“You are right, there is a secret. But it is so simple as to be unbelievable. Its nature insists that you believe, that you have faith; otherwise you will fail. The secret is simply this: you must relax body and mind totally. You must be prepared to accept defeat repeatedly and for a long period; you must ‘invest in loss’ – otherwise you will never succeed…. I relaxed my body and stilled my mind so that only chi, flowing at the command of my mind, remained…. In crushing defeat, I forgot anxiety, pride, ego. By emptying myself I gave the full field to chi. Gradually my technique improved. Then and only then, did my responses sharpen so that neutralizing and countering were the work of a moment. ”
Professor Cheng Man-ch’ing
from T’ai-Chi by Cheng Man-ch’ing and Robert W. Smith.
For me, this inspiring quote from a real master raises more questions than answers. It’s so large, how do we begin to embrace it? To emulate him?
One asks, how does one eat an elephant? One answers, one bite at a time. Another suggests, to become the Buddha, just assume you ARE the Buddha. Or perhaps a more modest approach would be to “act as if” in order to attain the attitude of the Buddha. Does either of these actually get you there? You can see the conundrum.
Either approach has its danger. To take it one step at a time could lead down the path of strategy, going in circles or an obsession with “progress”. The temptation is to feel obligated to demonstrate some success to your “strategic planning”. To be obsessed with progress can shut doors to discovering some aspect that you haven’t considered yet. That is, the limit of your conceptual mind will predetermine your mind’s suggestion, but other suggestions that don’t come naturally will not arise. Your own intellectual capacity can only take you so far.
I recall one hard working tai chi student who delighted in his “technique” in push hands. But in my eyes, he was missing the real thing. His progress was linked to his technical skill and this shut the door to real listening and real relaxation. His technique worked only because most of us are not equipped to handle such a forceful surprise attack. In addition, he was playing two games. His first strategy followed principle, but then he switched and used force (though he didn’t recognize it as such.) Another technique, he was using a very low low stance which gave him a mechanical advantage that really doesn’t necessarily rely on tai chi principles. When your strategy works on inexperienced players, your success proves nothing. Tai chi is one art form that requires a profoundly clear self honesty while maintaining a kind attitude towards yourself and others. You need to be self critical, but not self loathing. Hence, my personal war on “good” and “bad” in this context.
To “act as if” (or to assume you are the Buddha) could result in false view of oneself and one’s skill. You may think you are the Buddha, but who’s to say you manifest his qualities? You? Really? Good luck!
The “how to” of progress is what I am discussing here and it has long term implications. We are always looking for the balanced groove of the middle ground. By that I mean we are not this, not that, but right on IT, in the groove, at the pinnacle. The grooves are everywhere. Relax, but don’t collapse. Find that groove. Body upright, but don’t be stiff or held. Find that groove. Use the ground, but don’t grind yourself into the ground, and use the upward core as well. Find that pinnacle. Be round with your energy, but find the curves and straight lines within the form. Find that pinnacle. Be alert, but don’t be tense. Another groove, another pinnacle, another point of “just so”, the “it” path.
To me, that edge is like that perfect middle ground that you fall into that moves the whole mechanism (of the body) forward without “doing”. A roller coaster comes to mind. The path is set and you coast your way through it. The downward slope gives you the momentum to climb the upward slope. To leave that track would mean disaster. To follow the track leads to swift direct clear forward motion without strain or effort. The heights and valleys of the journey are smoothly accomplished.
To get back to the first two options in how to move forward in mastering tai chi, there yet another option and it can include both of the previous suggestions. I’d call it, The Open Path. As you move forward, your practice will give you guidance. What is happening now in your form will give you a clue as to what you might need next. Follow those leads that naturally present themselves to you. And include asking classmates and your teacher for suggestions. Sure, you can be strategic one day and map out some plan. You can also allow yourself the luxury of embracing all of it (the Buddha) and be that embrace to see where that leads you. Lastly, you can simply look at where the tracks are going for you in this moment and see where these lead as well. Stick and follow.
But even The Open Path has its deficiency. One has to be careful that this doesn’t lead to self indulgence or a sort of solipsism whereby your experience is the only thing that counts. All paths can lead towards success and improvement if used correctly; all paths can lead to nowhere. One way to check in on this is to seek the thoughts of others and see what they think or what they practice. It can be deeply revealing to check in with those who may not agree with you.
Most of us cannot be the master that Professor was. We have to be at home with our limitations and accept them. Nonetheless, what we put in is what we will get back. We can work to open doors that help us reach further than where we are right now. We can always look for the edge, find that groove, and enter the pinnacle of some aspect of practice. We can follow the master’s lead and discover ways to experience some of his ease and responsiveness. In that way, we can be masters.
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
Tai Chi - a BIG Picture
I don’t often come back as I should to the words of Professor Cheng Man-ch’ing, my tai chi grandfather. His legacy is so deep and vast that those who value what he taught have to return again and again to his teachings.
One statement that he made in his tai chi book with Robert W. Smith, now out of print, which always gives me a jolt, is his answer to a question presented in a question and answer section of the book.
The question: what is the secret to your martial arts success in tai chi?
His answer is almost incomprehensible:
“You are right, there is a secret. But it is so simple as to be unbelievable. Its nature insists that you believe, that you have faith; otherwise you will fail. The secret is simply this: you must relax body and mind totally. You must be prepared to accept defeat repeatedly and for a long period; you must ‘invest in loss’ – otherwise you will never succeed…. I relaxed my body and stilled my mind so that only chi, flowing at the command of my mind, remained…. In crushing defeat, I forgot anxiety, pride, ego. By emptying myself I gave the full field to chi. Gradually my technique improved. Then and only then, did my responses sharpen so that neutralizing and countering were the work of a moment. ”
There is great value in examining the words and experience of a master. Most of us do not have his level of skill, and in fact most of us will never attain his level of mastery. But our own journey can be spurred on by the experience of those who have greater skill. While it is indispensible to look at your own experience closely, it is also a dead end. My experience and your experience are limited. This is simply a fact of the human condition. There is only so much your experience can teach you. To be trapped by our own experience will never help you expand into new levels of growth. We learn much much more from the experience of others. Hence, it is even more indispensible to examine the success of true masters of the art. Let’s aim high, and look at what we can gather from Prof. Cheng.
(With that last thought, you might want to re-read the above quotation from Prof. Cheng. What grabs you? What inspires or perplexes you? What do you need to look at more closely? You may even want to get some thoughts from your teacher on the issues that you are drawn to.)
The first and foremost step is the total relaxation. Not “some”, not “a bit”, not “a healthy dose”, but a complete, total relaxation of body and mind, a place where you get out of the way and allow the chi to emerge. This level of relaxation allows you to discover chi, or internal energy.
Next, he tells us that technique is something that is employed through the chi. That is, relax, find your chi, then discover technique. The very last part not only refers to functionality, but being the “work of a moment”. A fine practitioner I know always states that Professor was in “real time”. Now REALLY is now, not just a little bit after now. Now is not the moment after – it’s the moment we are in. Attach your right palm to your left and move the right one. The left palm is right there in “real time”.
And if you don’t have all this, you must believe and have faith that what he is telling us is real. When he tells us to accept defeat repeatedly and for a long time, this is the point in training when we are learning how relaxation (then chi) replaces strength. He doesn’t elaborate in that sentence what new skills are being learned, but there are several basic skills that you need to develop while being relaxed. Skills such as how to stick and follow the opponent, how to connect them to the ground, how to relate the two bodies in motion through the tan t’ien (center) and so forth. Initially, you are defeated because you don’t have these skills. Being relaxed in the face of some “attack” is not like being a sack of potatoes in front of an oncoming truck. Yes, you are relaxed. And a whole lot more too!
