People often wonder where is the scientific evidence of Qigong’s effectiveness? Over the years, I have collected articles from various sources reporting on research studies of the benefits of Qigong (including Tai Chi) practice. Here is a summary of some of those reports:

At UCLA, researchers studied the shingles immunity of 112 healthy adults. Half practiced Tai Chi for 6 months and the other half attended health education classes. The Tai Chi group’s level of immunity against shingles was nearly double that of the class group.

A Bastyr University researcher conducted a randomized, controlled study of Qigong as therapy for type 2 diabetes mellitus. The therapy showed two statistically significant findings: 1) Practicing Qigong reduced blood-sugar levels, and 2) participants showed reduced stress levels. Many of the study participants also lost weight as a result of Qigong.

A research study published in the Journal of Human Hpertension (2005; May 19, 1-8) showed that hypertensive patients practicing qigong for 8 weeks had significant reduced levels of both blood pressure and their total cholesterol levels compared to a control group.

Researchers in Texas studied the genomic profile and function of neutrophils (type of white blood cells) in experienced qigong practitioners vs. a healthy control group. The study found in the Qigong practitioners changes in gene expression characterized by enhanced immunity and rapid resolution of inflammation. Some cells in the bodies of qigong subjects lived 5 times longer than the same cells in the control group. The authors concluded that “qigong practice may regulate immunity, metabolic rate and cell death, possibly at the transcriptional level slowing the aging process.”

A randomized, controlled trial published in the International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry found that regular Qigong practice could relieve depression and improve self-efficacy and personal well-being in elderly persons with chronic physical illness and depression.

Another study from China compared two groups of cancer patients, all of whom were receiving cancer drugs. One group practiced Qigong for more than 2 hours a day for a period of 3-6 months. While both groups improved, the Qigong group showed improvements 4-9 times greater than the control group for strength, appetite, diarrhea free, and weight gain. The phagocytic rate (a measure of immune function) increased in the Qigong group bu decreased in the control group.

If you come across any published reports of Qigong research, please share with me to include in future newsletters!

Master Liu often talks about the important practice of always “smiling inside.” When we have the feeling of smiling inside, then we feel happy and our hearts are open. This not only allows us to feel good, but also opens the qi pathways to create a healing response in every cell of the body.

How can we develop our inner smile? By practicing our outer smile! Try smiling and see if you can feel lousy at the same time. It’s nearly impossible! The act of physically smiling actually induces an inner smile. And that inner smile induces the qi to flow and activates a healing response in our bodies and in our lives.

Master Liu recommends this simple and easy practice that can transform your life in one week: Look in a mirror and smile for three minutes, three times a day – for one week. That’s only nine minutes per day! Do this for one week and then see how you feel different and what changes happen in your life. Take a few moments to quickly record your day while you are doing this so you can observe the changes.

Homework: I want all of our Qigong students to do this practice for one week sometime in the next few weeks (I will do it, too) – and then come to class this fall and we will share our experience.

If you find it difficult to look at yourself in a mirror when you are smiling, just relax with those uncomfortable feelings and it will get easier. Later, you can ask yourself, “why is this?”

When you can smile to yourself in the mirror for three minutes, your heart will naturally open. When we can keep our hearts open, we can then release the “heart stones” inside. When we release the heart stones, we are naturally happy all the time.

True happiness does not depend on what is happening in our lives. How liberating it is to cultivate our own internal source of well-being – regardless of any “negative” people or circumstances around us! How empowering it is to be in control of our response to any given situation, when we choose from a place of well-being instead of a place of fear.

If it is important to you to exercise your body, isn’t it equally important to exercise smiling inside?

I wish to join with you in your creative enterprise of offering goods and services that are of benefit to society. I have many qualifications that will serve us all very well.

First, my heart is open to all living beings and all of nature. Therefore, everything I do is with love, consideration and without selfish motivation. I will spread lots of good will around your organization, and people will naturally respond in a positive way, feeling happy and joyful to be here.

Second, my mind is wide open and clear with full frames of reference, not just those old limiting beliefs I grew up with. Therefore, I get along well with others because I appreciate everyone just as they are with full understanding of their true being as well as my own. I also pick up new information very quickly, and ideas for new and better ways of doing things just flow to me all the time!

