The Vital Force Archive

Tara Stiles, accredited by Justin Stone at Green Gulch Zen Center in 1978, recounts a beach seal watching her practice, her 'chi drawing' crayon exercise, and letting a joyful student flow uncorrected.

Marcella Box introduces Lovena Warren, an 86-year-old accredited teacher whose free weekday Zoom practice restored her daily habit, and who led hurricane evacuees in T'ai Chi Chih from a shelter stage in 2005.

Lisa Stroyan collects teachers' responses from Sandy McAlister's April 2023 Zoom discussion on the split mind, including Joan Weaver's trick for recovering a lost count while teaching.

Nico Borneman likens a practitioner to a breaching whale who surrenders to fluidity, followed by pyramid poems from Lisa Stryoan, Terry Gay Puckett and KayRydeen on tanden, rain and rooting in Hawaiian sand.

From a spoken word CD, Justin Stone recounts the 1974 first class where a priest regained his sense of smell, the tingling and heat students feel, and the stage when T'ai Chi Chih can be done mentally.

Connie Shaw describes how her teacher Marie's instruction to keep attention in the feet and belly led, during a weight shift, to the unraveling of her vasanas or habit energies.

Jim Shorr gathers statements from five practitioners in the five-year-old Saturday standing and seated class at Creekside Village for Seniors, who name Passing Clouds, Rocking Motion and Light at the Top of the Head as the movements that release old habits, steady balance and raise consciousness.

Sharon Sirkis collects four jokes first printed in March 2001, including a student named Murray who joked about the draft board and a beginner worried she was doing variations on the variations.

Ana Royal describes injuring her left knee reaching for a carry-on bag in Boston, the years of injections and medicated gel that followed, and how a year of daily TCC practice ended both.

Diana Daffner mistook Bass Drum for a drum beaten on top, substituted the image of caressing a tree trunk, and later told beginners the story when teaching the movement.

Transcribed from his spoken word CD, Justin Stone contrasts changing the Chi directly with working through the mind in Zen or Hatha Yoga, and traces Yin and Yang back to the Tao in Chinese cosmology.

Julie Heryet reports on the Folsom State Prison class after a 15-month lockdown gap, including a student talked out of suicide, poet Lawrence's release, and inmate-assistant Stephen's death from cancer.

Rebecca Paulson turned a snow day into imagery of snowballs for every circular movement and ball of energy, then pretended Working the Pulley launched them at a seniors class; Linda Braga adds how ten Chinese-speaking beginners learned by watching alone.

Caroline Guilott describes the resting pose that ends each movement, the softening around the t'an t'ien with feet rooted, and her memory of Justin Stone rising early and repeating his own close.

Judy Kistler-Robinson turned shut-down recreation center classes into Zoom sessions that drew friends across the country, and she still offers a free monthly online practice from Albuquerque, including one student's husband with Parkinson's.

Three 2002 letters from Mary Wichmann asking Justin Stone if she could come to Albuquerque to learn meditation, through his invitation to her June travel arrangements.

Terry Gay Puckett recounts how student Denise Richter contacted a San Antonio Express News columnist without telling her, and the resulting article filled her senior center class and a waiting list.

Carmen L. Brocklehurst recounts years of struggling with Justin Stone's instruction to "come to a graceful conclusion" until a Tuesday morning practice when she simply followed him and her wrists went soft.

Hannah Hedrick expands on the constellation idea born during Linda Prosche's stay in the Hawaii rainforest, inviting comments on a Prime Mover graphic with Justin as North Star for the 2024 conference.

Lorraine Lepine describes the resting position, or graceful conclusion, that punctuates the nineteen movements, and the grounded empty fullness of Chi settling when the body comes to stillness.

Abby Molino, a nurse and massage therapist, returned to T'ai Chi Chih after three decades, traded her frustrating VHS tape for a DVD, and drew the many-handed kitchen woman with her Sandhill Crane.

April Leffler describes imagining three coins under each foot, two at the ball and one at the heel, to track the weight shift and finally understand Justin Stone's reminder to bring a movement to a graceful conclusion.

Ivonne Begue se Benzo describes the weekly practice she began shadowing with the sisters of Assisi Heights in Minnesota, and how moving meditation lets her respond rather than react.

Teacher-trainer Daniel Pienciak breaks down Justin Stone's instruction to 'make a graceful conclusion,' describing the full weight commitment, the soundless setting down of the foot, and the pelvic girdle letting go into stillness.

Newly accredited, John Marquez compares himself to an artichoke shedding layers, and finds that demonstrating movements while talking, correcting, pacing and counting is harder than he expected.

Sandy McAlister describes how a wandering mind lets the Chi rise, bringing headaches and giddiness, and how attention below the waist keeps practice grounded while softness stays shaped rather than limp.

Rosalind L. Braga recounts a silent encounter at a contemplative retreat at Santa Sabina Center, where a curious young Chinese woman who practiced T'ai Chi Ch'uan watched her move and called it light as a feather.

Ann Rutherford recounts joining Justin Stone's Turiya meditation group in 1996, being hospitalized after touching an ungrounded student's feet, and Justin's call for teachers to loosen up.

Judy Hubbell, three years into teaching Mind Body Health classes including ones for Chinese seniors, responds to the JustinStoneTCC.com newsletter and asks about Justin's link to Wen-Shan Huang.

Lisa M Otero recounts her early frustration with Justin Stone's instruction to come to a graceful conclusion, how balancing over her heels removed knee strain, and how strength at 60 brought softness.