Soma Dao Qi Gong Courses – 2024
Learning Online – The “Make Fun of Me” Story.
If you are new to Conscious Embodiment practices, welcome home to your birthright of awareness, acceptance, and a nearly endless resource of learning, Healing, and Play!
We all have some good habits and not-so-good habits. It seems obvious to say, but habits are just things we do often. A 49 Day Rite of Passage is a chance to choose some new habits by cultivating new approaches and skills every day.
Why 49 Days?
Many ancient traditions, including Buddhism, Daoism, Judaism, and others all use either 100 days or 49 days for specific rites, rituals, or as ways to navigate certain times of the year. It is said that the Buddha became enlightened after sitting in meditation for 49 days non-stop, and in Tibetan Buddhism, it is understood that the soul takes 49 days after death to complete the journey of a human life.
A 49-day commitment to practice can be seen as a Rite of Passage or an Initiation. Depending on the traditions and practices you may follow, the specifics of the process, and the next stage of your life you are initiating yourself (or being initiated) into, will be unique.
Regardless of the specifics, something that is common to us all is the need for growth and change. Anyone can get stuck being the person they remember themselves to be. Until something new and redefining happens, there are no new memories or experiences to show us that we have grown.
Beginning Your Qi Gong Journey
10 Weeks – Begins March 26, 2024
Qì Gōng is a lot like Dancing.
Imagine learning a simple dance move to some fun and meaningful music that you love.
Imagine, somehow, that you give yourself permission to feel your body, to play with momentum, to be shy, and to be a rock star – all at the same time.
That is what Qì Gōng feels like. Coming home to your body, your sensual experience, feeling all of the good stuff, feeling where you hold any distress and trauma, feeling into your deepest places, while becoming centered, grounded, patient, and a conscious witness to whatever arises.
Ancient healing traditions and modern science agree, that stress can be held in the body, like you are flinching imperceptibly in all of your nerves and muscles – all of the time. This ‘chronic flinch’ not only creates physical tension, but it also manifests as changes in qualities of your Aliveness, or your Qì. Sometimes this physical and energetic stiffness creates a lot of stagnation or constraint, and sometimes it creates a feeling of collapse.
There are many different forms and styles of Qì Gōng. Each one has a specific focus and benefit, or a specific dance to move your Qì in just the right way.
Tai Chi Shibashi Qi Gong
10 Weeks – Begins March 26, 2024
This is a form of gentle Qigong exercises, that are practiced in a soft, fluid, and continuous manner.
The Shibashi practice was originally a template of exercises that were suggested for traditional Tai Chi (taijiquan) teachers to help those recovering from chronic poor health.
These gentle, beautiful, and flowing Qigong exercises are very relaxing at first. As you progress into the more advanced practices, you will explore different footwork and breathwork, as well as more dynamic gestures.
I initially learned this pattern of exercises as a warm-up with the renowned Xu Gong Wei.
A few years later, I was asked to collaborate with a Qi Gong teacher who did not study Tai Chi. They had asked about breathwork options, martial applications, and more advanced footwork. And thus was born the version I now teach.
In this version of Shibashi, there are three Passes, or levels to each of the classic eighteen gestures. This approach allows people to progress safely and consistently into more advanced expressions of this beautiful series of almost hypnotic Tai Chi like exercises.
(1 – 2 Years)
This course is for those who want to go in-depth into the Foundations of Qi Gong and want to become a Traditional Qi Gong Instructor.
If you are looking to train for a new career, learning to teach Qi Gong is a great choice. Qi Gong focuses on connecting with your Qi, or your ‘sensations of Aliveness’, entering deep states of meditation, instinctual readiness, emotional acceptance, and Spiritual reunion. Skills that almost everyone needs more of today.
Here is your homework…
Practice Awareness, Adaptability, Flow, Resiliance, Release, and Stillness.
Spring Cleanse – Cultivating Vitality and Longevity
8 Weeks – Begins March 26, 2024
It is an instinct to live a long, fit, and fun life.
If you have always wanted to commit to a Rite of Passage, take this chance to commit your willingness to some discernment, discipline, Self-Love, and Self-Care.
