Sifu Wong Kiew Kit's Home Page

Questions-Answers Series

September 2007 (Part 3)

SELECTION OF QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

Question 1

Answer

Although we do not have an official syllabus for Shaolin Cosmos Chi Kung (Qigong) like the ones we have for Shaolin Kungfu and Wahnam Taijiquan, we do have some structural guidelines for our chi kung courses.

There are two categories of chi kung lessons we offer — regular classes taught by certified Shaolin Wahnam instructors and short courses taught by me.

The type of chi kung taught by our certified instructors is “Shaolin Eighteen Lohan Hands”, which is a set of chi kung dynamic patterns first taught by the great Bodhidharma at the Shaolin Temple. These eighteen Lohan Hands are taught in two parts:

1. Eighteen Lohan Hands Part 1, which is taught in three months
2. Eighteen Lohan Hands Part 2, which is also taught in three months

Regular classes are held twice a week. But if conditions warrant it, like when an instructor has to travel over great distance to teach a class, the time-table may be modified.

Short courses taught by me are of two main types:

1. regional courses
2. intensive courses

Regional courses are offered in various countries and are announced over my website as well as the Shaolin Wahnam website of the respective country. The following courses are available.

1. Generating Energy Flow.
2. Massaging Intenal Organs.
3. Cosmic Shower.
4. Internal Force.
5. Cosmic Breathing (Dan Tian Breathing)
6. Merging with the Cosmos (Sinew Metamorphosis).

Except for the first course, Generating Energy Flow, whcih is completed in six hours, each of the above courses is completed in 5 or less hours in one or two days.

In addition, the follow two courses are also available:

1. Eighteen Lohan Hands.
2. Eighteen Chi Kung Exercises of Shaolin Wahnam

Each of the above two courses is completed in about 10 hours in two days.

Intensive Chi Kung Courses are held in Malaysia, usually in Sungai Petani but also in Sabah. It is proposed that from next year some of the Intensive Chi Kung Courses may be held in Penang.

It is siginifcant to note that while Generating Energy Flow is the lowest of the courses offered, and Intensive Chi Kung Course the highest in terms of skills, the same three chi kung exercies are used in both courses. These three exercises are “Lifting the Sky”, “Pushing Mountains” and “Carrying the Moon”.

As the name tells, in Generating Energy Flow we use the three exercises to generate an energy flow. In an Intensive Chi Kung Course we use the three exercises to acquire many other skills, including tapping energy from the Cosmos, building a ball of energy, having a cosmic shower, building internal force, directing chi to flow to where we desire, massaging internal organs, clearing blockages, expanding the mind and merging with the Cosmos. In fact, taking an Intensive Chi Kung Course is like taking all the regional courses together.

It is also significant to note that when we say that our Generating Energy Flow is our lowest course, we are speaking relatively to our other courses. Compared to what most other people practice, this course is of a very high level. Again, many people not exposed to our arts will think that we are boastful. But we are only being courageous to speak the truth. Considering the fact that generating energy flow is the essence of chi kung, and less than 20% of those who practice chi kung today can generate an energy flow and they can do it only after many months, if not years, being able to generate a vigorous energy flow in just one day is certainly high level.

Why is generating an energy flow the essence of chi kung? It is because if you can't generate an energy flow, you would not get the core benefits of chi kung like overcoming illness, enjoying good health, having vitality and ensuring longevity. Indeed, without generating energy flow, one only practice chi kung patterns as gentle physical exercise.

Question 2

Answer

Stance training is very effective for developing your legs to be powerful and fast. The Horse-Riding Stance is not the only option, but it is an excellent choice. You can also practice other stances, like the Three-Circle Stance and the Single-Leg Stance. Besides stance training, you should also practice some leg-stretching exercises.

You should, however, perform stance training as chi kung and not as physical exercise as most people do nowadays. A crucial difference between chi kung and physical exercise is that chi kung works on energy whereas physical exercise works on the physical body like muscles and joints.

