Become certified as a qigong instructor!
Study and practice from home in your own time and your own space
Share the experience with classmates in a private online community
Be guided step-by-step as you go deep into the Inner Fire Qigong Practices
What is Inner Fire Qigong?
Within each living thing is the spark of life, when this spark is nurtured it becomes a flame which transmutes and purifies, creating an abundance of internal energy. The practices in the Inner Fire Qigong Online 200 Hour Instructor Certification program work to kindle your inner spark into a healthy glowing flame to support a life filled with vitality.
The Inner Fire Qigong practices are active and dynamic, clearing stagnancy from our organs and sending our energy outwards into the external structures of our body, nurturing healthy nerves, bones, muscles, tendons, ligaments, and even skin. Many of the practices are much more of a ‘workout’ than other types of qigong, but always with an internal focus and awareness to create strong vibrant energy.
Connection with Kung Fu and Martial Arts
The Inner Fire Qigong practices are also known as the Warrior’s path because of their focus on developing a strong healthy body and clear focused mind, essential qualities for the warrior in times past. The practices develop obvious physical attributes such as strength, flexibility, balance, agility, and power, as well as the ability to regulate our mind and energy in situations of exertion or stress, and to quickly rebuild our energy when it is depleted.
As such these types of practices have often been associated with kung fu and the martial arts – to prepare the warrior for the difficulties of combat, but these qualities are also equally important for each of us in our modern lives to help us to have a healthy mind and body, and the inner strength and resilience we need to more easily deal with the challenges and adversities of life with grace and confidence. Through these practices we can each develop the vitality, passion, and confidence of a true warrior.
The Practices
We will work with three main areas of practice in the Inner Fire Qigong teacher training program:
Inner Fire Breathwork
For millennia the breath has been used as a primary tool for working with life energy, and in this program we will dive deep into understanding the role our breath plays in nurturing, regulating, and directing our inner fire. This will include an exploration of traditional breathing practices, concepts and philosophy, as well as a modern perspective of the anatomy and chemistry of our breath, to give you a both broad and deep understanding of how your breath works and how you can apply this knowledge to different areas of your life.
Working with over fifty different breathing exercises in the program will help to give you a practical experiential understanding of these concepts and to develop skill with your breath to support both your internal health and wellbeing, and to feed into and enrich the other qigong practices we will be focusing on in the program.
Wild Animal Play
Some of the earliest qigong practices arose from copying the movements of wild animals in their natural environment. These first manifested in the shamanic dances of the early Neolithic tribes of the people of China. Over time through careful observation, they learned that different movements affected the body, mind, and energy flow in different ways, and these movements started to be used in sophisticated and nuanced ways to bring health, balance, and abundant vitality.
The early roots of these practices are still evident today in the names and shapes of many qigong movements used for medical, martial, and spiritual purposes, which still draw on the same early inspiration of wild animals in nature.
The movements we will be focusing on in the Inner Fire Qigong Certification program move and express our energy in a dynamic way. They clearly develop physical attributes of strength, flexibility, balance, agility, and power, while also providing a means to process and release emotions and develop physical, mental and emotional balance.
The nature of the movements is that they can be quite physically challenging, and this is part of their benefit. The active yang character of the practices acts as a counterpoint to other more yin qigong practices, and the dynamic interaction between yin and yang leads to more abundant health and vitality. The practices can be adapted to a wide range of physical abilities – whatever your current level of health and fitness, they will help lead you towards manifesting your ultimate potential of dynamic, vibrant, physical health and energetic vitality.
The animal movements that we will work with in the Inner Fire Qigong teacher training program are those of the Tiger, Snake, Crane, Leopard, and Dragon. We will explore not only the physical performance of each movement, but also how they relate to the flow of energy in our meridians, our emotional expression, and the qualities of the five elements.
Iron Shirt Qigong
The extraordinary feats of physical resilience often connected to Iron Shirt Qigong sometimes causes the profound health benefits that can be gained from these practices to be overlooked. While the benefit of this external resilience in the context of its application to martial arts training (kung fu) is clear, the process of building and consolidating our energy to develop this skill is inherently deeply therapeutic.
