Yup this is me, the first day during allergy season.
Like many strong, brave men who hit their 40s, I used to be young, vibrant, and had a decent physique. Along with hitting 40, I have had to give up most of my beloved activities (climbing, kung fu, hiking, cycling, snow camping to name a few) to be a decent father. Now my sedentary lifestyle consists of a full time job in front of two computer screens, and coming home to further support my family. I have started up the Iron Shirt Qigong practice that my dad taught me decades ago to help remedy this. My dad’s version of Iron Shirt Qigong is a little more yang (harder and more external) than Mantak Chia’s version. I plan to practice daily and will be updating my progress every week or every two weeks. Veronica and I have already seen some dramatic results in my mood and energy through out the week. Let’s see if I can drop some weight and see my muscles again.
Update: 4/17/2017
15 days later…
I haven’t seen a good weight difference on the scale that I bought at Goodwill, but I am able to fit into pants better. My weight at night is around 140 lbs, and about 135 lbs in the morning. I have been faithful in practicing Iron Shirt Qigong everyday. I started the Golden Phoenix Washes Its Feathers for 45 counts, but I increased my time in the Golden Turtle / Water Buffalo from 180 to 200 count, which became too difficult, so I stopped doing the Golden Phoenix. I hope to be able to start the Golden Phoenix again next week. Even though I haven’t seen much weightless results, the exercise is maintaining a happy emotional state of mind for me.
Update: 6/2/2017
47 days later…
Today I am happy to report a 5 pound weight change! It took me more than a month to report back, but the change is genuine. My weight at night is around 135 and in the morning it is around 130. I am able to hold the Golden Turtle posture for a count of 105 and the same for the Water Buffalo. Last time I checked in I had stopped the Golden Phoenix, but now I am up to 72 repetitions. I think starting up the Golden Phoenix is the main reason for the weight loss as it is the most physically active exercise of the iron shirt. I am sorry I don’t have any images or videos of the iron shirt to share yet. I am making slow progress in setting up a space to create them.
Recently we fulfilled our workshop with Mantak Chia, which had a lot of wonderful insights. One of them was a Taoist chart of when to best eat. I have just started incorporating it into my lifestyle. Basically it recommends to eat heavy in the beginning of the day and less as you bring the day to a close–this is the complete opposite of my previous dietary plan!
Before I give out the answer, let me back up and explain how I first heard of him. Veronica was dissatisfied with Amazon Prime’s video selection, so she got a subscription with Gaia the beginning of this year. Since then we have been enjoying the series, Missing Links with Gregg Braden immensely. Braden is an author, researcher, and speaker who connects cutting edge science with modern spirituality. He has a passion for ancient civilizations, and together with his background in science, he blends them together for a refreshing take on spiritualism for the modern person.
Many use one or a combination of these, but Braden reveals that there is a fifth “lost mode” that is based on feeling the prayer. Braden’s rediscovery comes from his explorations into places like Tibetan monasteries and experiences like witnessing a rain-dance in the high desert of northern New Mexico.He goes on to explain that this Feeling Prayer is the language that the higher power (the Divine Matrix?) can be communicated to. Instead of vocally asking for, say rain, you would instead feel with your body that you had already been given what you asked for; you would feel the rain hit your body, you would smell what it smells like when it rains, and so forth. There is a very simple meditation called the Quick Coherence® Technique that utilizes the Feeling Prayer. You can use this method almost anywhere at any time; though I find the best results happen in a peaceful and safe place. You can also incorporate it into other existing meditations; I like to incorporate it into my Inner Smile practice. Here are the steps for the Quick Coherence:
Focus your attention in the heart area while you breathe slowly and deeply.
Experience or feel in your body a positive feeling, such as re-experiencing the feeling of love for someone or focus on the feeling of peace.
