Deep within all of us lies a hidden power, quietly awaiting discovery and release through harmony with the natural world. Most of us are unaware of this power and never take the time to learn how to access and wield it to unlock new strength and inner peace. Through the ancient Chinese practice of internal martial arts, hidden energies can be harmonized and the practitioner can begin to journey toward a sense of balance and powerful understanding of their own internal pathways. In this article, we unveil the power of internal martial arts and how it can bring about equilibrium and balance of both the body and mind.
1. Unlocking the Benefits of Internal Martial Arts
Breathing Easy: Connecting your breath and movements stimulates Inner Qi flow and uncovers the hidden power of internal martial arts. Learning to move with your breath helps you stay relaxed and connected to your body while performing martial arts maneuvers.
Delete Tension: Engaging in martial arts and controlling one’s breathing helps cultivate a deep connection with your inner energy and delete built-up tension. Body and mind harmony is strength, allowing us to let go and instead of pushing, learning to work with our body’s own power.
- Liuhe Bafa (Water Boxing)
- Xing Yi Quawn (Form-Mind Boxing)
- Tai Chi Chuan (Supreme Ultimate Boxing)
- Yiquan (Intent Boxing)
Experience the Power: Internal martial arts helps practitioners to align with their inner energy and manifest tangible improvements in strength. Popular examples of internal martial arts include:
Seeking Balance: Internal martial arts practice should aim to be gentle, graceful and meek with large and small muscle groups holding and controlling each other in harmony. Try taking the time to enhance self-awareness and to understand the energetic and physical patterns of the body.
2. The Power of Harmonizing Internal Energy
Unlocking Our Internal Potential:
The secrets of harmonizing energy are contained within the seemingly complex practices of internal martial arts. Taking the time to practice and understand these techniques unlocks the internal potential of our bodies. Practicing slow, mindful movements lures us away from our conscious mind, into the deep waters of our subconscious. Here we can gain insight into our body-mind connection, thus allowing us to synchronize our internal energies.
The Benefits:
Harmonizing internal energy brings with it a multitude of benefits. To begin with, we can improve our overall health and wellbeing by addressing chronic pain, stress, and inflammation. By synchronizing our energies, we can gain an improved level of strength, flexibility, and coordination. This physical balance also brings psychological harmony, allowing us to improve emotional control and mitigate the effects of anxiety or depression.
Activate Our Spiritual Centers:
When we harmonize our last chakra, our crown, we activate our spiritual centers. This allows us to open our mind to a deeper level of inner connection and clarity. With this newfound clarity, we are able to discern intuitive guidance, when it is most beneficial for ourselves and others.
Unlocking the Deepest Levels of our Being:
Internal martial arts reminds us of the hidden power within. Through harmonization, we are able to unlock the deepest levels of our being. This connection to our internal power makes us more aware of our actions, both in the physical and spiritual realm.
By understanding the power of harmonizing energy, we are able to embark on the journey towards self-mastery. Once we awaken to the connection between our energy and our external environment, we can take a step closer towards profoundly understanding our place in this world.
3. Understanding the Root Principles of Internal Martial Arts
is essential to realizing their hidden power. This is because these powerful arts techniques can help you harmonize your energy and bring balance into your body and mind. Here are three key areas to focus on when exploring these arts:
- Digestive Breathing: Digestive breathing is a type of breathing technique for controlling your energy flow. This technique combines slow and controlled relaxation with breathing exercises that use the abdomen rather than the chest. It helps open up the chest and shoulders, improving the energy balance in the body.
- Exploration of the Four Limbs: This involves the exploration of four physical areas: the arms, legs, head, and trunk. Movements in these limbs will help to focus and develop your energy, allowing you to move with a greater sense of balance and control.
- Mindful Meditation: Mindful meditation helps to develop the understanding of energy flow in the body and in the environment. Through this, practitioners learn to focus and direct their energy in a positive and beneficial way, improving their internal martial arts performance and relieving stress.
Through learning and understanding these three key areas, practitioners of internal martial arts can improve their overall skill level and begin to access the hidden power within the arts. Working with dedication and commitment is essential to realizing the full potential of internal martial arts.
