宗氣 Zong Qi – Breath in Chinese medicine

When I first began studying Chinese medicine in the 1990s, zong qi 宗氣 was one of the many mysteries the available literature presented us with. In Chinese Acupuncture and Moxibustion published by the Foreign Language Press in Beijing, we found the following;

Zongqi (pectoral qi)
Zongqi is formed by the combination of qingqi (clean qi)
which is inhaled by the lung, and the qi of food essence
which is produced by the spleen and stomach.
Zongqi is stored in the chest.
Its main functions are:

i. To promote the lung’s function of controlling respiration.
The strength or weakness of speech and respiration are
related to the quality of zongqi.

ii. To promote the heart’s function of dominating the blood and
blood vessels. The circulation of qi and blood, coldness and
warmth, and the motor ability of the four limbs and trunk are
all associated with zongqi.

 

We were also told verbally that actually the word “zong” meant “ancestral”, so in some way, this “pectoral” qi was to be considered ancestral qi… it wasn’t at all clear what we were actually talking about.

This shows you how the difficulties of transmitting Chinese medical ideas come about. With poor translation, incomplete explanation and only a partial idea of what we were looking at, it was impossible to recognize what zong qi is in reality.

Yet, when it becomes clear, the idea of zong qi is a wonderfully simple and elegant observation about some fundamental aspects of our physiology and our experience of life.

To begin with, zongqi is an energy that we receive from our parents, and through them from our ancestors. So ancestral qi is not a misnomer.

Movement is life, stillness is death. From the very instant of the first spark of our lives, we are always in movement. The first coordinated movement of cells is directed by zongqi. It is expressed as a pulsation in the fabric of tissues as they organize into a fetus that is becoming a person.

Before the structures of a human body are in place, before there are the rhythms of a heart pumping or lungs breathing, there is this pulsation or vibration that propels the differentiation of cells and the formation into the structures of the body, as the shén 神 directs the intelligence of the organization of a human being.

This ancestral impetus or pulsation called zongqi continues the entire time the baby is in its mother’s womb. It is responsible for the creation of the new person.

We rely on a never ending rhythmic pulsation to direct the innate intelligence of our bodies to self organize; in the womb, this is driven by something subtle, marvelous and mysterious that we are calling zongqi.

When the baby is born and takes it’s first breath, the focus of zongqi shifts into the diaphragm. At that moment begins a new process and the breath is the medium of a person’s relationship with the environment around them, the rhythmic up down movement of the diaphragm replaces the innate creation in the womb and becomes the never resting source life. From the first breath until our last, the diaphragm remains in motion. This we still call this zongqi and it now becomes our connection to the subtlety, the marvel and the mystery of life.

Once we begin to breath, we are responsible for our own rhythmic expression of life. How we breath is entirely up to ourselves; like all things human, it is a learned skill that must be manipulated, practiced and perfected.

In the terminology of Chinese medicine, as we saw in Chinese Acupuncture and Medicine, the zongqi is associated with “the circulation of qi and blood, coldness and warmth, and the motor ability of the four limbs and trunk”. I would go as far as to say the zongqi is not only “associated with” these things, but is responsible for them.

If we take zongqi to be the energy driving the movement of the diaphragm and the resulting breath in our lungs, then modern medicine agrees with this statement. From basic physiology such as the PH levels of our blood to our ability to perform tasks and withstand injury to our psychological resilience, modern science has accumulated masses of research showing the importance of full and healthy breathing.

In light of this, it is obvious that an important aspect of physical culture as medicine is the cultivation of full and effective breathing.

This means both the rhythm of our breath as well as open, flexible and elastic qualities in the structures that support breathing, the diaphragm, the intercostal muscles, rib attachments, pleural tissues, tissues of the abdominal wall and pelvis; all can be cultivated and optimized to support the expression of zongqi throughout the body.

Along with the obvious physical aspects of the breath, the physiology of oxygen and carbon dioxide and what not, the zongqi carries with it the ancestral pattern of humanness, moving through the body along with blood and shén, it provides our structures with the ongoing intelligence they need to remain coordinated and well functioning. In a literal sense, each breath we take reenforces and reestablishes the fundamental cooperative organization of the trillions of cells that make us up.

The same force that drove the creation of our bodies in the first place is now working through our patterns of breath to maintain the cohesion of our beings.

This gives us a radical agency over the processes of our metabolism and the ways in which we experience life. The practice and cultivation of full and easy breath connects us to the very roots of our life. This is what is encapsulated in the concept of zongqi and plays an integral role in the efficacy of traditional Chinese physical culture practices.