In the course of our lives, the many challenges and trials that we face can caused our inner being to become weakened and depleted. With Iron Shirt Qigong we go through a process of gathering new energy resources, packing and consolidating them, then smelting, forging and tempering through dynamic tension and striking practices. Much like working a piece of steel, this process of smelting, forging and tempering digs deep to uncover flaws and weaknesses, resolve them and make them strong. It develops structural integrity, strength, and flexibility – physically, psychologically, and energetically.
Iron shirt qigong can take a healthy person and make them stronger, and equally it can also take someone who is worn down and even broken and reforge them anew into the strong and resilient being they wish to be.
Iron shirt qigong can be classified as one of the most yang qigong practices, but within its development it also draws on some of the most yin practices in order to achieve this high level of expression of yang energy. To be truly healthy and vital there must always be a harmony between yin and yang, and Iron shirt qigong brings these polarities together in a challenging and dynamic practice yielding great physical, mental, and energetic benefits. As with other practices, the way that we apply them will depend on an individual’s situation. Whether someone is seeking peak performance or rehabilitation, the same practices are used, but tailored to the capabilities and condition of the practitioner.
Equipment Requirements
There is some equipment that you will need for the Iron Shirt Qigong portion of the program. This equipment is generally inexpensive and not difficult to obtain, and not required until week 5 of the program and later, so you have plenty of time to organize it. The equipment you will need is as follows:
You can find more details relating to the equipment in this video. You will also need access to a suitable tree, or post in the last weeks of the program for some of the Iron Shirt Qigong practice.
Your commitment – developing ‘gong’:
Qigong means skill with energy, and this skill, or ‘gong’ comes from practice over time. When you practice consistently over a period of time – with good guidance, you can develop personal experience and understanding of your vital energy. This will enrich your life, and make your teaching more authentic and valuable when you embark on your new role as a qigong instructor on completion of your training.
To develop this gong, you should be prepared to practice qigong for approximately 1.5 hours per day over the 15 weeks duration of this course, in addition to around 3 hours of reading, reviewing videos, and otherwise working on your theoretical understanding of the practices. You can choose to divide this up in different ways. You could do a single 1.5 hour practice session each day, or you could divide it into two or more shorter practice sessions. The time you spend on theory can also be spread throughout the week, or done in a more concentrated block.
The Inner Fire Qigong program will take you through a gradual process of development over the course of 15 weeks. Wherever you are at with your personal fitness at the start of the program, step by step you will make significant progress over the duration of the course. Each of the practices can be adapted to a wide range of physical capabilities, and often it can actually be an advantage of sorts to need to develop gradually and make use of adaptations, because this will help you in being able to offer this kind of guidance to others in a similar situation to yourself in the future.
If it is just a matter of not having done much exercise lately, then you will benefit from gently starting to do more physical activity in the leadup to the course start date. This can be a simple as getting out and walking regularly, or participating in any other healthy physical activity you enjoy.
If you have concerns about your ability to do the practices due to specific health conditions, injuries, or physical limitations – please send us an email so that we can advise you. This program is not suitable for pregnant women; and people with a history of uncontrolled high blood pressure or migraines will need to take additional care during the program. We will give you extra guidance regarding this as needed.
The practices you learn during this program will certainly give you the tools to develop the body of a Kung Fu fighter, and to develop the ability to perform incredible feats of physical resilience – if you carry through with training them to that level.
However – our focus on the program is primarily around health and wellbeing, and how we can develop this through the practices. Most people will choose to do the practices in a gentler way, which is sufficient for this purpose, and this will be their focus in teaching others as well.
If you do want to take your training further into the realms of high performance, you will have the understanding of the practices necessary to do this, but it is likely that it will take longer than 15 weeks of training for you to achieve this.
Different timezones and schedules can make it hard to attend live online sessions regularly for people in different parts of the world. We will do our best to schedule the q&a sessions so that it is possible most people to attend them at least some of the time, but recognize that this may not be possible for all program participants for all sessions. For this reason, attendance at the q&a sessions is highly recommended – but not be compulsory. We will also record the q&a sessions so that any discussion and demonstrations that occur there can be reviewed again later by all students as needed.
