“Big chest. Big chest. Big che-est!”

I’m lying supine on a modified gym machine, arms splayed out to either side, legs held in a bent position by a sling and pillows.  No, I’m not involved in some kinky, sexual adventure.  Nor am I trying to simulate the experience of giving birth.  I’m trying to relax my shoulders and torso so that I can breathe better.  Who would have thought it would be so hard to breathe.  I’m not talking about just breathing in and out to survive; I’m talking full diaphragm, chest-lifting-and-expanding breathing.  (As I write this I can hear Albert’s voice [Albert is the trainer/practitioner] encouraging me to breathe into a big chest and into my diaphragm.  In fact, I’ve just now straightened my posture and puffed up my torso, such is the lasting impact of Albert’s training.)  I’m finding it difficult to keep a regular rhythm of deep breathing while lying down.  I feel like going to sleep.  Albert instructs me to breathe like I’m yawning, and I do so while picking up my pace.

I thought my journey into the unknown would lead me on a journey somewhere south, and it still might.  For now it has taken me to Albert’s Original Yin Qi Gong Gym.  Perhaps I am avoiding the frightening leap into the unknown that I sensed in my shamanic journey; although, Albert’s work is scary enough for now.  My sense is that I need to get my vitality in order in order to do whatever work I’m going to do.  So, whether I’m avoiding my fears or listening accurately to my intuition, I am here in Vancouver to spend a focussed month of healing and strengthening with Albert.
Albert is the owner and trainer/practitioner of Original Yin.  He has a Ph.D. in computer science, training in acupuncture and traditional Chinese medicine, and training with a mysterious (to me at least) master from whom he learned other Chinese healing arts.

Albert likes to call his gym a Free Range Chicken Torture Chamber because he is helping us grow – grow  in the sense of growing our muscles and of coming back into full vitality – by twisting, stretching, spinning, opening, and cooking us so that we can have free range of breath, movement, and energy.  “I help you grow as fast as possible, just like chickens,” Albert likes to say with a teasing, sing-song tone in his sometimes-hard-to-comprehend Taiwanese accent.  He does this with his hands but much more with his specially adapted gym equipment.  Albert has added slings, springs, pads, pillows, and heat lamps to high-end gym equipment in order to get them to do the work.  Don’t come to Albert planning to analyze your physical and emotional problems, he will tell you to let the machines do the work.  And my, oh my, do they ever do the work.  The exercises are rarely vigorous.  More often the exercises involve slow and seemingly subtle movements.  Or they involve no movement at all, simply lying for long periods of time in positions designed to open the body.  But the work, that is to say the pain, often goes to deep places.
I have not posted a blog for a while because I’m finding the training at Original Yin leaves me spent.  I’m trying to make the most of my time here, so I’m at the gym from 9am to 12pm and 3pm to 6-6:30pm. Albert encourages us to get plenty of rest, “Train, eat, sleep.  Train, eat, sleep.”  I am happy to oblige.  However, this training is like nothing I’ve experienced before and I’m inspired by it, so I do plan/hope to blog more.  Stay tuned for my post on the martial arts-based “stretching” that Albert performs on us – in one word: Ow.