The Heart & the Divine Matrix
One aspect that I really like about Gregg Braden is that he brings interesting scientific studies into his highly engaging and articulate talks. As for the Feeling Prayer, he talks about the discovery and research about the heart’s intricate network of neurons, neurotransmitters, proteins and support cells like those found in the brain. The heart brain can sense, feel, learn, and remember independently! What we understand now, even though it isn’t widely taught, is that the heart brain constantly communicates to the head brain through the nervous system, hormonal system and other pathways. It was previously thought that the communication was more one-sided from the head to the heart, but now we are finding out that it is a dynamic two-way dialogue. The heart is able to influence the brain and major organs in order to carry out its role in mental and emotional experience. According to a study on how the heart affects the DNA in our bodies, some emotions (such as love) relax the coil of the DNA while other emotions (such as anger) contract and tighten the DNA. Furthermore, relaxed DNA has a healthy effect on your body while tight DNA has the opposite. By changing the emotions they felt, test subjects were able to change their bodies. You can see how the heart plays a vital role in the Feeling Prayer as it is the source of where our emotions are translated into feelings, which affects our beliefs and thereby our actions, body language, and how we exist in the world.Braden has another book called The Divine Matrix: Bridging Time, Space, Miracles, and Belief, where he compares widely accepted, outdated scientific beliefs to modern scientific discoveries. It is becoming more and more accepted that the universe isn’t empty, for example, that there is a field that connects matter on a quantum level. This is what Braden describes as the Divine Matrix. The Divine Matrix is another component or aspect of the Feeling Prayer that in theory makes this prayer/meditation work. Max Planck, regarded as the father of quantum theory, said “all matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force…we must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent Mind…This Mind is the Matrix of all matter.” In the Divine Matrix all possibilities already exists–all of the greatest peace and suffering already exists in the quantum possibilities. We can with our minds reach into these possibilities and with our hearts we give that possibility life. Thought happens in the upper chakras (Crown, Third Eye, and Throat) and emotion comes from our creative center (Solar Plexus, Sacral, and Root). Feelings come from our heart chakra. When thought, emotion, and feeling combine, our beliefs translates the quantum possibilities that we imagine into our physical reality. As Braden posits, the Divine Matrix, or the field that holds everything together, is also made up of electrical energy and magnetic energy. Braden also follows up with that the heart creates the strongest electrical and magnetic field in our bodies; this means that the heart is generating waves of energy when we have a feeling. With this understanding our feelings are not only changing our bodies, but also changing the world around us.
The Difference Between the Mind and Heart
Did you ever forget how to smile? I did! I remember going to the mall to get these pictures. This was the first time I had professional pictures done with a professional background and a professional stranger taking our pictures. I felt the pressure to look good for the camera, and I couldn’t remember how to smile. There was no mirror around for me to figure it out, so I took my thumb and index finger and traced my lips to feel if it was making that arc in the shape of a smile. What I got is what you can see in the two pictures. It is pretty funny to me how inauthentic the smile came out. Looking back on it, my smile ultimately failed because I was smiling with my mind and not my heart. Though as I got older, I learned how to fake it long before selfie sensation became a thing. Whether you are smiling from your brain or your heart, smiling is good for you. There are many studies on smiling and its positive effects on your body. Mantak Chia teaches the Taoist meditation called the Inner Smile to generate loving, healing energy in the body, focusing on the major organs and sending loving thoughts to each one.I have been practicing Mantak Chia’s Inner Smile meditation supplemented with the Feeling Prayer and have had very powerful effects. Perhaps the Inner Smile is supposed to be done this way. After understanding the way Braden described the feeling prayer it has given me greater understanding of the Inner Smile. It makes me feel really good and it is how I always practice the Inner Smile meditation now. I’ll go over how I like to practice these techniques in detail in the future.
In Closing
While I cannot say that I have experienced any miracles or witnessed anything that would fall into the paranormal, I can say that these meditations do have positive results. If nothing else the meditation and the information covered here help me feel really good and optimistic about our future. I honestly believe that if more people took the time to meditate on a regular basis there would be more happiness in our world. You don’t have to believe in a higher power and/or the scientific points that Gregg Braden shares. People from all walks of life and belief systems will benefit from it. The only requirements is an open mind, the will, a bit of time and space to practice regularly. Thank you for taking the time and allowing me to share this with you. I wish you the most kindest success!
