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Warrior Coaching International

Rock Solid Health Qi Gong Unit-4 Iron Shirt Qi Gong By Dr. Symeon Rodger © 2008 Rock Solid Life Systems and Warrior Coaching International No part of this publication may be reproduced, in whole or in part, without the express permission of the author and the publisher.

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Disclaimer: By following this program you are acknowledging that you are a mature adult and that you take full responsibility for your own actions. You are acknowledging that you agree to adhere to the terms of the disclaimer below and to those posted on any of our websites. This program (its texts, audios and videos) contains the opinions and ideas of the author(s). It is intended to provide helpful and informative material on the subject matters covered. Its content is not meant to replace the advice of mental or medical healthcare professionals or qualified counselors. The author(s) and publisher specifically disclaim any responsibility for any liability, loss, or risk, personal or otherwise, which is incurred as a consequence, directly or indirectly, of the use and / or application of any of the contents of this program. Please note that if you have any pre-existing medical or psychological condition for which you are receiving or have received treatment, you should not embark upon this or any other system involving physical exercise or mental work without the approval of a qualified medical professional. Please note that you should not engage in any of the meditative aspects of this program while driving a vehicle or operating heavy machinery until you have made substantial progress. And, even then, you do so at your own risk. Please note that the materials of or about this program are not to be interpreted as a guarantee that you will achieve specific results within a given time frame. Achievement depends on correct practice and dedication, as well as on the starting point of the individual.

Important Notice for Women! If you are pregnant or think you might be, you should not attempt to begin practicing any Qi Gong system without the express approval of a qualified practitioner of Traditional Chinese Medicine and your own physician.

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Iron Shirt Qi Gong The soldier’s main concerns in combat are how to overcome the enemy more effectively and how to avoid being hurt by the enemy. In reality, these two are closely related. Today’s soldiers and police put on Kevlar vests, the same way soldiers of old put on metal plate or chain mail armor. However, then as now this kind of external protection is much less than one hundred percent reliable. In ancient China this led to a search for better methods of self-protection, and one of the outcomes was Iron Shirt Qi Gong. If you watch Chinese and Japanese martial arts demonstrations, you’ll notice a significant difference. The Japanese tend to demonstrate their ability to break hard objects, like boards and bricks, with their bare hands. The Chinese tend to demonstrate how those same hard objects can’t harm their own bodies! So if you look for online videos of Shaolin monks demonstrating their abilities, you’ll likely see monks getting whacked over the head with wooden staffs or getting concrete blocks smashed on their stomachs with sledge hammers. You may be puzzled by how this is possible, since the monks aren’t built like body-builders and don’t appear to have much “padding”. The truth is, they have a “padding” you can’t see with the naked eye, an internal energetic padding that not only protects them from blunt force trauma, but also gives them splendid health and immune response. And, best of all, this “padding” is not difficult to acquire.

The Process of Acquiring Your “Iron Shirt” The “iron” of Iron Shirt is qi itself. It’s life force energy that supplies the cushion that protects you from external impact while at the same time providing the extraordinary health benefits discussed below. The easiest way to access and control the flow and strength of qi is through your breathing. And Iron Shirt uses the same Reverse Abdominal Breathing (RAB) found in Bone Marrow Cleansing, but then adds a different dynamic to it. Iron Shirt uses RAB and mental intention to “pack” qi into your body’s soft tissues, organs and cavities. This is one of those rare instances in Qi Gong where you deliberately hold your breath. Packing qi into the soft tissues really means packing qi into the muscles, tendons and, above all, the fasciae. Fasciae is the body’s version of plastic wrap. It _______________________________________________________________________ © Rock Solid Life Systems Page 3 of 9 MMVIII-MMX

RSHQG-4 RESTRICTED ACCESS __________________________________________________ covers nearly your entire body just below the skin. It wraps your muscles, your organs and also forms the three diaphragms that hold your internal organs in place. We’ll talk more about the health implications of this below. Iron Shirt also packs qi into your vital organs, making them more resistant to impact. This is particularly welcome since some of your organs are more exposed and vulnerable than others. For example, if someone tries to hit me in a way that will damage my lungs, I’d say to him “good luck!” My lungs are heavily protected by the upper rib cage and powerful pectoral muscles. My kidneys, on the other hand, have almost no protection. And some organs, like the liver and stomach, are only partly protected by the rib cage and shielded by muscle groups that aren’t necessarily up to the job. And just as the warriors of old had an interest in protecting their vital organs in combat, so we also have an interest in protecting them from accident. The final component of Iron Shirt breathing is to fill the body cavities with qi. Yes, you really do have some “empty space” inside you! And filling this space with qi, as we explain below, protects the organs in two different ways. The second part of Iron Shirt involves percussion or “beating”. The purpose of this is not to cause pain – and there isn’t much pain involved at all – but rather to raise the qi generated by breathing to the surface of the body in order to provide maximum protection. There are endless varieties of Iron Shirt from both Buddhist and Taoist sources. The version I’m presenting here represents the most effective method I’ve found to date for both health and martial purposes.

