This week’s lesson was a Nei Gong one, on Four Gates Breathing. Good timing for me: over the last month, when I do the basic stretch that has us pushing our hands up and curving so we get pressure from your foot on one side to that side of your body to your hands, I’d been noticing a really strong connection to my Lao Gong. So I think internal connections to my Lao Gong (and to my Yong Quan, though not as strong there) have been building pretty well recently; and linking that up to breathing is helpful.

Wednesday: 75m Wu Ji. I kind of wonder why I’m sweating so much during Wu Ji these days (that happened on Monday too), given that it doesn’t feel like I’m exerting all that much muscular effort? And 40m surprisingly sleepy seated work, mostly DTG but including 10m of Four Gates. Or rather, it was surprising at the time (and I was a little disappointed at the time that I did 75m of Wu Ji instead of 90m), but I came down with a (quite mild) cold the next day, so me stopping Wu Ji earlier was in retrospect a good thing, me paying attention to what my body was saying. Also I decided to go back to one round of neck rotations per day: I think three might be stressing my neck a bit too much, and it certainly wasn’t hurting anything.

Thursday: I reviewed Cloud Hands; I’m going to spend a bit of time on isolated practice for that. I went through the Chen pole weapons forms and the Double Dao form, and I did 20m each of Taiji Standing 2 and Cloud Hands. I started to feel weirdly tired at the end of that, though, that’s when I decided that I might be coming down with a cold. So I just went through the 37 form and the Xin Jia first form once each. And in the afternoon, I just went through the Du Stretch video and did 30m of breathing, and I skipped the Hunyuan 48 review in the evening.

Friday: Just 20m of breathing.

Saturday: 20m of Four Gates Breathing; and I skipped Chen Tai Chi class. (A good week for that, fortunately, since my teacher is out of town.)

Sunday: I just did some Shui Gong 1; I was actually feeling noticeably better, it’s just that spent all day up in San Francisco playing board games with a friend I hadn’t seen for months.

Monday: Starting to ramp up again: the Du Stretch video, 20m Wu Ji, 50m of sitting (mostly Dantian Gong), and a stroll.

Tuesday: 20m each of Reverse Stretch and Cloud Hands; and I went through the 37 form 3 times and the, Lao Jia first and second forms. And in the afternoon I watched Rick’s September 6 Zoom class and did 20m of Four Gates Breathing.

This week’s lesson was a Taiji one, on Reverse Stretch. Seems interesting enough?

Wednesday: I did 75m of Wu Ji; it was a good session, my main focus was on getting an an appropriate stretch in my left Kua, hopefully I made progress there. And I did 40m of good Dantian Gong.

Thursday: I watched the Taiji Standing 2 video, since I feel like it’s time to switch over to that one. I practice my Chen pole forms and Double Dao; I did ten minutes each of Taiji Standing 2 and Reverse Stretch; I went through the 37 form three times and the, Xin Jia form once. In the afternoon, I realized I was getting too distracted by a game I’m playing, I’m going to have to start building in longer break times from it, I think it’s interfering slightly both with my practice and my sleep. (And I’ve been decently successful at putting that into practice the rest of the week, fortunately.) For Nei Gong I did 25m of Du Stretch, 15m of Awakening Dragon, 40m of Sun and Moon Turning, and 25m paying attention to the breath. And I did my regular Hunyuan 48 review in the evening.

Friday: 45m Wu Ji; 1h Microcosmic Orbit attempt. Which I think worked, but not as well as two weeks ago? The Qi going up kind of bypassed the usual sticking point in my back, and then it seemed to split, with half (probably a little more than half) going to the Yellow Court or some place like that and hanging out, and the rest going up. But it did seem to go up and make the full circuit. Not sure what was going on there; also for what it’s worth it was moving a lot faster than a couple of weeks ago. We’ll see how I feel tomorrow, if I have aftereffects in my body like I did two weeks ago and, if so, how strong they are. (Update: no strong noticeable aftereffects the next day.)

