 minutes to perform.
13.) “Dong Sitting Qigong, Long Form” From Master Dong Zeng Chen. A total mind and body Qigong for meditation, thrusting vessel, small circle qi and upper body strengthening. Takes about 30 to 40+ minutes.
14.) “Dong Sitting Qigong” From Master Dong Hu Ling. A simple sitting routine for the upper body qi, the mind and the eyes.
15.) Five Elements Qigong, Wu Xing Qigong is a nine form set that is a medical qigong toning the internal organs and meridians. See video here: Ziranmen Five Elements Qigong.
16.) Muscle and Tendon Changing Classics, Yi Jin Jing is one of the oldest known set of gigong, originally authored by the famous Da Mo.
17.) The Eight Brocades, Ba Duan Jin is another old classic set.
18.) Zi Fa Gong, spontaneous Qigong comes when you have figured out some of these basic sets then you let your qi body lead you to move or not to move.
19.) Wudang Daoist (Hun Yuan) Primordial Qigong, a new set I have been showing and will be writing out soon…
20.) Wudang Five Animal Forms, another new set I will be showing in 2012
Over time I will expose everyone to parts or all of these forms, just keep coming to class and reading online and most importantly: PRACTICE
Do some Qigong everyday! Keep it simple but……Do it!
Yin AND Yang separated
In the first three lessons, I discussed how we align our physical bodies with the forces of Heaven and Earth. This lesson is about learning the difference between the two main aspects of our Qi using the concept of Yin and Yang.
Realize that there are two major forces acting upon us at all times, the first and most obvious is the force of gravity, we all understand what that is. There is however another, balancing force in play as well, that of centrifugal force. As the earth spins at about 6000 miles per hour trying to throw us off it, we are at the same time held fast by gravity. (Physicists would disagree, but I’m just illustrating a point) In another way of viewing it (the Taoist way), we are suspended between the two forces of Heaven and Earth.
Think of “Earth” as the pull of gravity, pulling directly towards the center of the planet. Know it is Yin and, elemental, sinking and compressing downward, everything heavier than air flows towards it. The only way we know which way is up is because we know which way is down!
Think of “Heaven” as that centrifugal force that is lifting us directly away from the center of the Earth; in Qigong parlance, “the golden thread from Heaven” this force is Yang, and ethereal. Lifting and expanding upwards, everything lighter than air, including electrical energy floats weightlessly.
Beginners on the way of Qigong first learn to feel and understand these two different aspects of energy, adepts move beyond the understanding of discerning yin and yang to get to a point where they harmonize yin/yang.
To better learn how to feel Yin and Yang, consider two main types of qi, Yeng qi and Wei qi. Yeng qi is all that stuff that sinks down through our bodies as we relax and let it sink, things like blood, lymph, muscles, organs, a thick viscous downward flow of all our soft tissue.
Think of Wei qi as all that stuff that floats like our electrical signals our nervous system releasing neutral density neurotransmitters into our system like endorphins… our emptied muscles and bones and our breath.
After you understand this concept, you are ready to apply the knowledge to Qigong exercise.
When you relax your body, the blood and lymph and all the soft tissues sink lower into your body; this is the Yeng qi sinking. As this material sinks down, the blood filters through the lymph nodes, and the fascia tissues relax and a curious event occurs. The Wei qi is displaced and it rises up giving you a buoyant feeling. The more you can sink and relax downward, the more you can expand and feel buoyant going upwards.
You are learning to flow all the Earth (Yin) elements (Yeng qi) downward causing the complimentary effect of all the heavenly (Yang) elements (Wei qi) to rise and expand. These dynamics act like an energy pump, sinking down stimulating a return to an upright posture, you are learning to discern Yin and Yang: a major milestone on the qigong path.
More Here: Qigong Lesson #5
One of over 8000 thousand life-size Terracotta Warriors standing strong for over two thousand years
Zhan Zhuang “Standing like a post” Standing Meditation
Standing builds structural integrity in your physique, calms the mind and emotions and it provides a foundation for internal qigong work known as “nei gong”.
