Search the Community

What is neigong? I see a fair bit of apparent misunderstanding about this term, so I thought I would just try to clarify the meanings and usage of this term based on my own personal understanding and experience. I know my post here won't likely really make any difference, and many people will continue to misunderstand and argue over such terms and concepts, but what the heck. Maybe someone will take away something useful from this. Neigong can be both a generic term meaning general internal cultivation practices, or it can mean internal skill(s) developed from internal cultivation, and it is also used to sometimes indicate very specialized practices and skills of internal cultivation. When it comes to practices such as qigong, neigong, and Chinese martials arts, (and probably Chinese medicine and other traditional related systems/practices as well), my experience has been that different teachers of different systems can use and define different terms quite differently. This is a key point that I think is often misunderstood by many Westerners or by anyone in general in modern times. Other than the very generic meaning of terms like qigong and neigong, the way these and many various related terms and concepts are used in different traditional systems and by different teachers can vary a lot in my experience. What I have just said in this paragraph can't be emphasized enough, IMO. If someone is insisting that qigong or neigong means only some very narrow set of practices or some very specific way of doing something, etc., then it is a pretty good indication that they have no real understanding about the actual broad range of practices and viewpoints and systems which make use of such terms and concepts. Terms and concepts including everything from jing, qi, shen, qigong, neigong, meridians, channels, energy centers, soul, spirit, five elements, internal, external, etc., etc., can be viewed and used quite differently from system to system and teacher to teacher. These terms simply do not seem to have the kind of more rigid and strict definitions which many terms and concepts can have in modern times. Ask five different teachers from five different traditional systems what is qigong and neigong, and what is qi, and what is internal and what is external, etc., and you may very well get quite a wide variation in answers. If you think that this indicates that one teacher is right, and all the others are wrong, then you are misunderstanding the traditional way that such concepts are viewed and used IMO. Rather than viewing things in such a rigid and limiting way, I think it is more meaningful to understand that such terms are often just not used in any sort of fixed and rigid way, and each teacher will use them in a way that makes sense to them, and which suits their own purposes and their own point of view. What is important is the underlying experience, and what are the benefits that any particular system can really give. Getting hung up on terms and concepts seems to be primarily due to trying to impose modern ways of looking at and approaching things on more ancient or traditional ways of looking at and approaching things. The two approaches do not necessarily mesh. If you think about all these terms and concepts related to neigong/internal cultivation in a much more plastic and pliable and loose fashion, then you have a better chance of starting to delve into the 'ancient' way which things were viewed. What is important is the underlying experience and the specific type of results which a certain system focuses on developing, and think of the terms and concepts which are used to 'explain' such things more just as guide lines that help give some idea of what the system is about. The terms and concepts and viewpoints give some sense of what a practice is about and how things are 'explained' at a surface level , but the actual practice itself is based on developing the internal experience and skills which may not actually be able to be described well in words and concepts at all. From what I have seen there are a lot of widely varying practices that may fall under the term 'neigong', everything from health exercises and stretching, foundational practices which build a good foundation for other practices, to very specific internal cultivation practices and very specific skills development, to meditation practices focused on self cultivation. Some practices are good for health and longevity, some practices develop very special and even extraordinary skills, and some practices are primarily for self cultivation. All might use the term 'neigong'. Some practices may be in general good for anyone, some practices may be potentially dangerous, or even harmful in the long run, and some practices are exclusive to a particular teacher or system and can only be learned through accomplished teachers in that particular system directly from teacher to student. Because some of these sorts of terms can have a certain mystique about them, certain teachers these days may adopt such terms as a way of marketing what they are selling as something very special and exceptional or 'high level', but if you travel around and meet teachers from various systems you will likely see that there are a wide variety of different practices which may develop quite different types of skills or which may have quite different purposes, and trying to compare them is like trying to compare apples and oranges and potatoes. Which is better, and which is 'higher level'? How do you measure higher level? With a measuring tape or ruler? There are many different systems which can have various purposes, and which can take widely differing approaches. Some are focused on health, some on martial arts skill, some are focused on healing and therapy, and some are focused on self cultivation, and some are multi purpose. I will say again that some practices out there can be potentially dangerous or harmful, and not all teachers out there are really qualified or teaching a 'good' system, so use caution and some good sense when seeking out teachers and practices.