The Vital Force Archive

Nory Esquivel compares T'ai Chi Chih with T'ai Chi Ch'uan, Rosen Method Movement, Erick Hawkins dance technique and Bartenieff Fundamentals, finding TCC simpler to learn yet equally effective and free of extraneous effort.

Justin Stone links karma to the habit energies built by the Chi, raises the dichotomy of Grace versus cause and effect, and cites Hakuin's Yassenkana on sinking heart fire below the navel.

Jody and her husband tried yoga and a T'ai Chi class before finding Hannah's T'ai Chi Chih class at the community center, where he gained relief from chronic pain and better sleep.

Judy Jackson has taught since 2005 at Exempla Lutheran Medical Center's holistic division in Wheat Ridge, and quotes students from three recent six-week sessions on moving meditation, balance and daily practice plans.

Sr. Antonia Cooper takes a student's remark about effort and no effort as a starting point for going deeper, drawing on Justin's koan in Spiritual Odyssey and on attentive awareness of how each movement begins, ends and feels.

Diana Bahn, a New York City teacher, takes a student's talk of American homogenization after a Florida beach trip as reason to be grateful that no two practitioners, or sessions, ever move alike.

Sandy McAlister takes patience and then expansion and contraction as concepts to examine in practice, tracing them through the back knee, front ankle, elbows and waist during the weight shift, until one student named her own contraction as fear.

Judy Chancey passes along her student Marilyn Morrison's gratitude for Justin Stone, and her discovery, after a year of practice and a new copy of Spiritual Odyssey, that hard work is not the only way.

Pam Towne imagines T'ai Chi Chih in 2111: millions practicing worldwide, teachers appearing as holograms in students' living rooms, a 1000-teacher conference, and the form still led by an appointed Guide.

Judy Tretheway describes two contrasting prison classes: at New Folsom, grieving a suicide, she let the men initiate the Chi, while at Old Folsom she led with visualizations and unsynchronized Working the Pulley.

Pete Gregory walks through Passing Clouds step by step, from the sideways T'ai Chi step and heel-to-heel weight shift to the counter-circling hands and the right fingers tickling the left elbow.

Marcy Burns, 83 and practising six times a week, describes how morning gloom lifts during group practice and how walking after a full practice leaves her faster and far less fatigued.

Amy Tyksinski's teaching tip has the bottom hand swing through rather than push through the t'an t'ien, plus Pete Gregory's notes on the opening waist twist and a poem.

Nadine Burge recounts how her mother's death in 2009 sent her into a depression that halted her practice, and how returning to fifteen minutes of T'ai Chi Chih eased both her neck and back arthritis and her mood.

Marty Beery, an accredited teacher, had a stroke weeks after retiring, and describes retraining her right hand, finding that body memory brought the movements back, and practising with a beginner's mind.

Glenn Northern, skeptical that a non-Chinese teacher could create a T'ai Chi form, enrolled in Sister Morales's class four years after meniscus surgery and found his knee pain gone by the tenth lesson.

Carmen L. Brocklehurst recounts an Atlanta workshop where Sheryl Adair's phone calls and emails brought sixteen students past work, flu, a funeral and distance, and quotes Justin on practising even when you don't feel like it.

Carolyn and Dennis, one week into their first TCC lessons, began home hemodialysis and found that doing a few movements dissolved the nervousness and jitters of a difficult treatment day.

Justin Stone offers a string of aphorisms on words versus actions, the danger of getting stuck in a feeling of Unity, the mental constructs we mistake for the world, and impermanence.

Taking up Justin Stone's question about whether TCC will have enough teachers, Hannah Hedrick describes organizing an accreditation course on the Big Island and credits Donna McElhose's six hours of vacation instruction.

Kompalya Thunderbird recounts learning the nineteen movements and one pose with Neena Mitchell, and how a first six-week course replaced constant worry with peace, harmony and clarity beyond years of yoga.

A rundown of the new taichichih.org features: a chronological, hyperlinked "In The News" archive of TCC press and research, a blog of Justin's writings, comment threads, and integrated Facebook and Flickr feeds.

Karen Carlisle, 67, joined Hope Spangler's class at Yavapai College after two foot surgeries and severe arthritis, and six months later walks miles barefoot with minimal pain.

Carolyn O'Donnell describes finding T'ai Chi Chih on a television segment in April 2010, taking beginner and Beyond Beginners classes with Sheila Leonard, and making morning practice part of her daily routine.

Terry Jennings practices every morning on her lanai facing the mountains, clouds and flowers, and describes how joy overflows by the end of the first movement, calling TCC her best friend.

Ruth Lillie, new to slow and purposeful movement, matches T'ai Chi Chih movements to her household pets: Stu the perpetually moving dachshund, Lewie the hunter cat, and Jujube the calm Sulcata tortoise.

April Leffler, diagnosed with Meniere's Disease, describes canceling classes and waking to a spinning room, and how dropping her attention to the soles of her feet loosens her white-knuckled grip on fear.

Three Big Island practitioners speak up: teacher Sharon Cushman credits 16 years of practice and her teacher Victoria Townsend, student Donna Fischer found balance and self-confidence, and Dave Johnson gave up coffee.

Dana Diller compares T'ai Chi Chih to the dormant oil applied to pinyon pines in early spring to control the needle scale insect, controlling stresses that rob vigor.

Neal Roy announces the 27th annual TCC Teacher Conference, set for July 5th through 8th, 2012 at the Red Lion Hotel on Portland's Columbia River, themed Bridges to Joy.