The Vital Force Archive

Deb Sitron recounts meeting an 89-year-old Naples student at a fruit stand, where he proudly introduced her to his grandson as his "Tie Dye teacher" and she let it stand.

Cristina R. Fridenstine recounts joining a beginner class at Senior Amigos in Las Cruces in 2018, drawn by memories of T'ai Chi along Hong Kong's harbor, and her growing wish to teach young people.

Sandy McAlister describes the year-end class celebration at Rossmoor, where donations go to a residents' assistance fund, then proposes local service projects and the TCC Foundation's three $200 teacher grants.

Jim Shorr gathers first-person testimony from residents and guests at Creekside Village in Beaverton, Oregon, who describe calm, loosened muscles, better balance and the group's shared Six Healing Sounds.

Rick Davis, a retirement community chaplain, draws on the Lotus Sutra and Psalm 23 to argue that seated T'ai Chi Chih offers people confined to wheelchairs by aging and illness a renewed experience of chi and inner vastness.

Pam Towne's practical guidance for teaching seniors, covering hearing loss, balance, stamina, footwear, chairs for seated practice, time for social interaction, and knowing the facility's emergency procedures.

Adabelle Rychtarik collected testimonials from her Greenville-area students at libraries, senior centers and a French creperie, who report better balance after hip replacement, tremor relief, improved sleep and giving up a cane.

Bev Chandley handed each of her 31 senior students at Shell Point Retirement Community a polished stone to hold palm up, and not one hand turned over while learning Pulling Taffy.

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.

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.

Margery Erickson gathers four teaching moments that made her chi smile, including a beginner who nearly walked out, a mother sharing energy with her handicapped son, and a student off her antidepressant.

Joseph Selzer describes how residents at a New Jersey retirement community organized twice-weekly Video T'ai Chi Chih practice, reporting improved blood test markers, blood pressure, balance and coping with Parkinson's.

Sandy McAlister opens her continuing classes with a circle of good news and questions about softness and favorite movements, and tells of a reclusive student whose balance class led to friendships and a first cruise.

Neena Mitchell had been teaching seated T'ai Chi Chih to seniors in Camillus just in case, then ruptured a kneecap muscle and used mental TCC in the MRI chamber and seated practice through surgery and recovery.

Julie Heryet credits Sandy McAlister's playfulness for loosening her insistence on accuracy, describing how frustrated elders at a Senior Center and inmates needing to feel safe changed her teaching priorities.

Bob Poland, 84 and a year into practice, describes being the only man at a Prajna retreat, April Leffler's talks on attention, four full practices indoors and out, and finding his way home in the dark.

Adabelle Rychtarik recounts the business basics covered at her 2013 Albuquerque accreditation, then describes calling 911 when a new seated student lost consciousness in class and later needed a pacemaker.

Sharon Sirkis recounts three classroom mishaps and puns, including a student who insisted she had taught only variations of the Six Healing Sounds and a Working the Pulley question that turned into a Supremes singalong.

Victoria Mogilner recounts eight years of teaching at Gilbert Senior, where a small class grew to 49 people a week, bringing better balance and a group that moves together.

Julie Barrier describes taking over the T'ai Chi Chih class she had attended as Bill Moore's student at the Oakland Senior Center, including sleepless nights before teaching and the silence that ends each class.

Lisa Vander Vliet met Trudi at her parents' senior living community and discovered the 84-year-old had taught herself T'ai Chi Chih from Carmen Brocklehurst's YouTube video, practicing alone for five years.

Adabelle Rychtarik collected testimonials from her South Carolina students, who credit TCC with better balance, easier rising from low chairs, and calm during long hospital vigils with a loved one.

Sharon Sirkis recounts Martin, a skeptical new student at a retirement home who predicted class would worsen his headache and then admitted he felt more relaxed, plus a college student inspecting his fingernails.

Dixie Adeniran's substitute teacher fell through at the last minute, and her twenty-four senior center students formed the circle-within-a-circle on their own and practiced without her.

Linda Braga describes a November ceremony in San Leandro where fourteen students in their 80s and 90s received gold-sealed certificates for years of consistent attendance, and offers the template to other teachers.

Dixie Adeniran, accredited in October 2014, recounts finishing her first beginner series at a senior center, from business licenses and flyers to the silent circle practice with music.

Hannah Hedrick, accredited in 1986, describes teaching at a nursing home, a senior residence, a homeless transition program and a reentry program, and a student who showed her the movements she could do lying down after fracturing her foot.

Jackson Rains points to the retiring Baby Boomers, once drawn to Transcendental Meditation and the Age of Aquarius, as a ready audience, citing his YMCA class growing from 20 students to over 30.

Jim Shorr gathers residents' own words from Edgewood Downs in Beaverton, Oregon, on regained balance, practising half the movements without a walker, and the calm the first twelve bring, plus Pyramid Poems on freedom.

Anita Vestal traces her teaching from a York health fair discovery in 2001 through classes in Taos, Austin, a Florida 55-plus community, and Spanish-language courses for Costa Rican mountain villagers.