Over the years, I have seen many students come and go. Of those that stay, some progress, and some actually regress. I wanted to state a few basics on what I see in those who progress.
The first requirement, of course, is a GOOD TEACHER. By that I mean someone who has something you want to learn. It’s that simple. Some are more articulate than others, or can demonstrate what they want from you with greater accuracy, but your teacher has to have the goods you want in your life.
The next major requirement is ATTENDING AS MANY CLASSES AS POSSIBLE. Some students have a “yoga” mindset. You drop in when you feel like it. I think yoga is great, but tai chi is not like yoga at all. Attending all or most classes is crucial in tai chi development. Attending every other class, or when you feel like it, or when it doesn’t get in the way of your social schedule never ever leads to progress. You have to be there to get it. Books and videos may be of interest, or even help you, but nothing replaces uninterrupted class attendance.
PRACTICE ON A REGULAR BASIS is another requirement. My teacher’s teacher, Prof. Cheng Man-Ch’ing claimed it was better to practice twice a day and, if needed, skip meals or get less sleep.
Next, students that really progress TAKE NOTES and review them to capture details or nuances that they know they need to work on. There is simply too much to learn to keep it all in your head. Some habits are so deep that you need to devote a portion of your practice time to breaking the habit. Writing it down keeps you on track. You are less likely to forget what you already don’t know.
The next item on my list would be to periodically LOOK AT WHAT YOU ARE NOT DOING. How? Just ask the question – what do I not give attention to in my practice? Maybe you are really good about how you use your feet, the placement, the weight on your feet, the transfer of weight into your feet, etc. So the opposite would be: what are you doing with your head placement and relaxation? If “sinking” is your joy, what about the counterbalance of the up movement? And so on.
Lastly, REFOCUS ON "NON-DOING". You can always work on non-doing in tai chi. When we learn tai chi, initially we do a lot of “doing”. Non-doing is the essence of tai chi, the most challenging aspect to manifest. We need to come back to it again and again because in our zeal to master the tai chi postures, we tend to get caught up in what we need to do. The question of doing less of something (muscle use, effort) or simply “being” while moving through the postures can get lost in the effort to succeed.
These observations come from looking at fellow students and teachers since 1982.
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Saturday, April 11, 2009
Tai Chi, Immunity and Shingles. New York Times article.
April 17, 2007
Exercise: A Little Tai Chi Can Go a Long Way Against Shingles
By ERIC NAGOURNEY
Older people who practice tai chi may be better equipped to fight off the virus that causes shingles or, if they do get the disease, may have a milder case of it, researchers say.
Shingles, a painful nerve condition, is caused by the virus that causes chickenpox. The virus, varicella-zoster, can linger in the body for many years after a case of chickenpox and then emerge as shingles. The disease generally affects people older than 50, as their level of antibodies to the virus decreases.
Tai chi, the centuries-old practice from China, is considered a martial art, but it includes aerobic activity, relaxation and meditation. It has been found in the past to strengthen people’s immune systems.
In a study paid for by the National Institutes of Health, researchers took 112 volunteers ages 59 to 86 and split them into two groups. One was given 40-minute tai chi lessons three times a week for 16 weeks. The other was given health-counseling classes.
The researchers, led by Dr. Michael R. Irwin of the University of California, Los Angeles, found that the people who did tai chi improved their immunity to varicella-zoster. They also found that when the volunteers were vaccinated later against the virus, the tai chi practitioners had a better response to the vaccine. The study appears in the current issue of The Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.
The finding that the exercise significantly raised the volunteers’ immunity to the shingles virus suggests that it may also offer help fighting off other viruses, the study said.
Exercise: A Little Tai Chi Can Go a Long Way Against Shingles
By ERIC NAGOURNEY
Older people who practice tai chi may be better equipped to fight off the virus that causes shingles or, if they do get the disease, may have a milder case of it, researchers say.
Shingles, a painful nerve condition, is caused by the virus that causes chickenpox. The virus, varicella-zoster, can linger in the body for many years after a case of chickenpox and then emerge as shingles. The disease generally affects people older than 50, as their level of antibodies to the virus decreases.
Tai chi, the centuries-old practice from China, is considered a martial art, but it includes aerobic activity, relaxation and meditation. It has been found in the past to strengthen people’s immune systems.
