Flying Phoenix Chi Kung

[sbtl_nrg]

Hi guys, I finally decided to register here after reading much of this thread (I've read other stuff on this site in the past as a guest). First I'd like to say thank you to Sifu Terry and others who are so helpful and willing to share their knowledge. I think the main reason I decided to try FPCK was the openness and insight I found in this thread. The results are impressive to be sure, but I think one can find incredible claims in just about any health-related discussion. Real knowledge, however, can't be faked.

 

I've been practicing for about five days straight now. I do vol. 1 every day, and vol. 2 when I have time. I can't speak of tangible results yet, but I'm feeling generally more positive and the meditations are becoming easier to perform and more relaxing. Because I'm a busy guy, I'm wondering if I can combine my workouts with the meditations. I train for the purpose of becoming more coordinated and athletic, so I try to do everything in mindfulness. For this reason, I think taking meditation breaks while training can be of great benefit. But please don't be shy to correct me if I'm missing something!

 

My sessions might look something like this:

 

Session 1: (standing)

monk gazing...

chain punching (a la Wing Chun)

bending the bows

snatch (olympic lift)

monk holding peach

clean and jerk

monk holding pearl

turkish get up

wind above clouds

 

* NOTE: I don't train the lifts to failure or anything like that. The weights are to train the nervous system, so few reps with perfect form is what I strive for.

 

Session 2: (seated)

seated warm-up 1

balance board/coordination exercise

seated warm-up 2

double-end ball work

seated warm-up 3

chain punching

MSW 1

upper-body exercise (usually isometric)

MSW 2

L-Sit (ab exercise)

MSW 3

 

I haven't tried combining the two yet, but this is roughly how I would do it. Thoughts? Thanks in advance.

[Fu_dog]

sbtl -

 

Sorry to be the bearer of this news however the routine you are suggesting is neither good for your Flying Phoenix practice nor your weight training workout.

 

To get benefits from FP you need a minimum of 30 minutes of contiguous practice i.e., no interruptions. An hour in a single Flying Phoenix practice session is better. In other words when you are doing FP, do only FP and nothing else. Actually, it's at about 30 minute mark were you really start to feel the Flying Phoenix energy. Your mind calms, and it will not take you many days of practice before you start to feel yourself enveloped in a very peacefuI yet powerful energy that Flying Phoenix elicits.

 

When doing a weight workout it's better to not go more than four minutes between sets or else your body tends to cool making you more prone to injury. You want to keep your body warm and do one set after the other. Again, a maximum 4 minutre break between sets is the way to get maximum benefits from your weight training program and keep injuries to a minimum. Less than four minutes between sets is even better. So likewise when doing weight training it's better to do only weight training and nothing else, except for cardio of course.

 

Net-net keep them separate.

 

Hope this helps.

 

Fu_dog

[TLB]

(Sorry, this one is merely evidence of my stumbling around trying to figure out how to do this!)

Edited July 12, 2012 by TLB

[TLB]

[sbtl_nrg]

sbtl -

 

Sorry to be the bearer of this news however the routine you are suggesting is neither good for your Flying Phoenix practice nor your weight training workout.

 

To get benefits from FP you need a minimum of 30 minutes of contiguous practice i.e., no interruptions. An hour in a single Flying Phoenix practice session is better. In other words when you are doing FP, do only FP and nothing else. Actually, it's at about 30 minute mark were you really start to feel the Flying Phoenix energy. Your mind calms, and it will not take you many days of practice before you start to feel yourself enveloped in a very peacefuI yet powerful energy that Flying Phoenix elicits.

 

When doing a weight workout it's better to not go more than four minutes between sets or else your body tends to cool making you more prone to injury. You want to keep your body warm and do one set after the other. Again, a maximum 4 minutre break between sets is the way to get maximum benefits from your weight training program and keep injuries to a minimum. Less than four minutes between sets is even better. So likewise when doing weight training it's better to do only weight training and nothing else, except for cardio of course.

 

Net-net keep them separate.

 

Hope this helps.

 

Fu_dog

 

Thanks fu_dog, that helps. I don't think this would be bad for my weight training, as I'm not approaching weights from a bodybuilding or powerlifting angle. I sometimes take up to ten minute breaks between sets to fully recover, and at times I even do single reps, because the form is what counts when you lift Olympic weights (Old time strongmen also trained this way - approaching lifting as a skill best developed by repetition with good form.) Not all lifters train this way, but many Bulgarian champs do.