If you perform stance training as physical exercise, you legs will still be powerful, but you may not be fast. If you perform stance training as chi kung, your legs will be more power as well as fast. You will also be able to concentrate better.

Unless you have practiced genuine chi kung, it is likely that you may not understand what I have explained above. To make things simple, when you practice the stances, you need not worry about chi kung or physical exercise but be relaxed in your practice. Do not tense any muscles. The more relaxed you are, the better will be your result from stance training in making your legs powerful and fast.

When you do not tense your muscles, you will be unable to use muscular strength. Understandably, many people find it hard to believe how one can be powerful and fast by not using muscular strength. But this is true, and if you read the teachings of internal art masters who were very powerful and fast, you will find that all of them said the same thing, i.e. be relaxed and do not tense any muscles. They did not use muscular strength, they used internal force. And internal force is possible only when you are relaxed. Once you tense your muscles, you block the flow of internal force.

Question 3

Answer

My intensive courses as well as regional courses are announced on my website at https://shaolin.org. Courses taught by our certified Shaolin Wahnam instructors are also announced on their respective websites with links from my website. You can also find a list of certified Shaolin Wahnam instructors at https://www.shaolin.org/general/instructors-list.html

Question 4

Answer

It is important to practice consistently and regularly to obtain good results. It is recommended to practice twice a day, about 15 minutes per session. If you practice only once a while, you may have some novel sensations but not lasting benefits.

Question 5

Answer

If you follow the instructions respectfully from my books and practice regularly, you will obtain good results. Many people have written to thank me telling me that practicing from my books has helped them overcome various health and emotional problems. The results, of course, will be faster and better when students learn personally from me or our certified instructors.

Many people who had “fantastic results” by practicing from my books, later attended my intensive courses. They told me that the difference in benefits is incomparable. For example, if a person can generate an energy flow after practicing for six months from my books, would have remarkable result, considering that more than 75% of chi kung practitioners all over the world, including those who learn directly from teachers, do not have any experience of energy flow even after practicing for a few years. But students who attend my intensive courses can generate an energy flow on the very first day of the courses.

Question 6

Answer

This is right. “Smiling from the heart” is a hallmark of our teaching. In traditional Chinese medical philosophy, the heart is known as the “emperor organ” because it affects all other organs.

When you smile from your heart, your heart opens, which in Chinese means you are happy, and energy that blossoms out flows to all other orgtans and systems. The “heart” in Chinese is also the spiritual centre, and in Chinese the spiritual includes the emotional and the mental.

When your heart is strong, you are not only physically healthy, but also emotionally balanced, mentally sharp and spiritually joyful.

Question 7

Answer

If you feel stiff and unhappy, it is a sign that your heart is closing. There may be various intermediate causes, like adverse environment, mental stress, physical tension and viral attack, but your heart closing is the fundamental cause. In other words, these or other intermediate factors cause your heart to close.

In chi kung we work on the fundamental cause. Irrespective of what exactly the intermediate causes may be, once your heart opens, which will result in smooth energy flow, you will be relaxed and happy. This is understanding the philosophy, which forms one part of your task.

The other, more important, part is practical benefit, i.e. how you open your heart and how well you open your heart. An effective way to open your heart is to practice from my books, as you have done and have benefited. But you do so only occasionally, which means your heart is open only occasionally.

At other times your heart may be close, which may result in your being stiff and unhappy. If, for the sake of a hypothetical example, an epidemic breaks out or if you are exposed to extreme emotions, you may be physically or emotionally ill.

The second practical consideration is how well you can open your heart. If you open your heart only a little, as it is your case learning from books, your energy flow is little which is sufficient to make you relaxed and happy but insufficient to protect you from physical and emotional illness.

If you can open your heart a lot, which is usually possible only when you learn personally from a good teacher, your energy flow will be smooth and vigorous. This means not only you will be physically and emotionally healthy, even when an epidemic breaks out or being exposed to extreme emotions, you will have a lot of energy to enjoy your daily work and play, to enjoy longevity and to experience mental clarity and spiritual joys.

