Qi Dao Compared To Other Disciplines
The Qi Dao style of Tibetan Shamanic Qigong is part
of a tradition going back many thousands of years
in Tibet. Qi Dao was cultivated in Siberia for around
a thousand years after the knowledge spread from Tibet.
While living in the former Soviet Union, Lama Somananda
Tantrapa learned Qi Dao from his grand father, the
previous lineage holder. This was during the time
when spiritual and martial arts traditions were publicly
suppressed in the Soviet Union. For this reason, Qi
Dao and other Buddhist and shamanic traditions had
to be practiced “invisibly”; “teaching
using neither sutras nor other texts, invisible worshipping
with no altars or any sacred objects, 24 hours a day
meditation without formal religious routine, and of
course, discrete Tantric experiences concealed in
the privacy of family life” (LINK to biographical
article). Like the covert magical activity of the
Toltecs which Don Juan described to Carlos Castaneda,
this covert worship enhanced the Shamanic perspective,
allowing Qi Dao to evolve as a no-nonsense spiritual
discipline, discarding unnecessary forms and focusing
on the essence of the practice.
After Serving with the Russian Special Force in Afghanistan
and having other adventures, Lama Somananda Tantrapa
traveled through out the former Soviet Union witnessing
for peace with Junsei Terasawa, an activity not looked
on well by the authorities. After receiving religious
refugee status in the United States, he traveled the
length of America, studying tracking with Tom Brown
jr., Shamanism with Carlos Castaneda, and Time Line
Therapy with Tad James, along with other adventures.
These studies extended his practice of Qi Dao. This
process of extension and learning is characteristic
of the live, vibrant spirit of Shamanism. The Shaman
views the world as a marvelous spiritual adventure,
where everything that happens involves a lesson to
be learned. Rather than either swallowing anything
that comes his or her way or rejecting all new experiences
and learning, the practitioner fluidly blends only
those techniques and methods from other traditions
which are in harmony with his or her underlying principles.
We hope that prospective students and clients can
benefit from a comparison between Qi Dao and other
healing, martial arts and energy arts traditions.
Lama Tantrapa often says that when we find differences,
we make war and when find similarities we make peace.
So the most interesting part of this discussion is
seeing how many disciplines are addressing the same
realm of human existence from different viewpoints.
None of the comparisons we will make will be judgments
concerning the value of the various approaches –
in Qi Dao, we don’t believe in good or bad.
Just as much, any discipline significant nuances and
we cannot to capture all of these. Still, comparison
can help a person determine for themselves which different
approach resonates most with them at a given stage
in their development.
Even more, by encouraging it’s practitioners
to grow and change with the energy they encounter,
we believe Qi Dao can serve as “graduate training”
for approaches seeing the world as energy as well
as for approaches that aim for mind-body unity. Qi
Dao is not a cut-and-dried discipline but rather a
paradigm that can add excellence to any endeavor.
Qi Dao has added to the practice of massage therapists,
championship athletes.
We believe that any deep mind-body discipline will
discover some of the same natural human qualities.
Thus one can find natural correspondences between
Qi Dao’s principles and those of many disciplines
aiming to achieve mind-body education. There are similarities
between Qi Dao’s principles of alignment and
the alignment principles of the Alexander Technique.
Similarly, there are similarities between Qi Dao’s
methods of spontaneous movement and the movements
of the Feldenkrais method. As a style of Tibetan Shamanic
Qigong, There are naturally strong correspondences
between Qi Dao and other forms of qigong. The martial
arts practices of Qi Dao were introduced into the
traditions of the Russian military by Lama Somanda’s
Grand Father. Thus there are number of similarities
with the Russian Martial Arts of Systema. By the commonality
of the world Shamanic traditions, there are similarities
between Qi Dao and the concepts found in the book
of Carlos Castaneda.
Later sections will compare various other disciplines
relative to Qi Dao in greater detail. We begin comparing
a few disciplines. This document will be updated on
a regular basis. We invite all comments and hope to
include any important comments into further revisions
of the sections.
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