SIFU TERRY DUNN'S TAI CHI FOR HEALTH & QIGONG FOR HEALTH NEWSLETTER
I. Tao Tan Pai 31 Meditations + Flying Phoenix Celestial Healing Qigong in one class; II. Tai Chi For Health form classes; III. Advanced Flying Phoenix Qigong + Tao Tan Pai Kung Fu & Nei Kung
I. QIGONG FOR HEALTH FOR 1st RESPONDERS: TAOIST ELIXIR METHOD + FLYING PHOENIX QIGONG
Sundays 4 - 6 pm EST. Classes No. 153, 154, 155, 156 = September 3, 10, 17, 24
Our 153rd Livestream of Qigong For Health For First-Responders is set for this Sunday, September 10 from 3pm to 4:30pm Eastern Time (U.S. and Canada), with 30 minutes of discussion and Q&A immediately following.
This class immerses you in two (not one, but two) authentic and powerful ancient Taoist monastic systems of Qigong that impart tangible, visible, repeatable, and verifiable health benefits on the way to self-empowerment.
(1) Taoist Elixir Method (“Tao Tan Pai”) Qigong - Each class begins with a half-hour practice of the Tao Tan Pai Short Form Power Yoga, a classical distillation of the Tao Tan Pai Basic 31 Meditations (“TTP-31”). The TTP-31 is the first of six levels in Tao Tan Pai Nei Kung—not counting the TTP 5 Animal Kung fu Forms that are foundational to the Nei Kung.
(2) Flying Phoenix Heavenly Healing Qi Meditations (“Fei Feng San Gung”) imparts tangible energizing and rejuvenating effects—and deep meditative states of consciousness— in surprisingly swift manner—within 30 to 50 minutes of practicing any combination of the 8 basic standing meditations or 24 seated meditations. The allostatic (restorative) effects of FP Qigong practice continue long after one’s practice has ceased and often very often will set on once again as if one were practicing.
"Flying Phoenix Qigong practice significantly elevates parasympathetic tone. 90 minutes of practice of this Qigong is restorative in real time and over time afterwards."
- Yetsa A. Tuakli-Wosornu, M.D., M.P.H., IOC Dip. Sp. Med. Assistant Clinical Professor, Yale School of Public Health Department of Chronic Disease Epidemiology (December 2019)
Joining the Livestream Session
To experience the profound health benefits of these two rare and extraordinarily powerful Taoist Qigong arts that are easy-to-do and profoundly restorative holistic health practices, and join a lively worldwide community of students dedicated to holistic health, personal growth, self-empowerment, spiritual fortitude, sign up for the next Sunday session:
The Zoom Meeting ID is: 872 7703 0824
Registration URL:
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87277030824?pwd=dXdyVHd0QnBMWVZlR2htVWtYdlF4QT09
FEE: $40 per class; $280 / 8-class series; or $500 / 16-class series
• Please send tuition via Paypal (to zenbearinc@gmail.com) or via Zelle (to terencepdunn@gmail.com) before 1:00 PM on the day of he class) —or send an email to zenbearinc@gmail.com asking to be sent a Paypal money request that you can use any credit or debit card to pay.) You will then be sent the Meeting Password by 2pm
II. TAI CHI FOR HEALTH: 60-part Short Form and Tai Chi Sword Form of Grandmaster William C.C. Chen—plus form refinement and applications for self-defense.
Sundays 11:00 am to 12:30 pm Classes No. 66, 67, 68, 69 = September 3, 10, 17, 24.
Graceful in movement, slow in tempo, relaxed in perfectly natural postures, Tai Chi form practice improves circulation, respiration, metabolism, flexibility, and the neuromuscular function—agility, balance coordination, and proprioception. This weekly 90-minute class teaches you the 60-posture Yang Style Tai Chi Short Form created by my teacher, Grandmaster William C.C. Chen—along with applications of the form for self-defense. The class will provide basic to intermediate instruction in Push-hands (fixed step sparring) for students at all levels. Once properly learned, the Short Form will serve your throughout a lifetime.
