Introduction

Ch'i Kung is one part of TCM, Traditional Chinese Medicine. The other parts are acupuncture, herbology (which we would think of as nutrition), and massage.

Ch'i flows through the body all the time, in the meridians used by acupuncturists to balance the flow of ch'i. The ch'i pathways connect each part of the body in sequence with every other part, and delineate special relationships between the body parts. When the ch'i is flowing smoothly and in the correct strength in each part of each meridian, we are in health – bodily, mentally/emotionally, and spiritually. If, through injury, stress, emotional or spiritual upset, or bad eating, sleeping, or exercising habits, the ch'i flow becomes clogged, constricted, reversed, or otherwise made out of balance, we become open to disease, to organic/mental/emotional/spiritual dysfunction, to pain and even death.

We can affect the flow of our ch'i by what we eat, how we stand and move and breathe, how we think, how we react or respond to situations. We can bring the ch'i back into balance once it's out of balance by eating properly, sleeping well, breathing fully, thinking and feeling appropriately, and standing and moving in ways that facilitate ch'i flow and balance. The practice of Ch'i Kung will facilitate this to happen.

With Ch'i Kung, different individuals improve at different speeds. Unlike some Western forms of physical therapy and medicine, Ch'i Kung lets the individual body and nervous system determine the speed of change. The moves are all done gently, slowly bringing the ch'i balance and flow through the body to its optimum, then slowly increasing the capacity of the body for expanded ch'i flow. Rarely is there dramatic change; but a gradual, continuous change is experienced by all who consistently practice daily and well.