Why do you believe in qi?

[Old Man Contradiction]

I want to open an honest discussion.

 

Why do you believe in qi?

or why do you not believe in qi?

 

 

I do not believe in qi, nor do I believe that qi does not exist. I am unaccustomed to traditional theory, as well as unaccustomed to western science. I do know that there is a mastery level of the internal martial arts that is achievable without qi theory. So I am left inconclusive...

 

plz discuss

[nac]

I believe in the existence of breath. I agree that many kinds of advancement happen in alternating progression and regression. I just don't think breath control gives people supernatural powers: http://scienceblogs.com/neurotopia/2007/10...tial_idiocy.php

[Old Man Contradiction]

I believe in the existence of breath. I agree that many kinds of advancement happen in alternating progression and regression. I just don't think breath control gives people supernatural powers: http://scienceblogs.com/neurotopia/2007/10...tial_idiocy.php

 

my instructor translates qi as oxygen. It is still in our bodys, the earth, and the heavens. But he also uses the word to describe the overall movement of the body sometimes, and also some other meanings.

Edited October 13, 2009 by Old Man Contradiction

[Ninpo-me-this-ninjutsu-me-that]

I want to open an honest discussion.

 

Why do you believe in qi?

or why do you not believe in qi?

I do not believe in qi, nor do I believe that qi does not exist. I am unaccustomed to traditional theory, as well as unaccustomed to western science. I do know that there is a mastery level of the internal martial arts that is achievable without qi theory. So I am left inconclusive...

 

plz discuss

 

I don't know if you can use a level of mastery achieved in martial arts that doesn't involve qi theory as a point in case. Although it may not be openly taught and/or understood it's still there. There is an ancient Indian dance, I have no idea what it's called, but an Indian girl who danced and practiced martial arts once mentioned it to me. She said within this dance were many of the postures and stances that can be found in most martial arts, and those in turn are yoga positions.

 

Therefore no matter if you know what your doing or not it's still developing qi(dependent on the art)because your'e opening certain pathways with your body positioning.

 

My point isn't that it does or doesn't exist, although I feel it does, my point is simply that the Martial Arts part can't be used as a benchmark. There's just too much cross over practice to say it's proof that it doesn't.

[nac]

my instructor translates qi as oxygen. It is still in our bodys, the earth, and the heavens. But he also uses the word to describe the overall movement of the body sometimes, and also some other meanings.

Isn't this in the same level as the black-hole-in-the-brain theories in New Age?

[Seth Ananda]

I believe in it cause I experience it everywhere. It doesn't matter to me whether i believe in it or not cause its always there.

I did try not believing in it many years ago to see if it would go away. It just started to seem ridiculous.

I dont think there is a moment when i cant feel it. I think the same would go for Many people here.

I am more interested in what can be done with it both within and externally.

[Gerard]

I do not believe in chi. I see, feel and experience it.

[Yuen Biao]

I do not believe in chi. I see, feel and experience it.

 

You took the words I was thinking and posted them before me.

 

Qi is intention, breath (oxygen), heat, light, force, and energy.

[i_am_sam]

I do not believe in chi. I see, feel and experience it.

 

+1

 

 

Take the buddha's advice - "Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense. "

[Gerard]

[Marblehead]

I just don't think breath control gives people supernatural powers:

 

Hi All,

 

I just wanted to highlight this statement.

 

Peace & Love!

 

 

I do not believe in chi. I see, feel and experience it.

 

And another beautiful statement with very few words.

 

Peace & Love!

 

 

Chi is the breath of life. Without Chi there would be no life. Yin and Yang are the polarities of Chi.

 

Peace & Love!

[Stigweard]

I want to open an honest discussion.

 

Why do you believe in qi?

or why do you not believe in qi?

I do not believe in qi, nor do I believe that qi does not exist. I am unaccustomed to traditional theory, as well as unaccustomed to western science. I do know that there is a mastery level of the internal martial arts that is achievable without qi theory. So I am left inconclusive...

 

plz discuss

When I was younger I "believed" in Qi. Then my perception "opened" and now Qi is my living reality.

[Chen]

Yes, I do beleive.

It is funny and also scarring.

Recently I met a friend that was practicing the same system. When we crossed,both of us smiled and looked instictly our palms. The one's Chi had interreacted with the others, raised by itself as a defence shield. No matter that we are friends . Chi didn't know it.