Question 8

Answer

When people say that they would love to attend my courses but cannot do so because of some reasons, it means they do not believe the value they can get from my courses is more than the sacrifice they have to make. Irrespective of whether they are millionaires or paupers, staying half a globe away or just next-door, attending my courses call for some sacrifice, and it is the first and usually the easiest of the sacrifice they have to make.

The most diffiuclt but paradoxially the most rewarding of sacrifice is to practice consistently and regularly what they have learnt in my courses. A student who lives half a globe away from me and who borrowed money to attend my course, is now a prominent instructor. A neighbour who lives a few doors away and whom I taught for free, is still suffering from the same illness which I have helped countless other students to overcome.

Honestly, I do not want those who are not ready, to attend my courses. I do not want them to waste their time and mine. But they can still get a lot of help as well as benefit from my Question-Answer Series as well as other Shaolin Wahnam on-line sources provided by me and other certified Shaolin Wahnam instructors.

Those who ask us to recommend other chi kung sources usually do not realize that there are many, many types of chi kung with vastly different results, ranging from the most basic benefit of being relaxed to the supreme attainment of returning to God. They also confuse chi kung exercise with gentle physical exercise, thinking that they can easily learn chi kung from books or videos. You appear to be one of them.

When someone comes to us for help, if there is an easier source even when we feel that this source is not as good as ours but is sufficient to overcome the seeker's problem, we usually point this out to him. If the other source is better than ours, we always recommend him to seek the better source. If we keep quiet about it, it means we do not know of any other sources.

The fact is that we keep quiet more often than make recommendations. This is simply because there are more occasions when we do not know of other sources.

Most of the people who seek our help have problems related to distorted energy flow or energy blockage. The main way to overcome these problems is generating energy flow.

But how many chi kung teachers or schools you know that teach generating energy flow? We do not know many. And the very few we know take a much longer time than we do to generate energy flow. They normally take months, some even years, to generate energy flow, whereas we take days or weeks.

This does not mean we are better than all the others, but it is a fact that we can teach our students generate their own energy flow in a few days, whereas most others will need months or years.

So, when people have serious problems which we beleive that energy flow will solve, we recommend them to take our courses. If their problems are not serious, we recommend them to seek a good chi kung teacher at their locality.

In your case, if your problem is merely being stiff and unhappy, you don't have to take our courses. You can overcome the problem by practicing some chi kung exercises from my books or even from our various Shaolin Wahnam webpages.

But if you want more advanced results, like a lot of energy to enjoy your daily work and play, or a glimpse of Cosmic Reality, and you want to learn the techniques and acquire the skills in just a few days, I would recommend that you apply for my Intensive Chi Kung Courses.

But please note that application does not guarantee aceptance, and even when you have been accepted, you still have to practice consistently and regularly on your own to obtain lasting benefits.

If you are not in a hurry and prefer to acquire these techniques and skills over a few months with regular supervision, I would recommend that you take a class from one of our certified Shaolin Wahnam instructors.

If you ask me to recommend other chi kung sources for similar results, I have to honestly say I don't know. This does not mean that we are the only school that practices genuine chi kung, as some critics wrongly and unfairly accuse us of claiming, but the fact remains that while other schools may be better than us in other aspects, as far as we know we are the only school that enables our students to generate energy flow, direct energy to flow to wherever we want, develop internal force, use traditional kungfu forms for sparring, and expand our mind into the Cosmos within a few days.

Congratulations for being a father soon. Being a father is one of the best things that can happen to any man. Treasure your children and wife dearly.

LINKS

Selected Reading

• Can You Recommend Another Master?
• Shaolin Kungfu against Boxing and Kick-Boxing
• The Wonders of Tantui Sequence 1
• Stances in Taijiquan and Shaolinquan
• Chi and Internal Force in Genuine, Traditional Taijiquan

Courses and Classes

• Intensive Chi Kung Course
• Intensive Shaolin Kungfu Course
• Intensive Taijiquan Course

• List of Certified Shaolin Wahnam Instructors

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