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!
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]
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[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.
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. 