Qigong and a Calm Mind

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Qigong and a Calm Mind

Postby LIB » Tue May 28, 2013 11:47 pm

Greetings:

I have started recently doing the Eight Pieces of Brocade produced by YMAA (book and DVD). I have a question. In this material, among others by Dr. Yang, he mentions that you need to regulate the mind and that you shouldn't do Qigong if your mind is not calm. For me, I find this a paradox. Since I wanted to do Qigong to relax the mind and improve my health. However, if I have some negative emotions, I am told not to do Qigong. Of course, if I have some sudden emotional argument, I can pass on doing Qigong for the time being, but if I have reoccurring stress at work or within my family that cause irritation, worry or whatever emotion on a regular basis that I can't avoid or escape, then I can never do Qigong. In this case, what can I do? I really welcome your suggestions.

Kind regards,
LIB
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Re: Qigong and a Calm Mind

Postby Monsoon » Wed May 29, 2013 6:07 am

Stand in a neutral position and concentrate fully on Sung breathing for 5 minutes. Relax all your joints - just allow them to become soft naturally.

Now start your 8 Pieces of Brocade.

(Of course there are many, many little techniques you could use to calm your mind before practice, this is just one I occasionally use. I'm sure other members will be along shortly to advise other methods!)
peace and harmony

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Re: Qigong and a Calm Mind

Postby joeblast » Wed May 29, 2013 8:17 am

sometimes if you attempt a strong corrective action whilst the problem is in its strong acute stage, you can drive it deeper, make the problem worse. of course the breadth and extent of such is quite a deep subject in and of itself, the yellow emperor's classic would be a good sort of tangential reference there since it is such a good exposition on the interactions.

the opening of any practice should be spent calming and preparing for the actual practice itself. of course the more and better in-practice you become, the easier this will be.
Even in mildly complex systems, any outcome is the wrong thing to target, with the process being where the focus should be.
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Re: Qigong and a Calm Mind

Postby LIB » Thu May 30, 2013 6:06 pm

Thanks for your replies. Would you be so kind as to post a link that explains or demonstrates Sung breathing. I have know idea what it is. I heard some breathing techniques might not be good for beginners.

That is interesting about the Emperor's Yellow classic. I wonder how I can apply that in the reality of my practice.

Thanks again. If anyone has any other ideas I would be most appreciative.

Kind regards,
LIB
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Re: Qigong and a Calm Mind

Postby Monsoon » Thu May 30, 2013 9:46 pm

No problem. For Sung breathing I would very much like to recommend this book.

Gives a good all round introduction to neigong practices.

I would hesitate to try and explain it myself as I fear I will probably overstep into plagiarism.
peace and harmony

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Re: Qigong and a Calm Mind

Postby joeblast » Fri May 31, 2013 12:05 pm

'Sung' roughly means 'relax.' Using natural abdominal breathing is the most relaxing method. When you begin an inhale, imagine descending where the diaphragm connects to the spine - I had an analogy once to imagine the spine as a train track, the train rolls from roughly the solar plexus down towards the sacrum on inhale - so this descending feeling continues for the duration of the inhale - and then gently backs up on the exhale. It was taught in the context of someone asked about breathing while laying down. The breath should not go as high as the heart or as low as the genitals. The front of the abdomen stays relaxed and will naturally, gently expand on the inhale and withdraw on the exhale. And the one last secret of it is to time the perineum in with the breath, relaxing gently on inhale, lifting gently on exhale - it may take a little effort to work on the timing since the perineum has a very short travel distance as compared to the other structures.

Just working on the timing of breath will yield excellent results - even when doing things in a 'sung' manner, there is still a point of maximal energetic potential for each piece (hint, look at yin yang symbol) - so in learning 'timing' you learn to make all of those relative energetic maximas all happen at once.

One other good key to that is to learn to not use the nostrils to breathe - this goes hand in hand with timing - normally when we breathe the sinuses expand and buffer the air pressure - but this expansion stimulates the olfactory nerve in the sinuses, so eventually work towards only using the diaphragm - there is basically a simple dynamic of the 3 structures, diaphragm, psoas, perineum, which accounts for the most fundamental energetics. That may be a little tough to start off with depending on how quickly you get these things, so treat that as a secondary point. That was just something that came out of my longevity breathing work and troubleshooting my own body. The end result is dropping the flow of air beneath the threshold of turbulence, can no longer feel yourself breathe, energy soars - so think of those quiet pauses if you exhale slowly and hold it - except it is ongoing and only limited by the focus of your attention.

