Falun Gong 1 Hour Exercise Videos

Falun Gong (Force of the Law Wheel), also called Falun Dafa (The Great Way of the Law Wheel), is a wonderful synthesis of ancient Buddhist and Daoist practices.

To me, it is a link between Yoga and the energy practices of Qi Gong. Its relatively simple exercises can be performed by almost anyone who is able to sit and stand up.

It is centered around building a spiritual force in the form of a Dharma Wheel. The practitioner becomes a living “energy transmutation machine” working according to the Highest Divine principles. Over time, this builds up a force called “gong” (功), an intelligent power that has a multitude of benefits. Essentially, you are building up a kind of “Siddhi manager”. This concept is important, because Falun Gong does not only develop Siddhis in isolation (so-called “supernatural” powers), which can cause more harm than good in the long term, but also acts as a guide to Lawful Thought and Action (Dharma).

Another piece of good news is that to practice effectively, you don’t need to visit seminars or become part of a Falun Gong group. All you need are the exercises, along with their magical verses.

To make it easier to learn the movements and verses, I have started to create a series of videos that allow you to practice each exercise and corresponding verse on its own, in the form of hour-long loops that allow you to choose your own repetition numbers without having to rewind a video.

So far, I have completed videos for the first two movements.

Here’s a link to the Youtube playlist, which I will keep updated as I complete new videos.

 

The 18 Arhats of Vihara Sien (Wihan Sien)

During my trip to Thailand in October/November 2019, I visited a temple museum near Pattaya called Vihara Sien (also known as Wihan Sien). It’s a Thai-Chinese temple that has been converted to a museum. Personally I think it’s still a temple. The energies in that place are very strong. Among colorful paintings and other artworks, Tao Masters share their space with Buddhist and Hindu deities. Among the many temples and shrines I have visited so far in Thailand, this easily ranks among the Top 3 (plus you can visit Buddha Mountain just around the corner).

Among the items I was impressed by the most is a series of sculptures called “18 Arhats”. Arhat, or Arahant in Pali, is a term in Buddhism for a certain type of Enlightened Person. The Wikipedia article on the term summarizes it quite well, but another way to understand what it means is looking at the statues along with their brief explanations. I wish to share my pictures of the 18 Arhats with you, so that you can draw inspiration from them for your practice.

For now, here’s an assorted collection of the images along with their placquettes. I am planning to create individual blog posts with some more background and a more refined presentation.

Full gallery