Each of these levels in the tai chi journey is deep and challenging. How are we to avoid being overwhelmed or simply cave in and give up? Or worse, dismiss his depth and genius? And what exactly IS chi anyway?
I will address some of these questions at a later date. His statement brings up many questions and I am not entirely prepared to answer them all at my own skill level. Nonetheless, listening to his words presses me to explore more deeply what this marvelous exercise has to teach.
How do we get from here to there?
One statement that he made in his tai chi book with Robert W. Smith, now out of print, which always gives me a jolt, is his answer to a question presented in a question and answer section of the book.
The question: what is the secret to your martial arts success in tai chi?
His answer is almost incomprehensible:
“You are right, there is a secret. But it is so simple as to be unbelievable. Its nature insists that you believe, that you have faith; otherwise you will fail. The secret is simply this: you must relax body and mind totally. You must be prepared to accept defeat repeatedly and for a long period; you must ‘invest in loss’ – otherwise you will never succeed…. I relaxed my body and stilled my mind so that only chi, flowing at the command of my mind, remained…. In crushing defeat, I forgot anxiety, pride, ego. By emptying myself I gave the full field to chi. Gradually my technique improved. Then and only then, did my responses sharpen so that neutralizing and countering were the work of a moment. ”
There is great value in examining the words and experience of a master. Most of us do not have his level of skill, and in fact most of us will never attain his level of mastery. But our own journey can be spurred on by the experience of those who have greater skill. While it is indispensible to look at your own experience closely, it is also a dead end. My experience and your experience are limited. This is simply a fact of the human condition. There is only so much your experience can teach you. To be trapped by our own experience will never help you expand into new levels of growth. We learn much much more from the experience of others. Hence, it is even more indispensible to examine the success of true masters of the art. Let’s aim high, and look at what we can gather from Prof. Cheng.
(With that last thought, you might want to re-read the above quotation from Prof. Cheng. What grabs you? What inspires or perplexes you? What do you need to look at more closely? You may even want to get some thoughts from your teacher on the issues that you are drawn to.)
The first and foremost step is the total relaxation. Not “some”, not “a bit”, not “a healthy dose”, but a complete, total relaxation of body and mind, a place where you get out of the way and allow the chi to emerge. This level of relaxation allows you to discover chi, or internal energy.
Next, he tells us that technique is something that is employed through the chi. That is, relax, find your chi, then discover technique. The very last part not only refers to functionality, but being the “work of a moment”. A fine practitioner I know always states that Professor was in “real time”. Now REALLY is now, not just a little bit after now. Now is not the moment after – it’s the moment we are in. Attach your right palm to your left and move the right one. The left palm is right there in “real time”.
And if you don’t have all this, you must believe and have faith that what he is telling us is real. When he tells us to accept defeat repeatedly and for a long time, this is the point in training when we are learning how relaxation (then chi) replaces strength. He doesn’t elaborate in that sentence what new skills are being learned, but there are several basic skills that you need to develop while being relaxed. Skills such as how to stick and follow the opponent, how to connect them to the ground, how to relate the two bodies in motion through the tan t’ien (center) and so forth. Initially, you are defeated because you don’t have these skills. Being relaxed in the face of some “attack” is not like being a sack of potatoes in front of an oncoming truck. Yes, you are relaxed. And a whole lot more too!
Each of these levels in the tai chi journey is deep and challenging. How are we to avoid being overwhelmed or simply cave in and give up? Or worse, dismiss his depth and genius? And what exactly IS chi anyway?
I will address some of these questions at a later date. His statement brings up many questions and I am not entirely prepared to answer them all at my own skill level. Nonetheless, listening to his words presses me to explore more deeply what this marvelous exercise has to teach.
How do we get from here to there?
Sunday, February 7, 2010
The Body Mind Connection, New York Times article
A fellow tai chi friend sent me this intriguing article. Tai chi is a body-mind exercise. This article discusses ways the body reflects the mind and the mind reflects the body. Tai chi practise is about fullness and balance. Take a look if this sort of topic interests you! Tom
February 2, 2010
Abstract Thoughts? The Body Takes Them Literally
By NATALIE ANGIER
The theory of relativity showed us that time and space are intertwined. To which our smarty-pants body might well reply: Tell me something I didn’t already know, Einstein.
Researchers at the University of Aberdeen found that when people were asked to engage in a bit of mental time travel, and to recall past events or imagine future ones, participants’ bodies subliminally acted out the metaphors embedded in how we commonly conceptualized the flow of time.
As they thought about years gone by, participants leaned slightly backward, while in fantasizing about the future, they listed to the fore. The deviations were not exactly Tower of Pisa leanings, amounting to some two or three millimeters’ shift one way or the other. Nevertheless, the directionality was clear and consistent.
“When we talk about time, we often use spatial metaphors like ‘I’m looking forward to seeing you’ or ‘I’m reflecting back on the past,’ ” said Lynden K. Miles, who conducted the study with his colleagues Louise K. Nind and C. Neil Macrae. “It was pleasing to us that we could take an abstract concept such as time and show that it was manifested in body movements.”
The new study, published in January in the journal Psychological Science, is part of the immensely popular field called embodied cognition, the idea that the brain is not the only part of us with a mind of its own.
“How we process information is related not just to our brains but to our entire body,” said Nils B. Jostmann of the University of Amsterdam. “We use every system available to us to come to a conclusion and make sense of what’s going on.”
Research in embodied cognition has revealed that the body takes language to heart and can be awfully literal-minded.
You say you’re looking forward to the future? Here, Ma, watch me pitch forward!
You say a person is warm and likable, as opposed to cold and standoffish? In one recent study at Yale, researchers divided 41 college students into two groups and casually asked the members of Group A to hold a cup of hot coffee, those in Group B to hold iced coffee. The students were then ushered into a testing room and asked to evaluate the personality of an imaginary individual based on a packet of information.
Students who had recently been cradling the warm beverage were far likelier to judge the fictitious character as warm and friendly than were those who had held the iced coffee.
Or maybe you are feeling the chill wind of social opprobrium. When researchers at the University of Toronto instructed a group of 65 students to remember a time when they had felt either socially accepted or socially snubbed, those who conjured up memories of a rejection judged the temperature of the room to be an average of five degrees colder than those who had been wrapped in warm and fuzzy thoughts of peer approval.
The body embodies abstractions the best way it knows how: physically. What is moral turpitude, an ethical lapse, but a soiling of one’s character? Time for the Lady Macbeth Handi Wipes. One study showed that participants who were asked to dwell on a personal moral transgression like adultery or cheating on a test were more likely to request an antiseptic cloth afterward than were those who had been instructed to recall a good deed they had done.
When confronted with a double entendre, a verbal fork in the road, the body heeds Yogi Berra’s advice, and takes it. In a report published last August in Psychological Science, Dr. Jostmann and his colleagues Daniel Lakens and Thomas W. Schubert explored the degree to which the body conflates weight and importance. They learned, for example, that when students were told that a particular book was vital to the curriculum, they judged the book to be physically heavier than those told the book was ancillary to their studies.
The researchers wanted to know whether the sensation of weightiness might influence people’s judgments more broadly.
In a series of experiments, study participants were asked to answer questionnaires that were attached to a metal clipboard with a compartment on the back capable of holding papers. In some cases the compartments were left empty, and so the clipboard weighed only 1.45 pounds. In other cases the compartments were filled, for a total clipboard package of 2.29 pounds.
