I had to break it first

Sometimes things have to be broken before they can be fixed.  And I found that with a sequence in Tai Chi recently.  Over the years, I developed a bad habit and in the process of fixing that technique, I ended up breaking another part.  

The spot in question is repulsing the monkey transitioning into flying diagonal.  In fixing repulsing the monkey, I had to break my transition. And it is both wonderful and annoying.  Wonderful because after all of this time I still have things to work on and explore, and annoying because it was a bit of a challenge to rebuild the transition into flying diagonal.  But, that is wonderful too if I look at from the right angle.  I have something else to fix.  

And there are other little adjustments that I have made that have made me better I think.  And they come doing it wrong first. There is so much within both the long form and the short form that will continue to teach me and to help me evolve.  

Numbers:

Modified Push Ups:  9170

Push Ups:  100

Tai Chi Short Form:  31

Tai Chi Part 1: 0

Tai Chi Part 2: 4

Tai Chi Part 3: 17

Tai Chi Part 4: 2

Tai Chi Push Hands: 3

Energy Release

The release of energy is typically at the end of a technique. When the punch has hit its target, when the kick has landed With Tai Chi, it’s the same, however I feel it begin earlier.  Because of the style, I am more attuned to my energy and it’s more obvious when it’s being gathered before it’s released.

I am thinking specifically about grasping the birds tail as I write this.   I am gathering and releasing at the same time with the final release at the end of the technique. A contraction and expansion if you will.  However, it’s internal and not something obvious to the naked eye.  I made an adjustment to this recently and it’s made a huge difference for me.  I feel a power here where I didn’t before.  

It’s important to think about when we are releasing our energy, otherwise we are not completing our techniques.  When you are learning Tai Chi, releasing your energy when you compete a technique can come across as chunky and looking more like a hard form than anything it’s meant to look like.  But over time, if you can become attuned with your internal spirit and energy, the softness will appear, but the release of energy will remain strong.  

Adjustments

 have made a couple of minor adjustments to a few techniques and they feel so much better.  I feel more grounded, more connected to my chi.  By taking a moment sooner to push, I therefore make my alignment a moment quicker and therefore my energy releases with more expansion.  

These adjustments though come through awareness and a lot of practice.  I spend a lot of time with just a few pieces of my forms and these little sparks form, and create opportunities to feel more in my Tai Chi.  That’s not to say that I am amazing or anywhere close to being a master yet, but these little sparks are exciting.  I am feeling more grounded.

But on a more humbling note, I need to go through my Kung Fu forms more.  I blanked when we did Da Mu Hsing the other day and it took a little bit to find my way through.  And it felt a little foreign to be honest.  So that tells me that I have neglected things for too long.  Shame on me.  Time to squeeze some Kung Fu forms in alongside my Tai Chi.  

Bits and Bobs

 I’m finding it difficult to track specifically the bits and pieces of Tai Chi that I am practicing.  I practice the whole sections, or the whole short form but there are many moments where I choose a technique or two and practice those.  I am tracking my reps of Tai Chi, but I have yet to decide how to track the bits and bobs that I practice.  There’s a little bit each day, even if there isn’t a full section or short form involved.  I guess, if I just focus on what I have chosen to track and go with that then I am making progress.  As long as I am tracking things. 

I have made a couple of adjustments to a couple of techniques and they feel so much better.  It’s amazing how just a small tweak can make a big difference in energy transference.  How changing my intent on a technique can change the trajectory of it.  It’s exciting and I am loving where this is going.  And now that it’s warm outside, I am looking forward to going outside to practice.

Numbers Year to Date:

Modified Push Ups - 4510

Regular Push Ups - 50

Tai Chi Part 2 - 4

Tai Chi Part 3 - 2

Tai Chi Part 4 - 1

Tai Chi Short Form - 10

Tai Chi Push Hands - 1

Energy Release

Sometimes I question myself as to when my energy should be released when I finish a technique in Tai Chi.  And it’s because I am not feeling it.  Am I not feeling it because I am not fully grounded or am I not feeling it because I have not made that tiny adjustment that needs to be made?

A second set of eyes is always helpful when you are in doubt.  For the most part, I can figure it out when something feels off or just not quite right.  And it’s usually because I am either rushing or am not quite grounded anymore.  

