How do you practise?

[NaturaNaturans]

This thread seems like one that has allready been made, and If so, appologies. But what do your «practise» consist of? Do you follow a «faith?» Are you trying to reach a certain end point?
 

Reading, meditation, yoga, walk in nature, journaling… 

 

I think it goes without saying that there are no wrong answers, and I would love to hear from you and hopefully be inspired.

 

💃🕺

[Sleepy Bluejay]

I posted how I practise cultivation.

I'm doing it because I refuse to live a mundane life.

[NaturaNaturans]

Today I will start journaling. I have the following rules:

- Do not compare yourself to anybody but yesterdays you.

- Your body is a temple, treat it as it

- value yourself because you are loved

- Strive for authenticity

- cost-benefit: you are constantly making choices, all the time, and for everything you choose you loose out on something else. Choose wisely

- listen more

[-ꦥꦏ꧀ ꦱꦠꦿꦶꦪꦺꦴ-]

I do Flying Phoenix Chi Kung, Tao Tan Pai and Authentic Neigong.

 

My daily schedule is like this:

 

Wake up

Tao Tan Pai cane form

Tao Tan Pai qigong 

Flying Phoenix qigong

Stillness

Breakfast

Waigong

Lunch

Neigong

Dinner

(Maybe seated forms of Flying Phoenix if I have time)

Stillness

Sleep 

 

Edit: forgot your second and third questions: I’m Muslim and my goal is to be able to heal myself and others with qi.

 

Edited January 23 by ꦥꦏ꧀ ꦱꦠꦿꦶꦪꦺꦴ

[NaturaNaturans]

Thank you for sharing 

[Unota]

That's hard to answer. I don't think I would be able to say I do anything any which way. There are times when I am really energetic, and I workout, I practice yoga, I do lots of physical activities and try to break my own personal records. I also do some qigong. Other times, I get sick, or I feel weak and tired. I'm a sickly person.

 

Other times I read obsessively, transcribing things and archiving, trying to learn new things. Sometimes I meditate outside, where it's quiet. Other times, I just don't feel like it? I don't like schedules.

 

For some reason I feel like I'm not really going to live a long life. And if I suddenly die some day, I feel like I would be a bit sad, if I had spent too much of my time forcing myself into a schedule of improving too many things that would not really matter that much once I am dead.

 

I've fulfilled my desires for working out, that was fun. I studied for a while, and that was fun. But now I am feeling nostalgic for doing nothing, so I am doing nothing. I miss sitting all day and drinking tea, petting my cat. I think he missed me, too.

 

It's almost February, so I'm sure soon enough, I will switch focus to my garden instead. It'll be a good time to start sweet peppers.

[NaturaNaturans]

Sounds great to me 

[NaturaNaturans]

30 minutes ago, Unota said:

For some reason I feel like I'm not really going to live a long life. And if I suddenly die some day, I feel like I would be a bit sad, if I had spent too much of my time forcing myself into a schedule of improving too many things that would not really matter that much once I am dead.

Regarding this, i am ambilivent. I am of course not disagreing with you, because who am i. But from my perspective, I think it is important to live/practise/work as and towards something that is authentic. Authenticity being the key word here. 

forgive me for reposting this corny AI qoute, but its gold: 

 

[Cobie]

56 minutes ago, Unota said:

… a schedule of improving too many things that would not really matter that much once I am dead …

I posted it before, imo Unota is enlightened (this being online, yes I am being serious).

 

 

Edited January 23 by Cobie

[ChiDragon]

4 hours ago, Unota said:

I also do some qigong. Other times, I get sick, or I feel weak and tired. I'm a sickly person.

I am always wondering why people say that they practice Qigong and still get sick often. Qigong is suppose to make the body healthy.
It seems to me that people do not know what Qigong is all about, but just practice something assuming it was Qigong and get no benefits out of it.

If you don't mind, would you please tell me how did you practice your Qigong. You don't need to tell what style that you were practiced. Just tell me how!

[Unota]

33 minutes ago, ChiDragon said:

I am always wondering why people say that they practice Qigong and still get sick often. Qigong is suppose to make the body healthy.
It seems to me that people do not know what Qigong is all about, but just practice something assuming it was Qigong and get no benefits out of it.