Participants stood with either a light or heavy clipboard cradled in their arm, filling out surveys. In one, they were asked to estimate the value of six unfamiliar foreign currencies. In another, students indicated how important they thought it was that a university committee take their opinions into account when deciding on the size of foreign study grants. For a third experiment, participants were asked how satisfied they were with (a) the city of Amsterdam and (b) the mayor of Amsterdam.
In every study, the results suggested, the clipboard weight had its roundabout say. Students holding the heavier clipboard judged the currencies to be more valuable than did those with the lightweight boards. Participants with weightier clipboards insisted that students be allowed to weigh in on the university’s financial affairs. Those holding the more formidable board even adopted a more rigorous mind-set, and proved more likely to consider the connection between the livability of Amsterdam and the effectiveness of its leader.
As Dr. Jostmann sees it, the readiness of the body to factor physical cues into its deliberations over seemingly unrelated and highly abstract concerns often makes sense. Our specific clipboard savvy notwithstanding, “the issue of how humans view gravity is evolutionarily useful,” he said.
“Something heavy is something you should take care of,” he continued. “Heavy things are not easily pushed around, but they can easily push us around.” They are weighty affairs in every tine of the word.
The cogitating body prefers a hands-on approach, and gesturing has been shown to help children master math.
Among students who have difficulty with equations like 4 + 5 + 3 = __ + 3, for example, performance improves markedly if they are taught the right gestures: grouping together the unique left-side numbers with a two-fingered V, and then pointing the index finger at the blank space on the right.
To learn how to rotate an object mentally, first try a pantomime. “If you encourage kids to do the rotation movement with their hands, that helps them subsequently do it in their heads,” said Susan Goldin-Meadow of the University of Chicago, “whereas watching others do it isn’t enough.”
Yesterday is regrettable, tomorrow still hypothetical. But you can always listen to your body, and seize today with both hands.
February 2, 2010
Abstract Thoughts? The Body Takes Them Literally
By NATALIE ANGIER
The theory of relativity showed us that time and space are intertwined. To which our smarty-pants body might well reply: Tell me something I didn’t already know, Einstein.
Researchers at the University of Aberdeen found that when people were asked to engage in a bit of mental time travel, and to recall past events or imagine future ones, participants’ bodies subliminally acted out the metaphors embedded in how we commonly conceptualized the flow of time.
As they thought about years gone by, participants leaned slightly backward, while in fantasizing about the future, they listed to the fore. The deviations were not exactly Tower of Pisa leanings, amounting to some two or three millimeters’ shift one way or the other. Nevertheless, the directionality was clear and consistent.
“When we talk about time, we often use spatial metaphors like ‘I’m looking forward to seeing you’ or ‘I’m reflecting back on the past,’ ” said Lynden K. Miles, who conducted the study with his colleagues Louise K. Nind and C. Neil Macrae. “It was pleasing to us that we could take an abstract concept such as time and show that it was manifested in body movements.”
The new study, published in January in the journal Psychological Science, is part of the immensely popular field called embodied cognition, the idea that the brain is not the only part of us with a mind of its own.
“How we process information is related not just to our brains but to our entire body,” said Nils B. Jostmann of the University of Amsterdam. “We use every system available to us to come to a conclusion and make sense of what’s going on.”
Research in embodied cognition has revealed that the body takes language to heart and can be awfully literal-minded.
You say you’re looking forward to the future? Here, Ma, watch me pitch forward!
You say a person is warm and likable, as opposed to cold and standoffish? In one recent study at Yale, researchers divided 41 college students into two groups and casually asked the members of Group A to hold a cup of hot coffee, those in Group B to hold iced coffee. The students were then ushered into a testing room and asked to evaluate the personality of an imaginary individual based on a packet of information.
Students who had recently been cradling the warm beverage were far likelier to judge the fictitious character as warm and friendly than were those who had held the iced coffee.
Or maybe you are feeling the chill wind of social opprobrium. When researchers at the University of Toronto instructed a group of 65 students to remember a time when they had felt either socially accepted or socially snubbed, those who conjured up memories of a rejection judged the temperature of the room to be an average of five degrees colder than those who had been wrapped in warm and fuzzy thoughts of peer approval.
The body embodies abstractions the best way it knows how: physically. What is moral turpitude, an ethical lapse, but a soiling of one’s character? Time for the Lady Macbeth Handi Wipes. One study showed that participants who were asked to dwell on a personal moral transgression like adultery or cheating on a test were more likely to request an antiseptic cloth afterward than were those who had been instructed to recall a good deed they had done.
When confronted with a double entendre, a verbal fork in the road, the body heeds Yogi Berra’s advice, and takes it. In a report published last August in Psychological Science, Dr. Jostmann and his colleagues Daniel Lakens and Thomas W. Schubert explored the degree to which the body conflates weight and importance. They learned, for example, that when students were told that a particular book was vital to the curriculum, they judged the book to be physically heavier than those told the book was ancillary to their studies.
The researchers wanted to know whether the sensation of weightiness might influence people’s judgments more broadly.
In a series of experiments, study participants were asked to answer questionnaires that were attached to a metal clipboard with a compartment on the back capable of holding papers. In some cases the compartments were left empty, and so the clipboard weighed only 1.45 pounds. In other cases the compartments were filled, for a total clipboard package of 2.29 pounds.
Participants stood with either a light or heavy clipboard cradled in their arm, filling out surveys. In one, they were asked to estimate the value of six unfamiliar foreign currencies. In another, students indicated how important they thought it was that a university committee take their opinions into account when deciding on the size of foreign study grants. For a third experiment, participants were asked how satisfied they were with (a) the city of Amsterdam and (b) the mayor of Amsterdam.
In every study, the results suggested, the clipboard weight had its roundabout say. Students holding the heavier clipboard judged the currencies to be more valuable than did those with the lightweight boards. Participants with weightier clipboards insisted that students be allowed to weigh in on the university’s financial affairs. Those holding the more formidable board even adopted a more rigorous mind-set, and proved more likely to consider the connection between the livability of Amsterdam and the effectiveness of its leader.
As Dr. Jostmann sees it, the readiness of the body to factor physical cues into its deliberations over seemingly unrelated and highly abstract concerns often makes sense. Our specific clipboard savvy notwithstanding, “the issue of how humans view gravity is evolutionarily useful,” he said.
“Something heavy is something you should take care of,” he continued. “Heavy things are not easily pushed around, but they can easily push us around.” They are weighty affairs in every tine of the word.
The cogitating body prefers a hands-on approach, and gesturing has been shown to help children master math.
Among students who have difficulty with equations like 4 + 5 + 3 = __ + 3, for example, performance improves markedly if they are taught the right gestures: grouping together the unique left-side numbers with a two-fingered V, and then pointing the index finger at the blank space on the right.
To learn how to rotate an object mentally, first try a pantomime. “If you encourage kids to do the rotation movement with their hands, that helps them subsequently do it in their heads,” said Susan Goldin-Meadow of the University of Chicago, “whereas watching others do it isn’t enough.”
Yesterday is regrettable, tomorrow still hypothetical. But you can always listen to your body, and seize today with both hands.
Saturday, January 9, 2010
Tai Chi Push Hands: Fact vs. Judgment
Recently I was practicing push hands with another practitioner, someone who really wants to get this right and improve. He’s good too. In our verbal exchange, I noted something that I was feeling again and again and again and this “error” gave me an opportunity to push him. I forget if he asked me what it was that inspired my pushes, or if I volunteered the observation, but it was a simple fact. “When I am moving forward on my press, you are using your arm to push me away.” It was NOT a gross level pushing me away, but nonetheless there was an effort to keep me out. I’m moving in and he’s trying to keep me out. Clash! He didn’t notice the error, and even after it was pointed out he continued to repeat it. This is not unusual because what is normal to us is hard to see and feel. His understanding of the neutralization was incomplete (or so I felt). We worked on it and he found a different idea about the neutralization.
