June/July 2006
God's Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn't Get It.
Mark Karlin interviews Jim Wallis
The Left Hand of God: Taking Back Our Country from the Religious Right
Mark Karlin interviews Rabbi Michael Lerner
New Business Models for a Sustainable Future
Torrey Byles
How the Wealthy Use the Government to Stay Rich and Get Richer
Dean Baker
Will the Major Media Finally Cover the Electronic Election Fraud Issue?
Bob Fritakis and Harvey Wasserman
The Great Turning
Reviewed by Ted Glick
Armed Madhouse
Amy Goodman interviews Greg Palast
Energy Futures
K. C. Golden
Choosing Solar Power Because It's The Right Thing to Do
Jody Woodruff
Reconnecting To Our Essential Nature With Tai Chi
Sean Kelly
Transforming Our Lives and Our Planet Through the Ancient Practice of Qigong
Julia Tucker Interviews Master Mingtong Gu
Rediscovering Who We Really Are With the Persian Sufi Poets
David Fideler
Book
Reviews
Deborah Mokma
Cosmic
Calendar
Salina Rain
Transforming Our Lives and Our Planet Through the Ancient Practice of Qigong
Julia Tucker interviews Master Mingtong Gu
Mingtong Gu, originally from China, is a master teacher of Qigong and founder of the Chi-Healing Center in Ashland, Oregon.
JT: What are the similarities and differences between Qigong, Tai Chi and Yoga?
MT: That is a good question. They are all good for the body, mind and soul even though they are from different traditions. Tai Chi is from the Chinese tradition and is actually a branch of Qigong practice. In general Qigong, which is focused on meditative continuous movement, visualizations, and sound integration, in the beginning is more simple, repetitive and energetic than Tai Chi. Yoga, from the Indian tradition, is more of a different fruit. One is like an orange and the other an apple—the taste might be different but they are both working for the same purpose of nourishing body, mind and soul. The tradition of Hatha Yoga is focused more on posture, breathing, and toning the muscles, tendons and joints. The main focus of Qigong is to bring your awareness deeply into all levels of the energy body which can be perceived differently according to ones focus. Some methods of Qigong are more physical and some more gentle.
When did you first study Qigong, and why did you decide to become a teacher?
Qigong came into my life fifteen years ago when I was still in graduate school working towards my fine arts degree. I was especially interested in iconographic oriented cultures/traditions like Hinduism, Buddhism and other mystical traditions. In that process of searching I encountered my own culture, including Qigong, in a new light. A lot of questions were answered in this process of reading about Qigong and the theory behind it. Experiencing different teachings from the Chinese tradition, such as the Taoist tradition, is really about honoring the true nature of things, and recognizing all phenomena in a state of oneness and interconnectedness. That was what really resonated with me very strongly. When I practiced and went deeper I found that I wanted more. I kept going back to the center in China to the source where this particular type of Qigong, Zhineng (“Wisdom Healing”), is researched. More than 6 million people practice Wisdom Healing Qigong in China. What distinguishes this from other forms of Qigong is that we approach the ancient practice with a new structure to make it more accessible. While the teaching and form is ancient, the understanding and research is new. It comes from the work of Grandmaster Dr. Pang, a doctor who specializes in both Chinese and Western medicine and who is a spiritual thinker in many traditions. He led very concentrated research and practice of healing for more than two decades.
When a person practices Qigong what changes can be expected?
It is more about a new relationship with ourselves and the cultivation of life energy within us and all around us. In that process of change, many things can happen individually. You can’t say what you should expect. You might feel certain new sensations about yourself. Sometimes you can feel your entire body very light, very energetically tuned in, and a very strong sensation of energy like heat, or electricity, or a sense of openness, fullness and a sense of blissfulness. This can happen very dramatically or very subtly, depending on the person. Sometimes people experience certain discomforts, which are a part of releasing old imprints from the body in the process of change before they stabilize a new healthier pattern. Sometimes it happens emotionally as well. Without any reason you might feel certain emotions, suddenly feeling deeply blissful for no reason at all, or you can feel grief or unsettledness. That deep condition was always there, but now you are recognizing it, experiencing it, more conscious of it without any blaming and analyzing, allowing positive changes at any moment through a compassionate relationship with yourself. It comes with energetic centeredness, grounding and self-responsibility. The next stage of healing is to develop a life of equanimity—that deep peace, deep compassion, which allows you to recognize these changes are happening as a part of life.
