Yes it is a perfectly serious question. From my understanding of Daoism, people have got a bit out of step with nature, by seeing themselves as above it. I personally think that our extra power gives us extra responsibilites rather than a right to plunder the natural world, but that's a whole other thread. I also understand that one is meant to try to become more like the animals in Daoism, so my question is aimed at Daoists and Qigong people predominantly. So, do Animals have Qi? Can Animals cultivate Qi? If animals don't do qigong, is it more animal-like to do qigong to try to become more animal like, or not to do qigong at all, missing out the qigong stage altogether? What do you think? A Poem My doggy don't do qigong so they're lying when they say that a dog looks like its owner, aren't they.
JK, First off what do you consider Qi powers? Most animals exhibited "odd powers" to ancient people and seemingly amazing feats of strength. We now have many ideas about how this is done due to body, muscular structure etc. However, some still don't quite understand how animals sometimes seem to have this "6th sense" about impending dangers i.e. volcanic eruptions, earthquakes etc...so I am unsure about what "powers" you may be thinking of here. You stated most of the below already but here is my knowledge on this. If they have Qi, it is known (won't deny it) I believe they do. Also animals do practice Qigong, or rather we practice animal Qigong, Five animal frolics, tortoise breathing, Tiger qigong, etc...these were all qigong's developed by watching and imitating the specific animal thought to develop that animal's "mentality and energy" Perfect example in Tiger Qigong, the practitioner visualizes hunting down prey and using that focus, power, intent and aggresiveness of a tiger to develop a Yang type of energy. At our school you have to be accepted to practice Tiger Kung fu because you have to show that kind of tiger ferocity at times. Where as during the Crane Qigong a practitioner tries to develop the idea of meditation and movement with purpose. Though animals are not "doing" Qigong, they are merely acting natural to themselves and following their own instincts or as Taoists would say "following their Tao" Some Taoists belief states (as you know): That animals are already close to the Tao they don't have the human mind to get in the way. This is a large basis for so much animal symbolism in Taoism and even in CMA for the most part, some schools still try to have you cultivate that mentality of the specified animal to this day. As for animals cultivating Qi, I believe so, take the tortoise breathing. The ancient taoists observed that tortoises would breath long, slow deep breaths, all the while slowly raising their necks and head up and down. They sought to imitate and this is similar to this exercise practiced today. Though animals do it simply because it is natural to them. Just my opinions though
Yes I think animals have qi, but that only humans do gong. Din Dong! Also I don't think animals have 'qi powers' just regular powers like spiderman..
inthespirit - that is so cool, although, I don't agree that they're ugly. Taoquan - regarding what I meant by qi powers, I wanted the views of qigong practitioners on this matter and I know their opinions about what powers are available to humans vary widely, so I can't really define what powers. Are the powers that you believe are available to humans also available to animals. e.g. if you believe in iron shirt or longevity / immortality training, etc... Or I know some believe in empty force, so my question for those who do would be can animals do empty force? Another thing that puzzles me though is that Tigers, Turtles etc. are just being themselves, they're not impersonating a whole host of other creatures (granted there is some mimicry in the animal world, but naturalists would normally interpret it as having a specific purpose such as attracting a mate or camouflage...) So why do humans need to act like other animals and if we are animals ourselves, why can't we just be ourselves? Couldn't it be argued that stretching routines and other forms of exercise developed around knowledge of our own human anatomy is perfectly good human qigong?
