Standing with head gently erect, eyes straight ahead. Why is it so hard? Wherever you take a t’ai chi class, from whichever teacher in whatever town or village in the world, you will hear at some point, imagine a long thread, stretching from the crown of your head, to the sky. it’s almost always something I say at the beginning of each class (after all the other postural instructions, starting from the feet). it’s quite an image, though, your crown attached umbilically to the heavens, and we may struggle a bit trying to visualize it, let alone to enact, and then to stay like this throughout the one hour class! Don’t feel discouraged. I tell my class that it’s probably the hardest part of the pose and the form — keeping your eyes focused ahead, your head relaxed on the stem of your neck. A teaching: Hawkes, my erstwhile teacher, would tell us, y ou can kill with your eyes! You can't though if your eyes are cast down, searching the floor
This is a blog about t'ai chi, specifically how we can apply the teachings of this ancient practice to our contemporary lives. How do we navigate an icy sidewalk? What is the best posture for that dreaded job interview? There are the eternal problems, of course, of back pain and creaky knees. My intention is to have a place to share ideas about t'ai chi methods of caring for our spirits and bodies in today's complicated world.