In a study paid for by the National Institutes of Health, researchers took 112 volunteers ages 59 to 86 and split them into two groups. One was given 40-minute tai chi lessons three times a week for 16 weeks. The other was given health-counseling classes.
The researchers, led by Dr. Michael R. Irwin of the University of California, Los Angeles, found that the people who did tai chi improved their immunity to varicella-zoster. They also found that when the volunteers were vaccinated later against the virus, the tai chi practitioners had a better response to the vaccine. The study appears in the current issue of The Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.
The finding that the exercise significantly raised the volunteers’ immunity to the shingles virus suggests that it may also offer help fighting off other viruses, the study said.
Friday, April 10, 2009
Tai Chi Shows Help for Stroke Patients. New York Times reports.
April 7, 2009. New York Times report by Eric Nagourney:
Stroke patients who practice tai chi may improve their balance — reducing the risk of falls, researchers say.
Writing in the journal Neurorehabilitation and Neural Repair, the researchers reported improvement in volunteers after as little as six weeks of training. The lead author was Stephanie S. Y. Au-Yeung of Hong Kong Polytechnic University.
In earlier research, one of the article’s co-authors, Christina W. Y. Hui-Chan, found that tai chi improved balance among healthy elderly people. For this study, the researchers wanted to see if the same effect would occur among stroke patients.
They took 136 people who had a stroke six months or more earlier and divided them into two groups. Over 12 weeks, one group did general exercise, the other a modified version of tai chi.
The tai chi group met once a week for an hour, and were asked to practice at home about three hours a week.
While the exercise group showed little improvement in balance, the tai chi group made significant gains when they were tested on weight-shifting, reaching and how well they could maintain their stability on a platform that moved like a bus.
The benefit of tai chi, the researchers said, is that once the forms are mastered, they can be done without supervision.
Still, they said, some patients lapsed in their practice after the training was over. They might be more likely to continue, the study said, if tai chi were available at places like community centers.
Stroke patients who practice tai chi may improve their balance — reducing the risk of falls, researchers say.
Writing in the journal Neurorehabilitation and Neural Repair, the researchers reported improvement in volunteers after as little as six weeks of training. The lead author was Stephanie S. Y. Au-Yeung of Hong Kong Polytechnic University.
In earlier research, one of the article’s co-authors, Christina W. Y. Hui-Chan, found that tai chi improved balance among healthy elderly people. For this study, the researchers wanted to see if the same effect would occur among stroke patients.
They took 136 people who had a stroke six months or more earlier and divided them into two groups. Over 12 weeks, one group did general exercise, the other a modified version of tai chi.
The tai chi group met once a week for an hour, and were asked to practice at home about three hours a week.
While the exercise group showed little improvement in balance, the tai chi group made significant gains when they were tested on weight-shifting, reaching and how well they could maintain their stability on a platform that moved like a bus.
The benefit of tai chi, the researchers said, is that once the forms are mastered, they can be done without supervision.
Still, they said, some patients lapsed in their practice after the training was over. They might be more likely to continue, the study said, if tai chi were available at places like community centers.
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Tai Chi Chuan and Change
One Fundamental aspect of tai chi is change. The one constant in the tai chi form as well as push hands is change. You are always doing it. You are never fixed or solid. The only moment of solidity may be when you discharge during a push, the moment when you have the advantage and can take it. You take advantage of your advantage. You undermine your partner’s momentary lack of change. Actually, I’m not sure if solid is the right way, this is still a question. Certainly, you are more full when you discharge, but maybe not solid.
Some changes are large. Like during push hands you run into the hard spot, the stuck moment of your partner. Then you change direction so that you are going under this hard spot, or going into the weak spot, or like a current of water that hits a rock, goes around the hard spot. All are big changes. Green light to red light to green light.
But there are small micro changes too. As you move through the form, your shape keeps morphing, amoeba like, into a new shape. And this happens in analog fashion, smoothly, effortlessly and within each tiny moment. It is like you can take a three second sequence and chop it up into 1000 tiny bits. Each bit is a complete change. Our minds can’t quite keep up with this, but it shows up when you don’t do it.