Discover the freedom of redefining what is a yes or a no.
Boost Your Vitality,
Reset Your Metabolism,
While Cleansing and Rejuvenating Your Whole Body.
Reawaken Your Authentic Self,
while Learning the Essentials of Traditional Chinese Medicine and Functional Medicine.
If you want to get in better shape while learning the most efficient forms of exercise, fat loss, and stretching, then jump on board. Jumping is great exercise!
If you are suffering from a chronic illness, this course will guide you through a gradual and consistent process that you can follow anytime you have a flare-up.
Let’s find out what 8 weeks of healthy habits feels like, together!
Tuesdays @ 6:00 – 8:00 pm.
March 26 – May 14
Shaolin Strength and Longevity Qi Gong – Yi Jin Jing
Begins April 10, 2024
Shaolin Strength and Longevity Qi Gong is a very effective and enjoyable way to strengthen your muscles, nerves, fascia, and bones, as well as ensure you do not lose your muscle mass as you age.
Although most Qi Gong exercises look very relaxed and effortless, they can still improve your fitness because they activate, stretch, and tone almost every muscle and membrane in your body. If you think of your Qi and Meridians like electricity and the thickness of a wire, the more abundant your ‘wires’ are the stronger the Qi you can experience.
Rearranging and restoring the structure and function of all of your connective tissues and circulation, and all of your meridians is like building a city. From the ground up. These practices are demanding, very high level, and are only taught when people are ready for this degree of Mind, Body, Meridian, Jing, Connective Tissue (Jin), and Breathwork transformation.
Here is a series of Articles on Yi Jin Jing Theory and Practice
Article One – The Meaning and Process of the Yi Jin Jing Practice
Article Two – Cultivating Strength and Longevity – the Yi Jin Jing Process
Therapeutic Qi Gong – A Ten Month Healing Journey
Begins June 4, 2024
Healing is a need for everyone – at some point, in some way.
Sometimes, we need support from others, and most of the time we need to find it within ourselves to commit to our own healing.
If you would like to learn some gentle exercises, meditation techniques, personalized breathwork practices, and Self-Healing Qi Gong skills, then you will need to learn some Therapeutic Qi Gong.
Or, if you feel called to help others, become a certified Qi Gong Therapist.
This course is meant for those with some Qi Gong experience, especially clinicians, therapists, and other health care professionals.
There are thousands of forms of Qi Gong, all focusing on Vitality, Healing, Fertility, and Longevity.
After decades of experience and exploration of many different styles and lineages, Dr. Michael Smith is offering this ten-month program of discovery and refinement to the general public and online for the first time. Most of the practices taught in this course have been reserved for monasteries, Daoist lineages, martial arts lineages, and those taught in the oral traditions of Qi Gong and Traditional Chinese medicine for the last 2,000 years.
This program will take you on a ‘deep dive’ into the most potent and practical aspects of one of the oldest intact Healing Traditions on Earth.
Enhancing Your Qi Gong Healing Abilities
8 Months – – Begins May 28, 2024
The primary focus at this level of Qi Gong training is to strengthen your Mind’s and your Body’s innate abilities to conduct and maintain a connection with increased Qi activity for hours at a time.
The content of this course has always been reserved for Monks, Martial Artists, and Healers. At this level of training, a certain part of your capacity resides in an awareness of Qi, but most of your capacity resides in your deeper energy systems and structures that ‘hold’ and express all of that energy throughout the day – especially a long day of treating patients.
This level of practice primarily exists to prepare people for a career as a Medical Qi Gong Therapist, a Monastic, an Ascetic, and/or as a professional Martial Artist. Many people also learn these practices for personal Healing and Longevity, as well as the unique opportunity to experience the Shaman/Doctor/Healer/Scholar level of Qi Gong, Dao Yin, Nei Yang Gong, Dian Gong, and Nei Gong practice.
It is always an honor to guide Qi Gong adventurers who want to see how far down the ‘rabbit hole’ this ancient practice goes.
More Courses Coming Soon
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2024 Courses with Dr. Michael Smith
Beginning April 8, 2024
Learn the skills, practices, and principles necessary to safely and successfully guide others through several kinds of Qi Gong Classes.