our house and living environment, work, friendships, rest, and sleep.

But the cultivation of chi mainly

resides in practice, which should theoretically be the center of our existence. The student’s practice is
centered on sitting meditation and expands through standing and moving practice. In sitting practice,
learning to relax and become yin is often the biggest lesson. Becoming yin means learning to receive energy
from heaven and earth and to align with these forces. This mastery can take a whole lifetime of dedication.
Fa Song
What is required to progress in Iron Shirt training is fa song. Song is usually literally translated as
“relaxation” and fa means “to issue or release.” Fa song is not as easy as it may sound, however: it is not just
becoming limp like a dead fish. The Chinese term for being limp is ruan; song is about creating a scaffold or
structure first and then relaxing and sinking into the middle of it so that the body can fill with chi. Note,
however, that the whole body cannot be too stiff, either. Wu master Wang Pei-Sheng says, “the body should
be kept naturally relaxed but not slackened.”2
What we really want is for the body to be filled with chi and the acupuncture channels to be open. The
channels will gradually open with mindful persistence. Some teachers may encourage their students with
directions like “be hard on the outside and soft on the inside,” or “feel like steel wrapped in cotton wool.” It
might be clearer if they told their students to “fill the body with chi.” Remember, “wherever the mind goes
the chi will follow.”3
In the Microcosmic Orbit meditation the mind should sink and be 95 percent focused on the lower tan tien.
This activates the chi and jin which rise up and inflate the structure (see fig. 3.1 on page 30). Wang says,
“abide by the Dantian, thus making the whole body vitalized and keeping one’s center of gravity lowered and
vitalized.”4 What Wang means by “vitalized” is an inflated whole body structure. This force, which arises
from sinking or falling into oneself, is what creates the internal power (jin).