Chi-Gung and Health: Healing with Energy
‘One way of looking at illness,’ writes Jack Schwartz in Human Energy Systems, ‘is to characterize it as stagnant energy that is not being transformed.’ In TCM, all disease, physical as well as mental and emotional, is diagnosed and treated as a basic imbalance in the vital energies of the human system. Today, so-called ‘energy medicine’ is the newest development in modern Western medical science, but in China, ‘energy work’ (i.e., chi-gung) has been used to prevent and cure disease for thousands of years, and recent research has begun to validate the therapeutic efficacy of this approach in human health and healing. Numerous studies conducted in China as well as America have established a solid scientific foundation for chi-gung as a primary means of preventing and curing disease.
Chi-gung may be utilized with equal efficacy for preventing as well as curing disease. For preventive healthcare, a regular regimen of daily practice, such as the one recommended in Chapter 10, protects the practitioner from both acute disease as well as chronic degenerative conditions by strengthening immunity and resistance, regulating vital functions, enhancing vitality, and keeping the human energy system in perfect balance. For curing disease and correcting degenerative conditions that have already developed, self-therapy through intensive practice of chi-gung is supplemented with transmission of healing energy from healer to patient. In both preventive and curative care, self-therapy through practice as well as transmission of energy from healer to patient, the basic healing agent is the ambient free energy of the universe, and the delivery system for this medicine is the mind.
About four hundred years ago, the Taoist healer and chi-gung master Shih Chien-wu wrote, ‘Energy is a medicine that prolongs your life. Mind is the aspect of spirit that controls energy. Therefore, if you can learn how to use your mind to control energy, you can become a wizard.’ Chi-gung masters in China have been using their minds to control energy and energy to cure disease and prolong life for thousands of years, but until recently, incredulous Western observers have dismissed such healers as wily ‘wizards’ who obtain results through some sort of hypnotic suggestion or faith healing. Now, however, in light of irrefutable scientific evidence, Western physicians are taking a closer look at chi-gung healing. Instead of seeing wizards they now see healers, and where they once saw magic they now see science.
Chi-Gung as Preventive Healthcare
Since time immemorial, chi-gung has been known in China as ‘the method for preventing disease and prolonging life’. Modern medicine finally seems to have come full circle regarding human health and healing. After several centuries of trying to ‘conquer’ disease with chemical drugs, radiation, radical surgery and other technological solutions, and trying to prevent disease with vaccinations, synthetic additives to ‘fortify’ food, and all-out chemical warfare against germs, medical science is beginning to realize that ‘the best offence is a good defence’, and that the best defence is a strong, well-balanced energy system. When all is said and done, daily practice of chi-gung is the best preventive health measure against acute disease, the development of chronic degenerative conditions, the debilitating effects of stress, and the dangers posed by environmental pollution – including the less obvious but equally damaging factors of ‘energy pollution’, such as artificial electromagnetic fields, microwave radiation, emanations from power lines, computers and appliances, and so forth. Let’s take a look at some of the ways that chi-gung practice protects health and prolongs life by reviewing the most important benefits it has on various aspects of the human system.
Brain and Central Nervous System
As we have already seen, chi-gung switches the autonomous nervous system from the stress-related ‘fight or flight’ mode of the sympathetic branch over to the restorative healing mode of the parasympathetic branch. When this happens on a daily basis due to regular practice, the body has a chance to heal itself and restore balance day by day, long before serious physiological damage has a chance to develop. In order for the nervous system to function in the healing mode of the parasympathetic branch, the cerebral cortex, where the constant chatter of the ‘internal dialogue’ arises, must be stilled. Electroencephalographic (EEG) monitoring of people practising chi-gung has shown that during and after a session of chi-gung practice, the cerebral cortex enters a state of calm and quiet that very few people experience even in sleep.
It’s a well-known fact that the average person uses only five to ten per cent of his or her 15 billion brain cells. That’s like trying to operate a computer with only five to ten per cent of its software loaded: many basic functions simply cannot operate properly under such conditions. Small wonder then that so many people’s immune functions fail to respond successfully to the challenges of disease and environmental pollution, and that by the time they reach old age, so many experience memory failure, senility and other symptoms of cerebral deficiency. EEG tests have demonstrated that chi-gung activates the dormant 90 per cent of the human brain by suffusing even the deepest layers of the cerebrum with stimulating bioelectric currents that activate long-dormant functions and cause measurable electrical excitation of brain cells that previously showed no activity. The practical results of this effect include significant improvement in memory, learning and other intelligence factors, enhancement in physiological functions controlled by the brain, and the awakening of latent psychic powers, such as extrasensory perception. Of particular interest here is the fact that the EEG brain scans of adults and elderly people who practise chi-gung regularly show a peak value and a frequency that are characteristic of the patterns in children. This sheds scientific light on the frequent references in Chinese medical literature to the ‘youth-restoring’ (huan-tung) effects of chi-gung practice.