 

I suspected that the energy could begin to dissipate during breaks, thanks for confirming this. I'll definitely continue the meditations as prescribed.

 

Now here's a question: would it be okay to use the meditations as breaks between my lifting sets, in addition to doing them all continuously, as recommended? I feel very good body alignment while doing these meditations, and it actually helps make the lifts smoother. I guess I'm asking if strenuous activity between meditations could lead to any undesirable effects...

 

Thanks for your help!

Edited July 12, 2012 by sbtl_nrg

[Fu_dog]

sbtl -

 

I admire your enthusiasm however I still recommend you keep the two practices separate.

 

As you get further in the practice FP you will find that some of the more advanced forms can take 20 to 30 minutes to complete, sometimes longer. I don't think those would work in the scenario you are suggesting.

 

As to whether mixing the two will lead to any undesirable effects, I will leave that for Sifu Terry to answer. ;-)

 

All the best,

 

Fu_dog

[tao mist]

sbtl -

 

I admire your enthusiasm however I still recommend you keep the two practices separate.

 

As you get further in the practice FP you will find that some of the more advanced forms can take 20 to 30 minutes to complete, sometimes longer. I don't think those would work in the scenario you are suggesting.

 

As to whether mixing the two will lead to any undesirable effects, I will leave that for Sifu Terry to answer. ;-)

 

All the best,

 

Fu_dog

Without a traditional master-disciple relationship the unsurrendered thinking part of the unawakened mind, known as ego, will usually come up with reasons to do things differently. When I don't know squat about something that is new to me, I am stumbling around in the dark and am grateful for the light that the master gives to light the way on the path. In India that master is called guru for good reason. That sanskrit word translates as something like dispeller of darkness. Chi Kung is from the Taoist tradition which teaches to surrender to what is, the harmony of Nature, and opposes putting our human will against what is. My guru taught us a meditation technique and the meditation program which was how to do the technique. Those that did the meditation but added to or substracted what went with the meditation were considered to be doing the method but not the program and thus were not expected to gain maximum benefits.

Edited July 13, 2012 by tao mist

[Fu_dog]

Tao mist - well said and a valuable perspective!

[tao mist]

Tao mist - well said and a valuable perspective!

Thank you Fu Dog for your reply and for all that you have posted. Your diligence and shared experiences from Flying Phoenix are truly inspirational. You are a disciple. But to answer your reply, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi said it all best. He trained us, his teachers of Transcendental Meditation, to neither add or subtract from the teachings of all mighty Nature. We are merely the mouthpieces of Nature as cognized by the vedic tradition. With the passing of my master I have come to embrace the teachings of China'a internal energy cultivation arts and I only see similarities.

Earlier this week I woke up with a sore throat and that always means cold symptoms will manifest the next day. So I did what I always do, I did my Flying Phoenix but added more of it and each day the sore throat/swollen lymph gland was less bothersome. It is now the end of the week and not one symptom of a cold has manifested and the sore throat is gone and what remains is just a bit of the gland thing. Just one more tangible experience of Flying Phoenix Celestial Healing Chi Kung which certainly was appropriately named!

Thanks once again Sifu Terry!

Edited July 14, 2012 by tao mist

[mjjbecker]

[Jeramiah Zeitigeist]

Thank you Fu Dog for your reply and for all that you have posted. Your diligence and shared experiences from Flying Phoenix are truly inspirational. You are a disciple. But to answer your reply, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi said it all best. He trained us, his teachers of Transcendental Meditation, to neither add or subtract from the teachings of all mighty Nature. We are merely the mouthpieces of Nature as cognized by the vedic tradition. With the passing of my master I have come to embrace the teachings of China'a internal energy cultivation arts and I only see similarities.

Earlier this week I woke up with a sore throat and that always means cold symptoms will manifest the next day. So I did what I always do, I did my Flying Phoenix but added more of it and each day the sore throat/swollen lymph gland was less bothersome. It is now the end of the week and not one symptom of a cold has manifested and the sore throat is gone and what remains is just a bit of the gland thing. Just one more tangible experience of Flying Phoenix Celestial Healing Chi Kung which certainly was appropriately named!

Thanks once again Sifu Terry!

 

Post of the day from Tao Mist !

 

Thanks for sharing your perspective. Says it all, succinctly and to the point.

 

Lets face it, the various masters through the ages have explored all the possibilities and made all the mistakes so that we don't have to ! Why should we think we can do it better, or think of something they didn't ?

[tao mist]

Post of the day from Tao Mist !

