Simple Chi Kung_ Exercises for Awakening the Life-Force Energy - Mantak Chia [22]
In addition, Chi Kung stimulates the salivary glands and gastric enzymes. Just fifteen minutes of practice has been shown to produce a major elevation in the secretion of pepsin, one of the most important digestive enzymes in saliva. In fact, we frequently teach students how to swallow their saliva! Because digestion starts in the mouth, increased production of saliva helps break down the food before it even gets to the gut. This way the organs have less work to do and are able to pull more nutrients out of your food. What’s important to remember is that eating is for energy: the better your digestion the more energy you will get from your meals.
Many digestive problems have a strong psychological component. Stress or other emotional issues can cause bloating, constipation, or loose bowels. Because Chi Kung effectively reduces stress and helps your body to manage its stresses differently, it helps to protect the digestive system from stress-related problems.
“Acid indigestion” has become such a common condition in the West that many people never leave the house without a pocketful of antacid remedies. Among the most important preventive health care benefits of Chi Kung is the way it immediately balances the pH level of the blood, digestive juices, and other bodily fluids. Balanced pH is one of the most important aspects of yin/yang balance in human health.
CHI KUNG AND SPORTS
Chi Kung is a powerful way to improve almost every aspect of sports performance. Chi Kung practice increases strength, improves flexibility, prevents injuries, improves coordination, and enhances sensitivity. In short, practicing Chi Kung helps athletes get into “the zone” and truly immerse themselves into their sport. If you watch a skilled athlete, they seem to make very difficult feats look easy. In Chi Kung, this sensation of “effortless power” is an achievable state wherein everything just flows.
Traditionally, Chi Kung was practiced by martial artists who would use it to develop internal power, increase awareness, and become able to anticipate an opponent’s strikes. Nowadays, a Chi Kung golfer knows that his practice helps him move from the center and hit the ball with relaxation, as if the swing, club, player, and ball were all one motion. Basketball players might use Chi Kung for focus and entering the zone, where shots, passes, and movements all flow with natural ease. Chi Kung teaches the whole-body coordinated power necessary for sports excellence and maintaining a competitive edge.
In addition, athletes who practice Chi Kung are less injury prone, and they are able to recover more quickly from any injuries that do occur.
CURATIVE APPLICATIONS OF CHI KUNG
“Breathing and related exercises are one hundred times more effective as medical therapy than any drug,” wrote the Ching dynasty Tao master Shen Chia-shu. “This knowledge is indispensable to man, and every physician should study it thoroughly.”
The Chi Kung exercises practiced for curing disease are much the same as those used for daily preventive health care, but they are practiced much more intensively when used for curative therapy. For mild diseases, for example, a person might practice his or her Chi Kung regimen for three or four hours a day until cured. For serious ailments, such as cancer, patients in China often practice for eight to twelve hours per day! With this type of training and practice people have seen miraculous results. After being diagnosed with cancer, national badminton champion and popular hero Feng Jiang practiced Chi Kung every day for ten months, sometimes up to twelve hours a day. When he went back to the hospital to have his condition checked, his doctors were astounded to discover that the cancer had completely disappeared!
In America, more than forty billion dollars have been funneled into cancer research since the mid 1960s. In this time, Western