As you are learning to connect with your internal energy, many new and intriguing adventures will open up to your awareness. In fact, awareness is the primary connection that you make as the path unfolds before you.
You can reach your health goals whatever they may be, whether they are physical health, as in posture, flexibility, balance or general strengthening or mental goals such as, improved memory, freedom from excessive thoughts or disordered thinking, or perhaps emotional goals like curing frustration, mania, anger, fear, grief, worry, depression or whatever else.
The one common denominator in almost all ailments is unbalanced energy within you. Even the most devastating illnesses often have their roots in basic problems with your personal energy and many are therefore preventable. Balancing our energies is the goal of all traditional Chinese medicine and Qigong is a basic part of TCM.
In the first two Qigong “lessons” here on this blog, I outlined the first skill you should master, Wuji. As the name implies Wuji is a starting point and it is where we begin all qigong exercises and the Taiji forms, yet there is a whole genre of “Wuji training” that can be explored.
Standing is sometimes called zhan zhuang, which means “standing like a post”, or referred to as standing meditation; it is in fact an excellent qigong exercise all by itself. There are no real ”forms“ per se, instead individual postures are sustained for a length of time as necessary.
The main goal here is to balance out our internal energy by standing still, however stilling your body often encourages thinking to arise; sometimes the thinking can become overwhelming. Redirect your thoughts into becoming aware of the 12 points outlined in the last lesson and only allow your thoughts to go through the “postural check list”.
Another technique to stop unnecessary thinking, is to simply count your breaths; paying attention to the air moving in and out as you do. When you find yourself caught up in a daydream, just start over with the alignment and then find your way back to your breathing; in this way you will learn to dissolve your mind and body together.
After we still our bodies, and refocus our thinking, errant energy tends to go into the emotions. This can be very annoying as thoughts and emotions are linked, often emotional thoughts like: “I feel dumb standing here”, “What are others thinking about me seeing me standing here?”, or “Am I wasting my time standing here?” Any excuse we can dream up to release us from learning about our true selves seems like a good enough reason to stop our training. Just go back through the same routine and you will find these emotions subside.
While standing in a posture, there are many other techniques that you may apply, such as various breathing practices and a whole host of higher-level skills known as “nei gong“. These skills will be explained in future articles about that topic but the first step into that whole universe of qigong arts starts with zhan zhuang.
To perform zhan zhuang all you need to do is stand, correctly of course, in any one of numerous postures. To avoid an emotional reason to give up, commit before hand to doing zhan zhuang for a certain length of time, say 10 or 15 minutes. You may stand in Wuji, or pick some postures from the Taiji form. In the beginning I recommend you attempt at least three minutes in each posture, that way you will not get bored so that during the 15 minutes you could manage five postures. Serious zhan zhuang practitioners may stand for up to an hour in one or two postures!
In coming lessons, I will show you some postures that can be used in addition to the ones you are learning as part of a Taiji class. Who knew that by just standing you could accomplish so much without knowing any forms?
Stand strong and you will develop good balance, strength, and energy.
Copyright Cory Williams 2010
More here: Qigong Lesson #4
You need to know where you are in order to find your way.
Your place in the universe is often twisted away from the ideal; it may be physical, mental, emotional,and/or spiritually misaligned.
Let me first explain that in the “physical world” you can be physically, mentally, emotionally,and/or spiritually misaligned and you can also be misaligned in the “celestial world”. This is because all things have Yin and Yang elements to them. Our goal is harmonizing Yin/Yang, not just balancing Yin and Yang .
To keep things simple, my objective in this article is just to start with the body, the physical within the physical.
The most important overriding principles in Qigong and Taiji and Meditation for that matter revolve around alignment. As stated in the second paragraph of this page, alignment could mean spiritual, emotional. mental, or physical.