But then he countered that my push “could be better.”
Here is the language problem. Or to create a new word, the “languaging” problem. How do we communicate to help each other? To tell your partner that their push could be better is an empty statement at best and unhelpful as well. Empty because all pushes could be better. Empty because he has no way of knowing if my push at this time could be better. Unhelpful because what he was expressing was his opinion. Opinions don’t help in push hands practice. I learn how he “feels” about something, but not much about what I’m doing. The “bad-good” discussion or the “better-worse” discussion doesn’t really move our skill level along nor does it increase any real understanding or appreciation of push-hands. (The same might be said of Life in general .)
Instead of telling him that he was pushing me back when he needs to take me in (standard operating procedure in push hands and tai chi because this avoids class and tension and hardness) I could have told him, “Your neutralization could be better.” What is he supposed to do with that? He has no more information on hand than before and not a clue as to what I am working off of. He most likely will feel judged and this does not help.
Of course, the whole situation is sticky to begin with because perhaps he doesn’t want to hear my factual observation at all. I could be wrong in the observation, yes, or he may not really want to hear it. Some folks like to work with push hands, experiment and try to figure out solutions by themselves. I’m not opposed to this, though it is the loooong road to improvement. My own preference is to take some time to try to figure it out and feel it out, but if I truly can’t see it I’d like to hear what they are experiencing and observing. I need a factual observation, not a judgment about whether it is good or not good.
With my regular push-hands partners, we have our languaging in pretty good order and we are on the same page with sharing information. The operative question is “Does it work?” If so, why? If not, why not?
Did my push work? My partner says the direction felt good to him, but it did not feel like the pressure that generally generates a good push went down all the way to my feet. We can argue this fact, but nonetheless, we are talking about a fact and not a judgment on the quality of the push as a whole.
To digress a bit here, I love the way tai chi gives one ample opportunity to be with each other and to note or solve problems that permeate our lives. The languaging problem is endemic and engineering better ways to communicate can help us along tremendously in relationships. But it helps to have a context that creates the problem in the first place. Believe me, you will never see a more heated laboratory than push hands when it comes to relationships. How we talk to each other and treat each other in this context is very very close to the surface. I have noted elsewhere (in another blog commentary) where I RAN from one partner because of his insensitivity. I know that I’ve insulted quite a few by my ignorance as well. But the lure of push hands gives us a reason to keep coming back. It’s a marvelous marvelous tool to see how you relate to others while playing a complex game.
In fact, because push hands is so confusing for such a long time, this aspect of practice doesn’t really surface until a later date. Mostly we muddle through with liking this partner and avoiding that partner. Just like life. And that is fine because not all partners will help you grow as a push hands practitioner or as a person. I still do that, I admit it! But at least I see the problem and how I am dealing (or not dealing) with it and, hopefully, why.
I reflect on one individual that I avoided for years and years. He drove me nuts. But at a later date, I realized he was EXACTLY what I needed for my own selfish growth. The interaction changed between us radically and then I loved working out with him. He has passed on since. I really miss him and – surprise! - not only for selfish reasons.
Tai chi gave me this invaluable experience.
A few years back I took a workshop on Having Difficult Conversations. A core insight from that workshop was the following: There are facts. Then we select the facts that appeal to us. From this we draw a conclusion. When we argue with each other, we typically argue from the perspective of the conclusions we have drawn. The facts are no longer in view. Of course, our conclusion is wrapped in a judgment that satisfies us. This conclusion is right, correct, good. We assume it is supported by the facts and to a certain extent, it is.
I’d like to suggest in tai chi and push hands, we get back to the facts and work from there. The process is more like mining for gold. We have to dig and dig and dig and explore and discover. More data is uncovered as we move through the process. To settle with some judgment or conclusion will not move us along. At best, it is a temporary resting place to let us gather some experience to move to the next level. Your conception of a good push, or your experience of some great push that you have met with some master will only get you so far. The facts that make up YOUR push are crucial to understand, discover and work with.
But then he countered that my push “could be better.”
Here is the language problem. Or to create a new word, the “languaging” problem. How do we communicate to help each other? To tell your partner that their push could be better is an empty statement at best and unhelpful as well. Empty because all pushes could be better. Empty because he has no way of knowing if my push at this time could be better. Unhelpful because what he was expressing was his opinion. Opinions don’t help in push hands practice. I learn how he “feels” about something, but not much about what I’m doing. The “bad-good” discussion or the “better-worse” discussion doesn’t really move our skill level along nor does it increase any real understanding or appreciation of push-hands. (The same might be said of Life in general .)
Instead of telling him that he was pushing me back when he needs to take me in (standard operating procedure in push hands and tai chi because this avoids class and tension and hardness) I could have told him, “Your neutralization could be better.” What is he supposed to do with that? He has no more information on hand than before and not a clue as to what I am working off of. He most likely will feel judged and this does not help.
Of course, the whole situation is sticky to begin with because perhaps he doesn’t want to hear my factual observation at all. I could be wrong in the observation, yes, or he may not really want to hear it. Some folks like to work with push hands, experiment and try to figure out solutions by themselves. I’m not opposed to this, though it is the loooong road to improvement. My own preference is to take some time to try to figure it out and feel it out, but if I truly can’t see it I’d like to hear what they are experiencing and observing. I need a factual observation, not a judgment about whether it is good or not good.
With my regular push-hands partners, we have our languaging in pretty good order and we are on the same page with sharing information. The operative question is “Does it work?” If so, why? If not, why not?
Did my push work? My partner says the direction felt good to him, but it did not feel like the pressure that generally generates a good push went down all the way to my feet. We can argue this fact, but nonetheless, we are talking about a fact and not a judgment on the quality of the push as a whole.
To digress a bit here, I love the way tai chi gives one ample opportunity to be with each other and to note or solve problems that permeate our lives. The languaging problem is endemic and engineering better ways to communicate can help us along tremendously in relationships. But it helps to have a context that creates the problem in the first place. Believe me, you will never see a more heated laboratory than push hands when it comes to relationships. How we talk to each other and treat each other in this context is very very close to the surface. I have noted elsewhere (in another blog commentary) where I RAN from one partner because of his insensitivity. I know that I’ve insulted quite a few by my ignorance as well. But the lure of push hands gives us a reason to keep coming back. It’s a marvelous marvelous tool to see how you relate to others while playing a complex game.
In fact, because push hands is so confusing for such a long time, this aspect of practice doesn’t really surface until a later date. Mostly we muddle through with liking this partner and avoiding that partner. Just like life. And that is fine because not all partners will help you grow as a push hands practitioner or as a person. I still do that, I admit it! But at least I see the problem and how I am dealing (or not dealing) with it and, hopefully, why.
I reflect on one individual that I avoided for years and years. He drove me nuts. But at a later date, I realized he was EXACTLY what I needed for my own selfish growth. The interaction changed between us radically and then I loved working out with him. He has passed on since. I really miss him and – surprise! - not only for selfish reasons.
Tai chi gave me this invaluable experience.
A few years back I took a workshop on Having Difficult Conversations. A core insight from that workshop was the following: There are facts. Then we select the facts that appeal to us. From this we draw a conclusion. When we argue with each other, we typically argue from the perspective of the conclusions we have drawn. The facts are no longer in view. Of course, our conclusion is wrapped in a judgment that satisfies us. This conclusion is right, correct, good. We assume it is supported by the facts and to a certain extent, it is.
