Social Question

LostInParadise's avatar

Does the Asian concept of dantian make any sense?

Asked by LostInParadise (31906points) January 7th, 2020
2 responses
“Great Question” (3points)

Dantian is related to the flow of qi in Asian martial arts, traditional medicine and other areas. There are dantians in three parts of the body – head, chest and abdomen.

I am not very knowledgeable about this, nor do I want to be, but I find the concept of abdominal dantian to be of interest. It is located about two inches below the navel. I learned about it in a class I took on aikido. Before dismissing this as nonsense, try the following exercises, imagining your energy as flowing outward from your dantian:

1. Throw a punch.
2. Sing a song
3. Do a dance step
4. Take a few calming breaths

Do you feel it? After I took the aikido class, my singing and dancing abilities went from horrible to barely acceptable.

Observing members: 0
Composing members: 0

Answers

zenvelo's avatar

It makes sense in that it is not too different from yoga breathing and centering.

janbb's avatar

I was doing Qi Gong for a few years and they spoke a lot about dantian. As an atheistic, pragmatist I didn’t buy a lot of the jargon yet I felt more peaceful at the end of a session than at the beginning. Whether it’s the movement, focusing your breath or just trying to quiet the “monkey mind” I do feel now that there is something in all these Eastern practices that is useful.

Answer this question

Login

or

Join

to answer.

Mobile | Desktop


Send Feedback   

`