Thursday, February 11, 2010

The East Qi



The East Qi
Recharge and circulate the Liver Qi (chi). Its element is wood. Its color is dazzling emerald green. Its direction is east. The sound is "shaer" or "shur".  We prefer "share". The imagery is a tree.


The tree unites sky and earth. Its roots and branches take nourishment above and below, providing strength to the whole. The trunk is the conduit which transforms and communicates sky energy into earth and earth energy into sky.

The roots grow toward the core of the earth, through thick matter into pure material energy. The branches grow into the space of the heavens, into apparent nothingness energy. Each energetic flow of the tree is distinctive.

But the distinctiveness transforms into the other, re-energizing the other, without losing its own foundation. The roots plug into the material nourishment of the earth and draw it upward into the branches. The branches draws energy downward from the living sky to strengthen the roots and its stance.

We are all upside down, hanging from this earth. Give many thanks to gravity and our adapted optical physiology. We all agree in the illusion of uprighted-ness in which we appear to be in full control.

Stand Comfortably
feet hip width apart

Turn your legs gently inward. Keep your knees and toes aligned with this mild internal rotation of the thighs.

Make a little bend in the knees toward each other.
Back of your hands touching one another.
Arms hanging down in front of you.

Take a breath in, then
let all of your air out. 
Sink, let your tail hang toward the center of the earth
relax your lower back in this mild pidgeon-toed, knock-kneed plie.


With One elongated inhale, straighten upward:
upward to straight legs, elbows lead upward too, reach your hands into the sky overhead.

Breathe.  One slow exhale to flower the arms open out to sides, like branches.  Sink.

Keep your legs parallel and gently bend your knees into a plie. At the same time, release your shoulders out of its shrug as your arms open out to the sides. Your palms turning upward create arms like branches. Chest open. Spine lengthens.

Return by gathering the arms upward again, reach through the heavens.  Elongate One inhale.  Stand up with the heels lifted again. Sustain your inhalation as you lengthen your entire spine. Crown to the sky,  evenwhile legs press down through the feet, down into the earth. 

Breathe out slowly, continue the upward reach of the spine. But lower to sink into original shape of the beginning.