What does standing meditation do to/for you?

[PLB]

ChiDragon,

When you ask: " Do you think Kung Fu is not an isometric exercise to get the body in shape....???", two thoughts come to my mind:

 

Standing practice is for cultivating awareness, calm, and the discovery of one's energetic body. Your description seems to give little credence to the idea that standing is a part of an "internal" art. The notion that it is primarily a body building exercise goes against every thing my training and teachers have led me to understand and practice.

 

Low stances certainly develop incredible leg strength and I enjoy going as low as I can go without hurting my knees. But the "isometric" element in those stances and movements are increased by obeying the rule about keeping the knees from going beyond the toes rather than letting the knees take up more of the load. Consider the kung fu of

He steps out into very low stances and never moves his knees beyond his toes on his weighted leg. I am pretty sure Yu Gua Shun could satisfy any measure of physical conditioning you have in mind.

 

When everything is relaxed and I am able to keep my focus very clear, I can do the Yang 108 in the low frame. I need the internal element to do it without hurting myself, not the other way around.

[ChiDragon]

Even if you can DON"T

 

Do you speak from experience.Do YOU stand with your knees beyond your toes?

or are you theorizing again.

Many taiji players have bad knees for this very reason.

 

ALL OF THE ABOVE except the last statement.......!!!!!

 

"Many taiji players have bad knees for this very reason."

It seems to me they need more practice.

[Gemstone]

I think Steve and Snowmonki are excellent sources of information in this thread!

 

Many weird and strange (and wonderful) experiences can be had in this practice,

so patience, curiosity and a playful attitude is good to have onboard.

 

When the training gets tough a smile will soften things up.

[ChiDragon]

ChiDragon,

When you ask: " Do you think Kung Fu is not an isometric exercise to get the body in shape....???", two thoughts come to my mind:

 

Standing practice is for cultivating awareness, calm, and the discovery of one's energetic body. Your description seems to give little credence to the idea that standing is a part of an "internal" art. The notion that it is primarily a body building exercise goes against every thing my training and teachers have led me to understand and practice.

 

Low stances certainly develop incredible leg strength and I enjoy going as low as I can go without hurting my knees. But the "isometric" element in those stances and movements are increased by obeying the rule about keeping the knees from going beyond the toes rather than letting the knees take up more of the load. Consider the kung fu of

He steps out into very low stances and never moves his knees beyond his toes on his weighted leg. I am pretty sure Yu Gua Shun could satisfy any measure of physical conditioning you have in mind.

 

When everything is relaxed and I am able to keep my focus very clear, I can do the Yang 108 in the low frame. I need the internal element to do it without hurting myself, not the other way around.

Yes, you are a fine practitioner. I was hoping someone with some fundamental knowledge to come forward to make the correction.

 

" Do you think Kung Fu is not an isometric exercise to get the body in shape....???"

 

It should be corrected to read as follows:

" Do you think Kung Fu is not an isotonic exercise to get the body in shape....???"

 

However, we must give Zhan Zhuang a little credence to the idea that standing is a part of an "internal" art. It is because ZZ is the only "internal art" which was required for Kung Fu as the prerequisite. Thus all Kung Fu practitioner starts with ZZ before taken other training.

 

You are right about the low stances. BTW Yu Gua Shun is actually performing the second level of Tai Ji Chuan with Fa Jin. At his level, he is way passed from getting his knees hurt or damage.

[chenplayer]

Yu Gua Shun is my sifu!!!!!! awesome to see him posted here!!!!!!

[chenplayer]

Also thank you so much for all the feed back it is much appreciated. Thank You mythmaker, adept, steve, and bubbles, any one i left out my apologies but thank you also!!!!!

[doc benway]

 

Standing practice is for cultivating awareness, calm, and the discovery of one's energetic body. Your description seems to give little credence to the idea that standing is a part of an "internal" art. The notion that it is primarily a body building exercise goes against every thing my training and teachers have led me to understand and practice.

 

Well said, PLB.

The OP titled the thread standing meditation.

If I sit and watch television, I am not practicing sitting meditation.

Similarly, if I stand and watch television or otherwise occupy my attention, this is not standing meditation, it is simple isometric exercise.

There is nothing wrong with standing without meditation, provided the posture is correct.

But meditation adds another dimension that enhances all other training...

[Ya Mu]

I've heard a lot about "standing meditation" and hear that its supposed to be very good for you, but what exactly does it do? I guess more specifically what does it to do your chakra's and channels, as well as to your energy? I would guess its good for grounding? does it affect the crown chakra as well? what else does it do?

