This website is dedicated to the Students of Seifu A.S. Umar Sharif, MA. It is also dedicated to the promotion and propagation of the Traditional Afro-Asian Martial and Healing Arts. Our goal is to inform, educate, inspire, encourage, and motivate others to improve their lives by applying The Wisdom of the Ancients.
As your teacher and host, Seifu Sharif [aka: Xia` Xue' Gong] [aka: Tobi Alakoso] is dedicated to helping each of you to remember and nurture the Spirit of Wu-Te and the powers dormant within you.
Self-Imposed Discipline Part II
Change, Qi, and Qigong
Namaste’ Students and Fellow Martial Arts Enthusiasts!
May 19th was the last day of our 21-Day Challenge for Self-Mandated Change if you decided to start on the day that I posted my last Blog. There really isn’t any need to broadcast your self-imposed efforts to change some aspect of your life. After all, it is your life, and you are the one who will have to live with the consequences of your choices. You’re probably heard the expression, ‘If you continue to do the same thing, you are bound to continue to get the same results.’ So, if you are dissatisfied with some aspect of your life, be it your health, your relationships, your finances, your level of education, your level of martial arts training, or whatever, the only way to change the situation from one of dissatisfaction to satisfaction is to do something different.
No individual who has risen to a level of greatness has done so without challenging themselves to do something different and then imposing the necessary discipline on themselves to accomplish the goal. The reward of such efforts cannot be understated. It feels great to achieve the positive changes that you have imposed on yourself. In fact, I’m already thinking about the next positive lifestyle change I want to make. That’s what it is you know! Any permanent change of positive consequence ultimately must be a lifestyle change because something has to be removed permanently from your daily habits of behavior and replaced with something better, something that serves you better. That is why it is so important to fill-the-void as I mentioned in my last Post.
I recommended using Qigong as a meaningful activity to fill-the-void. Lets talk a little bit about why I make that recommendation. It has to do with understanding what the word Qi represents. Here is a question for you. What is the ultimate source and essential reality that sponsors and supports the process of the coming and going, the manifestation and flourishing, the weakening and disintegration of everything? In the 7 Circles System we use two words to answer that question. One word represents the Shaolin perspective of China and the other represents the Ifa perspective of West Africa. In Chinese we refer to Qi and in Kwa (the Yoruba language) we say Ase (ah-shay-ay).
The Chinese Perspective on Qi
According to Lin Housheng and Luo Peiyu, “Qi (vital energy) is something by which the ancient people understood the phenomena of nature.” The first conceptualizations of the presence of Qi came about by observing the natural environment in all of its manifestations. They go on, “They considered Qi to be the essential substance forming the world and through its movement and change to be the cause of things coming into existence in the universe.” It is this notion of the intrinsic nature of Qi that in turn leads to the medical view that “Qi is the fundamental substance to constitute the human body and that its movement and change account for the activities of life.”
The ancient texts are replete with statements that express the idea that ‘human life solely depends on Qi’ and ‘a thing takes shape when Qi accumulates, and the thing dies out when Qi dissipates’. In other words, your ability to bring about change is depending upon your ability to potentiate and manipulate all of the sources of Qi, Original or Primordial Qi, Earth Qi, Environmental Qi, Visceral Qi, and Heavenly Qi. This is the significance of the Taoist symbol of Yin-Yang. It represents the constant interplay between the two essential qualities of Qi, positive and negative, hard and soft, hot and cold, light and dark, pushing and pulling, ebb and flow, coming and going, active and inactive, movement and stillness, etc.
According to Simon Wang, M.D., Ph.D. and Julius L. Liu, M.D., Qi is regarded as “the only elemental substance that possesses force or energy in the universe. At the very original stage of initiation of the universe, there was nothing but Qi.” In other words Qi lies at the root of everything in creation. “Because of the function and movement of Qi, the nature occurred and developed into the universe, so did the earth, man and everything else, all of which are interrelated, interacted, interchanged and interdependent.” So when you engage in Self-Mandated Change you are actually engaged in the process of manipulating the essential element of the creation and dissolution of things, Qi or Ase.
“The universe has everything you can think of. As the result of Qi man was formed as a microcosm of the universe, a little universe, which has everything you can think of as well. The universe has Qi as the essential energy and so does man. The universe has spirit, so does man. The earth consists of water mostly, so does man (water constitutes about 75 percent or more of the body). The universe has the sun and the moon, rain and thunder while man has the head, eyes, tears and voice. The earth has mountains, valleys, plains, rivers, trees, and grasses while man has the shoulders, armpits, belly, vessels and hair. The mountains can smile and the rivers can sing, so can man. The earth can be polluted and sick, so can man. The universe needs the balance and the harmony of Qi, so does man. Both the universe and man obey the same laws.”
The Ifa Perspective on Ase
The Me’je Oruka branch of the 7 Circles System is rooted in the Ifa tradition of Nigeria, West Africa. From the Ifa perspective, in the beginning there was nothing but the Ase, the black material of the darkness from which all things come, the Realm of Infinite Possibility. The first thing to emerge within the Ase was consciousness. The Ase became self-aware, a Sentient Being. It is this Sentient Being, Olodumare who calls into existence the creative process. This is Olofi-dumare, the One who calls to the material of the darkness and says to it come forth, willingly and unwillingly, and the Ase takes forms in response to thought, will, and intention.
As you can hopefully see the essential idea of both perspectives points to the same truth, that is, you and I have the ability to change the configuration of the universe, especially or most directly as it related to your or my personal everyday reality. The various styles that we employ in the Me’je Oruka aspect of the 7 Circles System are based not on animals (as in our Shaolin Kung Fu) but on the various Orisa (sentient energy forms that exist by the will of Olodumare). In a broader sense we not only practice these Orisa styles but also use ritual, ceremony, fasting, and prayer to conjure the Ase and bind our movements to its flow.
Qigong in general is the way of cultivating Qi inside the human body. Internal Qigong focuses on moving the Qi internally for health, healing, and self-defense while External Qigong focuses on techniques for extending Qi outside the body for health, healing, self-defense, and affecting the external environment. Another division or branch of Qigong practice is the distinction between Hard Qigong versus Soft Qigong. You can use Qigong practice as a way of adding energy, a tail wind to all of your other endeavors. Qigong practice can be a moving meditation full of the essential energy of creation, or a static practice focused on experiencing and manipulating subtle Qi energy. Change, Qi, and Qigong practice are all intimately connected to each other.
Useful references:
Qigong For Health & Longevity – The Ancient Chinese Art Of Relaxation / Meditation / Physical Fitness, Simon Wang, M.D., Ph.D. & Julius L. Liu, M.D., The Eastern Health Development Group, Tustin, CA, USA, ISBN: 0-9641605-2-8
300 Questions On Qigong Exercises, Lin Housheng and Luo Peiyu, Guangdong Science and Technology Press, Guangdong Province, China, ISBN: 7-5359-1269-9/R - 232
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It is not simply practice that makes perfect. It is perfect practice and consistent practice that makes perfect.