Also, please be assured that I will never work “hard.” No, you’ll never see me wear myself out, trying to please everyone, and then getting sick and missing work. Nor will my mind get scattered and unfocused, and you sure won’t find me spinning my wheels with no results. Instead, you can be assured that I will spend a good part of my day organizing a qi field and visualizing before I take any action. That way, I will have lined up the energy and created a very clear intention for success. Boy, when I do that, everything falls into place! It’s almost as if the entire Universe is bending over backwards to make it all easy for me.

This stuff is pretty catchy, so soon everyone here will be organizing qi fields and making this business even more successful. You’re going to see more and more money flow in and flow out, helping everyone live a better and more abundant and healthy life. Also, I would be very happy to show everyone here how to do some simple exercises for exchanging qi with nature. Just watch your health insurance premiums go down!

If I am ever unhappy in this job, don’t worry – I won’t blame you for my unhappiness. I will just go into a deep meditative state, look into my heart for the stone that is creating a blockage, and shine my happiness light on it, breaking it up into a million pieces! Then I’ll be happy again, always with the intention of staying in the New Point of Life.

So, you have nothing to lose and everything to gain! I can hardly wait to get started.

Here is a story that was shared with me by a student about a man who was diagnosed with “incurable” cancer. It is a wonderful parable about “tending to your garden.”

All his life, he had been a gardener, and loved his job and the beauty of flowers and nature. He was diagnosed with an incurable cancer and placed in Hospice. Down the street from the Hospice was a garden center, and knowing the man's love of flowers every day a volunteer took him to the garden center so that he could enjoy the flowers. There he sat for hours just enjoying the gardens and flowers. Apparently day after day, this man who “should” have become increasingly ill, went to this garden center and his health improved. The doctors finally, after many tests, said that his cancer had disappeared.

After leaving hospice, he decided to retire from working for other people in their gardens and devote the rest of his life making HIS garden beautiful. He is now 96 years old and is healthy and enjoying his garden.

Last week, I had a conversation with Liu Laoshi, and he wanted to emphasize to all of the

U.S.

students how important it is for our healing and our progress to fully open our hearts to each other and to all of nature. When we can keep our hearts open at all times, then we can be truly free and happy.

We all know how it feels when the heart is open. Every time we hug a child, sing with joy, appreciate the sunset, help someone in need, or go to a Qigong retreat, our hearts open and begin to flow. It is easy! But then, when we go back to our daily lives, we become unhappy by someone else’s words or behavior. We hold them responsible for how we feel. We blame, we judge, we become selfish – and then our hearts close.

Why does this happen? Liu says that deep in the heart of most everyone is a “stone” that is very hard. When we are babies, our hearts are open to everyone and everything, our heart energy flowing and exchanging freely. Then we begin to have life experiences in which we feel judged, blamed, and made to feel inadequate, unworthy, and powerless, and so we close our hearts by putting a protective covering over them. We keep deep secrets inside, hidden from others and sometimes ourselves. Over time, as we continue to respond to life experiences in the same protective way, more layers develop and the stone gets bigger and harder.

Liu says we must “let go of the stone” – release it – so that our hearts can be free and remain open to everyone and everything, even those people who upset us or who seem to be full of negativity.

Recently, I have been hearing quite a number of people talk about avoiding “toxic people” or not wanting to “pick up negative energy.” We act as though it is something that we must protect ourselves from, put up a defensive wall, and keep it away (as we have done in our hearts). In other words, we respond to things we don’t like withour own negative feelings, like fear and anger. Thus, the negativity comes from inside of us. When our hearts are truly open and flowing, negative people and energy will not touch us, or it can pass right through us, or it can be transformed by our positive intention.

How do we release the stone from our heart? Liu says to go inside and connect deeply with the heart. Then “talk it out.” We can talk to nature: RELEASE out all that we are holding in there, all our hurts and secrets – and then, GATHER all the love of the Universe deep inside.

When Liu was in Dayton, he said to send love into our hearts daily. Keeping an open heart and balancing the emotions will TRANSFORM your life!

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