What Are All the Different Styles of Chi Kung?
/I'm working on a web page that will be a clear and thorough explanation of Qigong. It will include links to articles which explore various details in greater depth. The following is a short section I have been working on:
Below is a list of all the styles of qigong. Nearly all qigong practices are named after a cosmological principle (like hunyuan, which means original chaos) or a metaphor which is specific to Chinese culture like Wild-goose, (which means lots of weird movements stuck together in one form). I haven't included every single name because the same type of qigong sometimes goes by different names, this is a list of qigong by characteristics and type.
I first started studying qigong in 1977 when I was 10 years old because it was considered a basic requirement of Northern Shaolin training. I first heard the term qigong when I was about 20 in the late 1980's as qigong fever was sweaping Mainland China. By 1995 I had seen every type of qigong on this list. Every year I hear someone claim to have discovered a new, yet ancient, type of qigong that is more special that all the rest. Inevitably what they are practicing is just one the following repackaged. While I find the claims a little pretentious, the trend itself is positive. All forms of qigong become very personal over time because all dedicated practitioners will naturally combine and integrate the following types of qigong to suit their needs, values and in accordance with their temperament. I myself have created two "new" types of qigong; Tiger Skin Qigong and Chicken Toe Qigong. Here is the list:
Zhangzuan (Standing Meditation, done in various postures)
Wu Xing-Five Organs (While the movements themselves may differ from school to school, the basic idea that each organ generates, and is tonified or depleted by, a particular quality of movement is the same.)
3 Dantians (the use of swinging movement generated from, and integrated with, the three centers of the body, abdomen, chest and head) (Note: Swinging the arms from the lower dantian while shifting weight from foot to foot is the most widespread form of qigong. Variations are used in almost all martial arts schools.)
Cloud Hands (a simple asymmetrical movement of the arms which can be use as a base for integrating other types of qigong)
Muscle Tendon Lengthening (The art of stretching)
Golden Ball (Moving qi around the dantian)
8 Extraordinary Meridians (Exploring how qi moves around the surface of the body at the moment of birth)
Heaven & Earth (Micro/macro cosmic orbit, three dimensional pulsing & elasticity, usually symmetrical movement)
Spine training (Bend the Bow and Shoot the Arrow; drawing qi into the spine for healing, power, and for connecting the movement of the limbs to the spine )
Chan Su Jing, (Silk Spinning --joint releasing & spiraling movements) go
Immortals Dancing in the Clouds (Bone Marrow Washing, Sinew integration, and development of spherical movement)
Daoyin (Orthodox Daoist Lineage Hermit Practice which uses extensive stretching, with rolling slapping jumping, pounding, scraping and self massage. Sometimes broken into pieces, sometimes combined with circus training or monkey kungfu.)
Hunyuan (Prenatal movement rediscovered with an emphasis on the movement of fluids and the development of the qualities of empty and full. Often asymmetrical.)
8 Silken Brocade (8 Sinew lengthening and integrating movements)
Wild Goose (A particular teacher's 'list of favorates' put together into a form linking them together.) (Geese in the wild do lots of different types of movement. They run, hop, swim, fly, flap, squawk, root, gargle, preen, stretch, stand on one leg, etc...)
Tai Chi--(Taijiquan, the martial art, can be practiced purely to get the benefits of improved balance, mobility, flexibility, and circulation. In this case it is often simplified and/or made symmetrical. )
Conditioning Techniques (Iron shirt, Gold Bell, iron palm--toughening exercise for forearms,shins, and torso)
Taoist (Daoist meditation is sometimes taught as stillness qigong. Particularly jindan, the golden elixir, and various tension dissolving techniques). (Sometimes the deity visualization intermediary practices are taught without explicit naming of the deities-- only their attributes as visualized.)
Now that I've released the comprehensive list I encourage people to challenge it! Have you seen or practiced a type of qigong not on the list? Can you describe it's attributes?
Note: Obviously I've discarded the standard Communist Government organization. I've never seen Buddhist, Confucian, or Neo-Confucian qigong.
Update: We had a discussion on Facebook, where my blog now appears (search for Scott P Phillips if you want to be my friend). I decided that the last category "Taoist" is an identity, and therefore not suitable as a category because it opens up the possibility of naming techniques after identity groups of regions. Therefore, I am changing the "Taoist" Category to "Inner Alchemy."