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Master Mantak ChiaI am thrilled to spread the word that Mantak Chia is coming to Portland, Oregon! He will hold a three day workshop at the OHSU Wellness Center for in May from the 27th to the 29th. For more information visit Mantak Chia’s World Tour.This workshop will be covering:
Six Healing Sounds
Cosmic Inner Smile
Microcosmic Orbit
Healing Love
Iron Shirt Qigong
Dan in his cubicleAre you a drone in the cubicle hive culture? Are you familiar with being locked in an 8 x 10 foot cube for many hours of the week? Do you often crave a natural setting? I spend a huge chunk of my day in front of a computer screen working for a large corporation. I have slowly but steadily been feeling the long-term stress on my mental, spiritual, and physical health. I have been suffering from back pain for a couple years now. It started with lower back pain from sitting too much, then as the years piled on, I started getting upper back pain. My eyesight has gone nearsighted, because it is fixed to the distance of my computer monitor. Fatigue and back pain often lead to laying in bed alone a lot. I often come home tired and irritable. I found Mantak Chia online accidentally by rediscovering a nameless meditation that my father taught me, and after a year of watching his videos and reading his books, he changed my life. I have studied his videos on YouTube and even a number of his student’s videos. I have also read a number of his books, such as Iron Shirt Chi Kung 1. After skimming the book I realized that I needed to learn the Micro Cosmic Orbit to safely move the energy in my body for the Iron Shirt system. After buying the book I realized that I should practice the Inner Smile to ensure that I was circulating good energy in my body; I bought that book as well. Since then I have felt a lot of improvement in my life. I feel a lot more positive and have a lot more energy throughout the day. I hope to greatly improve on my practices by attending this workshop.Currently I am doing a morning routine that starts with yoga stretching (frog pose, upward-facing dog, pigeon pose, thread the needle pose, and the windshield wiper pose) which is extremely important for my back. I also do foam-roller work to help keep my back flexible. I like to follow up with Shaking or Shaking the Tree qigong to help loosen up the body and start to get the chi flowing. If I have the time I will sit down and do the Inner Smile. If I am pressed for time I will do the Inner Smile while I do the first Iron Shirt posture (Embracing the Tree). If I have time I will do the Holding the Golden Urn, if not I will do The Golden Turtle and The Water Buffalo. The turtle/buffalo postures are really hard, so I usually follow them up with Embracing the Tree again to let my energy calm down. Next I do the Iron Bridge, and collect the chi. I usually cool down with dry washing/wiping my body and finish with a Shake to make sure I don’t have any stuck qi. When doing the iron shirt, I am not moving energy around, which is because I am not ready to do that part of the practice; I am just holding the postures for now.
[fruitful_tabs type=”accordion” width=”100%” fit=”false”]
[fruitful_tab title=”If I have the time meditation routine:”]
Yoga:
Frog Pose
Upward-facing Dog
Pigeon
Thread the Needle Pose
Windshield Wiper Pose
Shaking
Inner Smile
Iron Shirt Qigong
Embracing the Tree
Holding the Golden Urn
The Golden Turtle
The Water Buffalo
Embracing the Tree
The Golden Phoenix Spreads Its Wings
The Iron Bridge
Collecting the chi
Dry washing/wiping
Shaking[/expand]
[/fruitful_tab]
[fruitful_tab title=”If I am short on time meditation routine:”]
Frog Pose
Upward-facing Dog
Pigeon
Thread the Needle Pose
Windshield Wiper Pose
Shaking
Inner Smile + Embracing the Tree
The Golden Turtle
The Water Buffalo
Embracing the Tree
The Iron Bridge
Collecting the chi
Dry washing/wiping
Shaking
[/fruitful_tab]
[/fruitful_tabs]
These practices help me save money by reducing visits to the massage therapist and chiropractor that I have depended on whenever my back is in crisis. I also do acupuncture every now and then, which I find really useful especially as I am new to these practices, I can clear any stuck energies that I might have placed unknowingly.My partner, Veronica, has noticed dramatic results with me since I have started practicing meditation. She says that I am in a better mood during the workweek. I am also more optimistic, better at problem solving, I smile more, and that my socializing skills have improved. It seems so simple now looking back, that when you are in a happy mood you are better at everything and everyone around you can feel it. I do feel that I have a lot more energy and a lot less stress in my body. I feel a lot less mentally tapped and emotionally drained from work and the hour long home commute. I feel hopeful and optimistic about our future. I have let go of the mentality that I am a victim of my circumstances; I prefer to believe that I am a co-creator in our reality that we all participate in–this attitude shift is such an empowering and inspirational way to live your life.
Stay tuned for reports on my experience at the Mantak Chia workshop!
