Effects of Sterching .... qi wise

[waterdrop]

From a qi point of view  -    What are the effects of streching exercises  (that are not part of yoga or qigong system)  ?      

I have noticed there are a lot of stretching movements in zhineng qigong and maybe its in other qigong paths   -   does streching (not as part of qigong)  have any effect on qi in the body ?   does it make more qi in the body ?  does it help clear blockages in the meridians ? does it widen the meridians ?

If there are benifits to it in a qi point of view what does it mean on extremely flexible "rubber man"  ?         are there areas where they are extremly good at  ( spiritualy , strong qi flow etc)

Edited April 17, 2020 by waterdrop

[Vajra Fist]

I know you probably don't want to talk about stretching as part of yoga, but modern yoga is pretty much just stretching, with coordinated breathing. In yoga a lot of teachers say that we keep our emotions bound up in joints or in chronic pockets of tension in the body. Stretching will break through that tension and trigger emotional reactions. Sometimes I've seen people cry after yoga classes and they don't know why. A lot of bound up tensions represent stored energy. When you release them, your body becomes more integrated energetically.

 

I've been practicing yoga on and off for years but during lockdown I've committed to 1-1.5hrs of yoga a day. I've noticed that the looser my body gets the greater the sensation of qi. Sometimes when I move through a vinyasa I get the 'moving through water' feeling you get at times in tai chi. 

 

I remember reading in a book by a chap called Peter Deadman that in traditional Chinese medicine, flexibility, and in particular spinal range of movement, is linked with biological age. 

 

There are people on this forumm who have trained at Wudang in China who can probably attest to the amount of flexibility training they do, which is seen as the bedrock for their study of the internal arts.

 

 

[freeform]

2 hours ago, waterdrop said:

What are the effects of streching exercises

 

Stretching is fundamental for Qigong.

 

You don't have to be super flexible, but you must be able to unwind your body for qigong to actually work.

 

Stretching for qigong is a little different than some asana practice - you must loosen and open around joints - particularly shoulders, hips and spine... The point is not to isolate individual muscles, but be more fluid and keep joints mobile during the stretch.

[waterdrop]

So would you say  that stretching exercises   as  widely known by general public  - the ones shown in those training TV videos  and the ones done at the gym have this benifits too ?

Vajra Fist do you think that regular streching as done not thorugh yoga but through "regular" common stretches  have the same benefit of releasing  emotions ?  

freeform  you think streching "regular"  common streches  - without knowing anything about how to loosen and open around the joints , at least not knowingly  -  has any benifit

and forgot to add to the question above and will edit  add now :     If there are benifits to it in a qi point of view what does it mean on extremely flexible "rubber man"  ?                

do you think they released a lot of locked emotions and by that are spiritually "advanced"  more than the average person ?    they have really  clear open meridans with a very strong flow in it ?

Edited April 17, 2020 by waterdrop

[idquest]

To have good qi, you need to stretch. As everything else, stretching can be more or less efficient. Find the system that works for you. The result of the stretching you can assess if you perform either sitting meditation on the floor or shavasana right after the session of stretching. It is for a reason that each yoga session must be concluded with shavasana.

[freeform]

Common stretching is fine... and better than nothing. But they just rarely work as thoroughly on the hips as you should.
 

I remember someone posting a page with some great stretches for opening yourself up for full lotus - the stretches there were excellent... I’ll see if I can find them again. Damo Mitchell has a video on stretching on YouTube too.

 

Extremely flexible people have no internal connection... the flexibility they have is unhealthy - and in fact they need to do other work to be able to build stronger connective tissues.

[waterdrop]

Do you think i can over strech than ?  

I really want to strech now    since i always look for ways to strengthen my "practice"   that are not about adding meditation or qigong times than  if stretching really helps release stuck emotions and really helps you have more  qi in the body and more qi flow thats awesome     

especially if i can do a few stretches  for a few minutes  (not an hour long)  and thats  it  - and maybe do it a few times a day   that can be really easy for me  - and if that alone can have "spiritual" benifits (i mean stuff like release emotions or better qi flow)  than its great

But i wonder now about maybe i will be too flexible than which as you wrote might be unhealthy ?     and also  if i practice it without a teacher  if its still good  -   cause i dont want to go to classess or a yoga teacher  for this   ( at least not at the moment - not to mention i cant leave the house at the moment as well)

[freeform]

 

I do about an hour of stretching a day (broken down into two or three sessions) - I also do other loosening and strengthening exercise daily - joint rotations, shaking then bodyweight exercises, plank variations etc.

 

This is all very helpful for qigong and even more helpful if you don’t do qigong.

 

enjoy

[waterdrop]

That is a great watch    - couldnt get all the words cause i couldnt hear all of them well but got most of them

so what is the difference between what he does and yoga does benifit wise ?     for which cases yoga is better according to him ? 

Is there a way to that way to do stretches as he explains ?   ( as in a name i can google that so i can learn more about the techinque he explained  (from other people as well)   )
 
What is the difference stretch wise  ?  as in does he strech a differnt part of the body  (the fascia?)  ? 

