Am I doing the Standing Meditation Correctly?

[DalTheJigsaw123]

Edited December 5, 2009 by LeonBasin

[Old Man Contradiction]

This article, IMO, is the best out there for standing.

 

http://www.i-chuan.net/articles.html

 

The one that is on zhan zhuang. It's 15 pages long and should give you a clear cut picture and a few years worth of practice.

[DalTheJigsaw123]

This article, IMO, is the best out there for standing.

 

http://www.i-chuan.net/articles.html

 

The one that is on zhan zhuang. It's 15 pages long and should give you a clear cut picture and a few years worth of practice.

 

Great! Thank you so much:) I will start reading it now:)

[Gerard]

There are many postures you can adopt. If you stand embracing the tree/moon posture it will work hard on the middle dantien; that means that it will cleanse your emotional self:

 

http://www.durkhrodchogori.com/2009/10/sta...meditation.html

 

But remember that attaining a 100% relaxed state is the main goal.

 

Santi Shi is also a great standing meditation posture you can perform, switch sides in equal amounts of time. 10/10, 20/20, 30/30, 40/40, 50/50, 60/60 if you can. Just work your way up progressively.

 

 

Good luck.

 

 

Edited: missed a link.

Edited December 5, 2009 by durkhrod chogori

[DalTheJigsaw123]

There are many postures you can adopt. If you stand embracing the tree/moon posture it will work hard on the middle dantien; that means that it will cleanse your emotional self:

 

http://www.durkhrodchogori.com/2009/10/sta...meditation.html

 

But remember that attaining a 100% relaxed state is the main goal.

 

Santi Shi is also a great standing meditation posture you can perform, switch sides in equal amounts of time. 10/10, 20/20, 30/30, 40/40, 50/50, 60/60 if you can. Just work your way up progressively.

 

 

Good luck.

Edited: missed a link.

 

Thank you! What about the tree pose?

[Aetherous]

aANVaI9jI7A

Forum member "Blasto" has this video linked in his signature...it's good instruction. The only thing I'd really change with the structure in that video is to put the hands lower, approximately in line with the nipples.

Look in a mirror at the front as well as to your side, to see your alignments.

Feel integrated as a whole.

[DalTheJigsaw123]

aANVaI9jI7A

 

Forum member "Blasto" has this video linked in his signature...it's good instruction. The only thing I'd really change with the structure in that video is to put the hands lower, approximately in line with the nipples.

 

Look in a mirror at the front as well as to your side, to see your alignments.

 

Feel integrated as a whole.

 

What about as low as your waste? Is that to low? Thank you for the video.

[Old Man Contradiction]

aANVaI9jI7A

 

Forum member "Blasto" has this video linked in his signature...it's good instruction. The only thing I'd really change with the structure in that video is to put the hands lower, approximately in line with the nipples.

 

Look in a mirror at the front as well as to your side, to see your alignments.

 

Feel integrated as a whole.

 

That is a good video because it is very precautionary, but I'd personally advise anyone that watches it to make your arms longer than he does. You can see that his arms have folded a little too much, and martially this looks like it would limit your ability to let go of power at full range. I don't know how that translates to medicine.

[DalTheJigsaw123]

That is a good video because it is very precautionary, but I'd personally advise anyone that watches it to make your arms longer than he does. You can see that his arms have folded a little too much, and martially this looks like it would limit your ability to let go of power at full range. I don't know how that translates to medicine.

 

What about lowering the arms to the waste?

[Iskote]

What about lowering the arms to the waste?

 

 

Hi Leon. Yes, you can also do the 'embracing the tree' posture with your palms at the approximate

height of your navel. You can also do the wuji posture, which is like the embracing the tree

posture, except you can hang your hands down naturally by your sides, or rest your hands

lightly on the sides of your legs. The wuji posture is a great and simple way to build up energy and

improve health. You asked if standing meditation is a good way to build up qi. In my experience

it is the one of the best ways I have ever come across to build up qi, and to balance the qi in the

body as well. Just three months practice of 10 to 20 minutes a day should be enough to start

really noticing a difference, for many people anyway. If you are doing the embrace the tree

posture, make sure you keep your arms and shoulders as relaxed as possible. The shoulders

should be relaxed right down naturally (you can practice lifting and dropping your shoulders a bit to

get the feeling of what the difference is), and the elbows should also be dropped naturally as well.

You can also practice lifting and dropping the elbows as well to feel the difference.