If you don't mind, would you please tell me how did you practice your Qigong. You don't need to tell what style that you were practiced. Just tell me how!

I have COPD. I went from needing an inhaler, to being able to go on a bike ride for two miles. I'm not sure that what you mean by 'sick' in your question, and my 'sick,' are the same thing. Maybe ask someone else though, who means something like the common cold. I also think that you have to be careful with thinking like this, because if anything happens to you, and you think that you are capable of doing something that can reverse it, then when you fail to do so, you will blame yourself

[Unota]

1 hour ago, ChiDragon said:

I am always wondering why people say that they practice Qigong and still get sick often. Qigong is suppose to make the body healthy.
It seems to me that people do not know what Qigong is all about, but just practice something assuming it was Qigong and get no benefits out of it.

If you don't mind, would you please tell me how did you practice your Qigong. You don't need to tell what style that you were practiced. Just tell me how!

I wasn't really sure how to answer 'how' I practice qigong, so I didn't at first. Like, 'what do you mean! the stance? how I distribute my weight? You have to be more specific!' And I'm very bad at describing things. I only thought of afterwards, how I could say it. But do you know, when you concentrate on the sensation from your core to your fingertips, circulating in your center, and then it tingles down from your arm to your hands. Your hands start to heat up drastically, sometimes even by ten degrees, to match your core temperature. I do this, but along with the motions, depending on what that is. Left to right, down to up, up to down to my feet, it depends on what it is. From hand, through chest, to hand, or from upwards, through my chest, down to the heels of my feet. It occurred to me that this might be what you meant. Because doing the motions is not just a stretch. I also do the breathing techniques as directed, in through the nose, out through the mouth, several seconds each. Inhaling, and then exhaling, on releasing tension. My mind is blank while I do this, I focus on nothing else. Is this what you mean by 'tell you how?' At first I was wondering if you meant to describe to you the routine or something, hahaha. It didn't even occur to me, that you thought I might just be stretching and nothing else. I misunderstood!

Edited January 24 by Unota

[Cobie]

.

Edited January 25 by Cobie

[Mark Foote]

On 1/23/2024 at 10:45 AM, NaturaNaturans said:

This thread seems like one that has allready been made, and If so, appologies. But what do your «practise» consist of? Do you follow a «faith?» Are you trying to reach a certain end point?
 

Reading, meditation, yoga, walk in nature, journaling… 

 

I think it goes without saying that there are no wrong answers, and I would love to hear from you and hopefully be inspired.

 

💃🕺

You asked for it, NaturaNaturans!

“To Enjoy Our Life” (from zenmudra.com/zazen-notes)
 

A friend of mine recommended a particular approach to practicing musical scales.  She starts with the minor scale on a particular note, say, C minor.  She follows with the major scale on the same note (C major), and then the relative minor of that major (A minor).  She continues in this fashion four rounds, then picks up the next day with the minor scale beginning a step higher (D minor).  In three days, she’s made a circuit of scales.
 

I’ve tried in the past to practice scales, but found myself giving up in short order.  The organization in her approach is helpful to me, and though I’m not practicing as regularly as she does (she’s a performing musician, as well as a teacher), I have begun to practice.
 

I wrote to my friend:
 

The striking thing to me about my experience on the cushion these days is that I am practicing some kind of scales, as it were.  Gautama outlined the feeling of four states, the initial three and then the “purity by the pureness of [one’s] mind”, the fourth.  I’ve described that “pureness of mind” as what remains when “doing something” ceases, and I wrote:
 

When “doing something” has ceased, and there is “not one particle of the body” that cannot receive the placement of attention, then the placement of attention is free to shift as necessary in the movement of breath.
 

The rest of the scales are looking for a grip where attention takes place in the body, as “one-pointedness” turns and engenders a counter-turn (without losing the freedom of movement of attention); finding ligaments that control reciprocal innervation in the lower body and along the spine through relaxation, and calming the stretch of ligaments; and discovering hands, feet, and teeth together with “one-pointedness” (“bite through here”, as Yuanwu advised; “then we can walk together hand in hand”, as Yuanwu’s teacher Wu Tsu advised).
 