Saturday: I did 40m of Sun and Moon Turning and went through the four Dragon. I had my regular Chen Tai Chi class, and I led Silk Reeling during that. Which means I have to think about what I want to show my teacher; probably the Xin Jia form? I’ve got some extra time to decide, because I think he’s in China for the next two Saturdays.

Sunday: 25m of a combination of Wu Ji / Ji Ben 1 / Ji Ben 4, and 20m of Awakening Dragon. And I did 50m Bellows Breathing / Martial Breathing attempt / Calm Abiding; nothing particular to report, I had an okay Ming Line during the Martial Breathing attempt and I felt like my abdomen was maybe thinking a little about doing it but ultimately it didn’t.

Monday: 45m Spinal Dao Yin, 40m Dantian Gong.

Tuesday: I reviewed Repulse Monkey into Diagonal Flying. I did 20 minutes each of Taiji Standing 2 and Reverse Stretch, I went through the 37 form four times, and the Hunyuan 48 form and the Lao Jia 1/2 forms once each, and I went through the Chen sword forms. I had an acupuncture appointment that went long, so the only Nei Gong I did was 30m of paying attention to my breathing. And I think I’m going to pause acupuncture, at least with my current doctor; I am going to ask one of my fellow Tai Chi students about the doctor she goes to and potentially I’ll give that one a try.

Last week’s lesson was a Nei Gong one, on Sun and Moon Turning. It didn’t really fit into my schedule last week so I only did it once, I should find more time for it this week.

Wednesday: I did 40m of Dantian Gong, and took Rick’s Zoom class, covering some bits of Awakening Dragon. (I still need to watch the full video of the previous Saturday’s class, hopefully I can do that this week.)

Thursday: I did 20 minutes each of Taiji Standing 1, Torso Movement, and WSSF1, and I went through the 37 form 3 times and the Xin Jia form once. And in the afternoon I went through the Spine Spa video; I continue to like it quite a bit but I think I don’t want to have it take up all of my Nei Gong practice time one day every four weeks, given that I’m getting what seems to be an effective amount of spine stretching in other ways. So I’m going to swap it in the rotation with the Sinew Work Principles class; I think I’ll try to do the Du Stretch once a week, though, I could use that level of work on my spine and hamstrings. And I did my regular Hunyuan 48 review in the evening.

Friday: I got way too distracted goofing off in the middle of the afternoon, so all I did was about 30m of Awakening Dragon-related stuff. It felt really strong, though, at least…

Saturday: For Nei Gong, I did 30m of Advanced Dantian Gong and I went through all four Dragons; glad I did the latter, I’m on the edge of forgetting some bits of those. And I did my regular Chen Tai Chi class; I got back to doing long versions of the Silk Reeling exercises, this time was Kua Circling In With a Kick. (Which, unsurprisingly, didn’t benefit from being done for longer.)

Sunday: I did 20m of Hunyuan Qigong exercises, and went to the regular Sunday Tai Chi class. I got info there about a local Push Hands group, maybe I’ll start doing that most Sundays. And I spent 10m paying attention to breathing; and then I planned to do Scholar breathing in the afternoon, and since I slept well I was optimistic that I didn’t need a nap, but that turned out to be false, so I gave up on that sit after 30m and me repeatedly dozing off briefly during it.