In addition to learning Master William C.C. Chen’s subtle Tai Chi body mechanics that develop muscle-free, “toes-to-fingers” energization that leads to the high-level skill that our style calls the “slow fa-jing”, you will also learn different ways of perfecting each of the 60 postures in the Yang Short Form--that I first learned from my teacher’s classmate, GM Abraham Liu from 1980 to 1992, which I have practiced and taught for 30 years. My step-by-step instruction in the Short Form and refinement of each posture will be supplemented each week by a warm-up module at the start of each class comprised of selections from a wide repertoire of classical Tai Chi conditioning exercises that I’ve acquired over the past 49 years. This 20-minute module will utilize time-proven methods such as:
Terry Dunn’s Newsletter on Tai Chi, Qigong, Kung Fu &Healing is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
Subscribed
1. The Silkweaver’s Exercise - an excellent classical Qigong exercise that’s easy-to-do and develops 4 basic and essential stances for Tai Chi, wonderfully opens and closes the chest and back, relaxes the back, does a superb job of relaxing the intercostals with one knowing it, promotes toes-to-fingers energization, and even prepares one for reverse breathing.
2. 3 foundational Yang-style exercises –– taught by the late Master Abraham Liu: A. “The Gentle Bear”exercise— the “Wave Hands Like Clouds” pattern done in bow stances and ma-bu followed by the “Brush Knee” pattern in the same; B. Alternating Play Guitar and Lifting Hands exercise with 90º steps; C. Left-right Alternating “Snake Creeps Down” Figure-8 Exercise. (As seen in the first 40 minutes of my Tai Chi For Health DVDs made in 1989)
3. Qing Dynasty Imperial Guard Exercises - Practiced by the Qing emperors’ palace guards from 1644 to 1912. (As taught by Master George Xu in the 1980’s at his workshops at the Taoist Sanctuary of San Diego.)
4. Master James Lau King’s 5 Loosening Exercises. Master King is a senior student of the late Grandmaster Huang Sheng Shyan and teaches his teacher’s five loosening exercises that not only develop Tai Chi body mechanics, but each exercise trains a powerful set of Tai Chi kung fu applications.
5. Chen Style Chan-Su-Jin (“Silk-reeling”) exercises—by Master John Fey.
Joining the Livestream Session
Zoom Meeting ID: 893 1017 7261
Registration URL:
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89310177261?pwd=alZSanFDdXdHTUxZNC9rTzNMMFlEZz09
FEE: $30 per class; $210 / 8-class series; or $450 / 16-class series
• Please send tuition via Paypal (to zenbearinc@gmail.com) or via Zelle (to terencepdunn@gmail.com)
III. INTERMEDIATE QIGONG & BASIC KUNG FU
Tuesdays 6:00 pm to 8:00 pm. Classes No. 145, 146, 147, 148 = September 5, 12, 19, 26
September 5 will be the 137th intermediate-level Qigong & Kung Fu class of this ongoing weekly series (from 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. EST). This course concentrates on the intermediate and advanced levels of the two rare and powerful Kung Fu/Qigong systems: Tao Tan Pai (Taoist Elixir Method”) Nei Kung created in the Tang Dynasty and Ehrmei Mountain White Tiger Kung Fu, created in 1644 by Taoist monk Feng Dao Deh, the latter which includes Flying Phoenix Celestial Healing Qigong, its health safety “net”, a purely medical Qigong system.
Prerequisites for joining the Intermediate class have recently been adjusted—please note:
1. Proficiency in all of the Flying Phoenix standing Qigong exercises up to and including “Moonbeam Splashes On Water” moving meditation—i.e., proficiency in performing all the meditative exercises in Volumes 1, 2 and 3 of Chi Kung For Health DVD series. —i.e. you should have “Moonbeam Splashes On Water” moving meditation memorized and be able to do it and its breath control sequence from memory and with the eyes closed.
2. Proficiency in the Tao Tan Pai Short Form Power Yoga—and familiarity with the overall sequence of TTP 31 Basic Meditations—as acquired through attendance of two 3-day TTP Qigong workshops at Eastover Estate over past 3 years, or 3 months of weekly community classes.
