QIGONG

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7 SECRETS OF

Perhaps upwards of 90% of what is taught as Qigong today, is actually more correctly what wed call Qigong form. Qigong form will offer you the benets of gentle exercise, but is not powerful enough to offer you the benets of Qigong. In this report discover the 7 secrets that make the difference between Qigong form and Qigong.

NOW...

Discover 7 secrets that make the difference between qigong and qigong form.

SUNNY DEVON

8:30 P.M.

Introduc)on Seven secrets of high level Qigong

(Transcript taken from the DVD by the same name)

Marcus: Hi thanks for joining us, Im going to share seven secrets that make the dierence between high level Qigong and low level Qigong. Im joined today by my very good friend and special guest Jordan Francis, who is also a teacher of Qigong, weve got a lot of material to cover and before we go any further I just want to kind of dangle a liGle hook in front of you - at the end of the recording Im going to share with you a simple, liGle technique but a very powerful technique called The Point Massage. You know the one I mean Jordan? Jordan: Oh yeah sure. Marcus: Some people refer to it as like a face liP without the knives. Well what Ill do is at the end of the recording Ill share that with you. So make sure you stay with us unRl the end and like I said enjoy the video and well get started now Secret 1: What is Qigong? Jordan: Okay then, lets start with secret number 1 the history of Qigong perhaps you could tell us the history of Qigong. Marcus: Its a liGle tricky because Qigong has a record going back 5000 plus years. I remember Sifu telling me that in a museum, I forget which one, there is this piece of jade thats got 11 Chinese characters on it that are an explanaRon of a high level Qigong technique known as the small universe and that jade has been proven to be 5000 years old, but I think qigong is considerably older than that. Imagine if you drew a dot on a piece of paper and then start drawing two lines from that dot, if you have just 1 degree dierence in the angle between the lines over a 5000 year period youll nd that theres a big gap between those two lines. Now add into the mix dierent religious beliefs dierent social economic, and all the dierent kind of things that happen in history and society. Its very easy to see that suddenly youve got a lot of dierent styles of Qigong a lot of dierent schools of Qigong. Youve got Taoist Qigong , youve got Buddhist Qigong, youve got all kind of dierent religions that have got Qigong related to them, you have marRal arts Qigong. There are so many dierent types. And what I would like to go over with you a liGle bit is the kind of Qigong we teach. And thats Shaolin Qigong so the legend is that about 1500 years ago, the Very Venerable Bodhidharma who is considered to be the rst patriarch of Chinese Chan or Zen and the 28th patriarch of Indian Buddhism visited the Shaolin monastery. Whilst he was there he found the monks in very poor health because they would spend hours and hours at a Rme leaning over copying scriptures from one book to another, and obviously their posture was very messed up and everything wasnt parRcularly very good and at that Rme, there was

a philosophy that the body was just a hindrance like a dirty bag of bones that got in the way of spiritual culRvaRon. Now Bodhidharma had a very dierent take on this, he felt that spiritual culRvaRon is probably the hardest undertaking that a human is going to do, and to be able to do that much beGer your body needs to be in great shape, so Bodhidharma nding the monks of the Shaolin monastery in poor health taught them a series of 3 dierent exercises but the one that well focus on is the Shaolin 18 Lohan Hands. Using these Qigong exercises they were able to improve their health and their vitality which obviously helped to improve their mental ability and also their spiritual culRvaRon. And it might be interesRng for you to know that the Shaolin 18 Lohan Hands was the forerunner of Lohan kung fu. And obviously it seems interesRng if you know anything about Qigong to think that gentle external movements could actually go on to become a formidable marRal art. Jordan: Now as we all know from the Hong Kong movies and yes, it is quite a jump from health to combat Marcus: Thats right from gentle owing movements to full on craziness. Jordan: So can we break down the dierent types of Qigong to make it a liGle more understandable then. Marcus: Sure, but keep in mind that Im going to be making broad generalizaRons here because otherwise this whole DVD and another 6 of them would just be covering this parRcular aspect alone and obviously Rmes pressing. But you have dierent levels if you like because with Qigong you are working with health and vitality, longevity, internal force, mental clarity and spiritual culRvaRon. So the the lowest level Qigong if you like although its sRll very high if done properly is self manifested Qi ow and preGy much what youre doing is youre using the actual external movements of Qigong to generate a ow of energy and Ill discuss in more detail later why thats so important. But, preGy much its Qigong you would use if you had a clear medical problem, for example if you suer from asthma or diabetes, or if theres a very clear health issue thats the kind of Qigong you would want to look at. If you nd that youre in relaRvely good health, youre not aware of any parRcular health issues happening for you. Then you would be more interested in doing dynamic Qigong. And dynamic Qigong is probably, if you know anything about Qigong, is what you might think of as being the stereotype of Qigong, its a series of movements going on. Again, this parRcular type of Qigong is about generaRng a ow of energy and using that energy to remove blockages again Ill go over this in more detail later, but whereas the self manifested medical Qigong combines two, three, or more dierent qigong exercises, with the dynamic you usually just focus on one parRcular exercise. At a higher level you have a type of Qigong known as Zhan Zhuang which is where you use one paGern and you hold it staRcally, for example: golden bridge and you just hold the stance and then you just breathe and relax and relax and relax. Now, Zhan Zhuang is predominately used by marRal arRsts to develop internal force and internal force is preGy much what

keeps you going all day. But you have to be very careful Zhan Zhuang is something that you have to treat with great respect. Especially if youre crazy enough to learn it from a book or a video and not learn it directly from a master of the art. Why must you be careful? Because there is only one paGern, if you get the one paGern wrong you get the whole pracRce wrong. And because its very powerful, you can do yourself a lot more harm than good. So in my opinion Zhan Zhuang is a much higher level Qigong best learned from an instructor. Jordan: Sure Marcus: Then youve got the highest level of Qigong which would be techniques like the small universe. Or what some people might know as the microcosmic orbit. The connecRng of the Ren and the Du meridians, and well go into more detail about meridians in a minute. And then you have the big universe and so on, I dont really want to talk to you too much about these types of Qigong, because I would never ever want to learn these from a book. Small universe and big universe are such high level arts that youve got to learn them from a master, its as simple as that in my opinion.

