Advice From a Shaolin Monk on How to Stay Young

Following in the footsteps of Shifu Yan Lei (Shaolin Monk) would of coarse take a life long commitment and dedication which in my opinion would be Awesome!  However, it is not something that is within everyone's grasp.

That does not mean that we can not learn something and benefit from his teachings or his example.

Ten Tips From A Shaolin Monk On How To Stay Young 

1) Don’t think too much. Thinking takes energy. Thinking can make you look old.

2) Don’t talk too much. Most people either talk or do. Better to do.

3) When you work, work for 40 minutes then stop for 10 minutes. When you look at something all the time, it can damage your eyes and also your internal organs and peace.

4) When you are happy, you need to control your happiness, if you lose control then you damage your lung energy.

5) Don’t worry too much or get angry because this damages your liver and your intestines.

6) When you eat food don’t eat too much, always make sure you are not quite full as this can damage your spleen. When you feel a bit hungry then eat a little.

7) When you do things, take your time, don’t hurry too much. Remember the saying “Hasten slowly you will soon arrive.”

8) If you only do physical exercise all the time and you never do Qigong this makes you lose your balance and you will become impatient. You lose the Yin of your body. Exercise balances the Yin and the Yang.

9) If you never exercise, just peace, meditation, soft training, Qigong, then this doesn’t give you Yang energy so you use up your Yang energy.

10) Shaolin Gong Fu gives you everything. The purpose of our training is to balance our Yin and Yang. How many hours is not important. It’s down to knowing what your body needs.

If you would like to learn more about Shifu Yan Lei you can visit his website at shifuyanlei.co.uk where you can also purchase his books and DVD's.


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6 reasons Okinawans Live to Be Older than 100

by Christina Sarich
via: naturalsociety.com

Did you know that only 20-30% of our life expectancy can be determined through our genes? If you want to live to be 100, you may need more than just a sound set of X and Y chromosomes passed down from your parents. Lifestyle is the most important factor in determining not only how long you live, but the quality of your long life. It turns out the people from a small island off the coast of Japan, Okinawa, have figured out a secret recipe for living to be more than 100 years old.

Scientists researching for the U.S. National Institutes of Health and Japan’s Ministry of Health have been following Okinawan’s who are older than 100 since 1976 in the Okinawa Centenarian Study (OCS) and they’ve learned that there are some very typical traits for all those who live to be so vital at such an advanced age.

Want to know the Okinawan secret to living a long, productive life? Here it is broken down into easily digestible bits:

    1. Elderly Okinawans often exercise both physically and mentally.

    2. Their diets are low in salt, high in fruits and vegetables, and contain plenty of fiber and antioxidants that protect against the major diseases of the West, including heart attack and cancer.

    3. Although they consume more soy (60-120 grams daily) than almost any other population on earth, it is not GMO soy as grown in the US. Soy is high in flavanoids and is healthful when not genetically modified.

    4. Okinawans don’t overeat. They have a practice called hara hachi bu, which means “8 parts out of 10, full.” They never eat so that they are stuffed, but just mostly sated. This means their daily caloric intake is far lower than ours – around 1800 calories. We westerners sometimes scarf down twice that much in a day.

    5. Okinawans don’t suffer from dementia or senility as often, either, due to a diet high in vitamin E which helps keep the brain vital.

    6. Elderly Okinawans are respected and kept as an integral aspect of their overall communities. They feel valued as individuals even as their age progresses and this can only benefit their mental and physiological health. Elderly members of this society express a high satisfaction level with their lives.

 

It isn’t just something in the water in Okinawa, but when Okinawans move away from their island and take up the western diet and lifestyle, they no longer enjoy longer lives. Within one generation of taking on our bad habits, their life-spans shorten considerably. Cancer and hear-attack rates practically double.

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The Amazing Story of the Man who Reportedly Lived 256 Years

Li Ching-Yuen claims to have been born in 1734, but controversial birth records attest that he was born in 1677 in Qi Jiang Xian, Szechun province. So what was the secret to his long life? Lets find out.

Li Ching-Yuen, also known as Li Ching-Yun found the secret fountain of youth, as he was reportedly the oldest human on Earth, having lived 256 years. His 1933 obituaries which were featured in Time Magazine and the New York Times stated that he had outlived 23 wives and his amazing lifespan exceeds by far the oldest living person up to date, who lived 122 years and 164 days.

According to the records, Li Ching-Yuen was born in 1677 and died in 1928. The secret to his success? Li was a medicine physician, an expert in herbs, qigong master, and tactical consultant. As far as he would admit, Li said that his secret to a long life was:

“Keep a quiet heart, sit like a tortoise, walk sprightly like a pigeon and sleep like a dog.”

He told these wise words to Wu Pei-fu, a warlord of Republican China from 1916 to 1927. It was on this occasion when Li Ching-Yuen’s picture was taken, and by the looks of things, he looked young and reinvigorated.

It’s of no surprise that there is not enough information about the first years of his life, but we do know that by the time he was ten years old he was already a wonder child who had learned a lot and who had already traveled to Kansu, Tibet, Annam, Siam and Manchuria for his passion to gather herbs.

After his initiative journeys in the world of herbs, he immigrated to Kai Hsien where he met some well renown Taoist masters who taught him internal alchemy and chi kung, but also, the secret art of how to use herbs for a long and healthy life. Apparently, after learning the secrets of martial arts and herbs, Li Ching-Yuen went on to sell the herbs he collected.

At the age of 71, in 1749, Li joined the army of provincial Commander-in-Chief Yeuh Jong Chyi, undertaking the role of a martial arts teacher and tactical advisor.

In 1928, after returning home, one year later from his visit to Wang Xien, Szechuan, the old man died of natural causes, and General Yang Sen ordered his team to investigate the truth to his story.

The old man claimed to have been born in 1734 and to have lived 197 years, but the crew of investigators, lead by a professor and dean at Minkuo University by the name of Wu Chung-chien found records which proved that Li was born in 1677. Some documents attested that the Imperial Chinese Government congratulated him on his 150th and 200th Birthdays.

The picture of Li Ching-Yuen shows not a man of over 200 years, but a joyful 60-year-old… so what is the key to his longevity? Just the herbs?

Li avoided drinking hard liquor or smoking, he took his meals at regular times, he had a vegetarian diet and he was known to frequently drink wolfberry (also known as goji berry) tea. Apart from that, Li went to sleep early and also got up early, and as far as exercising is concerned, Li sat up straight with his eyes closed and hands in his lap, at times not moving at all for a few hours.

I have found many places around the internet that claim that the story of Li Ching-Yuen living to such an old age is false and fake, however in each of these cases the only evidence provided by the these sites of these "It's not true" stories are the authors own admission that they simply don't believe that it's possible.  Not that they found any evidence proving that it was false, just they don't chose to believe it.

Of coarse at this point there is really no way for anyone to know for sure if this story is true or not. So it will have to be left up to the individual reader of the story to determine if they believe it or not.

For me, given the things that I have learned over the past few years (which I will be sharing in future posts on this blog), I am inclined to believe that at the very least it is possible.


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