 

Really just practicing the wuji posture or the embracing the tree postures is enough to go a long

way in qigong cultivation, if a person can keep with it with regular practice. A person could go two or three

years easy just practicing that. People are always looking for something complicated, with the

idea that the more complicated something is the better it must be, but sometimes the simplest

practices are actually the more superior practices, if people could just let go of their preconceptions

and relax their minds and just keep practicing. By the way, breathing naturally, softly, slowly and

deeply through the nose, is the way to breath when practicing, with the emphasis on keeping the

breathing natural. In my experince, no special breathing or visualizing or the like is required. Just relax the mind and body as best you can and don't force the practice beyond what you can do without straining. Progress will come in due time. That's my view on it anyway.

 

 

Best wishes...

Edited December 5, 2009 by Iskote

[DalTheJigsaw123]

Hi Leon. Yes, you can also do the 'embracing the tree' posture with your palms at the approximate

height of your navel. You can also do the wuji posture, which is like the embracing the tree

posture, except you can hang your hands down naturally by your sides, or rest your hands

lightly on the sides of your legs. The wuji posture is a great and somple way to build up energy and

improve health. You asked if standing meditation is a good way to build up qi. In my experience

it is the one of the best ways I have ever come across to build up qi, and to balance the qi in the

body as well. Just three months practice of 10 to 20 minutes a day should be enough to start

really noticing a difference, for many people anyway. If you are doing the embrace the tree

posture, make sure you keep your arms and shoulders as relaxed as possible. The shoulders

should be relaxed right down naturally (you can practice lifting and dropping your shoulders a bit to

get the feeling of what the difference is), and the elbows should also be dropped naturally as well.

You can also practice lifting and dropping the elbows as well to feel the difference.

 

Really just practicing the wuji posture or the embracing the tree postures is enough to go a long

way in qigong cultivation, if a person can keep with it with regular practice. A person could go two or three

years easy just practicing that. People are always looking for something complicated, with the

idea that the more complicated something is the better it must be, but sometimes the simplest

practices are actually the more superior practices, if people could just let go of their preconceptions

and relax their minds and just keep practicing. By the way, breathing naturally, softly, slowly and

deeply through the nose, is the way to breath when practicing, with the emphasis on keeping the

breathing natural. In my experince, no special breathing or visualizing or the like is required. Just relax the mind and body as best you can and don't force the practice beyond what you can do without straining. Progress will come in due time. That's my view on it anyway.

Best wishes...

 

Wow, that is so helpful! Thank you so much! I signed up for a QiGong: Pan Gu Shengong: Level 1 course. If interested I can let you know how that went. Level 2 will be after a month of practicing daily. Thanks again!

[fiveelementtao]

 

Santi Shi is also a great standing meditation posture you can perform, switch sides in equal amounts of time. 10/10, 20/20, 30/30, 40/40, 50/50, 60/60 if you can. Just work your way up progressively.

 

 

Good luck.

Edited: missed a link.

 

Very cool posture...

What does that particular posture accomplish? What centers does it strengthen?

Thanks...

[Gerard]

What about as low as your waste?

 

You can go as low as you can as long as you are totally relaxed. It is not easy adopting mabu stance and pretend you are fuly relaxed for a 30/40/50 min meditation. Better not going that low or you might hurt yourself. Just bend your knees lightly and then follow the rest of the postural requirements; however in the end Qi will fix your posture so posture is not the goal end of the exercise.

 

Mabu:

 

 

 

Monks stand in that posture up to two hours on top of wooden posts.

 

That is really a Kung Fu skill useful for grounding power. Unless you practice CMA there is no need to engage in such strenuous training.

 

 

Edited: I forgot to mention one more thing. After your standing meditation session make sure you close off by performing a chi dispersion massage. There are several exercises that accomplish this goal. This vid at YT is a good example:

 

 

 

Very cool posture...

What does that particular posture accomplish? What centers does it strengthen?

Thanks...

 

This form of standing meditation will train your core stability muscles to keep you relaxed and poised while keeping only a narrow base. On the other hand, it will help to lower your centre of gravity and increase your relaxation response, which in turn makes your body denser and stronger. This type of training also strengthens the bone marrow and tendons. A core exercise in Xingyi training.

Edited December 5, 2009 by durkhrod chogori

[DalTheJigsaw123]

You can go as low as you can as long as you are totally relaxed. It is not easy adopting mabu stance and pretend you are fuly relaxed for a 30/40/50 min meditation. Better not going that low or you might hurt yourself. Just bend your knees lightly and then follow the rest of the postural requirements; however in the end Qi will fix your posture so posture is not the goal end of the exercise.

 

Mabu:

 

 

 

Monks stand in that posture up to two hours on top of wooden posts.

 

That is really a Kung Fu skill useful for grounding power. Unless you practice CMA there is no need to engage in such strenuous training.