As we know from the basic axioms of internal alchemy, ‘energy commands essence’. In terms of brain function, the enhancement and balance of the bioelectrical energies associated with brain activity observed in those who practise chi-gung should in turn result in a significant improvement in brain chemistry; i.e., in the synthesis and secretion of vital neurotransmitters, and this indeed proves to be the case. Numerous studies in China and America have shown that after a session of chi-gung practice, there is a significant rise in the level of essential neurotransmitters in the blood, brain and cerebrospinal fluids, particularly norepinephrine, acetycholine, serotonin and dopamine. Deficiencies and imbalances in these neurochemicals are causal factors in such increasingly common conditions as Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease, chronic depression, insomnia and drug addiction. By maintaining a constant supply and proper balance of essential neurotransmitters, chi-gung not only prevents cerebral deficiency diseases but also eliminates the need for the recreational and prescription drugs which so many people use today in an effort to balance their brain chemistry.
One of the most potent classes of neurochemicals in the human brain is the endorphin group. Endorphins have a molecular structure analogous to morphine, but their analgesic effects are about two hundred times stronger than morphine. One of these natural pain-killing neurochemicals is called enkephalin, and tests have shown that chi-gung stimulates the brain to produce large amounts of enkephalin, while also enhancing the capacity of the endorphin receptors to receive and hold enkephalin. No doubt this accounts for some of the astonishing feats that some adepts perform under the influence of chi-gung, such as walking on red-hot bricks, running knives through their cheeks, and so forth. This effect accounts for the well-known analgesic effects of chi-gung, and further explains why most chi-gung practitioners have no need of addictive substances.
Immune Response
Closely related to the improvement in cerebral function is the significant enhancement in immunity and resistance that results from chi-gung practice. As we have seen, the innate healing mechanisms known as psychoneuroimmunology are mediated by positive biofeedback between the nervous system and the endocrine system, and chi-gung activates this response by stimulating production of the neurotransmitters, hormones and other immune factors required for healing.
One of the primary factors in immunity is the activity of white blood cells, which are produced in bone marrow. Chi-gung not only enhances white blood cell production by stimulating the marrow, it has also been shown to increase the phagocytic activity of these scavenger cells in the blood. Recall that the title of one of the two classic bibles of chi-gung attributed to Ta Mo (Bodhidharma) is the Marrow-Cleansing Classic. That’s because one of the most important benefits chi-gung has for human health is the revitalization of bone marrow. TCM has known for thousands of years that bone marrow is a primary source of immune factors in the body, but it was less than a hundred years ago that Western medicine discovered this fact.
Blood tests on practitioners have demonstrated that chi-gung also increases the production of T-cells in the thymus gland. T-cells are another pillar of human immune response, and their virtual disappearance from blood serum is one of the primary indications of AIDS. Chi-gung stimulates pituitary, adrenal and other glandular secretions as well, thereby keeping the entire endocrine system in proper balance. A major study in China shows that just thirty minutes of chi-gung practice also results in a big increase in red blood cell count, which enhances the bloodstream’s capacity to carry and deliver oxygen to the cells and further improves immune response.
Another way that chi-gung boosts immunity is by inhibiting the secretion of adrenaline and cortisole, both of which are released in response to stress, over-excitement and hyperactivity, and are well known for their immunosuppressive effects. Chronic stress has become increasingly recognized in Western medicine as a primary causal factor in immune deficiency, chronic degenerative conditions, and cancer. By counteracting the physiological effects of stress, chi-gung serves as a powerful protector of immune response and a preventive against disease and degeneration.
Chi-gung’s well-documented benefits for those who suffer from arthritis are due to the enhancement of natural steroid production in the body. The synthetic steroids commonly used to treat arthritis in allopathic medicine have dangerous side-effects, including suppression of normal immune response, but daily practice of chi-gung relieves and corrects the condition both by activating natural steroid production in the body and by lubricating and loosening stiff joints with gentle rhythmic exercise. As the old Chinese chi-gung proverb says, ‘The hinges of a moving door will not rust.’
In addition to these biochemical factors of ‘essence’, chi-gung also strengthens resistance directly on the level of energy by increasing the field force and enhancing the protective power of the natural shield of Guardian Energy (wei-chi) that envelopes the human body. The existence of this shield has been scientifically verified by Kirlian photography, a method of visually recording energy auras, invented in Russia. Kirlian photographs of people before and after chi-gung practice clearly reveal the enhanced brightness, power and field circumference of this protective energy shield after practice.
Heart and Circulatory System
One of the most pronounced effects of chi-gung in the human system is a dramatic improvement in blood circulation throughout the body, particularly microcirculation in the brain, extremities, and deep tissues of the vital organs. As another axiom of internal alchemy states, ‘blood goes where energy leads’. By driving energy to every tissue and cell of the body, chi-gung ensures adequate circulation of blood, which in turn guarantees delivery of sufficient supplies of the oxygen and nutrients required to sustain health.
Chi-gung takes a tremendous workload off the heart by turning the diaphragm into a ‘second heart’ to support circulation, thereby preventing exhaustion of the heart muscle and prolonging life. Studies in China have shown that twenty to thirty minutes of chi-gung practice reduces the pulse by an average of 15 per cent and that this effect continues for several hours after practice. This reduction in heart pulse is accompanied by an overall increase in circulation, proving that chi-gung shifts much of the body’s circulatory duty from the heart to the breath.
High blood pressure is easily prevented, and can also be cured, by daily practice of chi-gung. High blood pressure has become one of the biggest banes of human health today, and the conventional approach to this problem is to prescribe drugs that may have dangerous side-effects, and to recommend a reduction of dietary salt intake. The drugs prescribed for high blood pressure today actually aggravate the root causes of the condition by robbing the blood of the very minerals required to regulate blood pressure, thereby making it a permanent condition. Furthermore, it is not salt that causes high blood pressure, but rather the denatured, mineral-deficient industrial type of salt produced by the food industry. Whole sea salt in fact helps regulate blood pressure by ensuring a proper balance of essential minerals in the bloodstream.