[sheng zhen]

I want to open an honest discussion.

 

Why do you believe in qi?

or why do you not believe in qi?

I do not believe in qi, nor do I believe that qi does not exist. I am unaccustomed to traditional theory, as well as unaccustomed to western science. I do know that there is a mastery level of the internal martial arts that is achievable without qi theory. So I am left inconclusive...

 

plz discuss

I am a little ambivalent in this regard. Through studying anatomy and science I have realized that a lot of TCM can be explained scientifically. But not everything! I do not think TCM should be discarded just because we have found a scientific explanation. I only think it confirms TCM. And at the same it time confirms that science really has not discovered everything that TCM and taoist sciences explains.

 

When I feel warm water flow slowly up my spine I don't have the scientific explanation for it so I use the taoist explanation and call it qi. Or when I feel wind blowing around me while doing qigong I dont know the scientific explanation. So I call it qi, like the taoists have done for thousands of years.

 

But when I feel heat in my hands I can maybe explain that by increased bloodflow. Or when I feel total unity with my body, what the taoists call Sung, I can explain that by increased proprioceptive activity of my nervous system. Or when I feel like I'm being supported by some "energy", what from ancient times has been called Zheng qi, I can explain that by biotensegrity and the slow-twitch postural muscles

 

I think many things can be explained by science and medicine. But taoists have already explained it thousand of years ago. And they have explained a lot more as well. This should not be underestimated. If we discard the taoists concept of qi, we miss out on a lot of the deeper effects of taoist practices and are stuck at the level of which science has evolved to.

Edited October 13, 2009 by sheng zhen

[hummingbird]

the more inconclusiveness

the more space for the undefinable

no this

no that

just

that which resists and yields

to its own name

 

a movement

going both

back to and away

from itself

[Taomeow]

Ted Kaptchuk, OMD, the guy responsible for exposing the western world to acupuncture and TCM, the first Westerner to practice TCM in China, and currently a Harvard Medical School researcher, wrote (in a book that must be a must-read for an aspiring taoist, IMO, "The Web that Has No Weaver") that qi is "the deepest insight of Chinese civilization."

 

Now "not believing in qi" means believing we modern western consumers are the only ones who are able to have insights about reality and perceptions thereof, and these can only happen on our terms and via our methods and are only allowed to bear names we choose for them. (So the drive to define qi via substituting something else and calling it something else -- breath, energy, prana, bioelectricity, etc. -- is a conditioned response along these very lines, a drive to not allow it to stand on its own, uncharted for us, foreign cognitive territory. A desire to drag it to the level we're at, wherever that may be. However, qi is neither one of these and the moment we drag it somewhere else to represent something else, it vanishes from our cognition and this "something else" usurps its place. Duh. Qi is qi, and a spade is a spade.)

 

"Not believing in qi" means "not believing" in Chinese civilization (incidentally, the only one among the ancient ones that didn't go extinct to date) which has been based on this "deepest insight" for millennia.

 

"Not believing" in general in things of strange foreign descent removed from our current common cognitive denominator by space or time or both, by language or culture or lifestyle -- aka xenophobia -- is alma mater of all fake knowledge and all true ignorance.

 

You better believe it.

[rain]

Ted Kaptchuk, OMD, the guy responsible for exposing the western world to acupuncture and TCM, the first Westerner to practice TCM in China, and currently a Harvard Medical School researcher, wrote (in a book that must be a must-read for an aspiring taoist, IMO, "The Web that Has No Weaver") that qi is "the deepest insight of Chinese civilization."

 

Now "not believing in qi" means believing we modern western consumers are the only ones who are able to have insights about reality and perceptions thereof, and these can only happen on our terms and via our methods and are only allowed to bear names we choose for them. (So the drive to define qi via substituting something else and calling it something else -- breath, energy, prana, bioelectricity, etc. -- is a conditioned response along these very lines, a drive to not allow it to stand on its own, uncharted for us, foreign cognitive territory. A desire to drag it to the level we're at, wherever that may be. However, qi is neither one of these and the moment we drag it somewhere else to represent something else, it vanishes from our cognition and this "something else" usurps its place. Duh. Qi is qi, and a spade is a spade.)

 

"Not believing in qi" means "not believing" in Chinese civilization (incidentally, the only one among the ancient ones that didn't go extinct to date) which has been based on this "deepest insight" for millennia.

