Today, on Mario Napoli’s very fine Tai Chi Chuan Study Group Facebook page, one of the members, Barry Strugatz, whom I don’t know, posted an interesting Youtube piece from Harvard on the distinctly human mechanics of throwing. And Barry made the analogy of the storing of elastic tension in throwing to Tai Chi, and I’m assuming he means Fa Jin.
Read MoreOne of the most common problems in the Tai Chi population is knee problems. And it isn’t because of Tai Chi. It’s because of a problem in your own knee – and here’s how to fix it.
Read MoreI was attracted to Tai Chi because of the exceptional abilities of my teacher, Mr. Benjamin Lo, when I first met him in 1975 on his way through DC to join Robert Smith’s Bethesda, Maryland group on the way up to New York City and the memorial for Prof. Cheng on the occasion of his tragic death to be held at the Shih Jung School.
Read MoreMy great grand teacher, Yang Cheng-fu, mentioned in his writings that root in a tai chi adept felt like a huge cotton bail. On the outside, it was welcomingly light and soft, but the deeper you pushed into it the more it became apparent that the bail was solid enough to prove immovable.
Read MoreOkay, so, yes, Tai Chi takes a regular commitment. I think the best way to think about your Tai Chi commitment and practice is to think of it as your daily ritual of meditation, which medical research tells us is essential for optimum wellbeing. Also, research tells us that physical exercise is also essential—how convenient that with Tai Chi we can kill two birds with one stone! This makes Tai Chi the neatest thing on earth . . .
Read MorePeople have asked me why I call Ben Lo “Lao Ba”. As I write this line, I remember the illuminated, deeply satisfied expression coming over the face of my tai chi nephew, David Chen, when I told him that I called Ben by that name.
Read MoreIt was, I believe, summer of 1974. The details of this portrait may be fused from my several trips to Shih Jung School. Dale Ward and I took the train that Sunday from DC to New York, 75¢ one way.
Read MoreIn my very early days studying tai chi with my first teacher Bob Smith, author of the book, Masters and Methods, there was no doubt in our school that chi existed and was the centerpiece of tai chi. Smith had a line in the above-referenced book about how practicing with his teacher, Professor Cheng Man-ching, left one with absolutely no doubt that chi was a real thing.
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