Qigong question

[hinokata]

I am working through the exercises listed in: http://ymaa.com/publishing/books/qigong/qigong_for_health_and_ma , and Wei Dan Qigong, exercise one it states:


Keep your hands down beside your body with the palms open and facing down, fingertips pointing forward. Keep the elbows bent. Imagine pushing the palms down and lifting your fingers backward when exhauling, and relax them when inhaling. This form will build the Qi energy at the wrist area, and your palms and wrists should feel warm after fifty repetitions.

Now my question is, do I strictly imagine my hands moving, or do I both imagine AND actually move my hands in the pre-described fashion? Thank you for your time.

[cjurakpt]

I would say you actually have to move them, although the amount of movement may be very minimal; you can certainly visualize it as well, but that's not qigong per se

the key is not to force anything - feel how the movement of the hands correlates to the movement of the breath and that will enable the movement to be "whole body" versus isolated muscular contraction

in a way, it's a "training wheels" guideline, IMHO - when you get "connected", you will feel how the movement of the hands is not in isolation, but rather in conjunction with the whole-body response to the movement of the breath and the subsequent ground reaction force effect: you may feel how the "pumping" of the hands correlates to that of the soles of the feet, the pelvic floor, other areas; at the beggining it's mostly muscular movement, later on it becomes, IMPE, linked to the whole body connective tissue matrix, such that the non-conractile, elastic structure of the CTM propogates the waves of the breath and subsequent ground reaction force throughout the body

[qiphlow]

i was taught that sinking the wrist will get the qi to move to the fingertips. i would guess that imagining the action will create the mental intention of the action, thus moving the qi without the actual physical movement (based upon the saying that the yi [intent] moves the qi). since it's qigong, the exercise is probably designed to build this yi/qi connection so you can feel it for yourself. try it with the mental visualization only, and also with the mental/physical together and see what happens. with your JMA experience, i'm sure you've dealt with the concept of ki, which is the same as qi as far as i know. metaphysical mumbo-jumbo aside, i've found that my techniques feel alot stronger and also have a greater effect when i consciously intend to do the movement vs. when i'm just "going thru the motions"

[Buho_Nival]

Yes..you actually move them....this is one of the exercizes that Ta Mo (Bodhidarma) brought to China...one of his I Chin Ching (Yi Jin Jing)