台北市氣功文化學會製作
練功與武術之心得
／賀安莉 (Ann Marie)
When I started practicing chikung here I didn’t know what it was going to be like. I wasn’t prepared during the first class to have to remember so much, so I felt a lot of emotions! A new way to breathe! My muscles had to move in a way they never had before and refused to cooperate! And, my body couldn’t begin to try to bend the way it was supposed to bend in class! Worst of all, it seemed like everyone else in class could do the practice so easily and so well, but I had no idea if I was even doing it right or not! It was quite frustrating to say the least!
Then I remembered that I was just a beginner, so I’m not supposed to know how to do it “right”. All I could be responsible for was to “just do it” and follow the directions as best I could. I figured if I just did the practice, changes and adjustments would happen slowly and naturally. So, I decided to be happy being a beginner for as long as I practice chikung. Whenever I try to be an expert and know how to do it right, I create problems for myself.
I have found that practicing chikung is not like doing other exercises to build strength or to tone your body. Those exercises have a “correct” form which your physical body can master. But in practicing chikung it seems like the practice changes as both my body and mind change in a wonderful way without a point of mastery.
Teacher Chung gives very few directions on how to practice chikung. He mostly just shows us what we need to do. His main direction is “don’t think”. I just discovered after all this time that when I am concerned about doing the practice “right”, I’m mostly using my brain to do the practice and not using my body, too.
I have found that when I get frustrated in the practice of chikung or kung fu, it can be a sign to me that something in my mind or body is telling me it is ready to make a change. It’s just like a two-year-old child who has a temper tantrum (兩歲小孩脾氣暴躁): he wants to do something but can’t yet tell people what it is, so he gets frustrated and angry. Perhaps in kung fu class when I “lose” a fight or get injured or in fundamental chikung class when I feel helpless trying to do something and feel so frustrated, these are just a sign that something is starting to open up in me to make a change. Seeing frustrations from this point of view will give us the optimism that we can further on in our practice.