Tai Chi Chuan - The Fabric of Living

Tai Chi Chuan – The Fabric of Living

I am recovering from surgery.  The result is that I have to be very aware of EVERYTHING: Where I step, what is on the floor, what is coming my way down the hallway, how to turn around and carefully restrict certain movements, how to place my body weight, what objects are in place at all levels of my own physical space.  Is that paper on the floor cellophane and slippery?  Is there a table top jutting out?

In managing recovery, an image has come to mind.  Stitching, sewing, weaving.  Cloth is made up of many many stitches.  If the cloth is thick, the stitches are horizontal and vertical and ultimately three dimensional.  One could fill any space with cloth-like material, like terry cloth towels stacked on a cupboard.  Each stitch is connected to every other stitch.  If one stitch comes undone, the cloth will begin to tear apart. If I don’t notice some table edge in my path of movement and it runs into my crutch, I may suffer a fall.

It strikes me that tai chi has been good training for this period of repair.  In tai chi, you are deeply aware of space, your internal space, the external space, the connection to all the other players in the room, even the non-players in the room, the floors, the walls, windows, chairs.  You learn to be with all of it and to utilize all of it.  This happens slowly over time, the result of an open awareness.  This attention is not linear.  It is multi-dimensional.  Each stitch in your tai chi cloth is connected to every other stitch.  And you need to be with all stitches.  Actually, and this is what you practice in tai chi, you can’t NOT be with all those stitches.  You have no choice.  All those other stitches are connected to us and we learn to be aware of that connection.

A piece of fabric – the dynamic interplay of many stitches – has a texture.  I see space as having texture; I think we all do: An open space, a tight space, an airy space, a congested space, a dead space, a somber space, a mysterious space, a space that needs fresh air or sunlight, the magnificence of Niagara Falls or The Grand Canyon, the delicate construction of a spider web, the vastness of the ocean, the infinitesimal universe of the human cell, the claustrophobia of the prison cell. 

If I think of space as made up of pieces of cloth that are stitched into my body fabric, then there is only ONE cloth, ONE fabric.  I move, it moves.  It moves, I move.  The molecular and energetic quality of those stitches change as we move from the body to the air to the floor to a light bulb to the next body, but regardless, there is only one fabric, a quilt, a patchwork with its own particular quality.  We work this into the group form by being connected to each and every person doing the form.  We work this into push hands practice where taking and giving up space is in continuous flux.

The value here is a deeper sense of being part of that space.  You use the space and its restrictions to your own advantage, but this is not a manipulative or strategic relationship. It’s making the best use of where you are organically.  Spaciousness is the material we are playing with.  We are playing tug-of-war with the elements in our space, with give and take as part of the game.  You give; you take.  The space yields; the space moves in.  The water molecule moves this way, then that way.  The cloth is moved to the right; the cloth is moved to the left.  All of tai chi is built upon this “game”.  And every stitch within the space has its own weight.

This is a collaborative inclusive relationship to space and in having that, you have greater protection and more options, more freedom.  In tai chi, we don’t “try” to do this because that implies a separation from the space, as if we are in control and shaking out a dusty towel.  This is more like seeing the movement before it happens so that when it comes your way, you have options.  In the ocean, you see the wave coming and you decide whether it's best to ride the wave or dive under it.  Neither choice disrupts the wave – you pick the best option available at the moment of contact. Nor can you simply leave the water and make no choice at all. 

When my teacher, Maggie Newman, tells us that “one wind” is blowing through our tai chi form, she is getting us to experience the space that lies between us all which connects us and moves us.  We all have a stake in creating this quilt of connection.  The fabric is torn when one of us is out of step or unaware of others; we all feel the tear in the fabric (except for the person who has cut themselves off from the others.)

Connect the fibers and watch the space…. And begin to weave yourself into this quilt that sits before your very eyes.

Zen saying:

Before Enlightenment, chop wood carry water;

After Enlightenment, chop wood carry water.

Tai Chi Chuan - One Way to Solve Your Habit

Tai Chi Chuan – One Way to Solve Your Habit

It seems we all contain SOME ACTION where we do the same habit again and again and again.  It never seems to really go away.  Odd isn’t it?  Often, we can even point blank state what that habit is.  Our practice partners point out our habit to us often.  So awareness of the habit isn’t solving the problem.  What could remove this habit?

I have a thought about approaching habits.  It goes like this:  Within the logic of our minds, the habit is there doing something that we think will solve the problem or improve our performance.  So if that is true, take a look at your habit and assume it has some intrinsic benefit.  Assume the habit is there helping you.  What exactly is it doing to help you?  How does it help you?  Look at the habit as something that achieves something positive (even if you know it doesn’t).

