Our Chinese New Year celebration was a mix of participating, listening and watching (and eating!). We started the afternoon with QiGong, gentle movements to get Qi moving for everybody in the room. We listened to some legends and history of Chinese New Year, rich with color and symbolism. We watched the beautiful, flowing movements of Dan and Debra in their Yang style form and sword demonstration. We concluded with students from my various classes demonstrating a portion of the short Yang style form by Cheng Man-Ch’ing and a Sun style form developed by Dr. Paul Lam. The finale was my leading everybody through the ancient Wudang TaiJi Five Element Bagua Fist QiGong form. Long name, beautiful form.

So there we were, moving our Qi in unison, those with no Tai Chi experience and those with over a dozen years. In a sense, we were all beginners, just at the first phase of discovering such a rich discipline and meditation in motion, called Tai Chi.

What a wonderful experience to have people come together and for three hours forget everything outside of the room, focus only on what was happening in the moment, relaxing, laughing, telling stories and moving energy together. Lots of smiles and ah-has.

Walking into the classroom on Monday, the following day, I felt the energy. The energy was palpable in that room from 24 hours earlier. That’s the ‘power’ of Tai Chi, mindful focus on moving energy. creating many positive, lasting effects.

Very grateful.