金鸡独立 The Golden Rooster Stance which predicts whether you are likely to live a long healthy life

金鸡独立 (Jīnjīdúlì) or Golden Rooster Standing on One Leg is an important stance in Chinese kungfu. It has been practiced by Chinese people for more than 5,000 years. This stance is also used heavily in karate. Like they said, “All martial arts under heaven arose out of Shaolin.” Shaolin kungfu, of course, is Chinese kungfu.

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金鸡独立 is formed by raising one knee to its maximum height. The facing can be either to the front or the side, relative to the opponent. As with karate, 金鸡独立 is used as a platform for frontal kicks, as well as side kicks. It is also frequently employed defensively to deflect low to middle height kicks. Lastly, it is used in Northern styles for Tiao Bu (“jump step”) and Dan Tiao (“single-jump”), two techniques of movement for advance or retreat. It is also known as the crane stance in many martial arts.

金鸡独立 is an indicator of how good one’s balance is. A healthy person should not have issue with balancing until well after his 70s.

Try to stand on one leg, lifting the other thigh as high as possible. If you are not able to stand on one leg for at least 10 seconds, it means you have the fitness level of a 70-year-old person! You may be still in your 50s, but if you could not stand on one leg for at least 10 seconds, you have the body of a 70-year-old person. Period.

According to Traditional Chinese Medicine, there are a lot of purported health benefits from practicing 金鸡独立, amongst which are normalizing blood sugar level and blood pressure, healing neck and spinal problems, and preventing senile dementia.

To obtain the full health benefits from 金鸡独立, one should close one’s eyes while standing on one leg. As one gains the ability to stand for longer time, the feeling of “heavy head, light feet” disappears. The mind clears up and memory improves significantly.

An original research published in British Journal of Sports Medicine in September 2022 revealed that inability to stand on one leg for 10 seconds was linked to doubling in risk of death. The researchers found that an inability to stand on one leg for 10 seconds in middle to later life is linked to a near doubling in the risk of death from any cause within the next 10 years.

How well a person can balance can offer an insight into his health. Previous research, for instance, indicates that an inability to balance on one leg is linked to a greater risk of stroke. People with poor balance have also been found to perform worse in tests of mental decline, suggesting a link with dementia.

Lead researcher of an earlier study in 2014, Dr Yasuharu Tabara, from Kyoto University in Japan, said that struggling to balance on one leg for 20 seconds or longer is linked to an increased risk of small blood vessel damage in the brain and reduced thinking ability in otherwise healthy people with no clinical symptoms.

A research published in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease in 2009 indicated that an abnormal one-leg balance test is a marker of more advanced dementia and predicts a higher rate of cognitive decline in Alzheimer’s Disease.

Previous studies have shown that an inability to stand on one leg for more than 20 seconds is associated with microbleeds and “silent” strokes. Silent strokes, or lacunar infarctions, are known to increase the risk of both full-blown strokes and dementia.

In 2022, an international group of experts from the UK, US, Australia, Finland and Brazil completed a first-of-its-kind, 12-year study examining the relationship between balance and mortality. Although the research was observational and cannot establish cause, its findings were striking.

The findings were so stark that the researchers, led by Dr Claudio Gil Araujo of the Clinimex exercise medicine clinic in Rio de Janeiro, suggested that a balance test should be included in routine health checks for older people.

Unlike aerobic fitness, muscle strength and flexibility, balance tends to be well preserved until the sixth decade of life, when it starts to wane relatively rapidly. However, balance assessment typically is not included in health checks of middle-aged and older people, possibly because there is no standardized test for it. Until now there had been little hard data linking balance to clinical outcomes other than falls.

A total of 1,702 people aged between 51 and 75 and with stable gait were followed between 2008 and 2020 for the study. At the start, participants were asked to stand on one leg for 10 seconds without any additional support. To standardize the test, participants were asked to place the front of their free foot on the back of the opposite lower leg while keeping their arms by their sides and their gaze fixed straight ahead. Up to three attempts on either foot were allowed.

One in five (21%) failed the test. Over the next decade, 123 died of various causes. After accounting for age, sex, and underlying conditions, an inability to stand unsupported on one leg for 10 seconds was associated with an 84% increased risk of death from any cause.

The researchers concluded that the 10-second balance test “provides rapid and objective feedback for the patient and health professionals regarding static balance” and “adds useful information regarding mortality risk in middle-aged and older men and women”.

Now, go on and try to execute a proper 金鸡独立. If you could not execute and maintain the posture for more than 10 seconds, watch the video below and start practicing! That’s if you wanted to live a long healthy life well into your golden years. Otherwise, you may go back to your couch, watch Netflix, while drinking Coke and eating pizza! Better still, smoke pot, too! Since it’s legal in the West now!