I didnt mention posture, but that also plays a factor, if you are slumped over then you dont have as much room for the guts to move freely. :)
Even in mildly complex systems, any outcome is the wrong thing to target, with the process being where the focus should be.
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Re: Qigong and a Calm Mind

Postby LIB » Sat Jun 08, 2013 12:15 am

Thanks for all your comments. They have been most useful and I will try to put them into practice. I chose the Eight pieces of Brocade because it seemed the safest and simplest for maintaining and developing good heath. Some Qigong may be risky. I heard that the Five animal routine is also good and safe for general health, but it seems that it is best for generating more chi and rejuvenation if you have already good health to begin with. Am I right?

Thanks for your input.

Best,
LIB
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Re: Qigong and a Calm Mind

Postby joeblast » Sat Jun 08, 2013 8:02 am

Only risky when one doesnt adhere to fundamentals - so if one is standing and doesnt pay attention that his knees are ahead of the toes, that will cause knee damage...just like bending at the waist to pick up a 25lb box can toss your back out. Or from an energetic standpoint, doing energy moving practices and then not closing/settling the energy afterward - I've had some teachers say if you arent doing this after these meditations then go away, I dont want to teach you! Of course that was for some other potent things, but the foundational aspects of grounding oneself via deep stillness are pretty much ubiquitous and applicable to any tradition. One has to still the body before the mind will really be still - and that's another reason why doing moving forms slowly integrates them more thoroughly, the focused awareness on each movement exerts greater refinement at each granular step of the way; the cumulative effect when trained diligently over time is quite a thing. So therein is your 'stillness within movement' - slow them down and practice in a fully aware manner and the mind naturally settles! Or if you want an energetic correlation, that is also a signal to stop the microcosmic orbit, when you have found the stillness within movement and have 'gotten past the coefficient of friction,' relatively speaking.

But back to the physical - In Tom Bisio's bagua neigung book he says to start out taking 30 seconds a step - not that easy! :mrgreen: There's many different forms out there and its up to the individual to decide what is appropriate for himself. If your body can handle it, more vigorous forms cultivate a good strong yang response, so if your meditation is also good then you can take great advantage - but if your body isnt quite that, like most of us, we can do other forms that have a decent measure of waidan-yang generating potential but not of such a level where we'd want to be doing iron shirt or something :lol: Best to have a good balance of waidan and neidan, one doesnt want to meditate all the time and not cultivate the body either!
Even in mildly complex systems, any outcome is the wrong thing to target, with the process being where the focus should be.
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Re: Qigong and a Calm Mind

Postby LIB » Tue Jun 11, 2013 10:37 pm

Thank you again for your comments. You said it is up to each individual to choose what Qigong is best for them. However, I wonder what criteria we can use to judge. Since I am a beginner, I don't have so much experience in these matters. I have tried several Qigong forms. I have had both uncomfortable physical and emotional reactions to some. One in particular was really bad, even under the guidance of a teacher. This is why I ask about the Eight Pieces of Brocade, which I have been using recently. So far, it seems to be going well. But I noticed that if I increase the number of repetitions, I start to feel uncomfortable, so now I only do 6 repetitions for each piece which is bear minimum. I am going to try slowly to increase the repetitions. I also thought the Five Animal frolic Qigong to be a good general Qigong, but it seems that it might be too energizing for me. Now I am just limiting myself to waidan. Any thoughts?

Thanks,
LIB
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Re: Qigong and a Calm Mind

Postby yeniseri » Sun Jun 16, 2013 1:49 pm

Devils' Advocate:
Objectively, and in a didactic manner, I do not see qigong as engendering a calm mind.
I know the routine of calm, taichi like stuff, floating stuff but I see more external behaviourally action that people display, that is an exact opposite of calmness.

The concept of 'XIn" would be the perfect union of jingqishen, which is pre-qigong stage, before actual neigong practice now called qigong.
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