In the months since I wrote my friend, I’ve had some time to reflect. There are some things I would add, on my practice of “scales”.
 

Gautama spoke of suffusing the body with “zest and ease” in the first concentration:
 

 “… (a person) steeps, drenches, fills, and suffuses this body with zest and ease, born of solitude, so that there is not one particle of the body that is not pervaded by this lone-born zest and ease.”
 

(AN III 25-28, Pali Text Society Vol. III p 18-19, see also MN III 92-93, PTS p 132-134)

 

Words like “steeps” and “drenches” convey a sense of gravity, while the phrase “not one particle of the body that is not pervaded” speaks to the “one-pointedness” of attention, even as the body is suffused.
 

If I can find a way to experience gravity in the placement of attention as the source of activity in my posture, and particular ligaments as the source of the reciprocity in that activity, then I have an ease.
 

Gautama taught that zest ceases in the third concentration, while the feeling of ease continues:
 

(One) enters & remains in the third (state), of which the Noble Ones declare, ‘Equanimous & mindful, (one) has a pleasant abiding.’
 

(Samadhanga Sutta, tr. Thanissaro Bhikkhu, AN 5.28 PTS: A iii 25; Pali Text Society, see AN Book of Threes text I,164; Vol II p 147)
 

That’s a recommendation of the third concentration, especially for long periods. Nevertheless, I find that the stage of concentration that lends itself to practice in the moment is dependent on the tendency toward the free placement of attention. As I wrote in my last post:
 

When a presence of mind is retained as the placement of attention shifts, then the natural tendency toward the free placement of attention can draw out thought initial and sustained, and bring on the stages of concentration.

 

Shunryu Suzuki said:
 

To enjoy our life– complicated life, difficult life– without ignoring it, and without being caught by it. Without suffer from it. That is actually what will happen to us after you practice zazen.
 

(“To Actually Practice Selflessness”, August Sesshin Lecture Wednesday, August 6, 1969, San Francisco)

 

I practice now to experience the free placement of attention as the sole source of activity in the body in the movement of breath, and in my “complicated, difficult” daily life, I look for the mindfulness that allows me to touch on that freedom.

 

 

Edited January 27 by Mark Foote

[ChiDragon]

On 1/23/2024 at 7:26 PM, Unota said:

I have COPD. I went from needing an inhaler, to being able to go on a bike ride for two miles. I'm not sure that what you mean by 'sick' in your question, and my 'sick,' are the same thing.

 

On 1/23/2024 at 2:13 PM, Unota said:

I also do some qigong. Other times, I get sick, or I feel weak and tired. I'm a sickly person.

 

The word "sick" came out from you. It has to be your description. I understand that you have CODP.
 

On 1/23/2024 at 8:02 PM, Unota said:

I do this, but along with the motions, depending on what that is. Left to right, down to up, up to down to my feet, it depends on what it is. From hand, through chest, to hand, or from upwards, through my chest, down to the heels of my feet. It occurred to me that this might be what you meant. Because doing the motions is not just a stretch. I also do the breathing techniques as directed, in through the nose, out through the mouth, several seconds each. Inhaling, and then exhaling, on releasing tension. My mind is blank while I do this, I focus on nothing else. Is this what you mean by 'tell you how?'

Yes, this is the "tell me how". This will do for the description of Qigong. Other times, you get sick and I know the reason why. It is because of your COPD. That is why you have to breathe through your nose and exhale through the mouth. For that reason, there is not enough oxygen in your body system. Your immune system is very poor due the hypoxia(lack of oxygen). However, you are doing the Qigong practice is the right thing for COPD.

I had a breathing problem in my early age and corrected by practicing Qigong. I have a good description in my PPD. If you are interested, then, you might want to look into it.
1. How do I know that I am healthy from practicing Qigong.
2. The Ultimate Method of Breathing.
3. Modern definition of Qigong/Chi Kung( 氣功 )

Ref: https://www.thedaobums.com/forum/635-chidragon/
Hope you are well!

Edited January 27 by ChiDragon