Energy gates – is longevity breathing necessary before standing practices?

[Anonymous]

Greetings y’all!
I am currently learning from the Energy Gates book.
My question is: Can I start standing practices before I complete the breathing exercises (and learn them both in parallel, at different times a day)? Or, do I need to be able to breathe perfectly in order to start sinking and dissolving, as to prevent from trying to ‘relearn’ them with proper breathing afterwards?

I would like to practice more and I’m thinking what to add. What would you suggest?

[Anonymous]

Hi Paul,

It’s nice to work on both, separately. If you practice the breathing, that will help your standing for two reasons: you’ll improve your breathing capacity and you’ll get more tuned in to what’s going on inside your body. This increased sensitivity will make it easier to do your standing practice, since for most people, the only thing they can actually feel when they start to stand is discomfort or pain.

Sinking and dissolving start from a base of clear feeling, and the breathing practices will help you get there.

Good luck and let us know how it goes!

Thanks,
Dan

[Anonymous]

hi paul

in POMA, bruce talks about the nei gung learning process being circular in nature, not linear.
you will periodically revisit any of these nei gung elements in your training, and there is no necessarily fixed pattern to learning them, although there are some pieces that are pretty advanced, and best worked on later in the training.

one thing I noticed when I stand is that I am already breathing, and that I cannot get very relaxed without good breathing, so id go ahead and say that breathing is a good thing to work on anytime you feel the interest or desire to do so.

another thing is that I have noticed many beginners will try too hard to concentrate, and they will slightly tense up and hold their breath a bit when they are trying to stand. they look kinda tense, Ill tell them (or tell myself) relax! they say, “iM TRYING!” but it’s not reasonable to try hard to relax, you gotta relax into it. simply opening up the breath, full and soft, is a good way to counter the tendency to focus too hard.

as I am going through the process of learning this stuff, it seems that breath is a connector point for many of the other nei gung elements, so it’s also a good thing to keep coming back to.

relaxed breath helps relaxed standing/relaxed standing opens up the breath.

I guess Id say the short answer is; yes, good breathing is appropriate for a beginning standing practice, along with the alignments and the dissolving process.

hope this helps…

[Anonymous]

Thanks Dan!
Will practice both then. I think a little diversity in practice will make it more interesting for me.

I’ve been practicing longevity breathing for 10 days already, 1-2 times a day, (sometimes for an hour per session – which made me very relaxed afterwards) and now I can do breathing with both lower and middle belly for 10 times smoothly. My breath length increased from 7sec to 17sec. I know it will be hard work till i get there, but I look forward to being able to do belly breathing 24/7.

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