Faulk TaiChi

Learn the beautiful, flowing movements for health and relaxation.

Slowing Down with Tai Chi

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Yang Jun
Yang Jun

It’s been 16 days since I wrote my last blog and some of you have told me you miss it. I appreciate your comments and knowing you look forward to my posts.

Although I have not written here, I have been writing. In fact, lots of writing. So many over the years have encouraged me to write my story and I am now working on that. A writing coach. Weekly assignments. Reading specific writers who will help inform my own writing. Lots of writing. I am on my way, and Tai Chi will be a big part of the story. Tai Chi helped transform my life. Tai Chi helped me discover health and balance. Tai Chi is helping me get healthier as I age.

tai chi class Evanston

Occasionally, I mention to my students that Tai Chi is one of the few things in life that gets better as you slow it down. Slow everything down. Focus on the moment, on that single move you are about to take. We need to slow down, take some time to be quiet, for discovery to take place. Be quiet and empty out our thoughts and tensions. Only then will we be able to open up, receive new thoughts and new ways of moving through our days.

Tai Chi is a practice that teaches us ways of slowing down, emptying out our minds and learning to have our mind direct our energy in very healthy ways. It’s a great time of year to start a class, to do something so healthy for yourself that it will benefit not only you, but all those with whom you have contact. When we learn how to generate positive, relaxed energy it radiates out to others. We all like that and we all can use more of it.

Learning about Energy

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tai chi master


Being in the presence of Tai Chi Grandmasters at the International Tai Chi Symposium was a privilege. Most of the keynote speeches and class instruction were in Chinese. It was amazing how clear and captivating it all was – there was no language barrier when it came to Tai Chi Chuan.

tai chi master

Each master stressed relaxation. Relaxation helps us:

-root. When we’re tense, too much energy is held in the top half of the
body.
-unify energy. We internally release energy from the tan t’ien.
-be agile for change. Otherwise, we can’t distinguish from full and empty,
know where the energy is.

The body becomes steady. The upper body is light; the middle body is agile; the lower body is rooted, energy sinks to the tan t’ien.

A main theme I derived from all the Grandmasters was that Tai Chi is more about learning and understanding our energy rather than performing movements. The movements are important to provide a structure and sequence for directing our mind and energy, but movements are not the goal.

Learning about and understanding our energy is much broader than Tai Chi. For each of us, how we understand and use our energy helps determine our quality of life, every day.

Lessons from Tai Chi Grandmasters on Relaxation

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Tai Chi Yin Yang

All of the tai chi grandmasters are talking about “relaxation” of the body and mind. Isn’t that what we all desire, whether or not tai chi is a part of our life? I think so.

Each morning one of the grandmasters gives a keynote address to the entire gathering. They have an opportunity to explain their particular style and each one has emphasizes principles that are foundational, regardless of particular style.

Grandmaster Zhong Zhenshan said “the mind pays attention to the breath but doesn’t direct it. That allows the two to naturally come together.” Grandmaster Yang Jun said “relaxation helps us root into the earth, unify the body’s energy and be agile for change.” Grandmaster Chen Zhenglei said “the torso is upright. The shoulders are relaxed. The whole body is a circle; there are no straight lines.

These are merely snippets of the emphasis given to relaxation in tai chi. Each grandmaster developed,and taught a 10-movement form. Each stressed relaxation and were live examples of that when teaching individual moves.

Then last night we had the wonderful opportunity to see performances, of each style, solo and two-person forms, group demonstrations. Yes, beautiful to watch and also beautiful to feel. Some moves were even and smooth, some were slow, with sudden explosive follow-up steps. Powerful and relaxed at the same time. We saw it and we felt it.

Tai chi helps us cultivate that powerful, centered energy because we learn to relaxe our bodies and minds. That, in turn, carries into our daily lives and affects how we move and relate to others around us.

Tai Chi Form in China

Just think of the strides we all could make in living fuller lives, in positively relating to people in different cultures and with different world views,if we all would learn to relax.

It starts with us as individuals, one person at a time. Tai Chi has some excellent lessons for us, in how we can make that start to happen.

Changing the Way You Look at Things

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A few days ago I posted a quote on my FAULK TAI CHI Facebook page, from Wayne W. Dyer, a prolific writer and inspirational speaker:

When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.”

The reach was far and readers liked it. It makes sense to me that people do want to broaden their perspectives, think more creatively or embrace change. How do we do that?

Faulk Tai Chi demonstration

One of my Tai Chi students had a profound experience of this change, which I want to share. She is a new student, in her fourth month of weekly Tai Chi class with me.  She is motivated to learn and is inquisitive. Early on she asked, “Does my arm go here? Should I try to relax my fingers?,” wanting to follow and do the moves ‘correctly’.

“The most important thing is to relax and focus on is where your weight is. The benefit of Tai Chi comes from intentionally shifting your weight in a very methodical way,” I explain to her and the class.

“Tai Chi and QiGong are about ‘allowing’ rather than ‘trying hard’. Letting go, relaxing can be a challenge in our busy lives. But for this hour, we have no ‘to do’s’ and no ‘shoulds’,” I add.

After class one day, this student came up to me.

“I’m so excited and  just have to tell you something,” she said. “I always thought of  energy as something I use to get me through my days and when it’s low, I know I need more sleep. I’ve never consciously felt it and frankly I haven’t, before now, thought about it intentionally. But with Tai Chi I’ve felt warmth in my hands and a few ‘a-ha’s’ when I start to relax. I was out walking my dog last night and I felt centered and thought to myself, I’m moving my energy. I’m feeling my energy!”

She has shifted how she looks at energy and now her energy has changed. Wonderful!

An Olive Branch Experience

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Olive Branch, Mississippi. I love that city’s name. It draws me in. I spent last the last seven days there.

Two hundred Tai Chi enthusiasts, teachers and students, gathered for a one-week workshop with Dr. Paul Lam, to study and “play” Tai Chi. Journeys started as close as Memphis and as far as California, Oregon, Hawaii, Vermont, Florida, England, Scotland, Austria and Australia.  With a variety of backgrounds, ages, states of physical health, sizes and shapes, all of us had a common thread and love — Tai Chi.

In advance of the week, each of us selected a particular form that we wanted to study and focus on the entire week.  Pat from Florida and Guy from New York, team-taught our class. They are Master Trainers for Dr. Lam and have years of Tai Chi and Kung Fu experience, both having been in competitions. Their love is Tai Chi and teaching it for health. We learned new moves and practiced four hours a day, sometimes more. After class, many practiced in hallways, outside, in open classrooms, all  on our own time.  It was obvious that everybody wanted to learn, wanted to understand the underlying principles and wanted to use Tai Chi as a tool to promote healthy lives, and for teachers, to pass it on to their students.

Given the concentration of study and practice, it was far from a type-A atmosphere.  There were breaks for tea and snacks. We drank plenty of water. Students sat down if they needed to rest.  Still echoing in my mind are my teachers’ frequent suggestions – “relax”. “do only what you can”. “nothing should hurt”. “don’t worry about the details — they will come later”.

As the week progressed and we became more confident with the movements and their sequence, there was less talk in class. We started to flow forward, backward as we shifted our weight. We moved less as individuals and more as a group. There was focus and there was silence. The flow and the silence helped us relax. The relaxation helped us with focus and flow. The flowing energy was more than a group of individuals; it was bigger than the individual parts. Our group energy filled the room.

Those moments of silence, focusing only on where we were in the present were key to feeling relaxed and fulfilled. It seems that each of us needs to find those moments.