Health and Fitness

1) Stop Making Excuses The most common excuses I hear for not exercising are: I haven't got enough time or I can't afford it .  Exercise gives us more time because it has the potential to give us a longer and healthier life. Not only that, recent research shows that higher earners exercise more. The choice to exercise benefits not only you but your family. " I can't afford it " is another self-defeating excuse. When I was at the temple, we couldn't afford to eat good quality food so we had to eat a lot of steamed bread so we could have enough energy to train. We never used lack of food as an excuse to stop us training. Ask yourself, what is required as a start up health and fitness investment? You don't need to pay the hefty price of a gym membership. For the price of a few Shaolin Warrior DVDs you get my twenty five years of martial art's experience giving you a lifetime of training. 2) Give Up Waiting For Tomorrow You already possess the tools for g...

When you are training for a fight, it is vitally important that you build up your stamina. A marathon runner has very good stamina but they would never have the stamina to fight in the ring because a fighter’s stamina is totally different. In this article I will concentrate on the first part of a fighter’s stamina training; running. In future articles I will concentrate on bag work, pad work, sparring and body conditioning so that whatever fighting art you practice you can be totally confident that your stamina will really work for you when you go to fight in the ring. RUNNING WITH YOUR OPPONENT As a fighter you need to vary the way that you run, some days do a short thirty minute aerobic road run, other days do some hill running. Sprint running is also very important, do ten repetitions of 100 or 200 metres twice a week. Other times you should start with a five minutes slow run then one minute slightly faster then four minutes slightly faster again then back to one minute slow again. ...

 “Heaven is right where you are standing, and that is the place to train.” Morihei Ueshiba Whether we are fat, thin, old, young, healthy or unhealthy, we all share a mind and body that can be trained. If we step onto the path of Shaolin with intellligence and determination, I am confident that we can bring to our life the health and wholeness that we all seek. Being healthy and whole means we take care of our minds at the same time as we take care of our bodies. Our mind plays a vital part in keeping us healthy. A happy mind makes a healthy body, and the key to happiness or unhappiness is in how we use our mind. Most of us have minds that roam about like untrained puppies. Our martial arts practice -  whether it’s Qigong, Kung Fu or both - acts as an anchor and tethers our mind.  Once you start to workout with my DVDs , let this become a  refuge from your daily activities. A time to let go of the small self and allow the big self to concentrate on the posture an...