The entire problem of high blood pressure can be readily prevented simply by practising chi-gung, which balances blood pressure throughout the circulatory system. A study conducted on 100 cases of chronic hypertension at the Shanghai Research Institute for Hypertension showed that after only five minutes of chi-gung practice, blood pressure in every patient began to drop, and after twenty minutes, their blood pressure was reduced to the same level it reached three hours after taking the drugs normally prescribed for high blood pressure. Ninety-seven of these patients were able to prevent a recurrence of hypertension by practising chi-gung, thereby effectively curing themselves, while three of them suffered relapses when they stopped practising.
Since various forms of heart and circulatory disease have become the leading cause of premature death in the USA and many parts of Europe, chi-gung could prevent millions of unnecessary deaths at no cost to the consumer and without any negative side-effects.
Respiratory System
Chi-gung, particularly the deep diaphragmic breathing it involves, greatly improves respiratory functions and protects the lungs from damage due to airborne pollution. Chi-gung breathing increases the oxygenation of the blood in the lungs, while chi-gung movement improves delivery of oxygen to the cells, resulting in a significant enhancement in overall respiratory efficiency. With oxygen levels in the air today reduced to only half of what they were two hundred years ago, this oxygenating effect alone represents an enormous step forward in preventive healthcare, particularly against cancer.
A study on deep breathing in India revealed that after fifteen minutes of practice, the average volume of air taken into the lungs on inhalation rose from 482ml before practice to 740ml afterward, while the average number of breaths per minute dropped from fifteen down to only five. This represents a huge improvement in respiratory efficiency. These benefits are due to the important role which the diaphragm plays in breath control. Chi-gung, which engages the diaphragm as a pump to regulate breath and circulation, strengthens this powerful muscle and restores its natural role in breathing, resulting in a cumulative improvement in respiratory efficiency the longer chi-gung is practised. For example, a recent study in China demonstrated that after only two months of daily practice, the average flex of the diaphragm, which is only about 1 inch (3cm) in people who do not practice diaphragmic breathing, rose to between 2½ and 3½ inches (6 and 9cm), a two- to three-fold increase.
Su Tung-po, one of China’s most beloved poets, who took up chi-gung as a health practice in mid-life during the twelfth century, praised the salutary benefits of deep breathing exercises as follows:
At first, one feels little effect, but after practising breathing exercises regularly for one hundred days or so, the efficacy of this method is beyond measure, and its benefits are a hundred times greater than any medicine . . .
The method is actually quite simple . . . If you try it for just twenty days, already your spirit will feel different . . . your waist and legs will feel light and limber, and your eyes and complexion will grow bright and lustrous.
These benefits are permanent for as long as one continues to practise.
Digestive System
Another clear manifestation of the ‘energy controls essence’ axiom of internal alchemy is the remarkable enhancement in digestive secretions observed in chi-gung practitioners. Chi-gung stimulates an immediate increase in the secretion of saliva in the mouth, digestive secretions in the stomach, and essential digestive fluids in the intestines. Just fifteen minutes of practice has been shown to produce a major elevation in the secretion of pepsin, one of the most important digestive enzymes in the stomach. Besides increasing the amount of digestive enzymes in saliva, chi-gung has also been shown to enhance the production of salivary lysozyme, an enzyme with potent anti-bacterial properties. Indeed, traditional Taoist literature refers to the saliva secreted from the ducts below the tongue during chi-gung practice as ‘sweet dew’ (gan-lu) and ‘jade fluid’ (yu-yi), and emphasizes the importance of swallowing this saliva as a sort of preventive medicine.
It has also been scientifically demonstrated that chi-gung balances the pH level of digestive fluids, which is absolutely essential to proper digestion of food and assimilation of nutrients. ‘Acid indigestion’ has become such a common condition in the West that many people never leave the house without a pocketful of antacid remedies. pH balance is one of the most important aspects of Yin/Yang balance in human health, and here again chi-gung regulates this vital form of ‘essence’ by balancing the energy that governs it.
The movement of the diaphragm in chi-gung breathing, in conjunction with the movements of the body in chi-gung exercise, provide a highly stimulating massage to all the digestive organs, thereby helping to regulate their functions and balance their secretions. This therapeutic massage effect also enhances peristalsis throughout the alimentary canal, improving digestion, enhancing assimilation, and preventing constipation and flatulence.
A lesser known but equally important benefit of chi-gung for the digestive system is that it greatly improves the body’s ability to extract and assimilate nutrients and transform them into energy. As we know from our discussion of internal alchemy, ‘essence transforms into energy’, and chi-gung results in a manifold increase in the energy the body derives from essential nutrients. It also enables the body to tap the abundant supplies of nutrients stored in the body. This is the basis of the bi-gu fasting regimen practised by some chi-gung adepts: every time an adept fasts for a period of three to thirty days, or longer, the body’s digestive power and efficiency take quantum leaps, and the amount of food required thereafter decreases proportionately. During periods of food abstention, chi-gung triggers the transfer of stored nutrients from various tissues into the digestive fluids, which deliver them directly into the stomach and duodenum in highly refined and concentrated form for quick and easy assimilation. Here again we see the ‘essence transforms into energy’ axiom of internal alchemy at work in scientifically verifiable terms.