Jordan: Yeah, absolutely Marcus: These levels dont really exist, they are more like of an aid for people learning about Qigong. Generally you have:
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Medical Qigong - which is relaRvely low level and is used for overcoming illness. Dynamic Qigong - qigong exercises for those who are healthy and want to stay that way and increase their energy. Qigong for the Scholar - that helps students and those interested in creaRvity to expand and uRlize the power of their mind. Qigong for the warrior - a warrior has got to be able to make split decisions, making the right decision or the wrong decision in baGle could be the dierence between life and death. And fortunately we dont nd ourselves living in such Rmes anymore. But obviously if youre in business you need to be able to make a decision based on the facts that youve got and you need to be able to make that decision quick. Qigong for spiritual cul:va:on the highest level of qigong. And you know as Ive said before, spiritual culRvaRon is one of the hardest endeavors that a human can undertake.

Now if youre lucky, there are certain types of Qigong you can pracRce that can cover two or more of these dierent types of qigong Ive menRoned. For example lets say if you took a qigong exercise called li<ing the sky a form of dynamic Qigong. This can be used to overcome illness. It can help the increase energy, it can help the scholar to develop mental clarity, and If you want to work on spiritual culRvaRon, then you can also use it to culRvate the spirit. The key here, and the important aspect to remember is that it depends on the level of the pracRRoner as to what results you can expect to gain. For example, if you have a very high level art but a low level pracRRoner, the results are going to be quite low. But if you have a high level pracRRoner, they can take something that seems low level and get a lot of very high level benets from it. Jordan: Its quite a stretch, especially for westerners, were very much xed on what we see, the visual and the movements. So a person could be doing what looks to be a very simple qigong exercise like liPing the sky, but they can be working on any dierent level according to their skill that theyre applying to it, its fascinaRng. Marcus: And liPing the sky is one of the rst qigong exercises we cover in the Qigong Secrets Home Study Course, I think its covered in weeks 3 and 4, so you can get to nd out more about that. Jordan: Its a fantasRc exercise. Marcus, what does Qigong do, I mean whats in it? Marcus: In a nutshell, there are two main aims to Qigong, one is to remove the blockages to harmonious energy ow, and this will become clearer later on I promise and the second, once the blockages have been removed the aim of pracRcing Qigong is to increase the energy ow. Jordan: Now we have got an idea of Qigong and its scope its quite a wide scope Marcus: Its a big umbrella term Jordan: So how can we t this into TradiRonal Chinese Medicine? Marcus: Brilliant Jordan: Perhaps that would help Marcus: TradiRonal Chinese Medicine theory is fundamental to the success if you like of Qigong, Qigong is based on the principals of tradiRonal Chinese medicine and without those foundaRons than Qigong would not be as powerful as it is, which leads us nicely into secret number 2. Secret 2: How Qigong works Jordan: Were going to look at TradiRonal Chinese Medicine and discover what why its so important to Qigong. But rst, perhaps you could give us an overview of TradiRonal Chinese Medicine. Marcus: The rst thing to say is that people who study TradiRonal Chinese Medicine study it for years and years. So, please take everything thats said here as being a complete simplied, gross overview, Im just giving you a Rny snapshot. There are ve main branches of TradiRonal Chinese Medicine you can consider.
1. Acupuncture Im sure every body has heard of acupuncture.

2. Tuina Is not so well known, but thats changing. It is a therapeuRc massage, it really gets in

there. It can feel very uncomfortable at the Rme, but can give long term relief from muscular skeletal injuries.
3. Herbs mixtures of herbs known to have certain qualiRes are prescribed to overcome illness. 4. Diet TCM has a very exhausRve approach to diet. It has nothing to do with the kind of fad

diets that we may think of in the West. This branch of TCM looks specically at how diet can overcome illness and disease.
5. Qigong the art of deliberately working on your bodies vital energy to improve health and

enhance life. All ve branches of TCM are seeking to achieve the same aim and that is to promote harmonious energy ow. And were gemng very close I promise to that point where I will explain more on what that is. Jordan: I think that leads into the key quesRon now, what is Qi? Can you give us an explanaRon of Qi that we can understand? Marcus: There is a book in my bookcase at home. Its Rtle is Qi and it is 100s of pages long. So its going to be very dicult to explain what Qi is here in such a short space. But in a nutshell the way were looking at Qi you can think of it as youre bodies vital energy, vital energy is the juice that keeps you and me alive that keeps all the systems in the body funcRoning. Vital energy or Qi is whats allowing me to look in the camera now and then think: okay now Im going to look at Jordan and talk more about vital energy. It keeps everything moving and in fact you can think of it as the basic building block of life. If we take this table for example and then go down to a deeper level and look at it through a microscope you might see the threads on the table cloth, if you went deeper and deeper youd see atoms and electrons if you went deeper and deeper as far as you could possibly go, at the very basic component is Qi, is energy. So for example if I put my hands like this then it may look like there is just empty space between my hands but preGy much there is Qi between my hands. Were actually swimming through Qi, were surrounded with Qi and were swimming through Qi.

