Mantak Chia is one of the best known teachers of Taoist health and meditation practices in the world. As the founder of Healing Tao, Tao Yoga and Universal Tao Center, his teachings are propagated by over fifteen hundred Certified Instructors and practitioners on every continent, to hundreds of thousands of students. As an author, he’s penned 38 books ranging from Life in the Tao, to the introduction of Chi Nei Tsang to the western world, to a wide ranging library of tomes and textbooks on Sexual Reflexology, Emotional Wisdom, Iron Shirt Chi Gung, and guidebooks to previously secret training exercises in books like the Greatest Kan and Li.

So what is it exactly, that this master of the Taoist arts teaches? The ancient Taoist practices he teaches form the core of a system designed to cultivate a balanced life of love, health, longevity, meaning and spiritual evolution. The key of the system is based on the science of developing and refining our qi – the subtle bio-electromagnetic life force - for self-healing and life enhancement. The result is an extremely practical and effective system of self-cultivation that leads to the harmonious evolution of body, mind and spirit.

So here I am, at Mantak’s healing retreat in Thailand, a Shangri-la called Tao Garden, in the foothills of the Eastern Himalayas in the countryside near Chiang Mai. It’s a world renowned center for Taoist training and holistic healing, detoxification and rejuvenation. They offer a world class holistic clinic, which offers a rare integrated approach that combines Western medical knowledge with traditional Chinese medicine and Ayurvedic techniques. Additionally, the Health Spa offers a full range of Thai Massage, Ayurvedic Massage, Chi Nei Tsang and a rare but amazing technique called Karsai Nei Tsang.

[Ed: By the way, if you haven’t tried Chi Nei Tsang and Karsei Nei Tsang… you haven’t lived! It is one of the most powerful modalities of somatic healing that I’ve ever experienced – a deep massage for the organs. And it feels absolutely amazing. Absolute bliss! Bye bye toxins!] 

Yeah, Tao Garden is an amazing place, with terrific pristine energy and air, and the grounds are the canvas for a Taoist sculpture garden – Immortals, yin-yangs and seven star formations are everywhere. The place is so magical that I wake up early; it’s so full of energy that I arrive at the dining hall before breakfast. They’re still setting up the buffet, so I help myself to one of the several “healthy” teas that are served around the clock. I notice that the metal walkway that surrounds the dining hall, over a lovely pond or moat, is in the shape of the Big Dipper. Small teahouse gazebos are in the place of the stars. Sitting here in the open air dining hall, I can’t help but observe how beautiful it is here, late December in Chiang Mai. The air is actually chilly, which is rare in this tropical climate. I notice that time passes differently here, it’s not as stressful here, so time stretches out. It’s almost like I can relish the present moment here.

A gentle wavelet of time passes, and breakfast is now being served. A few people show up. A couple from Moscow, a small group from Germany, a single Chinese woman from Beijing who sells real estate. Mantak arrives and everyone sneaks a quick peek at him. He’s a celebrity here, like a Taoist Eckhart Tolle or yes, a Taoist Deepak Chopra. He smiles and waves at me. I motion to invite him to join me, and I notice that he’s wearing a sweater – something I didn’t bother to pack as I expected a constant onslaught of heat and humidity in this equatorial jungle known as the Land of Smiles. After we greet each other, he immediately offers, “you should wear something that covers your throat chakra, so you don’t catch a cough.” That moment leaves an impression - his first thought is for my health. So I thank him for his advice, and I ask if it’s okay to begin our promised interview.

All smiles, he sits down and a waitress comes over to take his order. His regular breakfast consists of two boiled eggs in some sort of tamari sauce, some stir fried morning glory, Chinese breakfast soup, a healthy tea. I have to say, that stir fried morning glory is delish! Casually, I remark that the air here, unlike Bangkok, is very clean. He replies, “That was our goal here – good air, good water and good food.” I reply that the feng shui (the geomagnetic life energy of the earth) is also amazing, and he offers that his teacher helped map out the energy of the resort before they built it. And in this manner, with my questions and his answers, we slowly enter a dialog about Taoism and modern life –

MANTAK:Yes, of course. When I was a child, I lived in a village that was about two hours by car from Bangkok, and situated between three Buddhist temples. So the temple was my playground and from my earliest recollections, I saw monks in meditation. I was six when I started to learn from a monk how to sit and “still my mind”. Obviously, six is too young to learn how to meditate, but they found that I was able to sit quietly with them for 2 hours at a time. Eventually, they taught me a more formal meditation, and during those meditations it felt like I was flying and I could see lights and colours in my mind’s eye.

In grammar school, I started learning traditional Thai boxing. And eventually, I began learning Tai Chi Chuan from Master Lu, who also introduced me to aikido and yoga. There was a feeling of coming home, that first time I did Tai Chi Chuan. This formed a good basis for my health, so years later, when I was a student in Hong Kong, I excelled in track and field events. It was in Hong Kong that my senior classmate introduced me to my first Taoist master, Master I Yun, which means White Cloud. He taught me how to circulate energy through the microcosmic orbit (see below for explanation) and all of the other esoteric practices that I teach.

MANTAK:The main thing that I teach is re-opening the microcosmic orbit. A baby’s microcosmic orbit is fully open at birth – both the governor and the functional channels. However, it slowly gets blocked and shuts down as the baby ages and becomes an adult due to the normal stresses and processes of normal life. And if the orbit is blocked, your life energy won’t flow, and then your blood slows down. This is the beginning of sickness. Also, like with any form of qigong – once you begin studying, you will refine your internal senses so that you can detect things that are out of balance very early, and be able to repair them before illness blossoms. So the goal is to reverse the aging process, and become again, at an energetic level, like a baby. It says in the Tao Te Ching, “To be one with the Tao is to be like an infant. Poisonous insects will not sting him, fierce animals will not stalk him, birds of prey will not attack him.”

But again, the main thing that I teach is opening the microcosmic orbit, and through this method, people can really improve their lives. They can reclaim health and find greater peace of mind. I have personally taught over 100,000 people how to open their orbit, and I have over 1500 certified instructors who teach the method as well.