So lately, instead of going through either the individual parts of the forms, like part 2 or part 1, or the whole of the short form, I have found myself focusing on a few very individual parts that I have noticed aren’t quite right for me.  I had the blessing of meeting with Sifu Dennis on Friday and she was able to make a tiny adjustment that made the difference for me.  I am grateful for that as I am unable to attend classes right now.  There are still some pieces that I am working on and I am looking forward to feeling the release of energy once I have them figured out for myself.

Numbers YTD

Modified Push Ups 3735

Tai Chi Part 2 4

Tai Chi Short Form 9

Tai Chi Part 4 1

Tai Chi Push Hands 1

Healing

This may sound strange, but Tai Chi is healing for me.  It soothes my soul, it nourishes my psyche, it points out parts of my body that need attention.  I notice old injuries and new ones and it allows me to make adjustments and to focus on those parts while I move.  I can focus my energy on my physical body and feel it heal.  

Tai Chi calms me.  It uplifts me.  It brings me back to myself.  

An issue arises however when I forget to bring my awareness to my techniques and am only focusing on how I am feeling.  Bad habits creep in and when you have done something for a long time wrong it feels right.  But upon close inspection it actually doesn’t feel right, I have just fooled myself into thinking it was feeling right.  So to address that I need someone else to witness my forms, to see where my chi is or is not being released.  Then I can work on those areas.

A small tweak in my technique is often all it takes to take it to the next level and to feel things move correctly again.  I am fortunate to have some amazing mentors to witness my journey and to help me notice when I am missing something.  I do need to work more on noticing these things in myself however.  I am striving to be less dependent on them so that I may grow more.  

Questions are good.  I should be asking them.  I should ask myself and I should try to answer myself before I check in with my mentors.  I know more than I think I know.  

Numbers

Modified Push Ups - 1480

Tai Chi Short Form - 6

Tai Chi Part 2 - 1

Tai Chi Push Hands - 1

Not Something New

I have toyed with the idea of expanding my Tai Chi horizon, but then I look at what I do know, and how much there still is to learn within those forms and there is no point in really going forward with something new. There are minute tweaks that make a huge difference to my technique and to how I feel my chi.

I practice sometimes and notice that I am moving a foot to adjust to a transition that I haven’t noticed in the past.  That alone opens up questions about other transitions and how my chi flows from one stance to another.

I have been training in Kung Fu for 23 years and Tai Chi for 17 years.  I feel I know a lot, but there is still so much more that I hope to learn in the future.  However, training without mindfulness will not allow me to learn or address any issues that I may have.  Bad habits creep in unknowingly when injuries happen, or even when space constraints force adjustments.  Those need to be noticed and addressed.

I do feel at home with Tai Chi.  I have been blessed to learn under a Master who has infinite patience and knowledge to impart.  While I cannot be at the school right now to practice with my peers, I am keeping up with the form at home.  I stay at their pace, I practice the short form and the Tai Chi Broadsword.  

I have learned a lot, and there is so much more.  

Rooting

 

The term Shenling refers to your body having strong roots but being agile so as to move quickly if needed. (“the Taijiquan Classics” by Zhang Yun, David Ho, Peter Capellini and Susan Darley)

This is something that I work on a lot when I practice Tai Chi and I didn’t realize that there was a term for it. I don’t need one to understand the concept though, as my Kung Fu training has been influencing this rooting for a long time. Connecting with the earth, to stabilize your skeleton, and use the earth’s Chi with my own for power and strength.

It seems like a simple thing, but I have to remind myself that I have been practicing Kung Fu for 19 years and Tai Chi for 13 years. I know that it wasn’t that easy to connect and root myself to the earth and remain agile at first and that it took a long time for me to achieve that.

It’s like how easy it is for me now to just feel my Chi, without having to work at it, or concentrate. It just happens. However that also took a long time to feel at will. I tend to forget where I started, and so I have to remind myself every so often that my journey has been a long one, relatively speaking.

Achieving shenling takes time, but it starts with a toyu stance. Simply having your skeleton aligned, pelvis tucked in, knees slightly bent with an invisible string running up your spine and past your head. It’s feeling the earth beneath your feet, rooted and strong and at the same time feeling light and able to move quickly. It seems like a simple stance, and easy to attain, however it’s more about becoming one with the earth and feeling that connection. This will take time and practice.

I am by no means perfect, which is why Kung Fu and Tai Chi are a practice and why mastery is a journey.

Highs and Lows

 

We all experience highs and lows in our day to day lives. It occurs with our mental state and our physical state. So how do we handle the lows when everything seems impossible? When getting out of bed is a feat in and of itself? Let alone complete everything that needs to be done in a day?