Jordan: I like that Marcus: Qi is the vital essence of life. Jordan: Very good, so what does Qi do in the body? Where does it ow? How does it work? Marcus: Excellent, so, again this really is the in a nutshell version, I go into this in much more detail in the home study course. So remember this is an overview, but it will help our understanding. There are two core principals of TradiRonal Chinese Medicine:
1. Yin/Yang Theory - its very important, Im sure everybodys heard

of yin yang you know the round symbol with the two sh chasing each other. Yin/Yang theory is a concept you cant go into a shop

and buy a bag of yin you cant get some yang and nothing is absolutely yin or yang. Its a theory of relaRvity not like Einsteins e equals m c squared. Imagine that I had a dog, suppose my dog is sat here and over there we have an ant. I could say that the dog was yang in this relaRonship because its big and the ant was yin because compared to the dog its small Now, suppose we take a dierent relaRonship, we bring an elephant into the room. In this new relaRonship the dog now becomes yin, because the elephant is yang (big). Bear in mind that this theory of relaRvity doesnt just apply to maGers of size. Nothing is absolutely yin and nothing is absolutely yang. When we apply Yin/Yang theory to health we take the aspect of yin to be our bodies natural ability to be healthy, its natural for you to have good health, okay thats an important fact. And then we take the yang aspects to be anything that causes illness whether its bacteria in food, or adverse weather condiRons, or stress and worry, thats all labeled as yang. And as long as we have yin yang harmony, then well have good health.

2. Meridians - think of the meridians as the energy streams within your body. There are twelve

primary meridians, primary because they pass through internal organs. And there are eight secondary meridians. When your vital energy or Qi is owing harmoniously through these energy streams in the body you have what we call good health. If the ow of qi is blocked than you can have sickness, illness, disease. The severity of the blockage will relate to the severity of the illness. If a blockage stops the ow of qi completely, death quickly follows. We need to be aware of these two core principals of TCM because without them qigong cant possibly work.

Jordan: Okay with that in mind very briey of course, what actually is happening when someone pracRces Qigong? Marcus: When youre pracRcing Qigong what youre doing is youre seeking to inuence the ow of energy so youre trying to generate more energy more is not parRcularly a good term for it, youre trying to get rid of the blockages to harmonious energy ow. Qi if you like has an intelligence all of Its own, so for example lets say this table was on a slant and I took the water from the vase and I poured it out, the water would just fall o the table. The water doesnt think about owing o the table, it just does. Water ows to the lowest point naturally. Qi always ows to the areas of low energy and the areas of low energy in your body are where the blockages are. So you dont need to know where the blockages are you use your pracRce of qigong to generate an energy/qi ow, you then let go and you let your qi do the work. Secret 3: There is only one illness Jordan: Secret number three there is only one illness in tradiRonal Chinese medicine, can you tell us more about that. Marcus: Sure, if you remember back to secret number two I spoke about yin yang theory. And how if you have a harmony between yin, your bodys natural ability to take care of its self and to be healthy and full of vitality and yang which we said was everything that causes ill health and disease, if you have that yin yang harmony then you will have good health. Give me some illnesses Jordan: Stress Marcus: And another Jordan: Heart disease Marcus: And another Jordan: Liver disease Marcus: Stress, Heart disease, headaches, diabetes, asthma and so on. Regardless of the name you give to the symptoms of the illness, from a TradiRonal Chinese Medicine viewpoint the only illness that there is, is this yin-yang disharmony. For example lets say Ive got sickness and diarrhea. What might have happened? Well I might have eaten an egg mayonnaise sandwich at lunch which was 2 weeks past its sell by date and riddled with salmonella. Even though my yin (my bodies natural ability to look aPer itself) is quite high and strong, there is suddenly a massive increase in the amount of yang causing agents in my body and as a result I get sick. Regardless of the symptoms from a TradiRonal Chinese Medicine viewpoint there is only one illness and that illness is yin-yang disharmony and if we can restore this harmony you have good health again.

Jordan: Okay so when this harmony, we get the harmony back, whats actually occurred in the body to get that harmony back. How does Qigong achieve that?

Marcus: The causes of yin-yang disharmony are blockages to harmonious energy ow through the meridians, the energy streams, of the body. Qigong seeks to remove these blockages, and to aid understanding we can categorize blockages into 4 types: Physical these are usually caused by poor posture or physical injury to the body, like a cut or a blow of some kind. Emo:onal constantly being in a negaRve emoRonal state i.e. worried, stressful, fearful, anxious etc will eect health. Mental the main cause of mental blockages is obsessive thinking, or thinking too much. Spiritual depression is perhaps the most common example of a spiritual blockage. Now obviously when something happens to us it doesnt just cause a physical blockage or a mental blockage, because were holisRc beings something can happen to us and it usually has an eect on all four aspects so its important to keep that in mind. When were pracRcing Qigong were seeking rst of all to get rid of the physical, emoRonal, mental and spiritual blockages so that we have harmonious energy ow, which means we have yin-yang harmony. Once we have achieved this we then seek to increase the ow of energy so that we have vitality and longevity. Perhaps the most useful take away from this secret is that from the TradiRonal Chinese Medicine viewpoint there is no such thing as an incurable illness. But theres a caveat to that. It doesnt mean that TradiRonal Chinese Medicine can cure every illness. If the illness has been leP unchecked for too long then it may not be possible to fully restore yin-yang harmony. Jordan: So perhaps then to nish up this part we can have an example of how Qigong overcomes stress, anxiety, depression. Marcus: Sure, remember the meridians I spoke of, the energy streams of the body? One of those meridians is called the heart meridian. And its important to realize that when we talk about the heart from a TradiRonal Chinese Medicine viewpoint were not talking just about the four chambered muscle in your chest that pumps deoxygenated and oxygenated blood around the body. From a TradiRonal Chinese Medicine viewpoint the organs tend to be more symbolic and they also have funcRons. So the heart does a lot of things and it is known as the Emperor because it is the supreme ruler. The heart houses your Shen, or Spirit and from the TCM viewpoint if someones depressed then there is some kind of blockage to do with the heart meridian. So you would pracRce qigong exercises that have been documented to bring relief and to clear blockages from the heart meridian. One of those may be Emperor Walks Heart Opens or it may be Green Dragon SeparaRng Water. And perhaps one of the best paGerns, I mean Ive certainly used it to help people overcome their depression, is buGery dancing in front of owers and its the rst qigong exercise we cover in the home study course. Its the rst exercise we cover because its simple and its powerful.

