The way of Chinese medicine is to simplify things using yin and yang, five elements and other universal principles to find the root cause of the problem in order to correct it. For example, the Chinese physician when faced with a patient who has high blood pressure or kidney stones will not treat the symptoms and signs of these conditions directly but his attention will be on the imbalance in the body that has caused these conditions.

There are various methods used by Chinese medicine – herbs, massage, Qigong and acupuncture. Whatever method used, its aim is to always put the patient in touch with Nature and the Universe.

To fully understand the healing process we need to explain first how we can lose touch with nature. Then once we understand the causes and reasons we can reestablish our links with nature by using Chinese medicine and by practicing Qigong.

Chinese medicine recognises that the body heals itself once given the correct conditions and therefore the Chinese medicine practitioner only has to do half the job. The other half will happen by itself. Just by listening to our bodies, by being in touch with our bodies will put us in balance with the universe.

The reasons why we have lost touch with our bodies are many and varied. Here I will just touch on a few of the more common ones. Overriding all the reasons is the damaging effect of time. Day after day, year after year we gradually lose a sense of what our real needs are. If we only do something wrong once or twice then no harm is done but if done continually over a length of time we gradually and insidiously lose touch with what our real needs are. Our sense of reality becomes faulty.

Let’s take a few examples of how these problems start and evolve:

In order to live we all have to eat and we eat when we are hungry. We are hungry because our body tells us it needs food. It also tells us when it needs water, rest and sleep, when it needs to eliminate the waste products of metabolism by urine.

When we get sick or injured it tells us what we should or should not do. Should we move an injured limb? Pain tells us – don’t. Should we eat? Nausea and lack of appetite tells us – don’t. Should we drink? Thirst tells us – do. And so on.

These are basic inbuilt instincts in most living things and they have been functioning like this over millions of years.

The problem started when we started to ignore these instincts. And we ignore them everyday in big and little ways. For example – instinct tells us “I am not thirsty” but we keep drinking a beer or coke with friends in a pub or restaurant.

Instinct tells us “I am hungry” but the time it told us was not the lunch break at work so we had to wait. If we waited too long we might lose our appetite or overeat when lunch time finally does roll around. At other times when it is lunch break it might tell us “I am not hungry” but we will eat anyway because if we miss it then it’s too long before dinner.

In most cases we end up putting on weight and naturally we start ‘dieting’. That is skipping meals, drinking so called “diet coke” and similar often resulting in more stress and very little permanent success in our endeavours at weight loss. We do, however, succeed in being forever hungry and irritable, and of course, losing touch with our body along the way.

It is the same with sleep or rest. Our body often tells us “I am tired. I need a rest.” But we can’t just simply lie down and rest in the middle of work or school. Of course, we could often prevent this if we established a rhythm of life which would enable us to both take care of our body and do all our normal daily activities. Especially if that rhythm follows the rhythm of nature.

But so many of us get too excited late at night and forget about the next morning and we make the same mistake over and over again. Then we become irritable and emotional (because we are not machines, are we?). And that makes things even worse. When we are finally in bed, we cannot sleep. Or we just fall asleep when the noise from the street or next door neighbour wakes us up. We become more angry and frustrated.

And so, day after day, year after year, all sorts of vicious circles establish in our body and we just don’t know what our body really needs. Especially if we are addicted to cigarettes, alcohol, drugs where we think this is what our body needs, but it isn’t.

Putting yourself back in touch with your own body can start with daily practicing of Qigong. Very quickly you will be able to hear your body again. Once it starts to talk to you it should be listened to as any attempt to ignore it again, will cause your problems to come flooding back.

Just following what the body really needs can put us back in touch with nature resulting in better health , better quality of life and a sense of overall wellbeing.

Now, knowing this (and it has been proven over and over on tens of millions of cases in China and elsewhere), one would think: “This Qigong is great stuff, it can do so much for our body and wellbeing.” But for the true Qigong practitioner this is the lower level or the “rough balancing”. The real benefits of Qigong come with consistent practice.