The Vital Force Archive

Guy Kent announces the TCC Association's move to a larger Osuna Road center in Albuquerque, recalling the counsel that Chi follows community and the first center's 1995 opening.

Darlene Benton, who learned T'ai Chi Chih largely from Carmen Brocklehurst's YouTube videos, finally visited the Albuquerque center, toured Justin Stone's artwork and books with Guy and Carmen, and bought his "Joy" notecards.

Sharon Sirkis collects four TCC laughs, from a plumber who found waterfall music anything but soothing to a teacher candidate joking about the KGB over an autographed brochure.

Lanni Lantery recounts a 2003 TCC presentation where built-up Chi made her karate demonstration so fast she split her student's groin cup, plus a beginner's George Clooney remark during Pulling in the Energy.

Tara Stiles recounts coaxing travel companions into doing T'ai Chi Chih in airports before long flights to Australia, and choosing grounding movements like Bass Drum in a cramped courtroom corridor.

Beverly J. Miles describes a year of practising Seijaku and arrives at the questions she still cannot answer, about holding the breath during hold fast, alternating sides in the Joy Song, and which movements are omitted.

Sharon Sirkis Columbia collects three teaching mishaps, including a retirement community student whose hearing aid batteries died mid-class and a college student who decided Pulling in the Energy causes heart attacks.

Lorry Marcketta recounts Janet Oussaty's afternoon workshop on teaching beginners, with five points including ocean-wave imagery for Rocking Motion, energy balls held between the hands, and avoiding analysis paralysis.

Sharon Sirkis Columbia recounts three classroom moments from 2001: a reluctant husband who called his practice "T'ai Chi - Cha Cha Cha," a quip to Justin about "umm" versus "OM," and her own trip up the stairs.

Jan Walker asks the private TCC teacher Facebook group why polarity matters, and Chris McLain, Jessica Lewis, Hannah Hedrick and Barbara Kristoff answer with quiet minds, universal principles and Randolph Stone's polarity therapy.

Sharon Sirkis reprints four classroom jokes from December 2000, including a senior worried his big belly would stall the waist's engine and a hubcap that became the Seventh Healing Sound.

Sharon Sirkus collects four moments of classroom comedy, from an over-achieving teacher candidate over-rotating her waist to a student whose cracking joints sounded like clicking castanets.

Sharon Sirkis collects four classroom moments, including Ruth's shaking key-ring bracelet, silly putty mistaken for chewing gum during Pulling Taffy, and a student who called Anugama's music a funeral march.

Diana Hudson's Christmas parody recasts "The Night Before Christmas" with the WooWoos, her outdoor practice group at Veteran's Park, and a Santa pulled by honking wild geese who passes his COVID test before joining them.

Sharon Sirkis logs a fretful morning minute by minute until an insistent hunch sends her to the cable guide, where the 8:00 film is "Excess Baggage," followed by student accounts of Daniel Pienciak's June 2021 Seijaku weekend.

Lorraine Lepine catalogues a T'ai Chi Chih intensive entirely in words beginning with R, from revisiting movement basics with a beginner's mind to remembering she is not alone in the journey.

Sharon Sirkis collects five teaching mishaps from her early years, including a senior center student who wanted to push away his wife and a chat attempted with a man on silent retreat.

Trish Winger's students kept missing the mark on Working the Pulley, so she watched herself in the mirror and recast the movement as a pie throwing machine, with one pie handed over after another.

Mary Ann Johnson of Ponte Vedra Beach offers a New Year blessing in verse, wishing 365 days of deep joy and 525,600 minutes of peace to the TCC circle, sometimes gathered virtually.

Bruce Lee describes how moving softly and slowly as though flowing in a dream draws attention out of the head into the body, letting thoughts float by and revealing the divinity within.

Rick Davis finds time in the subtle pressure against the soles of the feet, arguing that each weight shift, settling and return marks one moment from the next during pandemic uncertainty.

Sharon Sirkis collects three classroom moments: a student telling her late, flustered teacher to get grounded, a class inventing its own Six Healing Sounds, and Howard's jigsaw puzzle Show and Tell.

Sharon Sirkis recounts her first Zoom class of seated T'ai Chi Chih, coaching a newcomer's beautiful smile through several movements before discovering it was Melissa's still photo, left behind after she logged off.

Deb Sitron's 89-year-old student at a Naples senior residence introduced her to his grandson at a fruit stand as "my Tie Dye teacher," and she let the mistake stand.

KG recounts two email mishaps: Carolyn Pogwist's joke about flying among clouds without cloud access, and an "impatient" reminder to teachers that sent itself three times.

Sharon Sirkis passes along a college student's story: after a class discussion on grounding and avoiding distractions, the student hung up from an undistracted hour-long phone call wondering whether the dog had been fed.

Donna Deffenbaugh recounts buying olive green drawstring pants and velveteen shoes for her first T'ai Chi Chih class, the too-big black replacements her teacher teased her about, and what practice is really about.

Vic Berg announces a new online teacher code and re-registration for ordering materials, followed by Sharon Sirkis quoting a college student on her barefoot professor and her deadline exchange with KG.

Sheryl Adair practices in a sunny spot in her home studio, reads Justin Stone's line about gratitude, then tastes harmony, circularity and balance in a breakfast bowl of Cheerios and blueberries.

Sr. Agnes Fleming, certified since 1992, recounts teaching in retreat houses, stepping back after cancer, and keeping a daily practice at her east-facing convent window with the dawn and birdsong.