Jordan: Wonderful, so the folks are probably wondering how is this a viable alternaRve or is it a viable alternaRve to western medicine? Marcus: Good point. You see the thing to bear in mind is that TCM has kept one of the largest populaRons on the planet healthy and well and that populaRon also has had one of the longest conRnuous records of documented history on the planet. We havent got Rme to cover it here, but in the home study course I share many areas where TCM has been someRmes hundreds of years in front of western medicinal breakthroughs in technology. But there is one thing I really want to make clear, absolutely clear. I want to go on record and make this point: Im not saying TCM is beGer than western medicine. Asking which is best is not a good quesRon. A much beGer quesRon is which is more appropriate for the situaRon? Imagine I have a bad car accident then I want a paramedic there as quickly as possible and I want to be taken to Accident & Emergency and I want all the benets that we have of the wonderful western medical tradiRon. But if I was suering from say depression or stress or something that you couldnt clearly point at and say Ah, yes Mr Santer, I see your head is falling o we need to take care of that. Then I would denitely want more of a Qigong approach to actually overcome that. I hope I have made it perfectly clear I am not saying that TCM is beGer than western medicine it is a case of what is the most appropriate for the actual situaRon presented. I think were straight on that

Jordan: Very good thank you. So thats secret 3 Marcus: And now well get onto secret 4 Secret 4: How to take back the power for your health happiness and well being. Jordan: Secret number 4: why 15 minutes just a quarter of an hour a day can really help us overcome our illness and maintain life. Marcus: One key point to make about that though is that you have to be pracRcing high level Qigong. And the next secret and the secret aPer that will give you a very good understanding of the key dierences the dierences between high level and low level Qigong. The key thing to remember is that if youre pracRcing high level Qigong, then you shouldnt have to spend an hour every day doing it.

So the rst key clue if youre going to check out a qigong school because you want to nd out if its teaching high level Qigong if they say you need to pracRce what they teach you for an hour at a Rme, then youre probably going to have to conRnue your search. Anything that is high level should give you great results in a shorter Rme, thats how you disRnguish what is high level in my book. Remember that Shaolin Qigong has its origins at the Shaolin Temple. The Shaolin Temple, was an imperial temple which meant that not any old Tom, Dick or Harry could go along to, despite what it says in the lm. I love those Kung Fu movies where the heros say: Lets go to Shaolin and learn kung fu, we can overcome our oppressors and get our revenge! No. Shaolin was an imperial temple its where reRred generals and high ranking government ministers and ocials went to culRvate when they nished giving everything to their families and to society. Remember, harmonious energy ow through the meridians of the body equals health. When you have vigorous ow, like a rushing stream through the meridians of the body then you have vitality. And when you have an abundance of fast owing Qi with no blockages then you have longevity, but youve got to be pracRcing high level Qigong.

Jordan: Qigong is such a big subject, I think we could be here a long Rme, but could you tell us what the 5 main reasons are for pracRcing qigong? Marcus: Well if I was more professional I would have memorized them. But as I said it took me two days to make a ve minute lm. Jordan: Stop boasRng. Marcus: The ve main benets the reasons why you would want to pracRce Qigong.
1. Health & Vitality The base building block. Theres no point learning how to become one with

the Cosmos if youre riddled with some sickness or illness. You want to take care of that rst and health and vitality benets are perhaps the main reasons why many people pracRce qigong.
2. Longevity once the energy streams, meridians, of the body are blockage free and we have

good health, we then want to increase that ow of energy unRl we have an abundance of it, that is what gives a person longevity and is the second main benet of pracRcing qigong.
3. Internal Force - many years ago as a marRal arRst, I used to think that internal force was all

about being able to hit people so that they couldnt get back up again. Because it wasnt just the physical damage you caused you transferred your energy and their heart exploded just with a touch. Im older, wiser and more mature now, internal force supposedly can do those things, but there are more useful benets to be had from internal force.

Think of internal force as energy plus. It gives you the energy to work, rest and play and make you beGer at everything you do.
4. Mental Cul?va?on many scholars, arRsts and students pracRce qigong to benet from

developing the mind. Lets take the sun as an example. If the sun shines on a piece of paper, the paper gets warm. But if we take a magnifying glass and focus the suns rays, the heat is now hot enough to set the paper alight. Think of qigong as the magnifying glass that allows you to focus the power of your mind. But without semng your books on re.
5. Spiritual Cul?va?on - like Ive said its the hardest endeavor a human can undertake and many

people just arent ready for it, so if you arent interested in spiritual culRvaRon dont worry about it. But if you are Qigong is a powerful tool. Jordan: Thats good, you dont have to sign up for everything when you do Qigong. Its a very personal thing. So why would someone pracRce Qigong instead of doing some other alternaRve art, whatre the core benets? Marcus: One of the main things that Ive always loved about pracRcing Qigong is that wherever you go you can pracRce it, its not like you need to get access to a staRonary bike or you need to be able access a bench press machine. If Ive got to go away on business I never have to worry about staying at a hotel with a gym. So wherever you go, because there is no equipment, you are the equipment, you are the gym, you can do your Qigong. Obviously there are some places where you dont want to pracRce qigong and Ill cover that in more detail in the course. But preGy much wherever you are you can do Qigong. There are no expensive gym memberships as well. I mean there is a frightening staRsRc that most people that take a gym membership wont go for longer than 3 months but will pay their gym membership for considerably more months aPer that. The gyms know that which is why they make you sign up for at least 3 to 6 months beforehand. Another great benet of pracRcing Qigong is that there is no expensive equipment to buy. You dont need to go out and buy a $100 pair of trainers. God Im thinking in dollars.

Jordan: I do that too Marcus: Theres no need to go out and buy expensive clothing or go out and get your own bicycle, or a fancy mat. Theres no need to buy anything all, you need is some comfortable clothes some at soled shoes and youre good to go. And the third thing I like about it is theres no expensive supplements to take, lets be honest most vitamins or minerals that people take just end up as being expensive urine, if youll pardon the gratuity of that. So, Qigong a complete art, you can take it anywhere, you dont need any extra material and you dont need to take anything extra when you do it, it really is a high level art.

