In T’ai-Chi the movements are practised slowly bringing attention to the posture, breath. By softening the body through releasing tension in the muscles and joints, T’ai-Chi helps restore the natural self-healing systems that are often suppressed by stiffness and muscle tightness which can have built up over many years of physical, emotional and mental habits. Regular practice helps to relax aching muscles and joints, boost the immune system, strengthen the legs and back, reduce blood pressure and generally improve health; both physical and mental.

T’ai-Chi is a moving meditation that cultivates a calm mind and a relaxed everyday awareness. It helps the practitioner to be awake and attentive to living life in the present and to let go of worry, constant planning and gnawing fears. Gradually through its regular practice the mind becomes calmer and clearer.

T’ai-Chi is a generic name for many different streams of work. Its study has many types of practices, the most well known being ‘The Form’. The beginner usually learns a short form that can take from thirty weeks to two years to learn. The form I study and teach is The Yang Style Short Form and comes to us through the lineage headed originally by the Chinese T’ai-Chi master, Cheng Man Ching.

The form is made up of different postures, each one having its own martial art application. The postures flow together in a slow and beautiful dance, a moving meditation. When I practice each morning, in my garden if the weather is clement, I am aware of having a treasure trove of knowledge contained in every posture. Each day the form enables me to balance and focus afresh. As well as the traditional short form I also teach a short, short form that can be learnt on the one-week retreats I facilitate on Holy Island. For more experienced practitioners there are longer forms which deepen the practice further.

The first three postures of the short form contain the heart of the philosophy of T’ai-Chi. The form does not start at the beginning, it starts two postures before the beginning, in ‘Attention’: a place where the practitioner brings the mind to internal and external awareness. Attention is given to the breath, posture and relaxation. ‘Attention’ calms the mind and balances the body. In this posture we cultivate poise and mindfulness. This posture can be practised at any time, anywhere. Bus stops, supermarket queues, any situation where we have to wait are excellent opportunities to bring the mind to this posture.

The second posture is called ‘Preparation’ – or: “bringing the mind to what is needed in order to tackle the next task”, something that can be applied to all daily activities. This posture is the first step of the form, but the step is not a forward step. It is to the side. We learn to get out of the way.

The third posture finally brings us to ‘The Beginning’. When we meet an obstacle, are in pain or trauma occurs in our lives we have a tendency to push against it or move away from it. Sometimes we even rush right into it an obstacle. ‘The Beginning’ posture does none of these things. It offers the practitioner a sublime alternative. The arms in this posture move in a backward circle that welcomes the attack coming to us to. Thus we get to know what is happening and can than deflect it or dissolve the attack. This ‘bringing toward’ is the essence of the martial art contained in T’ai-Chi. We learn to go into the pain, to not avoid it. By doing this, it can be deflected or dissolved.

The practitioner can use T’ai-Chi purely for physical health and relaxation. The practise of the slow flowing postures help to strengthen bones and relax the practitioner. The moves also help to calm and clear the mind. T’ai-Chi is like ‘waterless swimming’ as the practitioner appears to be flowing weightlessly through the air. This manner of movement requires a lot of strength and control in the lower legs and abdomen. Increased strength gradually builds through regular practice. The movements of the arms are especially useful in helping to develop better breathing habits. A deeper slower breath helps general health as well as instantly calming the mind. And T’ai Chi is renowned for strengthening the back. After even a few weeks, new students report that long-term lower back pain is beginning to ease. The spine is very important in its practice and is referred to as ‘a string of pearls’. The string of pearls is imagined as starting slightly above the top of the head and hanging freely down to the base of the spine. This helps to develop a long wide back with a free neck and relaxed shoulders. The upper chest is softened and hollows into the body and the stomach relaxes and moves with the breath thus massaging the internal organs. This is very helpful in aiding digestive conditions and keeping the other organs of the body healthy. Students gradually grow into their full height through their lengthening, loosening and straightening backs. Stamina grows as general health improves and students have often reported that they breathe far more easily than before they started to practice T’ai-Chi.

T’ai-Chi is very helpful in improving balance. The softening of the belly, shoulders and jaw gradually lower the centre of gravity and over weeks the student will gradually gain more confidence in their bodies. As T’ai-Chi requires single weightedness, (standing on one leg), it is helps to maintain bone density; this is very beneficial for people who have osteoporosis. Working with bent knees whenever possible helps strengthen the lower legs, ankles and feet. This aids the circulation; healthy calf muscles help the all important lower leg blood circulation. Several NHS hospitals now use T’ai-Chi to help patients recover from strokes where their balance and co-ordination have been impaired.

T’ai-Chi is one of the more subtle of the martial arts. The fighting form is based on the soft and weak overcoming the strong and hard. An example: the teeth can bite the tongue but over years the teeth crumble and the tongue remains flexible and firm. Or - which lasts longer, the soft tongue or the hard teeth? The art of T’ai-Chi is based on this principle of the soft and weak overcoming the strong and hard. The T’ai-Chi practitioner meets movement with stillness, hardness with softness and strength with weakness. Ultimately, T’ai-Chi is an investment in loss. And the more that is invested in loss the more the opposite arises.

How does this investment in loss work in practice? Often our lives have led us to become hard, to battle against obstacles and to toughen up. T’ai-Chi teaches us to do the opposite so to rediscover our inherent power and inner strength. The form is practised with the soft and poised posture of a child but using the wisdom of the mature adult. For beginners it is like shedding a suit of protective armour that although restricting, feels safe. The soft slow postures loosen and dissolve the habits that keep us stuck and uncomfortable. Its practice gradually changes long-term mental and physical habits that prevent us living with ease and happiness. It helps us to open our hearts to life, become fearless and to rediscover a generosity of spirit. Before I started T’ai-Chi, I used to question whether it were possible to live life with an open and generous heart yet at the same time feel safe and confidant. T’ai-Chi has given me profound yet simple ways of being able to be open to life and generous to myself and others yet feel safe and balanced. T’ai-Chi gives me – like so many other practitioners - a way to be warm and open in situations which previously we would have been vulnerable or found threatening.

