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More feelings.

Submitted by michael young on 2012-03-30 22:24

I have noticed for about the last week that, when I properly breathe to dantien, I have a sense that something is moving down from mingmen and up from mingmen, both vertically. The upward movement goes all the way up my neck and stops there. It feels as though my breath is filling up the area around my spine from mingmen up and mingmen down the whole thing seems to inflate. This concerned me because I thought that there was not supposed to be any pressure in the neck. The feeling occurs during the inhale. The fuller the breath gets the farther up and down the fullness travels.

brief hello

Submitted by tonyfu on 2012-03-27 20:50

Hello Chi Factory Community and Sifu Kelley.

I have started the basic training as layed out in the first few vids, but have not had time to really delve into writing about my experiences thus far.  I hope to remedy that this week.

I wanted to also say how much i appreciate Sifu Kelley for sharing the teachings on such a level.  I have learned and taught kungfu, chen taiji, and some other misc arts over the years.  Getting such depth to instruction is a true rarity.

Different feelings

Submitted by michael young on 2012-03-27 07:54

I went back to lesson 3 expand to absorb condense to project. While doing the seated meditation I noticed soon in to it that I had a warm sensation in the dantien it seemed to be horizontal circle and not a sphere. That was new. I have felt a kind of fulness there before but not to the point that it felt like an actual shape or that I could feel its specific dimensions. Later, I noticed my mid back becoming either tense or feeling a stretch  or maybe both.

Bubbling well?

Submitted by michael young on 2012-03-24 19:18

While doing some training this morning, I noticed a tension or fullness on the bottom of my foot while doing the fajin exercises. That was a first! What's that about?

TJ Mar. 22, 2012

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on 2012-03-22 06:17

Thur. Mar. 22/12:  Going back to stage 1!  Time to go back and revisit the basics, besides Sifu says it's all just further refinement of the basics.  Sigong said, "If you guys cannot do absorb/project, opening and closing, expand and condense correctly... then you have not even begun training or learning my family art."  

Still going to keep up some of the opening exercises, etc., but focusing on stage 1 stuff when not in class.

TJ Mar. 20, 2012 "Meeting Sigong Sam Chin"

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on 2012-03-20 19:18

  This past weekend I drove down (or over rather) to Durham, NC to meet with Sibat Ben Fisher and his Durham ILC crew for a workshop with our Sigong GM Sam Chin.  I had a ton of expectations and ideas about what meeting GM Chin would be like, as well as what it would feel like to touch him.  And although Sifu does as good a job as can be done in class about trying to convey the essence of the feelings and conditions of the training, nothing could have prepared me for what I felt, no words could have accurately described it.

Fajin - fullness in the arms

Submitted by michael young on 2012-03-19 16:30

When doing the fajin exercises I could feel a wave of fullness come down my arms AFTER my arms had stopped. Is my timing off? Should the wave coincide with the movement?

The trickiest principle (maybe) of tai chi chuan!

Submitted by pjmca on 2012-03-09 22:49

Crown Suspending

Recent interesting and invaluable posts of a kung fu brother (if humbly I may say it) questioning about practice and his feelings and Sifu’s answers were inspiring and enlightening in many aspects. It enticed me to talk a little of my own practice feelings.

Simplicity over complexity.

Submitted by michael young on 2012-03-09 09:06

I have a good friend who has no grid for understanding the principles of internal martial arts because his back ground is in tae kwon do. I have nearly no grid for them and I have a background in the internal martial arts! : ) 

Just do it.

Submitted by michael young on 2012-03-09 08:55

I am seeing quickly how that we must lose all assumptions as to what we are trying to accomplish in this training. Not that it is esoteric or mystical and undefinable. But, that it is just completely different than the assumption is on the front end. What we think we are looking for is not what we are looking for. We assume that we need to learn this skill when we actually need to let that skill go or reserve for another time so that it can be refined. Simply doing the curriculum is what is needed. There is a mystery to what we are doing but it is not mystical.

Everything seems backwards today...

Submitted by michael young on 2012-03-08 08:56

While doing some training this morning I began with the warm up, some standing and then the bitter pill. I noticed a few things.

1. I still get a stressed or strained feeling on the outsides of my knees as if the tendons are being overstretched.

2. I notice that while standing over time it becomes more difficult to breathe down to into Dan tien. Everything begins to feel tight and the breath feels like it has to rise up instead of sinking down.