 

"Not believing" in general in things of strange foreign descent removed from our current common cognitive denominator by space or time or both, by language or culture or lifestyle -- aka xenophobia -- is alma mater of all fake knowledge and all true ignorance.

 

You better believe it.

 

as always.

 

when the hands are "full" there is potential exchange.

such is love. No?

[Old Man Contradiction]

My point isn't that it does or doesn't exist, although I feel it does, my point is simply that the Martial Arts part can't be used as a benchmark. There's just too much cross over practice to say it's proof that it doesn't.

 

this is true. but it was just an observation and I've used it to conclude that belief in qi is not necessary to work with qi, or to get really good internal martial arts.

 

Isn't this in the same level as the black-hole-in-the-brain theories in New Age?

 

Probably not, unless those theories are just saying that people misinterpret the word qi, and that which you breath in and circulate in your body is actually oxygen.

 

If we discard the taoists concept of qi, we miss out on a lot of the deeper effects of taoist practices and are stuck at the level of which science has evolved to.

 

I disagree because it seems to me that investing in any belief, whether taoist or scientific, is limiting and potentially delusional. The real progress in any form of work is looking at your experience as it is, and working to improve it.

 

I can visualize and feel the sensations of moving qi through my body, as I used to practice a la mantak chia a couple years ago, but that doesn't mean I'm actually moving qi. I can visualize and feel the sensations of a lemon in my mouth, but that doesn't mean there is actually a lemon.

[doc benway]

I don't have as much to say as I thought I did.

I think you're on the right track Old Man Contradiction, it's not about belief or disbelief.

It's about doing the work and finding your own answers.

 

I do like Hummingbird, Rain, and Taomeow's posts quite a bit.

Edited October 14, 2009 by steve f

[Taomeow]

as always.

 

when the hands are "full" there is potential exchange.

such is love. No?

 

Yes, exactly! Qi is only present in a relationship -- is a link -- being established or broken -- is a change -- is a pattern of changes -- occurring among or between objects or processes or persons (who are, of course, also processes) engaged in actual or potential exchange. So is love of course. There's no qi in "nonduality," nor love. Which is why taoism is no advaita and a spade is no machine gun.

 

Deep shit, no?

[Gerard]

Yes, exactly! Qi is only present in a relationship...

 

Qi is everything manifesting in Samsara.

 

We move with it. As Marblehead stated: Yin and Yang are the polarities of Qi.

[Taomeow]

Qi is everything manifesting in Samsara.

 

Everything manifesting in Later Heaven (or taiji, or tao-in-motion -- as opposed to Earlier Heaven, or wuji, or tao-in-stillness) has qi as its medium and its message. Samsara, which is not part of this system, has some qi too, of course. Exactly as much of it as a mental construct of a culture that has no concept of qi requires for its transactions.

 

In Samsara, one can say something "is" something else (the way you did in the above example), which is why unreality is its proper name. But in Later Heaven, every bit of which is as real as tao-in-motion that it is is real, everything "does" what it "does," and qi acts as the currency of exchange and the change itself between these "doings." That's why it's not possible to say what qi "is" -- can't define, can only describe. Like with all things taoist.

[Easy]

+1

Take the buddha's advice - "Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense. "

 

I know jack about Buddha and prefer to keep it that way, but based on 15 years as a national class investigative journalist and another 18 years as a private investigator (criminal defense, civil rights and assorted craziness) I have concluded that those who believe in anything at all are fools. Belief slows the instincts, limits creativity and demeans one's humanity.

A little essay on the topic.

 

Easy

 

p.s. I just got an error message that says in essence that the server is too full of posters and can't handle the traffic. Is administration considering an upgrade?

[gendao]

When I first REALLY felt powerful qi from a qigong healer, it was an eye-opening experience to discover that it was SIMPLY AS THE ANCIENT CHINESE HAD DESCRIBED IT. It's not metaphorical, breath, oxygen, biomechanical or even bioelectrical...or any other Western scientific rationale. It is a very literal "life force" that can even feel like a "fluid ectoplasm." Again, simply and literally as the ancients described. No need to overcomplicate it.

 

Of course, the catch is that the more open one is, the more one can sense it. But most people aren't very open by default.

 

I hope to get to the point where I can easily see it.

[Easy]

Without Chi there would be no life.

Peace & Love!

 

Without life there would be no Chi.