Following our review of Spring Forest Qigong (SFQ) Fundamentals Level 1, it is now time to introduce how Qi can be used for the benefit of healing others. In SFQ Level 2, the entire book is aimed at this, and focuses on introducing more Qigong theory, healing techniques and methods for cultivating healing energy to help others open energy blockages.
While SFQ’s main focus is to teach everyone how to help themselves heal through Qigong practice and a balanced lifestyle based on the elements, food theory and even fengshui, it also recognizes the importance of being able to use your Qi for the benefit of others. For founder Master Lin, sending Qi to others is a very simple principle that anyone can study, and it is throughout the Level 2 Book and DVD he introduces everything you need to know to learn these techniques.
How Healing Others Begins
The book emphasizes the following:
- Preparing your friend for healing
- Preparing yourself
- Detecting blockages and conducting the healing
To begin, someone who has never received or is skeptical about receiving healing through Qi methods needs to first relax and enter a state of mind in which they can be more susceptible and sensitive to the process. While sending energy is not a placebo effect, allowing oneself to relax and be open to it allows for better results. Simply have your friend close his or her eyes and sit comfortably while you explain to them that you will first detect the blockages and then move onto healing the blockages. This may take a minute or two so have your friend close their eyes and think about something pleasant.
After explaining the process in a relaxed and confident manner, prepare yourself as your friend has their eyes closed by relaxing yourself. You need to go into a state of relaxation and emptiness where you become calm as well as confident that you will detect blockages. Following this, proceed to call on your master’s energy. A master is simply someone who you have great respect for or feel they provide a sense of energy that appeals to you on some positive level. By calling on this energy, you simply visualize that person (or thing) and their energy connecting with yours. This helps fuel the body’s energy, and acts as a stronger conduit for helping to send energy.
Once your master’s energy has been established it is now time to detect and open the energy blockages. The detection portion can be intimidating for people when they first start. Essentially, what it comes down to is confidence and you need to call upon your master to help you understand where blockages are when using your hand to scan over a person’s body for the detection. While doing this you may notice your body cool down, shake or warm up in certain areas depending where the scan takes places, which signals possible energy imbalances in the body. The key is to trust this feeling and rescan a few times while asking specific questions. For example, you may notice some energy blockages in the facial area but ask “Are they from the eyes, ears or nose etc.?” Pose these questions as you scan and you will find you get clearer results.
Once you are sure where the blockages are, Lin outlines several steps to open them. First, begin by activating the small universe, which follows a pattern much like the Small Universe Meditation that we review on this site. Then, open the spine in the relevant area and move onto using what is known as sword fingers to move away the excessive energy causing the blockages. One you are done, you send energy back to the healed area, the spine and end with the small universe healing technique.
Our review of having taken the class twice and using it on others is that it works. Some people seem to react very quickly to the energy while others don’t notice any immediate effects, but nevertheless feel something either mildly or later in the day. This really depends on the person’s capacity to heal and for how long they do it. The best way to practice before working on others is to try it on yourself. If you have a sore area on your body, do the exact same process but by visualizing yourself sitting in a chair. A more simple way would be directly use sword fingers to the area and send back positive energy. Almost every time this is done we feel the energy circulating differently in our body and it helps us alleviate pain.
To increase your healing energy, the Level 2 book also has a number of Qigong exercises that can also be used for increasing one’s energy as well. They are more visual based and compliment core practices found in the Level 1 handbook.