Often we don’t change. When you don’t change, the “not-change” hangs on. So the movement gets stuck or off balance or out of kilter. The whole is no longer whole, but in two parts. One part static, another part fluid. It feels wrong somehow. Or worse, it feels OK because you can’t feel the part that isn’t changing. You assume something that isn’t true. This now feels normal somehow. Habit creates a sort of blindness and you don’t see or feel your stuck unchanging places. You can fool yourself for a while, but when you get to partner work in push-hands, you will get pushed. We push each other to help each other find our stuck places.
In tai chi, as in life, we deeply need each other to learn what is stuck and how to free it. When you get pushed, the best attitude is one of gratitude. This is not some sort of false piety or humility. How else will you grow? Of course, in the normal course of our human interactions in push-hands, we often get frustrated or angry. Even more amusing, we blame them for doing it wrong when they push us! How backwards we get it. It takes great skill to create a situation to see what is really needed and to appreciate it.
I can recall an interaction when I literally stopped the game and left the “ring” because I was so angry. I really needed a huge change! But so did my partner. In retrospect, thinking about my anger, it amuses me to think how much I enjoy that memory today. I even really love that partner – he’s a lovable person. Yet in that moment, in that context, what he was doing drove me out of the room in anger. Or so I thought. You have to go through certain experiences to find a new change. I couldn’t change then, I simply reacted. Today, the same situation would be totally different. I have a more mature understanding, more options, and I wouldn’t have to flee. I can thank him now for driving me nuts then!
The tai chi space has to be carefully tended so that we can practice in a spirit of mutual cooperation and trust. This is something very delicate to achieve, though it can be done. We need to find the right balance to get it right. In one sense, you are always creating this safe space, a space where real play, and exchange, and change can happen. Generosity of spirit is needed. A lack of being judgmental is needed. Playing the game at the right level needs to be agreed upon. The changes here are very very fine indeed. It is an act of mutually creating a playing space that works for both of you. It takes two to do this.
The point of practicing change goes beyond your physical ability. Clearly it is advantageous to be able to change. Fast, instantly, in a microsecond. Because sometimes life itself is like that. A still body, at rest, has tremendous change due to breathing and blood flow. A static body simply doesn’t exist until it dies.
In a deep way, you have to listen to your body to hear what is stuck, and then you have to let go. You may not even be able to let go. You may not know how to let go. But this fundamental practice, noticing what is stuck and then letting go, is a basic practice in your form and push hands work.
This is what tai chi is about: living, life, fluidity, change. Change is our issue, our blood, our breath. You are not solid, the ground is solid. Even the ground is not solid, but by comparison it is more solid than your body. To be able to change, to practice change, to see change, to have the options that change provides is a high level. It feels right. It creates health, physical as well as mental health. When you give up changing, you begin the process of dying.
Tai chi = Life. This is one of the most primary and deep aspects of practice. Is it not better to be able to change, anywhere, at any time, for any reason, than to not change?
Change is the option always on the table. It's a good thing to practice.
Some changes are large. Like during push hands you run into the hard spot, the stuck moment of your partner. Then you change direction so that you are going under this hard spot, or going into the weak spot, or like a current of water that hits a rock, goes around the hard spot. All are big changes. Green light to red light to green light.
But there are small micro changes too. As you move through the form, your shape keeps morphing, amoeba like, into a new shape. And this happens in analog fashion, smoothly, effortlessly and within each tiny moment. It is like you can take a three second sequence and chop it up into 1000 tiny bits. Each bit is a complete change. Our minds can’t quite keep up with this, but it shows up when you don’t do it.
Often we don’t change. When you don’t change, the “not-change” hangs on. So the movement gets stuck or off balance or out of kilter. The whole is no longer whole, but in two parts. One part static, another part fluid. It feels wrong somehow. Or worse, it feels OK because you can’t feel the part that isn’t changing. You assume something that isn’t true. This now feels normal somehow. Habit creates a sort of blindness and you don’t see or feel your stuck unchanging places. You can fool yourself for a while, but when you get to partner work in push-hands, you will get pushed. We push each other to help each other find our stuck places.
In tai chi, as in life, we deeply need each other to learn what is stuck and how to free it. When you get pushed, the best attitude is one of gratitude. This is not some sort of false piety or humility. How else will you grow? Of course, in the normal course of our human interactions in push-hands, we often get frustrated or angry. Even more amusing, we blame them for doing it wrong when they push us! How backwards we get it. It takes great skill to create a situation to see what is really needed and to appreciate it.
