The Function Of Daoist Tai Chi
☯️ is to become natural again, to rediscover the Original Body and Original Mind, and to explore where these 2 become 1. The natural Form of Movement involves correct alignment and correct transition from one alignment to the next through spirals.
It is The 3 Treasures of Daoist Tai Chi : how to stand, sit, and turn.
This practice cultivates The 3 Treasures of Daoism: stability of Form (body), Circulation (energy), and Awareness (mind). We can practice all this in any number of movements. Like a multi-faceted jewel, each and every part reflects the whole.
The Form of Tai Chi serves to give us a variety of nuances in the expression of simple principles. But it is our adherence to the simple principles that produces the result. In a single t’ai chi move there is standing, sitting, turning. And there is stability of Form, circulation of Energy, and cultivation of Awareness.
When body, energy, mind, all coordinate, we experience a unified mind-body. Awareness dawns that energy flows from intent, and embodies in continual physical changes (mind-energy-body). Our practice controls and directs change into cultivation of optimal function (Original Body), whilst awareness (Original Mind) sees all changes of phenomena occur within its own sphere or space.
The Function of Daoist Tai Chi is to cultivate stability of Form, circulation of Energy, and Awareness of the Dao
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Internal Alchemy and the Paradox of Becoming Ourselves
☯️ The reality of Internal Alchemy becomes more obvious when we practice for extended periods. We are changing as we work. Transformation, transmutation, feeling different, behaving differently – something new is being cultivated. The paradoxical reality is that in cultivating “something new” we become more truly ourselves. We are coming home to Original Body and Original Mind. Letting go of our “normal” we bring forth our truth ☯️
Letting Go and Bringing Forth: The Natural Movement of Wu Wei
☯️ Letting Go and Bringing Forth : like the yin-yang of breathing, or forgetting and remembering, releasing the negative automatically leads us to establishing the positive : as we let go of stress and destructive habits, we open into stability and harmony, we evolve from dysfunction into natural flow, from confusion into clarity : there is a realignment with our true natural state of being : letting go of the physical and mental-emotional problems we carry around we bring forth Original Body and Original Mind : this letting go and bringing forth is Wu Wei ☯️
Freedom of Choice Beyond Habitual Conditioning
☯️ Freedom Of Choice is rightly claimed as a natural right. But few see that it’s properly only achieved when we break free of habitual conditioned behaviour. The way we move the body, our emotional reactivity, and our habitual thought patterns are not complete freedom. Cultivation of the 3 Treasures (stability, circulation of energy, clarity of mind) is true freedom of choice. This cultivation doesn’t tell us what to think, feel, or do; it brings us into natural harmony, free from confusion ☯️
The Interpenetration of the Three Treasures in Daoist Tai Chi
☯️ The 3 Treasures of Daoist Tai Chi overlap and inter-penetrate each other : every sit and turn contains alignment of the spine, awareness engages with every movement, every turn includes sitting, every sit includes the spiral in muscles, the circulation of energy involves alignment and spiralling, even standing can be sitting and turning… these interactions produce a symphony of harmonic resonance like an instrument being played. We “play tai chi” like a child who is both the player and the instrument ☯️
☯️ The 3 Treasures of Daoism (Jing, Chi, Shen) are reflected in
The 3 Treasures of Daoist Tai Chi :
- Wu-Chi : Standing properly gives access to awareness mind (Shen);
- Dan-Yu : Sitting properly circulates energy (Chi-pump effect);
- Tor-Yu : Turning properly enhances the physical structure (Jing is solidity and integrity of body: bone density, lubrication and strengthening of joints, and grounding)
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The Threefold Presence: Guard, Gate, and Temple
☯️ Standing Guard at The Gates of The Temple 👫we are simultaneously all 3 aspects : the guard, the gate, the temple : outer, inner, innermost : body; energy; awareness : stability of physical posture, circulation of energy, clarity of mind : The 3Treasures of Daoist Tai Chi : Jing, Chi, Shen ☯️
Being Human: Cultivation Through Imperfection
☯️ Being Human means working with our imperfections. Only by acknowledging our faults and weaknesses can we know where to apply effort. Creating our wellbeing from the ground up is the key to practice. The light at the end of the tunnel is self-mastery, from the depths of our problems we emerge onto the ground with our feet set properly as in The Form. From there we can rise up with The Returning Force, lengthening with the 2 Roots and 2 Skyhooks. We expand with each breath, even into the Wei Chi Field. We relish the practice, each small step a cultivation of ourselves. The new expanded version of ourselves is seen paradoxically to be a restoration of what we truly always were. That which was hidden potential is actualised… ☯️
Practising in Harmony with Nature
☯️ Good practice in the rain today! Being ok with the way things are in nature, letting go of resistance, cultivating sensitivity. The Dao is often translated/explained as The Way, or the way things are in nature and the way of knowing/being with how things are in nature. Well done everyone. Daoist Tai Chi reflects natural processes in that it emerges from empty Wu Chi space, unfolds its processes, and returns to space. Along the way we are being cultivated. ☯️
Wise Investment to Live Longer in Good Condition
☯️ One of my Chi Gong teachers, the former abbot of Chithurst Buddhist Monastery, Ajahn Sucitto, taught the senior nuns at Amaravati Buddhist Monastery. The head nun, Ajahn Sundara was leading a retreat for which I was manager. She had been a nun since age 40, now 70. In her youth she’d been a ballet dancer and intellectual (married to professor of history at Hull university). She is a serious person, with knowledge, wisdom, and experience.
At the time of the retreat I was just starting to instruct Daoist Tai Chi, about 17 years ago, age 40. Ajahn Sundara observed I was the same age then that she was on entering the order 30 years before, then to begin training with the great Ajahn Sucitto. She looked at me very seriously and said that as I was instructing tai chi now it would prove to be the best investment for my old age, and for the old age of people in my classes.
The subtlety and power of this training is often overlooked. People often think that old age is way off, and while young it doesn’t matter. Yet the ancients knew it is far wiser to practice reconditioning now. Being in good condition means longevity is experienced in the now. A life energy depleted tends to decay. A life energy cultivated tends to increase vitality.
Therefore please consider the truth that your practice of Daoist Tai Chi is a wise investment in stability, vitality, clarity. You live longer in good condition.
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The Value of Extended Practice
☯️ The Value of Extended Practice Some of you may already realise that in practicing we go on a journey from our ordinary state towards the Dao.
This transformation has an outer Form and an Inner Alchemy. The yin-yang of stillness-movement spiral around each other to cultivate the 3 Treasures of stability, vitality, clarity.
We create a new habit of increased warming energy to melt the ice that easily re-freezes into old habits. Having re-frozen we often dont even remember the experience (or even the possibility) of having changed/unfrozen!
We accumulate familiarity and confidence in the healing power of the Form. We face the challenge of not returning to the frozen state.
When starting on any journey you can always go back and start again at any time; and sometimes you can forge ahead into new territory.
It’s partly about learning new movements, and partly about realising that the Form is a useful tool whose real power comes from applying it.
Cultivation takes time because growth in nature is a gradual process.
Along the way we have enough time to fully appreciate the change that is being cultivated ☯️
