Last Updated on March 17, 2021
The book, “The Healing Promise of Qi” written by Roger Jahnke, O.M.D began with a story about a person called David, who had everything going on for him in life when he started experiencing severe nervous system attacks. Various healthcare professionals could not find anything wrong with him. Until he suffered a major epileptic seizure, brain scans revealed that he had developed stage two astrocytoma with rapidly dviding cells. Survival is quite bleak given the prognosis and past cases.
Astrocytoma is a star tumor- like a starfish with long slender fingers that wrap around and compress the portion of the brain. For David, the tumor had gripped his motor cortex, the portion of the brain that operates the body movement. Because of the size of the tumor, to opt for surgery, even if successful would bring about paralysis. The doctor told him that astrocytoma rarely goes into remission. Radiation could only give temporary relief.
Even when he went for second opinion, the neurologist confirmed the same prognosis. Suddenly life was bleak and the prospect of imminent death was unnerving.
David reached a turning point:
“It may have been rebelliousness, anger or disbelief. But I actually feel it was my faith that pulled me out of my chair. I reached out and shook the doctor’s hand, saying ‘I will be alive when your grandchildren graduate.’. I walked out. It was as if I had declared out loud what my inner sense had been saying all along- that not only the information I was receiving but also the tone in which it was delivered was inconsistent with my intuition and my values. I had a strong internal feeling that it was possible for someone- me- to recover from this disease.”
David explored various methods including flying to China to study qi gong (chi kung). The practice feel in line of his values- to tap into the forces of nature to accelerate natural healing- it seemed a much better option compared to surgery that guranteed paralysis or radiation that only could prospone death. Eventually David learned the methods from Guo Lin who herself had healed herself from cancer through qi gong practices.
He practiced qi gong everyday and continue doing the MRI scans. The 4th scan showed a definite reduction in the size of the astrocytoma- the doctors were amazed by confused as to how to proceed. But one neurosurgeon felt the tumor had strunk enough and could be removed surgically.
When he had the surgery in 1998, people were surprised at how an inoperable, terminal, class two astrocytoma had became an operable, class one astrocytoma. The cells initially were dividing rapidly- but had strunk and stopped dividing.
David did not do any chemotherapy or radiotherapy- he only medical follow up was the occasional acupuncture. When asked what else he need to do to follow up, his neurosurgeon said, “keep doing qi gong”.
David was able to go back to work a year later. In his words:
“This is a quest- a spiritual quest, an opportunity to be off service. My dream is that people with frightening diseases, and even mild discomforts, will be as lucky as I was. They’ll find their way to understanding the Qi (Chi) through QiGong and get swept into a process that leads to a new life. QiGong is not a cure; it is a tool for healing and empowerment. It may sound like a paradox, but I have to give thanks for this tumor also. I am still getting used to being thankful for a life-threathening disease. It introduced me to QiGong and gave me access to the mysterious, vital resource that is Qi.”
As mentioned above, Qi Gong is not a cure- but a tool to help in healing.
