I Just can't Bring Myself to Do It

Not too long ago, we got an email – not even from a Spring Forest Qigong practitioner, but a potential practitioner. She was thinking about it. 

Without sharing anything too specific, we want to tell you her story. It’s such a perfect example of something we encounter at our Healing Center every day. This person’s example opens the door to a conversation that we think almost all our readers will find helpful. 

It was clear this person was intelligent – you could see it in what she wrote about and how she wrote it. She knew a lot about Qigong, meditation, Chinese medicine, and even other kinds of healing. She had read a lot of books. 

But do you know what her question was? 

It was basically this. 

I have this health challenge and these symptoms, I know this about this from the Qigong perspective, and I know if only this could happen, I would get better. But no matter what I do, I can’t find the will to practice. Is there a way Master Lin can make a simpler Qigong practice that can help create that will for me? 

Ah. 

So there it was. All that knowledge, all that intelligence, but she just couldn’t find the will to actually... do Qigong. 

Isn’t there a saying – “An ounce of practice is worth a pound of theory”? There you go. It’s almost funny – not because this person’s struggles were something to laugh at, but because... everyone goes through this same thing! 

Every single person who has found the will to make Qigong a daily practice has had this struggle. That includes Master Lin! He jokes about his failures, his pains, and even the clever mind-games he’s played with himself to avoid doing what he knew he should be doing. It’s normal. 

But despite all that, every day, every single person who’s made Spring Forest Qigong a part of their daily life faces the same decision: to do Qigong, or not to do it. 

Where do I find the will? 

You know by now that Spring Forest Qigong keeps things simple. That is exactly the secret to finding the will to do Qigong every day... but maybe you didn’t realize just how simple “simple” is. 

First things first. 

Remember what Master Lin says. Qigong-learning is only 30 or 20 or even 10% about the information you know; “learning” Qigong is actually 70 or 80 or even 90% practice. So, learn from our friend who wrote in: you don’t need to know more about Qigong to do it or to enjoy its benefits. You don’t even need to  understand it. You just have to do it. 

Most of us are raised to think the opposite. “Once I know everything there is to know about this thing, then I can do it really, really well.” Not with Qigong. Only by doing it do you learn it, and the more and more you do it, the more you understand it. 

So – you already know what you need to know. Just start! 

Another... “impediment to the action of the will” (that’s a fancy way of saying “reason people don’t do their Qigong”) is something very common among our Healing Center clients. 

They have their initial consultation and healing, then their healer gives them some recommendations. And, since very often the client has some big health challenges, the recommendations seem like a lot. “Practice the Five Element Qigong Healing Movements twice a day, the Small Universe Meditation twice a day, and ‘dolphin’ the neck for 15 minutes a day.” 

You can almost hear the wheels spinning in their mind. Two sets of movements a day... that’s an hour and a half. Two meditations a day... that’s another hour. Doing that thing with my neck... fifteen minutes. That’s almost three hours! I don’t have that kind of time! 

Don’t you? What do you have time for? 

But leaving that aside, people then usually think like this. Well, if I can’t do three hours a day, then there’s no point to practicing, because I won’t heal otherwise. So, then they don’t practice. 

We’re here to tell you: it’s right there in Level One, at the start. “There is no right or wrong in Spring Forest Qigong, only Good, Better, Best.” People sometimes don’t believe it, but it’s true. 

Can’t do three hours, or one hour, or twenty minutes of Qigong a day? Can’t do ten minutes? Do three minutes. Bounce your body with your arms over your head for three minutes. Tap your tailbone for three minutes. Do “Moving of Yin and Yang” for three minutes. Maybe we’ll believe you don’t have three hours to spare, but you definitely have three minutes to spare. 

If you remember that every little bit of Qigong you do counts, if you realize and experience that, in just one minute, you can enter the Emptiness and emerge fully refreshed, you’ll never doubt that three minutes can change your life. 

And just as important, if you realize that even three minutes of Qigong a day is still good, you will be able to be consistent. Consistency is a key to success in Spring Forest Qigong. And, if you can just be consistent long enough – even promising yourself to do three minutes a day for 100 days, whether you think it will “do” anything or not – not only will you be amazed by what you start to feel, but those amazing changes will themselves create the desire in you to do more and more. 

The other thing people forget is Qigong means “working with energy.” It does not mean “doing Chunyi’s exercises and meditations.” So, yes, it is best if you make time to do Small Universe or the Butterfly Meditation and the healing movements. But that’s a limited view of Qigong. You can do Qigong anywhere, any time, all day long. 

How about this? 

When you go grocery shopping, try to smile with love every time someone makes eye contact with you. Smiling opens your heart, and it helps to open the heart of the other person. The love you share this way is the most powerful healing energy there is, and smiling releases endorphins in your own body – which help you to heal. What do you think happens when you keep doing that? 

When you are standing in line, sitting in traffic, or sitting at home, practice energy breathing. That means visualizing healing energy entering every pore of your skin, running between all your cells, and gathering deep behind your navel when you breathe in, then visualizing any pain or sickness leaving the body as smoke – out through the pores, going to the ends of the sky. This breathing is a foundation of Spring Forest Qigong, and you can do it any time, anywhere, with no physical effort. 

Before you leave the house every morning or before you go to bed every night, take a few seconds to close your eyes and give thanks for ten things in your life. They can be as simple as, “I am thankful I have food today” or “I am thankful for a chance to have a better day today.” Gratitude helps the kidney energy, and kidney energy is the body’s vitality. The more you can support the kidney energy, the faster you can heal and the more energy you will have to do everything you like. 

So you see, the way to find the will is to realize even a little Qigong counts, and anyone can do a little. And once you can do a little, you will be able to do a lot. 

The last thing to consider is... you have a Spring Forest Qigong family! If you have a practice group near you, go! If you don’t... maybe you should start one! When you have a community, a group of people who help and support each other in their goals, there’s no more question of “will” and effort – the whole thing becomes a joy. 

If you just can’t do either of those things, then join one of our memberships. The Deep Transformation membership features a guided healing meditation with either Master Jaci or Master Gadu every week. That’s just one feature of a membership. But having a live healing community you can connect with, something to look forward to, prepare for, and practice (you get recordings of those meditations) gives you a goal, a direction, and a structure, so all the “burden” of doing Qigong isn’t on your shoulders. 

We could go on and on. But you have what you need now. Do your Qigong. Three minutes is still good. And if you need something more... then... YOU CAN DO IT!