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 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 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 moreLearn Gods Qigong
Gods Playing in the Clouds Qigong Gods Qigong is from Lao Tse’s school in ancient China, offering a unique feature not found in other qigong systems. Typically qigong sets are practised with the purpose of learning particular strands of neigong, each with a distinct flavour, which can then be applied in deeper practices, e.g. bagua and tai chi. However, Gods serves as a container for all 16 neigong where practitioners can unify the internal power grid into one coherent whole. A supreme movement art, skillful Gods training can evolve qigong...
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 moreChi Balancing in Qigong, Bagua & Tai Chi
Balancing Exercises Video Lesson 8 All internal exercise ultimately intends to get chi flowing in your body. In fact, one reason external alignments are a main focus in the beginning is to help optimise fluid (such as blood) and chi flow. So now that you have the basics of balancing your outer casing in your form, we’ll look at two primary flows in the body: ascending and descending chi. Descending chi is responsible for: Relaxing the nerves Softening the tissues Releasing the stress and tension out of the body and into the...
read moreBalancing the Upper & Lower Body in Qigong, Bagua & Tai Chi
Balancing Exercises Video Lesson 7 So far we’ve been practising exercises for balancing the left and right sides of the body with a focus on the legs, the arms and the turning of the body. Now we’ll look at balancing the upper and lower body in qigong, bagua and tai chi. The lower body is much more capable of developing and cultivating blood and chi flow than the lower body. However, most people focus more heavily on their arms than the legs because they’re used to using their arms to carry out everyday tasks, especially when...
read moreBagua Balancing Exercises: Balancing the Legs, Part 2
Balancing Exercises Video Lesson 6 Now that you’ve reviewed the basics of balancing the legs, let’s look at how to balance the legs whilst in a forward-weighted stance. Many practitioners find that when assuming tai chi or other postures where the front leg carries the body’s weight, that the legs, especially the knees, become compressed. You definitely don’t want to programme this position into your body memory because, over time, you will cause more harm than good. So start by focusing on keeping your spine erect....
read moreBagua Exercises: Balancing the Legs
Balancing Exercises Video Lesson 5 In the last lessons, we’ve balanced the arms in symmetrical and asymmetrical postures as well as while turning the body. Now we will look at balancing the legs. The three primary points to balancing the legs are: Keeping the pelvis level. Maintaining an even stretch through both legs. Not compressing the knees. Start by aligning the knees, move up to leveling the pelvis and then sink the tailbone. Stretch the knees without allowing the body to go down in height. The spine must stay erect. When you...
read moreBagua Exercises: Balancing Asymmetrical Postures
Balancing Exercises Video Lesson 4 In the least lesson, we looked at balancing non-symmetrical movement in tai chi. Now we’ll apply the same principles to asymmetrical bagua postures with the goal of equalising the body’s halves, creating even stretches and maintaining the left-right balance. Happy practising, Paul Any physical and/or energetic exercise can carry risks. Do not attempt these exercises if you have any physical, emotional or mental conditions that may make you susceptible to injury. © 2011 Paul Cavel—All rights...
read moreTai Chi Exercises: Balancing Non-symmetrical Movement
Balancing Exercises Video Lesson 3 The last two lessons covered methods for balancing symmetrical movement, but many times in bagua and tai chi, the form calls for non-symmetrical movement. Even when one side of the body does not mirror the other, you still seek to create stability and continuity between both halves. In this lesson, I’ll take the ji movement (“to press forward”) of tai chi to look at how we can find symmetry in non-symmetrical exercise. Happy practising, Paul Any physical and/or energetic exercise can carry...
read moreTurning Exercises in Qigong, Bagua & Tai Chi
Balancing Exercises Video Lesson 2 In this lesson, we continue our balancing exercises by looking at turning in the internal energy arts. Turning is a component of most qigong sets and all bagua and tai chi styles. So stabilising and equalising your turn (and weight shift into either leg) is a fundamental prerequisite to achieving a truly internal practice and the benefits that come from it. Many internal arts practitioners have greater flexibility and range of motion on one side of their body and they reinforce this imbalance by playing up...
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