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When going back into my past to offer up an ideal of my childhood, I wish I could conjure up images of a secluded Buddhist temple on a high misty mountain, where kung fu training happens, and monks walk around great golden shrines chanting about enlightenment, and that I had been handed down the secrets of immortality by the veneration of the past. -But this was not my story. As a child, meditation was a time when I couldn’t bother my father. It was a small barrier of time when the door was closed. Our secluded temple, I mean our three bedroom ranch in Las Vegas, was home to immigrant parents from Hong Kong and a first generation American toddler (that’s me of course).My father as a blackjack dealerMy dad was a blackjack dealer and my mother was a cocktail waitress at a casino. So far as I can recall, my memory keeps offering me up images of my father holding postures, partially unclothed, and sweating; they were brief glimpses of a practice that was intended to be behind closed doors. I didn’t know what he was doing in his underwear; I was told by mother that he was exercising and not to bother him. Once I was trying to spy on him through the crack between the door and the carpet; to get a better view I slowly opened the door to a small sliver, yet big enough for an eye to see. I thought I was doing some amazing ninja skills until he said, “No”, to which I responded by an immediate closing of the door.My mother kept a large collection of family photos that she stored in a big plastic bin. I always loved digging through them. There are a number of photos of my dad doing kung fu poses in Hong Kong. Later during my teens I started taking kung fu classes at a community college.Dan acting out as a childDespite my heart and dedication towards practicing, I felt that my skills were not where they should be. Our instructor was a burly ex-construction worker with a six foot something frame. With his long strong arms, I felt I needed an edge to survive his barrage of punches during sparring time. I remembered those pictures of my dad doing kung fu and asked him if he would teach me the meditation to make me stronger. He said that it would be hard and that I would have to do it everyday for 100 days. He also told me:
No sex
No drugs
No alcohol
This is what kung fu and meditation does to an adolescentI eventually broke two of the rules. In hindsight, I think the two abuses were a way for me to cope with being unpopular with the girls, or perhaps unpopular in general. I did maintain the great task of doing the meditation everyday for about three years, even when I was living in the dorms with a roommate in college. It must have been weird to open the door to see me standing in my underwear with my hands reaching out like I was hugging an imaginary person. I knew my roommate from high school; he was a good sport about it. Meditation during my formative years was largely about my ego and self esteem. I hoped that meditation practice would make me more confident.
My father’s explanation about the meditation wasn’t in depth. I didn’t even know what the name was. He had said it was tai chi, but I took a tai chi class in college, and it had no resemblance to it at all. He taught me the postures and the movements. He told me to put the tip of the tongue on the top of the roof of my mouth behind the teeth. I questioned if I was able to feel chi, but I kept practicing as it was an avenue to feel connected to my father and the exercise made me physically stronger. My father also told me that he paid a lot of money to learn it, so I felt obligated to keep up the practice. -plus it made me feel special.In my 30s I had stopped practicing the meditation. Life got busy and other interests grew. It wasn’t until 2015 when I was YouTubing at work, that I came across a video in where I recognized some of these postures that I had been practicing for so many years. It was an amazing moment for me. Finally, some answers for a mysterious practice that I carried on for years! I learned that this is known to many as Iron Shirt Chi Kung and had eight main postures.
Embracing the Tree
Holding the Golden Urn Yang
Holding the Golden Urn Yin
The Golden Turtle
The Water Buffalo
The Golden Phoenix Washes its Feathers
The Iron Bridge
The Iron Bar
There were some differences, most notably that there was a science to moving energy inside your body. Sadly, I could not share my new found discovery with my father. My father had passed away twelve years ago while I was in my graduate program, which I had to postpone to be with him during his passing. He had Hepatitis B, which gave him liver cancer. He stopped practicing his iron shirt for many decades, which I often wonder how he would have been if he hadn’t stopped.Now with this new information I started practicing Iron Shirt Chi Kung following the online instructions from Mantak Chia. Until this time in my life, I never realized how much Iron Shirt has been in and out of my life. When this meditation came back to me my body, mind, and spirit were not in a good place. Physically, my back was having a lot of issues that needed chiropractic work. My Sacroiliac Joint would get locked up during long hours of sitting or standing in front of a computer screen. My eyes started going near sighted and were often tired. Mentally and emotionally I was prone to being grumpy and tired. This often left me alone in bed all day. Spiritually I felt lost and life had been gradually losing its meaning. Meditation for me today means a source of salvation. This is one of the reasons why I started this website.
After weeks of meditation, the physical manifestation has begun: a pebble has been dropped and the ripples have been sent.
It is with great hope that this blog will help me in my spiritual journey and also be source of inspiration and good will to the global consciousness.
Taming the Tiger (Gung Gee Fook Fu Kuen), is an ancient Hung Gar kung fu form that came into my life just after high school. It was taught to me by Sihing Daniel Howard in the gymnasium of Clatsop Community College located in Astoria, Oregon. While Daniel was my instructor, he was not a master. Hung Gar traditionally does not have a belt system, so titles like sihing is a traditional formality that means older brother. Sihing taught me one of the oldest forms in Hung Gar that originated from the Southern Shaolin temple, which was destroyed by the Ching dynasty in the 17th century. Legend says, that the Five Elders of Shaolin survived and fled the famed monastery before it was burnt down.
