Long White Cloud Qigong Instructor Certification Program
200 hour Inner Fire Qigong – Online 
31st August - 14th December 2025

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

Wild Animal Play

Iron Shirt Qigong

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.

Benefits of this program

Nurture the spark of life within you and develop your inner fire through traditional breathing practices.

Gain a practical understanding of your breath and how skill with it can be applied to everyday activities and situations.

Develop physical and mental strength, flexibility, balance, agility, and power.

Find healthy ways to tap into, process, and channel the energy of your emotions through movement with vitality and passion in Wild Animal Play.

Build or rebuild your internal strength and resilience with Iron Shirt Qigong

Learn not just the exercises, but also the theory behind them so you can really understand what you are doing and get the most out of your practice.

Gain practical advice and support as you begin your journey as a qigong instructor in your community.

Included in the program:

Comprehensive study materials to guide you in learning and practicing Inner Fire Breathwork, Wild Animal Qigong, and Iron Shirt Qigong

Comprehensive testing to ensure your knowledge and practice is sound at the end of the program

Weekly Q&A sessions with Long White Cloud Qigong Founder during the course to share your experiences and refine your understanding.

Guidance in planning qigong classes and workshops

Weekly group practice sessions led by Long White Cloud Qigong instructors to deepen your practice and connect with other course participants.

Free access to private practitioner only online community for one year on completion of your course to support you in your ongoing practice and teaching

2 private sessions with senior Long White Cloud Qigong Instructors

Lifetime access to all program learning materials

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:

Foam roller

Massage balls

Bamboo tapper

Rattan or other wooden stick

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.

  • I’m out of shape – will I be able to keep up with this program?

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.

  • Will this program give me the body of a Kung Fu fighter? (and will I be able to break bricks on my body by the end of it?)

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.

  • What if I can’t attend the q&a sessions?

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.

  • What if I can’t complete the program in 15 weeks?

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.

  • Receiving your certification

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 is the founder of Long White Cloud Qigong, which currently has a network of over 450 instructors around the world. He brings more than 25 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 five 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.

Feedback from previous course participants

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 Foucault
John 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 Bowers
I 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 Fukumoto

You can find more videos and written comments from course participants about their experience with the program here.

Course Summary

This program focuses on dynamic breathwork, Wild Animal Play, and Iron Shirt Qigong. Each of these practices is dynamic in nature, and together they support one another. Within the program you will explore over 50 different breathing exercises, and over 70 moving qigong practices with deep therapeutic benefits.

Course Curriculum

John Munro

John Munro is the founder of Long White Cloud Qigong, which currently has a network of over 450 instructors around the world. He brings more than 25 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. John is a current member of the World Academic Society of Medical Qigong (Beijing) and National Qigong Association (USA), and 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. 

As well as offering qigong training online, John often travels to deliver retreats and workshops around the world. 

Course Pricing

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