Longevity Breathing Techniques: How to Boost Results of Physical Exercise
I’ve written about breathing techniques and offered several guided practice sessions on breathing because we do it all day, every day. Learning how to guide your breath at will therefore gives you the power to shift your state of mind and reinvigorate bodily systems whenever you choose. However, breathing well can go far beyond a little relaxation and peace of mind, and take health and well-being to the next level by boosting the results of any exercise programme. Starting with a few minutes of rhythmic, smooth and measured breathing can...
read moreBagua Walking Techniques for Health + Fitness
To elaborate on yesterday’s post on bagua walking methodology, I’ve got more on how to really get your bodily fluids (blood, lymph, interstitial, synovial and cerebrospinal fluids) to circulate strongly throughout your body. Since the fluids are responsible for delivering nutrients to and removing waste byproducts from the body, boosting their circulation is one of the key ways that the internal arts (bagua, tai chi and hsing-i) can foster incredible health from the inside out. In hsing-i, movement is initiated from the hands and...
read moreBagua Zhang Walking Techniques: How to Create a Concertina
Bagua is first and foremost about the feet and legs, so any good training starts with learning and developing stepping techniques. In the monastic bagua tradition that I teach for health, fitness and stress relief, there are two kinds of stepping: heel-toe and mud walking. Regardless of which type, you don’t want to bob up and down like you’re on a boat at sea. Mud Walking for Beginners In mud walking, the classic bagua stepping technique, when you put your foot down in front of you (to take a step), you want to ensure it lands...
read moreRelease Tension + Pain in the Neck, Shoulders + Back
The most common area that people hold stress and tension is undoubtedly the neck, shoulders and upper back. If you need some comic relief, just take a look at the way some people drive with their shoulders up around their ears while they hold on to the steering wheel for dear life! However, it’s not only moments of intense, accute stress that causes this reaction, but all the micro-movements in reaction to minor inconveniences and setbacks while we stare at computer and television screens. In the following how-to video, I demonstrate a...
read moreTai Chi + Qigong Exercise for a Healthy Spine
Poor posture and repetitive movement using improper body alignments have resulted in back, neck and shoulder pain that has become a pandemic in the West. It’s not only affecting adults, but our youth as well. The symptoms are caused by prolonged sitting, usually starring at computer or television screens, and recurring micro-movements operating keywords, remote controls, clicks on the mouse and more. With each passing year, we are only becoming more reliant on technology, so although prevention is key, the solution (at least in part)...
read more3 Layers of Learning Tai Chi: Form, Content + Circularity
Over the last two decades or so in the tai chi game, I’ve noticed that many practitioners have unrealistic expectations about what they can achieve in short timeframes. Many times, students seek to learn a form and gain a high level of skill within a period of a few months, which of course is impossible unless you’re a rare genius in mind-body-chi. The irony is that those who let go of these expectations are usually the students who advance more quickly and, more importantly, experience the deeper health and healing benefits for...
read moreFixing Imbalances in the Body with Qigong, Tai Chi + Bagua
A few months back I posted some how-to videos to help you balance your body in your qigong, tai chi and bagua practice, which I elaborated on in a course I offered on Tai Chi Circling Hands and Gods Qigong in Crete last year (see below). 3 Steps to Addressing Imbalances in the Body First of all, many people are unaware of just how imbalanced their body may be. It could be that one side (left-right) or one half (upper or lower) of the body is more bound, less flexible or has a limited range of motion, or is generally less comfortable than the...
read moreGuided Breathing Practice
The following 10-minute breathing practice was recorded while on retreat in Crete earlier this year. It’s an easy breathing practice, particularly good for beginners to the Energy Arts System, that covers some of the primary points you want to focus on when you come to sit. To learn more about the theory that underliesLongevity Breathing techniques, click here. Happy practising, Paul To learn more about Paul’s next Longevity Breathing course in Kentish Town, click here! © 2011 Paul Cavel—All rights reserved. Links are...
