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From Incurable to Unstoppable: Building a Global Qigong Empire with Master Mingtong Gu · Beyond Fulfillment Podcast

• 0:00
  Foreign.
• 0:06
  Master Mingtong Goo.
• 0:08
  Welcome to Beyond Fulfillment.
• 0:11
  Thank you so much.
• 0:12
  Thank you, David.
• 0:13
  Thank you for being here.
• 0:14
  We greatly appreciate it.
• 0:17
  So, so, Mingtong, you've got an incredibly fascinating story and journey up to building this incredible community that you.
• 0:27
  You've been.
• 0:28
  You've built in, in these retreats you offer.
• 0:30
  You're one of the most qigong practitioners in the world with a massive facility and a very big following.
• 0:39
  And you're really doing incredibly profound work that's, that's impacted so many people in a big way.
• 0:45
  So want to get into how you did all that and how it happened.
• 0:49
  If you could just set the stage for our listeners.
• 0:51
  Can you talk about your backstory and, and how you got to where you are today?
• 0:55
  Yeah.
• 0:56
  Thank you.
• 0:57
  Thank you.
• 1:00
  So, you know, I never imagined I'm doing what I'm doing.
• 1:04
  Let's say only even 35 years ago.
• 1:08
  I was doing, you know, study, first of all, study mathematics, study fine arts and in the academic field, you know, feeling like, okay, on the way to success and fulfillment.
• 1:21
  Then some point I realizing it's not really satisfying.
• 1:28
  You know, I was doing pretty good academically and, but really feel something is missing.
• 1:35
  Even at a time I was struggle with health issues, you know, chronic or incurable conditions such as muscle sclerosis.
• 1:44
  But I learned to kind of adapt to it, you know, feel like okay with it.
• 1:49
  You know, I was young enough anyway, kind of sustaining every day.
• 1:53
  But deep inside, just feel like, unhappy and just not satisfied.
• 2:01
  You know, usually you don't know what it is can be satisfied until you discover, right.
• 2:06
  But you feel absence of satisfaction.
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  And so, but then just kind of qigong showed up in my life.
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  A friend introduced me to her class.
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  She's teaching qigong.
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  Actually, she's from Columbus, Ohio, and very encouraging and successful woman.
• 2:27
  But she decided to teach Tai chi in qigong.
• 2:33
  That was my first time encountering qigong in Columbus, Ohio.
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  I never heard of qigong when I grew up in China, so it was like, unusual, really unusual.
• 2:43
  So the feeling of the first time experiencing qigong is difficult to describe, is very subtle.
• 2:49
  A sense of, like, calmness, a sense of subtleness, a sense of connection.
• 2:57
  And then she gave me a book about wisdom, healing qigong.
• 3:00
  So I start to, like, surprisely discovering long history of qigong.
• 3:06
  And then also, of course, the incredible benefit, the power behind the qigong tradition.
• 3:12
  So I get very excited, start to, you know, learn more from her, but also from.
• 3:17
  From her teacher, become very disciplined.
• 3:21
  And then I discover, obviously the origin of qigong.
• 3:25
  Come From China.
• 3:26
  So I went to medicine at qigong hospital to study with my teacher.
• 3:31
  And he is the founder with qigong in China.
• 3:35
  And he's a physician.
• 3:37
  He used to be actually physician in Western medicine, you know, also traditional Chinese medicine.
• 3:44
  He decided to use qigong to help people because most of condition as diagnosed as incurable chronic condition.
• 3:53
  There's not much of help from Eloprasek, but also from traditional Chinese medicine neither.
• 4:00
  So he start to experiment in qigong as he studied qigong with many teachers from childhood on.
• 4:08
  And so it's kind of underground practice in China at the time, hardly anybody know about qigong.
• 4:15
  That's why I didn't never heard of qigong when I grew up in China.
• 4:20
  But he opened up a medicine qigong hospital in China become not only successful, but incredibly impactful.
• 4:29
  And people show up at a time when I was there, like 3,000 people, 5,000 people practicing together one month at a time.
• 4:39
  So.
• 4:39
  So it's beyond the phenomena where we know of Tai Chi or qigong over there.
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  People go beyond like recreational it take it very seriously.
• 4:48
  So in the beginning, people working with these severe condition and able to improve.
• 4:54
  And the best scenario is totally covered from incurable condition.
• 4:59
  So in this case, it's like people thinking this is miracle.
• 5:02
  It's unbelievable, right?
• 5:04
  But when you experience it as I did, when you practicing every day for 10 hours, 12 hours in a large community and with dedication and connecting the mind, body, discovering the energy, it's so tangible, experiential, and you feel
• 5:25
  better every day.
• 5:27
  So according to the statistics in the medicine Chi gong hospital is 95% of cases which is incurable condition, mostly chronic condition, experiencing improvement, measurement improvement from the western medical test before and after.