The Health Dynamics of Iron Shirt By now you may be wondering how Iron Shirt could apply to you, since no one has attacked you physically since your grade 3 school playground! The fact is, Iron Shirt has proven to have such extraordinary health benefits that it’s worth learning just for that purpose. And keep in mind that even though no one is likely to attack you physically, having a body that’s not easily damaged by accidental falls or impacts can be a life saver. We mentioned the importance of the fasciae layers in your body. In reality, these are important for two reasons. First, your body’s energy distribution network relies on the fasciae, so healthy fasciae means more efficient qi distribution to your cells. Second, the fasciae have a vital role in holding your internal organs and skeletal structure in their proper places. Organs that fall out of place or compromised posture resulting from fasciae weakness can have a severe _______________________________________________________________________ © Rock Solid Life Systems Page 4 of 9 MMVIII-MMX

RSHQG-4 RESTRICTED ACCESS __________________________________________________ negative impact on the flow of blood, lymph, spinal fluid, qi and oxygen to your cells. In other words, your immune system takes a big hit. By packing the fasciae layers under the skin with qi and then using percussion to further develop that qi, Iron Shirt builds up what Chinese medicine refers to as “wei qi” – the body’s most external protective energetic layer and its first line of defense against pathogens and harmful energy. If your wei qi is strong, your immune system is strong. You may remember that it Bone Marrow Cleansing, the purpose of percussion was to send qi deep into the body, into the center of the bone structure itself. The result is what Tai Chi refers to as a body of “steel, wrapped in cotton” – in other words, your body is very soft and pliable on the outside, but your bones are like steel. In Iron Shirt, the result is complementary but different. By using percussion to bring qi out to the surface of the body, we create a body that’s “cotton, wrapped in steel”. So the surface of your body becomes very resilient while the inside becomes deeply relaxed and pliable. A second dynamic has to do with the environmental stress the body is constantly subjected to. And I’m not referring here to pollution or toxic overload, but to something more fundamental. Your body is under continuing atmospheric and gravitational pressure. Iron Shirt helps to counteract gravitational pressure through proper postural adjustment – the same postural adjustments used in Hara, Tai Chi and in the other Qi Gong systems in this program. Proper posture maximizes the load bearing capacity of your skeletal structure and prevents gravity from slowly compromising your posture and your health. It’s said that the average person loses from one to two inches in height over the course of a lifetime. That does not apply, however, to people whose posture is properly adjusted and who cultivate their spinal health through methods like those presented here. Atmospheric pressure is something we tend not to notice, since we’ve never been without it. Each square inch of your body is under a continuous pressure of 14.7 lbs. (6.67 Kg). This continuous 14.7 psi pressure can and will have negative effects on your health over the long term unless there is an at least equal and opposite pressure within your body to counteract it. Otherwise, the wei qi and internal organs will suffer and your immune system will be unable to protect you. I remember in junior high school science lab we once did an experiment with an empty pop can. The teacher turned the can upside down and sucked the air out of it. Suddenly, the can began to crumple up, as that 14.7 psi started to crush it! This was an eye-opening event, to say the least! _______________________________________________________________________ © Rock Solid Life Systems Page 5 of 9 MMVIII-MMX

RSHQG-4 RESTRICTED ACCESS __________________________________________________ Iron Shirt fixes this internal pressure deficit quickly and easily by packing qi into your body cavities, organs and soft tissues. One of the most common reactions of Iron Shirt beginners is to report this wonderful feeling of pressure inside the body, of feeling a bit like an inflated balloon. Needless to say, this inflation is totally invisible from the outside – it’s not as if you won’t fit into your clothes anymore ;-) Imagine a bicycle tire or car tire that’s lost half of its air. Suddenly the wheel rim itself is exposed to the road without an adequate cushion and the road starts to damage it. The same thing happens to your body as it loses internal pressure: your organs are no longer adequately protected from the ravages of external pressure.

When and How to Practice You can practice Iron Shirt any time of the day or night. And you can practice any of the three parts of it separately or together. Needless to say, they’re best practiced together for maximum effect. And practicing doesn’t take very long, as you’ll see from the video. Preliminaries: The first thing is to practice RAB again. Following that, there’s an exercise for developing your sensitivity to absorbing qi. Once you have a good feel for that, you no longer need to do this exercise. You’ll remember that one of the key presuppositions of Qi Gong is that you can use your mental attention to guide qi to any part of your body. Iron Shirt Compression Breathing allows you to take in an enormous amount of qi from the environment and then send it to any area of your body. There will be times when you wonder if it’s working or you feel you’re not doing it right. That’s when you simply say to yourself, “Even if I don’t think today’s practice went well, I know my body still got great benefit from it. And tomorrow’s practice may be better.”