I’d like to suggest in tai chi and push hands, we get back to the facts and work from there. The process is more like mining for gold. We have to dig and dig and dig and explore and discover. More data is uncovered as we move through the process. To settle with some judgment or conclusion will not move us along. At best, it is a temporary resting place to let us gather some experience to move to the next level. Your conception of a good push, or your experience of some great push that you have met with some master will only get you so far. The facts that make up YOUR push are crucial to understand, discover and work with.
Circles - New York Times article
This off the beaten track article is not really about tai chi, but about circles. Tai Chi is loaded with circles (and spirals) and to that end, this art world article may give us some clues and inspiration about how important these circles are. NOT required reading this, but sort of fun in a tributary way.
Enjoy if you decide to venture forth. Tom
December 8, 2009
Circular Logic of the Universe
By NATALIE ANGIER
CIRCLING my way not long ago through the Vasily Kandinsky show now on display in the suitably spiral setting of the Guggenheim Museum, I came to one of the Russian master’s most illustrious, if misleadingly named, paintings: “Several Circles.”
Those “several” circles, I saw, were more like three dozen, and every one of them seemed to be rising from the canvas, buoyed by the shrewdly exuberant juxtapositioning of their different colors, sizes and apparent translucencies. I learned that, at around the time Kandinsky painted the work, in 1926, he had begun collecting scientific encyclopedias and journals; and as I stared at the canvas, a big, stupid smile plastered on my face, I thought of yeast cells budding, or a haloed blue sun and its candied satellite crew, or life itself escaping the careless primordial stew.
I also learned of Kandinsky’s growing love affair with the circle. The circle, he wrote, is “the most modest form, but asserts itself unconditionally.” It is “simultaneously stable and unstable,” “loud and soft,” “a single tension that carries countless tensions within it.” Kandinsky loved the circle so much that it finally supplanted in his visual imagination the primacy long claimed by an emblem of his Russian boyhood, the horse.
Quirkily enough, the artist’s life followed a circular form: He was born in December 1866, and he died the same month in 1944. This being December, I’d like to honor Kandinsky through his favorite geometry, by celebrating the circle and giving a cheer for the sphere. Life as we know it must be lived in the round, and the natural world abounds in circular objects at every scale we can scan. Let a heavenly body get big enough for gravity to weigh in, and you will have yourself a ball. Stars are giant, usually symmetrical balls of radiant gas, while the definition of both a planet like Jupiter and a plutoid like Pluto is a celestial object orbiting a star that is itself massive enough to be largely round.
On a more down-to-earth level, eyeballs live up to their name by being as round as marbles, and, like Jonathan Swift’s ditty about fleas upon fleas, those soulful orbs are inscribed with circular irises that in turn are pierced by circular pupils. Or think of the curved human breast and its bull’s-eye areola and nipple.
Our eggs and those of many other species are not egg-shaped at all but spherical, and when you see human eggs under a microscope they look like tranquil suns with Kandinsky coronas behind them. Raindrops start life in the clouds not with the pear-shaped contours of a cartoon teardrop, but as liquid globes, aggregates of water molecules that have condensed around specks of dust or salt and then mutually clung themselves into the rounded path of least resistance. Only as the raindrops fall do they lose their symmetry, their bottoms often flattening out while their tops stay rounded, a shape some have likened to a hamburger bun.
Sometimes roundness is purely a matter of physics. “The shape of any object represents the balance of two opposing forces,” explained Larry S. Liebovitch of the Center for Complex Systems and Brain Sciences at Florida Atlantic University. “You get things that are round when those forces are isotropic, that is, felt equally in all directions.”
In a star, gravity is pulling the mass of gas inward toward a central point, while pressure is pushing the gas outward, and the two competing forces reach a dynamic détente — “simultaneously stable and unstable,” you might say — in the form of a sphere. For a planet like Earth, gravity tugs the mostly molten rock in toward the core, but the rocks and their hostile electrons push back with equal vehemence. Plutoids are also sufficiently massive for gravity to overcome the stubbornness of rock and smooth out their personal lumps, although they may not be the gravitationally dominant bodies in their neighborhood.
In precipitating clouds, water droplets are exceptionally sticky, as the lightly positive end of one water molecule seeks the lightly negative end of another. But, again, mutually hostile electrons put a limit on molecular intimacy, and the compromise conformation is shaped like a ball. “A sphere is the most compact way for an object to form itself,” said Denis Dutton, an evolutionary theorist at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand.
A sphere is also tough. For a given surface area, it’s stronger than virtually any other shape. If you want to make a secure container using the least amount of material, Dr. Liebovitch said, make that container round. “That’s why, when you cook a frankfurter, it always splits in the long direction,” he said, rather than along its circumference. The curved part has the tensile strength of a sphere, the long axis that of a rectangle: no contest.
The reliability of bubble wrap may help explain some of the round objects found among the living, where the shapes of body parts are assumed to have some relation to their purpose. Eggs are a valuable commodity in nature, and if a round package is the safest option, by all means, make them caviar round. Among many birds, of course, eggs are oval rather than round, a trait that biologists attribute to both the arduous passage the egg makes through the avian oviduct, and the fact that oval eggs roll in a circle rather than a straight line and thus are less likely to fall out of a nest.
Yet scientists admit that they don’t always understand the evolutionary pressures that sculpture a given carbon-based shape.
While studying the cornea at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, Dr. Liebovitch became curious about why eyeballs are round. “It seemed like their most salient feature,” he said. He explored the options. To aid in focusing? But only a small region of the retina is involved in focusing, he said, and the whole spherical casing seems superfluous to the optical needs of that foveal patch. To enable the eye to roll easily in the socket and dart this way and that? But birds and other animals with fixed eyes still have bulging round eyeballs. “It’s not really clear what the reason is,” he said.
And for speculative verve, nothing beats the assortment of hypotheses that have been put forth to explain the roundness of the human female breast. It’s a buttock mimic. It’s a convenient place to store fat for hard times. It’s a fertility signal, a youth signal, a health signal, a wealth symbol. Large breasts emphasize the woman’s comparatively small waist, which is really what men are interested in. As for me, I’m waiting for somebody to explain why a man’s well-developed bicep looks like a wandering breast.
Whatever the prompt, our round eyes are drawn to round things. Jeremy M. Wolfe of Harvard Medical School and his colleagues found that curvature was a basic feature we used while making a visual search. Maybe we are looking for faces, a new chance to schmooze.
Studying rhesus monkeys, Doris Tsao of the California Institute of Technology and her colleagues identified a set of brain cells that responded strongly to images of faces, monkey and otherwise. The only other sort of visual stimulus that aroused those face tracing neurons, Dr. Tsao said, were round objects — clocks, apples and the like. She suspects the results would be similar for humans. We make a fetish of faces. “If you have a round object with two spots in the middle,” she said, “that instantly attracts your attention.”
Or maybe the circle beckons not for its resemblance to human face but as a mark of human art. Dr. Dutton, author of “The Art Instinct,” pointed out that perfect shapes were exceedingly rare in nature. “Take a look at a billiard ball,” he said. “It’s impossible to imagine that nature threw that one up.” We are predisposed to recognize “human artifacture,” he said, and roundness can be a mark of our handiwork. When nature does play the meticulous Michelangelo, we are astonished.
“People come to see the Moeraki boulders of New Zealand,” he said, “and ooh and aah because they’re so amazingly spherical.”
