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Tai Chi Is Simple And Easy

Steve Rowe

Tai Chi is ‘simple and easy’, it’s only one thing that we view through many different windows to increase our understanding. The first aware breath you take in neigong makes you better than you were before you took it. Your first lesson where you’re taught to ‘stand tall, breathe deep and focus your mind’ makes you better than before you attended. It makes you feel better, healthier, more happy and positive. From that point on you can only improve these skills. Always practice with an inner smile knowing that you can only get better. It takes years to ‘master’ musical … Continue reading Tai Chi Is Simple And Easy

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The Universe Police

Steve Rowe

I was floating around as a spirit in the universe with a kind of unresolved yearning. Then the universe police caught me in a net set out for spirits like me and I was given a ‘life sentence’ and suddenly found myself imprisoned in a meat carcass on this planet. At first I was confused, selfish, hurt and hated prison, as a result the other prisoners hated me and I hated them, my ‘teenage years’ were tumultuous and painful. I caused a lot of danger to myself, my cell, others and the prison itself. As the years went by I … Continue reading The Universe Police

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Dealing with 3am Black Dog

Steve Rowe

Dealing the 3am black dog. When you wake with that incredible feeling of dread or anxiety, when PTSD is at its height and what is normally only irritating makes you extremely angry. Breathe in fully and completely using lower abdomen, then expanding the ribcage and lengthening the neck and drain all energy, softening all tissue down with the outbreath to the lower abdomen. If that doesn’t work sit up and do the same. If that doesn’t work use distraction, think of a random word and with each letter of that word think of every other word that starts with that … Continue reading Dealing with 3am Black Dog

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Fingers & Thumbs In Tai Chi

Steve Rowe

Carrying on from my posts on cupping and flattening the palms of the hands to pump the energy and the power of mudras to manipulate it on discharge I thought I’d do a post on fingers and thumbs as they manipulate both. All these posts are on my blog. The thumb controls a large part of the hand and the ‘tiger’s mouth’ (the area between thumb and forefinger) and is used extensively for trapping and guiding the opponent. The forefinger ‘points’ and directs the hand and energy also stretching to work the other part of the tiger’s mouth. The middle … Continue reading Fingers & Thumbs In Tai Chi

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Tai Chi Teachers

Steve Rowe

When someone spends ages telling us what taiji/qi/neigong/qigong isn’t, I’m waiting for them to tell me what it is. When they’re telling us that we’re all ignorant and don’t understand and only they do, my spidey senses are alerted. When we’re told that you have to spend years to understand and train it I can definitely smell snake oil. Whatever art or system you train in after your first session you’ll be better than you were before it. Then you build your skills as the days, weeks, months and years go by, exactly the same as if you were learning … Continue reading Tai Chi Teachers

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Semantic Satiation In Tai Chi

Steve Rowe

Semantic satiation is when you’ve repeated a word many times and it loses its meaning and becomes just a sound, this can also happen with tai chi techniques. You’re practising your form day after day, month after month and year after year, the form has become a moving meditation, suddenly that technique that you’ve done so many times feels wrong. This is how when your mind and movement have gone from ‘absorption’ to ‘insight’, the conditions are right for these insights to arise. Your mind is receiving messages from the body to tell you ‘this isn’t right’ and that it … Continue reading Semantic Satiation In Tai Chi

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Respect Is A 2 Way Street

Steve Rowe

Many martial artists learning capacity has an expiry date. They get what they want or need from a teacher or system and some stop progressing at that point or move on to someone or something else. It’s a hard pill for some teachers to swallow as they feel discarded and that the work they put into that person was wasted but that’s not true. If the student stops learning at that point they’ve reached capacity, but the teacher’s contribution still have added value to their life. Others have got what they wanted or needed from one teacher and now need … Continue reading Respect Is A 2 Way Street

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Body Intelligence

Steve Rowe

Body IntelligenceThe more we train, the more get to realise and utilise this skill. The mindfulness aspect of training means that as we develop good posture and deep breathing: Our body calms down,Then our emotions calm down,Finally our mind calms down and becomes more aware, focused, sensitive and intense. This means that instead of trying to train subjectively and having to take instruction, as we’ve been indoctrinated to do with the desire to ‘become’ something, our new state of being is able to observe objectively to see and feel what is actually going on. This unified state of inner calm … Continue reading Body Intelligence

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Qigong In Plain English

Steve Rowe

From this morning’s training –Insights couched in analogies and plain English (my skill). Think of the ‘arches’ of the feet and the palms of the hands as like sink plungers ‘sucking and blowing’ energy when everything is connected through the body with the bows in the jointed parts storing and releasing the energy to and from them. The energy is ‘coloured’ and intensified by emotion and intention like releasing a morning stretch and shivering at the spine sending and bouncing pinballs like in a pinball machine. If you get this, our minds work in a similar way and our training … Continue reading Qigong In Plain English

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My Day’s Training Schedule

Steve Rowe

I always start my Tai Chi coaching sessions by asking the students how they’re getting on with their training programme, any questions, any problems or any comments, and it helps me to shape the day’s study. I thought over the next few days I might share some of the most common thoughts. One of the most common comments is ‘I’ve been concentrating on one particular form or part of it’. The problem is that while they are doing this the other forms and skills slide. I practice everything in the syllabus every day, in the morning I’ll meditate, do the … Continue reading My Day’s Training Schedule