Cultivating Chi

Grant has been working with me for some time now. I usually see him whenever I pass through Kansas City, which happens about two or three times a year. I usually begin the healing sessions by observing what’s going on within an individual’s body and mind. Grant wasn’t doing very much work on his own during the months in between sessions, and so his energy, emotions and physical body would start to become very stagnant.

I started to teach Grant some chi gong practices. The sensations resulting from these practices can be very subtle initially and Grant told me that he wasn’t really feeling anything. But then I taught Grant a very simple practice that helped him to bring more chi into the abdomen. I then had Grant do about two hundred repetitions of the practice. Grant really felt something happening that time. Grant told me that he could feel warmth, movement and a greater sense of aliveness in his abdomen. He also noticed feelings of warmth and tingling in his hands.

Grant was asking me a lot of questions about the chi gong practices when he picked me up at the airport the next time I flew back into Kansas City. He then told me more about some of the experiences that he’s had over the previous months. Grant said that he started to work with the practices one day while he was sitting in church, but then he stopped doing them because he was feeling the heavy emotional energies and sickness from other people around him. I was really amazed to hear that, because it told me that Grant’s senses were really opening up and that he was becoming more perceptive.

My sense perceptions also became much more acute when I started doing the chi gong practices consistently. I could tell that my intellectual and emotional range was expanding. Chi gong practices also helped to create a greater sense of balance within my body and mind and that made it easier to work with difficult or challenging emotions, issues or circumstances. I began to feel much more present within my body and I started noticing a lot more of what was going on in and around me.

Chi gong practices have made me much more sensitive to what’s going on with other people. Most people are not really processing their thoughts, feelings, emotions or life experiences. They may also be absorbing the toxic energies and emotions of other people within their environment. Unprocessed feelings and other forms of stress create a heavy congestive residue that settles into the organs and tissues of the body. The life force within the body tends to become very heavy and stagnant. The residue of the undigested emotions and other stresses impairs the functions of the various organs and systems. That causes the physical and subtle bodies break down at an accelerated rate.

Many of us are also under so much stress these days. We often end up working long hours and in many instances we’re doing things that we really don’t want to be doing in order to survive. We add to the stress upon our bodies by not allowing ourselves to get adequate rest. Our bodies become so tired and then we drink however many cups of coffee or tea to get ourselves up in the morning. Running on empty depletes the life force from our kidneys, adrenals and the rest of our body and so we become dependent on caffeine to get ourselves through the day. Many of us come home exhausted at the end of the day and then we park our ass in front of the television, which further overwhelms our senses and then we stuff our faces with Doritos or other kinds of processed food that have little, if any, nutritional value. Some of us also feel the need to light up a cigarette to take the edge off, or we self medicate with alcohol or other substances.

Being in an environment where we don’t want to be, with people that we don’t want to interact with and doing things that we really don’t want to be doing is very deadening. The resulting negative feelings states that we experience on a continual basis cause parts of us to shut down. Sometimes we have to work really hard to create the life that we truly want to be living and the process may take a lot of time. But it’s so important for us to find a way to do the things that we really want to do with our lives. Doing the things that we truly love, enjoy and believe in, the things that make us want to get up in the mornings and that give us meaning, helps to create more aliveness within our bodies.

Our bodies and minds need rest in order to replenish themselves. We feel much better, we think more clearly and we can process what’s happening when we are getting adequate rest. Our minds are just not equipped to handle the overwhelming stress that many of us are subjecting ourselves to. We seriously need downtime just so that we can digest everything that is happening in our lives. We need to make time to be really still and just breathe into all the feelings and sensations so that we can decompress. Breathing into our feelings and sensations activates the innate healing intelligence that resides within and that will help us to process the stresses that tend to accumulate within our bodies and minds. Digesting the stresses in this way renews us and increasing the life force within our bodies.

The life force can become very heavy in densely congested urban environments. Our bodies and minds need room to breathe. I do what I can to get out into open spaces as often as possible. Rocks, trees, grass and the Earth all give off life force that nourishes us. Some of the chi gong masters intentionally draw chi power out of the trees. Mountains and oceans have especially powerful chi.