4. Enhancing Mind-Body Awareness
- Controlling the Breath: It may come as no surprise that breathing exercises are an important part of cultivating mind-body awareness. Pranayama is a breathing technique commonly used in Internal Martial Arts such as Tai Chi and Qigong. This technique involves learning how to direct and control the breath, resulting in improved health, balance, and a deeper state of relaxation.
- Balancing Life Force: The practice of Internal Martial Arts also involves unifying yin and yang energy to balance life force or qi, resulting in improved body-mind coordination and a greater sense of well-being. This can be achieved by connecting the breath to the movements, coordinating the breath with the movements, and meditation.
- Gaining Greater Awareness: By becoming more aware of the internal qi flow, martial artists are able to explore the deepest reaches of their body and mind. Through Internal Martial Arts, they can use the qi to detect energy blockages and imbalances to enhance physical and psychological balance. This enables practitioners to control their physical and emotional reactions to situations more effectively.
- Living in the Present: Internal Martial Arts are about living in the present moment and being more mindful. It is about slowing down life, so practitioners can experience more fully and deeply. When martial artists can bring their focus to the present moment, they can better adjust to new experiences that life brings.
5. Psychophysical Benefits of Internal Martial Arts
1. Enhances Mind-Body Connection & Awareness
Internal Martial Arts, like tai chi and qigong, focus on the energetic alignment that occurs in the body when the mind is still and attentive. Practicing these arts can improve concentration and focus as well as increase awareness of the body and its surrounding environment. Through this heightened awareness and connection to energy, practitioners can become more in tune with their intuition and inner-strength.
2. Enhances Balance & Posture
The practice of Internal Martial Arts works to strengthen the core muscles and joints, thereby improving the overall balance and posture of the body. This can help individuals improve their posture while standing, walking, and even sitting. Additionally, balance is improved as the body becomes more relaxed and responsive to its surrounding environment.
3. Enhances Internal Strength & Flexibility
By combining mindful breathing, focused movement and energetic alignment, practitioners of Internal Martial Arts benefit from an improved internal strength and flexibility. This provides a lower risk of injuries and allows individuals to remain in a state of enhanced flexibility despite their advancing age.
4. Enhances Mental & Emotional Clarity
Internal Martial Arts are known to reduce stress and depression as they cultivate empathy and an enhanced sense of connection to the inner-self. Additionally, practitioners are often able to find emotional clarity as they become more in tune with their thoughts and feelings. This ability to distinguish between the two leads to improved decision-making and mental clarity.
5. Improves Self-Defense & Self-Mastery
Though the basis of Internal Martial Arts lies in calmness and awareness, practitioners also gain a heightened sense of self-defense. Through the practice of these arts, individuals learn useful techniques to defend against physical and emotional assailants. Furthermore, mastering the art imparts a greater sense of self-mastery and understanding of the body.
6. Establishing a Personal Practice Plan
Whether you’re just starting out with internal martial arts or have been practicing for a long time, creating a personal practice plan can be a great way for you to achieve a deeper level of mastery. A personal practice plan should be tailored to your experience and the goal of your training. Here are 6 steps to help you get started:
- Identify Your Goals: Think about the skills you would like to develop and the goals you would like to achieve. How often do you want to practice? What should the focus of your practice be?
- Set Aside Time: Scheduling specific time for practice is essential, that way you can plan other activities around your martial arts training without sacrificing any of your quality training time.
- Establish a Routine: A consistent routine helps keep you on track and makes it easier for you to focus on developing your skills. Decide on how long you’ll spend on each practice, and plan for breaks between exercises.
- Find a Space: Find an area that you feel comfortable and relaxed practicing in. A dedicated martial arts practice space is ideal, but it isn’t necessary as long as you have a space that you can dedicate to practice.
- Bring the Right Tools: Make sure you have all the necessary tools and supplies for your practice, such as kungfu attire, weapons, or a protective pads.
- Seek Advice: Training in internal martial arts can be challenging, so don’t be afraid to ask more experienced practitioners or instructors for advice. They can help you customize your practice to meet your goals.
Creating a personal practice plan can help you better understand the complexities and nuances of internal martial arts. As you progress in your practice, your plan can be modified to ensure that you are always developing your skills.
7. Strengthening Internal Strength and Balance
Internal strength and balance in martial arts practice go hand in hand, and they are both components of harmonized energy. Working on one’s internal power through an array of martial arts techniques is essential for gaining self-mastery and achieving optimal health. It requires a holistic view of the martial arts journey and the integration of various skill sets.
