“Heaven is right where you are standing, and that is the place to train.”
Morihei Ueshiba
Whether we are fat, thin, old, young, healthy or unhealthy, we all share a mind and body that can be trained. If we step onto the path of Shaolin with intellligence and determination, I am confident that we can bring to our life the health and wholeness that we all seek.
Being healthy and whole means we take care of our minds at the same time as we take care of our bodies. Our mind plays a vital part in keeping us healthy. A happy mind makes a healthy body, and the key to happiness or unhappiness is in how we use our mind.
Most of us have minds that roam about like untrained puppies. Our martial arts practice - whether it’s Qigong, Kung Fu or both - acts as an anchor and tethers our mind. Once you start to workout with my DVDs, let this become a refuge from your daily activities. A time to let go of the small self and allow the big self to concentrate on the posture and breathing.
This act of surrender creates an enormous freedom. We just have to learn how to get out of our own way and once we can do that, we begin to harmonize with the universal life. Through our workout, we come back to ourselves. When our training session is finished and we go back to our daily life, we find that mind is clear and calm. But this clarity and calmness is just a by product. It is always important that we remind ourselves to do our workout without any goal or desire for profit.
In the West there is a very strong emphasis on the individual and personal choice. But for all of us, our life is not just inside our body but it is a constant exchange with the life of the universe. We continually take in air, food, water, thoughts, energy, ideas, pictures. So where does the individual begin and end?
One thing that we all have in common is we want to be happy. Thich Nhaht Hanh, the great Zen master said that we can only find heaven in the hear and now. There is no better place or better time or anywhere else to be. The Qigong and Kung Fu that I teach on my DVDs are the Shaolin Way to Zen. Make this the year where you expect more from yourself and expect nothing.