Edited: I forgot to mention one more thing. After your standing meditation session make sure you close off by performing a chi dispersion massage. There are several exercises that accomplish this goal. This vid at YT is a good example:

 

This form of standing meditation will train your core stability muscles to keep you relaxed and poised while keeping only a narrow base. On the other hand, it will help to lower your centre of gravity and increase your relaxation response, which in turn makes your body denser and stronger. This type of training also strengthens the bone marrow and tendons. A core exercise in Xingyi training.

 

Thank you so much for such great information. What I meant by low, was my hands being low, not my knees/feet/legs. Sorry for the confusion. Thank you once again!

[Old Man Contradiction]

Thank you so much for such great information. What I meant by low, was my hands being low, not my knees/feet/legs. Sorry for the confusion. Thank you once again!

 

I think I've seen people have their hands low while embracing the tree but in my school we don't really do that. We usually try and make the positions more difficult, one of which looks like you're holding a beach ball above your head. You can also stand as tall as you can on your toes and stay there.

[Gerard]

Thank you so much for such great information. What I meant by low, was my hands being low, not my knees/feet/legs. Sorry for the confusion. Thank you once again!

 

You can place your arms any height and position you wish (as long as you know what you are doing), but in the embrace the tree posture keep hands facing the middle tantien (which corresponds to the heart chakra in the Hindu system).

 

These videos will help you to progress through Chinese ZZ:

 

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=5AC656794EE191C1

 

 

Edited: fixed link.

Edited December 6, 2009 by durkhrod chogori

[DalTheJigsaw123]

You can place your arms any height and position you wish (as long as you know what you are doing), but in the embrace the tree posture keep hands facing the middle tantien (which corresponds to the heart chakra in the Hindu system).

 

These videos will help you to progress through Chinese ZZ:

 

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=5AC656794EE191C1

Edited: fixed link.

 

 

Thank you so much! Appreciate it:0

[Riyue]

Standing is possible because we are kept in balance by forces of heaven and earth.

Muscles adapt to these forces in creating a certain level of swinging tension going in resonance with these both forces.

If we are relaxing this tension goes down.

The more we are relaxing the more our muscles relax... Completely relaxed one is unable to stand anymore... (Remember the effect of relaxantia in medicine during op....)

Lying down we can reach a very good level of relaxation....

This teaches us a well done standing meditation 站桩功. - 站樁功

One identifies with heaven and earth... one goes in resonance with the interaction earth - heaven... one finds the harmony of the three powers: heaven - earth - human...

Inhaling:

Focusing one heartbeat on earth

Focusing one heartbeat on heaven

Exhaling:

Focusing three heartbeats on body's center of gravity: zheng dan tian 正丹田: space between and before the two kidneys (huang ting 黄庭)

Thus one creates an harmonizing resonating swing.... mediating the feeling of being one with heaven and earth...

one is identifying with heaven and earth... being in a subtle swing in resonance with heaven and earth...

Having reached this level one is changing to 站樁忘 having the same effect for body-mind-soul as 坐忘 zuo wang...

At this level breathing and swing happen 自然 ziran naturally - the control by mind disappears...

Edited December 12, 2009 by Riyue

[DalTheJigsaw123]

站桩功

站樁功zhan4 zhuang1 gong1

you can try this:

 

breathing in - focus on earth one heartbeat long- focus on heaven one heartbeat long

breathing out - focus on space between kidneys three heartbeats long

 

Can music be used while doing the Standing Meditation? Zen music?

[Riyue]

deleted

Edited December 10, 2009 by Riyue

[Gerard]

Can music be used while doing the Standing Meditation? Zen music?

 

 

Anywhere in any condition. I remember a Bagua master I met in Taiwan telling me how he used to practice ZZ in the middle of a busy day market as requested by his teacher. I don't know if you have ever been to a Chinese market in Asia but if you did then you know what I mean. I am not saying this is the best way of practicing, but remember that what we are training here is the mind.

[DalTheJigsaw123]

Anywhere in any condition. I remember a Bagua master I met in Taiwan telling me how he used to practice ZZ in the middle of a busy day market as requested by his teacher. I don't know if you have ever been to a Chinese market in Asia but if you did then you know what I mean. I am not saying this is the best way of practicing, but remember that what we are training here is the mind.

 

Been to a Russian market. Is Standing Meditation better than sitting? Or is it totally different systems?

[DalTheJigsaw123]

Does this experience, sound like I'm doing the Standing Meditation Correctly?

 

1. My left leg started getting hot

2. My right arm started producing heat

5 min in Standing Meditation 2 1/2 min 2 times in the same day.

I also did a cool down massage.

 

Please, let me know. Thank you so much!

[DalTheJigsaw123]

Can someone comment on my experience?

[Riyue]

deleted

Edited December 10, 2009 by Riyue