There are more than one type of standing form of internal arts as well as external muscle development. Zen type meditation differs from ZZ differs from other neigong standing forms differs from isotonal form. So the answer here is that results vary just a whole heck of a lot. I think most forms would help with calmness although isotonal perhaps less so; some forms would go deeper into the calmness. The energy component depends on the form as well as what other energetic practices one is doing.

Standing can be an awesome thing. Decide what you want to learn and give it a try. When I first learned standing Stillness-Movement form I actually thought I was not going to like it as much as sitting. That quickly changed and I like both. One can accomplish much with standing.

As far as energy centers go some forms work these much more than others.

[ChiDragon]

..... I just started practicing standing pole and literally in the first few minutes i get this uncontrollable shaking from my legs.

 

Chenpalyer....

Your sifu is doing the Chen Style Tai Ji alright. May I ask you where did you get the term "standing pole". BTW It is the proper translation for Zhan Zhuang(站樁). I will wait for your response before say anything else....

[ChiDragon]

As a master with more than 20 years experiences in standing maditation, I recommend Wuji Standing for you, you can download the free ebook at http://pan.baidu.com...&uk=3372875513/, hope it helps.

 

Li Jiong, I am a Li(李) too. It is nice to see a real Taoist Master here in the forum. Ｗhere have you been 修道 at in the last 20 years...??? I would like to hear some of your cultivated experiences. I would like to know how did you start going about being a Taoist practitioner...??? Did you learn your English in the Taoist shrine(道觀) too....???

[Bubbles]

Yu Gua Shun is my sifu!

 

If so, there is (very) little you can learn here at TTB.

Just stick to Yu Gua Shun teachings for as long as you can. Don't miss any chance to learn such a fine art from a fine martial artist.

Keep up the good work!

Edited November 28, 2012 by bubbles

[gatito]

Lam Kam Chuen was one of my teachers (in person) and the warning here about the knees is correct.

 

The knees should NOT project beyond the feet.

 

Get hold of a copy of The Way of Energy by Sifu Lam and use it in conjunction with the videos

 

 

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Chi-Kung-The-Way-Energy/dp/1856752151

 

£2.03p second-hand at the time of this post (plus shipping @ £2.80). Absolute bargain!!!!

[gatito]

PS Also Zhan Zhuang (as taught by Master Lam) is definitely NOT meditation and he pulled me up about it in class one day because he spotted me entering into meditation while I was standing.

[Jetsun]

It's a good meditation for bringing your awareness into your body and grounding, because you are standing you always automatically maintain some conscious awareness in the body otherwise you could fall over and hurt yourself which is why you don't need any focus or anchor to maintain your awareness, whereas with sitting meditation your mind can go flying off anywhere to any dimension.

[gatito]

Fair enough.

[Jetsun]

Fair enough.

 

I wrote my reply before I saw what you wrote, I agree its not a meditation as such, because your awareness automatically gets grounded in the body there is no need to do anything with the mind, or focus it anywhere everything just gets done.

[gatito]

No, your right.

 

Mindfulness of body = meditation

 

Let's not split hairs

 

I got pulled because I went off on a sitting meditation type "state"

[Bubbles]

Your sifu is doing the Chen Style Tai Ji alright.

 

This is inappropriate and condescending. No one here is able to compete with Yu Gua Shun.

Edited November 28, 2012 by bubbles

[Bubbles]

I just want to emphasize that ZZ is only a simple method to strengthen the legs muscles. Thus there is really nothing else more than that.

 

This is a gross misconception.

If one wants to develop leg muscles he would probably do better with weight training.

[i am]

I bought the above referenced book a few weeks back, and have been standing for a couple years now (though more seriously just in the last 9 or so months), but I just opened it and started reading last night.

 

I was happy to see that I'm not doing anything seriously wrong. I can also see that the book is going to help me quite a bit. He has very good descriptions. I agree with what I've seen expressed in other threads, he doesn't go super deep into anything. But that's good. It's just a short, couple hundred page book, and gives you the basics you need to know for standing. Anything deeper than what's in the book isn't something you need to be thinking about before you've been standing for years anyways, in my opinion.

 

He very much stresses the knees never going past the toes, but in the first section, he does mention that you will probably feel pain. He doesn't go into depth about how much or what kind.

[i am]

Get hold of a copy of The Way of Energy by Sifu Lam and use it in conjunction with the videos

 

 

What videos?

[gatito]

www.youtube.com/user/StandStillBeFit?feature=watch

[i am]

Thanks gatito!

[gatito]

Little bit off topic - but this might also be of interest to someone here:-

 

http://www.youtube.com/user/shorechi?feature=watch

 

(Master Li Junfeng)

[gatito]

Thanks gatito!