Modern society is transforming the way we look and the way we eat, forcing us to be lazy and to pile on excess weight. This is incredibly unhealthy for our hearts, our lungs and for our overall health. It is possible to be overweight and healthy, but if you’re overweight then you’re putting unnecessary stress on your heart, making it work harder than it should, and that’s never a good thing.
Luckily, weight control is something that Qigong can help with. Diet and fasting play a big role in this practice, and you can also lose weight with a little help from some specialised techniques.
In this article we’ll look at some of those techniques, all of which can be found on the many online, home-study courses offered by the Spring Forest Qigong Centre.
SFQ Healing Courses
Many of the main courses at the Spring Forest Qigong Centre can help you with weight loss and weight management, and this is especially the case for the three main courses listed under the Start Qigong Now section on the SFQ website. These courses guide you through levels 1, 2 and 3, and they do so with a combination of written manuals, meditation CDs and DVDs. These courses can be taken one after the the other and won’t require much of your time. All of them will be of use, but the level 1 course and the level 3 course will be particularly useful, as these deal with self-healing courses, whereas the level 2 course is more focused on ways that you can heal others.
Combined, these courses will teach you about dieting (with Qigong for Advanced Healing focusing heavily on fasting), and they will also guide you through some meditations and exercises that can regulate yin and yang in your body, helping to keep your blood sugar, your cholesterol and your blood pressure at normal levels, while also ensuring that you maintain a healthy weight. These three courses can also help with all of the following:
- Generalised pain (neck, back, shoulder, etc.,)
- Headaches and migraines
- Sinus problems
- Problems with your hearing
- Loss of sight
- Diabetes
- Depression
- Anxiety
- Cancer
- Breathing difficulties
They can also help you with distance and remote healing, effectively helping you to take your first steps toward becoming a healer and following in the footsteps of Master Lin. Much of this happens in the level 2 course, but in the level 3 course you will complete these studies and will also learn how to lead a group healing session and how to use massage water, among other things.
Diet and Fasting
Obviously, when it comes to losing weight, your diet plays a huge role, and Qigong can help here as well. When it comes to food, Qigong follows ancient Chinese medicine, whereby all foods are classified in 5 different groups, beginning with “cold” and going all of the way to “hot”, with “neutral” in the middle. According to Chinese medicine, you need to have a proper balance of these foods in your body in order to attain a proper balance of yin and yang energy. However, it’s not as simple as eating a balanced amount of hot and cold foods, nor is it as simple as sticking to neutral foods. All of our bodies are different, and how you respond to certain foods will depend on your unique biological makeup. As a result, the foods that work for you will also depend on your individual biology. Therefore, it pays to know what you’re doing and to research into proper dieting.
There are courses that you can take at the Spring Forest Qigong Centre that focus on this, but you can also simply have a consultation with one of their healers via the phone. If you tell them what you want to focus on beforehand (usually via a preliminary phone call) then they can help you with your needs. They will tell you all that you need to know and may even be able to suggest a healthy and balanced diet. There are also courses that focus on the aspects of dieting and fasting, including the Wisdom and Embodiment Package, which was a level 4 retreat that was recorded for all advanced students to benefit from.
In the Head to Toe Body’s Repair Manual, which is available to all students, you will find a recipe for Yin Yang Water, as well as some techniques that can help to regulate your diet, and the Qi-ssage Healing course may be able to help in a similar manner. There is also a supplement called Nature’s Qi, which can give you a healthy balance of vitamins, enzymes and minerals, among other things, all with a proper balance of yin and yang. This supplement can be purchased on the Spring Forest Qigong Centre website and is actually endorsed by Master Lin.