I can recall an interaction when I literally stopped the game and left the “ring” because I was so angry. I really needed a huge change! But so did my partner. In retrospect, thinking about my anger, it amuses me to think how much I enjoy that memory today. I even really love that partner – he’s a lovable person. Yet in that moment, in that context, what he was doing drove me out of the room in anger. Or so I thought. You have to go through certain experiences to find a new change. I couldn’t change then, I simply reacted. Today, the same situation would be totally different. I have a more mature understanding, more options, and I wouldn’t have to flee. I can thank him now for driving me nuts then!
The tai chi space has to be carefully tended so that we can practice in a spirit of mutual cooperation and trust. This is something very delicate to achieve, though it can be done. We need to find the right balance to get it right. In one sense, you are always creating this safe space, a space where real play, and exchange, and change can happen. Generosity of spirit is needed. A lack of being judgmental is needed. Playing the game at the right level needs to be agreed upon. The changes here are very very fine indeed. It is an act of mutually creating a playing space that works for both of you. It takes two to do this.
The point of practicing change goes beyond your physical ability. Clearly it is advantageous to be able to change. Fast, instantly, in a microsecond. Because sometimes life itself is like that. A still body, at rest, has tremendous change due to breathing and blood flow. A static body simply doesn’t exist until it dies.
In a deep way, you have to listen to your body to hear what is stuck, and then you have to let go. You may not even be able to let go. You may not know how to let go. But this fundamental practice, noticing what is stuck and then letting go, is a basic practice in your form and push hands work.
This is what tai chi is about: living, life, fluidity, change. Change is our issue, our blood, our breath. You are not solid, the ground is solid. Even the ground is not solid, but by comparison it is more solid than your body. To be able to change, to practice change, to see change, to have the options that change provides is a high level. It feels right. It creates health, physical as well as mental health. When you give up changing, you begin the process of dying.
Tai chi = Life. This is one of the most primary and deep aspects of practice. Is it not better to be able to change, anywhere, at any time, for any reason, than to not change?
Change is the option always on the table. It's a good thing to practice.
Friday, January 9, 2009
Tai Chi and Life: Lessons to be Learned
Tai Chi and Life: Lessons to be Learned.
Initially, you cannot see your own deficiencies – you need an outside source to guide or inform you of the right path. You can learn from a beginner as well as advanced players. Of course, life itself will eventually point out what you need to know -- we just have to be able to hear the messages. You may need to go back one step in order to go forward two steps. The answer is in the whole, not the parts. All aspects need to be considered. Tai chi is always 4 dimensions at minimum.
Cellular, structural and unifying aspects begin to make up a tai chi posture. Ultimately, you are creating a circle that surrounds you. Cellular is each cell’s involvement, structural are the vector forces that balance each other, and the unifying aspect is the movement as a whole piece with all the parts assisting to make the entire body function as one smooth sculpture without gaps or hollows.
Tai chi has a strong psychological aspect. For many, this is the most important lesson of all: be aware of your own sense of self and your feelings within the form and about the form. This is a world view that you carry with you and it can be addressed through the small world of tai chi. (Are you better than others? Have the answers? Always need to be paid attention to? Afraid of being corrected? Want to be admired? Want to be invisible? Resist practicing? Feel tense? Feel tired? Feel energetic? Feel full and relaxed?)
How you relate to space -- the air -- is another way you relate to the world. Is it there? Does it feel good? Is it in the way? Is it friendly, or your friend? Do you like it? Can you mesh with it seamlessly? Do you thrash through it like it doesn't matter?
Your body communicates many things instantly. The neutral tai chi body allows you to see those messages, change or drop them altogether. It also helps you “hear” the world. You are no longer in the way of receiving information. Your internal static has been neutralized. First this is done with the body, and then it extends into the mind.
Consider what you don’t look at in your form. Consider what you don’t look at in your life.
You can’t micro manage balance of the whole. You have to be aware of the whole, and allow it to balance itself. Balance is an allowing condition, not a control issue. You let it happen; tai chi is about letting things happen. It reflects what is happening and responds to what is happening. Tai chi is not about controlling or manipulating yourself or others. It is about being with, and ultimately just being.
Learning tai chi is about learning how to stick and follow. This is a crucial first step in your own self growth as a person. Even a little goes a long way!