Acid/Alkaline Balance (pH)
Among the most important preventive health care benefits of chi-gung is the way it immediately balances the pH level of the blood, digestive juices and other bodily fluids. Chronic excess acidity gives rise to a condition of pH imbalance known as ‘acidosis’, which has become a primary causal factor in many common degenerative conditions today. This is due to the extremely acid-forming properties of modern diets, particularly meat, dairy products and refined starches and sugars. Stress and physical exhaustion also produce a lot of excess acid in the blood and muscles.
Chi-gung, particularly the deep-breathing aspect, restores normal pH balance to the blood every time you practise. This effect is related to oxygenation: proper pH balance can only be maintained when sufficient oxygen is present in the blood. Conversely, oxygen deficiency predisposes the blood and other bodily fluids to excess acidity. Recall that excess acidity and insufficient oxygen are the two primary conditions of imbalance that predispose tissues to the development of cancer. Thus, chi-gung helps prevent cancer by correcting the two main imbalances associated with its development.
The French physicians Dr Peschier and Walter Michel make note of the preventive health benefits of deep breathing as follows:
Every organic or functional disorder leading to conditions of illness is susceptible to the influence, if not always the cure, of controlled breathing.
Controlled breathing is the most outstanding method known to us for increasing organic resistance . . . There is always a natural immunity attributed to ionic balance in the blood, and dependent on breathing . . . It confers on the balance of the acid/base a regularity which is reestablished with each breath.
Free Radical Scavenger
Modern Western medical science now accepts the thesis that the main mechanism involved in ageing and deterioration of the human body is cumulative damage from the activity of ‘free radicals’. Free radicals are unstable, highly reactive molecules that are produced naturally as by-products of metabolism, but today they also enter the human system with pollutants in air and water, pesticides and chemical additives, junk foods and convenience foods, and many other unnatural factors in modern lifestyle. The result is the saturation of the tissues with free radicals, which constantly bombard healthy cells and thereby produce more free radicals, setting in motion a chain reaction that gradually destroys the cellular matrix, inhibits vital functions and prematurely ages the whole body.
Free radicals are controlled in the body by free radical ‘scavengers’, also known as ‘antioxidants’, which neutralize free radicals by balancing their electrical charge. Most antioxidants are either basic nutrients such as vitamins A, C and E and various minerals and trace elements, such as selenium, or else particular enzymes that are specifically designed and secreted for this purpose. The most important free radical scavenger in the body is the enzyme called ‘superoxide dismutase’ (SOD). Laboratory analysis of blood samples taken from elderly chi-gung practitioners shows that after a session of chi-gung, the level of SOD in their bloodstreams rises to double that of those who do not practise, indicating a major enhancement of antioxidant activity as a direct result of chi-gung practice. Chi-gung also seems to increase the bioavailability of certain minerals and trace elements, particularly zinc and selenium, which are essential factors for the production of SOD, peroxidase and other antioxidant enzymes.
Enhanced antioxidant activity in the body has been scientifically proven to retard the ageing process and prevent the degenerative conditions associated with old age, so here we see another modern scientific validation of one of the most ancient claims regarding chi-gung – that it slows down the ageing process, ‘restores youth’ and prolongs life.
Curative Applications of Chi-Gung
‘Breathing and related exercises are one hundred times more effective as medical therapy than any drug,’ wrote the Ching dynasty Tao master Shen Chia-shu. ‘This knowledge is indispensable to man, and every physician should study it thoroughly.’ Indeed, if every physician thoroughly studied the therapeutic powers of ‘breathing and related exercises’ (i.e., chi-gung) and applied them as medical therapy, before long there would be such a dramatic improvement in public health that the conventional medical industry would probably shrink to a small percentage of its current size.
When used for curative purposes, chi-gung is most effective when an intensive programme of self-practice is combined with healing energy therapy by emitted chi from a qualified chi-gung master. The sort of chi-gung exercises practised for curing disease are much the same as those used for daily preventive healthcare, but when used for curative therapy, a lot more time is devoted to practice each day than in preventive chi-gung. For mild diseases, for example, a person might practise his or her chi-gung regimen for three or four hours per day until cured. For serious ailments, such as cancer, patients in China often practise for eight to twelve hours per day.
An effective set of chi-gung exercises developed specifically for healing is the Six Syllable Secret, which is discussed in Chapter 6. This is basically a standard ‘moving meditation’ style of practice; except on exhalation, one aspirates a particular syllable in the top of the throat, thereby modulating energy in a way that guides it to a particular organ. The entire Six Syllable healing set with detailed instructions on how to practise it is presented in my Complete Book of Chinese Health and Healing.
Emitted Chi (fa-chi)
This is the aspect of healing energy that is exciting so much popular as well as scientific interest in chi-gung today. If even half of the claims regarding the cures achieved in China with emitted chi are true, and evidence seems to indicate that they are, then curing disease with emitted chi, in conjunction with intensive practice by the patient, represents the greatest revolution in human healthcare in medical history. Many Western physicians remain sceptical about curing disease in this way, but those who have taken the time and trouble to go to China and witness this method with their own eyes, and to speak with the patients and the therapists involved, have returned to the West with their views on human health and healing totally transformed.