 

Thanks for sharing your perspective. Says it all, succinctly and to the point.

 

Lets face it, the various masters through the ages have explored all the possibilities and made all the mistakes so that we don't have to ! Why should we think we can do it better, or think of something they didn't ?

Wow Jeramiah! You just parapharased one of the teachings from Maharishi almost verbatim. When he was training us to be teachers he shared with us that he had made all the mistakes already so we did not need to duplicate that. He called it maintaining the purity of the teaching. You just follow the method of the teacher and then your students will be learning correctly. This is why the lineage of chi kung masters needs to be unbroken and why the true teachers are called masters. They have mastered the method. How many of us so far can claim that we have even truly mastered one Flying Phoenix meditation on volume one or two? Those of you who have done so please come and teach me!

[zen-bear]

sbtl -

 

Sorry to be the bearer of this news however the routine you are suggesting is neither good for your Flying Phoenix practice nor your weight training workout.

 

To get benefits from FP you need a minimum of 30 minutes of contiguous practice i.e., no interruptions. An hour in a single Flying Phoenix practice session is better. In other words when you are doing FP, do only FP and nothing else. Actually, it's at about 30 minute mark were you really start to feel the Flying Phoenix energy. Your mind calms, and it will not take you many days of practice before you start to feel yourself enveloped in a very peacefuI yet powerful energy that Flying Phoenix elicits.

 

When doing a weight workout it's better to not go more than four minutes between sets or else your body tends to cool making you more prone to injury. You want to keep your body warm and do one set after the other. Again, a maximum 4 minutre break between sets is the way to get maximum benefits from your weight training program and keep injuries to a minimum. Less than four minutes between sets is even better. So likewise when doing weight training it's better to do only weight training and nothing else, except for cardio of course.

 

Net-net keep them separate.

 

Hope this helps.

 

Fu_dog

 

 

Fu_Dog,

 

Thank you very much for giving excellent advice to sbtl-nrg based on your solid experience of almost 3 years of FP practice. You basically took the words right out of my mouth, Lloyd.

 

To cultivate the Flying Phoenix Healing Chi effectively, one should do a many of the basic FP Meditative Exercises as possible in one session. 30 minutes is minimum for beginners; one hour is adequate; 90 minutes is even better. You speak from good experience when you say that (for beginners) the FP Healing Chi becomes tangible and unmistakable at approx. 30 minutes into practice. As I've stated in this thread earlier, once one has established the FP Chi Kung in one's energy body by practicing 30 to 90 minutes a day (6-7 days a week) of both seated and standing FP meditations, the reserve of FP Healing Chi that's cultivated can be accessed and magnified almost instantly by simply doing one of the breath-control sequences. One cannot attain this level of access by interrupting FP Meditations with weight training.

 

A second reason why sbtl-nrg's training schedule is not efficient use of FP Chi Kung is the fact that FP Chi Kung is not a good complement whatsoever for weight training, especially power lifting. FP energy is a super-refined and ethereal healing energy; a "heavier" energy--something akin to jing (released through the sinews in Tai Chi Chuan) might be a better fit with weight lifting. I did some weight training when I was in my 20's and 30's, but I balanced that training only with certain Shaolin and Tao Tan Pai forms to integrate the strength developed by weights into the natural movements of the forms--but I never paired weight training with any type of Qigong. Also, in the Chinese martial arts tradition, weights are only used very selectively only after one has thoroughly and rigorously been "stretched out" and has supernormal flexibility and range of movement as in northern shaolin.

 

In terms of specialized weight training for kung-fu (as opposed to competitive Olympics-type weight-lifting), I have done for past 20+ years the exact same training using a PVC pipe filled with 25 lbs of lead ball bearings that Sifu Garry demonstrates in this clip:

 

I do this exercise to this day in mostly standing position, emphasizing the coordination of the "flexing" of the horse stance with the extension of the arms with hands hooked downward. There are numerous health and martial benefits to this "roller bar" exercise. Cryptic hint: this exercise makes the entire class of martial techniques in all Kung Fu systems represented by or referenced by--for lack of a better verb--the Tai Chi posture "Pick Up Needle on Sea Bottom" extremely easy to do with powerful energy.

 

There may be some forms of Qigong that would lend themselves well to supporting the type of weight training as sbtl-nrg has described, but I don't know of any.

 

Thanks again, Fu_Dog for your reply.

 

Good luck to sbtl-nrg in finding the qigong to complement his weights training,

 

Sifu Terry

[zen-bear]

Post of the day from Tao Mist !