Does Qigong affect personal philosophy or is it more a physical discipline?
Qigong itself doesn’t have a specific belief system. Philosophically, it is quite open. It depends on each individual. If you focus more on physical healings, then you connect with your body more tangibly. If you want to have more openings of spiritual awareness and more understanding of life in general, within the experience of practicing and connecting with energy certain intuitions and awareness can emerge. It is an individual creative process. The philosophy itself is about recognition of possibilities, of human potential, of how change is happening in the evolution of life in general and how we can contribute in that process.
How does energy affect our life?
In general, when you are working with energy you are concerned with three aspects of energy exchange, whether you are absorbing energy from food, environment, relationship or from within yourself. If the energy is strong but not in balance then you may experience stagnations. When the energy becomes stronger in one area than others, it is not good. The aspect of balance is important. The communication of our body within and with the energy around is also important. The third aspect is the quality of energy. In the same way in our own body physically, that pureness has a lot to do with our belief system, our past experiences of emotional states, and our attitude towards life in general. People who have a positive attitude tend to hold purer energies. In Chinese, the quality of chi means the essence of your personality.
How do Western medical doctors react to Qigong?
Nowadays, I think more doctors are open to the ideas. There are a couple of doctors attending our month-long retreat in China. Overall the mainstream is, of course, still reserved, working with more conventional systems based on treating phenomena from a pure material/mechanic perspective. Even in the mind-body science, conventional scientists are still trying to look for the mind in the brain, and how the brain affects the rest of the body. It is a far stretch looking into the possibility of the mind within the whole body and beyond which has a direct way of influencing and healing the physical.
In modern science and esoteric teachings, including Qigong, we are heading in the same direction and asking the same questions, in different ways, using different parts of the brain. Science is like going out there in order to come back within. Eventually they are going to meet, so you don’t need to wait for science to validate or to prove anything before you can practice and benefit from Qigong. The moment you do the movements, visualizations and feel the energy, there is nothing too mysterious about it. Recognizing life force and how it is influencing our life on all levels is the practice.
How many levels of Qigong are there?
Different systems have different ways of structuring the progress. In this system we can look at five levels, or five stages of practice, but it is all very relative. In the beginning, you develop more consciousness of your energy body opening and connecting externally, internally—the new energetic relationship. And then the second stage of the practice allows your mind to penetrate deeper so that you have more control of the mental, in relationship to the physical and energetic. The third stage is more concerned with the initiative control of your emotional states, the integration of the mental state with the emotional state. The fourth and fifth stages, coming from the first three stages naturally, is not something that we can talk about. It is about transformation, deep transformation, deep integration, and the stable experience of oneness of you and oneness of life and the universe.
What is the role of music and chanting in Qigong?
Sound, or chanting, is very important in Qigong. To some degree it was considered to be quite secretive teachings because it does access the energy more directly. On an energetic level, the level that we can look at, we see energy as vibrations. Vibration itself is kind of a structure of energy. If the vibration changes—synchronizing or becoming disharmonious—then the condition of that energy structure changes, influencing the physical structure. In that level sound healing is very, very powerful and very deep.
In the Qigong tradition the movement of energy in the body is the deep cause of emotions. Emotional expressions, in humans, come from the heart. In an instrument, the notes are expressing what the body is feeling. By chanting you are using your body instead of other instruments to create new resonance and new frequency to experience life differently in order to change and heal. There are different sounds for different organs that can quickly access frequencies of energy to harmonize them within the body. In this system, we use three sounds for each organ corresponding to the physical, the emotional and spiritual aspects of the organ. It is very powerful practice with movement, visualization and sound.
There is actually better understanding now of how sound alters the structure of water. Chanting sacred sounds, playing music, or simply projecting thoughts, changes the molecular structure of water. Life phenomenon is so much in the resonance of sound.
Does Qigong make a contribution to world peace?
Yes. We are recognizing our intentions for world peace as well as inner peace, connecting with that frequency of peacefulness of the world, activating it and stabilizing it. The more you do, the more people are involved, the more powerful it becomes. Humanity can awaken that possibility for healing the Earth and all life. Qigong is offering an opportunity to go beyond the paradigm of dependence on material resource. Suffering and wars are caused by a limited view of looking for happiness and security in the wrong places. Humanity is slowly evolving beyond the physical survival needs now—it is truly exciting to experience life in this era!
Julia Tucker is a writer and filmmaker living in Ashland Oregon who has studied Qigong with Master Gu.
Master Mingtong Gu
