The Taoist Practice You Probably Haven't Heard Of
The Legendary Power of SunDo as a Neigong Art
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If you teach one of the many Taoist arts, like Qigong and Tai Chi or the popular practice of Yin Yoga, you know just how powerful and transformative these disciplines are for your students. As a dedicated instructor, you have the ability to share a tradition of wisdom and self-awareness that connects people across the farthest reaches of culture and history.
You strive to refine your skills and find new ways to help others through the unique offerings at your school. But there’s one practice you probably haven’t considered - a renowned discipline within the Taoist tradition that has been concealed throughout history, yet mythically celebrated for its health and vitality benefits to practitioners - we speak, of course, of the art of SunDo. |
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What is SunDo, how is it related to Qigong, and why is it considered a Neigong practice?
We often use Qigong in conversation to refer to the Taoist practice of energy cultivation through unity of movement with breath (“qi gong” literally translates to energy cultivation). However, the term actually refers to five separate categories of practice: medical, vitality, scholarly, martial, and spiritual Qigong.
SunDo partially fits into the Qigong system as a union of the vitality and spiritual practices:
We often use Qigong in conversation to refer to the Taoist practice of energy cultivation through unity of movement with breath (“qi gong” literally translates to energy cultivation). However, the term actually refers to five separate categories of practice: medical, vitality, scholarly, martial, and spiritual Qigong.
SunDo partially fits into the Qigong system as a union of the vitality and spiritual practices:
- Vitality: cultivates strength, flexibility, suppleness, and fitness, all of which contribute to overall well being and longevity.
- Spiritual: cultivates The Three Treasures of Jing (body), Qi (mind) and Shen (spirit) for unity or oneness through various levels of breathwork.
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In truth, SunDo is actually a sub-set of Qigong practice known as a Neigong, or “internal cultivation” method. Neigong disciplines focus on breath, concentration, complete stillness and/or very subtle movement.
Unlike Qigong, where movement and breathing are used in tandem, SunDo is mostly practiced in stationary positions to allow for optimal focus on breathing. Poses that include some minimal movement (about 15%) emanate mostly from the core of the body. SunDo breathwork, postures and exercises all increase the amount of qi available and remove the obstacles to its smooth circulation. SunDo creates the most direct pathway for collecting and circulating Qi energy through the body. Practitioners never bend their knees in standing positions — legs are held straight and their feet maintain downward pressure to form a direct connection with the ground. |
A strong, grounded lower body can then drive Qi energy upward through the legs and into the lower dantian or “sea of qi.” Establishing this direct pathway of energy is critical for accomplishing the powerful deep belly breathing techniques used in SunDo.
During each SunDo practice session, a 40-minute period of deep belly breathing, after a warm-up stretching sequence, builds up a concentrated excess of Qi in the lower dantian. Rather than building up and distributing Qi all at once, as is done in Qigong, a SunDo routine first builds Qi through deep breathing and then circulates it through gentle stretches and movements to all the meridians and energy centers of the body. This ending sequence also includes Qi exercises that distribute energy to each of the vital organs following the cosmological flow of the Taoist Five Elements.
This makes SunDo one of the most direct and powerful ways to cultivate and circulate Qi, which will help you and your students with any task or routine. While many practices cultivate vital energy, think of SunDo as your body’s way of constructing a “Qi super highway.”
During each SunDo practice session, a 40-minute period of deep belly breathing, after a warm-up stretching sequence, builds up a concentrated excess of Qi in the lower dantian. Rather than building up and distributing Qi all at once, as is done in Qigong, a SunDo routine first builds Qi through deep breathing and then circulates it through gentle stretches and movements to all the meridians and energy centers of the body. This ending sequence also includes Qi exercises that distribute energy to each of the vital organs following the cosmological flow of the Taoist Five Elements.
This makes SunDo one of the most direct and powerful ways to cultivate and circulate Qi, which will help you and your students with any task or routine. While many practices cultivate vital energy, think of SunDo as your body’s way of constructing a “Qi super highway.”
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SunDo is also one of the oldest forms of Taoist Yoga
We don’t often think of Taoist practices as yogic arts – conventional thinking regards them as distinct from the Hindu yoga disciplines. So why do many SunDo postures look exactly the same as postures you would see in a Hatha or Yin yoga class? Because over the many millennia in which these practices developed, in both the Taoist and Hindu traditions, certain ways of positioning the body were universally recognized as having powerful effects on energy flow. However, SunDo distinguishes itself from Hatha yoga practice by holding postures still for one-to-three minutes — keeping with its classification as a Neigong practice. As we discussed above, stationary poses are an important part of SunDo because they allow users intense focus on their breathing, but, unlike other yoga forms – even the soft Yin Yoga that drew its inspiration from Taoist Yoga, poses are always secondary to the breathing. |
During SunDo practice, students hold postures similar to Hatha yoga poses such as locust and fire toes (see above). Eyes are kept mostly closed to maintain a meditative focus on the breath in the dantian (lower abdomen).
