Dear World T'ai Chi & Qigong Day Supporters,
Happy Mothers Day 2012! Below is a video celebrating the Yin, the Feminine, the power of the Internal Arts. Please share it widely!
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World Healing Day - World Tai Chi & Qigong Day - Rise of the Feminine, The Internal Arts |
Tai Chi and Qigong are Internal Arts, or yin arts. Chinese tai chi (taoist) philosophy, which these arts are based upon, calls the yin the feminine aspect of our consciousness and world.
"Know the masculine ... keep to the feminine."
-- Lao Tzu (founder of Taoist philosophy)
"In the last few years I have learned a great deal from women masters worldwide. They have taught me that Tai Chi and Qigong are less about showing others how powerful I am, and more about serving the powerless among us to help them find their power."
-- Bill Douglas (founder of WTCQD)
A great woman master, Dr. Luk, is the organizer of World Qigong Day in Hong Kong. In 2012 at the event Master Luk organized, a group of her students performed Qigong. All of the participants wore pink shirts, and all of them were dealing with breast cancer. It was the most powerful exhibition I had ever seen, more powerful than any martial feat I have ever witnessed (see above video).
It drove home to me a deeper understanding of something that many of us have heard or read, that Tai Chi and Qigong are "internal arts," or "yin arts." Again, yin arts, or internal arts, are feminine arts.
At Master Luk's event in Hong Kong many powerful women masters participated, including Sifu Olive Hui, who has been the primary force in bringing World Tai Chi & Qigong Day to Hong Kong, yet Olive has remained "behind the scenes," loving the growth of the global connection of the internal arts family more than her own recognition. Few of you have heard of Olive, but without Olive's behind the scenes efforts and dedication to this vision, Hong Kong's massive events would have never occurred, and without Hong Kong's profound visual events, many around the world may not have been captivated by the idea of participating in this global effort.
"Manifest plainness, Embrace simplicity,
Reduce selfishness, Have few desires."
Dr. Luk and Olive's efforts made me remember that WTCQD 2012 was dedicated to Dr. Effie Chow because of her profound influence to the direction of internal arts toward healing and love.
Dr. Chow's Qigong prescription, which has helped heal thousands, includes getting 10 hugs a day. Only a woman master of her centered courage would advocate such an act as Qigong. How powerful. How yin. How beautiful.
My wife, and cofounder of WTCQD, Master Angela Wong-Douglas, has poured her life into the creation of this event. Her business degree and formidable organizing skills have made this global phenomenon possible. Yet, she has always pushed me into the limelight because I have "the gift of gab." She knew I was good at it, and that was all that was important to her. She did not seek recognition, she sought the success of her global vision of personal and worldwide health & healing. What a yin act, what a feminine act.
"Silence is a source of great strength."
Another such woman of yin power, was my teacher Jais Booth, who I have rarely if ever mentioned in our newsletters. Master Booth made all I've done possible. Through the trials and tribulations I suffered in taking on such an epic effort as organizing a global movement for health & healing, she was there for me. Guiding me energetically through these trials, self doubt, and frustration. She never resented her student being in the spotlight. She revelled only in Qi healing's force expanding throughout the world and gaining more and more attention, not for her, but for the healing power of the internal arts and what they offered our world. Her satisfaction was for the rise of the power of the unseen, at a time when the world needed it the most.
Women masters such as Sifu Bev Abela in Australia, and Sifu Liz Keith in Phoenix, Arizona, have created networks, powerful networks, through their dedication to forming, not just successful tai chi businesses ... but by creating strong communities around their work. Each has magnetized many to support their healing efforts, and to advancing their vision of being part of a global tai chi and qigong family, and in Bev's case, even opening her heart and efforts to the larger mind-body community of yoga, reiki, and meditative communities.
This yearning for community and connection is a very yin, a very feminine quality. The internal arts cultivate this in men as well as women. We become more "magnetic" as we relax into the field of Qi.
Qi does not seek control or domination, or power, or recognition. It is like water. it benefits all things, and is often unseen and unnoticed.
In 2012, more than at any time in history, women have begun to come out of the background in the internal arts world, and their influence is and will grow to be an increasingly powerful force in the internal arts community.
This is not really an issue of gender, but rather a way of approaching the arts, and our world. Men are fully capable of expressing yin qualities. Deepak Chopra wrote that "Jesus and Buddha were very feminine in their nature." Conversely, women are capable of being just as aggressive and domineering in nature as men.
One man who embodies the yin/feminine aspect of the internal arts as much as any woman, is Master Li. Master Li had also been one of the most powerful yang/masculine masters. Master Li was one of the most successful Wushu coaches in China's long martial arts history. Until he had an epiphany, and embraced Qigong. His work then began to flow in a different direction, giving up his spectactular wushu career, to pour his life energy toward health & healing.
When Angela and I had the idea of a World Tai Chi Day, I announced it at the National Qigong Association that year. Master Li, who was a keynote speaker, stopped me in the hallway and said, "Why do you want to form this world event?" Then he extolled me, "Do it for love. If you don't do it for love, don't do it
at all. The world's Qi is depleted of love."
"By accident of fortune a man may rule the world for a time,
but by virtue of love he may rule the world forever."
So even though men are fully capable of "keeping to the feminine," as Lao Tzu put it, yin energy is often prevelant in women. Yin is the energy of compassion and connection. The world needs that energy, and it needs the soft, the internal arts, in order to handle the stresses of a world changing at a bone jarring speed.
Women masters are on the rise, and they will continue to bring the internal arts, and male teachers like myself, toward fulfilling our highest purpose.
As the world moves faster, and the population grows worldwide, the yin force of yielding, connecting, nurturing will be needed. We see the majority of people who come to the arts today, are coming to find physical, emotional, and mental healing.
This newsletter celebrates 2012 - The Year of the Feminine - The Year of the soft arts - the Internal Arts
"The softest things in the world overcome
the hardest things in the world."
* If you know of women masters or teachers excelling in the healing use of tai chi and qigong who we haven't mentioned here, let us know and we will honor them in future newsletters.
Recent radio program had participants and reports from: Egypt, United Kingdom, Bulgaria, California, Florida, Kansas, New Jersey, Harlem New York, and other cities ... hear NQA founder, Roger Jahnke, explain how we can end world hunger by doing our Tai Chi and Qigong ... click below to listen.
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/inner-child-radio/2012/04/23/conversations-with-bill-douglas-of-world-healing-day
