Tai Chi Information, continued

Additional Tai Chi Information

gleaned by Dorothy Case

Tai chi special benefits for those over fifty:
Increases physical balance, regulates and lowers blood pressure, improves circulation, promotes a good night’s sleep, re-establishes biomechanical alignments, restores sexual vitality.

In Taoism, the body contains three energy centers, or tantiens (pronounced dantien). They are located in the lower belly, the heart, and the head (third eye). They are the Tai Chi pole. We try to align our bodies to allow the chi to flow directly from “heaven” to “earth” through these centers. (In yoga, they are the three chakras.) The lower tantien is the most important. We sometimes fold our hands over the tantien. Women put the left hand first, then cover it with the right. Men do the opposite.

In Chinese medicine and belief there are five elements:
These elements are in a circle and relate to each other sort of like rock, paper, scissors. Metal, Water, Wood, Fire, Earth. The acupuncture/pressure meridians are based on these five elements. Tai Chi has in it ways of stimulating these five elements for better health. This is a whole other huge area of study.
Metal: Lungs, large intestine, autumn, silver color.
Water: kidneys, bladder, winter, blue.
Wood: liver, gallbladder, spring, yellow.
Fire: heart, small intestine, summer, soft red.
Earth: spleen, stomach, Indian summer, green.

There are several styles of Tai Chi, named after the founders of these styles. We are doing Yang style, the most popular. However, if you go to another school or class with another teacher, they will do the movements differently and call it Yang style, depending on who they learned from at first. I have done Yang style with four people now and each time I adjust my style using some things I like from some people and some from another. That means that what I demonstrate is not how you MUST do the style. You adjust it to your own capabilities, your own body, your own sense of rhythm and bodily constraints. I cannot stretch my legs as wide as some, so I don’t. I cannot kick as high as some, so I don’t. But as I practice, I can kick higher, I can balance better, I have more strength in my legs and more endurance, as well as better flow and alignment. You will too. It comes from practice. They say you have to do it 10,000 times to begin to get it right. The Shifu (teacher) here will teach us a movement and then tell us to just do what we think it is, not worry about getting it absolutely correct. Every time you practice, you will see something to correct, something new you like better for your body, and the movements will flow more easily. I have been practicing for over a year now, a relatively short period of time, and I am constantly learning and adjusting. I try to practice every day. Seven to 20 years, depending on how often you practice, is considered the time you need to become somewhat proficient. Therefore, do not feel discouraged if you sometimes forget something or feel awkward, because it happens to everyone. Sooner or later muscle memory will kick in and you can then start to concentrate on the breathing techniques, or better alignment. Regular weekly classes are needed if you want to continue to improve.

The other styles are Yang, Wu, Chen, Hao, and combination, in order of popularity. I am told that the Yangs have settled in the Seattle area. If your primary goal is health and longevity, the different styles don’t matter much. Wu emphasizes small compact movements. Yang and Wu represent over 80% of practitioner styles. Chen alternates slow-motion movements with short, fast, explosive ones. Hao style is extremely rare and is focused on internal chi movements.