As we work ever inward to the higher levels of understanding we need to start somewhere. The starting point is the physical alignment of your body, starting with your feet. When we learn this basic skill called “Wuji Stance” we will have a working model of alignment that we can “clone” into our thinking to restructure our bodies, minds, emotions, and ultimately our spirits. Then we can keep feeding back that spiritual energy to continually strengthen our bodies, minds, emotions. The cycle continues until we have the “rarefied qi” of original Spirit known as “the gold pill” a spiritual embryo that grows within us until such time as it “becomes” us and we are reborn into Tao.
It is simple really. Just start under your feet. We want a totally natural alignment of our skeleton so we can relax all of our muscles. The following list is an example of what I tell my students. I probably say this list fifty times a week in my classes…..
1. Feet parallel and shoulder width apart
2. Knees slightly bent
3. Tailbone tucked in so your lumbar spine is vertical
4. Relax the hips and “sit” into your legs
5. Let the “golden thread from heaven” lift your head
6. Tuck in your chin so that your cervical spine is vertical
7. Relax your shoulders, let your arms dangle at your side
8. Contain your chest, don’t “puff out” your chest
9. Bring your breath to your dantien, just below the navel
10. Bring your mind down to your dantien
11. Put your tongue at your palate
12. Keep your eyes soft, don’t strain your eyes
In addition I tell students to: keep their hearts open, explaining that there is no need for any emotional energy, and to keep their mental energy redirected inward, reviewing the 12 points on the list. Then I repeat the list….
Now you can start right away by learning to Tune your Breath
Copyright Cory williams 2009
more here: Qigong lesson #3
Wuji
“The journey of a thousand miles, starts under your feet.”
For all people on the Way, there are many paths with side excursions and a few distractions and even some “deviations”.
Any well thought out journey starts somewhere; indeed today even scientists think they can explain the origin of the universe. As fantastic as “the big bang theory” is….would you believe that well over 2500 years ago the planet’s original “scientists” the Taoists, had a similar theory?
According to the Taoist cosmology, before anything “existed” there was something they called “Wuji”. This (literally) means “the Void” or “without form” or “the beginning.” From this “Void”,”Tao” emerged, Tao being translated as “the Way” or “path”. An interesting side note corresponds to religious texts….”God created the Heaven and Earth”. For the Taoists you might look at it this way…’From the void, Tao emerged and created the heavens and Earth’.
Is it not sort of enlightening that Taoist thought can merge science and religion and validate both simultaneously? I tread lightly here so as to not evoke sensibilities, but let’s assume that the science of things is always open to scrutiny, and admit that religious texts were written thousands of years ago and are famous for using metaphorical language. Anyway, I’m only attempting to give some perspective to Wuji.
If you are still following me (and wondering what this has to do with Qigong) consider this, finding a “place” without form gives us a connection to divine origins. Notice my choice of words, crafted somewhere between the scientific and religious terminology. It is here where we see one way that “all things are connected”.
Along the Way we often find that science and religion merge into philosophy. By extrapolation it is easy to see that our physical self’s are connected to an understanding of the merger of the two (science and religion) into a philosophy. In the Taoist arts this philosophy is applied to the physical realm so that practitioners can assimilate cosmic energy directly into themselves.
One can see that practicing Qigong is an endeavor using a philosophy combined with science and spirituality, to nurture the physical self that contains our “Self” self.
Now don’t ever get put off by the talk of spirituality or the word “cosmic” as Taoists define these words in a general sense, for instance, tonight I am “inspired” to write this page, and so these words are coming from my “spirit” and as I post this message it is sent (via satellite) into the cosmos.
This stuff is not rocket science, nor is it some intangible “cosmic” thing; the fact is, this concept is so simple it is woefully misunderstood. My approach to Qigong (energy cultivation) is equally pragmatic, I’m not asking anyone to make any leap of faith; only to see the truth. With this understanding, we can now “start” the journey, also know, that by reading this, you already have…..
Copyright Cory Williams 2009
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Taiji on Maui 