I've often told people that it was practicing tai chi that cured my chronic asthma. Actually, that's not quite true. It was really a combination of different things which put an end to my frequent nocturnal ambulance trips hooked up to an oxygen cylinder:

Chi Kung otherwise known as Qigong,

Tai Chi also known as Taijiquan,

Meditation

and let's not forget

Biofeedback

That was nearly 30 years ago and a lot has changed since then. Technology and trends in health exercise have moved on. I didn't even know then, that what I was practicing at that early stage was mostly qigong. My teacher at that time used to avoid discussing qi or chi, preferring to emphasize tai chi chuan (taijiquan) warm-up exercises. In retrospect I think this was largely because that was how he branded his school.

In those days tai chi was quite the cool thing to do and turned a lot of heads in the local parks. I remember a drunk approaching my teacher and asking for a blessing. We all kept a straight face. The few people who had heard of chi kung or qigong as it's now known, thought it simply meant standing still for a long time in the tree-hugging posture - yawn.

Meditation in those days usually involved trying to fold the legs up into a half or full lotus position, something which never worked for me. Tai chi was a revelation because it gave me a way to meditate in motion, which produced a much more lasting effect on my health and general state of mind. I got astonishing results after only a few months, after more than a year of frustration with purely sitting meditation.

I know now that the biofeedback was key to the rapid improvement in my breathing and posture. Some classes with the late Maxwell Cade, some experiments with an EEG (Mind Mirror) and a Galvanic Skin Resistance meter (GSR2) proved beyond doubt that tai chi suited me far better than mantra meditation.

Although I could significantly reduce my state of arousal (stress) by sitting in meditation for 20 minutes, it only took a second to snap back into my habitual state of anxiety: a truck driver passing me too close as I cycled to work was enough to set my nerves jangling for some time.

I applied the same biofeedback test while practicing my tai chi warm-up sequence, which I now realize was pure qigong or chi kung. Not only did this practice prove to be a faster and much more reliable way to induce a sense of relaxation and calmness, but the state lasted much longer. In fact, I could generally maintain it right through my working day just by remaining mindful of the qigong and tai chi principles I was learning. I remember once surprising myself by calmly catching in mid-fall a pint of beer as it slid off the counter. This was a new me I was discovering.

At that time, biofeedback provided the only available means of directly influencing electro-magnetic activity in the brain. The science of binaural beats was still in its infancy. Although it would have been technologically possible for me to listen to brain-wave altering sounds while practicing my qigong, no such sounds were available to the public and there were no conveniently portable CD or MP3 players to wear or carry while practicing.

Nowadays this has all changed, but I'm really surprised that binaural beats and brain-wave entrainment audio are generally still presented as something to listen to passively while sitting or lying down. That's certainly not the way I use them.

I'm fully convinced of the benefits of brain-entrainment, but I don't have time in my day to spend an hour doing that and then another hour for my qigong, tai chi, bagua exercises etc. I need to do all these practices during the same time-slot, and in fact, I find that they complement each other extremely well.

Hemisphere synchronization or balancing the amplitude of your alpha, theta etc. on both sides of your brain is a must for practices involving a high degree of physical co-ordination such as the circle-walking of bagua zhang, or the forms of taijiquan.

Given time these practices alone will promote hemispheric synchrony, but practicing them in conjunction with binaural beats has a very noticeable effect on your progress because you are influencing the brain directly. Listening to binaural beats while practicing, you can be "in the zone in 8 minutes flat, compared with 20-30 minutes of ordinary solo training.

Some may object that this approach induces a dependency on technology, but actually this is far from the truth. As Bill Harris of Holosync points out, it's the long-term effect of listening to binaural beats which is most significant. The brain has to create completely new connections, to virtually re-structure itself, in order to process the stimulus of binaural beats. Repeated use over a long period actually raises the individual's threshold for overload. Then, through gradually lowering the carrier frequency, this effect can be extended.

The lasting result is a permanently improved ability to "stay cool", concentrate better, remember better and do all the things that meditators, taiji and bagua players and qigong practitioners do in a much more efficient and developmental way.

That's why I decided to develop my own system for training the combination of brain-wave entrainment with basic qigong and tai chi movements. For absolute beginners, it will provide an effective, time-efficient, inexpensive and enjoyable way to exercise the body and the brain together.

For experienced practitioners it will provide a noticeable boost to their ability to maintain clarity of awareness, and new insights into how the brain is working during practice.

All of this is just about as far as you can get from mindlessly running on a treadmill while watching TV like I've seen people doing at the local gym - it's much cheaper, much healthier and much better for your mental and emotional well-being.

Quite soon I will be releasing a limited beta-test and I will be looking for people to try it out and give me feedback on what I'm developing. If you want me to keep you informed, send me an email at rcoldman@gmail.com with "Change your Brain" in the subject line.

In the meantime I will also be posting reviews and links to information and products that I've been using myself. These will be of interest to anyone who wants to venture into this uncharted territory of combining the use of binaural beat technology with traditional practices such as tai chi and qigong. I am always interested to hear about other people's experience in this field.

Until next time, be well.

Richard