Monday: 1h of very good Wu Ji; wish I could have gone longer but I wanted to leave time for an MCO attempt. Just as a note for myself during my next session: I started by relaxing near my pelvic bone like Rick’s been telling us, and made sure that that led to a stretch behind my butt into my lower Kua as I sank down. And then once I got my feet weight in the proper position, I tuned in there, and the stretch coming up the Yong Quan linked in well, so I felt pretty strongly supported in my lower body in a way that made it easier to create a stretch by sinking. And that stayed surprisingly strong the whole time. Though I noticed it was weaker on my left side, which isn’t too surprising since I’ve always been asymmetric there, but I found that it was easier to try to reduce the asymmetry by sinking more into the stretch on the left than to try to figure out the asymmetry by sensing my body positionally; hopefully that can build up my left side more if I stick with that? (Though of course I also should spend more time doing Wu Ji in front of a mirror…) So that was good; and I was optimistic about the MCO attempt, since the last one had gone well and my spine had been feeling good all day. And the prep seemed fine, but the attempt itself was kind of a dud; basically, I got stuck at the same spot as I had frequently gotten stuck at in the past, and while maybe a little bit of Qi made it past there and even up to my head, it was only a tiny amount and even that tiny amount didn’t really complete a cycle. So that’s too bad, I guess I still have more work to do. (Random thought – I feel like, in the previous successful attempt, I didn’t spend as much time thickening first as I’ve been in the habit of doing? So maybe I should dial that down some: Damo always does some thickening when teaching MCO, in my experience, but also last summer he did say that your Qi kind of craps out after doing a certain amount of it.)

Tuesday: I had both an acupuncture appointment and a dentist appointment in the afternoon, so the only Nei Gong I did was 25m of Sun and Moon Turning. And my Tai Chi practice was a bit shorter than normal; I went through the Chen sword forms (and I think I have the basic shapes of the Double Dao more or less in place now?), Taiji Standing 1, Torso Rotation, and two repetitions of the 37 form and one of the Lao Jia 1st/2nd forms. Taiji Standing 1 is making less of a dramatic difference than it was a few weeks back when I started doing it, so probably I should move on to Taiji Standing 2 on Thursday, I should have time to go through that several times before I hit Taiji Standing 5 in the regular sequence of lessons.

Last week’s lesson was Torso Movement, from the Taji course. And it was paired with Push Hands – Roll Back, that looks like one that’s worth trying some Saturday, though I wasn’t able to try it out this week.

Wednesday: I did 1h Wu Ji, 1h seated stuff (mostly Dantian Gong). Both really good, my abdomen felt really full and tissues were doing interesting things. And I started using the CPAP – for now it’s interfering with my sleep more than it’s helping.

Thursday: For Tai Chi, I reviewed 37 form Punch Under Elbow; 37 form x3; 10m Torso Movement; I recorded a video of me doing the First Road; I went through the Chen sword weapons; and did the Xin Jia form. I asked in the IAA Discord for feedback on the video, and I got some useful pointers, but also just watching it gave me some ideas; I should probably record more of my forms (especially ones that I think are getting solid), I bet I’d see a bunch of stuff on video. (Maybe I should ask some of my fellow Chen students if they want to review videos?) For Nei Gong I did 30m Awakening Dragon, 30m paying attention to the breath, 30m Song Breathing. And in the evening I did my regular Hunyuan 48 review.

Friday: 35m Spine Shoulder Dao Yin. And then I did a 75m Microcosmic Orbit attempt; I wasn’t super optimistic during the prep, my Qi wasn’t feeling as intense as it had on Wednesday, and when I kicked off the attempt proper, it didn’t seem like I had any more Qi going up than in prior attempts. But it kept on going up (and was going up in a narrower column than before); I think maybe the spine work I’ve been doing (e.g. the Awakening Dragon at the workshop, but also a lot more Spine Waves during the day) has had an effect? It took 10-15 minutes to make its way up (and 10-15 minutes again to make its way down after that), but it really did seem to be the full Orbit. (Which I succeeded in for the first time in ages, and it’s only the second time I’ve done it in a non-workshop context.) Pretty unexpected, because I’d been stuck at the same place for a while, and that place wasn’t particularly close to the top of my head, but I’ll take it!

Saturday: minimal Nei Gong, just a bit of Awakening Dragon practice; and I did my regular Saturday Chen class. But my body felt really good inside; not sure if it’s lingering effects from the workshop or that I’ve been working on my spine or side effects of the MCO work or if it’s the CPAP (though I actually didn’t use the CPAP on Friday night) or if it’s just random or what, but I feel like I’m noticeably more full of Qi than I every have been in the past. (And it’s a broader sort of fullness – sometimes in the past after a good session I’ve felt noticeably tingling along my Ming Line, but this is different.) And Tai Chi was, as a result, quite a bit more interesting than normal. And, looking ahead, that fullness is still present in my body as I’m writing this; not as strongly as on Saturday, but not nothing. So hopefully something has changed; and hopefully I can keep it up through a combination of spine work and Microcosmic Orbit work? We’ll see.

