About chi
The Traditional Chinese Tai Chi model is based on the premise that
there is a bio-energy system (Chi) in the body.
"Chi or Qi" gets carried round the body in energy channels called meridians.
There are 12 main meridians and 8 secondary meridians.
When your Chi flows smoothly trough the meridians you are well.
Chi is circulating life energy.
Chi (energy) is the vital life force believed in
Taoism to be inherent in all things
Chi is expressed in the combination of
passive (yin) and active principles (yang).
Expressed in the balance between yin and yang.
Everything is always changing.
Chi(qi) is the universal energy behind all changes.
Chi refers to the energy of the universe as well as to our own life force.
Chi is the drive behind happiness, confidence, self-esteem,
success and good health.
Happiness and good health is a question of a healthy chi.
Manipulating the chi flow
to change, to weaken, to block or to interrupt
the natural flow in the meridians.
Accu point manipulating can be effective for short time use.
Dim mak (Dian Xue): to destroy the natural chi flow.
Only in a life or dead situation, when the only alternative is your dead.
Hitting the right targets, automatically, with the right technique,
the right speed and the right power, solide and automatically:
conflict is over. So help you God, but He doesn't help you.
6 HEXAGRAMS:
In traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) there are 6 different sick chi (binqi).
All of them are related on fire, heat, dryness, damp, cold or wind.
8 DIRECTIONS:(for example 'wind binqi'):
Stormy wind binqi: small intestine related.
Strong wind binqi:kidneys related.
Soft wind binqi: liver related. Gentle breeze: stomach related.
Brutal wind: large intestine related. Week wind: hart related.
Dangerous wind: spleen related. Vigorous wind: lung related.
Tai Chi: fine tuning of the control system (lungs and hart).
Challenge heart and lungs.
to make our lungs breath and our hart beat.
Remember:
All internal Chinese martial arts use the hexagrams
(6 changes) in 8 directions.
Your Tai Chi study has no end.
Chi (chee-qi) is invisible life giving force know only by its effects.
Rivers streaming, plants growing, stars shining....
are manifestations of chi.
All functions of the body and mind are all manifestations of chi.
The goal of Tai Chi Chuan should be to stimulate the correct energy flow.
Everything and everybody has his own 'chi'.
Even a tiger has his chi.
Tiger chi stands for great power and flow chi.
Each Tai Chi posture is a physical tool to stimulate the inner energy flow.
The ideas behind postures of Tai Chi Chuan are universal
and not limited to the expression of postures,
or to any Tai Chi form or to any Tai Chi style.
Nor to any Tai Chi family.
Nor to any country.
If they did not, what purpose did they serve.
Tai Chi Postures:
° Step back to ride tiger:
to ride tiger means that you must have achieve a perfect control over your own chi flow( this posture is expressed in hexagram 53). Congratulations.
° Carry tiger and return to mountain:
the mountain is a place of stillness and rest. You give your chi to stillness and rest where it stays until you are ready to start again. In this posture your legs and respiration are very important to return to the mountain.
° Hit the tiger left and right:
be gentle with tiger chi... Tigers could be dangerous animals. This posture is derived from hexagram 42.
° Shoot tiger:
has to do with body and soul chi (hexagram 40).
Your Tai Chi study has no end.
Our attitudes, our emotions are all influenced by our chi level.
A weakened or blocked chi flow is considered the beginning of all disease.
One of the best ways to build and develop our chi level is Tai Chi Chuan.
Chi can be hardened in the lower abdomen( tantien).
People sleep to rebalance, to renew their chi.
The more relaxed their rest and sleep,
the more easily their energy is increased.
Nutrition, emotions, posture, water quality,
breathing, exercise, music...
all our thoughts and deeds have a bearing on our chi level.
Tai chi is the art of rebalancing and renewing the chi.
The balance between yin and yang
in the body is essential for mental and physical health.
Workshop 'chi painting' with my student Petra Von Knobelsdorf
Petra:"My passions lie in working with young people".
"Your thoughts, emotions and feelings are energy, or 'chi',
they can shape and change your own reality".
Nothing is hopeless, we must hope for everything.
"Be the change you want to see in the world"
Mahatma Gandhi
Petra Von Knobelsdorf:
"Thoughts are powerful pulses of invisible energy (chi or qi). Thoughts and imagination are everything, they are the
preview of life's attractions. Invisible energy or chi, is powering your visible experiences, your own thoughts can shape
and color your own reality. So, if you' re constantly focusing on negative thoughts, what type of realty will unfold for
you? But, what would happen if we made the conscious choice to think only positive thoughts ? Your invisible energy is
powering your visible reality and you can control and direct it. So, change your reality, your positive thoughts lead to
positive outcomes!"
Visible horse power is limited, while invisible chi power is not.
In working with the chi flow within our being, it needs to be understood
that chi flows on the path of least resistance.
To understand this, just look at the way water runs down hill.
Water runs down hill.
Energy flows on the path of least resistance.
In many ways we can look at this process as a river flowing
in a given direction through a given environment.
Chi flows in the path of least resistance.
Don't resist positive thoughts, and change your reality.
Energy (chi) is free to flow or not to flow.
Follow the positive!
I hope you find your way to the sunny side of the street.
Be positive, be spontaneous.
"Be spontaneous" is a well known Taoist paradox. If you follow this recommendation, your behavior can no longer be
spontaneous.
If you spontaneously decide to be spontaneous, or to do nothing, you are not spontaneous either. In this case it doesn't
matter what you do, you're always doing it wrong. "Be spontaneous" means: "Let it be, go with the flow, let the good times
roll" (laissez les bon temps rouler). Go with the flow strongly conveys the joy of living (joie de vivre) attitude.
Let the good times roll, let it be.
Your own chi flow must be free to follow its natural course
into and out of form within the environment in which it finds itself.
Let the good times roll.
A positive and joyful attitude allows the chi to flow more easily.
Go with the flow.
Without a flow of energy there is no creation.
Working with the natural chi flow without some feeling, nothing happens.
Creation lies in what we feel and allow ourselves to feel,
and what we give permission to feel to ourselves to feel.
Make your own world.
When we act, we create our own reality.
Create your own reality.
The human act of creating is an ebb and flow of energy
into and out of form.
Our thoughts and feelings dictate our creation.
Without some feeling, there is no creation, and nothing happens.
Sometimes the image, thought or feeling is literal, sometimes figurative.
Our feelings are not under control, but, we can control our actions.
The greater clarity we have in seeing and feeling the energy flow as it is,
the more and more image we get will be literal rather than figurative.
Feelings and action :
the relationship between inner feeling and outer action is very useful.
Don't think, just do it.
However the image may make no logical sense.
Your thoughts are energy waves that go out into the universe.
The law of attraction : like attracts like.
Chinese masters about chi: