San Ti Posture is a standing posture that is used to teach someone to go inside their body and heal from a relaxed and meditative state of awareness. San Ti Posture comes from an ancient Taoist art known as Hsing I Chuan, which was one of the 3 major Taoist forms of Internal Arts. Internal Arts are about spiritually knowing your energy inside your body, putting your mind fully inside your body, and radically healing and strengthening your own nervous system. People mostly think of them as martial arts, but there is another side beyond fighting. The ancient Chinese monks used this practice of San Ti, to cultivate the physical discipline required to meditate and reach a consciousness of “Oneness”.
The San Ti Posture is the gateway to acquiring a root for both spiritual and martial art cultivation in all of the Internal Arts of Hsing I, Tai Chi, and Ba Gua. It is the strongest energy posture to bring out Yang Qi and build a strong Tan Tien or a spiritual root connected to your nervous system inside a human form. This energy anatomy or “root” is then linked to the nervous system to build in strength and manifestation of certain phenomena of Qi cultivation. It is not associated with muscle strength, but an actual internal power using body structure to open acupuncture meridians and build the energy of a relaxed nervous system that is life giving instead of anxiety inducing.
The by-product of San Ti was having a calm and clear intention in the mind of the novice monk, which would help them to move forward in life. What an insane gift for people in a modern world, to go through life without the nervous system attacking you! If someone has Sympathetic Nervous System Dominance, then their nervous system will give them a signal that they feel threatened and under red alert. This chronic stress will destroy a human, but what if you had a simple posture to practice that taught you how to be rooted, centered, calm, and rewired your nervous system to handle more Qi? It would be like a tiny electrical wire over years becoming thicker, stronger, and able to channel more spiritual energy that gave someone a life affirming nervous system. You can handle the storms of life without being broken by negative situations anymore. San Ti helps people to keep from crumbling internally from weakness and stress.
Legend has it the monks were too weak to sit in meditation for hours on end. Internal Arts like Hsing I Chuan, Tai Chi, and Ba Gua were taught to the monks to strengthen their mind and body for deeper meditation practices. The process of integrating and becoming a stronger disciplined human being was necessary as a step towards enlightenment and being of service for the monks in training. But forget about attaining enlightenment for a moment, that’s a word that can be used as a grandiose thought that people aspire to. Let’s stay rooted and grounded in the pursuit of being a better human being.
Certain spiritual phenomena gradually unfolded within every monk as they practiced these Internal Arts for qi-cultivation daily. The act of combining meditative states with qi cultivation would awaken gifts inside the monks. Taoist monks would move forward to greater levels of being at peace with the psychic world, expanded perceptions of energy awareness, a clear mind with clear intention through life, a nervous system that is life giving, and the gift of feeling at peace with your karma. Taoists claimed to have received these gifts, after years of opening their meridians and strengthened the energy field by doing Hsing I San Ti Posture first before other lessons were given.