Rock the Cinnabar

內有丹田，氣之歸宿*

Inside are the Cinnabar Fields, the place vapours return to

勁從足下起，還得丹田足

The strength raises from the feet on the prerequisite the cinnabar field is sufficient enough

掌心力從足心印

The force from the centre of the palms comes from the mark in the centre of the feet

Working on one's vitality flow, as it was explained in the two previous posts, was one of the objectives in the old practices. To do so, apart from mobilising one's organs, one could work on, or enhance, certain parts of the body having an impact on such flow. Of the numerous parts, the most famous are the cinnabar fields, 丹田.

Flat Stomach Improved Vitality, Directing Breath To Emptiness

 

得胎息者，能不以鼻口噓吸¹

Who obtains the fetal breathing can, without his/her nose or mouth, slowly breathe out and in.

食氣者必謂吹呴呼吸，吐故納新也²

Who nourishes himself/herself from vapours has to be called the blowing and yawning breathing, spitting out the stale and receiving the fresh.

其息深深。真人之息以踵，眾人之息以喉³

Their breathing came deep and silently. The breathing of the true man comes from his heels, while men generally breathe from their throats. 

鼻息無聲神氣守⁴
Soundless breathing through the nose, guarding vapours and spirit

Breathing is a much more complex subject than it seems. It encompasses multiple exercises coming from various and sometimes quite different, if not opposite, traditions. The general term breathing, therefore, can refer to the lungs main function, a cutaneous possibility, an organ-related capacity, a directional practice and so on… Goals are also numerous, from relaxation to waking, from heating to cooling, from posture to movement, from Berzek to emptiness, etc., a myriad of exercises so that one can easily get lost and most of the time ends up practising a mix of now and again actually incompatible ones.

Condensation and The Belt

氣聚丹田

Vapours gather on the Cinnabar Field

息息歸臍

All breathing returns to the navel

龜尾升氣，丹田煉神*

The turtle tail makes vapours rise, Cinnabar Fields refine the spirit

Internal Alchemy is not only about fire, it is also a question of condensation. The places where vapours are supposed to mainly condense are called Cinnabar Fields, 丹田 (down, middle and upper), which will be dealt in another post. Condensation was a question of accumulation in the first place, and compression in the second, the two first skills targeted by internal breathing, 息.

Iron Breath

治身：天門，謂鼻孔開，謂喘息闔，謂呼吸也¹

Cultivating the body: the Heavenly Door, called opening the nostrils, called closing gasping and resting², which is called exhaling and inhaling³.

天門亢，擤鼻，旡

The Heavenly Door is haughty, blowing one’s nose, to choke⁴.

Iron training and its main breathing technique, empty breathing, are exercises less and less witnessed in internal practices. They target the capacity to tense all and any part of the body while relaxing and stretching. They use an old type of respiration, sometimes linked to Taoist practices, which consist of taking a long exhalation to empty as much as possible, not only the lungs but the stomach and the whole trunk for the least, and keep at all costs this state while inhaling. 

Flat Stomach Improved Vitality, Production&Insulation

 

五臟六腑，各安其位，各司其職

The five viscera and six internal organs, each in its place, each in its function.

肛門不提，丹田氣散，内中空虚，元氣¹虧損
When the anus is not pulled up, the vapours around the cinnabar field disperse, the inside becomes empty and one’s vitality depletes.

A flat stomach is not only an issue linked with the body verticality, it is also an even more important one which concerns our capacity to correctly produce and maintain vitality. As mentioned earlier in this blog, the main machinery used to generate vitality are the organs, hence the first quote. The concept of 气 in its original writing refers to a process between fire and water which creates vapours.

Breathing, Complex and Evolving

睡則氣以耳出，名龜息，必大龜壽*

Vapours comes out of the ears when resting eyes closed, what is called the tortoise breathing, for certain the big tortoise lifespan 

人能依嬰儿在母腹中，自服内氣，握固守一，是名胎息**

If one can do like a baby in a mother's womb, taking by himself internal vapours, holding and protecting tenaciously the unicity, what is called the foetal breathing

鼻息無聲神氣守***
Soundless breathing through the nose, guarding vapours and spirit

Breathing is one of the most important things in life, thus the core of internal practices. Whatever he/she would do, an internalist was always about checking the impact on his breathing and heartbeat. Being a key issue made it also a complex one, it was not only about lungs, but also about heartbeat, skin, fascias, organs...

气 Where is my Bowl of Rice?

練劍莫先於煉气*

Training the sword cannot be done without first refining the Qi

"Listen, swordmanship is the discipline and training of the Great Vitality. So you begin this study by training the ch'i by means of technique. After your beginning studies, you will discipline your ch'i, but move away from technique; yet, there should be no point where you try your hand vacantly. You should become mature in your discipline of ch'i, and master the mind"**

气 is a notion very particular to the Chinese culture, not only a polysemous word, but also a riddle to solve in the old practices. That makes it a complex and hard notion to deal with. But since it is, in most cases, an integral part of Chinese martial arts, leaving out this notion would be like wanting to make wine in France without taking into consideration the "terroir".

Train, Refine, Temper

練形術

Art of training the body

煉石補天

Refine the stone to repair the innate

千錘百鍊

After hard work and numerous revisions

練, 煉 and 鍊, are all pronounced liàn. They are all made of 柬, to select, but written with different radicals*. They all can be used as to describe one's training. Even if they seem interchangeable, those three characters actually refer to different parts of training in internal arts.