The Vital Force Archive

Eileen Magnuson recounts her accreditation week with Pam in Albuquerque, where candidates and auditors from across the country worked on mindfulness, grounding and finding words to teach, closing with a graduation dinner featuring Justin's artwork.

Eliza Fulton pairs the Aramaic Lord's Prayer, meant to be embodied and intoned, with the TCC movements from Rocking Motion through Passing Clouds, finding new meaning in the Around the Platter variation.

Justin Stone's writings paired here: verses from Spiritual Odyssey on impermanence and non-attachment, and a taped lecture comparing T'ai Chi Ch'uan's 108 movements with the quick results of T'ai Chi Chih, including the priest who regained his sense of smell in the 1974 first class.

Lynn Porzig recounts her accreditation course as both thrill and agony, from effortless Chi flow in "aha" moments to movements falling apart while mirroring the Six Healing Sounds.

Guy Kent uses an orchestra analogy to argue that teachers should play their own instrument but not rewrite the score, recalling Justin Stone dropping Circles within Circles and adding the jing.

Rachel Rilinger announces her accreditation after six-and-a-half years of practice begun with her aunt Terry Jennings, and lists the settings where she plans to teach, from a disability camp to a climbing gym.

Seven years after Justin Stone's death, Sheryl Adair catalogs what he left behind, from books and pyramid poetry to his refusal to charge teachers, and asks how teachers can keep his selflessness alive for students.

Shari Holmes, accredited in November and teaching her first class right after New Year, describes the twelve students who came, the forgotten handouts and tips, and watching beginners find softness.

Donovan Rundle plays grand piano accompaniment for all 19 movements at Lisa Otero's Silent Circle Practice in Ventura, and traces his playing back to physical therapy for a bullet wound to his dominant hand.

Justin Stone explains the one-two-three-four-three-two-one syllable Pyramid Poem form he invented as an English alternative to haiku, argues joy is our natural state clouded by words, and gathers retreat poems on silence.

Nancy Johnson writes as an owl looking down on a flock of white-robed Brothers who walk slowly to and fro, wondering whether those wing-like gowns could ever fly.

Rose Brown describes how Marie Dotts and Sandy McAlister at the Colorado Springs Intensive returned her to body awareness, prompting tears, emotional release and a new grounding practice in the soles of her feet.

Nancy Johnson sets a great horned owl beside a satellite at dusk, contrasting solo grace and natural stillness with metal, programs and village-sized upkeep, then asks whether both belong.

Andrea Skillman recounts teaching T'ai Chi Chih to long-term care residents, veterans at fall risk, and more than a decade of early morning classes for the American Holistic Nurse Association's national conference, with student evaluations included.

Carmen Brocklehurst describes how Caroline Guilott's invitation to touch one's own cheeks like a baby's face let teachers feel softness for the first time, plus the 2019 Minnesota conference theme Return to the Circle.

Nancy Jo Bleier recounts how a breast cancer diagnosis and surgery in Seattle led her back to a T'ai Chi Chih practice she had nearly abandoned, and to plans to teach again.

Sandy McAlister marks T'ai Chi Chih's 45th year with retreat participants' reasons for practicing, and urges teachers to drop unwarranted fear, use World Tai Chi & Qigong Day, and let TCC shine publicly.

Ron Richardson asked students at his church class why they practice, and student Park Dodge of Tupelo compared moving in unison to the call and response of liturgical worship.

Dan Pienciak returned to teaching after three family deaths, and used Gene Kelly's remarks about being grounded to the earth and dancing from the waist down to re-focus his classes on grounding, softness in the upper body, and surrender.

Linda Minor describes preparing to teach a seated class for seniors aging in place, practising seated herself, attending Carmen Brocklehurst's retreat entirely seated, and checking the room for armless chairs.

Dr. Janet Oussaty reports from the inaugural International Medical Tai Chi and Qigong Association conference at Massachusetts General Hospital, where researchers proposed grandfathering accredited T'ai Chi Chih instructors into new standards.

Nancy Johnson thanks the strangers behind her daily comforts: whoever planted the tea she brews, the makers of a mismatched thrift store sweater, the farmers, entertainers and caretakers.

Judy Kistler-Robinson, teaching a Saturday class at a 55-plus retirement complex, found herself telling students to pick up a burden from the shoulder, carry it forward and release it.

Four men in Julie Heryet's Folsom Prison class describe what the practice gives them: internal cleansing, a filter for bad thoughts, relief from body pain, support for 24 years of sobriety, and silent recognition on the yard.

Dorene Krause describes how Push Pull has spoken to her since her beginner days, connecting the forward release and the drawing in of energy to the rhythm of ocean tides where she practices.

Jan Wilkowski recounts a brutal third week after left knee replacement, when playing Justin Stone's DVD on repeat and moving the arms, then the mind, brought her first real sleep and a return to writing and artwork.

April Leffler describes organizing T'ai Chi Chih flash mobs at two Pennsylvania malls, one circling a two-story lighted reindeer, with participants' accounts of finding calm amid holiday shoppers.

Nancy Johnson argues that a broken heart holds more, urging readers to drop resistance, abandon jealousy and ownership, and practise calmness, patience and tenderness as a religion of the Open Heart.

Linda Worlton recounts the November accreditation course in Albuquerque, where an auditor's question about where she disappeared to during the movements exposed the self-criticism and 'survivor armor' behind her tension.

Susan K. G. McGrath describes how, after a first year of practice spent balancing her own energy, she found herself balancing chi for family, friends, everyone and everything, an experience Justin Stone called "TCC doing itself."