• 5:50
  So that is quite incredible.
• 5:53
  And there's also percentage of people between 20 to 30% of people able totally recovery from these incurable condition.
• 6:03
  So from medical point of view, this is impossible.
• 6:07
  From a qigong point of view, you know, you know, it's.
• 6:11
  It's.
• 6:12
  It's like, you know, we can all.
• 6:15
  Understand that when we letting go from treating this body like as a machine, as a biological machine, you know, as only physical only.
• 6:26
  You know, if you think of the power of the mind connecting with the body and accessing the energy beyond medical science, beyond our story, beyond what we're familiar with, then you start to discover the power through the direct
• 6:45
  experience.
• 6:46
  And that's the beauty of qigong.
• 6:47
  So I was able to recover myself from sclerosis in asthma condition in about two years.
• 6:57
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• 7:51
  So then I attended the master training program for two years.
• 7:57
  Then I came back from China to study.
• 7:59
  I mean to teach full time in the last 25, 26 years now.
• 8:04
  25 years now.
• 8:06
  Okay, I believe story.
• 8:08
  Okay.
• 8:09
  All right.
• 8:09
  No, a lot to dig in there.
• 8:10
  Just briefly if you can, to set the stage for our listeners.
• 8:14
  What is qigong?
• 8:16
  Good question.
• 8:17
  Let's go back there.
• 8:18
  What is qigong?
• 8:19
  Right.
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  Qi literally means energy and gong means practice to work with energy.
• 8:29
  Yeah, but deeply is about how do you perceive the energy?
• 8:34
  How do you determine how do you work with energy.
• 8:38
  So in this case, in the wisdom, healing, qigong perspective, everything is energy.
• 8:43
  So when people ask me, you know, what is Qi?
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  What is energy?
• 8:47
  Ask back, what is not energy?
• 8:50
  Yeah,.
• 8:55
  That's a good response.
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  Your body is made of energy.
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  Even your mind is made of energy.
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  All existence of life, visible, invisible, physical, non physical.
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  It's all made of energy.
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  But that knowledge is not available until later.
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  And it's available ancient time, people cultivating energy for power, for spiritual realization, accomplishment, so on.
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  Including the idea of immortality as well.
• 9:31
  But now it's approved by new science, regular science, but particularly quantum physics.
• 9:39
  Now there's many technology available to measure energy.
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  For example, in this case, we just finished the 30 day literature in our literary center.
• 9:50
  Imagine, you can imagine 30 days, every day, people practicing with me 10 hours, 12 hours.
• 9:58
  This technology we use is input from Russia to measure the energy field of the room.
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  And the result was amazing.
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  You can just see from collected data how the energy intensity, the energy frequency, the energy coherence is kind of gradually building up over the 30 day.
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  Then the last week is like total jump to another level stabilize self.
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  And that helped me to understand why my teachers using 30 day as a minimum time to helping people.
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  And also the science validating that takes about 30 day to change habit.
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  Any Habit.
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  So healing, spiritual awakening is about changing habit.
• 10:48
  This habit is programmed in the body, is programmed in our mind, programmed in our life in general.
• 10:55
  So when we do retreat, it's really like detaching from everyday life so we can concentrate, you know, acknowledging the limitation of life, challenge of life, but same time go deeper into the energy system, who we are to change
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  the habit internally.
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  So every practice, every guidance, every choice, every commitment, help us to expanding our capacity by changing the all habit.
• 11:24
  So it's really about capacity of life as human being, your physical capacity, emotional capacity, mental, spiritual capacity.
• 11:34
  So, so it's more than just healing, more than just physical health.
• 11:38
  Yeah.
• 11:39
  Okay.
• 11:40
  It's about realizing your pew potential as a human being.
• 11:43
  Yeah.
• 11:44
  Okay.
• 11:45
  All right.
• 11:45
  So you are, you grow up in China, you come to the U.S.
• 11:49
  it, like you said, it was an underground practice in China for a long time.
• 11:53
  You were introduced to it by someone in Columbus, Ohio, because you were, you had some chronic ailments and depression and whatnot.
• 12:01
  You, you are introduced to this qigong practice.
• 12:03
  It works for you, has a profound impact.
• 12:06
  You go back to China to study.
• 12:08
  You work at this medicineless hospital, which is a, a mind blowing idea where they don't use any actual medicine, they just use qigong to heal people.
• 12:17
  And there's a lot of rave reviews there and testimonials to, to the work that was done.
• 12:22
  So then you come back to the US to actually teach and spread the word and spread this art of qigong thereafter.
• 12:30
  Yeah, exactly.
• 12:30
  Okay, thank you for the summary highlighting that.
• 12:33
  Okay.