My long standing push hands habit is predicting where the partner is going and getting ahead of the movement.  I think by not being there, I am protecting myself.  Certainly they cannot run into me and I am perceived as “soft”.  So my habit has everything to with being invisible.  There is a logic here that appeals to my own sense of what we are trying to do.  If you are not there, you can’t be pushed.  But in reality, I am there and when I predict the movement and leave that space open, it gives my partner something obvious to follow; it gives him/her a push.  It also gives them a gap to fill.  My habit doesn’t work, and the assumption that if I am not there, I am safe, is false.  But I really had to think about this to come to that conclusion.  I needed to look at this habit as if it were solving a problem.

So what is true?  I want to be there in the sense that the space the partner wants to take is being filled by me.  In this way there is no gap.  Further, as they take the space, I give up the space.  But I don’t create a gap.  I am IN the space they want to take.  If they take it, fine; if not, also fine.  This is a new thought for me.  Don’t NOT BE THERE, but in fact BE FULLY THERE.  I am not saying that I am blocking or resisting.  I am saying that I fully inhabit the space that they want to take from me.  In that way, I own the space and it is mine to give away.  My habit runs from the space prematurely and gives them a gap.  By being fully in the space that they want to take, I am fully connected to them at all times.  This feels light years away from the habit.

So try this one out.  Label your habit, look at the benefits, and then look at alternative ways that may be more beneficial.  It can be enlightening.

This is true for life as well.  I have a dear friend who doesn’t think this way.  Her habit is to react to situations with anger.  I suspect she feels she is being true to her feelings and by being in touch with that feeling and letting it go, she is doing herself a service.  But then anger hits her “partner” and the whole thing blows up in her face.  Result?  More anger!  True, sometimes she can’t let that anger out if the relationship is unequal, as in a supervisor.  But in many other situations, her sense of being true to her emotion does not really serve her.  It is very important to be in touch with your emotions.  It is not true that expressing them right here and now will get you what you want.  It often doesn’t.   Her habit is so strong that to look at it in this way is not even an option. 

But it is YOUR option if want it.

Tai Chi Chuan and Your Flawed Partner

Tai Chi Chuan and Your Flawed Partner

I’ve been thinking a lot about, again, how we work with each other.  This is crucial because we depend upon each other for our mutual growth.

It is not fun for me to lack a challenge; it is not good for you to be constantly overwhelmed.

It is not helpful for me to be the wise one who always wins, dispensing my wisdom to those in need. 

It is useless for me to judge what I do not like in someone’s practice. 

As a teacher, I need beginners to verify my thinking and my approach.  I need to see them “get it”.  They come to learn. 

As a partner, however, I need to allow myself lots of time and space to make mistakes; I need to allow others the time and space to make lots of mistakes.  Learning from our mistakes is invaluable.

So here are some ideas that I think strengthen the foundation of building a partnering relationship.

Don’t teach.

Don’t take advantage of every opportunity to “win”.

Don’t criticize or judge flaws – your own or the partner’s flaws.

Give your partner lots of time to be wrong without correcting it.

Play with your point of failure and be sure your partner doesn’t fix you.

Give advice when asked for.  Maybe.

Ask for advice if you have run out of options.  Maybe.

Don’t ask for advice if you have run out of options.  Think about it for a while.

Don’t scoff at what you see as flawed or inferior.

Don’t be a tai chi sports newscaster, calling out each and every play.  Unless they want it for some odd reason.  (This is a great way to kill the “us” and create a superior one and an inferior one.)

But don’t we learn from the observations of others?  Isn’t feedback required?  Yes, absolutely.  But you won’t hear a thing if the messenger feels overbearing and authoritarian.  You will learn less about Push Hands and more about who is delivering your “lesson”.

I was pushing hands with someone who had less experience than me.  He had many flaws.  I was simply letting him be and I wasn’t taking every opportunity to use his flaws to my own advantage.  But another senior student came over and told me I should be correcting him.  He eagerly agreed!  She then proceeded to “correct” him with a list of items that he needed to address.  As she left us, his only comment to me was, “She’s bossy.”  So much for the Good News!

I think it is good to fail and not be fixed.  You will learn a significant amount if left to your own experience, even if you can’t solve the push in front of you.  Mostly, we rush too quickly to solve the situation before we have a good idea of what we are doing in the situation.

“You are too hard!” really means, “I can’t deal with that push in a way that sticks to principle.”

“That was a lousy push!” really means, “I am superior since I can call you out on it!”