The biggest deficiencies are those you don’t see or feel. It comes down to you don't know what you don't know. So searching for it can be a challenge. There is a marvelous quote by Dr. William Thurston, Cornell University, as follows: "You don't see what you see until you see it, but when you do see it, it let's you see many other things." This happens in tai chi alot!
The classics teach that all is lead by the mind. So it is good to start from there. What is mind? It seems, however, one clue to what your mind is up to is contained in the holding or releasing patterns in the body.
While relaxation is a central part of the answer, it is in relationship to balance. That is, if you are relaxed, you are balanced; If you are balanced, you are relaxed. To be relaxed, but not balanced, would be useless. To be balanced, but not relaxed, would waste precious energy.
Tai chi, in general, is about relationships, and balancing those relationships. Removing the sense of separation within the world is the goal. You are part of the world and the world is part of you. Be connected. Be with. Tai chi allows you to fit in and go with the flow. This allows greater awareness of opportunity and the ability to take it.
I am not suggesting that what I have noted above happens automatically. We can sabotage anything it seems, and to let the best of tai chi happen, it helps to consider what it teaches and then try to apply this in your life.
Initially, you cannot see your own deficiencies – you need an outside source to guide or inform you of the right path. You can learn from a beginner as well as advanced players. Of course, life itself will eventually point out what you need to know -- we just have to be able to hear the messages. You may need to go back one step in order to go forward two steps. The answer is in the whole, not the parts. All aspects need to be considered. Tai chi is always 4 dimensions at minimum.
Cellular, structural and unifying aspects begin to make up a tai chi posture. Ultimately, you are creating a circle that surrounds you. Cellular is each cell’s involvement, structural are the vector forces that balance each other, and the unifying aspect is the movement as a whole piece with all the parts assisting to make the entire body function as one smooth sculpture without gaps or hollows.
Tai chi has a strong psychological aspect. For many, this is the most important lesson of all: be aware of your own sense of self and your feelings within the form and about the form. This is a world view that you carry with you and it can be addressed through the small world of tai chi. (Are you better than others? Have the answers? Always need to be paid attention to? Afraid of being corrected? Want to be admired? Want to be invisible? Resist practicing? Feel tense? Feel tired? Feel energetic? Feel full and relaxed?)
How you relate to space -- the air -- is another way you relate to the world. Is it there? Does it feel good? Is it in the way? Is it friendly, or your friend? Do you like it? Can you mesh with it seamlessly? Do you thrash through it like it doesn't matter?
Your body communicates many things instantly. The neutral tai chi body allows you to see those messages, change or drop them altogether. It also helps you “hear” the world. You are no longer in the way of receiving information. Your internal static has been neutralized. First this is done with the body, and then it extends into the mind.
Consider what you don’t look at in your form. Consider what you don’t look at in your life.
You can’t micro manage balance of the whole. You have to be aware of the whole, and allow it to balance itself. Balance is an allowing condition, not a control issue. You let it happen; tai chi is about letting things happen. It reflects what is happening and responds to what is happening. Tai chi is not about controlling or manipulating yourself or others. It is about being with, and ultimately just being.
Learning tai chi is about learning how to stick and follow. This is a crucial first step in your own self growth as a person. Even a little goes a long way!
The biggest deficiencies are those you don’t see or feel. It comes down to you don't know what you don't know. So searching for it can be a challenge. There is a marvelous quote by Dr. William Thurston, Cornell University, as follows: "You don't see what you see until you see it, but when you do see it, it let's you see many other things." This happens in tai chi alot!
The classics teach that all is lead by the mind. So it is good to start from there. What is mind? It seems, however, one clue to what your mind is up to is contained in the holding or releasing patterns in the body.
While relaxation is a central part of the answer, it is in relationship to balance. That is, if you are relaxed, you are balanced; If you are balanced, you are relaxed. To be relaxed, but not balanced, would be useless. To be balanced, but not relaxed, would waste precious energy.
Tai chi, in general, is about relationships, and balancing those relationships. Removing the sense of separation within the world is the goal. You are part of the world and the world is part of you. Be connected. Be with. Tai chi allows you to fit in and go with the flow. This allows greater awareness of opportunity and the ability to take it.
I am not suggesting that what I have noted above happens automatically. We can sabotage anything it seems, and to let the best of tai chi happen, it helps to consider what it teaches and then try to apply this in your life.
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