Jee Sin was the Chan Buddhist master of the temple who had five pupils that became the Five Family Elders. One of the five is Hung Hei-gun, who later founded Hung Ga or Hung Gar. The other four also became founders of their own systems. Taming the Tiger is the first of the four pillars of Hung Gar and is thought to have originated from Jee Sin who passed it down to Hung Hei-gun. It took me two years to get to the first pillar of Hung Gar, which would be the last form that I learned from Sihing before I transferred to the U of O. Not too long after I left Astoria, Sihing Dan also parted ways by moving to San Francisco.
Two years later, I reconnected with Sihing Daniel by joining him under Sifu YC Wong for a summer in Chinatown. It was a great opportunity to learn from a well known master. His students really impressed me with their skill level. The first day at the school, Sifu asked to see my last form. After I struggled to remember Taming the Tiger, Sifu offered to re-teach me the form. I was a little disappointed that I couldn’t progress into a new form. It wasn’t until a decade later that I began to appreciate what relearning Taming the Tiger did for me. It gave me a strong foundation that helps me with other styles. Taming the Tiger is a long rigorous routine meant to strengthen the practitioner. Because the form is so long, I had to learned it one piece at a time from start to finish for many months. Taming this form was a name very well earned. While I did not know it for many years later, the “tiger” was not just in the form, but through the discipline of practice it became other things like subduing my pride and being patient with myself.
Understanding Form
Given the age of MMA and Brazilian jiu-jitsu, there is a lot of hype on ground game (wrestling). I know that Hung Gar favors low solid stances to avoid going down to the ground on the battlefield. I know that Chinese wresting, or Shuai jiao, is over 6,000 years old (4,000 BCE), which I believe would predate the Southern Shaolin temple. While most tend to focus on the striking tools from Hung Gar’s Taming the Tiger, I know that this form contains techniques to subdue wrestlers. In my research I am able to find a few examples. The following videos clips are sections in Taming the Tiger where I am able to interpret moves that can defend take downs. Are you able to see them? I plan to training these techniques and would like to share once I am able to pressure test them.
Did you ever forget how to smile? I did! I remember going to the mall to get these pictures. This was the first time I had professional pictures done with a professional background and a professional stranger taking our pictures. I felt the pressure to look good for the camera, and I couldn’t remember how to smile. There was no mirror around for me to figure it out, so I took my thumb and index finger and traced my lips to feel if it was making that arc in the shape of a smile. What I got is what you can see in the two pictures. It is pretty funny to me how inauthentic the smile came out. Looking back on it, my smile ultimately failed because I was smiling with my mind and not my heart. Though as I got older, I learned how to fake it long before selfie sensation became a thing. Whether you are smiling from your brain or your heart, smiling is good for you. There are many studies on smiling and its positive effects on your body. Mantak Chia teaches the Taoist meditation called the Inner Smile to generate loving, healing energy in the body, focusing on the major organs and sending loving thoughts to each one.
I have been practicing Mantak Chia’s Inner Smile meditation supplemented with the Feeling Prayer and have had very powerful effects. Perhaps the Inner Smile is supposed to be done this way. After understanding the way Braden described the feeling prayer it has given me greater understanding of the Inner Smile. It makes me feel really good and it is how I always practice the Inner Smile meditation now. I’ll go over how I like to practice these techniques in detail in the future.
There were some differences, most notably that there was a science to moving energy inside your body. Sadly, I could not share my new found discovery with my father. My father had passed away twelve years ago while I was in my graduate program, which I had to postpone to be with him during his passing. He had Hepatitis B, which gave him liver cancer. He stopped practicing his iron shirt for many decades, which I often wonder how he would have been if he hadn’t stopped.
Now with this new information I started practicing Iron Shirt Chi Kung following the online instructions from Mantak Chia. Until this time in my life, I never realized how much Iron Shirt has been in and out of my life. When this meditation came back to me my body, mind, and spirit were not in a good place. Physically, my back was having a lot of issues that needed chiropractic work. My Sacroiliac Joint would get locked up during long hours of sitting or standing in front of a computer screen. My eyes started going near sighted and were often tired. Mentally and emotionally I was prone to being grumpy and tired. This often left me alone in bed all day. Spiritually I felt lost and life had been gradually losing its meaning. Meditation for me today means a source of salvation. This is one of the reasons why I started this website. 
After weeks of meditation, the physical manifestation has begun: a pebble has been dropped and the ripples have been sent.
It is with great hope that this blog will help me in my spiritual journey and also be source of inspiration and good will to the global consciousness. 
