Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Neigong, also spelled nei kung, neigung, or nae gong, refers to any of a set of Chinese breathing, meditation and
spiritual practice disciplines associated with Daoism and especially the Chinese martial arts. Neigong practice is normally
associated with the so-called "soft style", "internal" or neijia Chinese martial arts, as opposed to the category known
as waigong or "external skill" which is historically associated with shaolinquan or the so-called "hard style",
"external" or wiji Chinese martial arts. Both have many different schools, disciplines and practices and historically
there has been mutual influence between the two and distinguishing precisely between them differs from school to
school.
There is both martial and non-martial neigong. Well known examples of martial neigong are the various breathing and
focus trainings taught in some traditional Taijiquan, Baguazhangand Xingyiquan schools. An example of non-martial
neigong is the discipline known as Daoyin.
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Martial Nei Gung is about developing internal power. One way to possibly achieve this is to train particular exercises
regularly where the breath is matched with movements of blood or to effect the movement of blood throughout the body.
Through these exercises it can be possible to move the blood to a particular area during a particular movement to have a
particular result. One of the benefits of martial nei gung exercises is the relaxation of blood vessels, nerves, muscles and
sinews to help the body move more freely. With the body moving freely and an excess of blood moving to a particular
area with little or no effort, the practitioner can possibly develop many benefits. These benefits may include:
According to Daoist doctrine the Three Treasures can be described as three types of energy available to humans.
The Dao De Jing purported to be written by Lao zi states in chapter 42 that "The Dao () gives birth to the One, the One
gives birth to the Two (Taiji () or Yin and Yang ()) and the Two gives birth to the Three (which some interpret to
mean Jing , Qi and Shen , or sometimes Heaven Tian , Earth Di and Man Ren ) and lastly the Three gives
birth to the 10,000 Things (Wanwu ); which is all that exists in heaven and on earth.