ChiLel helps guitar playing:

Wanda Pavoni of Verona, Italy, has studied Chilel with Master Luke Chan in Zhong Shan, China, for the past month. Wanda's goals for the course were to improve her practice of Chilel, receive certification to teach Chilel, and to learn to live in the present moment.

Wanda reports she has learned to maintain a straight line and she has become rooted. She now feels more physically stable. The Ching Ling theories help her to stay in the present moment.

The entire class has enjoyed Wanda's guitar concerts as we struggled to learn to think in Dantien. At first she had many hesitations and stops as she practiced a difficult piece of music that her music teacher had given her just before leaving Italy. She struggled with the piece very much. She had hesitations and stops as she played and complained of how difficult the piece was. Then suddenly a drastic change occurred. She no longer had stops and hesitations. She played the piece from memory and said it was easy. She was comfortable playing in front of us. "Wanda. What happened?" Wanda started playing the guitar from Dantien. She says that when she turns the "millwheel" in Dantien she feels as if her body, Dantien, her fingers and the guitar are one. Since her fingers are playing from Dantien they feel stronger. She is not disturbed by playing in front of people because she has her mind in Dantien. Her music is stronger and without stops and hesitations.

Wanda exemplifies using Chilel principles in daily life to make it richer and fuller. Thinking, moving and seeing from Dantien make daily activities that seem mundane and difficult easy and powerful.

Hilda Booth

Columbia, SC, USA