Shaolin Arts
Live Online
Monday 7-8pm
Mind, Body and Energy Training through the Shaolin Arts
A traditional approach to working with mind, body and energy in an integrated way, supporting physical, mental, emotional and spiritual wellbeing.
Our Monday evening Shaolin Arts class is now focusing on Cultivating Internal Force, returning to an important part of traditional Shaolin training and exploring it through both quiet and more dynamic practices.
Classes are live online every Monday, 7–8 pm UK time, and recorded for those who would like to catch up or return to the practice during the week.
This is an online Shaolin training class for new and existing Fully Alive members. It brings together Qigong, Kung Fu stances and Zen practice, drawing on ancient Shaolin mind, body and energy arts, while exploring how they can be met and applied within modern, everyday life.
Through regular practice, people often notice changes such as:
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greater ease, strength, flexibility and balance
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increased resilience when meeting challenge or pressure
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clearer mental focus and steadiness of attention
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a quieter, more grounded sense of confidence
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a growing ability to recognise and apply what is learned in class within daily life
The Internal Art of Shaolin Training
The Shaolin Arts draw on centuries of practice and cultivation, shaped by a deep, experiential understanding of the relationship between mind, body and energy.
At the heart of this training is the cultivation of internal force. Rather than relying on muscular strength or physical effort alone, we learn to work more directly with mind and energy: entering a quieter state of awareness, allowing energy to flow, cultivating and gathering that energy, and developing internal strength through both movement and stillness.
Traditionally, these skills supported the health, vitality, clarity and resilience required of those practising the Shaolin Arts. Yet their value reaches far beyond martial application.
As internal force develops, the practice can become increasingly quiet. There is less unnecessary effort, greater awareness of what is happening within us, and a growing sense of being centred, present and fully alive.
'The Shaolin practice as taught by Tim Franklin is a mixture of Zen (meditation, mind and spirit practices), Chi Kung (energy practices) and Kung Fu (physical practices). These can all happen within a single lesson and sometime within a single practice.
For those of us who spend too much time in our heads and at our desks, these sessions which let us switch off our busy minds, and allow us to simply enjoy the flow of guided embodied mindfulness within a supportive group, are a complete tonic.'
- Jonathan
Cultivate greater internal steadiness, presence and awareness.
Cultivating from Within
The Shaolin Arts offer a way of cultivating mind, body and energy together. Through regular practice, we learn to become quieter and more aware, allow energy to flow, cultivate internal force, and explore how movement and stillness can become part of the same practice.
Combat skills are only one aspect of Shaolin training. The internal arts are equally concerned with how we use the mind, how energy is cultivated and directed, and how internal strength develops without relying on muscular tension or unnecessary effort.
The online classes are open to complete beginners as well as more experienced students. You are welcome regardless of age, physical mobility or current level of fitness.
Rather than following a “no pain, no gain” approach, the training begins by learning how to relax the body and focus the mind. From this foundation, the more demanding aspects of the practice can be met with greater ease. Over time, each session builds naturally on what has already been explored and embodied.
Cultivating Presence
With roots in the Zen tradition, the Shaolin Arts are simple, direct and experiential, placing emphasis on meeting what is here and entering more fully into the practice.
Through working with body, mind and energy, we learn to cultivate without unnecessary force or effort. Movement, energy flow and stillness become different aspects of the same internal practice, allowing greater awareness, presence and internal strength to develop naturally.
Enhancing enjoyment of life
Shaolin Grandmaster Wong Kiew Kit often emphasised that the Shaolin Arts exist to enhance our enjoyment of life, here and now, not as a future reward.
Practising in this way gradually becomes more than something we do during a class. The qualities cultivated through training can begin to accompany us into everyday life, with greater vitality, mental freshness and a sense of ease arising naturally from regular practice.
Enjoy the practice.
Develop fitness, resilience, confidence and calm
'This Shaolin Arts class is the most comprehensive class that I’ve taken in the past 13 years that I’ve been practising these energy arts.
The courses are carefully structured to help us experience and gain greater awareness of the benefits of each aspect of the training and to explore the profound applications they have in everyday living.
They are fun, challenging, relaxing and rewarding. I am in my late fifties and I have greater agility and suppleness and more awareness of the tensions in my body and mind and how to respond to these than I have had for a very long while.
Tim’s teaching is very inclusive, clear and easy to follow and there is plenty of time to ask questions and review what we have been doing.
These classes are so much more than just an energy reboot (as if that wasn’t enough in itself), I always finish them feeling refreshed and renewed in body and mind and set up for the week.'
Min Angel
Developing the Practice
Cultivating internal force is not something that needs to be rushed. The training develops through regular practice, as we become more familiar with entering a Qigong state of mind, allowing energy to flow, returning to stillness and gradually cultivating greater internal strength.
The classes bring together different aspects of Shaolin training, with practices introduced progressively so that skills can develop through experience rather than simply learning more techniques.
Once closely guarded, these arts are now openly taught to those who feel drawn to practise them. Training online means that wherever you are, you can join the live class and become part of that continuing practice.
Access to recordings and practice resources
Each live class is recorded and available through the Fully Alive Academy, so you can attend live, catch up if you miss a session, or return to a practice in your own time.
You also have access to a growing library of shorter practice videos, ranging from 5 to 30 minutes, including Qigong, meditation, Zen yoga, Daoyin, stance training and forms. These offer different ways to continue exploring and practising between the live classes.
Shaolin Arts: The Way of Physical, Mental, Emotional, Energetic and Spiritual Development
Doorways into Practice
Zen, Qigong and the Shaolin Arts can sometimes appear to be different practices, each with their own methods and purposes. Within our training, I increasingly see them as different doorways into the same exploration.
We may enter through movement, stillness, breath, energy, stance or awareness. At times the practice may be gentle and quiet; at others physically demanding and dynamic. Yet beneath these differences is an exploration of integration: body, mind and energy experienced less as separate parts and more as a whole.
Opening the Way may begin through Dao Yin, mindful movement or Zen yoga, but opening is not simply something we do to the body. We are creating space, becoming receptive and noticing what changes when unnecessary holding is no longer required.
Entering the Way is not limited to Qigong. We enter whenever we move from simply doing a practice towards experiencing it more fully. Attention quietens, energy can flow, and the distinction between movement, breath, mind and awareness can begin to soften.
The Warrior's Way is not simply about combat, strength or resilience. Through stance, movement, stillness, Zen and internal force training, we explore what it is to remain present and connected without unnecessary tension or effort.
These are not separate stages to complete or levels to achieve. They are doorways we can enter and return to again and again.
Through each of them we explore a deeper integration of self, in relationship with ourselves, with others and with the life we are already living.
Come as you are. Enter the practice. Enjoy the art.
Shaolin Arts Classes
- Monday 7-8pm
- Live online, plus receive the class recordings to take or review in your own time
- Get access to all Fully Alive weekly classes with Premium membership