• 12:34
  And then so how did you go about doing it and how did you scale this practice into what it is today?
• 12:40
  It's a good question.
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  In the beginning, you know, qigong is so new here, right?
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  It's totally new.
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  Phenomenal.
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  Most people right now still don't know.
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  So back then when I started to teach, you know, like 25 years ago, it's like, it's a new phenomena.
• 12:56
  And I start to teach like on my own and you know, workshop weekend, you know, weekly classes and you know, small scale, it's like 20 people, maybe up to 50 people.
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  Then over the years, growing to is like from 50 to 100 people over the weekend.
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  And I was living in Ashland, Oregon, then living in the Bay Area, so the business kind of growing in that process.
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  But it's really, it's because of my dedication.
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  I was like, so, you know, 100% dedicated.
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  It's, this is my highest purpose.
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  It's my life, you know, destiny.
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  And so in the beginning it's Like I have only one assistant, right?
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  Then have two assistant, then have three assistant.
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  Eventually I go on the team into like, you know, in about 10 years I have a, you know, 10 assistant, 10 staff on the team.
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  Then highest.
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  The time is before pandemic, I had more than 20 people on the team.
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  And because of pandemic have to scale down quite a bit.
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  And then I opening a retreat center.
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  That's before pandemic.
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  So then another operation happening.
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  So right now it's like I have two different business.
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  One is online teaching qigong.
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  Actually three business.
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  Another is doing qigong retreat, and the third is, is the operation of the retreat center is available for other teachers and other traditions to do their own work here.
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  So the three business continuously happening and a lot of work you can imagine.
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  On the other hand, it's so fulfilling because, you know, bringing this location, this sacred land, offering this to the community, local but also international, to coming together, deepening their work is another level of fulfillment.
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  So that's kind of overview what I'm engaging.
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  Okay.
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  All right.
• 14:55
  And as you're growing this, right, like you said, it started in a very small scale, maybe 20 people in a class, just doing something on the weekends.
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  You're still working to try to make a living.
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  And then, and then practice in this qigong, like in the beginning, as you're getting this off the ground, were there ever moments where you thought about giving up?
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  Many moments.
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  Honestly, David, you know, it's like so many moments, you know, it's like even right now, the moments like that, you know, it's like, what the heck I'm doing, You know, so much work, right?
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  You know, you know, it's like you're.
• 15:34
  Trying to sustain everything, right?
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  Also same time growing, you know, the potential is so big, right?
• 15:41
  But takes so much work right now, economically so challenging and political condition is so challenging.
• 15:50
  And the world, everybody is facing the uncertainty.
• 15:54
  On one hand, we're stressed, we need this work more than any other time.
• 15:59
  But on the other hand, we experiencing anxiety, fear and uncertainties, overwhelmingness, like we don't know what to do with it and also feel it's like unsafe, you know, want to protect us from anything is like risky, you know,
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  new and different.
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  So all these level makes this work.
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  You know, it's really challenging and yet I'm doing my best.
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  It's like unshakable commitment.
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  On other hand, there are times like, wow, this is so challenging, like I could have done something easier, you know, safer, whatever, right?
• 16:36
  You know, make money, bring food to the table.
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  That's the easiest thing to do.
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  But to fulfill the mission, the vision is another level of commitment, another level of, you know, fulfillment come with it.
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  And it's not absence of challenge.
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  Definitely.
• 16:52
  Yeah.
• 16:53
  Okay.
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  And give us a sense of how big your operation is in terms of, like, the size of this retreat center, how many people that you teach on a.
• 17:02
  On a monthly basis, and kind of like, what.
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  What's that look like today?
• 17:08
  So right now, you know, we do have a quite a big online community membership program about, you know, 1,000, close to 1,000 members.
• 17:18
  And coming with me together every Thursday, sharing the teaching, practicing together, a lot of community interaction, feeling a sense of community is so important nowadays.
• 17:32
  So because of the technology, making as possible as we're doing, like this moment, right.
• 17:36
  So it's amazing for feelings that is one part of the business.
• 17:41
  Then when I do, literally, as I mentioned, it's like one month at a time.
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  Then between 20 to 50 people, it's very intimate, very, you know, deep kind of practice.
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  Then other retreat, when other teacher leader come in, bring their group to the retreat center.
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  Then this between 20 to 50, 50 people.
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  So the.
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  The retreat center can accommodate about 50 overnight guests, and people can stay around the areas.
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  You know, our practice room can accommodate more people.
• 18:14
  It's like so depends on the group.
• 18:16
  Yeah.
• 18:17
  Okay.
• 18:18
  All right.
• 18:18
  And when you look at this journey too, right, where you never expected to be doing this work, you found this qigong that, that healed your ailments, and you were so inspired by the way you felt and, and how
• 18:30
  it impacted you, you decided to spread this teaching to the world.
