Gentle Exercises for Optimal Health

Strengthen Your Immune System with Qigong

Qigong has earned a reputation for being a powerful illness-prevention practice. Qigong can and often does prevent many acute illnesses from arising. While there is no guarantee you won’t get sick if you practice Qigong, your body will stand a much better chance of fighting off sickness. In my experience, there is something even more than prevention that sometimes goes on: The oncoming illness is waylaid, knocked out like a boxer with a glass jaw.

Qigong Workshop

On November 14, which is a Saturday, I will offer a 4-hour workshop on Qigong methods that can prevent acute sickness from taking effect in your body.

Workshop Details

When:              Saturday, November 14 , 2009
Time:               10:00 pm to 2:00 pm. Bring a Lunch.
Cost:                $60. 
Location: 1095 East Axton Road, a few miles north of Bellingham, WA.
To Sign Up: (360) 398-7466, or rbbatesdc@comcast.net

First Clear the Organs with the Six Healing Sounds

First we will warm the body up and begin the purging of stagnation. The Six Healing Sounds clear the organs, tissues and cells of stagnant Qi; open blocked Qi channels; and reinvigorate sluggish lymph.

Then Engage in Slow, Gentle Movements that Move the Qi

For this we will practice the set known as Hun Yuan Qigong. I find this set to be a marvelous way to stave off getting sick.

Move Qi Stagnation

My Own Experiences with Vaulting Past Colds and Flu

Over the past two or three long, cold, wet Washington State winters, whenever I start to feel run down—maybe on the verge of getting sick—I practice the slow motion Hun Yuan set for about 30 to 40 minutes. By the end of the practice I can feel a pulsing, whole-body empowerment. There is a balanced magnetic warmth in my hands, ease in my breathing, and calmness in my heart and mind. I get a strong sense that the healing forces in my body have been renewed and reinvigorated.

So far, it has worked and I haven’t gotten ill when engaging in my preventive Qigong practice. This idea of staving off illness is a very common one in the Qigong literature, a universal notion of the value of the art.

Proved Once Again

Again, there is no guarantee, but I proved to myself just the today that it works. I’ve been very busy lately, with little down time. I thrive on a certain minimum of time off to rest my mind and body. Last night I began to get fatigued-feeling and overly-sweaty. I went to bed early and slept in, feeling even more tired in the morning.

Over the day I practiced 20 to 30 minutes of the above type of Qigong three times. After the second practice–in the early afternoon–I began to feel a definite shift toward energy and strength. Hours later, I feel pretty good over all.

It isn’t just me who thinks Qigong is good for preventing colds and flu. Googling for “Qigong and colds”; and “Qigong and flu” I quickly found these websites extolling the virtues of Qigong practice for preventing colds and flu.

http://www.centralpathacupuncture.com/blog/?p=29

http://www.prweb.com/releases/2009/11/prweb3226484.htm

http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2007/08/qigong-and-tai-.html

http://www.healingqigongcenter.com/apps/blog/show/899824-swine-flu-influenza

Qigong for prevention of illness doesn’t work every time, nor exclusive of other lifestyle factors. Diet, stress, bad habits, climate, etc. do have their effects. Yet it is surprising just how often and how effective Qigong can be for promoting illness-bashing power.

Here is a short video demonstrating how people are more likely to exercise when it seems fun and interesting to do so.

Flowing Lymph Leads to Glowing Health

Recently I was re-attending a seminar on the powerful healing art of Lymphatic Drainage Therapy from the Chikly Institute. Lymphatic Drainage Therapy (LDT) is a method of helping someone’s lymph flow better. This results in many, many, many benefits; I won’t go into them here, except to say that you want good, strong, regular lymph flow. You really want this. One of the best way to help your lymph flow is through the practice of Qigong.

I’ll talk more about the specifics of how lymph and Qigong are related in a later post.

Don’t Work on the Acute Illness

One of the many great ideas I came away with from the seminar was about the rhythm of working with the arc of acute illness. Basically it is this: Don’t do LDT on someone who is in the throes of an illness–someone on the top end of the bell curve of being sick. Let the illness take its course. [By the way, I always have to look up the proper use of its and it’s. Why won’t that rule stick in my head?]

Heal First and Avoid Getting Sick

As a general rule don’t work on a fully sick person with energetic or body work. However, if you perform the healing work just as the sickness is taking off, you may lessen the severity of the illness, or even thwart it entirely. You are giving the body a leg up on fighting the oncoming illness.

Recover Faster

If you do the LDT on someone as they are coming down from the illness, you can increase how quickly and thoroughly they heal.

When Not to Do Qigong: When You are Sick

Here’s my point with Qigong: It is exactly the same as receiving hands’-on bodywork. Don’t do Qigong if you are full-on sick. Rest, sleep, let your body find a way for you to recover.

When to do Extra Qigong: When You Feel Run Down

But if you feel yourself beginning to get sick–if you feel extra fatigued, tired, run-down–do a bunch of Qigong pronto. It is likely you can stave off the illness. Thirty or sixty minutes of slow, energizing Qigong is a much more fun experience than a day or week or fortnight of feeling like a smashed, twisted and upended car, spilling its fluids.

When to do Qigong: When You are Recovering

If you do get a cold or the flu or some other uncertain collection of sick yuckiness; wait until you start to come out of it. Then restart your Qigong practice. You’ll get better faster, and more completely.

With preventing sickness that seems to be threatening, there is a particular approach to Qigong that works well. Do slow, smooth, rhythmic, gentle movements over and over and over. Build the sense of magnetic power, of pulsing Qi, or whole body pulsing.

More on this soon.

Five Flows in the Palm Springs Area

On Thursday October 15, I will be teaching a Five Flows Qigong workshop at the Palm Desert  Chiropractic office and Qigong studio of my colleague Robert Haberkorn.

Five Animal Frolics in Monrovia, CA

On Saturday, October 17, I will be teaching a workshop on Five Animal Frolics workshop at Monrovia studio of my long-time friend Tom Hould.