Sometimes life can get in the way of our best made plans, and you may need to pause your study and practice for one reason or another. This does not need to stand in the way of your completing this 200 hour qigong instructor certification program. While the program and the related q&a’s will run over 15 weeks, you will have lifetime access to all of the course materials, including recordings of the q&a’s. If during the program your training needs to be interrupted for any reason, you can pick it up again from where you left off using the recorded course materials – and you have up to one year to complete your certification tests.
At the end of the program, we do have a comprehensive testing process . The thought of doing a test can be daunting for some people, but this is done in a supportive way to ensure that your understanding and practice are sound, so you can share your new knowledge and skills with confidence as a qigong instructor.
Your Instructor
John Munro
John Munro is the founder of Long White Cloud Qigong, which currently has a network of over 200 instructors around the world. He brings more than 20 years experience of Qigong, Traditional Chinese Medicine, and Kung Fu to his teachings. His passion is to bring traditional practices to life so that they are understandable and relevant when applied to modern living. He has previously served in a number of key roles as Vice President, Secretary, and Registrar of the New Zealand Qigong and Traditional Chinese Medicine Association, and as Chair of Natural Health Practitioners of New Zealand.
John has written four popular books on qigong, and is active in teaching workshops and running retreats around the world. Recently he received an award from the World Academic Society of Medical Qigong for his work in promoting qigong.
You can find more videos and written comments from course participants about their experience with the program here.
Feedback from previous course participants
I am very thankful for this course, I knew it was going to be good, but it surpassed my expectations. I highly recommend the Inner Fire Qigong Course to anyone who wants to teach Qigong or to use the knowledge for their personal journey.
Sandra de FoucaultLong White Cloud Qi Gong offers high-quality, excellent courses. Previously, I studied two different forms of Qi Gong. And one of those was a program designed by a very well-known, leading Qi Gong expert in my country. I can honestly say that I got so much more out of John’s program. So far, I have completed QFP and BHE. I was impressed by how comprehensive and thorough the material was, and how well the exercises work on many different levels. I didn’t imagine that I could learn so much from an online format, but it was very well presented, clearly communicated, and easy to understand.
Furthermore, it answered so many questions I had about Qi Gong which I never really understood from my prior training. I am practicing what I learned from John almost every day. And the positive effects on my body, mind, and energy level far surpasses the results I gained from my prior practices. I will definitely continue my studies with Long White Cloud Qi Gong. I would recommend it to anyone who is considering. You will not be disappointed, and the quality and value is definitely beyond what you might be imagining.
Angela BothwellThe Level 1 Qigong Instructor Certification program was thoroughly enjoyable for me. With the QFP course, at first there was a lot of learning about the movements themselves. I felt that just as I was ready, Mr. Munro added the energetic concepts to the exercises. At this point the exercises became more personal and I got a deeper meaning out of them. I felt the exercises in the Between Heaven and Earth class were very helpful in moving significant amounts of chi through my body. The ETF classes helped me be less critical of my efforts and really play and flow with my movement. The Meditations were great for me to explore the different forms of energy and how they are held and flow through the body. I feel energized and more fluid after taking the courses. I also enjoyed the live interaction at the end of the courses when I had the opportunity to skype with Mr. Munro. It was not a critique but more of an interaction where he showed me how making some subtle changes in my movements would increase the flow of energy through my body. I highly recommend the Long White Cloud courses to anyone interested in learning about Qigong!
Jennie GoffI got certified as a Qigong Instructor Level 1 a few months back and I am currently working on my Level II certification. The courses allowed me to not only improve on a personal level but also on a professional one. i am a certified Chinese Medicine practitioner and the connection I feel with the energy improved dramatically which in turn allowed me to help my patients more effectively. The courses are easy to follow, very well structured and just require your consistency and motivation. John has written many books that compliment the courses. He is always there to answer any questions, to organise workshops and to share his knowledge and pass on a tradition that has been there for generations.
Sandra De FoucaultJohn has a gift for expressing abstract concepts in a concrete way making them easy to understand and apply. His passion for what he does shines through his commitment to his students’ understanding and the depth of response to all questions asked. Classes provide both physical direction as well as theory. I have learned a wealth of information and feel prepared to share that information with others. I have had the intention to study Qigong for years, but was unable to find a local teacher. Thanks to Long White Cloud, I am now teaching Qigong in my area and sharing the many benefits with others in my community.