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If we do not have control over our breath, we cannot cultivate and circulate Qi energy in its purest form. In fact, poses can actually drain us of Qi if they over-emphasize fast or shallow chest breathing, causing us to expend more energy holding positions than we can cultivate during practice. This may be a reason some of your students have hit a plateau.
Yoga in Sanskrit means “to yoke,” join, or attach. Such is the power of SunDo, the art that yokes or trains the body through postures, the mind through focus, and the spirit through breathing and Qi cultivation. In uniting the effectiveness of longer-held “yoga” poses with the deeply focused breathing of Taoist disciplines, SunDo offers practitioners the best of both worlds.
Yoga in Sanskrit means “to yoke,” join, or attach. Such is the power of SunDo, the art that yokes or trains the body through postures, the mind through focus, and the spirit through breathing and Qi cultivation. In uniting the effectiveness of longer-held “yoga” poses with the deeply focused breathing of Taoist disciplines, SunDo offers practitioners the best of both worlds.
How authentic is the instruction at SunDo International?
SunDo has been passed down from teacher to student for thousands of years (not just the 1000 we have direct records of!) and today, we still teach it the old way — not via books, videos, and how-to manuals, but from primary source knowledge and hands-on techniques passed to us directly from an appointed SunDo master.
The transfer of wisdom from one generation to the next is one of the most critical parts of any Taoist practice. The teacher must not only take great care to choose and develop practitioners, he or she must also insure that the quality of practice and level of Qi is not being diluted in its transition.
SunDo masters were keenly aware of this danger and took great care to impart only the exact teachings of SunDo to their students. Like the finest Qigong teachers, SunDo instructors across history used a three-pronged approach to accurately cultivate skills in their proteges. These methods included meticulous exercise routines, thorough explanations of the theory and deliberate teacher-to-student monitoring of breathing to ensure quality Qi development in the dantian.
SunDo has been passed down from teacher to student for thousands of years (not just the 1000 we have direct records of!) and today, we still teach it the old way — not via books, videos, and how-to manuals, but from primary source knowledge and hands-on techniques passed to us directly from an appointed SunDo master.
The transfer of wisdom from one generation to the next is one of the most critical parts of any Taoist practice. The teacher must not only take great care to choose and develop practitioners, he or she must also insure that the quality of practice and level of Qi is not being diluted in its transition.
SunDo masters were keenly aware of this danger and took great care to impart only the exact teachings of SunDo to their students. Like the finest Qigong teachers, SunDo instructors across history used a three-pronged approach to accurately cultivate skills in their proteges. These methods included meticulous exercise routines, thorough explanations of the theory and deliberate teacher-to-student monitoring of breathing to ensure quality Qi development in the dantian.
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Click to see a partial lineage timeline
of SunDo teachers throughout the millennia. |
We are able to accurately trace the progression of authentic SunDo practice from Taoist disciples 9,700 years ago in Koon-ja-kuk (The Nation of Gentlemen), to royalty across several empires, to several generations of hermits living in the mountains, and finally down to Master Chung-san who descended from the mountains in 1967 to open the first SunDo training school for the public.
Of Master Chung-san’s 11 approved Bup Sa Instructors entrusted to carry on the traditional practice of SunDo, Grandmaster Hyunmoon Kim has traveled to North America and Europe to make the discipline available to students across these continents. From years of studying under his supervision, we at SunDo International continue to make these authentic teachings accessible to anyone who wishes to learn. |
How can SunDo help with Qigong, Tai Chi or Yoga practices?
The marvelous thing about SunDo is that it dramatically enhances any practice with its emphasis on controlled and focused breathing.
We know breathing serves an important role in these disciplines; smooth and even belly breathing, as well as use the dantian as an energy center, is commonly taught. However, the technique of breathing is rarely explored on a deeper level. In SunDo, the first few years of training in basic breathwork are required before attempting to learn the advanced methods.
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While basic levels of SunDo breathwork are very beneficial, advanced techniques channel such a vast amount of Qi into the energy centers and meridians, that new students must spend time preparing the body for the ensuing influx of new energy and vitality — it’s that powerful.
SunDo breathwork, when integrated into Qigong practice cultivates greater amounts of Qi energy and reduces fatigue through more productive and higher-quality breaths. Your students will have greater ability to focus deeply on their routines and more energy to improve their overall health. This opens the door to limitless achievement in your respective discipline, and it is very much to your students’ benefit that you make them aware of this incredible breathing practice! |
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Getting started: Is SunDo practice accessible to older individuals or complete beginners?
You bet it is. As a soft Neigong practice, SunDo can very easily be tailored to the physical abilities and limitations of almost anyone.
SunDo beginner poses are gentle on joints, can be modified if needed, and offer multiple tiers of difficulty students can progress through over time, when they are physically and mentally ready.
Through consistent practice, students may also build up to taking longer, deeper breaths that bring more energy into the body. Additionally, feelings of calm and clarity are triggered by the body’s relaxation response within the autonomic nervous system.
For these reasons, there is no time like the present to get started and offer your students the special benefits that only SunDo can.
If you’re interested in learning and possibly teaching SunDo breathwork, SunDo International offers a certification program in the Northeastern US beginning in January 2018. For details or program registration visit our info page.