Two words to throw away:  1. Bad, and 2. Wrong.  It is never Bad or Wrong.  It is always, “We can do better.”  Secondarily they are never too hard; they never use too much force.  It is, “I need to improve my skills.”  (Technically speaking, if they are hard, they should be the one defeated because “the soft will overcome the hard”.)

It is always gratifying to be the one who knows.  Teaching is ego gratifying.  But if that were the point, I’d never want to teach again.  The point is not to be right or superior.  The point is to have all of us grow in our skills.  This is an endless process, right?  I love it when someone gets it right and then I am the one that has to solve the problem!

In general, I will ask more advanced partners if they want my suggestion.   They often want it, but I have no deep need to solve the problem at hand.  I think it is wonderful to sit with the problem and not fix it!  To let it simmer.

If they do want a suggestion, I don’t give them the entire bible – everything I know.  I try to give ONE basic idea to address.  Too much information never helps.  This is mostly a slow, one step at a time process.

At some point, you have to play a game not hampered by right and wrong.  You try your best and if and when you fail, it should be OK for both of us (short of actually hurting your partner).  From time to time, playing a sloppy game will show you quickly where you need to focus next.  Criticizing a sloppy game kills it in its tracks.  DOA!  See the sloppy game for what it is: a game that is beyond your reach.  There are few more instructive places to be.

Of course, should you encounter someone with a great push, it is instructive to be pushed and pushed and pushed.  The lesson may not be apparent in the moment, but in time, you will have gained great experience.

I’d rather have a good learning relationship with my partners than be feared, revered or avoided.  I need them, they need me.  How you work together will move the process with greater benefit.  Slinging out advice left and right is a dead end.  It is a skill to know when, if and how to intervene.  Truly, I turn red thinking of my past errors in this regard.  Like, just last week!

I’m not holier than thou.  I’ve learned this through experience.  The learning process here is too tough to be an excuse for ego creation.  Most of us are struggling.  It is better to struggle with the skill at hand than with your partner’s personality.

It’s true: I break all of these rules.  But don’t think for a moment that I’m not looking at my actions.

And of course we all need feedback.  But before you enter that quagmire, know that feedback can be brutal and damaging.  It may not help.  Giving feedback always feeds your ego so check in with that.  Your ego will always be there, but the point is not one-upsmanship.  The point is growth.

Alternatively, NOT asking for suggestions can be an ego trip.  “I’m going to figure this out all by myself.  (I don’t need your advice.)”  Maybe so, but few of us get anywhere without suggestions and external advice.

Push Hands has to be fun.  Fun in the sense of satisfying, welcome, interesting, delightful, an adventure in learning, an adventure in change.  For those that enter it in this way, it is an endless source of joy!  You will laugh every push of the way.

Tai Chi Chuan - I am not good at....

Tai Chi Chuan – I am not good at….

Like my teacher, Maggie Newman, I often use small walking steps to introduce a new posture or to find greater relaxation in an old posture.  These steps are a bit intricate and many students find it difficult to replicate them.   Perhaps they think, “I am not good at choreography….”

This statement has several problems.  Here they are in order of importance:

I.

Am.

Not.

Good.

Choreography.

If we were to spend a year ONLY on intricate footwork that changed each class, those who are not “good” at choreography would get better at choreography. 

I recall some statement from Prof. Cheng Man-ch’ing saying that if you don’t have a natural talent for tai chi, you simply have to put in more work.  Voila!

So in tai chi, “I’m not good at choreography” needs to be reengineered into “I need to attend more diligently to the choreography.”

Even better: “Working with choreography is a challenge I’m enjoying.”

If you focus on some idea of ultimate success, this is a dead end. 

If you compare yourselves to others, this is a dead end. 

If you focus on process, and what’s taking place “now”, this is great fun!  There is no goal when you work that way.  When there is no goal, there is no goalie, trying to stop you from your own experience.

In this case, more is better.  Whatever it is that you are not good at, but wish to gain greater ease, then this tells you to pay more attention and don’t toss it aside as something that does not apply to you OR as some sort of stumbling block that you cannot get beyond.

Remember when you began to walk?  No, I didn’t think so.  But this much is clear: Infants don’t say, “I’m not good at walking.”  They most likely don’t “say” anything to themselves.   They just try and try and try again.   Maybe what they think is “Let’s do this again.”  Or perhaps, “This looks like fun.”  Or, “I bet I can do that!”  They never give up.  They don’t own that experience when they give it a first try.  Their muscles and mind grow into the experience.

Zen adage:  Fall down seven times, get up eight.

That’s life, right?

It’s also good tai chi.