I learned Five-Stance Quan (a form of Chinese martial art) today

Today is the first day of the Chinese New Year of 2023. As usual, I went to the small gym for an hour of jogging on a treadmill. I have been running since last October, but my weight has not budged a little. From December 2022 on, I run at least four times for at least 50 minutes at the small gym.  My weight has not changed even though I have lengthened my running time to one hour at the speed of 4 miles an hour, my sleep seems to have improved somewhat. 4 miles an hour seems a good speed for me, and my heart rate is controlled within the range of 110~130 per hour most of the time, and 1-hour running does not make me tired the following day.

Chinese medicine is against people running rigorously and sweating profusely in winter because doing so is against nature.  Look all around you in winter. Trees have no leaves, grasses are yellow, and their life energy is stored in the root, waiting for the right time for their lives to spring up and regenerate. Likewise, if one must exercise, Chinese medicine only recommends gentle exercises such as walking, playing taichi, and standing like a tree stump (Zhan Zhuang).   Another argument for favoring walking over running is that we human beings only have two feet, while animals like dogs and wolfs have four. Thus, we are not built to run like them. Running like them is against human nature and will deplete our in-born yuan qi (which is fixed at birth) faster and thus shortening our lifespan. 

Considering that I have a rather sedentary lifestyle, I think, jogging at a pace slightly faster than walking, and sweating a bit every day is healthy. Flipping back to two thousand years ago, I guess only the elite class could have the lifestyle of today’s middle class. Yet, running on a treadmill is most monotonous and thus can be very borrowing. After running on it for about 40 days, I found listening to the sounds my feet make on the treadmill very soothing, and therapeutic as it makes my mind less active, and thoughts less bubbling to some degree. May I call it yoga-like or qi-gong-like jogging?

According to Chinese medicine, eczema (which I suffered a great deal since June 2022) is due to too much heat and humidity in my body. Jogging helps the body get rid of both through gentle sweating （or detoxing).  Indeed, I notice that my skin is again smooth and soft except for the scalp and forehead which will flare up a bit if I eat too many roasted almonds.

Although I don’t feel tired the next day after jogging, I do feel the runner’s stiff, especially in the lower body, thus qigong or taichi or yoga will help this. As I journaled last year for over 100 days, standing meditation also warms up the body in cold winter (my house is set at 53 degrees). Jogging seems to improve body temperature too. I no longer feel cold when sleeping at night even though the house is set at 50 degrees. Perhaps the improvement is due to both jogging and standing meditation or qigong which I do regularly to supplement jogging.

Today I run into several videos that teach five-stance martial art—-the forms that are very energetic and are being taught to primary school kids.

Here is a youtube link in case you are interested. It probably cannot help with self-defense but will help with flexibility and balance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5a6_WtinqY&t=340

https://baike.baidu.com/item/%E4%BA%94%E6%AD%A5%E6%8B%B3/6724021