This is a great beginners guide to understanding the concepts of Yin and Yang. Watch the video below and then use your Lishi practice to learn to feel these different energies at work in the exercises that we do. Learn to work with these forces and you begin to feel the natural flow of your life
#Lishi #Dao #Tao #Taoism #Taoist #LishiSalford #Salford #selfawareness #selfconfidence #learnaboutyourself #worklifebalance #taichi #taiji #breathing #daoyin #newcourse #discoveryourself #socialmediachampion #connectedness #breathwork #breathcontrol #yin #yang #yinyang #yingandyang
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This year we are taking a different approach to running things. It's very difficult to give new students a taste of what Lishi can offer in the space of one to one and a half hours. To cover the whole syllabus takes over 16 years, so to compress that into ninety minutes and do it justice is a near impossible task. That might seem a daunting number, but it's only a number and we shouldn't get too fixed on it. Some people may cover it in less time, others may take longer. It doesn't really matter. The journey is one of self discovery and you go at the pace that suits your life. Whether you're taking little shuffles forwards or leaps and bounds forwards in your training, just by coming to a class you'll start to feel what is the right tempo for you.
So back to running things differently. I'm starting to do all the preparation work for the new term ahead. To give students more of a chance of feeling what we are working towards and to give them more of a running start, at Lishi Salford www.lishi.org/classes/salford we're going to be running 4 week courses focusing on specific aspects of the Lishi Daoist Arts. The first course we are running will be starting 28th September 2018 and will work on the Lishi Tai Chi Short form, and breath control with three sectional breathing and some breathing exercises known as Dao Yin. We also do partner work where we will assist one another in improving both of these. I feel excited about it. I think it will give people a running start to see if they like what we have to offer and how we teach it and the community within the class. I'm also having a go at trying to increase the classes social media presence. That's a full time job in itself. I'm trying to get the balance of screen time to engage with people, yet also maintaining a connectivity to the world around us - by getting into green spaces and keeping physically active. Juggling work and life can be a real challenge at times, but having Lishi training helps me to ground and root my thoughts and stop me from flying into rabbit holes of work. It has helped to teach me to reflect on life and pull my focus back to the important things in life. It's given me more confidence in recognising what my intuition tells me and not what society projects as expectations on to me. The breathwork and breath control is so important to our vitality and it cannot be understated. I'll do some more blogs later on the importance of breath control and how it can be used in your life to improve things for you, mentally and physically. If this resonates with you. Get in touch. Lishi is a very enabling art and will give you wings to see things in different ways. If you want to that is...... #Lishi #Dao #Tao #Taoism #Taoist #LishiSalford #Salford #selfawareness #selfconfidence #learnaboutyourself #worklifebalance #taichi #taiji #breathing #daoyin #newcourse #discoveryourself #socialmediachampion #connectedness #breathwork #breathcontrol So I've not blogged for over 3 years. What has been going on. If I were a character from a taoist myth I would have been meditating in a cave watching birds as they moved and learning life skills from nature. I live in Greater Manchester, however, and currently my life has not had that heroic element to it at all....... I've still been practicing the Daoist System of Health arts known as Lishi. It's full name is Daojiao Lishi Quanfa which can be broken into 3 parts. Daojiao - meaning daoist teaching or teaching of the way, Lishi meaning from the Li Family and Quan Fa meaning a system that focuses on the use of the hands and feet. As Laoba says, 'if you can concentrate on your hands and feet, everything else will sort itself out' The class has still been going on and we've had some fantastic students who have started to feel and develop a sensitivity that can only be transferred in a class. I've also been involved in making a documentary which will be released later this year. I've been working on the new website at www.lishi.org/classes/salford and simplifying improving and updating the page. I've also taken on new roles in the NHS and work at the Homeless GP Practice in Salford alongside wider strategic planning for the health of young people in the City. So I haven't been idle, but I have been distracted from blogging. But I'm back now. if you want to hear more, just let me know, comment etc and I'll start to give you more of my thoughts
The human body is designed to take in 75% of its energy requirement through breathing; oxygen is the most fundamental unit of fuel that we take into our body. Further, we also eliminate 70% of our toxins via the breath; oxygen also cleanses the cells by oxidation and enables waste products to be carried back to the lungs via the bloodstream. Given these basic facts it is easy to see why learning to breathe correctly is one of the most fundamental things we can do to support and maintain our health and wellbeing. Since we are not educated to become conscious of this fundamental metabolic process, over 90% of us are using less than 50% of our breathing capacity. The results of poor breathing practices and under-oxygenation are low energy levels, toxicity build-up, high stress and stagnant emotional states. It is well accepted that long-term emotional stagnation eventually leads to physical and emotional disorders. By becoming a conscious breather we can re-take control of our lives by fully oxygenating our system and maintaining a lucid state of emotional