 

Thanks for sharing your perspective. Says it all, succinctly and to the point.

 

Lets face it, the various masters through the ages have explored all the possibilities and made all the mistakes so that we don't have to ! Why should we think we can do it better, or think of something they didn't ?

 

 

 

Thank you, Jeremiah Zeitgeist, for your succinct advice based on good common sense in respect of generations of masters that created, refined, and then impeccably preserved the Flying Phoenix Celestial Healing Chi Kung so that it produce the profound results to this day.

 

The goal of practice when one has a complete and effective Qigong/yogic system in front of them is to master that system. Once mastered, the wisdom imparted by the practice of the FP Meditations will then intruct one on how to apply FP Healing Energy to any endeavor or life situation. But first master the discipline by practicing it purely and correctly!

 

Sifu Terry

[zen-bear]

Wow Jeramiah! You just parapharased one of the teachings from Maharishi almost verbatim. When he was training us to be teachers he shared with us that he had made all the mistakes already so we did not need to duplicate that. He called it maintaining the purity of the teaching. You just follow the method of the teacher and then your students will be learning correctly. This is why the lineage of chi kung masters needs to be unbroken and why the true teachers are called masters. They have mastered the method. How many of us so far can claim that we have even truly mastered one Flying Phoenix meditation on volume one or two? Those of you who have done so please come and teach me!

 

 

Hi Steve,

 

Thanks for your very good perspective from your years of experience with Maharishi and your passing on his advice of "maintaining the purity of the teaching."

 

Alas, I'm afraid that it may be one of FP Chi Kung's unique and most interesting qualities that makes it susceptible to be practiced incorrectly or ineffectively by beginners. Recall that I have stated--and by now I think most practitioners have verified for themselves this to be true--that once the breath control sequence is completed and the FP Qigong posture and movements (if there are movements) correctly done, one does not have to mentally focus on anything at all. No visualizations, no guided imagery, no particular mental focus whatsoever is needed, yet the same physiological benefits will still accrue. Thus it may be the greatest irony that the freedom a beginner has to think about anything while doing an FP Meditation has given him the time and temptation to think of, well, mischievous ways of practicing the art ineffectively! --thus given creedence to that saying "the idle mind is the devil's playground"!

This general musing was inspired by your and Fu_Dog's good responses to sbtl-nrg...but is not further admonishment against what Sbtl is doing. It's just my way of advising all to: "Just Do It--and only It--until you master It."

 

Regards and thanks again to you and Fu_Dog for your contributions.

 

Sifu Terry

Edited July 15, 2012 by zen-bear

[sbtl_nrg]

Without a traditional master-disciple relationship the unsurrendered thinking part of the unawakened mind, known as ego, will usually come up with reasons to do things differently. When I don't know squat about something that is new to me, I am stumbling around in the dark and am grateful for the light that the master gives to light the way on the path. In India that master is called guru for good reason. That sanskrit word translates as something like dispeller of darkness. Chi Kung is from the Taoist tradition which teaches to surrender to what is, the harmony of Nature, and opposes putting our human will against what is. My guru taught us a meditation technique and the meditation program which was how to do the technique. Those that did the meditation but added to or substracted what went with the meditation were considered to be doing the method but not the program and thus were not expected to gain maximum benefits.

 

It wasn't my intention to add or subtract anything from the FP meditations. My intent was to enhance my weightlifting with the relaxing effects of the qigong - not to enhance the qigong. If I'm going against any tradition, it's the weightlifting tradition, which I'm not so worried about as it's based on somewhat shaky principles in my opinion. Not sure where you got ungrateful from that.

Edited July 15, 2012 by sbtl_nrg

[sbtl_nrg]

Hi Steve,

 

Thanks for your very good perspective from your years of experience with Maharishi and your passing on his advice of "maintaining the purity of the teaching."

 

Alas, I'm afraid that it may be one of FP Chi Kung's unique and most interesting qualities that makes it susceptible to be practiced incorrectly or ineffectively by beginners. Recall that I have stated--and by now I think most practitioners have verified for themselves this to be true--that once the breath control sequence is completed and the FP Qigong posture and movements (if there are movements) correctly done, one does not have to mentally focus on anything at all. No visualizations, no guided imagery, no particular mental focus whatsoever is needed, yet the same physiological benefits will still accrue. Thus it may be the greatest irony that the freedom a beginner has to think about anything while doing an FP Meditation has given him the time and temptation to think of, well, mischievous ways of practicing the art ineffectively! --thus given creedence to that saying "the idle mind is the devil's playground"!