Artists in turn have used the circle as shorthand for the divine: in mandalas, rose windows, the lotus pad of the Buddha, the halos of Christian saints. For Kandinsky, said Tracey Bashkoff, who curated the Guggenheim exhibition, the circle was part of a “cosmic language” and a link to a grander, more spiritual plane. A round of applause! We’ve looped back to Kandinsky again.
Enjoy if you decide to venture forth. Tom
December 8, 2009
Circular Logic of the Universe
By NATALIE ANGIER
CIRCLING my way not long ago through the Vasily Kandinsky show now on display in the suitably spiral setting of the Guggenheim Museum, I came to one of the Russian master’s most illustrious, if misleadingly named, paintings: “Several Circles.”
Those “several” circles, I saw, were more like three dozen, and every one of them seemed to be rising from the canvas, buoyed by the shrewdly exuberant juxtapositioning of their different colors, sizes and apparent translucencies. I learned that, at around the time Kandinsky painted the work, in 1926, he had begun collecting scientific encyclopedias and journals; and as I stared at the canvas, a big, stupid smile plastered on my face, I thought of yeast cells budding, or a haloed blue sun and its candied satellite crew, or life itself escaping the careless primordial stew.
I also learned of Kandinsky’s growing love affair with the circle. The circle, he wrote, is “the most modest form, but asserts itself unconditionally.” It is “simultaneously stable and unstable,” “loud and soft,” “a single tension that carries countless tensions within it.” Kandinsky loved the circle so much that it finally supplanted in his visual imagination the primacy long claimed by an emblem of his Russian boyhood, the horse.
Quirkily enough, the artist’s life followed a circular form: He was born in December 1866, and he died the same month in 1944. This being December, I’d like to honor Kandinsky through his favorite geometry, by celebrating the circle and giving a cheer for the sphere. Life as we know it must be lived in the round, and the natural world abounds in circular objects at every scale we can scan. Let a heavenly body get big enough for gravity to weigh in, and you will have yourself a ball. Stars are giant, usually symmetrical balls of radiant gas, while the definition of both a planet like Jupiter and a plutoid like Pluto is a celestial object orbiting a star that is itself massive enough to be largely round.
On a more down-to-earth level, eyeballs live up to their name by being as round as marbles, and, like Jonathan Swift’s ditty about fleas upon fleas, those soulful orbs are inscribed with circular irises that in turn are pierced by circular pupils. Or think of the curved human breast and its bull’s-eye areola and nipple.
Our eggs and those of many other species are not egg-shaped at all but spherical, and when you see human eggs under a microscope they look like tranquil suns with Kandinsky coronas behind them. Raindrops start life in the clouds not with the pear-shaped contours of a cartoon teardrop, but as liquid globes, aggregates of water molecules that have condensed around specks of dust or salt and then mutually clung themselves into the rounded path of least resistance. Only as the raindrops fall do they lose their symmetry, their bottoms often flattening out while their tops stay rounded, a shape some have likened to a hamburger bun.
Sometimes roundness is purely a matter of physics. “The shape of any object represents the balance of two opposing forces,” explained Larry S. Liebovitch of the Center for Complex Systems and Brain Sciences at Florida Atlantic University. “You get things that are round when those forces are isotropic, that is, felt equally in all directions.”
In a star, gravity is pulling the mass of gas inward toward a central point, while pressure is pushing the gas outward, and the two competing forces reach a dynamic détente — “simultaneously stable and unstable,” you might say — in the form of a sphere. For a planet like Earth, gravity tugs the mostly molten rock in toward the core, but the rocks and their hostile electrons push back with equal vehemence. Plutoids are also sufficiently massive for gravity to overcome the stubbornness of rock and smooth out their personal lumps, although they may not be the gravitationally dominant bodies in their neighborhood.
In precipitating clouds, water droplets are exceptionally sticky, as the lightly positive end of one water molecule seeks the lightly negative end of another. But, again, mutually hostile electrons put a limit on molecular intimacy, and the compromise conformation is shaped like a ball. “A sphere is the most compact way for an object to form itself,” said Denis Dutton, an evolutionary theorist at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand.
A sphere is also tough. For a given surface area, it’s stronger than virtually any other shape. If you want to make a secure container using the least amount of material, Dr. Liebovitch said, make that container round. “That’s why, when you cook a frankfurter, it always splits in the long direction,” he said, rather than along its circumference. The curved part has the tensile strength of a sphere, the long axis that of a rectangle: no contest.
The reliability of bubble wrap may help explain some of the round objects found among the living, where the shapes of body parts are assumed to have some relation to their purpose. Eggs are a valuable commodity in nature, and if a round package is the safest option, by all means, make them caviar round. Among many birds, of course, eggs are oval rather than round, a trait that biologists attribute to both the arduous passage the egg makes through the avian oviduct, and the fact that oval eggs roll in a circle rather than a straight line and thus are less likely to fall out of a nest.
Yet scientists admit that they don’t always understand the evolutionary pressures that sculpture a given carbon-based shape.
While studying the cornea at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, Dr. Liebovitch became curious about why eyeballs are round. “It seemed like their most salient feature,” he said. He explored the options. To aid in focusing? But only a small region of the retina is involved in focusing, he said, and the whole spherical casing seems superfluous to the optical needs of that foveal patch. To enable the eye to roll easily in the socket and dart this way and that? But birds and other animals with fixed eyes still have bulging round eyeballs. “It’s not really clear what the reason is,” he said.
And for speculative verve, nothing beats the assortment of hypotheses that have been put forth to explain the roundness of the human female breast. It’s a buttock mimic. It’s a convenient place to store fat for hard times. It’s a fertility signal, a youth signal, a health signal, a wealth symbol. Large breasts emphasize the woman’s comparatively small waist, which is really what men are interested in. As for me, I’m waiting for somebody to explain why a man’s well-developed bicep looks like a wandering breast.
Whatever the prompt, our round eyes are drawn to round things. Jeremy M. Wolfe of Harvard Medical School and his colleagues found that curvature was a basic feature we used while making a visual search. Maybe we are looking for faces, a new chance to schmooze.
Studying rhesus monkeys, Doris Tsao of the California Institute of Technology and her colleagues identified a set of brain cells that responded strongly to images of faces, monkey and otherwise. The only other sort of visual stimulus that aroused those face tracing neurons, Dr. Tsao said, were round objects — clocks, apples and the like. She suspects the results would be similar for humans. We make a fetish of faces. “If you have a round object with two spots in the middle,” she said, “that instantly attracts your attention.”
Or maybe the circle beckons not for its resemblance to human face but as a mark of human art. Dr. Dutton, author of “The Art Instinct,” pointed out that perfect shapes were exceedingly rare in nature. “Take a look at a billiard ball,” he said. “It’s impossible to imagine that nature threw that one up.” We are predisposed to recognize “human artifacture,” he said, and roundness can be a mark of our handiwork. When nature does play the meticulous Michelangelo, we are astonished.
“People come to see the Moeraki boulders of New Zealand,” he said, “and ooh and aah because they’re so amazingly spherical.”
Artists in turn have used the circle as shorthand for the divine: in mandalas, rose windows, the lotus pad of the Buddha, the halos of Christian saints. For Kandinsky, said Tracey Bashkoff, who curated the Guggenheim exhibition, the circle was part of a “cosmic language” and a link to a grander, more spiritual plane. A round of applause! We’ve looped back to Kandinsky again.
Saturday, December 12, 2009
Non-Doing Is, Oddly, Hard To Do
I’ve been having an interesting time teaching a simple exercise. We start to do it standing in the legs with little steps. At first I have the class do it as sort of an easy movement. Essentially we perform the movement, but it is sort of a glob. No real skill is being utilized. We “do” it.