We have to just keep putting one foot in front of the other and not hold ourselves to our normal standards as that can just exasperate our mental state. Self care if important, so how we treat ourselves has to be a priority. We need to be gentle, and allow ourselves to be less than, as long as we are still trying. It helps to remember that we are not alone, that this will pass, and you will come out the other side.

But the key is to just take a step forward even it’s a baby step. Reach out so that you are not struggling alone. There are more people that care about you than you realize.

A Calm Mental State

 

Xinjing- A Chinese term for heart calm. The heart referring to our mental state and keeping it calm or still.

One of the most important aspects of Tai Chi is to have a calm mental state. A calm mental state is focused, and will help to keep you in the void. This can be considered an abstract concept, but your mental state can be trained.

So how do you train your mind to stay calm? It isn’t easy in a world where we are surrounded by noise. Phones, computers, emails, social media, television, deadlines, and endless pressures keep us from truly breathing and able to be calm. However, by practicing Tai Chi over and over, we will eventually be able to turn off the noise and find ourselves in the void. (I should state that this also applies to Kung Fu.)

We need to practice without any preconceived ideas as to what our opponent might be doing; to be able to keep our minds still in order to simply follow or intercept our opponent. Our bodies need to just react.

Collecting Moments

 

I read the phrase “collect the happy moments” today and it struck a chord with me. Each day is filled with moments, and I know we miss most of them. Usually it’s the powerful moments that catch us, cause us to reflect and remember and they’re the ones that usually illicit strong emotions. However, if we can find just a few minutes each day to practice gratitude we will find so many more moments throughout the day that define us that we would normally miss.

It might be a small moment that made you smile, one that made you laugh or cry, ones that brought you some calmness, and of course ones that maybe rubbed you the wrong way. I think it’s all the little moments that we miss that actually hold us back from being in the here and now. And all it takes is a pause, a breath, a brief check into ourselves to find the small moments that make us who we are.

I really like the idea of “collecting the happy moments” but we can’t have the happy ones without the sad or angry ones. Yin doesn’t exist without yang, light doesn’t exist without the dark. However, it’s easy to migrate to the negative - it surrounds us constantly in the news and social media. But if we can focus on the little happy moments that happen all the time, then we have a whole arsenal of tools to help us cope with the negative moments.

The Evolving Journey

 

Evolution is a natural part of the Kung Fu journey. Over time, our techniques change a little as our bodies age and we adapt to injuries or other limitations. It doesn’t make us less of a martial artist though. As long as we are moving forward and keeping an open mind, we will continue to grow and improve.

The same can be said for techniques or forms. Over time we find better ways of doing them, or adapting them. And change can be hard when we have been doing something the same way for a long time. However, the exciting part of Kung Fu are these adaptations or changes. I love how I have to look at it from a new perspective and make it work for me.

But I see frustration in students sometimes when we change things and they wonder why we do to this to them. They feel they are just starting to understand something and then we pull the rug out from under them and point them in another direction. We do this because the discover better ways of doing things. The key is to take a deep breath, and remove our ego so that we can see how this new direction can improve us.

Manifesting Chi

 

During a simple Tai Chi exercise yesterday, I experienced something that I haven’t yet experienced or at the very least noticed before. As my arms moved across my body, I could feel my chi between the two. That energy was manifesting on the outside where I could feel it between my arms and my chest and it amazing.

I can pretty much gather my chi in a ball at will, but to feel it on the outside while moving either in a form or during a warm up exercise is new to me. It’s exciting and I look forward to working with this more.

I AM A Student

 

I love when a seemingly simple concept is introduced in class and my mind gets blown. Recently, I had the privilege of a applying lesson in which I spent the whole class with my tongue hanging out while I tried to wrap my mind around something I thought I already understood. One recent class focused on projecting forward in a form, another on chi and sticky hands (that one felt awesome!)

The chi class was particularly powerful for me, as my oldest had just been commissioned to write a poem for a dance event in Edmonton. This poem was fresh in my mind, and the words painted such vivid images that I found really focused my chi, and it was so, so strong. I have never experienced that amount of heat flowing from my body before and it left me in awe.

That’s what I love about this journey. It truly never ends, as long as I keep my ego in check and I keep my cup empty. However, without my instructors, I wouldn’t be on this journey and for them I am grateful.

Being Present

 

As I was getting a massage the other day, I found myself forming a mental list of the things I had to accomplish that day, and other thoughts were keeping my mind going.  But then I had to pause - I forced myself to take a deep breath, to ask myself where I was and what I was doing.