1. Compression Breathing into the Organs NOTE: Do not use compression breathing if you suffer from high blood pressure or have a history of heart problems, stroke or other vascular condition, unless you have the approval of your physician. _______________________________________________________________________ © Rock Solid Life Systems Page 6 of 9 MMVIII-MMX

RSHQG-4 RESTRICTED ACCESS __________________________________________________ The first round of compression breathing packs qi into the five major “yin” organs of the body – the heart, lungs, liver, spleen and kidneys. You inhale only a small amount of your total capacity for each organ so that, by the time you get to the last organ on the list, you’ve inhaled to close to your full capacity. In Chinese medicine, each organ is related to another specific organ with which it shares one of the five elemental energies of Chinese medical cosmology. The chart below summarizes these relationships. Since the significance of each element isn’t vital to your performance of Iron Shirt, we won’t get into that here. If you’re interested, though, any good text on Chinese medicine will explain this. Yin Organ Heart Lungs Liver Spleen

Emotional Energy Joy Courage Kindness Justice

Kidneys

Confidence

Related Yang Organ Small intestine Large intestine Gall bladder Stomach, pancreas Urinary bladder, genitals

Elemental Energy Fire Metal Wood Earth

Color Red White Green Yellow

Water

Blue or black

Remember here that the inhale is gentle. You should try to keep your torso as relaxed as possible during this exercise, so if you notice yourself tightening the muscles of your abdomen, chest or arms, you’ll need to consciously relax them. The second round is compression breathing into the yang organs; the small intestine, the large intestine (also called the bowel or colon), the gall bladder, the stomach and pancreas, the urinary bladder and the internal and external genitals. 2. Compression Breathing into the Fasciae In this sequence, you inhale to your full capacity each time, hold the breath until you feel the urge to exhale, then exhale and finish with 2-3 rounds of Normal Abdominal Breathing. The sequence is as follows: 1. The belt channel (all around the torso at the level of the navel) 2. Front of torso, above the waist 3. Front of torso, below the waist 4. Back of torso 5. Right side of torso (from waist to armpit) 6. Left side of torso (from waist to armpit) 7. Legs 8. Arms 9. Head (optional) _______________________________________________________________________ © Rock Solid Life Systems Page 7 of 9 MMVIII-MMX

RSHQG-4 RESTRICTED ACCESS __________________________________________________ After a short time of doing this practice, you’ll probably notice a “full” feeling in your torso. This is a feeling of great solidity and stability, a very wonderful feeling of being strongly energized. 3. Percussion The percussion sequence is identical to that found in Bone Marrow Cleansing. As you’ll notice in the video, though, I’ve only demonstrated the torso sequence for Iron Shirt, since that’s where the greatest health benefits lie. You’re free to cover the rest of the body if you wish. Remember to start hitting with very little force. If you find yourself using muscle to resist, you’re using too much force. Your attention needs to by fully on the area you’re hitting, since this mental attention helps the qi to come to the surface to counteract the blow. At first you may find yourself bruising easily. That’s normal and will only last for a week or two. Following this strategy slowly and persistently over a period of many months is exactly what ancient warriors used to become invulnerable. They didn’t start with heavy blows right away. Instead they worked up to heavier blows in a ways so slow as to be imperceptible. This approach, by the way, is something they applied to cultivate all sorts of extraordinary abilities. As I’ve said in the video, you can start with the palm of your hand or a hard cushion. Once you can tolerate forceful blows from that, you graduate to very light blows with a bamboo rod. Then come the sandbag. You may not choose to go all the way to the sandbag, and that’s okay. Even if you never get past the palm / hard cushion, you’ll still get enormous health benefits. In summary, Iron Shirt’s major health benefit – vastly improved immunity to disease and accidental impact – is derived from: 1. Improved postural alignment, which protects the integrity of the inner organs, their position and the circulation of blood, oxygen and energy to them. 2. Improved organ function resulting from compressing qi into the organs 3. Increased wei qi derived from compressing qi into the fasciae and the body cavities, and from percussion used to bring that qi to the surface of the body 4. Increased qi circulation throughout the body resulting from compressing qi into the fasciae _______________________________________________________________________ © Rock Solid Life Systems Page 8 of 9 MMVIII-MMX

RSHQG-4 RESTRICTED ACCESS __________________________________________________ 5. Better mental acuity because of increased circulation of blood, oxygen and energy throughout the body and particularly to the brain The more you practice Iron Shirt, the more these benefits will become apparent to you. Enjoy!

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