The irony here is that chi-gung was the very first form of curative therapy ever recorded anywhere in the world. Five millennia later, after having dabbled with virtually every conceivable variety of herb, drug, chemical nostrum, blood-letting, surgery, radiation and other techniques to cure disease, healers as well as patients are finally realizing that both the problem and the solution lie not in germs, physical symptoms and other external factors of disease, nor in the chemical and mechanical warfare modern medicine wages against the human body to battle disease, but rather in the invisible template of the human energy system and the natural balance of internal energies.
Extensive scientific research has been conducted in China on chi-gung masters who have the ability to emit chi to heal disease. For one thing, it has been shown by technological means (through machines which can measure energy vibrations) that these healers emit a beam of energy from the lao-gung points in their palms, with properties and penetrating powers similar to that of laser beams. These beams are able to penetrate several centimetres of wood, leather and metal. The same research showed that when a healer beams emitted chi at a patient, the patient’s energy field patterns become identical to that of the healer. In other words, the healer literally ‘plugs’ his or her energy into the patient’s system, and in doing so, any imbalances, deviations, deficiencies and other abnormalities in the patient’s energy patterns are immediately corrected. This makes scientific sense, because it is a well-known fact of physics that a high-energy field always prevails over a low-energy field, imposing its patterns on the lesser field. This effect may also be achieved by practising chi-gung exercises: by tuning the human system into the energy field of the earth, which is always perfectly balanced, chi-gung induces the earth’s power to naturally straighten out any kinks and wrinkles, supplement any deficiencies, correct any imbalances, and normalize any abnormal patterns in the practitioner’s energy system. In the case of emitted chi, the perfectly balanced patterns of the healer’s powerful field are super-imposed over the patient’s weak imbalanced system, immediately rebalancing and recharging it. When that happens, any problems that have developed in the patient’s body as a result of the imbalance in the energy system simply disappear and normal physiological health is naturally restored.
These studies also showed that emitted chi could kill powerful bacterias that have grown resistant to drugs, such as staphylococcus, and dangerous viruses such as hepatitis B, but that this only happened when the healer was told in advance that this was the purpose of the treatment, so that he or she could consciously modulate the emitted energy to produce ‘killer chi’. Here again we find sound scientific confirmation of an ancient axiom of internal alchemy: ‘spirit commands energy’. What this means is that the energy emitted by the healer will perform precisely the healing functions which the healer imprints on it with his mind. Hence, emitted chi carries healing power as well as healing information from healer to patient, and heals the patient’s body in exactly the way the healer’s mind commands it to do.
It has also been shown that after treating several patients, a healer’s own energy reserves become depleted. Some healers’ bodies actually take on some of the physical symptoms of the diseases they have just finished clearing from their patients, such as yellow eyes when treating hepatitis, diarrhoea after treating gastrointestinal ailments, headaches and so forth. Sometimes a foul sour smell exudes from the healer’s body after a treatment. This indicates that while the healer was treating the patient, during which time the healer’s energy gates are wide open, some of the patient’s ‘muddy energy’ (juo-chi) seeped into the healer’s system. It is therefore of utmost importance that chi-gung healers take careful measures to clear their systems each and every time after treating patients with emitted chi. Special breathing exercises, body movements, visualizations and sounds have been specifically developed for this purpose.
The most accomplished healers, who learn how to work entirely with universal free energy channelled through their systems and transmitted onward to the patient, without getting their own personal emotional energy or ego involved, do not experience as much contamination from their patients’ polluted energies, but very few masters have reached this level of practice, because it requires a very high degree of spiritual development and complete withdrawal of the personal ego from the healing process.
Curative therapy with emitted chi usually begins with a brief diagnostic scan by the healer, who passes his or her hands slowly over the surface of the patient’s body, without touching, to detect areas where energy is out of balance, blocked, toxic or otherwise abnormal. Sometimes the diagnostic methods of TCM are also used, such as looking at the patient’s tongue fur, eyes and skin, sniffing the breath and body, and palpating the organs, but the best chi-gung healers can simply feel a patient’s condition instantly just by scanning the body with their sensitive hands. The patient is then told to either lie down or sit comfortably, while the healer beams energy into the patient from a distance of six inches (15cm) up to six feet (170cm) away. A session may last anywhere from twenty minutes to an hour, and the treatment is repeated several times a week for as long as the condition requires.
Let’s take a look at some of the conditions which are currently being successfully cured in China with emitted chi. If you or any of your friends or family suffer from any of these conditions and are not getting positive results from conventional modern medicine, you might consider taking a ‘health holiday’ in China to try this approach, or contacting some of the chi-gung associations listed in the Appendix to see if you can locate a qualified healing energy master in the West.
Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, Senile Dementia
In China, emitted chi has been used for several decades now to treat people with degenerative conditions of the brain, such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s. Several of modern China’s top leaders, including Deng Xiao-ping, were treated in this manner with great success.
In 1985, a controlled study was conducted on patients in the Columbia Lutheran Home, a nursing home in Seattle, to test chi-gung as therapy for Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and other forms of senile dementia. The healer who provided the emitted chi therapy was Dr Effie Chow from San Francisco. The improvement in these patients was so dramatic that the staff at the nursing home were moved to tears. In almost all cases, major symptoms either disappeared entirely or were significantly reduced, and some patients were able to terminate heavy drug therapy on which they had depended for years. The results of these tests were later presented in testimony to the House Select Committee on Ageing in the US Congress.