Course Agenda:
1. Warm up with the Tao Tan Pai Cane Form.
2. Instruction in the basic Tao Tan Pai Monkey, Crane, Snake, Tiger, and Dragon forms.
3. Instruction in advanced Tao Tan Pai Qigong systems: Shen Exercises and Six Stars Qigong.
4. Refinement of Flying Phoenix Moving meditations: A. “Moonbeam Splashes On Water” — the 2nd most advanced Flying Phoenix moving meditation (on Volume 3 of Chi Kung For Health DVD series ) B. “Flying Phoenix Heavenly Healing Qi Meditation”, aka, the Long Form Standing Meditation (on Volume 4 of CKFH).
5. Refinement of “Monk Serves Wine” seated FP Meditations (#1 - #8)
ADVANCED TRAINING (#6 - #8) are available to students whom have been certified as instructors in Taoist Elixir Method Basic 31 Meditations and Basic Flying Phoenix Qigong:
6. Instruction in the Advanced Flying Phoenix Qigong (9 standing moving meditations)
7. Instruction in “Monk Serves Wine” advanced seated Meditations (#9 - #24)
8. Instruction in the Bok Fu Pai “Eagle Claw Ten Hook Attack Form”—as seen here:
9. Instruction in the 8 Sections of Energy Combined (“Bat Din Gum”) Kung Fu System—as seen at the top of this section.
10. Introduction to “10,000 Buddhas Ascend To Heaven” – 54 Meditations.
11. San-shou (free sparring). Instruction in my style of street fighting that combines Crane Kung Fu, Mok-Gar “Browns” (”Splashing hands”) techniques, and Tai Chi Chuan’s body mechanics.
JOINING THE INTERMEDIATE COURSE LIVESTREAM: Tuesdays, 6pm - 8pm EST
The Zoom Meeting ID is: 828 6280 6822
Registration URL:
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82862806822?pwd=VWpGRkQ3LzN6RDNZYUhweXRYNTRuUT09
FEE: $60/ class or $440 / 8-class series or $800/16-class series
• Please send tuition via Paypal to zenbearinc@gmail.com or via Zelle to terencedunn@gmail.com (before 12 noon on each day of class) to receive the Zoom Meeting Password by 5pm EST.
IV. Poetry pick for this month of September:
In following my seasonal (sun in Virgo) recipe for original thinking and wild but harmonious living by reading the uncommon and very obscure, here is a beautiful, tough-love neo-Taoist poem that came out late in the short life of the very troubled Hart Crane--which I hope will inspire current day eco-warriors and climate-stabilizers--as well as provide foresight to post-apocalypse philosophers:
A NAME FOR ALL
Moonmoth and grasshopper that flee our page And still wing on, untarnished of the name We pinion to your bodies to assuage Our envy of your freedom—we must maim
Because we are usurpers, and chagrined— And take the wing and scar it in the hand. Names we have, even, to clap on the wind; But we must die, as you, to understand.
I dreamed that all men dropped their names, and sang As only they can praise, who build their days With fin and hoof, with wing and sweetened fang Struck free and holy in one Name always
--Hart Crane (1926) in an unpublished collection titled "Key West."
About the third quatrain of this Taoist meditation--that would even give Alfred J. Korzypsky pleasant pause--the late Harold Bloom, Sterling Professor of Humanities at Yale, wrote: "I do not associate Hart Crane with St. Francis of Assisi and yet these quatrains are Franciscan in spirit. We are usurpers. Even the winds have suffered our namings. The third quatrain opens up to redemptive vision BUT ONLY WHEN WE HAVE REJOINED OURSELVES TO ALL THAT IS NOT HUMAN.”
In other words, Crane is telling us that it's all or nothing when it comes to atoning for the damage humankind has inflicted upon Nature throughout modern history and also when it comes to communing with Nature to understand the nameless order behind it, which the ancients in China styled the TAO.
V. Song pick for this month of September:
“Tell Me a Tale” by Michael Kiwunaka
“Tell me a tale that always was, sing me a song that I’ll always know.”
A soulful and uplifting track from Michael Kiwanuka’s debut album, “Home Again,” which he released in 2012. His smooth vocals perfectly complement the upbeat and jazzy-folk instrumentation. His lyrics tell a whimsical story of a fantastical world where the sun and moon dance together. The song’s message of hope and imagination has resonated with his worldwide audience and has become one of Michael Kiwanuka’s signature tracks.
mitakuye oyasin,
(Lakota greeting and prayer that means “All are related,” “To all my relations,” and “Help and health to all my brothers and sisters.”)