Chinese Wushu Series

Wushu Exercise

for Life

Enhancement

Yu Gongbao

FOREIGN LANGUAGES PRESS BEUING

Contents

Introduction                                                                                             1
Basic Principles of Wushu Exercise for Life Enhancement     10
Main Schools of Wushu Exercise for Life Enhancement         14
Instructions for Beginners                                                                 20
The Basic Wushu Method Sitting Exercise                                   28
The Unique Wushu Method Standing Pole                                   33
Yi Jin Jing (Sinew-Transforming Exercise)                                 48
Eight-Trigram Internal Exercise                                                       57
Exercise for Opening and Closing of Yin and Yang                    69
practice of internal exercise.

Numerous researchers and practitioners have carried motion o its practic, absoring userus ba and pro Chinese phillosophy and medicine. This constiutes the basis of the theory and prats lene sha enertile for valuable system for preventing and curing disease and

prolonging life

Wushu exercise for life enhancement, also known as Wushu Qigong or internal Wushu exercise, is a system that can improve the internal conditions of the human body, hence benefiting one’s physical and mental wellbeing and prolonging life. The word internal here has several meanings. First, it refers to consciousness. Consciousness is the dominant factor of vital activities, and its purity is necessary for one’s physical health. Second, it refers to essence, vital energy and spirit. These, considered by the theory of life enhancement to be quintessential and minuscule substances of the human body, are known as the “three internal treasures.” (The sun the moon and the stars are known as the “three external treasures.”) Third, it refers to the law of one’s life pro cesses, such as the relationship between the internal organs and the growth and development of each organ.

Wushu Qigong, one of the five major categories of traditional Chinese Qigong, has intermingled with the other four-the Buddhist, Daoist (Taoist), Confucian and medical Qigong. Chinese Qigong as awhole is asystem of both theory and practice for improving physical fitness, curing disease, prolonging life and cultivating the mind, its various schools and exercises having developed from roots of culture in ancient China. As

one school of Chinese Qigong, Wushu Qigong shares the features common to the entire system:

(1) Wushu Qigong has widely absorbed ideas about the constitution of the world and the laws of motion from ancient Chinese philosophy. It has made these the theoretical basis for the many philosophical concepts embodied in its practice.

For instance, gi (vital energy) is considered to be the source of the constitution of the world and the material basis of vital activities. Qi can coordinate the functioning of the various parts of a system; it is therefore the major factor for the maintenance of normal activities in the human body and also the focus of Qigong exercise. In fact, some people have defined Qigong as “the exercise to process, improve and cultivate the gi of life”

Tai l is a second theoretical stone in the foundation of Qigong. Everything has two aspects, yin and yang, which are both opposed to and united with each other. Tai Ji refers to the balance and coexistence of yin and yang. The Tai Ji chart, known as “the illustration of the

 

Fig. 1-1 The Tai i Chart