Shana Moore wrote:
I didn't mean to imply they were the same, but I do believe they are related arts.
Qigung is the general study of energy, often more specific kinds of energy are studied as subsets of
general qigung study.. This study is a part of many, but not all, CMA and is also studied as a stand alone art..
Qigong (or ch'i kung) refers to a wide variety of traditional “cultivation” practices that involve methods of accumulating, circulating, and working with Qi or energy within the body. Qigong is sometimes mistakenly said to always involve movement and/or regulated breathing; in fact, use of special methods of focusing on particular energy centers in and around the body are common in the 'higher level' or evolved forms of Qigong. Qigong is practised for health maintenance purposes, as a therapeutic intervention, as a medical profession, a spiritual path and/or component of Chinese martial arts.
The 'qi' in 'qigong' means breath or air in Chinese, and, by extension, 'life force', 'dynamic energy' or even 'cosmic breath'. 'Gong' means work applied to a discipline or the resultant level of skill, so 'qigong' is thus 'breath work' or 'energy work'. The term was coined in the twentieth-century and its currency, Ownby suggests, speaks of a cultural desire to separate 'cultivation' from 'superstition', to secularize and preserve valuable aspects of traditional Chinese practices.[1]
Attitudes toward the scientific basis for qigong vary markedly. Most Western medical practitioners and many practitioners of traditional Chinese medicine, as well as the Chinese government, view qigong as a set of breathing and movement exercises, with possible benefits to health through stress reduction and exercise. Others see qigong in more metaphysical terms, claiming that cosmic qi can be drawn into the body and circulated through channels (aka meridians).
Shana Moore wrote:
As for the withholding of information to a select trusted few...while I understand the concept, I also feel that this attitude assist in the decline of knowledge and watering down of an art.
Yes, exactly as it was intended to.. Can't say too much else there.
Shana Moore wrote:
I'm sure many a master passed before expected, for whatever reason, and his knowledge was lost. Or, he didn't have students or the right students to pass along knowledge, and again...the knowledge was lost.
Certainly there are lots of ways to loose the information.. You can have good teachers, bad teachers, unwilling teachers, bad students, it all comes down to the weakest link.. You have to realize many teachers became such out of necesity, to support themselves.. When you go commercial it changes things too.. Folks you would never have taught end up in your school.. But one of the hardest things for modern day students is to find the good stuff and to learn to know the difference between the bad, the okay and the good, etc.
Shana Moore wrote:
While I appreciate the concept of purity of form and purpose, the scholar and learner in me is saddened whenever anything good is lost, particularly if it is based on a matter of pride or judgment and not necessarily need.
Sure, it's sad..
But the reality is we, or you and I are not entitled to anything.. This is the way the old school teachers felt.. If you wanted their kungfu you had to earn it and be worthy of it. It was often the most valuable thing they had..
Both my teacher and his were old school.. My old sifu would tell of students whom felt they were entitled to whatever knowledge they wished.. They would simply demand it, in a real sense. But do you think they got it? Nope..
Now if you understood how to be a 'good son' then you understood how to get it... It all depends on the relationship you had with the teacher.. That's the beginning, often money played a role too.. And there were all kind of shades in between the top and bottom.