Sleepy Panda

Not that I am interested in 6-pack abs or anything. I do engage in strength training alongside my qi gong daily training. I am wondering if I should train my core or ab muscles? I practice longevity breathing from Bruce Frantzis' book and the basic idea in it (and also generally) is that you want to have a soft belly by which the breath is able to cause expansion of the abdomen in along all sides and this expansion and contraction motion acts as a pump massaging our organs 24/7. If I practice strength training in the abs, I suspect I will end up creating tension and stiffness/hardness against the massaging motion of my belly. If my belly can't expand anymore during my breathing, likely my breathing is ineffective. What are your thoughts?

Hi, Do you guys have recommendations for qigong teachers/schools and practioners in Central California (mostly around Bay Area) for two purposes: 1) Learning qigong 2) Helping diagnose and perform healing work on some blockages that have been interfering with my daily life.

Thanks for the heads-up.

Hey @forestofemptiness I practice Zhan Zhuang and abdominal breathing in the morning while I do self-inquiry in the night. Is that what you mean by energetic practices? I would've thought that self-inquiry is quite harmless as a practice because it simply involves relaxing into the being and no kind of special breathing, concentration or visualization.

Thanks to the links shared in this thread and the useful feedback I received, I was able to make progress on my self-inquiry today. It was not as much self-inquiry as it was self-abidance since I don't generally need to go through the process of questioning in order to locate my presence, it is something I can do without mental thoughts. For a moment, the whole world disappeared and it was just I, enclosed in some black orb. After sometime, it seemed like the spiritual heart was engulfing everything around me like a black hole and its presence was expanding to immerse everything into me. The body's boundaries disappeared and everything was just presence. Maybe I can post futures updates on this practice to my journal.

That is fantastic. What I've read is that the I-thought (I am the body, or I am the ego) thought shoots up from the spiritual heart (or the heart on the right) into the brain. It is what gives you the sense that you are located behind your eyes. A major turning point in doing self-inquiry is when you are able to push back the I-thought into the heart and keep it rested there. The I-thought is like a parasite, it needs to cling to other thoughts in order to continue the illusion of separateness/duality. If you continue the practice to the point that you are able to stabilize yourself completely in the heart, the I-thought dissolves in there and you become a jnani. I've only started inquiry recently but I've been struggling a bit to rest the mind into spiritual heart. How were you able to do that and how do you know when that happens? Based on my experience and reading, for practitioners seeking to practice this method: 1. As it has been mentioned earlier in the thread, you need to have a lower density of thoughts or be able to drop them relentlessly to isolate the I-thought or I-am-the-ego/I-am-the-body thought. Practice other techniques until you get to this point. 2. You need to be able to relinquish or surrender any interest in thoughts of any kind that arise during your practice - whether it be doubts and confusions about the practice. 3. You need to be able to open up your heart and love yourself fully in order to prevent the kind of resistance that the I-thought shows during practice. The more negative emotions you have about yourself, the more power to the I-thought. 4. This technique is opposite to the ones which are about concentration i.e. focus on objects. You pull your attention back to the subject or who the experiencer is.

Fantastic stuff for my routine.

I didn't realize that the palm facing downward pose was Wuji and Zhan Zhuang was entirely different i.e. holding or pushing ball at the different heights. Atleast Lam Kham Chuen's The Way Of Energy doesn't make that distinction.

Excellent discussion on this thread. I learnt a lot today.

What could be the foundation for Zhan Zhuang? I thought Zhan Zhuang was the foundation of all internal martials arts.

Can you list the different exercises you use for training your core?

I am a beginning qi gong practioner. I practice zhan zhuang, taoist breathing and the likes. I have noticed that post-ejaculation my energy drops so much that I often have trouble getting off the bed and want to lie down there forever. I don't have enough energy or motivation to even cook my meal or go out and buy food even if I am starving. I feel sick inside. This happens if I ejaculate twice in a short period (usually the same day). If I ejaculate once, the consequences are there but they are not as severe. This was not something that used to happen before and I think it is unusual considering that I am in my late 20s. I do not ejaculate too often (once in 10 days or once in 20 days) so it kinda sucks that I still get the backlash.Today, I practiced zhan zhuang the next day after ejaculation and immediately I felt weird, felt that I couldn't go on anymore in the middle of my practice and wanted to lie down again and sleep for a while. I know ejaculation and abstention has been the topic of multiple discussions and I did went through them but I still wanted to have you guys chime in on this. What do you think could be wrong with me (or possible solutions) I can think of a few things: 1. Possible hormonal imbalances or lack of testosterone. I need to go to endocrinologist. 2. Qi blockages in my body or some unhealthy stuff going on which I am not sensitive to which is causing this fatigue. There is not an advanced TCM practitioner near my vicinity so I am not sure how to get it diagnosed. 3. I have an entity that is sucking or leeching off my energy. In general, I also am more easily fatigued when I compare myself to others.

The feeling is hard to explain, it is just a really weird feeling inside. A feeling of a great lack of vitality. Is it a known thing - this energy getting sucked out of the plug hole? My energy builds up over time. It takes a few days to feel normal. But these days I still feel a lack of energy compared to few years ago when I had a lot of energy to do things. Like I get exhausted earlier but it doesn't seem to me interfering with my life as much as the post-ejaculation experience. I was also feeling uncomfortable in the right region of my chest today. @freeform I don't feel much guilt or shame regarding this experience as I used to. I still do it out of a compulsion (as a reward for abstaining for 10 or 20 days) but this may not be the cause.

Thanks. And no worries!

Hi, I have been a big fan of Taoism and it's approach to life: the path of the least resistance. I have been trying to learn Qigong on-and-off. I joined an Qigong class which started with basics like Zhan Zhuang and then went onto a few more other exercises like some style of Bagua and Microcosmic orbit but I quit the class before I could finish it. I have been trying to get back into my Qigong practice again and based on my research, I have found that Way of the Energy by Lam Kam Chuen and Opening the Energy Gates of your Body by Bruce Frantzis are amongst the best beginner books. I have practiced Zhan Zhang/Wu Ji on and off and I have not much difficulty standing for 20min. However, I want to make it a part of my daily practice and atleast do that for 6 months before checking back in. I was wondering what practices/duration should I incorporate into my daily routine for great foundation work and cultivating Qi. Some practitioners here suggest NeiGong/Meditation along with Qigong. There are also a lot of articles about semen retention but there are always mixed opinions so I it is hard for me decide on what to do. A lot of practitioners also consider learning microcosmic orbit as essential but it has been called as a technique to be learnt only under a teacher. I want the experienced posters here to help sort me out through all these confusions and advise me a routine that I should stick for next 6 months. TLDR; Best books and practices for beginning qigong cultivation. Any thing that I should do that would complement it? Any tips or tricks along the way that you have learnt from your own practice and you would recommend to a beginner.

hello, could I also have a personal practice discussion page?

Thanks. I will submit a request right away

How can I create a journal in the Personal Practice section? It seems greyed out for me.

Great job on keeping a journal. I bet it helps you keep the accountability. Maybe I will start one too.