Below is a list of all the styles of qigong. Nearly all qigong practices are named after a cosmological principle (like hunyuan, which means original chaos) or a metaphor which is specific to Chinese culture like Wild-goose, (which means lots of weird movements stuck together in one form). I haven't included every single name because the same type of qigong sometimes goes by different names, this is a list of qigong by characteristics and type.
I first started studying qigong in 1977 when I was 10 years old because it was considered a basic requirement of Northern Shaolin training. I first heard the term qigong when I was about 20 in the late 1980's as qigong fever was sweaping Mainland China. By 1995 I had seen every type of qigong on this list. Every year I hear someone claim to have discovered a new, yet ancient, type of qigong that is more special that all the rest. Inevitably what they are practicing is just one the following repackaged. While I find the claims a little pretentious, the trend itself is positive. All forms of qigong become very personal over time because all dedicated practitioners will naturally combine and integrate the following types of qigong to suit their needs, values and in accordance with their temperament. I myself have created two "new" types of qigong; Tiger Skin Qigong and Chicken Toe Qigong. Here is the list:
Zhangzuan (Standing Meditation, done in various postures)
Wu Xing-Five Organs (While the movements themselves may differ from school to school, the basic idea that each organ generates, and is tonified or depleted by, a particular quality of movement is the same.)
3 Dantians (the use of swinging movement generated from, and integrated with, the three centers of the body, abdomen, chest and head) (Note: Swinging the arms from the lower dantian while shifting weight from foot to foot is the most widespread form of qigong. Variations are used in almost all martial arts schools.)
Cloud Hands (a simple asymmetrical movement of the arms which can be use as a base for integrating other types of qigong)
Muscle Tendon Lengthening (The art of stretching)
Golden Ball (Moving qi around the dantian)
8 Extraordinary Meridians (Exploring how qi moves around the surface of the body at the moment of birth)
Heaven & Earth (Micro/macro cosmic orbit, three dimensional pulsing & elasticity, usually symmetrical movement)
Spine training (Bend the Bow and Shoot the Arrow; drawing qi into the spine for healing, power, and for connecting the movement of the limbs to the spine )
Chan Su Jing, (Silk Spinning --joint releasing & spiraling movements) go
Immortals Dancing in the Clouds (Bone Marrow Washing, Sinew integration, and development of spherical movement)
Daoyin (Orthodox Daoist Lineage Hermit Practice which uses extensive stretching, with rolling slapping jumping, pounding, scraping and self massage. Sometimes broken into pieces, sometimes combined with circus training or monkey kungfu.)
Hunyuan (Prenatal movement rediscovered with an emphasis on the movement of fluids and the development of the qualities of empty and full. Often asymmetrical.)
8 Silken Brocade (8 Sinew lengthening and integrating movements)
Wild Goose (A particular teacher's 'list of favorates' put together into a form linking them together.) (Geese in the wild do lots of different types of movement. They run, hop, swim, fly, flap, squawk, root, gargle, preen, stretch, stand on one leg, etc...)
Tai Chi--(Taijiquan, the martial art, can be practiced purely to get the benefits of improved balance, mobility, flexibility, and circulation. In this case it is often simplified and/or made symmetrical. )
Conditioning Techniques (Iron shirt, Gold Bell, iron palm--toughening exercise for forearms,shins, and torso)
Taoist (Daoist meditation is sometimes taught as stillness qigong. Particularly jindan, the golden elixir, and various tension dissolving techniques). (Sometimes the deity visualization intermediary practices are taught without explicit naming of the deities-- only their attributes as visualized.)
Now that I've released the comprehensive list I encourage people to challenge it! Have you seen or practiced a type of qigong not on the list? Can you describe it's attributes?
Note: Obviously I've discarded the standard Communist Government organization. I've never seen Buddhist, Confucian, or Neo-Confucian qigong.
Update: We had a discussion on Facebook, where my blog now appears (search for Scott P Phillips if you want to be my friend). I decided that the last category "Taoist" is an identity, and therefore not suitable as a category because it opens up the possibility of naming techniques after identity groups of regions. Therefore, I am changing the "Taoist" Category to "Inner Alchemy."
