One secret tip to improve your health
October 5, 2007
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If you do nothing else to improve your health, stand. I love to watch those PBS specials that go on for two or three hours. They feature a doctor who will inform us how to improve our health. Why do we need to keep hearing the same advice though? To improve your health, you need to install healthy habits, and habit forming takes time. Here is one suggestion where to start.
The absolute simplest and possibly the most important habit to adopt is standing. Yes, standing. Standing meditation has very old roots, and some suggest that it was practiced in pre-historic times. Standing meditation has most efficiently been formalized in Chinese Qi Gong. I recommend watching Ken Cohen’s Qigong : Traditional Chinese Exercises for Healing Body, Mind, and Spirit for easy to follow yet in depth guidance into standing meditation. You can also read his book Way of Qigong for a detailed explanation and a deeper background.
It is amazing what a simple standing exercise can do for your health. Much more than seated meditation (in my experience) standing calms the mind, energizes the entire body, creates deep awareness of your body, heals day-to-day aches and pains. But that is just my experience. For some, this practice can be life saving.
Practice Standing Meditation outside if you can, but only if there is no risk that the temperature will give you a chill. Likewise, wear something flat on your feet if there is the slightest coldness on the ground. When you practice inside, see if you can open a window.
Start by standing for 3 minutes. Is that all, you ask? Yes, if you can maintain a calm standing posture for three minutes, you are off to a great start. Increase gradually, and I do mean gradually. Eventually stand for 20 minutes. Everybody is different though. For some, 10 minutes feels good, and others stand for an hour. You will find out for yourself what a good length of time is. I practice in the morning after waking. That seems to be the best time.
How to practice standing meditation:
- Imagine your head is suspended by a silk thread from the sky.
- Keep your feet hip width apart. Make sure that your feet point forward. Look for it.
- Keep your chin slightly tucked in. This will release your neck.
- Keep your eyes open but unfocused.
- Let your chest be sunk.
- Drop your shoulders.
- Keep your arms rounded in front of your chest. Imagine that you are keeping a round balloon in front of you.
Sink the elbows.- Feel your back as if it is fluid and sinking down.
- Loosen your hip. There is a spot where your leg joins the hip on the inside. That crease is called the qua in Chinese. Feel it to be open.
- Let the knees naturally bend.
- Keep the weight evenly on the entire foot, both feet. You may be inclined to rest on your heals. Move forward a bit and you will find that you can relax your back more easily.
- Breathe naturally into your belly. Don’t worry about breathing slowly so you can “be good at it.” Your breath will gradually slow down.
I have practiced standing meditation for some time. The explanation I give is from my own experience, but what I have learned I have learned mostly from Ken Cohen.
I am curious to hear what your experiences are.
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