freedom. You may wish to experience some relaxed abdominal breathing right now. Sit back and put your hand on your stomach, inhale and feel your abdomen rise; let your breath flow upwards to your chest, then, as you quickly exhale with a relaxed sigh, feel the chest and the abdomen fall; repeat this cycle 5 times without any pauses. Note how you feel: more energized, lighter? Was it easy or difficult to access your abdominal muscles? Where are you tight and where is relaxed? Could your breathing benefit from re-training? All traditional cultures have recognized the value of conscious breathing practices, ranging around the world from the Yogic Pranayama to the Ha Breath of the Hawaiian Kahunas. There are a bewildering number of breathing techniques to choose from, including contemporary practices such as Holotropic Breath, Rebirthing, Vivation, Buteyko, Mézières etc. It is very important to recognize that most ancient breathing practices, along with their modern counterparts, are either designed to induce altered states of consciousness, such as deep relaxation, bliss states and out-of-body experiences, or they are intended to induce healing of a specific disorder, such as asthma, or birth and trauma release. None of them are intended to teach us how to breathe correctly on a regular day- to-day basis. Transformational Breathing fills a very important gap in this respect. From the ancient practices, Leonard Orr developed rebirthing in the 1970s. Designed to heal the most fundamental of human trauma, that of the birth experience, rebirthing was largely responsible for raising awareness of the value of breath work in the West. Of breathing Leonard Orr has said, "The purpose of conscious breathing is not primarily the movement of air but the movement of energy. If you do a relaxed, connected breathing cycle for a few minutes you will experience dynamic energy flows within your body. These energy flows are the merging of spirit and matter." This simple truth is also clearly contained within the Latin word for oxygen, which is spiritus. As a basic -people are taught to breathe into their upper, mid section and lower section.... WAIT A MINUTE - Those 3 sections sound familiar. Lishi practitioners have been doing that for years....... Have you ever wondered why you feel funny at certain times of the day. Is there a pattern where you feel tired at a certain point in the day regularly, or are you waking up at the same time when you don't want to wake up. In traditional Chinese medicine your organs energise at certain times of the day or night and this table might help you manage it. Have a look yourself
Taken from The Telegraph Newspaper By Jon Swaine, New York Lou Reed died peacefully at home doing tai chi and surrounded by trees, his widow has said. In her first public remarks since her husband’s death on Sunday, Laurie Anderson described him as “a prince and a fighter,” in a short obituary for The East Hampton Star, their local newspaper. “Lou was a tai chi master and spent his last days here being happy and dazzled by the beauty and power and softness of nature,” wrote Anderson, who is also a successful musician. “He died on Sunday morning looking at the trees and doing the famous 21 form of tai chi with just his musician hands moving through the air.” The 21-form is a series of exercises practiced within I Liq Chuan, a Chinese martial art that purports to combine the relaxation and health benefits of tai chi for the body with a zen state of mind. “Lou was a prince and a fighter and I know his songs of the pain and beauty in the world will fill many people with the incredible joy he felt for life. Long live the beauty that comes down and through and onto all of us.” Reed, the former frontman of The Velvet Underground and solo artist, died of liver disease. He was 71. Anderson, 66, signed her letter as “his loving wife and eternal friend” Click on the image above to watch Opening Dao - a documentary on Daoism and Martial Arts
Opening Dao Produced and directed by filmmaker and founder of Life Arts Media Gennaro Ambrosino,is a short documentary film on Taoism and martial arts, filmed in China in 2009. Scholars, top martial artists and monks explain the principles of the way, a treasure of wisdom that survived thousands of years. The film highlights the interconnectedness between the philosophy and the natural world and how its principles manifest in certain martial arts and meditative arts. The film contains exclusive interviews with Prof. Chad Hansen and Prof. Chris Fraser from the University of Hong Kong, Dr Wang Daoke from Wudang Taoist Association, Master Yuan Xiu Gang (Wudang Gong Fu Academy) and martial arts performances from Master Heng Wei (Tang Long Kung Fu), Master Yongxing Guan and the students of the Wudang Taoist Kung Fu Academy in Wudang Shan, China. The documentary also features a master narrative of the Dao De Ching by Edward Petherbridge, former leading actor of the Royal Shakespeare Company. Meditation can be a difficult skill to grasp. Practice and it will get easier. To begin with, two things must be done with the greatest aptitude, each must be mastered and done with ease. 1) Sit still and detach from thought (zuo wang) 2) Regulate the breath (tiao xi) Zuowang the words zuo 坐 "sit; take a seat" and wang 忘 "forget; overlook; neglect" "oblivious of oneself and one's surroundings; free from worldly concerns" (Liang Shih-chiu & Chang Fang-chieh 1971) You must master breathing correctly, which is considered the key to calming down or directing the qi with coordination of the mind. This is the process of regulating the breathing (tiao xi). Beyond this more skills can deepen and enrich your meditation, however, the above must be mastered first. To activate your chi - you must rid yourself of pride and ego. Only then will the chi flow A wise old owl sat in an oak,
The more he heard the less he spoke, The less he spoke the more he heard, Why aren't we all like that wise old bird |
AuthorLishi tai chi coach and NHS Dr for 15 years Archives
August 2018
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