The life force can also become very stagnant in our homes, because our living spaces tend to hold onto our emotions, our sickness or any other form of stress that we emit. One of the best ways to clear heavy stagnant energies in our home is to open the doors and windows to allow in as much fresh air as possible. It’s also important for us to remove clutter by giving away or throwing out things that are unessential. Keeping our spaces neat and organized also helps to improve the quality of chi within our homes.

Toxic people and situations can generate all kinds of unpleasant feelings within our bodies. These feelings may never really get processed and then we end up creating a lot more stagnant chi that gets stuck in our bodies. It’s very important for us to do everything possible to clean up our lives. We do that by experiencing our true feelings and doing the best we can to address the issues as they arise. It also helps to surround ourselves with people who nurture and bring out the best in us and encourage us to grow.

Refined sugars and other processed foods are often devoid of any real nutritional value. They have also lost most of their life force. Processed foods rob our bodies of the vital nutrients that we need to maintain strong and healthy bodies. That creates a lot of additional stress on our system and it also produces stagnant chi. The vast majority of commercial produce is sprayed with pesticides. It’s just common sense: the chemicals used to kill bugs will also poison our own bodies.

Raw organic fruits, vegetables, sprouts, nuts and grains have greater nutritional value, contain clean and vital life force and they also help to cleanse the physical body of toxicity. The foods that we eat are fuel for our bodies and they also have a consciousness about them. This is why it’s so important for us to eat the best foods available.

Our bodies possess an amazing intelligence and perform a wide array of highly complex functions. Allopathic medications usually work by suppressing symptoms rather than addressing the cause of an illness. In many instances the underlying imbalance is driven deeper into the body. Pharmaceuticals often do succeed in masking or alleviating symptoms and they may be the best course of action in some instances, but they can also disrupt the innate healing processes of our body and mind. Smoking, drinking or the use of other recreational substances may also compromise our body’s own innate healing intelligence. All of these things weaken our bodies and cause the life force to become very stagnant.

Water that sits for too long becomes stagnant. A similar phenomenon takes place within our bodies when we fail to get enough exercise. Physical activities help us to draw more life force into our bodies. Movement helps us to circulate the chi through the body and facilitates the elimination of physical toxins. Deep tissue massage and other forms of body work also helps to expel toxins, circulate the life force through the body. Bodywork also helps to awaken our bodies own innate healing intelligence.

Children, adolescents and young adults have such an aliveness about them. Their life force is usually very clean and vital. Our life force tends to diminish as we age because the generative forces that cause our bodies and minds to develop from the time of conception begin to weaken as the years go by. We tend to accumulate more and more stress within our bodies over time and that also diminishes our life force.

Spiritual adepts in China, India, Tibet and various other ancient cultures understood that there are charged particles of matter permeate the air around us. These charged particles have a consciousness or intelligence about them. Chi gong, pranayama and other esoteric practices were devised by individuals within the various ancient traditions to help people utilize the force of creation to nourish and heal their bodies and minds and to develop spiritually.

I would encourage everyone to seriously train in some discipline such as yoga and tai chi or chi gong and pranayama. These practices enable us to draw healthy and vital chi into our bodies. Building the chi within our bodies promotes greater health and longevity by nourishing, strengthening and healing the internal organs. Building chi also enables us to develop a more radiant presence.

People come to me seeking healing for a wide range of personal and health related issues. Most people are not really digesting their feelings and emotions or the stresses they’re experiencing in response to what’s happening in their lives. Their bodies often get backed up with the heavy reside of all the emotions and other stresses they’re not digesting. The body’s own innate healing powers often become so compromised as a result of all the stresses. The physical and subtle bodies begin to break down and then people start experiencing all kinds of health problems. Breathing into our feelings and sensations will help us to digest the stagnant emotions and other stresses that accumulate within the body.

Yoga and meditation were foreign concepts within our culture just a few generations ago. Fortunately our minds are broadening and we are beginning to incorporate the healing practices of other cultures. Indigenous peoples were much more connected to the Earth and the forces of nature. They relied upon the assistance of other forces and beings to facilitate healing and would go through vision quests or other intensive ceremonial practices. An intensive process of purification takes place during these healing practices that helps the participants to digest all that has happened in their lives. Damage is repaired within the physical and subtle bodies. More of the soul in drawn into the body and the innate healing intelligence that resides within the body is awakened. People whose bodies and minds are aligned with the force of creation have a greater aliveness about them and they naturally emanate the presence of the divine.

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