This general musing was inspired by your and Fu_Dog's good responses to sbtl-nrg...but is not further admonishment against what Sbtl is doing. It's just my way of advising all to: "Just Do It--and only It--until you master It."

 

Regards and thanks again to you and Fu_Dog for your contributions.

 

Sifu Terry

 

 

In the video you say that one ought to imagine sitting on a chair or being suspended by a string to aid in keeping the back straight. Can one take this too far? And would it be incorrect to actually imagine that one's arms are draped over a large egg in the Wuji posture? These visualization seems to help me maintain good form, but I don't want to stunt my progress by limiting my awareness (not seeing the forest for the trees).

 

Also, can it be counterproductive to sink too low into the horse or wuji stance?

 

Thanks for your recommendation concerning the roller bar. I'll try it out.

[tao mist]

It wasn't my intention to add or subtract anything from the FP meditations. My intent was to enhance my weightlifting with the relaxing effects of the qigong - not to enhance the qigong. If I'm going against any tradition, it's the weightlifting tradition, which I'm not so worried about as it's based on somewhat shaky principles in my opinion. Not sure where you got ungrateful from that.

 

My apologies to you. I just used your post as an opportunity to share a basic teaching. I did not have the impression that you were tampering with tradition or were ungrateful for anything. I should have prefaced my remarks stating that my warning is in case there are people out there combining things instead of spacing out different methods. In fact, it probably is better if I remain the student that I am and just let the Sifu and other experienced people do the teaching! I think I will stick with questions and testimonials. So thanks for bringing this to my attention.

Steve

[Fu_dog]

Steve -

 

Actually your responses add a lot to the board.

 

I and many others always enjoy your comments.

 

I hope you keep posting as you have been!

 

Fu_dog

[sbtl_nrg]

My apologies to you. I just used your post as an opportunity to share a basic teaching. I did not have the impression that you were tampering with tradition or were ungrateful for anything. I should have prefaced my remarks stating that my warning is in case there are people out there combining things instead of spacing out different methods. In fact, it probably is better if I remain the student that I am and just let the Sifu and other experienced people do the teaching! I think I will stick with questions and testimonials. So thanks for bringing this to my attention.

Steve

 

Wow man sorry, honestly I'm probably a being tad defensive. I did appreciate what you wrote and I agree very much with what you said. In the West, it seems like a more common error to undervalue the role of the vehicle (or equivalently, the guru) than to cling to the vehicle once the journey is finished. We just have that do-it-yourself type mentality - who needs the guru when enlightenment is in this very moment? But I've reasoned this way before and it turned out teaching me that I can't always do things best on my own.

[zen-bear]

In the video you say that one ought to imagine sitting on a chair or being suspended by a string to aid in keeping the back straight. Can one take this too far? And would it be incorrect to actually imagine that one's arms are draped over a large egg in the Wuji posture? These visualization seems to help me maintain good form, but I don't want to stunt my progress by limiting my awareness (not seeing the forest for the trees).

 

Also, can it be counterproductive to sink too low into the horse or wuji stance?

 

Thanks for your recommendation concerning the roller bar. I'll try it out.

 

 

 

 

Hello sbtl-nrg,

 

The form points "arms draped over large egg shape rising from the ground"; "back straight as if suspended from above by string attached to crown of the head"; etc. are very basic ones that address one of the three essential aspects of any Qigong system: the shape/form of the body, or "hsing" (xing). The other two elements being (2) Chi (breathing) and (3) Yi (I): Mind or mental focus (which also includes visual focus).

 

It's fine to keep these form visualizations in mind for as long as you feel you need them. No, you won't stunt your growth of awareness by thinking of good form. As I have stated, one can mentally focus on anything one chooses to once the breath-control sequence of an FP Meditation has been completed, as one will still derive the same benefits.

 

The basic FP Meditations don't require a very deep wu-ji stance to be effective. In fact, I teach beginners to "bend the knees to the degree as if they're seated on the edge of a barstool" and students standing with almost knees locked can use Monk Gazing At Moon, Monk Holding Pearl, etc. to good effect. But the answer to your question is that it all depends on the martial training of the practitioner. If one is very limber and has been practicing, say, Chen Tai Chi for 20 years and as a result has very strong and relaxed stances, then it doesn't matter how deep or shallow that person holds his wuji stance--as long as he/she can stand at that level perfectly relaxed and comfortable in good form with unencumbered breathing.