As we have seen, when healing energy is transmitted into the systems of people suffering from severe imbalances in brain chemistry, the enhanced infusions of cerebral energy stimulate production of vital neurochemicals, such as dopamine, deficiencies of which are associated with Parkinson’s and other cerebral diseases. After these imbalances have been corrected with emitted chi, daily practice of chi-gung at home prevents them from recurring. A very significant point here is the remarkable finding that the EEG brain wave patterns of elderly patients treated with emitted chi become identical to those found in children, a clear indication that a genuine ‘rejuvenation’ effect has occurred. If ever there were a ‘fountain of youth’ in medicine, then chi is most certainly the water.
Paralysis, Stroke
Emitted chi has established a very strong track record as therapy for paralysis due to stroke, spinal injuries or other conditions. In 1991, a chi-gung master in China by the name of Wang Heng treated three totally paralysed stroke victims who had been under conventional medical therapy for several years. The treatment was monitored under close scientific scrutiny by sceptical observers at a modern hospital, under the supervision of several licensed Western physicians. After three days of treatment, two of the patients got up out of bed and started walking!
The attending doctors were so amazed by these results that they immediately set up another controlled study at a larger hospital, this time with one hundred paralysed stroke patients. After only three days of treatment from Master Wang, 85 of these patients were able to walk. One of them got up out of bed after the first treatment and walked down three flights of stairs, unassisted, to get a breath of fresh air.
Similar results have been obtained treating children with partial paralysis and limb deformities due to cerebral palsy. Dr Effie Chow, who is trained in both Western medicine and TCM, treated an eight-year-old cerebral palsy victim named Eric at her medical institute, witnessed by seventy-five Western health professionals. Within twenty minutes, the boy was able to move his formerly useless arms and hands, straighten out an ankle that had never taken a normal step, and walk normally across the room by himself. The same sort of results have been observed in countless other cases, and yet chi-gung is still not recognized as valid therapy for these conditions in any Western countries, despite the spectacular results it has achieved for those fortunate enough to encounter qualified therapists.
Spinal Fractures
Emitted chi therapy has been used in China to rehabilitate patients suffering from disabilities due to severe fractures of the spine. Dr Yan Xin, a chi-gung master who has recently established a following in the USA, cured several such cases under close scrutiny in China during the late 1980s and early 1990s. In one case, the patient had a fractured skull, a fractured L-2 vertebrae in the lower back, and severe injury to the spinal cord. He was paralysed in both legs, unable to sit or turn over in bed, and virtually helpless. While the patient lay in bed in a hospital, Dr Yan sat in a temple about ten miles away and spent the entire night beaming healing energy to the patient, who later reported that he felt a soothing warm sensation wash over his body all that night and could smell a faint trace of sandalwood on the air in his room. Lo and behold! After sleeping soundly for nine consecutive hours after the treatment, the patient was able to get out of bed and walk again.
Dr Yan subsequently treated about a dozen more similar cases, all with equally successful results. These are not cases of ‘anecdotal evidence’, but documented cases of patients hospitalized in serious condition, complete with X-rays, blood tests, EEG scans and other modern medical technology to monitor the results. When such patients get up and walk again, after years of being bedridden under conventional medical care, the evidence is rather difficult to refute.
AIDS
One of the first observable benefits of chi-gung, both from personal practice as well as treatment with emitted chi, is an immediate enhancement in immune response. This is due partly to effects on the nervous system and partly the endocrine system. When internal energy is brought back into proper balance, the innate healing responses in both systems are activated and sustained by establishing a cycle of positive feedback between neurotransmitters and hormones. Every test ever conducted on the blood of chi-gung practitioners has shown enhanced levels of T-cells, white blood cells, antioxidant enzymes and other immune factors after a session of practice.
Patients with AIDS have been successfully treated with chi-gung in China as well as in the USA, but only if they refrain from taking AZT and the other toxic drugs currently used to treat people with HIV. The causal link between HIV and AIDS has never been scientifically proven, and many medical scientists are beginning to suspect that the extremely toxic drugs used to treat HIV themselves contribute to the patient’s immune deficiency, due to their immunosuppressive side-effects. Therefore, in order to treat an AIDS patient with chi-gung, regardless of whether he or she also has HIV or not, it’s important to do so before any toxic drugs have been administered. Unfortunately, the medical establishment has become so entrenched in the HIV/AIDS hypothesis and so convinced that the cure is to be found in chemicals, that they have, in the vast majority of cases, refused to consider the results of chi-gung therapy for this condition. Nevertheless, the fact remains that chi-gung has been proven to significantly enhance every aspect of human immune response, so it stands to reason that it would be an effective treatment for any sort of acquired immune deficiency, as long as no drugs are used to counteract its benefits and the patient agrees to alter the lifestyle factors which caused his or her immune deficient condition.
Eradicating ‘Super-Bugs’ with Chi
Studies conducted at the Microbiology Department at Shandgong University in China demonstrated that emitted chi destroys staphylococcus bacteria more effectively than carbolic acid, a disinfectant commonly used for this purpose. Eight minutes of exposure to emitted chi resulted in a 76 per cent kill rate. Other microbes were eradicated with equal efficacy under similar conditions.
Similar results are also observed on a wide range of bacteria and viruses when infected patients are treated with emitted chi. Many serious viral ailments that often do not respond to drug therapy, such as hepatitis B, have been successfully cured by treatment with ‘killer chi’. In America and Canada, it has been discovered in recent years that intensive care units have become breeding grounds for drug-resistant strains of staphylococcus and other germs, and that many patients in these hospitals end up dying of diseases contracted as a result of exposure to these ‘super-bugs’. In light of the proven efficacy of chi in destroying such microbes, it would seem advisable to conduct some studies by having qualified chi-gung masters come in and ‘clean the house’ in contaminated hospitals to eliminate these dangerous health hazards. It would certainly be a lot cheaper and much safer than continuously developing ever stronger chemicals and antibiotics, which in the end only breed ever more resistant strains of germs.
Cancer
It is in the field of cancer that emitted chi is having the most dramatic results as a cure. First of all, the incidence and mortality rate for cancer have been steadily rising over the past thirty years, while the treatments developed for it by modern medical science have not proven successful as cures. In America, over $40 billion has been funnelled into cancer research since the mid-1960s, and half that figure in the UK, and the treatments have grown almost prohibitively expensive, but still more and more develop cancer and continue to die from it, sometimes as a direct result of the therapy itself.
In addition to the regular chi-gung exercises used for prevention, there are also special sets which have been developed especially to cure particular diseases. In China, there is a form of curative chi-gung called ‘Guo Lin Chi-Gung’, which was developed as a specific cure for cancer by a woman of that name about thirty years ago. Not only did she cure herself of a serious case of uterine cancer with her practice, she also taught the same set to other cancer patients, most of whom experienced similarly effective results. Eventually the Guo Lin Research Society was established to study and teach this form of chi-gung practice to cancer patients all over China, and it is estimated that over one million cancer patients in China and elsewhere in Asia are now practising this cure in preference to conventional cancer therapy. A significant number of these practising patients report that their tumours have either stopped growing, gone into remission, or disappeared entirely, and the long-term survival rate for cancer patients who cure themselves this way is proving to be far higher than that achieved by conventional modern treatments such as chemotherapy and radiation. Sceptical Western doctors who doubt this claim need only contact the Gou Lin Research Society in China and arrange to go and see for themselves, or request copies of the copious scientifically documented records now being kept in China regarding cancer cures with chi-gung. The real question here is not whether chi-gung works as a cure for cancer and other supposedly ‘incurable’ diseases, but rather whether the Western medical establishment is willing to consider a form of treatment that in effect would eliminate the need for expensive doctors, drugs and hospitals.
There are so many case histories of successful cancer cures with chi-gung that it would take several volumes just to categorize them, so we will discuss only two here. Those interested in finding out more about curing cancer with chi-gung can do so by contacting some of the organizations and institutes listed in the Appendix.
One of the most celebrated cancer cases in China was that of Feng Jian, a national badminton champion and popular hero. At the age of only twenty-one, he was diagnosed with lung cancer, which is almost always fatal. His doctors suggested immediate surgery, to be followed by chemotherapy and radiation – the conventional ‘cut, poison and burn’ approach. However, Feng Jian declined to accept their advice. Instead, he found a teacher and started practising Guo Lin Chi-Gung, the special practice set developed specifically for cancer, in conjunction with careful attention to diet, regular exercise, plenty of rest and other related yang-sheng health regimes. He practised chi-gung every day for ten months, sometimes up to twelve hours a day, and when he went back to the hospital to have his condition checked, his doctors were astounded to discover that the cancer had completely disappeared. Two decades later he is still alive and well.
While doing a story on Chi-Lel Chi-Gung in China, health writer Luke Chan was invited to sit in front of an ultrasound machine monitor and watch a patient’s bladder cancer literally dissolve before his eyes. Prior to the treatment, the tumour could be plainly seen attached to the wall of the bladder. While Chan kept his eyes riveted on the image on the screen, the patient was treated with emitted chi by four therapists. Within minutes, the tumour began to dissolve, and by the end of the treatment, it could barely be detected. Ten days later, after several more treatments and daily self-practice, the patient was checked again, and the cancer had completely disappeared.
Scores of such cases, all of them documented, were presented at the Medical Conference for Academic Exchange on Medical Chi-gung, held in China in 1988, and again in 1993, with health professionals from all over the world in attendance. Case studies of successful treatments for virtually every known type of cancer were included in the papers presented. Patients were not only cured of their cancers, but they also recovered their overall health and vitality, a far cry from the debilitated condition in which most patients are left by conventional cancer therapy, which virtually destroys human immune response, decimates the liver, causes impotence and digestive problems, and weakens the whole system. Chi-gung therapy, in addition to dissolving cancerous tumours, also rebuilds the whole immune system, rebalances the blood, oxygenates the entire body, normalizes all vital functions, and enhances vitality, permitting patients to recover total health and enjoy the remaining years of their lives. Unfortunately, conventional doctors these days scare their patients into submitting to immediate surgery, chemotherapy and/or radiation treatment, before they ever have an opportunity to consider alternative approaches. Many of these patients end up trying alternative therapy such as chi-gung after conventional therapy fails to cure them, but by that time there has been so much damage done to their bodies that it is far more difficult, and sometimes impossible, to effect a cure.