Next, I begin to break it down in greater and greater specificity. This means that I’m looking at ways to accomplish the same movement but using relaxation and non-doing. As I articulate how to make it one whole non-doing movement, slowly but surely the students start to lose the movement altogether. Then they go through a time period where they feel they have mostly lost the movement. It falls apart in their hands.
One student commented that the more we work on it, the harder it gets. This is because the focus has shifted. As an unskilled glob, it was easy. But now we are relying on a whole body movement where all parts are integrated and working together. Each part individually is not required to hold you together. The whole is holding you together. One part is all parts. So each individual part has little to do, but more importantly each part must communicate with every other part.
Harder to not "do" it? How fascinating.
Of course, this is impossible to nail in print here because this is an experiential experiment. But the class goes from being able to “do” it, to not being able to “do” it. Nor are they able to NOT “do” it. We perpetually lock ourselves into the habit of doing in order to accomplish what is essentially a simple simple movement.
Or to put it another way, we only know how to do things, we don’t know how to allow things. Allowing relaxation, air, ground, structure, whole body integration to be the tools that hold us together and create a movement. Our habit, and therefore our experience, is that a sense of our doing things is how we get things done. If that support system is removed, we fall apart. Yet to utilize this other support system makes a world of sense because it requires much much less effort. It makes life easy. And now we have a surplus of energy. All that fuss and stiffness is gone.
I see our American sense of personality as a way of forcing results to happen as well. We throw this around like a calling card to help identify who we are and get what we want. This would be OK except this is often unnecessary, tiresome and inefficient. And it is so hard to let this go. Who are you and how do you act if you don't access your personality? And so many times it actually gets in the way and prevents us from getting what we want.
This comes up a great deal in the work place where most of us are on automatic, getting things done as quickly as possible, and relying on habit to do so. Doing what comes naturally, which usually means how we have always done it via "doing". The spaciousness and potential of non-doing is completely lost: mistakes are made, feelings are hurt, work is poorly executed, working relationships are damanged, information is misinterpreted and so on. Ever happen to you?
Oddly, in our culture, presenting who you are – your personality – is considered a necessary means of getting to know each other. But it is primarily this habit of doing that we are presenting. Maybe this is a good thing because it is this habit that we ultimately have to deal with. Isn’t it an insult to say "Mr. Jones" has no personality? Yet when we complain about someone, it is the personality that we are annoyed with. How ironic.
If nothing else, I would like to suggest that adding “non-doing”, or allowing, as a tool to get things done is a worthy pursuit and an invaluable practice. The art of tai chi is one way to study this (although not the only way.) Certainly you will add energy to your day since you now need less of it to do what you used to do. You get out of the way of what needs to be done. Your energy goes where it needs to go to accomplish tasks. You are no longer this stiff glob, but free flowing energy.
Yes, this IS difficult to do! Because we don’t practice this. Is "non-doing" on your to do list? It requires great focus and a certain kind of commitment. But the pleasure of tasting even a little bit of this is what tai chi students love. The thrill is palpable. Non-doing is a challenge, yes, but is also thrilling.
Next, I begin to break it down in greater and greater specificity. This means that I’m looking at ways to accomplish the same movement but using relaxation and non-doing. As I articulate how to make it one whole non-doing movement, slowly but surely the students start to lose the movement altogether. Then they go through a time period where they feel they have mostly lost the movement. It falls apart in their hands.
One student commented that the more we work on it, the harder it gets. This is because the focus has shifted. As an unskilled glob, it was easy. But now we are relying on a whole body movement where all parts are integrated and working together. Each part individually is not required to hold you together. The whole is holding you together. One part is all parts. So each individual part has little to do, but more importantly each part must communicate with every other part.
Harder to not "do" it? How fascinating.
Of course, this is impossible to nail in print here because this is an experiential experiment. But the class goes from being able to “do” it, to not being able to “do” it. Nor are they able to NOT “do” it. We perpetually lock ourselves into the habit of doing in order to accomplish what is essentially a simple simple movement.
Or to put it another way, we only know how to do things, we don’t know how to allow things. Allowing relaxation, air, ground, structure, whole body integration to be the tools that hold us together and create a movement. Our habit, and therefore our experience, is that a sense of our doing things is how we get things done. If that support system is removed, we fall apart. Yet to utilize this other support system makes a world of sense because it requires much much less effort. It makes life easy. And now we have a surplus of energy. All that fuss and stiffness is gone.
I see our American sense of personality as a way of forcing results to happen as well. We throw this around like a calling card to help identify who we are and get what we want. This would be OK except this is often unnecessary, tiresome and inefficient. And it is so hard to let this go. Who are you and how do you act if you don't access your personality? And so many times it actually gets in the way and prevents us from getting what we want.
This comes up a great deal in the work place where most of us are on automatic, getting things done as quickly as possible, and relying on habit to do so. Doing what comes naturally, which usually means how we have always done it via "doing". The spaciousness and potential of non-doing is completely lost: mistakes are made, feelings are hurt, work is poorly executed, working relationships are damanged, information is misinterpreted and so on. Ever happen to you?
Oddly, in our culture, presenting who you are – your personality – is considered a necessary means of getting to know each other. But it is primarily this habit of doing that we are presenting. Maybe this is a good thing because it is this habit that we ultimately have to deal with. Isn’t it an insult to say "Mr. Jones" has no personality? Yet when we complain about someone, it is the personality that we are annoyed with. How ironic.
If nothing else, I would like to suggest that adding “non-doing”, or allowing, as a tool to get things done is a worthy pursuit and an invaluable practice. The art of tai chi is one way to study this (although not the only way.) Certainly you will add energy to your day since you now need less of it to do what you used to do. You get out of the way of what needs to be done. Your energy goes where it needs to go to accomplish tasks. You are no longer this stiff glob, but free flowing energy.
Yes, this IS difficult to do! Because we don’t practice this. Is "non-doing" on your to do list? It requires great focus and a certain kind of commitment. But the pleasure of tasting even a little bit of this is what tai chi students love. The thrill is palpable. Non-doing is a challenge, yes, but is also thrilling.
Monday, November 2, 2009
Tai Chi: To Change or Not to Change -- That Is the Question
I spoke with a successful friend a while ago and asked: In the last ten years, how have you changed?
Answer: No change at all!
I was momentarily stunned. I see life AS change and assume if you are alive, you are changing. I guess this is not so for all.
Personally, I’ve had to change because there were so many things that I needed to let go of and address. I resented this for a long time. So it makes sense that I have taken up a practice that is about change.
My teacher of many years, Maggie Newman, is still looking for what can be improved in her tai chi form. It’s just part of the fun at this point. Change in tai chi ultimately means better functionality, more relaxation, more balance, and greater whole body unified movement. You will feel better as you discover new ways to accomplish these goals. She carries this into her non-tai chi life as well. Maggie is always exploring new ways to encounter reality in order to better meet up with reality.
They say in business that if you are not growing, you are dying. I have the privilege of talking to accomplished individuals in science and engineering and business. They are always on the prowl for improvement: Improvement in either themselves, or in the operations that they are involved in. Most work very hard and rarely do they rest on their achievements. One goal is accomplished and off to the next one. Yes, this can be form of workaholism. But it doesn’t have to be. It can be a source of creativity and liveliness, a form of being fully engaged.
We can rest in a comfort zone, or repeat endlessly the niche that we do well. This can lead to a success of sorts. But it is also dead in a way. It’s inert, complacent, self-satisfied, unmoving. At a Zen talk one day, the monk speaking noted that it is good to do things we don’t do well. I didn’t get the point then, but I do now. The point is not about success or failure. It’s about a willing connection with whatever you are doing without judgment or motive. It’s about pure engagement.
