Hi, I'm a black belt in Nam Wah Pai Kung Fu. Our style involves a degree of external training, which is replaced by internal breathing techniques and Taiji as students progress into the senior ranks. I am also a scientist by profession, so I have always been very sceptical of the internal claims that NWP makes, and I try to remain objective at all times. The other day a weird thing happened to me which I can't explain by myself, so I was hoping to gain some insight from other forum members. In late December I attended my cousin's wedding. Everything was fine until my Aunty came up to me and asked me to speak to my Mum's new partner, to which I agreed (I didn't know the guy and she has been hurt a few times before so naturally I am a bit protective). At this stage I completely stopped drinking and waited half an hour or so to get my wits about me. I approached her partner and asked him what his intentions were with my mum. He didn't like being spoken to in this way by someone younger than himself (I am 28 and he would be 60ish) so he became quite stroppy. I told him that I was only interested in my mother's wellbeing, and suggested he made some sort of commitment in the near future (not marriage or anything, just something so she knows where she stands). Anyway, after that the partner discussed the issue with a family friend. This guy is really nice but has been having some trouble with alcohol etc. since his wife died. He called me aside and started to tell me off like a ten year old child. I told him that it was none of his business and that I had a right to protect my mother etc. In the end he replied "you’re not half the man your father was" which hit home a bit since my father died of cancer about 10 years ago. I walked away from him and began to think of what to do. This is where things got weird.... I talked to my Aunty and told her exactly what had happened. She agreed that this guy was going off the rails and someone needed to talk some sense into him. I decided, while I was at it, I might as well do it myself. I went into the room where coffee was being served and drank a couple of cups. After that I breathed into my dantien a few times, which calmed me down and allowed me to think properly. I spent the next half hour talking with people situated around the table where the family friend was located, before approaching him a second time. At this stage I seemed to go on auto-pilot. My mind seemed to relax to the back of my brainstem, and a very calm serious side of myself began to emerge. I told the family friend again that it was none of his business, which is when he started to try and wind me up. I think he wanted me to snap and hit him in the middle of a family wedding (which wasn't going to happen as I have had too much training and discipline for that). I reminded him that what he said before was horrible, and that he owes me an apology. He started speaking louder and louder, saying horrible things about myself and my family ('my mother is a..., beef wellington etc..). I reminded him that everyone around the table could hear, to which he replied 'I don't care, these people are all cheese and onion sandwiches. At that stage I developed a small twitch in my eye, that took about two weeks to disappear. I also knew I had broken him so I started enforcing what I had said by telling him to respect women, stop drinking and driving, and basically to grow up. I also started telling him about Kung Fu, in an effort to distract him and calm him down. At this stage I seemed to sink deeper and deeper into my mind, to a level of almost no conscious thought, and the things that came out were really quite strange. He started accusing me of being drunk, which was quite untrue as I hadn't had anything to drink in an hour and a half. I remember saying specific things like 'I will wake up tomorrow morning and think I drank too much because I won't remember anything about this argument'. After that I remember saying 'my brain will release this information in four specific stages when I have close friends and family around, so I can remember each event and learn to deal with it accordingly'. I also remember saying things with confidence about the future, such as 'i won't feel better until new year's eve when I sit down around a table with my closest friend's and talk through this', and 'I will start to realise what has happened when I am doing tai chi on the beach', and 'i have linked my memories to coffee so they will start to reappear with every cup I drink', and also something weird about dubstep and dancing. Anyway, at the end of all that, I felt sorry for the guy, so I told him I would go and pretend to be drunk on the dance floor so he could apologise to his mates and say we just had a drunken heated argument. I came back about half an hour later and deliberately said some things so he could regain credibility, told his mates that he was really a good guy and not to judge him on one event, and then left him completely alone. The next day I woke up with no hangover, but also no memory of anything that happened. Eventually things began to come back to me in four distinct stages. Even weirder, all of the 'predictions' I made were pretty much bang on. I can also sink into a deeper state of relaxation more easily, people and animals seem to have a new affinity to me, and my sex life has increased dramatically. My mum and my mum’s partner jointly purchased a caravan so they can travel, and both my mum's partner and the family friend seem to have some newfound respect for me. I also have a weird good feeling radiating from my dantien. If you made it this far, then thank you, and I would appreciate your feedback. I am open minded but struggle with the concept of internal energy etc. Saying that, I can't explain why so many changes have occurred in such a small time after this particular event. Your help and guidance is much appreciated. Kind Regards, Jimdare
Hi Jimdare, Welcome to MAP! The internal side of Nam Wah Pai can have quite a lot of weird effects on your mind. I wouldn’t worry or think too much in to it. Take the positives you've gained from your experience (increased awareness etc) and don’t fret about the weirdness. Also, with the NWP internal stuff, do follow the exact curriculum you have been taught and don’t deviate or experiment on your own. If you start to feel uncomfortable, make sure you take some time to really relax and let go, speak to your school senior(s) or even to someone from the Singapore school, it may be necessary to cut back or adjust your practice. If you start to feel unstable or particularly negative, I would stop training all together until you can digest whatever is bothering you or have specific advice from a reputable source on how to deal with it. Overall, I wouldn’t worry too much or ask yourself too many questions, this combination can be quite unnerving, unpleasant and personally I don’t think it’s necessary. Just relax, enjoy and take it easy. NWP internal practices can have these sort of effects, I think it mainly from increasing awareness very quickly which results in your own capacity/faculties becoming more active/perceptive very suddenly, so you tend to see/realise a lot of things which you may not have been aware of before. Feel free to get in touch if anything