Jordan: Talk about convenience, its amazing. Secret 5: The three core skills of high level Qigong Jordan: Secret 5 I like this one parRcularly, I teach Qigong to my students. Ive read your book, this books been helpful to me, it gives a great map on how I can approach teaching Qigong more systemaRcally.

And when I talk about high level Qigong I talk about the three core skills of high level Qigong. Please tell us a bit more. Marcus: The three core skills this is very much the most important stu on this video if you like. Qigong is a marriage of form, energy and mind, if one of those aspects is missing parRcularly the energy and the mind aspects, then I would quesRon whether you are pracRcing Qigong at all. One of the most important aspects of Qigong is the mind aspect. The rst of the three core skills is entering the Qigong state of mind. It is a heightened state of awareness or an immense sensaRon of relaxaRon if you like. It is important that when you do Qigong you are in this Qigong state of mind. The second core skill is Qi ow, or more poeRcally known as owing breeze swaying willows and if you remember we talked about how we generate energy ow, we let go and energy ows through the meridians of the body and gets rid of the blockages. Well its during owing breeze swaying willows where a lot of those blockages can be got rid of and where the Qi is busily working on removing blockages, whether physical, emoRonal, mental, or spiritual, doesnt maGer. Flowing breeze swaying willows can literally be just that - somebody gently owing, to something which is quite extreme I mean, Jordan, Im sure youve had the pleasure of seeing 70 or 80 students in the class in Qi ow.

Jordan: I certainly have, yes, its quite a scene. There are a lot of people going through some cleansing, but its just the energy clearing through the blockages. Marcus: Its a good point, because there may be one person crying, somebody next to them may be rolling on the oor, but theyre not doing anything, theyre just lemng go and lemng the work be done for them. Its Wu Wei, do nothing, and let everything be done for you, theyre not consciously thinking, Oh, Im going to laugh now, or Im going to roll on the oor now. But if you have Qigong without owing breeze swaying willows, then I really would quesRon the benets youre actually going to get from it. So, its very important if youre doing qigong to have owing breeze swaying willows, but from the experience Ive had of other qigong schools its very rare, I havent come across it. Jordan: Seldom talked about. Marcus: Yeah, it really is, and the third core skill is standing meditaRon. If you think of the owing breeze swaying willows as being movement, yang, then standing meditaRon you can think of as the yin, the sRllness, and its preGy much just like if youve got a thousand pounds on the table and you want to keep it safe, so youre going to put it away. And the standing meditaRon, is like the consolidaRon of your pracRce, bringing everything together, and like I said at the start of this, you know, qigong is a marriage of form, energy, and mind, and if you bring the three components together, then youll have high level qigong. So, when youre out there looking for a school to learn qigong from, try to make sure that what it teaches is a marriage of form, energy and mind. All schools have qigong forms. The form is very

obvious, and youll have some schools where all they do is form, and they tell you to go away and pracRce this form a hundred Rmes a day, or for an hour, or however long. Its the energy and the mind aspects that you need to look for, the entering a qigong state of mind, owing breeze swaying willows and standing meditaRon, so make sure you look out for those three. Jordan: So really, were gemng down to the dierence here between the techniques and the skills, because, everybodys going to have qigong form, going to do some sort of movement, those are techniques. But its the energy and the mind aspects, those two parts that are important skills. Marcus: Yeah, thats right, its a good point because the forms the external part, so you can see the form, but qigong form is not qigong, you know, youre not going to get great benets. Now, if you have these three core skills, then you can take a technique and get the benets from that qigong form. For example, lets say I took the qigong exercise Looking back to carrying the moon, or carrying the moon as its someRmes known. I could look at the technique in a book, but because I have the skills, I could very quickly get the benets from that technique. Theres a big dierence between skills and techniques, it took me years to learn this, and when I did my pracRce went through the roof, because theres a saying in marRal arts circles that you dont fear the marRal arRst who knows a hundred kicks but has only had the Rme to pracRce each one a hundred Rmes, you fear the marRal arRst who knows one kick, but has pracRced it ten thousand Rmes.

Jordan: Thats so true. Marcus: You must be careful because theres this noRon that, repeRRon is the mother of skill, thats not quite true. Its correct repeRRon thats the mother of skill, okay, because if you do something wrongly ten thousand Rmes, youre going to be very skillful at doing it wrongly. Jordan: Yeah. No one will be able to match it (laughing) youll be ahead of the curve, but Marcus: The second point Id like to make on this is that skills are virtually impossible to learn from a book, or from a video, theyre best learned from, from a master or a teacher. And an example I like to give of this concept is this. Years ago I was very much into skateboarding, and I wanted to learn how to do a trick called an Ollie, its a bit like a bunny hop on a BMX, it looks really cool. Jordan: I didnt know this! Marcus: And I used to, at that point, I used to believe, I was a bit of a late starter, but you know, probably too old to be on a skateboard, but Jordan: That was last week, folks!

Marcus: Thats right. But I used to be a big believer in you could learn anything from a book, so I went down to the library, I got a book on skateboarding and read how to do an Ollie. It sounds really simple. I re-read a few Rmes and then Im o to pracRce. Jordan: (laughing) Marcus: I fell o many, many, many Rmes, and eventually all I did was I just went to see somebody, you know, one of the kids that was doing one, and I said, Hey, can you teach me how to do that? and we spent an aPernoon doing it, and I could do it. Skateboarding is a high level art, but qigongs an even higher level art, so Jordan: So youre not bringing out a skateboarding course? Marcus: No, no, no, the skateboarding course is going to have to wait. But, basically the point Im trying to make is that the skills of qigong, in fact any skills are best learned from a master, or at least a, a competent instructor. Jordan: At least someone at least a level or two above you. Marcus: Yeah, in fact, its a bit o topic here, but I would just like to menRon as it seems appropriate, the three requirements for success in any endeavor, I know thats a bit of a bold claim Jordan: It is, quite. Just three? Marcus: Just three, only three, Ill see if I can pull it o. So, the rst requirement is the master, okay? You need to make sure youre learning from someone who is a master of whatever technique you want to learn. So lets say youve been not doing great ollies on a skateboard. I need to nd a master, or somebody who is a master of doing ollies on a skateboard. The second requirement is the method, you know, they have to be using a method thats tried and tested for making you good at being able to do ollies on a skateboard. It cant be haphazard, it has to be systemized, structured, so that if you follow the method, youll consistently get the result. Which in this example is you can do great ollies. The third and the most important requirement for success in any endeavor is the student. You see, you can have the greatest master teaching the ulRmate method in the universe, but if you dont do the work, if they say, right, you need to do ten minutes of this every day, if you dont do that, and you dont get the results, its not the masters fault, its not the methods fault, its your fault. And thats perhaps why they say that great masters are rare, and its true, and great methods are rare, but perhaps even rarer is great students. Sorry to go o on a side there.

Jordan: Marcus, why is qigong form so prevalent today? Marcus: Great quesRon. If you remember, Qigong, high level qigong is a marriage of form, energy, and mind. Now, the form aspect is the visual aspect, you can see it, if someones doing this you can copy that, if someones doing this you can copy that, but its the energy and the mind aspects, you cant see those parRcular aspects, so therefore its very hard to copy them unless youve been taught them directly. Now, one of the downsides of high level qigong is that is has been a jealously guarded, closely kept secret of an elite few for a very long period of Rme.

Whether its high ranking marRal arRsts, scholars, warrior monks, its oPen been the case that many students will leave their learning from a master before theyre actually been given the key to the door, if you like, the invisible aspects of the art, so a lot of teachers have gone on and taught just the form aspect. They mayve got benets themselves, and theyve then gone on to teach qigong form, it has benets, and those benets are on par with what youd get from gentle physical exercise. But its not powerful enough to give the kind of health, vitality, mental clarity, spiritual culRvaRon benets that we want. Another reason qigong form is so common today is that, well, its hard for me to believe this, but a lot of people will start teaching aPer watching a video, or pracRcing from a book for a period of Rme. They will then take it upon themselves and start thinking that somehow theyre ready to start teaching. And its interesRng, weve never lived in a more interesRng Rme if you ask me, the amount of interesRng arcane knowledge that we have access to. Today you can get access to top secret texts that you were never able to get hold of. In the past people would sacrice their giant fortunes and give up their, kingships or Rtles to be able to learn this parRcular informaRon, or to get access to this knowledge. People would ght for this knowledge. And yet now you can go onto Google, Amazon, visit your local bookstore and you can get the Tao Te Ching, you can get the small universe Its crazy, because a lot of these texts, especially, from the Taoist side of things, were deliberately wriGen in secreRve, arcane, esoteric language that was virtually impossible to decipher unless youd been iniRated into the art itself, so unless you were a high ranking Taoist pracRRoner of the art, the notes youd have in front of you would make no sense whatsoever.

Jordan: Nonsense. Marcus: Nonsense! So, this is why a lot of the internal aspects of the energy arts, the energy and the mind aspects are missing, or someRmes even worse theyre misinterpreted because someone will take some text and think, Yeah, right, okay, so Ive got to walk around with a donkey bladder on my head, and thats going to help me aGain some parRcular skill, but thats probably a reference to something else. If you were iniRated into that school, you would know that thats actually a code, or actually a reference to something else. Jordan: Secret language code, there. Marcus: Yeah. And remember that a lot of the original texts for qigong, were wriGen in Chinese, and have therefore been translated, and a lot gets lost in translaRon. A lot of people may have incomplete studies from people, the masters theyve been learning from, and also the Cultural RevoluRon and the eect that thats had on a lot of the internal energy arts. Thats the reason why theres a lot of qigong form out there, and let me just say, its not evil, its not a bad thing, but if you want the

benets of great health, wonderful vitality, longevity, mental clarity, and spiritual culRvaRon, youve got to learn high level qigong. Secret 6: A PERFECT Approach to Learning Qigong Jordan: Secret number six. So, referring to the book again, Ive noted that for the book you actually devised a system to help your students remember the process. You came up with the PERFECT system. So perhaps you could tell us what PERFECT stands for. Marcus: I noRced that when Id be teaching, Id start teaching something and Id stand here, then Id move onto a dierent aspect and Id be here, I noRced I was moving. So I started thinking about it and I realized that between starRng your pracRce and Peen minutes later ending your pracRce, I felt that there were seven clearly dened steps, and when I started learning qigong myself Id nd someRmes Id forget what came next. I dont know about you, but Id be going through and Id get stuck trying to remember what I was meant to be doing now. Jordan: Yeah. Marcus: It took me quite a few months just to get happy with what I was doing in that Peen minutes because Id have to remember what came next, and obviously high level qigong is a marriage of form, energy, and mind. If your minds like, What is it that happens next? thats really not good for maintaining a qigong state of mind that we menRoned. So I found that PERFECT was a great liGle tool, and its just a tool, that can help people to know what comes next, in a short period of Rme. Then they dont have to break their wonderful qigong state of mind and can focus on gemng the benets of Qigong instead. So briey, and I cover PERFECT in great detail in the home study course, but I havent got Rme to go into much detail here, but Ill just, an overview. So, the P stands for prepara:on. If youre going to do anything, you need to be prepared to do it. And thats all Ive got to say about that one (laughing) it really would take forever, Im resisRng the urge to go on and on. So then you have the E, which is entering a qigong state of mind, which we menRoned earlier on, and thats one of the three core skills. You then have the R, which is really smiling from the heart. This is something that is simple when you know how to do it, but confusing as hell if you dont.

