zhan zhuang

[Ramon25]

Is this guy overreacting big time or what?

Zhan zhuang is a powerful exercise, and is best done under supervision. Those who practice wrongly and still persist on, may vomit blood, have deformed bodily structure, or insidiously damaged internal organs. There are usually warning signs for wrong practice, such as discomfort, pain and nervousness. Whenever you have such warning signs, stop your zhan zhuang and revert back to Ba Duan Jin. Resume zhan zhuang training only when the warning signs have disappeared.

 

If you practice zhan zhuang on your own, which is actually not advisable but may be attempted if you are very careful, you have to proceed very slowly; I repeat, very slowly. If someone training with a master takes 6 months to attain certain result, you should aim at that for two years.

 

 

Like how wrong could you possibly do this and really in general?!?!/

[ralis]

Is this guy overreacting big time or what?

Zhan zhuang is a powerful exercise, and is best done under supervision. Those who practice wrongly and still persist on, may vomit blood, have deformed bodily structure, or insidiously damaged internal organs. There are usually warning signs for wrong practice, such as discomfort, pain and nervousness. Whenever you have such warning signs, stop your zhan zhuang and revert back to Ba Duan Jin. Resume zhan zhuang training only when the warning signs have disappeared.

 

If you practice zhan zhuang on your own, which is actually not advisable but may be attempted if you are very careful, you have to proceed very slowly; I repeat, very slowly. If someone training with a master takes 6 months to attain certain result, you should aim at that for two years.

 

 

Like how wrong could you possibly do this and really in general?!?!/

 

Never heard of these effects. Zhan Zhuang is very safe.

 

ralis

[TheSongsofDistantEarth]

Those who practice wrongly and still persist on, may vomit blood, have deformed bodily structure, or insidiously damaged internal organs. There are usually warning signs for wrong practice, such as discomfort, pain and nervousness. Whenever you have such warning signs, stop your zhan zhuang and revert back to Ba Duan Jin. Resume zhan zhuang training only when the warning signs have disappeared.

 

 

Like how wrong could you possibly do this and really in general?!?!/

I had all those things happen to me when I did Zhang Zhuang on the painted line on the southbound 405 in LA and got hit by a guy on a motorcycle cutting in between lanes of traffic...in addition to wearing reflective clothing, I recommend road flares and traffic cones as a minimum when practicing freeway Qi Gong...

[Aetherous]

If this is how your standing looks, then it can eventually cause problems...

 

 

 

"Cultivation". We cultivate the feeling of integration throughout the body. If you feel disjointed, then you're cultivating the feeling of being disjointed, and should adjust your posture so that you're centered, rooted, at-one, etc.

[sifusufi]

Please see below

 

thanks

Edited May 6, 2010 by sifusufi

[sifusufi]

Never heard of these effects. Zhan Zhuang is very safe.

 

ralis

 

How true!

Loved the scene in The Way of the Peaceful Warrior!

 

 

Verrrrry effective if you do it (note to self)

 

http://6.cn/watch/7439098.html

 

"It" begins at the 21:00 minute mark

[Pietro]

Never heard of these effects. Zhan Zhuang is very safe.

 

ralis

 

For what I know the maximum hat can happen is that you damage your joints for poor posture (but they would scream bloody murder before it happens), or that you touch something that it is so bad, but so bad that you lose consciousness, and the as you fall you can harm yourself. But I only heard happen one time, and the person was not just doing Zhan Zhuang, but also some different meditations. Generally you can keep a chair on the back of where you stand and if the worse come to the worse you just sit.

[mYTHmAKER]

My teacher had me stand in wuji (hands at sides)

At some point I told myself to move but so grounded I was unable to do so.

After one and a half hours he slapped my arms and legs

and pulled my arms and told me to do some walking.

[Baguakid]

My teacher had me stand in wuji (hands at sides)

At some point I told myself to move but so grounded I was unable to do so.

After one and a half hours he slapped my arms and legs

and pulled my arms and told me to do some walking.

 

 

This is by far the safest and best exercise for cultivating Qi (IMO).. Cai Songfang teaches not to stand over 1 hour each time. Stand for 1 hour (or less), then walk around a bit and stand again if you like. He told me to stand 2 hours a day. He told my friend to stand 4 hours a day.

 

Regarding posture. With Wuji the posture will be corrected naturally through standing.