Kimberly BowersI have been learning Qigong from John for three years. While I am learning Qigong my life was up and down as normal human life. John has encouraged me to develop my life and transform my life better with Qigong. His Qigong methods is not only simplicity and informative but he teaches us relationship of mind and body as core of energy system of universe, also interaction of emotional state that help us to become healthy mind. My soul has grown up with LWCQ practice and currently I am an instructor of Long White Cloud Qigong and I teach LWCQ’s methods of Qigong to the community people time to time.
Aiko FukumotoI would like to share how much I have benefited from studying qigong with John Munro. John is gentle and kind and very funny at times. The written information and videos are over the top amazing. They are clear and evenly paced making them easy and enjoyable to follow. With any skill it’s the daily practice that I find brings me most benefits. I have taken a number of Johns twelve week modules and each one slowly but surely allows me to learn and practice the new skills at my level. I needed adaptations due to a spinal issue and he always went out of his way to make this accessible and understandable. I have experienced quite a number of teachers in my life and I consider John Munro to be one of the rare gems that I am so grateful to have encountered. ” It’s not magic but it’s magical” is how he describes qigong. Well, he makes this come true by explaining how and why the magic happens in a language even a non scientific person like me can follow.
Helen JucevicThis is the real thing, energy cultivation. Not memorizing forms and making minute adjustments to your posture. Not an old school master with an ego problem. Not a “new school” teacher who is just repeating what she memorized. This teaching is alive. It’s real. Of course, you have to practice, and put in some time. If you do, you will be amazed.
Mary WhithamLong White Cloud Qigong is an important resource providing excellent learning possibilities for understanding Qigong practice as instructed by John Munro. The courses and teachings are well instructed, intelligently informative, and an effective bridge for modernising the depth that Qigong has to offer. The teachings offered are the real deal. What may begin with a little work around developing an understanding of how our breath can change ones health can eventually lead to a depth of understanding with an immensely purposeful and meaningful philosophy and practice to enrich the life of oneself and others. Qigong has the potential to remove any limitations we experience through a lack of understanding and poor life practice. The courses that John Munro offers and teaches are fundamental practices to significantly empower our lives and give us the tools we need to achieve what ever we find most meaningful. John’s teaching style is patient, caring, effective, and extremely enjoyable which is encouraging and essential to keep this practice alive. The help I have received from John, both directly and indirectly, has definitely helped me to understand some of the finer points of body practices and remind me how such seemingly insignificant and often forgotten habits can drastically change my world. I can not express my gratitude enough.
Jared ElliottQigong, in particular Johns Small Universe Instructor Course, has been life-changing for me. I am so grateful. The course is better than I ever could have imagined. John really has thought of everything! The way the whole course and weeks are laid out is absolutely perfect. Every week John builds on your knowledge of each practice in a gentle and supportive way. There are videos, text and audio files to help with your practice. Our weekly live practice sessions with Cathryn and Miguel were so amazing and the sense of practicing all together on zoom was fantastic. If you can’t make the Morning or Evening practices, they are available to watch later or again if you would like to. The 1:1 sessions with Senior Instructors Clayton, Helene and Miguel were brilliant and really helped with individual feedback and advice. The weekly Q and As with John are invaluable. It gives you the chance to ask any questions directly to John, hear other students queries and discuss everything all together. Again, these are available to watch at a later time. John and Tihana are always available by email for any queries you may have. Also, there is the Community forum that you can share experiences or questions with your fellow course-mates and John is always checking for any questions that need answering. The main benefits of the course for me, are both physical and mental. I feel my body is stronger and more balanced. I also feel a greater sense of connection to my body and mind. Mentally, the practices help me to stay positive, motivated and yet relaxed at the same time. Starting my day with Waking the Qi really sets me up for the day ahead. I could not imagine life without my Qigong practice now! Thank you John for making this wonderful Instructor course available around the world and for bringing us all together in our love of Qigong. I would definitely recommend this amazing course to everyone, even if you don’t intend to teach. You will learn so much about Qigong and yourself. You will be stronger and more relaxed. What are you waiting for?! Please enrol in this course. You will be so happy that you did!
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