Change can come naturally, without effort or conscious intent. Or one can consciously decide to work at it, perhaps motivated towards a better world, a better me, a better you. Change, therefore, can be a choice. You decide to engage with the changing world and therefore you will need to change. It is possible to decide what aspects that you want to change. It could be small, incremental changes, or large sweeping changes. It can be internal changes, or external involvement effecting change. I suspect either way, the arrow will go in both directions. By this I mean, if you decide you need to make an internal change, this will create changes in the external world. If you want to make real changes in the external world, it will cause changes in your internal world. External forces may create or even force internal changes. We grow into new perspectives this way.
Tai chi is a very internal art. The changes are mostly about your physical and mental state. It will definitely impact your external world. Since there is so much to study and work on in tai chi, in one way you can select what’s next on the study list. Or you can ask your teacher or fellow student what they think you might tackle next. This can be a very exciting journey.
I tend to be fearful of change, but fear is not really a part of tai chi. I also tend to change slowly and that is fundamental to tai chi because the changes in tai chi are very deep and very subtle. They take time to manifest. Fear tends to actually block progress and it is harder to change in a fearful environment (internal or external). One has to deal with, or at least minimize, fear.
Mostly, tai chi feels like experimental play. You experiment with various aspects until you are ready to attempt play in a potentially fearful environment (as in aggressive push-hands partners). But even then, there are ways to minimize the fear and maximize your ability to experiment.
The mindset of discovery, to learn something new, is a way of engaging life. As you change your tai chi form, you could be changing your life. You never really arrive, settle, or land with a final “product”. You are always experimenting and playing with SOMETHING. In this way, tai chi is endlessly fascinating.
Do you know how to stop growing in tai chi (or life)? Assume that what you are doing is right, or that the path you are on is the right path. OK, in fact, it may be that your path is the best path for you, but you always need to test it. And test it again. Is there a better way? Did this really work? Is there something else? Did I miss something? How do others manage this?
I hold high the example of those who think they really have it nailed down. I hold them high because I know I don’t want to replicate them. They prove my point. They don’t improve. They repeat some “technique”. They may even be very, very good at what they do. But this doesn’t make them right or better or successful. Often, it makes them stuck. It is easy to delude ourselves when we “win” using some “technique”. In push hands, it’s easy for me to confuse a beginner by doing something other than using real tai chi principles. I can fool myself into a feeling of superiority.
These last paragraphs may give you the impression that you have to constantly second guess yourself and never feel secure. That’s not the point. You only have to work towards freedom of movement, relaxation and ease, and to keep working on ways to accomplish this. It’s the difference between saying, “Here’s how it’s done – here’s the answer” versus “Currently, this seems to work best for me. It feels good. What works for you?”
Catch that shift? You can feel good about the experience you are having right now. You don’t have to close the door to something new. Nor do you have to invalidate someone else’s experience to prove your own.
I love most the example of those who keep learning and experimenting and playing with the principles of tai chi. Sure, I’m a sucker for a new “technique”. But growth and learning don’t end there. This is where it begins.
Answer: No change at all!
I was momentarily stunned. I see life AS change and assume if you are alive, you are changing. I guess this is not so for all.
Personally, I’ve had to change because there were so many things that I needed to let go of and address. I resented this for a long time. So it makes sense that I have taken up a practice that is about change.
My teacher of many years, Maggie Newman, is still looking for what can be improved in her tai chi form. It’s just part of the fun at this point. Change in tai chi ultimately means better functionality, more relaxation, more balance, and greater whole body unified movement. You will feel better as you discover new ways to accomplish these goals. She carries this into her non-tai chi life as well. Maggie is always exploring new ways to encounter reality in order to better meet up with reality.
They say in business that if you are not growing, you are dying. I have the privilege of talking to accomplished individuals in science and engineering and business. They are always on the prowl for improvement: Improvement in either themselves, or in the operations that they are involved in. Most work very hard and rarely do they rest on their achievements. One goal is accomplished and off to the next one. Yes, this can be form of workaholism. But it doesn’t have to be. It can be a source of creativity and liveliness, a form of being fully engaged.
We can rest in a comfort zone, or repeat endlessly the niche that we do well. This can lead to a success of sorts. But it is also dead in a way. It’s inert, complacent, self-satisfied, unmoving. At a Zen talk one day, the monk speaking noted that it is good to do things we don’t do well. I didn’t get the point then, but I do now. The point is not about success or failure. It’s about a willing connection with whatever you are doing without judgment or motive. It’s about pure engagement.
Change can come naturally, without effort or conscious intent. Or one can consciously decide to work at it, perhaps motivated towards a better world, a better me, a better you. Change, therefore, can be a choice. You decide to engage with the changing world and therefore you will need to change. It is possible to decide what aspects that you want to change. It could be small, incremental changes, or large sweeping changes. It can be internal changes, or external involvement effecting change. I suspect either way, the arrow will go in both directions. By this I mean, if you decide you need to make an internal change, this will create changes in the external world. If you want to make real changes in the external world, it will cause changes in your internal world. External forces may create or even force internal changes. We grow into new perspectives this way.
Tai chi is a very internal art. The changes are mostly about your physical and mental state. It will definitely impact your external world. Since there is so much to study and work on in tai chi, in one way you can select what’s next on the study list. Or you can ask your teacher or fellow student what they think you might tackle next. This can be a very exciting journey.
I tend to be fearful of change, but fear is not really a part of tai chi. I also tend to change slowly and that is fundamental to tai chi because the changes in tai chi are very deep and very subtle. They take time to manifest. Fear tends to actually block progress and it is harder to change in a fearful environment (internal or external). One has to deal with, or at least minimize, fear.
Mostly, tai chi feels like experimental play. You experiment with various aspects until you are ready to attempt play in a potentially fearful environment (as in aggressive push-hands partners). But even then, there are ways to minimize the fear and maximize your ability to experiment.
The mindset of discovery, to learn something new, is a way of engaging life. As you change your tai chi form, you could be changing your life. You never really arrive, settle, or land with a final “product”. You are always experimenting and playing with SOMETHING. In this way, tai chi is endlessly fascinating.
Do you know how to stop growing in tai chi (or life)? Assume that what you are doing is right, or that the path you are on is the right path. OK, in fact, it may be that your path is the best path for you, but you always need to test it. And test it again. Is there a better way? Did this really work? Is there something else? Did I miss something? How do others manage this?
I hold high the example of those who think they really have it nailed down. I hold them high because I know I don’t want to replicate them. They prove my point. They don’t improve. They repeat some “technique”. They may even be very, very good at what they do. But this doesn’t make them right or better or successful. Often, it makes them stuck. It is easy to delude ourselves when we “win” using some “technique”. In push hands, it’s easy for me to confuse a beginner by doing something other than using real tai chi principles. I can fool myself into a feeling of superiority.
These last paragraphs may give you the impression that you have to constantly second guess yourself and never feel secure. That’s not the point. You only have to work towards freedom of movement, relaxation and ease, and to keep working on ways to accomplish this. It’s the difference between saying, “Here’s how it’s done – here’s the answer” versus “Currently, this seems to work best for me. It feels good. What works for you?”
Catch that shift? You can feel good about the experience you are having right now. You don’t have to close the door to something new. Nor do you have to invalidate someone else’s experience to prove your own.
I love most the example of those who keep learning and experimenting and playing with the principles of tai chi. Sure, I’m a sucker for a new “technique”. But growth and learning don’t end there. This is where it begins.
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