hi J, The human intent is hard to connect with ... you need to train the ability to focus your intent in order to connect with it. Training can take many forms but we are talking animals... from my perspective. Animals have a pure intent untouched by ego or other human mind traits. In order to connect with the pure minset or intent of human capability we connect with the ability to form the intent that a certain animal displays. Like the hunting intent of a tiger. The key missunderstanding is that we try to change ourselves into the animal (... Some styles do this ... like some Silat Systems) or mimic the animal in some strange way. The aim is to connect to the natural intent that humans have ... by focusing our intent into that of an animals 'key' power. So we do not try to become a tiger ... become a swallow or a hawk ... we try to display the characteristic intent of that animal. Each animal in the Xing Yi system discplays a specific intent. Once they are formed together they create an ability to connect to the Humans potential mind ability ... the mind has trained to focus individually and can now focus as a whole and therefor no longer has to focus.... just my perspective. regards Chris
Well, as Dr.Johnson put it “He who makes a beast of himself gets rid of the pain of being a man.” I guess that makes sense in more ways than one. But the way I see it is that man is physically weak amongst animals, but his strength is adaptability, or ability to change one could say. Hence, man can learn to move like an animal, not in the sense of outwardly resembling, but the essence of their movement. Animals, unlike us are not impeded by their minds to the extent that we are. What I mean by this is that animals, or at least wild animals don’t develop bad habits of movement as they do not keep their stress like we do, their minds don’t affect them as much. In turn their movements are strong and balanced. Thus, if one is to follow the principles of movement that an animal follows, one naturally has to reduce the levels of stress or tension, in order to move like them. Coincidentally, one of the yi quan guys I trained with told me that humans, being quite a young species on the evolutionary scale, are still not fully evolved to walk upright, i.e. in their terminology the balance between stabilizer and phasic muscle use in humans is not fully balanced, thus tension and stress partly from overused phasic muscles and in part from our minds impede us from moving correctly. Hence, by adopting the principles of movement that animals follow we in turn can refine our own movements. I find it interesting watching animals and seeing how they move, specifically how their kwa is moving and how relaxed they are. Cats are masters! Check out the movement of this kitty: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6651413045806084048 I'd rather be a dugong of course.
Yes animals have chi. Yes they cultivate it. That is an awful word though. Cultivation is a word that sounds high and mighty. As if growing the chi was a god like attainment. Growing the chi is like growing the muscles. Just an everyday thing that you go to the gym to lift weights for. Nobody thinks weightlifters are god like. They are just people exercising to get stronger. Doing chi gong is just an exercise to make your chi stronger. Stop thinking of chi as super mystical magical mumbo jumbo and think of it as another muscle. You do arm curls to build your bicep muscle, then you do chi gong to build your chi muscle. Chi is a bad word too because it has so many interpretations. If you are a western person, the phrase "energy field" is much more accurate, and should be more pleasing to the way you were brought up. "Energy Field" sounds nice and scientific so people can discuss it instead of spitting and saying "chi is some stupid chinese word that means nothing". If you think of an energy field surrounding you, all animals, and all plants, that is what chi is like. If you walk close to another person, your energy field would crash into their energy field and you would both feel something. If your energy field contacts a dog or other animals energy field, both you and the dog will react. If your energy field contacts a plant energy field, the plant will not react I don't think. But you should begin to feel cool and calm because that is the effect that plant energy has on a human being.
Thanks for everyone's comments. I've worked quite a bit on animal imagery in martial arts and have utilised both the imitation and inspiration approaches. I'm really not sure how much we can really know such things as whether or not animals do or do not have ego, or how fair it is to stereotype or archetype them with things like "key" powers or traits. In human society, such things might be considered "generalisations." I do actually think that animals have language and culture and individual personalities, just as we do, which are a product of both nature and nurture.
I think personally each animal uses a different "power" such as the feral rage of a tiger, the somewhat hypnotic hiss of a cobra, the springing action of deer, the flying squirrel. Even though most of these can be explained as innate traits to each species it is still something they themselves have naturally and do naturally. You also "nailed it on the head" with the animals being themselves I agree here, for the most part man in general is not necessarily him/herself. Let's face it who here has dressed up in clothes they hate and are uncomfortable to go somewhere? Who has acted someway because that is how they were supposed to act (according to society etc.)? Only man impersonates others some (such as actors) may get to the point to where they don't know who they are or what they believe for example. Animals just are, they go with instincts, they do what they feel natural with no fear of repercussion. As for human beings stretching and doing their own Qigong we do. After a long day at work or sitting you get up and stretch to the ceiling maybe even yawn? You are relaxing and stretchin intaking more oxygen, getting out of bed in the morning and rubbing the eyes, this is a great "taoist" exercise yet everyone does it almost instinctually, same when you get stressed you sigh, burst out in anger, laugh, you are releasing energy and changing a mindset, thus Qigong. We have our own stretches if only we pay attention to when we use them and when they are needed again.
