How to Learn Qigong from Chinese Medicine Classics

Resource:
*How to Practice Qigong: The Basics and Principles*

Doctors throughout the history of traditional Chinese medicine have contributed greatly to the development of qigong. Many Chinese medicine classics recorded the ways to practice qigong as important methods for health promotion and disease healing. These valuable descriptions provide both instructions and experiences on how to practice qigong well.

In the earliest traditional Chinese medicine classic The Yellow Emperor’s Internal Classic, qigong principles, training methods, and effects were explained systematically. For example, one should “keep calm and clear, and genuine qi will follow. Guard the mind inside, and disease will not come…. Exhale and inhale essence qi, concentrate the mind, and unite the muscles and flesh as one….”

In the classic Treatise on Febrile and Miscellaneous Diseases (about 3rd century A.D.) written by “the medical saint” Dr. Zhongjing Zhang, there were methods on how to use qigong to treat diseases. For example, “as soon as the limbs feel heavy and sluggish, immediately use qigong, exhalation-inhalation methods, acupuncture, and massage through rubbing with ointment, to prevent the nine orifices from closing up.”

Another renowned physician at the same time with Dr. Zhang, “the magic doctor” Tuo Hua created a set of fitness exercises based on ancient qigong. This exercise was the famous “Five-Animal Game.” Through mimicking the movements and gestures of the tiger, the deer, the bear, the ape, and the bird, this exercise can help one with “smooth blood circulation to prevent diseases.”

A well-known physician in the Eastern Jin Dynasty, Dr. Hong Ge, pointed out in his classical book Baopu Zi’s Inner Treatise that there are a variety of methods in practicing qigong, including “flexing or stretching, bending or up-facing, walking or lying down, leaning or standing, pacing or strolling, chanting or breathing.” He emphasized that qigong should be used to “prevent diseases, to smooth out the disharmony of qi. The movements will help qi flow smoothly everywhere.” He mentioned that through exhalation and inhalation, expiration and inspiration, one can “guide qi” to “promote health internally, and eliminate pathogenic factors externally.”

In the Ming Dynasty, the famous physician and pharmacist Shizhen Li (1518-1593) recorded in his A Study on the Eight Extra Channels, that “the inner scene and channels can be perceived clearly only by those who can see inwards.” He also wrote the classic The Guidebook to Acupuncture and Moxibustion. In this book, he pointed out that those who learn acupuncture and moxibustion should practice meditation first. Only through doing so, could the practitioner really understand the theories of “the circulation of qi and the blood.”