Formosa Neijia

I once had a Chinese teacher who was also a qigong master. I could tell she was different right away because of all the Buddhist paraphernalia in her classroom. She asked us what our hobbies were on the first day. But when she got to me, she simply asked what martial arts I do. I’ve […]

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Those of you who are members of the Formosa Neijia Discussion group have access to a little treat I cooked up. I have four breathing meditation MP3s in the file section that are free downloads for discussion group members. I will be making these these things available from time to time in the discussion […]

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The following is a long comment by David Silver of YMAA. He brings up many interesting things from the perspective of his training under Dr. Yang Jwing-ming. Take it away, David:
The real reason some people reject “the Qi paradigm”? Lack of experience. You don’t need it explained, just practice and see for yourself.
Practice Embrace the […]

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Here’s a solid piece of wisdom about IMA from Steve Cotter, who’s mostly known for his kettlebell training.
I would say that most people do not have access to high quality MA instruction in the traditional sense, and so they adapt a very external approach to skill acquisition in the arts. In that context, if […]

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We rarely look at the location of teachers to see WHY they teach what they teach. And yet, this is a big consideration. Take qigong, for example.
If you look the qi skeptics, most of them are blue-collar, hard working folks that expect no BS in their martial arts training. They want to hear about what […]

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I read lots of stuff on the Internet about what and how people are training, so I all the time come across lots of stuff that look worrisome. Take etheric qi practices, for example.
Etheric qi practices usually involve feeling the qi that surrounds your body and working with it in a variety of ways.
So […]

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…is physical fitness.
Learning qigong really has brought home a comment from a teacher I learned from briefly. He told me that I should take his qigong class, and I asked him why. He pointed to my gray hairs and then compared them to his head full of black hair. He is in his early fifties […]

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzIjUR-mHCY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFijeHmOPlQ
My guess is that everyone is very familiar with these clips since they were some of the first to show a more advanced or fake version of taiji depending on your perspective (perhaps there’s a range between those two extremes?). In any case, this is Shi Ming — the now deceased teacher who […]

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There’s a new blog on the scene that I think you should know about: Personal Development from Lifeworks. This is Buddy Tripp’s new blog and he is covering personal development from a IMA and body work point of view.
As a preview of what he’s offering on the site, I would like to draw your attention […]

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Below is a post I wrote about an interview with Bruce Kumar Frantzis that was posted in the Taoist Water Tradition Yahoo group. If his material interests you, then I suggest that you subscribe to this list. I put my reaction to the article here because it’s applicable to learning neigong in general, but especially […]

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