read morePartner Exercises: Getting Real about Your Internal Arts Practice
The video snippet below was filmed on Crete earlier this year as part of my Five Elements in Qigong retreat. The discussion was focused on ways to restore balance in and revitalise the body. One method for fretting out imbalances and getting real about your practice is training with a partner. Partner exercises accomplish three important goals: Engages the Part of Your Mind that Wants to Achieve The observer effect dictates that the sheer act of observation will influence the phenomenon being observed (Wikipedia). This is true for science and...
read moreQigong, Tai Chi + Bagua for Beginners
How Much Practice Is Appropriate for a Beginner? Okay, I’m going to make this short and sweet because this has got to be one of the most popular email questions of the year: I advise new students to mind their 70% of effort in mind-body-chi, and save 45-minute to hour-long practices for many months (or even years) down the line, once you have a solid foundation in neigong. Otherwise, you may injure yourself or build up too much internal resistance and stop practising. Go with the flow and do whatever “clicks” for you yet try to build...
read moreTai Chi: The Softer Side of the Internal Martial Arts
Last month, I wrote a blog on tai chi’s softness, but is it possible to ever say enough about the form’s yielding nature? Even though tai chi is the youngest of the internal martial arts, it has a quality that is absolutely unique unto itself. The intrinsic yin nature of tai chi allows deep healing to occur while the practitioner executes the form in the most gentle of ways. It is this hyper focus on the soft quality that often leads tai chi practitioners astray. Relaxed Doesn’t Mean Collapsed The Asian concept of softness...
read moreTai Chi: The Art of Softness
Tai chi is a yin art, which is why it often gets disregarded as useless or only being good for the elderly and young girls. But in fact, the soft nature of tai chi is exactly why it is so effective as a means for developing chi power—whether for health, healing, meditation or martial prowess. First and foremost, exercise done in a soft way can prevent you from embedding existing, superficial tension deeper within the body. Tai chi is a superior exercise system for releasing the nerves, which in turn releases all soft tissues. This process...
read moreInternal Energy Exercise to Contact the Subtle Energy Anatomy
(Part 2 of 2) Re-educating Your Body The first step to living pain-free or improving your health is re-educating your body about how to move and perform even minor daily tasks, such as typing on a keyboard. In fact, most people have never received health or physical education that includes information about correct and sustainable body alignments and movements. Internal energy exercises are designed to provide you with an experiential physical education so you learn how to align your body and refine your movements. This will not only prevent...
read moreInternal Energy Exercises for a Healthy Back, Neck and Spine
(Part 1 of 2) Most people will experience back, neck, spinal or repetitive strain injuries at some point in their lives. For many, it will limit the mobility they experience for the rest of their life. Learning what you can do now will help you prevent needless suffering from chronic aches and pains. Startling Health Statistics An EU-wide study (by The Work Foundation www.theworkfoundation.org, reported by www.backpain.org.uk on 13 February 2010) found that musculoskeletal disorders, such as back pain, neck pain and...
read moreCircling Hands Qigong Video: A Guided Practice Lesson
Hiya, You can watch and follow along to the Circling Hands video below. It’s a great practice for deepening neigong and improving your qigong, tai chi and bagua forms. In Circling Hands, kwa exercises go deep into the body to create a powerful massage for the internal organs and further increase blood and fluid activation. In combination with the C-curve, kwa exercises generate strong hydraulic activity, so you can get a good workout while remaining extremely relaxed. Make gentle, smaller circles to help release your nerves, allowing the...
read morePulsing the Body’s Cavities in Qigong, Tai Chi & Bagua Circle Walking
My last blog introduced the concept of pulsing, and provided an overview of how to pulse the joints in qigong, tai chi and bagua for health benefits. However, the more dramatic, broad-ranging and long-lasting results come after the tuning in period, when you can go deeper than only pulsing the joints and gain some faculty in opening and closing the body’s cavities. Pulsing the Joints: The Middle Ground Activating the joints is only the beginning stage. Whether you only pulse the joints in the limbs (arms and legs) or the entire skeletal...
read more