Last Tuesday evening I did a Nei Gong lesson, on Auric Connection. And I watched the Tai Chi Hurts video and the Path of Daoism lesson from Maryland 2022.

Wednesday: 50m Advanced Dantian Gong. Participated in Rick’s Zoom class; more Dao Palms, quite intense this time.

Thursday: I’m giving my foot a rest (acupuncture Wednesday helped but it’s not clear that it completely fixed the issue) so I skipped Tai Chi in the morning. 25m Dragon 3 in the afternoon, then an interruption came up so that was all the Nei Gong for the day.

(And, unfortunately, the acupuncture really didn’t fix the foot issue – some aspects are better but real problems are still there. So I’m doing much less standing Nei Gong and Tai Chi until that gets better – I want to give my foot as much time as possible to heal before going on vacation in a few weeks.)

Friday: 50m Dantian Gong, 20m Auric Connection.

Saturday: 40m Spleen Hui Chun. I did some of my regular Chen class, but I skipped most of it because of the aforementioned foot problem.

Sunday: No Tai Chi (foot); 35m Calm Abiding.

Monday: Du Stretch; 1h10m Microcosmic Orbit attempt, some Qi eventually made it up there but not a lot

Tuesday: I watched Foundations of Sitting Zoom class. Which was mostly theory, so my actual Nei Gong practice time was low today; the theory seemed familiar, I wonder if it was once in a different section of the library or if it was excerpted into a lesson in the course or if it’s just that he talks about the same thing in multiple places.

And it would be a Tai Chi week but I’m skipping that because of the foot problems. (And because the foot problems mean that I’ve only done Taiji Standing 6 once.)

The Tuesday lesson was Taiji Standing 6 – Shoulder Press. Been a while since I’ve done Taiji Standing, hopefully I’ll be up for it now.

Wednesday: 25m Wu Ji + Coiling Snake; I was surprised how, during the initial Wu Ji part, the front of my torso (Tian Tu and a little below that) wanted to sink decently strongly on its own. I attended Rick’s Zoom course. And I started looking for beta testers for the iPhone app I’m writing that, among other things, I use for suggesting Nei Gong exercises. (Probably everybody reading this saw that announcement, but if not and if you want more info, let me know.)

Thursday: Watched the Yang Taiji Basics Zoom class; I think probably I’ll spend some time going through the IAA Taiji Zoom classes instead of restarting the review of the 37 form videos. I did the 37 form, the Chen sword forms, and the Chen Lao Jia first and second forms. For Nei Gong I did 25m Dragon 3 and watched a recent Zoom class that Anastasia gave about seated Dantian Gong. And I reviewed the Hunyuan 48 in the evening.

Friday: 30m Wu Ji, 1h Dantian Gong and other seated work. I felt tingling not just in my abdomen but in other places, including my thigh, after that; not used to that feeling in my thigh. Though the downside is that, in the evening, the back of my knees ached, which I think is a sign of Jing depletion; not sure if that was because of something about practice or because sleep was bad the previous night.

Saturday: 40m Water Hui Chun; no Chen class today, I’m went to see my TCM doctor to talk about foot pain during that time slot. (Except that he didn’t actually do anything about the foot pain; I understand why but I’m still not thrilled.)

Sunday: The monthly advanced Chen class. 10m of bad Enquiry 3; I keep on bouncing off of that, I think I’ll just give up on it for now. And I started a Calm Abiding attempt but I was too sleepy so I stopped after 15 minutes. (I skipped my nap; was okay for doing normal stuff but not good if I wanted to do Nei Gong.)

Monday: Du Stretch, and 15m Wu Ji. And a 1h15m Microcosmic Orbit attempt; Qi got stuck for quite a while in the normal lower back place, and when it made it past there, it had a hard time making it through various other places in my lower back. It did eventually make it to the top, though; doesn’t feel like it’ll be as effective as it was last week but we’ll see how I feel the next couple of days. (Update from one day later: not completely ineffective but definitely not as strong an effect as the previous week.) At any rate, nice that it succeeded at all.

Tuesday: The Chen long weapon forms; my left hand was basically fine, yay. 20m each Taiji Standing 6 and Wu Song Shen Fa 1. And I went through the 37 form and the Chen Xinjia first form. For Nei Gong I did 30m Dragon 2 and 50m of the Being Present / Ming Men sequence.

I didn’t do a new lesson on Tuesday, I was too tired and I hadn’t done enough Tai Chi over the last few weeks to want to progress.

Wednesday: 25m surprisingly strong full moon practice. Then I went through the recording of Rick’s March 21 zoom, and took notes on the Dao Palms. Also, at the start of the recording when settling in, I felt like I was doing a better job of feeling what it means to sink flesh off the bones and to get my mind in that space, hopefully I can get better at that.

Thursday: I went through one of the sections of Practical Tai Chi Training. I did the Chen sword forms, 20m Wu Song Shen Fa 3, the 37 form, and the Chen Laojia first and second forms. For Nei Gong, I did a 20m stretching set, 30m Dragon 3, and 40m Water Hui Chun.

Friday: 25m Wu Ji + Ji Ben 1; 70m Dantian Gong + Qi Thickening + Dao Palms.

Saturday: Regular Chen class. And, unfortunately my left foot is hurting enough that I’m going to dial down standing Nei Gong stuff a bit, I think. (Update from a few days later: my foot is starting to get better, but it’s still not great; hopefully my TCM doctor can help but he’s out of town until Saturday. So, in the meantime, no long Wu Ji sessions.)

Sunday: A couple of hours of push hands. Working with Jason, the inside of my body is working a lot more than it had been – doing more, reacting more instinctively, being more effective. (Or maybe I’m noticing it more? But Jason found it surprising.) So that was very interesting, I hope I can build on that. And I did 35m of Calm Abiding in the afternoon.

Saturday: 1h Spinal Dao Yin, and 80m of my first successful Microcosmic Orbit attempt in months, yay. Things were stuck at the top of my lower back for ages, but my Dantian had felt quite full during the prep part of the attempt, and it felt like things had gone up the spine in a plausible location, so I decided to just sit and wait it out. And after 5-10 minutes (probably closer to 10, but who knows), it finally started moving past that clipping pass; it was still moving very slowly, so it took it ages for it to actually make it up the rest of my back and then to the top of my head (and down the middle of my body), but it did manage it eventually. So that was good, glad to be back at succeeding at that, hopefully I can build on that.

Tuesday: I went through the section in Practical Tai Chi Training on “Drawing Up Perineum on Inhale, Relaxing on Exhale”; surprisingly interesting / useful, it’ll help me in postures with one leg raised, I’d never really felt effects from my perineum before but now it’s starting to connect up in productive ways. I did Chen pole weapons for the first time in several weeks, and they went pretty well, yay; no left hand pain at all when doing the Guan Dao, the staff led to a couple of small jolts and the spear maybe one so things aren’t completely healed but they’re much better. And I went through the Chen Xinjia first form, paying attention to my perineum. For Nei Gong, I did the Du Stretch, 25m of Dragon 1, and I rewatched the Enquiry 3 video.