I chose then, to focus on my breathing, to be mindful of my muscles relaxing, of where I had pain.  I wanted to use this opportunity to for what it was.  The chance to give my body a small gift.  I left my mental list alone, and let myself be.  It wasn’t easy, and took some concentration, but the effort was worth it.  

I know I felt more relaxed at the end of my session.  I know my muscles released a little more tension because I was in the moment. I try to be in the moment throughout the day, but I find that unless I can block off time it’s challenging.  It’s easiest though when I’m outside.  To stop and just breathe.  To take in the surroundings and appreciate what I have.  

Being in the moment takes practice, but it’s worth the effort.

I AM…Exuberant

 

I am exuberant when I approach things that I am passionate about. Sometimes it is external, and other times it’s internal. 

My exuberance allows me to put my whole self into my teaching, particularly the kids classes. However, internally, I feel it while doing Tai Chi, painting, creating and spending time with my family. It translates to amazing experiences travelling with my husband, where we have explored unencumbered.

Tai Chi principles

 

I have started reading into the history of Tai Chi and came upon this quote: “If your practice does not follow Taiji principles, your practice cannot be said to be Taijiquan at all no matter what movements are performed.” ( pg. 21 of the Taijiquan Classics  by Zhang Yun, David Ho, Peter Capellini, Susan Darley)

This has really stayed with me, and has me evaluating my practice.  I keep asking myself, what is my practice?  And if I am not consistently practicing, then can I even begin to say that I remotely understand what the Taiji principles are?  I know that I cannot really define my practice, and I don’t practice my Tai Chi every day, so how can I understand the principles?  What I do know however, is that I am curious, and I am going to delve deeper into my Tai Chi practice.  How do I do this?  I practice every day.   I will be mindful during this moving meditation. I will study the text and the history and strive for understanding.

Vocabulary

 

Vocabulary. We use words and phrases all day every day without a lot of thought, and last week, with some reflection I realized that my Kung Fu vocabulary needs expanding.  I’m confident when it comes to teaching the preschool and young dragon classes, but I don’t think that same vocabulary serves me very well when it comes to teaching adults. 

It’s no secret that I have always felt more comfortable teaching kids, and working with adults is something I am working on. I have the opportunity to do this and this brings me to learning to modulate my teaching towards my audience.  The only way for me to improve is to do, not simply observe.  With practice, I will get better at expressing the lessons I am sharing.  With practice, my ideas with form more defined shapes.  With practice, it will get easier.  

Repetition

 

Recently, I decided to sit down and fold cranes.  It has been around 2 years(?) since I have folded any, but didn’t think much of it, until I actually started to try to fold one.  I was completely stuck about 1/3 of the way in.  I had no clue what fold came next, and unfolding an old crane I had done did very little to help me.

My husband ended up showing me ( somehow things are etched in his brain forever ,while mine is like sand in an hourglass), and after a few tries I had it again.  So what does this illustrate?  My lack of practicing led to a loss of knowledge.  Repetition is key, and not once in a while either.  In order for me to keep this, I am going to need to fold a few every so often (few times a month at the bare minimum).  

The same goes for Kung Fu.  I know that there are forms that are either really, really dusty or just gone (the gone ones are the forms that I created for the I Ho Chuan and then never really practiced again when the new year would roll in).  So, there is a lot of truth in the adage “If you don’t use it, you lose it.”

Time

 

I had the opportunity to have lunch with my husbands aunt last week and I am so grateful for it.  I grew up with only my immediate family, so having this extended family is something I appreciate.  It struck me after, how easy it is to take people and opportunities for granted. My dad lives next door, but I know that I don’t make the effort to visit that I should.  I know that I take my husband and kids for granted too and I am making an effort to practice daily gratitude for them.  And I also take my Kung Fu for granted.

There have been many times that I have not felt like training, so I put it off, knowing that I can just do it later.  My Kung Fu isn’t going anywhere right?  That’s where I am so, so wrong.  My body isn’t getting younger, and I have some permanent challenges.  So why am I wasting time putting of practicing?  I could make a thousand excuses, wrap them up in transparent reasons, and tell myself that it‘s fine. 

Last week’s lunch reminded me that time is finite.  I only have so much time left that my body will allow me to train in a meaningful way (to me).  I need to train when I don’t want to train, I need to show up when I don’t want to show up.  I will practice gratitude for the time and opportunities that I have had with Kung Fu, and gratitude for the continued opportunities to train.