Reflections

                                    Pay attention and make the entire body comfortable.

                         Learn less, practice more.

 

Why I Practice T’ai Chi Ch’uan  by Mark Bernhard

T’ai Chi Ch’uan as an art of self-defense must completely spurn muscular force.    – Zheng Manqing

The Heart of Lightness: A 2004 Letter to My Fellow Students by Mark Bernhard

Mind Over Matter: Higher Martial Arts by Shi Ming

Presence of Mind by Greg Brodsky

The muscles must vanish. You must become a ghost to yourself, full of the power of not doing. – Richard Powers

Tai Chi Fingers by William CC Chen

In our culture, we tend to focus more on doing than being. When we want to change something of ourselves, instead of “being” our actions or “becoming” a better person in some way, we merely “do” something differently, and so remain separated from the act or change that we desire. When we adopt some external process to do, rather than a new and better way to be, the body and mind remain fundamentally unchanged. What’s needed is not the addition of a new activity, but a change in the foundation from which all our actions arise. – Peter Ralston

Feeling Yi by William CC Chen

T’ai Chi As A Path of Wisdom by Linda Myoki

Yang, Yin and the Nature of the T’ai Chi Form

Qigong as a Portal to Presence: Cultivating the Inner Energy Body
by Gunther M. Weil, Ph.D.

Taijiquan is a wordless dialogue between the limitless and the limited.                     – Wang Xiaopeng

What’s Good for the Brain is Good for the Body (and vice-versa)

Taoist Cosmogony and T’ai Chi Ch’uan

On Practice with Master Li Yaxuan

In practicing T’ai Chi Ch’uan the whole body relaxes. Don’t let even one ounce of tension linger in the blood vessels, bones, and ligaments to cramp yourself up.      – Yang Chenfu

Eight Active Ingredients of T’ai Chi Ch’uan

No Effort

Tension is a way of holding onto something that isn’t there. – Zheng Manqing

Interview with and Writings of Patrick Kelly

The Flow State: The science of the elusive mindset that can improve your life

Tai Chi And The Five Integrities by Kenneth van Sickle

How to Grasp the Bird’s Tail if You Don’t Speak Chinese

T’ai Chi and Dynamic Balance  by Mark Bernhard, DC

Balance as a Predictor of Longevity

How to Improve Your Balance and Why You Should

Harvard Magazine: Easing Ills Through Tai Chi

Sitting Tai Chi exercises improved recovery outcomes for older stroke survivors

Chinese Study of Taiji and Parkinson’s Disease

Tai Chi Helps Boost Memory 

Taiji Secrets by Patrick Kelly

From familiarity with the correct touch, one gradually comprehends internal energy; from the comprehension of internal energy one can reach wisdom.              T’ai Chi Classics

Five Essential T’ai Chi Skills

When learning how to practice martial arts, it starts from emptiness and returns to emptiness. When you reach this point, the notions of Xingyi, Bagua, or Taiji all disappear into nothing but waves and ripples, an undifferentiated oneness in which there can no longer be a “Taiji” or a “Xingyi” or a “Bagua”. Therefore the practice of the boxing arts does not lie in the postures, only in the spirit and energy being fully rounded and without gaps. Che Yizhai

T’ai Chi and the Feldenkrais Method® by Ralph Strauch

The Interoceptive Turn: How we sense ourselves from within, including our bodily states, is creating a radical picture of selfhood by Noga Arikha

Interoception: the hidden sense that shapes wellbeing by David Robson

Breathing Lessons by Li Yaxuan

The Eight Gates of T’ai Chi Ch’uan 

The T’ai Chi Lesson That I Can Apply to Almost Anything by James Sturm

Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.                 – Victor Frankl

Health Benefits of T’ai Chi Ch’uan 

Medicine in motion: How Tai Chi heals body and mind by Sandee LaMotte

Finding a Sense of Balance Within by Greg Brodsky

You must be completely relaxed, only then can you respond spontaneously and unknowably to every condition. You must be as relaxed as a bag of bones, only this can properly be called relaxation. Never forget that you’ll never be able to issue energy as long as you cling to any residual tension whatsoever.  Li Yaxuan

Compression Breathing in the Practice of T’ai Chi Ch’uan by Greg Brodsky

Staying Rooted: Insights on How to Handle Stress Using T’ai Chi by Milton Huang

The Three Treasures: Jing, Qi and Shen

Only those activities that are easy and pleasant will become part of a person’s habitual life… Actions that are hard to carry out, for which a man must force himself to overcome his inner opposition will never become part of his normal daily life.- Moshe Feldenkrais 

What If It’s All Vertical?  by Greg Brodsky

T’ai Chi Driving by Greg Brodsky

Training Tip: Squats

Well-Used Ex-Marine Finds His Way to Health, Inner Peace by Gene Ervin

T’ai Chi is the Perfect Antidote to a Digital Age by Florence Waters (in The Telegraph)

Why Does Tai Chi Feel Good? by Paul Thagard, PhD

Better Sleep and Tai Chi Reduce Inflammation  Journal of Biological Psychiatry 

The Remarkable Dr. Ping-Siang Tao  by David Pace

The Way of the Brush by Toinette Lippe

Best Ad for Tai Chi Shoes Ever