Karana Krama and Are Qi Gong and Yoga complimentary or mutually exclusive?

"Karana Krama as part of the practice of hatha yoga has nothing to do with the aesthetics of Indian dance and the practice of martial arts, but the basic movements are borrowed from preparatory techniques of Indian dancers, Kalaripayattu and contemporary Australian teachers of hatha yoga Sandor Remete (Shadow Yoga) and Simon Borg-Olivier (Yoga Synergy), which over the years developed their practice of yoga asanas and pranayama, using elements of the martial arts of India and China, as well as the experience of the traditional Ayurvedic and modern knowledge of anatomy and physiology."
Mikhail Baranov: "Karana-Krama as a Standard of Movement in Hatha-Yoga"

From this Wildyogi article
http://wildyogi.info/en/issue/mikhail-baranov-karana-krama-standard-movement-hatha-yoga


Enjoyed watching this video from Mikhail Baranov as well as reading the article but I'm starting to wonder how complimentary Chinese Qi Gong and the postural yoga that tends to be associated with India are.

Here's Mikhail again, a particularly interesting section of the article

Main features:

1. Promoting “active flexibility” – the main range of movements (bends forward and backward, twists,  rotations, lunges and others) are done without “arms”, for example, in a standing position we move one leg aside and put it back without support of the arms (a sequence Utthita-padangushthasana 1 – Utthita-padangushthasana 2 – Ardha-chandrasana). Backbends, bends forward in twists are also done without help of the arms, the main movements of the spine are fulfilled due to more active work of the body muscles.
    
2. Warming up and redistribution of the muscular tone are fulfilled using special techniques inherent to hatha-yoga and yoga-therapy.
    
3. Developing standard of the movement – gradual awareness and optimization of habitual movement stereotypes. All movements of arms and legs purposely include work of torso muscles and the spine as well.
    
4. Developing skills of concentration and volumetric attention through coordination of breathing and movement.
    
5. Stimulating movement of the prana and taking control over prana-vajyu (subtle vital force) – application of bandhas (special means of muscular tone redistribution) and kumbhakas (breath detention) in a context of dynamic practices.

1. Using the force of gravity (inverted positions)
2. Regulation of heart rate (techniques activating the parasympathetic tone of the ANS)
3. Purposeful work of respiratory muscles (ujjayi, uddiyana-bandha, tadagi-mudra)
4. Active involvement of muscular micropumps
5. Joint bandhas
6. Asanas are fulfilled in a certain sequence when configuration of elongated and strained muscles creates conditions that cause the circulation of blood from high pressure zone to low pressure zone.
7. Relocation of attention

I can see why we might want to appropriate Qi Gong to compliment our asana practice but how complimentary are they really? Are they not perhaps mutually exclusive? After moving the energy around the body nicely to clear any 'blockages' we then BIND in a posture??? Does binding make any sense in Qi Gong?

Perhaps, I'm still too ignorant and on a steep learning curve but the breathing seems different, contradictory even, movement rather than postures and what of my beloved inversions? And yet it all seems to make more sense somehow and best of all it's almost impossible to make Qi Gong look cool..


....unless you're Mikhail or Simon or practicing in you eighties perhaps.


Qi Gong is delightfully uninstagramable.


It started off for me as a preparatory practice, taking the place of my pre Ashtanga ten minute tadasana Vinyasa Krama, now it's becoming the main event.

How unexpected and unlooked for, the turns in the path. "Oh, OK, this way then".