Biofeedback, Tai Chi, and Qigong Retreat
Tai Chi and Qigong (Nikki):
Two practice sessions and two lectures each day, one focusing on tai chi and the other qigong,
Tai Chi: Our focus will be on practicing simple routines and movement drills that build body and mind awareness and help cultivate health and longevity in a way very complimentary to our regular Himalayan style practices, These practices will be taught at a level accessible to beginners but also offering more depth appropriate for experienced practitioners. At the end of the retreat each person will have a suite of movement practices and a mini Wudang Mountain Tai Chi form that they can use as they see fit, integrated into their daily life, or simply as an experience to help build insight into the practices they already have.
Qigong: The qigong that we will practice is a deeply healing and energetically balancing style of qigong that has its origins in the Shaolin temples and Daoist masters of the mountains of Central China. At the end of the retreat each participant will have a number of valuable tools to add to their toolbox for managing stress, building energetic resilience, and cultivating a healthier, more balanced, body, mind, and spirit.
The tai chi and qigong sessions will have accompanying note pages that we will prepare for the participants reference. They can be made available in digital or print format. By providing general reference notes, the participants can more fully engage in practice without being distracted by note taking.
General note: The tai chi and qigong sessions will be very fluid and the content may change slightly depending on the mood and general feeling during each practice session.
Biofeedback (Daniel):
A few talks will be offered to explain the concepts of biofeedback. The focus would be on individual, one on one, private sessions with Daniel for all the participants.
Biofeedback is well-recognised as a powerful, non-invasive, and relatively simple way to measure subtle changes in the emotional and physiological state in order to increase self awareness and support the process of leaning self-regulation. Daniel will be using state of the art research/clinical grade biofeedback equipment (and training techniques) to measure HRV (Heart Rate Variability) to determine RFB (Resonant Frequency Breathing), the ideal breathing rate that will most quickly balance the autonomic nervous system. A typical session will use a heart rate sensor and a respiration belt. Participants will be guided through a series of Yoga and Meditation breathing exercises in order to determine the optimal RFB for that individual. Time permitting, other biofeedback modalities may be measured, such as muscle tension, skin temperature, or skin conductance.