The precise mechanism whereby chi-gung cures cancer has not been fully established, but it probably has a lot to do with oxygen and alkalinity. If the tissues in which a tumour is growing can be saturated with oxygen and kept in an alkaline state, the cancer will shrink and dissolve. Oxygenation and alkalization of blood and tissues are two of chi-gung’s most prominent effects. Other factors involved in chi-gung therapy for cancer might be the overall enhancement of immune response, which would allow the body to fight and destroy malignant cells, the great improvement in microcirculation, and the rebalancing and recharging of biolectric currents in each and every cell in the body. Obviously, cancer does not occur in a properly balanced body, and since chi-gung’s overall effect is to properly balance the body, what chi-gung seems to be doing is creating conditions in which cancer simply cannot exist. Sufficient oxygen and alkalinity are two basic parameters of balance that can be easily measured, but no doubt there are also many other factors, some of them as yet unknown, involved in the optimum balance which chi-gung establishes in the human system.
Chi-Gung Hospitals and Research Centres
Due to the popular as well as academic interest sparked by publicity surrounding some of the more spectacular cures achieved by chi-gung, a number of special hospitals and research centres have been established in China and elsewhere around the world to conduct further studies and make treatment more widely available to those who wish to try it.
One such hospital is the Wahzhan Zhineng Chigong Clinic and Training Centre, located in an old navy hospital in Qinhuadao, a five-hour train ride from Beijing. Founded in 1988 by Dr Pang Ming, the hospital uses no drugs, no herbs, no special diets and no surgery of any kind. Instead, it offers only one kind of medicine and one kind of treatment, and that is chi. Over the past ten years the hospital has treated hundreds of thousands of patients for nearly two hundred types of disease, posting an amazing 95 per cent success rate. The diseases treated and cured here include diabetes, arthritis, coronary disease, paralysis, lupus and cancer.
The type of chi-gung used at this hospital is called ‘Chi Lel’, and it was developed specifically for curing disease by Dr Pang. The programme consists of four parts:
1. Strong understanding of the healing powers of chi in the mind of the patient. Patients are first taught how and why chi works to cure the human body, so that there are no doubts in their minds to counteract the effects of the healing energy. Remember the basic axiom, of internal alchemy: ‘spirit commands energy’.
2. Group healing sessions. Large groups of patients are treated together in order to amplify the power of universal free energy as it flows through the group.
3. Individual treatment with emitted chi. Patients are treated on an individual basis by qualified masters, according to their requirements.
4. Individual practice. Patients are taught various chi-gung sets, and they spend the entire day, and much of the night, practising.
According to medical records kept at the hospital on approximately 10,000 specific cases selected for study, an overall success rate of 95 per cent was achieved in these cases as follows: 15.20 per cent experienced total cures, with all functions returning to normal; 37.68 per cent experienced ‘very effective’ results, which means that symptoms almost completely disappeared and tests indicated great improvement in vital functions; 42.09 per cent experienced ‘effective’ results, meaning there was noticeable improvement, and the patient was able to eat, sleep and function normally again. Only 5 per cent of the people treated in this study experienced no improvement whatsoever. Anyone who has ever been treated in a modern Western hospital, or who has gone to visit friends and family in such places, knows that this is a far better record than drugs, surgery and other high-tech therapies have posted, and at far less expense, discomfort and risk. Today, a significant number of people treated at great expense in modern hospitals end up contracting serious diseases there that they did not have when they entered.
Average cost of treatment with Chi-Lel Chi-Gung at this hospital in China amounts to about £50 per month. Compare that with medical costs in any big Western hospital, and we find yet another major advantage to treating disease with chi-gung. The only medicine used in chi-gung healing is universal free energy, which costs nothing and is readily available to anyone in unlimited supply. The only equipment required to administer healing energy therapy is the human body and mind, so the only real costs involved for treatment at this sort of hospital are room and board.
The Guo Lin Research Society is another well-known organization that studies and teaches curative chi-gung in China. Developed as a specific cure for cancer, Guo Lin Chi-Gung has been used by millions of cancer patients to cure themselves. Those who opt for conventional cancer therapy, such as radiation or chemotherapy, sometimes practise Guo Lin Chi-Gung to relieve the unpleasant side-effects of those therapies.
The World Academic Society of Medical Chi-Gung in Beijing organizes international conferences to present the results on medical chi-gung to health professionals from around the world, and to exchange information with similar organizations elsewhere. In addition, there are hundreds of individual chi-gung masters practising chi-gung as medical therapy in China, and anyone who makes the effort to go there and find one will certainly succeed in doing so.
Similar organizations are beginning to crop up in America, Australia and elsewhere in the Western world. In San Francisco and Vancouver, there’s the East West Academy of Healing Arts and the Qigong Institute, which offer personal consultations, professional references, and documented information on medical chi-gung. Chi-gung master Dr Yan Xin has recently established training centres for his school of healing chi-gung in the USA, as have other noteworthy masters, such as Dr Yang Jwing-ming from Taiwan and Master Hyunmoon Kim from Korea. In the UK, The British Council for Chinese Martial Arts and the Qigong Institute in Manchester offer courses, workshops and personal consultations. The infrastructure for healing chi-gung therapy is already in place in the Western world, but you must still take the initiative to find a qualified master and a style that suits you, because it’s highly unlikely that you’ll get a reference from your local family doctor or city hospital. Some of the addresses listed in the Appendix should be helpful in guiding anyone who’s interested in practising chi-gung for preventive healthcare, or finding a master healer to receive treatment by emitted chi, to the right place.