Investing in loss is based on releasing tension in the body, to letting the breath move all the time (are you holding your breath as you read this?), to be more aware of what is going on within and around us. Gradually we can let go of the mental habits that disturb sleep and wear us down. T’ai-Chi teaches us how to listen to our inner voice and trust the wisdom of our bodies.

Ultimately T’ai-Chi works with the mind. It said that the first blow is never made as the experienced practitioner anticipates this and can deflect the attack before the opponent has time to strike. My teacher told us that until we knew what we were doing we were to keep out of the way. When we know what we are doing we won’t need it.

The philosophy, study and regular practice of T’ai-Chi can help a student to live happily and healthily. T’ai-Chi has been one of the most wonderful gifts I have had in my life over the past years. My journey to T’ai-Chi came through an injury sustained during my professional dancing career. I knew absolutely nothing about it except that it was slow and my injury required me to be slow, very slow, in order to maintain movement. I am grateful that I found T’ai-Chi. It has been an illuminating presence in my life all these years, and continues to be so, filtering into every aspect of every day life.

Finding Peace in a Noisy Place

 

Peace arises from within. Outside conditions may be chaotic and noisy. We can include the chaos in our practice. Or - we can try to push the chaos away. One action may be helpful, the other feed the chaos. We have a choice.

 

When we practice T'ai-Chi or meditate or any other technique that supposedly offers us peace, then we are disappointed when everything seems just as muddled as before, just as noisy either in the mind or externally. The promised peace eludes us. We get upset. We may even go nuts!

 

One of my teachers went on a solitary retreat. He chose to start this retreat in the mountains on the East side of the USA. He had lovely little home: it had electricity, a bathroom, a kitchen. It nestled in the middle of tress. He was alone with the only disturbances being the animals and elements. Everything was conducive to the deepening of his practice for the first couple of years. Then the community who owned the land decided to build a temple. His little home was torn off its foundations and put elsewhere. The electricity and water were disconnected. A multitude of builders and machinery moved onto the site. He was surrounded by noise. He contacted his retreat mentor telling him that he had to move somewhere else in order to carry on his solitary retreat. His teacher told him to stay where he was. The purpose of the building was pure, so his task was to learn to weave the noise into his meditation. He spent the next few years meditating in the middle of this noisy building site.

 

His brother was the Abbot of Samyé Ling Monastery in Scotland and encouraged him to move there, promising him a peaceful place to carry on his retreat. Off he went to Scotland. All was well and peaceful for a while. Then it was decided to build retreat houses for the men and women who wished to go into long-term retreat themselves. Once more our meditator found himself in the middle of a bulding site. For the next two years. Again the purpose of the bulding was for the good of others. Again Lama Yeshe wove this constant noise into his meditation.

 

Now when he teaches us to meditate he passes on this experience to us. We create the peace we wish from our own hearts, our own attitudes. There is never a perfect place to practice. I can remember once when teaching meditation a student complained "I could do this in the Himalayas" inferring that Isleworth was too noisy for meditation what with the traffic and the nearby busy, busy Heathrow airport with planes flying in low every ninety seconds. I have visited the Himalayas several times, conditions there are much harsher than those we meet in our church halls, dance studios or college classrooms. Our studios and classrooms have conditions far superior to any I have met in the Himalayas. Things like running water, regular electricity supplies, good transport systems, heating, cooling, bathrooms..... OK, and I agree that where most of us live and teach there aren't the snow-capped mountains and the clear star-blazed skys, the clean air of the high Himalayas.

 

When we practice our T'ai-Chi or meditation it is helpful to begin by listening. Simply listen. Listen to the sounds in our heads, in the room, outside the room. They are ALL the music of life. Embrace these sounds, let them be a part of the practice, not an enemy. If they become our enemy we then spend all our time trying to repell this 'disturbance' and use our effort and energy in pushing stuff away and not in the development of our practice. Soften, relax, yield to the noises. Think what our lives would be without them: no airconditioning or heating? Would you be very stuffy or cold? No buses, cars, trains or planes? What would our lives be like without these machines? They are all there for our benefit. It is our attitude that turns them into demons.

 

So when a plane flies overhead as you try to explain a tricky point in the practice just look up, see the beings in the thin metal tube and welcome them heartily to your country, your town. Bring them into your practice. When noise leaks from the studio next door, rejoice in the celebration of life and return the peaceful quiet place in your own heart centre, and carry on the practice. If the teacher finds it in his or her heart a way to weave the sounds of life into the practice, then the students will do so too. With great ease and simplicity. Use the constant drone of fans sending clean air into the space as the drone in Indian music, the drone is the support of the melodies the musicians weave around it.

 

Most of all yield to the conditions. Accept that which you cannot change, change that which you can. It is so rare to find a perfect space in which to practice. And if we think about this, the reason for this becomes very clear. None of us is perfect, so expecting perfection from outside conditions is unreasonable. A deep part of the practice of T'ai-Chi is to be able to work with what we have and not with what we want: both physically and mentally.

 

And always return to the pith of T'ai-Chi: soften, yield, breathe, open the heart, feel the twinkle in the eyes, and trust the practice will always lead you to a peaceful place.
Sue Weston, September 19, 2006