[Aetherous]

With Wuji the posture will be corrected naturally through standing

 

Not necessarily.

[Guest sykkelpump]

Zhan zhuang is very safe and very effective.You want waste time with this practice,combined with meditation will speed things up.

Edited May 6, 2010 by sykkelpump

[Ramon25]

yeah this huy kind of freaked me out a little. He is a martial arts sifu. So last word is that zhang zhuang wont fuck you up right?

the link \

http://www.shaolin.org/general-2/stance-training.html

[Guest sykkelpump]

yeah this huy kind of freaked me out a little. He is a martial arts sifu. So last word is that zhang zhuang wont fuck you up right?

the link \

http://www.shaolin.org/general-2/stance-training.html

 

 

yes,it want fuck you up.It will open up your channels and give you better health

[Aetherous]

It won't if you just do a little research on how to practice, and always correct yourself.

 

A lot of people like this book. 11 bucks, can't beat that.

[gendao]

I find that stretching your kua open & progressing towards full lotus help immensely as cross-training to attaining the optimal zhan zhuang posture. Your kua is typically your largest bottleneck in assuming most stances properly.

 

So far, just based upon my own feeling & conjecture - I'm guessing that in the optimal ZZ stance:

Your entire backside (including back of pelvis & heel spacing) flattens & spreads outwards, your arms curl around in front & almost back in towards your centerline. Sort of like a scroll.

The outer edges of your feet run straight forward so that you are just slightly pigeon-toed.

Feel your weight running down the backside of your pelvis & transferring from your sitz bones to the tops of your femurs.

All of this would match your back's expansive yang & front's inward yin natures. Your back expands out to infinity...while your front absorbs inward like a black hole.

In ZZ, you can do both simultaneously! Isn't that amazing genius?!

 

Then keep relaxing, opening, feeling, aligning, etc...

 

The second bottleneck I probably need to work on though is my...actual neck.

I still need to figure out a good straightening stretch for that.

Edited May 7, 2010 by vortex

[Sloppy Zhang]

I think it depends a lot on the type of standing practice you are learning.

 

If you are learning a Shaolin type of horse stance (like the one you linked) which involves long hours of holding (usually pretty forcefully, as you are shaking a lot at the beginning) a particular stance, for strength or for energy, then, yeah, I'd say you can mess yourself up.

 

But you can mess yourself up forcefully doing ANYTHING for hours on end.

 

With my experience with B.K. Frantzis' standing method taught in his books, the body naturally corrects itself if you do it right. We usually develop pretty bad posture during our lives/day to day habits, but a lot of that is because of the tension we carry around in our muscles- we force ourselves to adopt certain postures. And we even sleep carrying a lot of that tension!

 

But when you start releasing that tension, you ease up on the system. Suddenly, the system, your body, wants to return back to it's natural state. I, at least, thought that I was straight and relaxed, then suddenly I have an urge to move. I do, and I find out that I naturally shift into a posture that is much better than the one I had before, and much more relaxed.

 

For a while while after meditation, my posture is near perfect, but as the day goes on I usually revert back to my poor posture from bad habits little by little.

 

People who have known me for a long time noticed how my posture dramatically changes, a lot of times I don't even notice anymore, how it is straighter, more vertical, but isn't tense or rigid.

 

So I think if you practice a truly relaxing form of standing, one in which you let go of a need to be in control, the body will do what it needs to do to fix itself. The whole reason our bodies evolved the way it did was to conserve energy- comparing how we walk on two legs to how a monkey walks on two legs, it shows that the monkey wastes lots of energy, but human movement is very efficient and graceful. It's just how we are, but our mental thoughts have the power to override the system controls sometimes, and mess the whole thing up. But if you can get in tune with your body, you can figure out what it wants to do to become more efficient, and you can do it.

 

Once you get a better posture, good things start happening, and once you get a good sense of what posture your body needs to be in to be healthy and have a relaxed energy flow and good circulation (sometimes quickly sometimes not, depends) then you can begin to take on other stances and know when you are doing something right or wrong (sometimes the entire stance will feel wrong!!!) just by listening to your body.

Edited May 7, 2010 by Sloppy Zhang

[Old Man Contradiction]

From the standing found in books, you aren't going to hurt yourself. You might make your posture worse by standing with sway or hunch back, or something else similar to bad form. But all in all such a simple exercise isn't going to hurt you.