• 18:34
  You started very humbly, and you built up this.
• 18:36
  This membership, this community and this, These retreat centers, everything else you're doing.
• 18:40
  When you look back at this whole journey, what's been the best part of it for you?
• 18:44
  The best part, it's hard to pick, right?
• 18:49
  You know, honestly, I think every party is best part.
• 18:54
  It's like moving the program to online.
• 18:57
  At the beginning, especially Pandemic was challenging, but now it become such.
• 19:01
  Opening, such a gift.
• 19:03
  Actually, I started online program way before Pandemic.
• 19:07
  It's been like 12 years now.
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  The beginning, the technology is so minimal, so challenging, unstable.
• 19:15
  But I was clear that's the potential, that's the future.
• 19:18
  So been doing it all these 12 years.
• 19:21
  And that's one of the best part.
• 19:23
  And in person, literally is the best part, because for different reason, no matter how much we connect, online can only place in person connection.
• 19:33
  That intimacy, that feeling of being together, you know, practicing together, eating Together, you know, enjoy the connection intimately, especially with nature and so on.
• 19:45
  And just the best part.
• 19:47
  So what I'm saying is, like, everything is the best part for me because I know they're important, meaningful, but also I enjoy all these parts as part of my own experience and life, not only as a business owner,
• 20:02
  entrepreneur, as a teacher, but as a human being.
• 20:05
  So it's like this, you know, I realized some point many years ago life can be very simple.
• 20:12
  The three things most important for me.
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  Yeah.
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  When you.
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  Nature has been always important for me.
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  Being in the nature, connect with the nature, feeling, you know, the nourishment of nature is so important for me, including gardening, for example, part of my life.
• 20:31
  So the second one is qigong.
• 20:36
  Of course, Qigong is more important.
• 20:38
  It's my life.
• 20:39
  Yeah.
• 20:39
  I practice qigong for my own sake, my own benefit, sustaining my energy, my vitality, my creativity, my joy, you know, my experience of life.
• 20:50
  That's so important.
• 20:52
  It's internal fulfillment.
• 20:54
  And the third is really community.
• 20:57
  Community.
• 20:59
  So I feel lucky.
• 21:00
  Yeah.
• 21:01
  I have all three.
• 21:03
  Yeah.
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  In a large scale, so to speak.
• 21:05
  Yeah.
• 21:06
  Not only practicing qigong for myself, but teaching qigong.
• 21:09
  Yeah.
• 21:10
  And internationally now through this new technology, but also, you know, have this land connecting with mother Earth and also, you know, really have strong community, both online in person as well.
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  So that is so important.
• 21:28
  So when I look at these three things.
• 21:29
  Yeah.
• 21:30
  I feel fortunate, really blessed.
• 21:33
  That's how I feel.
• 21:34
  These are best thing in my life.
• 21:36
  You okay.
• 21:37
  All right.
• 21:38
  And mingtong, if people want to get in touch, learn more about your teaching qigong, see your, your membership community, learn about the retreats you do, or just connect with you on for any other reason.
• 21:48
  What's the best way people can find you online?
• 21:50
  Yeah, best way for me is going to my website, mintongu.com you can see my name on the screen, mintongu.com and that's where you also can find the book, you know, can if you're starting, if you're ready for online
• 22:08
  training, I'll be so happy to see you soon.
• 22:12
  And if you want to, you know, learn more before, you know, starting any formal program, you can order a book with also bonus as well video teaching, video practice available.
• 22:25
  So that is the link mintongu.com book and so I'm looking forward to share this.
• 22:34
  You know, what I have discovered is like the best thing for me in my life and to share with all of you, to support you of whatever you do.
• 22:46
  You don't have to be a therapist, healers, this is like self healing, self empowerment, self care.
• 22:54
  But Deeply is about awakening your capacity as human being, you know, for your job, for your, you know, your vision, for your organization, for your own mission and everyday life, you know, increasing the quality of your life and
• 23:12
  deeper fulfillment of life.
• 23:14
  Okay, well said.
• 23:16
  All right.
• 23:16
  Mastermington Gu, thank you so much for taking the time to be here and sharing all this incredible wisdom from your journey with our listeners.
• 23:23
  We greatly appreciate it.
• 23:24
  Absolutely.
• 23:25
  Thank you for this opportunity.
• 23:26
  Thank you David.
• 23:27
  Thank you for everyone listening, sharing together and your energy presence is so important and now we're facing all these choices and my invitation is coming home to your own body and that's what this book is about.
• 23:44
  Coming home to embodied awakening so you can discover your body more than the story, more than biological machine and discover the power inside of you already and fulfilling your highest purpose as human being in this challenging time.
• 24:01
  Okay, thank you so much.