Jordan: Its a skill. Marcus: Youre right, It is a skill. It is not a technique, its a skill. Then you have F, which is the form. Thats the bit that you can see, so everyone, the form is the easy part, if you like. Then you have the E, which is energy ow, or owing breeze swaying willows, which is the second of the core skills, and thats where the healing takes place, gemng rid of the blockages, or increasing the ow of energy

through the meridians if youve got rid of the blockages. Its always important to clear blockages and then build, if you do it the other way around you get trouble. Think of a hose pipe with a lot of bends and its been outside for the last six years and hasnt been used, if you suddenly, turn on the tap and put a lot of pressure in, youre going to get trouble. Its not a great analogy because meridians dont have dened boundaries like that, but it gives you an idea. So, owing breeze swaying willows, the energy ow. Then you have the C which is cosmic balance, or standing meditaRon and nally you have the T, the :me to end, because its very, very, very important when you nish your qigong pracRce that you nish o properly. Again, Ill give you an example of this. I was up in Nomngham years ago and I went to get a massage, and it was a beauty treatment if you like, it wasnt a Tuina - therapeuRc massage where they make you feel like EEEWWGH! (laughing), it was a massage where youre just like Ahhhhhh so I poured myself o the bench at the end of it and I opened the door to go home, and I went straight into Nomngham rush hour trac, it was such an assault on my senses such a jolt, a shock that whatever benets I got from having the relaxing massage were completely lost, and I probably created a hundred more blockages than I had before I went in. So its important when you nish your pracRce, that you nish properly because when youre doing your pracRce youre in a heightened state of awareness. Youve got to be careful going from that place to going out and doing your work, or playing with your friends, or doing whatever it is that you do, so nishing your pracRce correctly is very important. And, PERFECT is a nice liGle acronym, you have to stretch a few of the words to make it t, but overall, PERFECT is just a tool that helps people get the benets of qigong quicker because theyre not thinking What comes next? all the Rme.

Jordan: FantasRc. Secret 7: Dont Believe the Hype Jordan: Secret number seven. This qigong is starRng to sound a bit too good, and Im sure people want to know, are there any aws, is there anybody its not for, is it for absolutely everybody, is there anything wrong with it? Marcus: Thats a good quesRon. I mean, the, whilst everyone can benet from the Shaolin arts, the Shaolin arts are not for everybody. I remember when I rst started learning, 10 years ago now, I quickly realized there were three major aws with Shaolin qigong. The rst one is that it really is best learned directly from a master, and at that Rme, my master lived seven thousand miles away from me and spent nine months of the year traveling around the world. So I had lots of Rme where I had quesRons and it took a while to get an answer, which isn't a brilliant way to learn, The second aw, if you like, is that you have got to do the work, nobody can do it for you. Remember, we talked about the master, the method, and the student? The master shows you the way, but you must make the eort. Qigong is no thirty day miracle cure, you have to do the work, and thats Peen minutes every single day. If youre hardcore, if you want the fast track to results and benets, youll do thirty minutes youll do a Peen minute session in the morning and a Peen minute session in the evening. But, nobody can do that for you, and if your pracRce is haphazard

your results will be haphazard. It took me probably one or two years to actually establish a proper daily pracRce. Jordan: Sure. But amazingly, thats a very short period of Rme. FiPeen minutes can easily be squeezed into a morning or an evening. Marcus: Thats right, but that leads onto the third aw, because pracRcing Qigong does require discipline and commitment. It requires discipline, and Ive found, and please take this to heart, Ive found I had to actually schedule, to start with I had to schedule that Peen minutes in the morning and that Peen minutes in the evening. Because otherwise, life just seems to happen. If youre not good at taking care of things, things just seem to happen, and before Id know it itd be Rme to go out to work, or Rme to sit and spend some Rme with my wife, and the Rme had gone. So you really have got to commit, its not something you can just do for a week and then expect to be the healthiest, most vibrant person, and spiritually culRvated person on the planet, its not going to happen. Like I said, its not some thirty-day miracle cure, youve got to be commiGed to it. And, I guess there are certain people for who Shaolin qigong really isnt for. If youre somebody who likes to have everything done for you, you know, if you like to go to a health spa and just lounge around and do nothing and just let everybody do everything for you, then Qigong really isnt for you. If you also like to believe that theres a pill for every single ill, you know like Oh, Ive got something wrong with me, right, Ill go to my doctors, theyll give me something for it, theyll tell me what to do, then Shaolin qigong probably isnt for you, so dont waste your precious Rme the most precious thing we have in life I think is Rme, because once its gone its gone, so dont waste your precious nite valuable Rme learning Qigong if you like to have everything done for you and if you think theres a pill for every ill. But, if youre prepared to commit, prepared to follow instrucRons, and most importantly, if you want to take back the power and the responsibility for your health, your vitality, your well-being, your happiness, if you want to be in control of that and you want to be able to manage that eecRvely, then I certainly believe that Shaolin Qigong is probably the best tool that you can use.

Jordan: Great. Well, the control element is a big one for me, because I didnt like pumng the responsibility of my health in other peoples hands, you know, I like to, as much as possible, keep that control, you know, be responsible for my own health. Marcus: That right. Another o topic discussion, the reason this book got wriGen was I remember reading an arRcle in The Telegraph years ago that really boldly said Britain is becoming a naRon that believes in a pill for every ill, and there was some study that theyd done, that preGy much we were just thinking like Oh, Ive got a cold, Ill go to the doctors and get me a pill Ive got guts ache Ill go to the cupboard and take a pill that scared me, that really scared me, Id been pracRcing four or ve years then and Id witnessed the eects and benets of Qigong in my own life and in so many other people lives and I thought if only people knew about this Qigong! So, Ive got that to thank for wriRng the book.