Thanks inthespirit, your advice is much appreciated. One half of me wants to dissect everything bit by bit and find out exactly what my mind was doing, the other half wants to relax and forget. I think I will follow the latter. Jimdare
Hi jimdare, Dissecting things might be an interesting distraction, but that's all it will be. The bottom line is no-one can tell you what actually happened, including yourself. There is also a danger to this: do not underestimate imagination, expectation and self-fulfilling prophecies. If you come up with an alternative explanation to chi or whatever, your mind is more than capable of making that seem real to you (just as if you buy into the chi thing completely). There are two things at work here; first is the chi aspect, which I believe is to do with increasing neural connections and invigorating the endocrine system. The "running on autopilot" aspect just shows you what a small part of yourself is the conscious "I" - there are worlds to explore within us, as well as a whole host of different "you"s. As for the prophetic element, you could interpret that in two ways: perhaps saying those things made them happen when the time was right. Or maybe you saw the future - I would recommend Peter J Carroll's Apophenion for an attempt to develop a solidly science-based cosmology that allows for subtle amounts of such things (largely thanks to giving time 3 dimensions). The squares would call it a psychotic episode, but even if it is, it is benign or beneficial and gives you a rich narrative to your inner life, which I think is a very healthy thing to have. If you want to carry on down this rabbit hole, the best advice I can give is to hang on to your ability to laugh at yourself, and all the weird things that might happen to you. Flippancy is a good way to combat attachment and obsession. From a Hindu perspective it sounds like you've opened a chakra (I don't believe in them either, even though I've had a few "opening" experiences. Hope this is of some help. Good luck and stay sane!
I am completely amazed by OP's experience! I was always kind of interested in internal martial arts, but I couldn't imagine that their practice can affect you so much in a psychological and awareness level. I am facing some serious anxiety and concentrations problems for as long as I can remember myself and it looks to me now, that internal martial arts could be beneficial for me. If someone of you could be kind enough to PM me with some generic informations and links about this subject, in order, you know, to get a starting point, I would appreciate it.
Hi Madao13, You can get similar effects from mediation or some types of qi-gong alone, might be easier to just add that to whatever you do now. Also, it is likely that you will experience some positive changes from these practices, but having an expectation for specific results is usually not the best way forward as you end up looking for something specific which may not appear as opposed to just being aware/perceptive and picking up on the small, cumulative changes. Thing is with learning IMA is that you need a good teacher and these are few and far between with a lot of nonsense in the middle. If you want to check out a class, just let us know where you are and maybe we can suggest something. Might also be worth mentioning, that a lot of IMA practice does not necessarily address the issues raised directly, and these are often a byproduct, though this is not always the case. I personally, do both meditation and IMA as I find the two focus on certain aspects more specifically and complement each other very well. Also, if you want to do meditation/qi-gong, its the same as for IMA's above (more so for qi-gong), you need a good teacher. One of the problems with starting to learn on your own is that it is often hard to push yourself to relax/breathe/let go, etc, etc and often this can result in actually getting more stressed from performing these activities with the improper mind set or what have you, whereas a good teacher will be aware of these factors and will help you work around them. In terms of anxiety, these sort of practices can be quite helpful in that anxiety usually is accompanied by subtle breath, postural and muscle tension/relaxation changes. If your self awareness is developed enough, you can pick up on these changes and thereby control them to bring them back to a calm/relaxed state. Also, further down the line you should be able to take a step back and somewhat objectively observe these experience and change how the negative and positive patterns arise within you. All this is usually accompanied by an increase in focus/concentration as your awareness is increased, or more like the noise that was preventing your attention from focusing on whatever you wished to focus on is removed or diminished.
Hmm, just one other weird thing I would like to add. When I finally sat down with my friends and talked it through, it was such a release that my legs went into spasm. I have never experienced anything like this.
Are you sure you weren't just totally wasted? Waking up afterwards and remembering everything through out the day is pretty common on massive drinking binges.
I know it sounds like that, but no I wasn't. I think it was more stress related reterospective amnesia.
Muscle spasms and big emotional releases are fairly common bedfellows. Nothing to worry about, I reckon.
You need to stop doing this training imediately. your sufering from some kind of pre programmed hypnosis. there is nothing safe about things happenning in your mind that you were not aware of before this happenned . who ever taught you this will not have a true answer because there under it too. what a scam , i am completely against this mythical internal traing its a false label for hypnosis quit your style and find a reality based kung fu Subtle wind kung fu founder
Thanks for your concern, but I am not one to run from something I don't understand. Humanity will never progress if we don't explore our environment, both internally and externally.
True, but there are ways and then there are ways. Doing like Steve Irwin and crawling in dark holes just to see what's there is not always a great idea. Because if you do like Steve Irwin, chances are that you'll end up like Steve Irwing. As an aside, how much did you drink, were you tired already, etc. Even if you were not drunk, there are plenty of other, non MA explanations. An adrenaline dump can have similar effects like detachment of self, loss of memory, and shakiness. Allergic reactions as well. And emotional release can do all kinds of funny things.
Wise words from Inthespirit. You have to let these things go or the next one wont come. You have to breath out so you can breath in . You have to swallow the coffee so you can eat the mint lol :hat:
