The Vital Force Archive

Monica Motyka credits her teacher Donna McElhose, who led mixed standing and seated group practices, with the confidence to now teach seated T'ai Chi Chih in every location she teaches.

Lorraine Lepine walks through the upright posture of the resting position, from the thread of energy at the ceiling to the tucked chin, lowered shoulder blades and perpendicular tailbone, as a route to the relaxation response.

Sandy McAlister explains why she left Anchor Taffy and Working the Pulley out of her seated TCC DVD, and why she now believes both belong in the practice with safe adaptations.

Terry Gay Puckett's Shih Tzu puppy chewed open a tube of toxic acrylic flow, and the two hours stranded in a vet's exam room became a slow practice of T'ai Chi Chih and Seijaku.

Pam Towne traces how she moved from seeing seated T'ai Chi Chih as a last resort to respecting it as a powerful practice, after teaching wheelchair users, hurting her back overdoing the pelvic tilt, and finding beginners connect with the t'an t'ien faster when seated.

Judy Chancey and Sky Young-Wick outline the 2022 International Teachers' Conference on Zoom, themed Cultivating Wisdom, from the Friday Around the World Practice to Sandy McAlister's opening words, Seijaku mornings and breakout rooms.

April Leffler compares the t'an t'ien to a dog walker and the arms to the dogs, then describes trying the analogy in class, including students whose hands reached up Daughter on the Mountaintop before the center moved.

Sharon Sirkis of Columbia, Maryland collects classroom moments: two seniors interlocking fingers during Around the Platter, one wanting to push away worries, and a student pulling taffy at red lights.

Lisa Otero recalls sitting knee to knee with Justin Stone in chairs and finally understanding that it is all in the wrists, then gives practical guidance on chairs, feet and adapting Working the Pulley.

John Marquez builds a pyramid poem from the word gratitude after a morning practice, then traces how years of T'ai Chi Chih turned being alone from a negative into valued time for practice and writing.

Jessica Lewis credits a painful summer of toe trouble with converting her to seated T'ai Chi Chih, and lists why she now starts every student in the chair, including her VA-referred veterans.

A gathering of Justin Stone's sayings on teacher and pupil, softness that cannot be forced, and chi stored in the bones, plus zen poet Paul Reps's all-capitals letter praising his ordinary motion.

Dorene Krause draws on dictionary definitions and a Psychology Today passage to describe surrender in T'ai Chi Chih: yielding weight into the soles of the feet, releasing self-judgment, and trusting the flow of chi.

Carmen L. Brocklehurst gives practical instruction for seated practice in a straight-back chair, working the weight shift through the sits bones in Rocking Motion and Around the Platter.

Bruce Childs returned to teaching chair-assisted TCC at the Barnstable Adult Community Center after the pandemic, and lists the resources in his toolbox, from Sandy McAlister's DVD to his own Little Guy illustrations.

Passages from Justin Stone's Climb the Joyous Mountain on disciplined mind, Japanese understatement, spring rain on temple eaves, gratitude at meals, and Zen freedom lived amid conditions.

Hannah Hedrick recounts her 1985 classes with Theda Gillespie in Mexico, the unprepared California accreditation Justin embraced, and the s-e-l-f breath guidelines she developed for students with COPD.

Quotations drawn from Justin Stone's spoken word CD, on building an imperturbable Center amid busy life, the tan t'ien as the seat of intuition, and why a teacher who does not practice is a fraud.

Christeen McLain recalls recognizing an alpha brain wave state while going Around the Platter with her teacher Jean Katus in 1975, and later dropping a grounding exercise that made students fall over.

Hannah Hedrick, managing nearly four decades of chronic back pain and recovering from a third hip surgery, found that seated TCC sharpened her feel for grounding, alignment and the tan t'ien.

Ten of Donna McElhose's students answer her homework questions, describing tingling hands, pulsing heat in Daughter in the Valley, energy circling a group, coping with cerebral palsy, and seated practice after a sprained ankle.

Jeneth Rundle describes teaching seated T'ai Chi Chih over Zoom while her student Angela recovered from knee replacement surgery, and teaching from a chair herself during her own knee trouble.

Lisa Stroyan, after auditing accreditation courses and a Zoom intensive, counsels a hesitant candidate and argues that accreditation is a class to be met with an empty cup, not a test to pass.

Lisa Stroyan recounts how tiny hand movements in a reclined gravity chair restored her Chi in 2015, then details practical seated adjustments: sit-bone weight shifts, arm extension, grounding and "squirm."

Sue Bitney played Carmen's KNME interviews and Justin's instructional DVD for her senior students, who asked why no one had told them about softness, and moved more softly alongside him.

Jim Shorr describes how Creekside Village senior housing uses Margie, a longtime student, as a seated demonstrator whom wheelchair and walker participants follow, with Wayne and Bob explaining what it gives them.

Richard Karasik argues that teachers inevitably break T'ai Chi Chih into parts such as flexible wrists, hip swivels and moving from the t'an t'ien, but the student must reassemble them, as sodium and chlorine become salt.

Kathy Starrick teaches seated TCC to every class, standing or not, after two major surgeries and a fractured leg left her practising mentally, then seated, with less pain and better sleep.

Margery Erickson recounts a former student, Sandy, rejoining her drop-in YMCA class and producing the worn list of TCC movements she once used to practice before craft shows.