 

Enjoy the roller bar training. It perfects one's form and body mechanics, develops integrated strength, and puts serious "juice" into one's martial applications. And you have as a reference Sifu Hearfield's detailed demonstration clip on Youtube.

 

Enjoy the FP Chi Kung practice--any way you choose to!

 

Sifu Terry Dunn

Edited July 16, 2012 by zen-bear

[zen-bear]

Hello Flying Phoenix practitioners and FP thread readers,

 

Yesterday morning, at the end of a 2.5 hour Tai Chi Chuan class, I led my students in the 3 stationary FP standing meditations found in Volume 1:

Monk Gazing at Moon (6 minutes)

Monk Holding Peach (10 minutes)

Monk Holding Pearl (8 minutes)

For lack of time, we didn't proceed to Wind Above the Clouds or Wind Through Treetops.

 

Everyone remarked that they clearly noticed the different energy cultivated by the 3 closing FP Meditations in contrast to the energy experienced in the Tai Chi practice. They said they felt that the FP Energy was more sublime, more relaxing, ethereal and lighter yet thoroughly permeating and mind-clearing.

 

Sifu Terry Dunn

[Jeramiah Zeitigeist]

My apologies to you. I just used your post as an opportunity to share a basic teaching. I did not have the impression that you were tampering with tradition or were ungrateful for anything. I should have prefaced my remarks stating that my warning is in case there are people out there combining things instead of spacing out different methods. In fact, it probably is better if I remain the student that I am and just let the Sifu and other experienced people do the teaching! I think I will stick with questions and testimonials. So thanks for bringing this to my attention.

Steve

 

 

Steve

 

Keep posting your observations too. I found your posts very interesting. We are all students, finding our way, and your comments have helped me !

[Jeramiah Zeitigeist]

Hi Everyone !

 

I have started a new thread, advertising the Flying Phoenix workshops that will take place in the UK in autumn 2012.

 

Have a look, and let me know if you are interested in attending.

[zen-bear]

I just received news today from my classmate Sifu Steve Baugh that one of our teachers, Master Share K. Lew has just passed away at the age of 94 years. Master Lew was the 23rd generation lineage holder of the Tao Tan Pai (Taoist Elixir Method) School of Kung-fu dating back to China's Tang Dynasty. The art is attributed to the legendary Lu Tung Pin, the "leader" of the Eight Taoist Immortals. In 1934, at the age of 16, Master Lew entered the Yellow Dragon Monastery (Gee Lum Gee), located at the summit of Mt. Luofu, Guangdong Province, China. He was also the nephew of the famous Choy Lay Fut master, Lew Ben (Lau Bun). Thus he taught the Chang Chuan (Long First) Form of CLF as an adjunct/pillar to his basic Tan Tan Pai training. Master Lew was one of the only two temple-trained, fully ordained Taoist priests residing in America; the other being Master Kuan Sai Hung of the Huashan sect of Taoism (the two met in 1983 and had a joyful time of it). He was also a peer and friend of my teacher of Flying Phoenix Chi Kung and several other internal arts, Grandmaster Doo Wai of the Bok Fu Pai (White Tiger Kung Fu) system of Ehrmeishan--so often mentioned in this thread by myself and Sifu Garry Hearfield. In fact, GM Doo Wai told me in 1992 that one of the reasons that Sifu Lew had moved from Los Angeles to San Diego in the mid-70's was so that he could be close to GM Doo Wai so that he could dp am exchange of their respective arts. I studied Tao Tan Pai from 1975 to 1983 under Master Lew's senior students John Davidson and Bill Helm of the Los Angeles and San Diego Taoist Sanctuaries. In 1988, Master Lew authorized me to teach Tao Tan Pai. In 1990, he taught me his Tai Chi Ruler. Perhaps synchronous with his passing, early yesterday morning, I practiced the Tao Tan Pai Six Stars neigung, the TTP Crane Form, TTP Snake Form, and TTP Monkey Form in my first hour of a 5-hour training session.

 

Master Lew taught his Taoist martial and healing arts for some 52 years, profoundly changing the lives of all his students with his powerful and enlightening gifts of martial, yogic, and healing knowledge. As seen in this link, Master Lew was teaching right up into the final weeks before his passing:

http://208.100.58.124/?p=454

http://sandiegofitnessmartialarts.com/blog/entry/3188853/cloud-hands-earth-meditation|workshop-taught-by-master-share-k-lew

Edited July 22, 2012 by zen-bear