Hi TQ, I've heard those arguments about yawning and stretching etc. before. They do indeed seem to be innate. Perhaps when our dog Charlie stretches and yawns, that is innate too. So why do I need to do lots of man made exercises on top, when he doesn't? What is natural about Dragon Gate Qigong or the Dragon and Tiger set? I also struggle with any essentialistic comments like "animals don't do this" or "only mankind does this." We are constantly finding out that many of our old humancentric assumptions are untrue. They used to say only people used tools, then they discovered primates and birds using tools. They used to say only humans have culture, then they found out that different groups of the same species have widely variable social behaviours in different areas. They used to say animals had no emotions, but now they think birds call out and fly around in sheer joy. Deer in the UK used to be bold diurnal creatures, but hunting has made them shy and nocturnal. They must have passed down stories about how people are trouble. Our dog Charlie likes to join in when we push hands - why does he do that? British Robins are bold creatures, whereas their mainland European cousins are very shy. Nothing exists in a vaccuum. I'm still waiting for them to discover that other animals have legends and religions... they've discovered that Chimps employ physical comedy - on a TV programme we saw, the dominant male chimp at a sanctuary had hurt his leg and was limping. Some of the other younger chimps would walk behind him and copy his limp, but stop and look innocent as soon as he turned around to look at them. Maybe taking the rise out of others is not just a human failing...
I haven't thoroughly read this thread, it smells like a troll-trap to me....but... Animals do or they don't do. They are part of nature, not separate. Humans have become disconnected, hence they ask questions like in this thread. We do not become like the animal, we learn to understand, produce and embody the quality that animal has and/or represents, but as a re-integrated human being. We borrow the idea adapt it to our form and use it for our benefit. Qi powers? I've never heard anyone who believes in qi or does qigong talk about that. Animals have animal powers, people have people powers. Tao has natural power. Animals are what they are, people ask questions about what they are....
Don't worry, it isn't a troll-trap. It is just that I seriously doubt how different people are from animals. We might insist we are different, but I think insistent individuality equals ego and leads to many problems. For example, take any form of prejudice. You could tell the people on both sides of almost any divide that they are really not so different from each other, but they might fiercely argue that they are. I still struggle with why there is so much religious division in the world considering that at the heart of so many faiths is the basic idea of "don't get above yourself and be nice to each other." Maybe any animal at the top of the food chain would start to act like humans do eventually. If our actions are not natural what are they? Where outside of nature did they come from? Anyway, the central reasoning behind my question is that if we wish to be more like animals in order to return to a more natural state, shouldn't we just be lying around getting plenty of sleep, scratching in public and playfighting quite a lot? Couldn't it be argued, that as a wolf does not try to emulate the spirit of a tiger or a crane, that a human made exercise such as qigong, that emulates the spirit of a tiger or a crane is actually symptomatic of the perceived human disconnection from nature? How can we know which is more natural? 1) For humans to emulate animals 2) For humans NOT to emulate animals or 3) For humans to question whether animal emulation is positive or not and argue for its continuation or cessation?
For me JK, I think you are taking some of the animal qigongs a little too literally. It sounds to me as though you are making a case that as you do these qigongs you are becoming the animal ALL the time. This is not the case, and I know this is not what you are implying but it seems this is how the thinking is. When you perform an animal Qigong the goal is to use this exercise or stretch just like any other stretch. You don't always get up and stretch your quads, calves, piriformis etc. every time of the day do you? No, these exercises are just like any others designed to stretch certain musles ligaments and/or tendons. Even though we are to imitate said animal in the Qigong, this brings on a different element to the stretch or exercise. For example a person may find it difficult to think of a light and graceful crane, while they are lifting weights. Most prefer to think of something more aggressive i.e. tiger, bear etc. You are also trying to lump humans in general in your arguments (it seems to me) and this also puts us in a vaccum. Just b/c some animals act like humans and some humans act like animals does not pose the same for all of us. To say that just because some animals lay around all day and scratch themselves, that humans should also do the same to be close to nature does put us in a vaccum. We know animals are different, not just between species, but even between individuals in species. Any animal lover or owner would tell you that certain animals exhibit certain personalities or emotions. The point is, that animals don't necessarily (as far as we have been able to observe) "bottle up" their emotions, they don't "filter" their thoughts. When they are mad, or aggressive, they show it, happy, frightened etc...they show it not caring what they or anyone else think. Hence, some animals lash out on trainers or people that raised them, saying this person will not tell me what to do, or I don't feel like it. Where as humans we tend to "bottle up" or not show true emotions, feelings etc...because of society fear of rejection from opposite sex take your pick.
This is the best description of qi/qigong I have ever read. See posts byDeclan. http://www.martialartsplanet.com/forums/showthread.php?p=661705#post661705 So if this is agood representation, I would guess that animals have "qi" too.
