The Vital Force Archive

Pia Knighton traces her path from a Cenacle Retreat Center brochure in 2002 to accreditation in 2011 and teaching adolescent and adult psychiatric patients in Houston hospitals.

M. C. Bauder credits a first community education class with Jean Katus for breaking loose stopped-up chi, ending a fear of going anywhere alone and easing stiff joints.

Linda Braga recounts the 2011 virus that led to a suspected lung cancer diagnosis, and credits 25 years of TCC meditation for the serene mind she kept as scans, an oncologist and an unexplained shrinking mass followed.

Lawrence Kaiser, a student of Bill Moore, describes practicing T'ai Chi Chih before and backstage during his run as Bottom in "A Midsummer Night's Dream," using it to ease pre-performance nerves, stay moment-to-moment, and release lower-back tension that blocks the voice.

Linda Jones fractured her ankle on a shore excursion in Crete, practiced T'ai Chi Chih mentally against the pain, and found calm and gratitude through surgery and eight days in a Rome hospital.

Mrs. Stough, unable to do yoga after back surgeries, found TCC through an online search for relaxation, and describes falling asleep easily, lowered pain, and feeling grounded for the first time in her first Seijaku class.

Sheila Leonard collects brief student comments: Harriet practising mentally through transatlantic turbulence, Trish sleeping better by week three, Sue's seasonal low lifting in the fog, and Mary's joints and balance.

Henry Smith was referred to a hospital T'ai Chi Chih class for work-related anxiety after two emergency room visits, and now pairs weekly floatation tank sessions with near-daily Seijaku; Pyramid Poems follow.

Stu Goldman describes how COPD was caught early by his cardiologist, the two stents that followed his Prescott retreat, and the calm that has let him give up carrying an inhaler.

S. Ross could not sleep or settle before a daughter's wedding in Ocean City, New Jersey, and found that a 20- to 30-minute practice carried her calmly through the weekend.

Melinda Antoon Cormier, a 56-year-old artist practising in Lake Charles, mentally ran through the Six Healing Sounds during a resting stress test, and her angioplasty revealed a naturally grown bypass around a minor blockage.

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.

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.

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.

Peggy Koch read a newspaper article about T'ai Chi Chih in February 2010 and began classes; her husband Larry followed in January 2011 and found the movements stopped his anxiety attacks.

Christine Burel returned to a beginners' class after letting her practice lapse for four years, and describes how fifteen minutes of morning practice before work and children's appointments restored her sense of control.

Karen Dingwell-McCarthy describes her five-year, intuitive path to accreditation, the terror that gripped her in the three months beforehand, and the gratifying week that proved her fears unfounded.

Nancy Werner-Azarski takes a ranger's advice not to hurry through a park home from a Quetico canoe trip, then meets her husband's heart surgery and her own hip injury with visualized practice.

April Punzo used Rocking Motion, Around the Platter, Bass Drum and the Cosmic Consciousness Pose outside the gym before her karate belt exam and got through it without an anxiety attack, followed by Andrea Bork on Minnesota's summer park practice and a set of Pyramid Poems.

Peter Gregory traces how obsessive/compulsive rituals crowded out openness until TCC practice let him move from the T'an T'ien, with Margery Erickson describing daily practice steadying her switch to teaching high school algebra.

Lee Moore, facing two scheduled operations seven years ago, used acceptance and faithful T'ai Chi Chih practice at home and visualized practice in the hospital to walk into surgery free of panic.

Ruth and Sam write to Sr. Francis about a Mozambique campsite where both woke paralysed and suffocating, and did T'ai Chi Chih facing the ocean at 1:00 a.m. until the fear faded.

Monica Simorangkir enrolled in Sharon Sirkis's class only for graduation credit, then found her hands warm after the first session, slept sixteen hours straight, and saw her anxiety attacks grow less frequent.

Sharon Sirkis traces her lifelong fear of money back to her parents' arguments, and describes how a Sedona retreat, a dead car with 242,000 miles and a friend's phone call taught her to stop forcing and let things happen.

Jessica Skolnik, a college student of Sharon Sirkis, recounts walking away from a near-fatal car accident, losing her migraines, and practicing barefoot in a Connecticut park while on tour with a band.

Louise Bureau writes to Justin Stone about coming to T'ai Chi Chih after an early breast cancer diagnosis, staying calm during her father's emergency bypass surgery, and her accreditation with Ed Altman.

Jeremy Williams, six weeks into Sharon Sirkis's class, describes using Rocking Motion, Pulling in the Energy, Perpetual Motion and Push Pull before shifts waiting tables at Phillips Seafood in Baltimore's Inner Harbor.

A week after the Maryvale accreditation course, Sherry Corson writes to teacher trainer Ed Altman about her spiritual shift, her new understanding of chi, and the five hour drive home that no longer frightened her.

Kay Monroe Farrell thanks her teacher Richard Brier and describes how daily Shibashi Qigong and T'ai Chi Chih eased her fear of metastatic colon cancer and preceded a 59% drop in her CEA.

Lee Campbell reports a student who left her first TCC class pain free and, after six months of daily panic attacks, had none since, rocking many times a day and videotaping herself to check her movements.