THE DARK SIDE OF CHI KUNG
Secretary, Utrecht, Holland
After two months of stormy weather and always cloudy I begin to see the sunshine in my life again. I begin to see the colours of the rainbow clearly again and realize that the combination of those colours make a rainbow beautiful!
-- Lanny.
Sifu Wong and Lanny in Amsterdam
Dear Sifu,
First of all I would like to thank you for answering my mail. After two months of stormy weather and always cloudy I begin to see the sunshine in my life again. I begin to see the colours of the rainbow clearly again and realize that the combination of those colours make a rainbow beautiful! I'm 100% okay now.
I'm glad you have warned me about these uncomfortable feelings. Knowing that all these could happen because of chi kung and that they were temporary made me go on with my chi kung exercises.
I hope you can use my story for your website.
Because my body was vulnerable for certain kind of diseases I joined a group for your chi kung training about 13 months ago. After this training I practiced chi kung everyday and felt very well. It seemed that I am cured of all the diseases I got before. For months I've never been ill.
Last year I took a personal class with you. The reason was because I wanted more than just to be healthy. I also wanted to get what I was looking for (and am still looking for) in my life, i.e. inner peace and emotional balance. I asked you to teach me some exercises to attain what I had aimed to get.
After two months practicing the chi kung exercises I felt something was wrong with me. I began to feel pain all over my body, got an eye problem, sometimes I couldn't breath easily, got the flu several times etc. Suddenly I got all those diseases again which I had years ago.
Also I felt very uneasy and was very confused. I reacted more with my emotions and lost my temper easily which made me very sad. I just wanted to make clear what I thought or what I wanted for other people. But my words made them confused and sad. My reaction shocked them sometimes. I lost my ability to think twice before saying something.
To feel uneasy, to be worried about something which you didn't know what, trying not to discuss things with other people because you were afraid you would hurt them with your words again, to be sad and to be confused -- all these made me ask myself what I was practicing chi kung for. I supposed to be healthy, to get inner peace and emotional balance, but instead I got those uncomfortable feelings.
But I was glad that you had warned me about these things. Also the things you wrote in one of your books, something like this: practice, perseverance and being assured that your master's method is the best for you are what one needs to attain what one aims at in chi kung.
Those two things made me go on with my exercises. And I'm glad I've done this because after two months at "the dark side of chi kung" I feel much better now and those bad feelings are gone. I begin to see life differently.
Before, the only thing I thought was just working and working again. I have never taken the time to look around me and to see the beautiful things around me. I have never taken the time to look at people around me, to observe them and to listen more to their inner voice. I just, like many other people I guess, went right to my destination, not noticing that I had walked through a beautiful garden.
When I look at people now, I feel like I look at them deeply: I see their positive side and also their negative side. I realize now that "the dark side of chi kung" has taught me something.
I'm glad that I can be one of your students. We always can ask you when we are confused about chi kung. You always take the time to answer our questions. You make your students have the feeling that you also care about them. Not many chi kung masters do this.
Lanny
Fri, 29 Jan 1999
E-mail:
lannyutama@hotmail.com