Jordan: Its a ip though, because a lot of people look at health as a sort of curaRve thing, like you get a problem, then you go and get a x. And thats great, you know, when youve got a problem youve got to get a x, sure, but this is also prevenRve, you can just stop all that aggravaRon ahead of Rme. Marcus: Its a really good point Jordan, because when youre young, its very easy to take your health for granted. Generally, and Ive certainly have been guilty of this, we dont actually start doing anything for our health and vitality unRl its too late, unRl the yin yang harmony is way out of balance. So, Qigong is brilliant for maintaining health, for developing health, and the great thing is, and Jordan you know, obviously as someone whos tried it yourself, that you dont have to wait ages to start gemng the benets, even though its something you have to do on a daily basis for preferably the rest of your life, you do get benets quite quickly. Jordan: But frankly, its not an instant cure, its not a thirty day wonder thing, but you do one session, and you feel beGer aPer than before you started. In that sense, youre already gemng some benets. Marcus: Thats right, you feel calm the amount of Rmes I nished my pracRce and Im just kind of like Wow its very common, so whilst 15 minutes once or twice a day may sound like a chore, unRl you start trying it for yourself, youre not going to nd out. Jordan: Now at the start, I think you did menRon some sort of promise that you were going to give the people, didnt you? Marcus: Have we covered all seven secrets? Jordan: Yeah, this is it, were here, we need that hook. Marcus: Okay, so that leads us nicely into that bonus I promised you at the start of the video. Bonus: Who Else Wants a Beau)ful, Youthful Complexion? Marcus: At the start of the video, I did promise to share something with you, and if we go back to PERFECT, just quickly, remember T was :me to end, and how its important to nish your Qigong pracRce o correctly. Well, as part of that, and theres quite a few parts in that parRcular leGer if you like, and one of them is the facial massage, one of them is point massage, and one of them is banging the heavenly drum, and I thought it would be fun to show you those. Because you can also benet from them without doing Qigong, remember I spoke about the energy channels of the body called meridians? Well, on those energy channels, lets take acupuncture for example, they put needles into specic points on the meridians where they know that if they sRmulate those points, it gives a tried and tested eect. There are a lot of these points on the face. So, thats why when we do the point massage it can be quite benecial, and help to give a youthful glow, and if you have problems with the skin or your complexion, this is a wonderful liGle tool, itll take you ve minutes if that, so Ill quickly go through the facial massage. PreGy much, you just rub your hands together, make sure your palms are nice and warm, and when theyre nice and warm just gently, dab the palms of your hands against the eyes, just gently nourishing the eyes. Dab, dab, dab, dab, dab.

And then with the ngerRps, just make small circles around the eye sockets, gradually making the circles larger and larger, unRl youre massaging your face, your head, and your neck. In circles, its a circular movement, and be gentle, dont be too rough. So thats the facial massage, then the point massage. So, you can either use your index nger or your middle nger, and preGy much its just applying rm pressure and then making liGle circles. So we start right in the corner of the eyes, just gentle press and liGle circles, and then come to where the eyebrows would meet, and now sweep along the eyebrows. Now midway on the eyebrow you can always tell when youve got the right places because you feel, like, these liGle depressions on your skull

Jordan: It just seems to t. Marcus: Yeah, the ngerRps just t in. Then come to the end of the eyebrow, then come to the outside corners of your eyes, then come to the lower half of the eye, back to the center, and then make long sweeps down the side of the nose, and then where the nostrils kind of curve in just sort of sink the ngers in there and jiggle it around a liGle bit. Then with the big eshy part of the base of your thumb, just gently place it on the temples and in small circles in the same direcRon, so this kind of direcRon, as when you were doing the facial massage, just gently massage the temples. And this is a good test to see if you can follow instrucRons because the keyword here is gently, okay? Then, back to the ngers, and what you do is preGy much where the jaw goes up into the back of the ear youre just going to stu your ngers in there, dont press too hard otherwise youll start coughing, Marcus: Just press and then just in small circles, and thats the point massage, these points all have names which I cant repeat, but theyre in the book. So, Thats the point massage.

NOTE: Please view the next two pages for diagrams that will help you make sense of the text above. You can also watch the video on Youtube hGp://youtu.be/1VmeRCOyMJU

The nal part is banging the heavenly drum and its 24 Rmes another test to see if you can follow instrucRons. Its not 22 its not 26 Rmes, its 24 Rmes. So preGy much whats happening is youre sealing your ears o and then youre either icking by pumng the index nger against the middle nger and icking. Or you can just use the ngers and pat the back of the head, itll make sense in a second. But preGy much whats happening is it gives the spine spinal cord a wakeup call.

Banging the heavenly drum is kind of like shaking the rust o the spinal column. So you are going to close the ears and ick or tap 24 Rmes. And youll know if you got it right because you will hear a boom boom if you hear a kind of bap bap bap you need to get a beGer seal over the ears. So well do this 24 Rmes. And thats it weve nished. It doesnt have to be quick, it doesnt have to be fast, at your pace, but it does have to be 24 Rmes. Which brings us very nicely to the end, So what I would like to do is thank you for watching the video and I would like to thank Jordan for traveling down to pay me a visit.

Jordan: My pleasure thanks for lemng me come down here, and share the moment. Marcus: If there is only one lesson people take from our talk, it is this: Qigong is best learned directly from a master or at least a suitably qualied master. But and its one of the reasons I made the Qigong Secrets home study course is that I know that for whatever reason there are lots of people who are unable to nd a suitably qualied instructor or master but who are genuinely dedicated and commiGed and want to take back responsibility for their health and vitality. They want to learn high level Qigong. But for whatever reason, traveling thousands of miles to learn from somebody isnt always pracRcal. So I wanted to make something for those people whore genuine, commiGed, and want to learn high level Qigong thats why I created the Qigong Secrets online course. If anyone wants to nd out more, please visit: hGp://enjoyqigong.com

About The Author

Marcus Santer is founder and Chief instructor at Qigong15. Creator of the PERFECT Qigong System, the 22 week online Qigong home study course and author of 3 books on all aspects of Qigong. His aim is to help you live a happier, healthier and longer life through the practice of Qigong. More info here: http://enjoyqigong.com http://shaolinchikungbook.com http://smilingfromtheheart.com http://qigong365.com/qigong-daily-book/