As long as i keep that tension  -  there is no risk of over flexibility ?         

(cause i can see a scenario when someone can become extremely flexible  while keeping that tension ) 

in yoga there is the risk of over flexibility than ?

Edited April 18, 2020 by waterdrop

[freeform]

19 hours ago, waterdrop said:

As long as i keep that tension  -  there is no risk of over flexibility ?

 

Be careful because meat first there won’t be the correct tension - it develops through standing and absorbing your mind into your body and it takes time to develop.

 

Always be sensible and pay attention to your needs. Avoid sharp pain, but expect some discomfort.
 

19 hours ago, waterdrop said:

Is there a way to that way to do stretches as he explains ?

 

Try it out

 

19 hours ago, waterdrop said:

so what is the difference between what he does and yoga does benifit wise ?     for which cases yoga is better according to him ? 

That’s a question for an experienced yogi - not me! 

[Creation]

21 hours ago, waterdrop said:

so what is the difference between what he does and yoga does benifit wise ?     for which cases yoga is better according to him ? 
 
What is the difference stretch wise  ?  as in does he strech a differnt part of the body  (the fascia?)  ? 

As long as i keep that tension  -  there is no risk of over flexibility ?         

(cause i can see a scenario when someone can become extremely flexible  while keeping that tension ) 

in yoga there is the risk of over flexibility than ?

I wouldn't call myself an "experienced yogi" but I've been considering the answers to similar questions for a bit now.

 

First consider that this is coming from a particular lineage within everything that could be called Daoism or qigong, which, as freeform is always saying, is trying to absorb the mind into the body and relax they body to an ever deeper degree.  So if some other lineage does it differently, perhaps it's because they don't have that particular goal in mind.  Particularly, many lineages of yoga do not make this their express goal.  They might be trying to awaken and channel internal energies like kundalini or bindu (sexual essences), and not care so much about the complete well being of the body or a more whole-system understanding of what the process of spiritual development entails. 

 

The other issue is that the goal of much yoga asana practice, even what is taught Indian teachers that can recite the Gita or Yogasutras from memory, is to have a Hindu/sattvic form of physical culture and is not connected at all to the kind of radical inner transformation of real hatha or raja yoga (as described in, say, Autobiography of a Yogi).  So their perspective on how to practice yoga asanas will be skewed by not having this deeper knowledge, however well meaning they might be.  It's sort of like a Chinese person coming to the West and teaching the Tai Chi 24 form and telling their students that they are doing ancient Daoist Internal Alchemy out of a desire to promote Chinese spiritual culture (and this is being generous, they might have less noble reasons for overselling what they are teaching).

 

So, which yoga teachers understand the hatha yoga asana practice as part of a complete spiritual system for total spiritual and physical transformation, rather than paying lip service to kundalini or the eight limbs of yoga but in practice just promoting mindful exercise with Sanskrit names and a sattvic lifestyle?  Iyengar, Jois, and even Sivananda and his students as far as I can tell were doing the latter.  One exception was the father of modern yoga, Sri Tirumalai Krishnamacharya.  He stopped his heartbeat under medical examination on multiple occasions, a pretty clear indication of real yogic attainment.  But when his own son begged him to teach him how to do this, he said "I will teach you anything I know except that."  All evidence suggests that he was teaching a form of exercise and healing suitable for householders, and didn't teach his deeper knowledge of internal transformation to any of his students.  Moreover, he taught differently to different students at different periods, so he taught Pattabhi Jois a certain way and put him in charge of training young boys, and taught BKS Iyenger seemingly just to be a demonstrator of challenging asanas, and this clearly colored the way they taught when they ended up spreading their teachings worldwide. 

 

That said, he did teach some of the deeper knowledge he had, as evidenced by his writings and the teachings of the students who studied with him longest, in particular Srivatsa Ramaswami.  You then get a different picture of what he was teaching than you would get from Iyengar or Jois.  You see long stays even in challenging postures.  For instance, Krishnamacharays mentions the benefit of holding mayurasana for 15 minutes in one of his books, and that to do this you must soften your abdomen.  15 minutes!  I can hardly believe it.  And if you look at the pace of movement in Ramaswami's teachings, it is very very slow compared to other teachers, and movement is always linked to breath in Krishnamacharya's method so this means very slow breathing.  So, slow movement linked to slow breathing and long holds in postures that force you to relax in order to continue to hold them, what other lineage of spiritually informed physical exercise does that remind you of?

 

I know this deviated pretty far from stretching, but all this is to say doing yoga postures with attention to the principles that Damo Michell teaches is probably closer to what Indian Hatha Yogis of real spiritual attainment do, than how contemporary asana popularizers such as Iyengar, etc. say to practice.

