Zhan Zhuang Versus other Sports and Physical Exercises

Zhan Zhuang or an Internal Qigong practice is different from physical Exercises in that both mind and body are trained simultaneously as an integrated wholeness.
Training of the body by internal qigong is different from ordinary physical exercise because it is based on the training of mind while body is trained in an relaxed state. This relaxed state of the body is very important for entering an subconscious realm of mind.

Internal Qigong (including internal martial arts) is different from non-qigong exercises (including external martial arts) in that all common physical methods require you to be fully conscious, while in internal qigong you enter a state between consciousness and unconsciousness. In internal martial arts you train consciously while you are in touch with the subconscious and then you succeed unconsciously. During standing and moving mediation you imprint on your subconsciousness the fighting techniques. In fact, this subconscious is not exactly the psychological subconsciousness but includes body consciousness.

In such a relaxed state, also the healing qi (bio-electricity) runs freely inside the body, self regulates the physiological functions of the body.

Zhan Zhuang is ideal because it lowers energy consumption including oxygen consumption, blood consumption and calorie burning, etc. Thus, the body is in a state which is highly energy conserving and this accumulated energy can be used to heal many physical problems.
By doing Zhan Zhuang we use the body as much as it is needed without running out of energy. The living things have an intrinsic biological mechanism which evolves by using and degenerates by not using.

The training of the body through Zhan Zhuang has the effect of lowering energy consumption and while the body consumes less energy then energy storage will automatically increase. 

It is a perfect state where we produce more energy than we consume. On contrary, other physical exercises consume more energy than our body could produce and therefore you get exhausted soon.

The stored energy after during standing internal qigong can be called potential energy. By decreasing energy consumption, energy storage is increased. This energy can be transformed into kinetic energy such as Fali (power release in yiquan system) in internal martial arts or it is used for healing by body itself.

Note: In the beginning, you will get exhausted by Zhan Zhuang until you learn to use the stabilizers and relax mobilizers. The relaxation in zhan zhuang is a must for taking the benefits of internal qigong practice.

Medical Students Syndrome and Anxiety

Ignorance is bliss when it comes to deal with anxiety disorder. As you might know, many medical students develop somatization symptoms. The knowledge that they acquire about diseases produces pain and symptoms in a certain spots as they put a lot of concentration and attention upon that region which causes any sensation. The mere knowledge of the location of the appendix transforms the most harmless sensations in that region into symptoms of serious perceived symptoms.

Why this happen? It is easy to explain..When a medical student thinks he has a disease in a certain location in the abdominal area he/she transfers the the brain energy (yang energy or positive electricity) through the vagus nerve to the neural intestine network. As we have explained the whole connective tissue of the body is a semiconductor which is able to conduct the electric energy through the electric channels. So the yang energy coming from the learned awareness on the abdominal area will be counterbalanced as soon as possible with the yin energy or negative electricity. This is only the case of a person without congenital blockages in which the student will suffer only a very short time (one month lets say) from somatization disorder. It is clear that as soon as the student removes the awareness from the area where it thinks he has acquired the disease the somatization disappears. A temporary problem might be with students who makes the increased transfer of yang energy from a conscious process to unconscious process by entering into a vicious circle of anxiety. The mind is like a monkey which the more you fight or resist it the more it persist. All of these cases are not for concern because the somatization period will be very short.

For instance, a student that puts the mind into the heart location will disturb the electric activity of the heart resulting in palpitation. After some time the heart will ignore this mind interference and the heart palpitation will disappear despite the conscious brain yang energy.
The problematic case will be only a student who have congenital blockages. He will suffer the somatization for a long period. He/she has to follow two solutions: To contact a Cognitive Behavioural therapist (CBT) to learn to forget the body and to distract he mind from the abdominal area. Or to try to open the congenital blockages through qigong practices.

Qigong practices will open the channels where the energy can flow freely without resistance. When the energy flows with resistance zero the body feels empty. 

I believe that body have a tremendous wisdom to self-regulate to circulate the energy. The exercise Zhan Zhuang is just a tool to help the body accelerate the self-regulation of energy flow.

Wuji Standing practice of Master Cai Song Fang

Simplicity is the secret of mastery.  There is no complicated method, "false teaching needs ten thousand volumes, real teaching is just one sentence, and to get inside qigong's door, you need only this simple exercise Wuji Standing practice of Master Cai Song Fang. The teaching of real qigong does not resemble the replication of one form or one style like in the teaching of external martial arts. Contrary, the Yiquan is internal qigong which connect you to the center Wuji from where ten thousand emerge. Wuji is formless and from formlessness any form can be born.

The form emerges or is born from interconnected wholeness of formlessness. The secret of Yiquan is just the awareness of the wuji point or center of the body. And when every part of body is interconnected through the center of body the wholeness is created. In this state if one hand moves the whole body follows through fluid awareness. You move one hand and your foot is aware.

In standing meditation you maintain the mechanical interconnected wholeness of the body by means of neural interconnected wholeness of nervous system which in turn can be achieved through DC body field or quantum interconnected-ness of liquid crystalline matrix of connective tissue (behaving like liquid-crystalline).

Wuji standing is easier and the same as Zhan Zhuang differing only to the hand position. Wuji standing is easier for a starter and needs a littler more mental directed activity by sending brain energy to the wuji center (navel).

The DC body field can be produced either from tendon stretching of the bending knees or from mental directed activity. The brain energy is sent to the second primitive brain (the navel area or neural network of intestine). In the beginning, the DC body field produced from the bending angle is dominant and then after some time of practice the brain energy is dominant as the awareness of the wuji center increases. For a starter it is better to bend less as this way the correct posture is easier. 

Wuji Standing practice of Master Cai Song Fang