Qigong Basics - Regulate the Breath

The key to integrating the body and mind, to achieving a deep state of conscious relaxation, and to opening a greater flow of qi throughout the body is the regulation of breathing. 

With most qigong methods, the emphasis is on “natural breathing”. This does not mean you ignore your breathing; rather, it means that you do not inhibit, force, use special techniques or guide the breath in any way. In qigong, a natural breath mimics the way a baby breathes when sleeping. When breathing in, the body is relaxed and the belly rises as the air flows down; when breathing out, the body remains relaxed and the belly sinks in. Through the course of our lives, from the time we first learn to walk, our breathing begins to change - it becomes more shallow, pushing up and filling the chest, or can even be restricted to merely the upper chest. Everyday activities, like working on the computer, talking on the phone, concentrating on a project, working out, cleaning house - all of these, (and more), can cause us to hold our breath, have an irregular breathing rhythm, hold our neck or shoulders tight, hold our abdomen tight, and breathe shallowly, etc.  

When practicing qigong, if there is any type of tension in the body or straining effort, the breathing changes; with any mental tension or emotional reaction, the breathing changes. Habitual sighing and yawning are the body’s mechanism to regulate emotions, body and breath - it is common, and a good sign, when your body regulates itself in this way when you begin your practice. 

When practicing the Healing Sounds qigong method, the breath is so quiet, smooth and fine that you don’t hear it.  All the while, when breathing in, out and in again through the nose, and then breathing out through the mouth while imagining the respective sound, the breathing has to be natural, uninhibited and not forced or strained in any way. As this method really focuses on breathing with the movements, you need to find your own, comfortable rhythm and let that be the guide to how slow you practice the movements. Over time, as you become more familiar with the practice, you will develop in your qigong and the rhythm will become very slow as you are able to have this long, fine, completely freely flowing quiet breath. At this point the integration of body, mind and breath has reached a very high potential.

When first learning the Healing Sounds (or any qigong method), you keep the 3 Principles in mind, first regulating the body, the breath and the mind as a preparation, and then throughout your practice.  This means that when you complete one set of movements, you regulate before proceeding to the next. For example, if you feel any tension or strain while practicing, you simply pause at the completion of one part, and wait until your breathing is completely natural before continuing the practice. This helps to let go of any residual tension in the body and allows the mind to become quiet and settle, bringing you into a deeper and more potential qigong state.

The key point of the 3 Principles is that relaxation has to be everywhere -before you start your practice, and throughout the practice.  You can start with any of the regulations - of the body, the mind, or of the breath - and you will find that the other two will occur simultaneously. It is not possible to relax the body fully without also calming and quietening the mind, or allowing the breath to come and go naturally. 

With no special effort, the body, breath and mind work together in a deep state of relaxation, (also known as the “qigong state”), creating a pattern of healthy self-integration that carries you through each day. The body feels more comfortable, the mind remains clear and focused, the breathing becomes easier and more enlivening. Over time, this pattern becomes the stable norm of a healthy equilibrium that can support and protect your bodily functions, and inspire and motivate your creativity throughout life.

Qigong Basics - Regulate the Heart (Mind)

"The Way of Great Learning consists in manifesting one's bright virtue, loving the people and coming to rest in perfect goodness.

When you know to stop, you will have stability; when you have stability, you will be tranquil; when you are tranquil, you will be at peace; when you are at peace, you can reflect, when you can reflect, you will attain.

Things have roots and branches, affairs have end and beginning. When you know what comes first and what comes last, then you are near the Way." …

Tiao Shen 调神 - Regulate the Heart (Mind)

The second of the three guiding principles for entering into what is called the “qigong state” is a type of deep relaxation that unfolds from within. The body is “yin 阴” or visible, substantial form of existence; the mind and spirit, which in terms of qi are “yang 阳”, comprise the invisible activity, the inspiration of human existence. 

As you regulate the body, you are already beginning to regulate the heart qi; as tension is relaxed at the deepest physical levels, both the physical mechanism of breathing and the heart rhythm relax, allowing for a smoother flow of breath and blood to supply the body’s needs.  When more relaxed in the practice of qigong, both the pulse and blood pressure are better regulated according to your needs - if the pulse is regularly too fast, it slows down; if the blood pressure is regularly too high or too low, it adjusts to a healthier value. This is the noticeable effect of regulating the yang qi of the heart - circulation, pulse rate and blood pressure all begin to adjust in a more relaxed physical state.

Regulating the mind, the thinking and feeling aspect of the heart qi, means you enter into a deeply quiet state, a vast calm, stable inner silence that is unaffected by any type of sensory intrusions from outside (sights, sounds, smells, weather or room temperatures). The internal activity of mental pictures, feelings or emotional reactions, and the constant, chaotic stream of thinking begins to slow down as a clear lightness of mind and heart arises. 

More than anything, a calm mind creates a vast sense of space, and an experience of timelessness. Sitting in a cramped seat on a full train can feel like sitting comfortably alone in a quiet pasture; a journey of hours can feel like minutes. The sounds of machines and people can recede into the far distance, or come and go without making an impression or pulling you out of this rarefied state. This is the essence of what is called the “qigong state”, and even the briefest moment of entering into it is cultivating an ability to nourish life.