Edited April 19, 2020 by Creation

[Creation]

As to the more specific aspect of your question about keeping the tension while stretching, I would like to point out a distinction.  The yoga teachers I always liked best emphasized things like actively moving into postures, balancing opposite actions and moving with complete control (which requires eccentric contraction - contraction while stretching, think of the floating transitions and tick tocks of Ashtanga Vinyasa), and maybe even borrowing the wester sport science idea of PNF (which again is an eccentric contraction). As far as I can tell, this all creates a creates a certain amount of connective tissue integrity, which is good!  But it is connective tissue engagement that is dependent on muscular engagement.  The height of this found in elite gymnasts, who have incredibly strong connective tissue compared to other types of elite athletes, but it is always linked with muscular strength/tension.  This it is not the same as what Damo is taking about in that video, which is connective tissue engagement that is not dependent on muscle engagement. When you realize that you can engage your connective tissue independently of your muscles, that changes everything. 

Edited April 19, 2020 by Creation

[anshino23]

On 4/18/2020 at 6:50 PM, freeform said:

 

I do about an hour of stretching a day (broken down into two or three sessions) - I also do other loosening and strengthening exercise daily - joint rotations, shaking then bodyweight exercises, plank variations etc.

 

This is all very helpful for qigong and even more helpful if you don’t do qigong.

 

enjoy

 

And how much (how little!) do you sleep?  Seriously impressed you can get an hour of stretching in on top of all your other internal training... 

[dwai]

Stretching is vital to Qi flow, but not extreme stretching. Rather, it is stretching for the purpose of releasing tensions that impair the natural elasticity of the body. When a body is in homeostasis, Qi flows unimpeded. So stretching is good and required to "unclench" the tissues and muscles of the body that (may) have become chronically clenched due to stress. More the tissues release, the more aware we become of qi flow.

 

Spoiler

But eventually (and ideally) you should not feel sensations (hot/cold/burning/stinging etc etc). When qi flows unimpeded, it doesn't feel like anything. 

 

WRT Yoga and stretching -- real yoga is not forcing the body into awkward postures. Real yoga also isn't about asana practice (those postures). Asanas are meant as a means to an end -- bring the body into equanimity, thereby allowing the breath to become equanimous, at which point meditation can be performed. Just as qigong can vary based on what is needed (is it for medical purposes or for martial arts or for spiritual practices), similarity yoga can also vary. What is prescribed by an ayurvedic physician for treatment of diseases is not necessarily the same for all ailments. Different asanas help with different organs/nadis etc. 

 

[Vajra Fist]

On 19/04/2020 at 4:07 PM, Creation said:

So, which yoga teachers understand the hatha yoga asana practice as part of a complete spiritual system for total spiritual and physical transformation

 

This is a great post. There's no doubt that some stuff hasn't been passed down, but I still believe that modern yoga, even in its most westernized form can be a very deep practice over time.

 

I'm reading an excellent book at the moment called 'the mirror of yoga' by a chap who has been practicing modern yoga (ashtanga) for most of his life. I would say he some pretty deep spiritual insights.  

[Creation]

4 hours ago, Vajra Fist said:

 

This is a great post. There's no doubt that some stuff hasn't been passed down, but I still believe that modern yoga, even in its most westernized form can be a very deep practice over time.

 

I'm reading an excellent book at the moment called 'the mirror of yoga' by a chap who has been practicing modern yoga (ashtanga) for most of his life. I would say he some pretty deep spiritual insights.  

Richard Freeman and Simon Borg-Oliver are my two favorite yogasana teachers, by far.  The difference in the depth of their understanding of asana vs other teachers is clearly a combination of natural aptitude and cross training.  Simon is very clear about his teachers, Iyengar and a direct student of Jois, but also an he cross trained in traditional pole and rope gymnastics, Western free diving, as well as Shandor Remete's Shadow Yoga and a Shaolin qigong master.  Freeman on the other hand presents what he is teachings as nothing other than traditional Ashtanga Vinyasa, but if you are familiar with Vajrayana it is unmistakable that he has trained it and incorporates it's principles into his Ashtanga teaching.  He even co-teaches workshops with Bob Thurman.

 

Most all of what I know about Krishnamacharya and Ramaswami came from Grimmly's Ashtanga blog, which he unfortunately seems to have deleted.  Did you ever come across it when it was up?

[freeform]

17 hours ago, anshino23 said:

 

And how much (how little!) do you sleep?  Seriously impressed you can get an hour of stretching in on top of all your other internal training... 

 

 

I just do a stretching routine before each block of internal training. If I'm doing sitting practice then I stretch on the floor - slow deep stretches - particularly hips and spine. If I'm doing moving practice, it's a bit more vigorous and includes some physical work like animal crawls and planks... then depends on what I'm working on, I might focus more on opening the neck or the spine or the shoulders etc. I normally do a lot of loosening and joint opening before standing or the more forceful methods that purge pathogens...

 

It all helps to make the internal stuff a lot more efficient - plus I slowly increase my flexibility.

 

I also have to plan my days very carefully to fit everything in!

[Earl Grey]

17 minutes ago, freeform said:

I also have to plan my days very carefully to fit everything in!

 

As someone who personally considers 4 hours of training to be insufficient and averages 6-8 hours, I completely relate to this!