Sunday: I went through the Chen pole weapons; the Lao Jia first and second form; the Hunyuan 48 form. And I did 20m Wu Ji, 30m Anchoring the Breath, 30m Calm Abiding.

Monday: I had a stiff back after I woke up; didn’t mess me up too much, though, but maybe kept the Wu Ji short? Though I think that was really mostly a mental thing… At any rate, I did 65m Wu Ji (which would be fine if my target had been 60 minutes but not great with a 90 minute target!), and 60m DTG and other seated stuff, both of which were quite intense.

Tuesday: 20m each of Taiji Standing 1 and Torso Movement, the 37 form 3 times, the Xin Jia form, and all the Chen sword forms. I watched Rick’s September 6 Zoom class recording, but it was weirdly truncated; hopefully that’ll get fixed. And then I did 30 minutes of observing the breath and 30 minutes of Calm Abiding. Also, my TCM doctor continued to claim that my sleep apnea is related to / caused by an enlarged disc at my C3 / C4 vertebrae, and that doing neck rotations will help; I’ve been doing the quantity of neck rotations that he’s recommended for the last through years and it hasn’t helped, but honestly I’m not sure I’ve got the quality right? So I’ll slow them down and try to Song more, and I’ll do three sets a day instead of one, we’ll see if that helps.

Anyways, a really good week overall, I’m happy very happy with that, it feels great to be able to concretely see what the (or a) next step in my practice might feel like.

I didn’t do a new lesson on Tuesday. But I did review the lesson about stretching your palate, and I added in a recurring daily reminder for that, we’ll see what results from it.

Wednesday: My sleep was bad; it’s been happening a few days in a row, noticeably worse than a week or two ago. I haven’t been doing as much back stretching during the day, maybe that’s relevant, I should get back to doing that. (Update: I did, and I slept much better the rest of the week.) And then two unexpected outside interruptions happened this afternoon, so I didn’t have as much Nei Gong time as normal; I did 15m of Wu Ji, an hour of seated stuff (Dantian Gong, thickening, and a less successful than normal MCO attempt).

Thursday: I went through the Chen sword weapon forms; I did 20 minutes each of Taiji Standing 1, Sinking the Qi, and Wu Song Shen Fa 1; I went through the 37 form 4 times; I went through the Xin Jia form; and I took a walk. In the afternoon, I went through the recording of Rick’s August 16 zoom class and did 30m Calm Abiding.

Friday: A travel day; I did 20m Leg Rotations and a sleepy 25m just breathing.

Saturday / Sunday: A Foundations workshop, focused on the first Dragon. Maybe the most interesting Foundations weekend that I went into? That Dragon was feeling really interesting this time, and I think Rick’s emphasizing the importance of absorbing into the process is finally starting to sink in for me.

Monday: A good Wu Ji session 90m, which is the longest I’ve done in a while; I had a very stable base; my lower back had a pleasant stretch that never really got painful; there was something active going on in my tailbone; and, quite close to the end, my upper torso and shoulders decided they wanted to spend a few minutes expanding rather strongly. And then I did an hour of DTG/thickening.

Tuesday: I reviewed Tiger Returns to the Mountain; I did 20 minutes each of Sinking the Qi, Wu Song Shen Fa 3, and Taiji Standing 1; I went through the 37 form 3 times, the Lao Jia 1st and 2nd forms, and the Hunyuan 48 form, and I took a walk. And in the afternoon I did 25 minutes of Leg Rotations, 30 minutes each of just breathing and of Song Breathing, and 30 minutes of the first Dragon (some focusing on isolated parts and some of the whole sequence). And my CPAP arrived, so I guess I’ll start using that tonight, we’ll see how it affects my sleep and energy levels.