Did you know that someone who shifts their body weight closer to the forefoot looks and feels more confident? The way we stand reflects our relationship with the world, Taoists believe. Knowing these features, we can adjust the balance of weight – and hence our style of communicating with reality.
We have three main points on the foot that we can rely on. We transfer the main weight of the body to one of these points:
- on the heels – in this case, the person transfers the weight of the body back;
- in the center – a neutral point of support, located in the center of the arch of the foot;
- on the forefoot, based on the Yun Chuan point, translated from Chinese – “Bubbling Spring”.
How to find this point? Feel where the ball of your big toe ends. Usually there is a small crease. Draw a line from it across the foot – and in the center of this line there will be a small dimple, which, when pressed, is quite painful. This is the Yun Chuan point.
How will each of these points of support affect our posture, energy background and emotional state?
Heel support
The way we stand affects our energy state, posture, and emotions. The easiest way to show this is with a “negative” example: what happens to the body if we are used to standing on our heels?
- Posture – when resting on the heels, the body is forced, firstly, to tighten the groin and pelvic area, and secondly, to push the neck forward. Thus, a person who is used to standing on his heels slouches just to keep his balance.
- Distribution of energy – in the Taoist tradition, it is believed that qi energy circulates through our body, and if a person stands on his heels, he creates an active downward movement of this energy. With this position, he literally “drains” the vitality, depletes his energy structure.
- Emotional background – what feelings does this situation create against the background of emotions? People who are used to standing on their heels usually perceive the tasks facing them as very responsible, difficult, overwhelming. Perhaps they really work in a responsible job or are responsible for the family.
When a person sees a huge number of difficult tasks in front of him, he tries to step back, as if to recoil back. Taking a position on his heels, he seems to be trying to examine something huge, covering the horizon – something that is pressing on him with all its mass. As if there is a rock in front of you, it is 40 centimeters away, but in order to overcome it, you need to “move off”, step back and examine it in its entirety.
Closer to the center
If a person is used to standing, distributing body weight in the center of the arch of the foot, such a position can be called conditionally neutral. However, if you practice qigong, then you are faced with the task of raising your energy status and achieving the injection of additional energy into the system.
Qigong practitioners always want more strength and better energy circulation. And for this, the support should be on the point of Yun Chuan – “Beating Spring”. Activation of this point tones the kidney channel – one of the most important energy channels of the body. Thanks to this, the body receives additional energy, and it begins to circulate faster and more productively.
Know and manage
Information on how to properly distribute the balance of weight and how it affects the general state of the body and spirit makes it possible to manage your emotions and adjust your energy background.
- If you are worried, everything infuriates, people around you are annoying, there was an acute attack of anger – you can “dump” excess energy. In such acute negative states, as a rule, it rises in a stormy stream, fills the head and chest – hence this feeling of fullness inside, as if you are about to explode. If you have the strength and common sense to retreat and retire somewhere, do the following exercise. Shift your balance of body weight to your heels and do some springy squats. This allows you to quickly “drain” the seething energy, calm down and regain clarity of thought.
- If there is no strength, the tone is at zero, and there is a lot of work ahead, do similar springy squats based on the Yun Chuan point, transferring the main body weight to the metatarsal bones. Before you start doing these squats, you can take off your shoes, find the Yun Chuan point, press it a few times with your thumb – and begin the exercise. And after a few squats, you will notice that there will be more energy in the body, it will be more energetic and full.
If you notice that you have habitual deviations in the balance of body weight, then you can safely be recommended to engage in certain qigong practices – for example, Sing Shen Juang gymnastics, so that the correct, tonic position becomes natural, familiar and does not have to be restored. volitional effort.