Here are just a few ways to hone and balance your inner power:
- Tai Chi: This ancient Taoist martial art is full of slow, meditative movements that cultivate internal strength and help maintain physical balance.
- Prayer: A regular practice of prayer can be used to ask for guidance from within, helping to create a feeling of inner peace and connection.
- Meditation: Formal meditation, or even just 5 minutes of silent contemplation, can be incredibly effective in developing your inner power.
- Breathing exercises: A great way to relax, reduce stress, and increase your internal energy.
It is important to understand that inner strength is not just about physicality. The spiritual aspect of martial arts practice is just as important, if not more so. Working on one’s inner power through faith, prayer, and meditation can help to create a strong foundation for martial arts training to build upon.
Internally strengthening your martial arts practice not only helps to improve your physical strength and balance, but also helps to develop courage and emotional resilience. By unlocking the hidden power of internal martial arts, you can ignite the fire of self-discovery and create an unshakeable foundation for your martial arts career.
8. Applying Internal Martial Arts Principles to Everyday Life
Internal martial arts systems, such as Tai Chi and Bagua Zhang, share a common goal of achieving a harmonious balance between the body and mind. This is achieved through a variety of martial arts exercises and meditation practices that can help us transcend our physical limitations and tap into the hidden power within each of us. Here are 8 ways to use these principles in your daily life:
- Breathing: A basic breathing technique taught in internal martial arts is called “Circular Breathing.” This technique involves breathing deeply from the abdomen instead of rushing, allowing us to fill our lungs up more fully and oxygenate our bodies better. This type of breathing can be used as a meditative practice and will bring more overall balance and harmony to your life.
- Relaxation: To fully utilize all the benefits of internal martial arts, it is important to be in the present moment and to relax the body and mind. A simple and effective technique is to start by focusing on your breath and then, throughout the day, taking some time out to scan your body and consciously relax and let go of any tightness or tension. This technique will help you create a sense of connectedness with yourself and maximize the power of the practice.
- Body Mechanics: Internal martial arts emphasize the importance of developing good body mechanics. This means paying attention to body alignments during physical activity and using proper body mechanics in every movement. This will help prevent injuries and promote overall health and well-being.
- Centering: Centering is a powerful exercise that helps us to find inner balance and stay grounded. To center yourself, imagine a point of equilibrium at your center of gravity, such as the dantian in the lower abdomen, and use this to stay steady and focused during physical activity or in moments of stress.
- Visualization: This exercise helps us to achieve a sense of presence when feeling out of balance. Start by closing your eyes and visualizing yourself in the center of a circle of energy, with beams of light radiating from its center. As you stretch your arms outward, imagine that the radiating light spreads throughout your body and into your environment. Take a few deep breaths and then come back to the present.
- Muscle Tensing: One of the most effective internal martial arts exercises is muscle tensing. Start by tensing the major muscle groups throughout the body, such as your arms, legs, back, and abdominal area. Hold the tension for a few seconds and then relax. Simultaneously, relax the mind and let go of all thoughts. This exercise will help you stay present and energized throughout the day.
- Circular Movement: As internal martial arts practitioners will tell you, movement should be round and continuous. This means that instead of making sudden and jerky motions, your movements should be fluid and graceful. When walking, driving, or doing anything else, make your movements circular and unified, enabling you to leverage the power and force of Yin and Yang.
- Being Mindful: Being in the present, or mindful, is a key principal in internal martial arts. Being mindful is essential for cultivating the internal power of martial arts and realizing its full potential. Pay attention to your body and the environment around you throughout the day and stay present in any moment.
The principles of internal martial arts can be used in our daily lives to bring greater balance, clarity, and mindfulness to them. This practice is about cultivating the power within us and connecting us to nature and our environment. With practice and dedication, we can uncover the hidden power of internal martial arts and bring greater joy and peace into our lives.
Unleashing the true power of internal martial arts requires an understanding of harmony and balance that will allow practitioners to transform from ordinary seekers of self mastery into powerful conduits of energy, capable of attaining greater balance, peace, and creative insight. With harmonizing energy comes a sense of harmony that extends beyond the martial arts arena and into the everyday life of an individual. Through patience and practice, unlocking the hidden power of internal arts can bring powerful realizations and lasting peace.