 

The first real challenge of zhan zhuang is finding someone that can take it to it's fullest potential. It's really rare. Some things to take note of:

 

1. just standing relaxed won't open channels. you have to physically open them yourself, just standing around relaxed is not going to do that for you. the "do nothing, get everything" approach doesn't work.

 

2. Without wasting breath trying to explain the more intense methods of zhan zhuang, it's important to note that in standing and all of the internal martial arts, you want to be using all of your muscle as much as possible. When in unison, you have connected your body better than anyone that is just relying on dead muscle swiveling on mechanics will ever be able to.

 

3. Don't create tension.

[Baguakid]

 

1. just standing relaxed won't open channels. you have to physically open them yourself, just standing around relaxed is not going to do that for you. the "do nothing, get everything" approach doesn't work.

 

This is an incorrect statement. First of all, "just standing around" seems to mean you mean, standing on a street corner watching girls go by or something. If you're going to give tips and information, be clear. Second, you are completely wrong if you think you "must" open channels, that is, you must do something other than stand to open the channels. WRONG!! Standing Wuji will open channels completely and safely. People seem to want to give blanket instructional statements based on their experience even if what they're talking about, they've never practiced. If you've never tried it, don't comment on it.

 

Peace

[Guest sykkelpump]

From the standing found in books, you aren't going to hurt yourself. You might make your posture worse by standing with sway or hunch back, or something else similar to bad form. But all in all such a simple exercise isn't going to hurt you.

 

The first real challenge of zhan zhuang is finding someone that can take it to it's fullest potential. It's really rare. Some things to take note of:

 

1. just standing relaxed won't open channels. you have to physically open them yourself, just standing around relaxed is not going to do that for you. the "do nothing, get everything" approach doesn't work.

 

2. Without wasting breath trying to explain the more intense methods of zhan zhuang, it's important to note that in standing and all of the internal martial arts, you want to be using all of your muscle as much as possible. When in unison, you have connected your body better than anyone that is just relying on dead muscle swiveling on mechanics will ever be able to.

 

3. Don't create tension.

 

nr 1 is just plain wrong.it will open channels.what you NOT wanna do is to interfere with your body intelligence and try to force open any bolcks.Belive me I have years of bad experience with that.just relax into the posture an in time your energy circulation will grow and channels will open up naturally.

[Old Man Contradiction]

I know it's not a popular idea, but I have stood with my only intention being to relax and clear my mind. In fact that is a necessity and precursor for taking the practice farther. But yeah, you definitely want to advance your practice if you want to open up your body.

 

When I practice tai chi the way it is popularly practiced (just relax and move, empty your mind, all sung), I feel sedated and tired afterwards. When I pump my taiji full of I-chuan's six directions, tendon changing, resistant force, and attempts at awakening my Yi, well damn, I feel energized, awake, and alive. The same difference applies to zhan zhuang. Just IME! and it makes complete sense too.

[Mal]

When I practice tai chi the way it is popularly practiced (just relax and move, empty your mind, all sung), I feel sedated and tired afterwards.

 

I find people sometimes breathe too shallow when trying for "sung" with Tai Chi, that shallow breathing can make them feel lethargic and sleepy. But good to hear your Yi Quan experiences are helping you, I've never learnt it but I wonder if it's another method of approaching the same goal?

 

I don't practice standing often, so I don't have anything to say about that

[Baguakid]

I was going to write a lengthly reply but I'm just tired of writing the same things over and over. Anyone with any salt will be objective and do their own research and can make an educated decision. Wuji standing is a tremendous exercise with tons of benefits and will completely open one's body.

[Nilo]

I don't follow most of the tedious guidelines for ZZ. In my opinion, just relax and stand like a tree, that is all you have to do. Your intuition will naturally correct your body alignments.One thing is for sure, you might want to warm up your joints and gently shake your body loose before practicing ZZ, it helps alot in opening up the channels.

[Russell-NWIA]

Zhan Zhuang is a very safe practice. Having a teacher to adjust your alignments in the beginning is very valuable because there are many mis-alignments we simply aren't aware of. These corrections will help you get the most out of your practice. If you don't have a teacher... go for it anyway and scrutinize yourself in a mirror to realign.

 

The longest I've seen someone hold this pose is two and a half hours. No blood vomit. They did say the long hold cleared some knots out of their shoulder that had been there for years though.

 

-Russell

Northwest Internal Arts

[Ramon25]

Thanks guys