The Confucian “Great Learning“ describes how one can, step by step, develop one’s true nature as a human being in alignment with Heaven and Earth: Three of these steps are called Ding 定, Jing 静, An 安, which literally translate as “Stable, Quiet, Peace”. First there is “Ding”, becoming and remaining stable, or still; after stability comes “Jing”, becoming quiet, or a deeper type of stillness;  and finally comes “An”, peace, a rarefied state of true reality.  

“An”, or peace may not be possible to achieve in the course of “normal” daily life, especially in these uncertain times. But you can easily develop enough stability and stillness to be lead into the qigong state, a realm of deep inner calm and quietness, the source of profound health, regeneration and rest

Qigong Basics - Regulate the Body

Qigong Basics: Preparation for practice

These notes are geared toward practicing the Liu Zi Jue Healing Sounds, as this is the main method we have focused on for the purposes of protecting our health in the time of Covid-19. However, the following information is not just for one qigong method, or for beginners to these methods; it applies to preparation for the practice of all types of methods of qigong, whether still or moving, and for all levels of practitioners. In qigong, it is always the case that the most simple methods and most basic instructions are the most profound and must be returned to, consistently, no matter how advanced a person’s skill or experience, or how many methods or forms a person has learned.

There are three guiding principles as a preparation for entering what is called the “qigong state”. Furthermore, these principles are adhered to throughout all qigong methods, to bring yourself into a deeper state while practicing. The deeper the qigong state, the stronger and more freely the qi flows, and the more open you become as an organism to the subtleties and sensations of this flow.

The first of the three principles is:

1. Regulate the Body.

Before beginning your practice - whether it is a moving, standing, sitting or lying down method - it is essential to be deeply, physically relaxed. When we speak of relaxation in Qigong, we mean not only the body, but primarily the Qi itself. Relaxation means opening the Qi, allowing it to achieve a better flow in the body, to better penetrate and reach all areas of the body. Of course, this relaxation has to start at a relatively superficial level of the body - the level of the tendons, muscles and interconnective tissue. This is the starting point and, consequently, you learn to relax at even deeper levels. This requires more practice.

Moving from this superficial level inward, the large joints begin to relax - the shoulders, hips, knees. With more relaxation, the smaller joints loose tension and relax - the jaw, top of the spine where it meets the base of the head, the elbows, wrist joints, the upper spine and rib cage, the base of the spine where it meets the top of the sacrum (which sits between the back of your hip bones), the ankle joint.

When scanning through the body as a technique of relaxing from the outermost to the innermost, level of the body, and through the largest to the smallest joints of our skeletal framework, it is best to start at the top, and work down to the bottom - from the head through the neck and shoulders, the arms through the hands and fingers, the chest and upper back, the abdomen and lower back, the hips, buttocks and pelvis, the legs through the feet and toes.

As you are able to relax the smallest joints, areas of the face and scalp noticeably loosen and relax. Relaxing the tiny joints of the fingers and toes, the tailbone, and all the vertebrae of the spine will allow a more full and open flow of the qi and blood from the tips of the fingers and toes to the face, head, the brain and throughout the whole body.

Our vital organs are all located near the spine, so it is especially important to develop your technique of relaxation so that all the vertebrae and, at a deeper level, the spinal cord hold no tension (here it becomes obvious that we talk about Qi and its flow through the spinal cord). Even with underlying conditions, such as arthritis, back or joint injury, it is possible to reach this deep physical level of relaxation that opens the flow of qi and blood, and strengthens the entire structure of the body.

With any outer tension in the body, or inner tension of the emotions or thoughts, the rest of the body reacts - if you make a tight fist, it creates tension in the body; if you are tight in the shoulders or jaw, it creates tension; if you try too hard to have perfect movements, or bend lower than your muscles are used to, or in any way push yourself to go beyond your current physical limits, you create tension. Any tension in the body is reflected as tension in the mind, and vice versa. If you hit your thumb with a hammer, your body tenses and your emotions react as well. If you think you can’t stand the cold, your shoulders hunch and the body becomes tight and literally freezes. 

The body is a solid, visible form; it is the structure of our existence that transforms through the life stages of growth and decline slowly. The mind and emotions are formless, invisible and without substance; thoughts and emotions move quickly, coming and going, connecting our outer and inner existence, transforming and creating our perceptual reality. The mind and the body work together to integrate the deepest levels of human existence with the most outermost boundaries of physical form. 

That part of our existence which is both visible and invisible, which has a physical and a non-physical quality, is the breath. It is air, it is moist; it energizes and moves qi and blood throughout the body; it arises when we are born, and ceases when we die.

So, when learning to relax at the deepest levels needed for the practice of qigong, it is important to allow the breath to release tension in the body (and the mind). By simply breathing naturally, easily, and with a smooth and continuous flow between in and out breath as you take time to relax through all the large and small, innermost and outermost parts of the body, you will develop your skill in any method of qigong. 

Regulating the body is useful as a first step in the practice of all qigong methods. But it is also a useful method in itself for our normal, daily activities - to remain relaxed in the body is to always ensure we remain comfortable, no matter what situation we find ourselves in, and do not waste our physical energy on holding tension within our bodies. To be comfortable in the body means we have a greater ability to remain comfortable in our minds, which is certainly a benefit to our health and our ability to enjoy life!