The Vital Force Archive

Acupuncturist Margaret Weber, Ph.D. spoke on T'ai Chi Chih to nearly 100 people at the April 1994 Whole Life Expo, with Bay Area teachers performing the form and a seated version demonstrated.

Anne Doering, a T'ai Chi Chih student, offers a short syllable-counted poem praising the practice as release and simple joyful moves, and Justin Stone as the teacher leading students up joyous mountains.

Tara Stiles of Sacramento lists eight teaching points for a handout, from yinning and yanging feet and diaphragmatic breathing to relaxed shoulders, rootedness in the legs and quietness within movement.

Barbara Peller recounts sponsoring the April 1994 teachers' course at a Techny retreat center, where nine candidates were accredited, and her imminent move to northwest Wisconsin to marry and start new classes.

Catherine Clark, a student of Elizabeth Tyler in Lake Oswego, calls her T'ai Chi Chih practice an extraordinary gift whose benefits came faster than any meditation or yoga she had tried.

Dyanna Chowka's brief pyramid poem offers a single image for the practice, asking the practitioner to move like a strand of pearls.

Sr. Adria Neumann's pyramid poem moves from spreading palm heat and healing aura through exploding kaleidoscope light to the feather softness and rooted hardness she calls the Seijaku contrast.

Jamie McDonald's pyramid poem describes arms, legs and head disappearing during practice, currents of energy visible flowing from the t'an t'ien, and jarring pain in the left ankle pushed aside like broken rock in a flood.

Rosa S. Fallon sets out nine principles for teaching practice, from relaxation and the resting pose to circularity, yinning and yanging legs, focus at the t'an t'ien, and sitting still afterward to absorb the chi, quoting Justin Stone and Steve Ridley.

Fred Muckel of Fremont, California offers a short pyramid poem about chi moving through every fiber of his being and love flowing through heart, mind and soul, ending in repeated joy.

Rosalind Braga lays out an extended garden metaphor for T'ai Chi Chih practice, from cultivating the soil as a beginner to weeding agitated thoughts, rotating practice locations, and harvesting unlimited chi.

Twelve non-teacher subscribers answered a postpaid postcard naming who introduced them to T'ai Chi Chih and what it has meant, from a chiropractor's office advertisement to a chronic balance disorder improved in class.

Ralph Garn's pyramid poem builds from "Open-hearted Surrender" through wanting not and lacking no-thing to a closing line of being at one in peace.

Sandy McAlister describes co-teaching a six-hour Clinical Use of T'ai Chi Chih workshop with hand therapist Eva Ching for Northern California physical and occupational therapists treating chronic pain and hand rehabilitation.

Steve Ridley advises teachers who learn of a non-accredited person teaching TCC to respond with communication rather than reprimand, offering help toward a future accreditation course and announcing the policy in class.

Theda Gillespie traces her path from private lessons at Rio Caliente Health Spa in Mexico to the 1983 teacher training in Denver, and her classes in New Zealand, including a demonstration for 200 guests at a Chinese New Year dinner.

Vicki Brodie misses no more than two or three days of practice a month, and after almost six years she credits T'ai Chi Chih with helping her cope with a hectic, demanding life.

Steve Ridley's brief reminder to teachers: pause in stillness between movement patterns to assimilate what the motion generated, returning to neutral before the thought to begin the next one arises.

John Lash recounts meeting Justin Stone at an Albuquerque bookstore in 1974 and now running the Harmonious Dragon T'ai Chi School and a Taoist temple in Bern, where every student learns T'ai Chi Chih.