The Vital Force Archive

Bill Nakao takes up continuity between movements, citing Justin Stone's "It is all continuous, dear" and the thread running from Rocking Motion to the close, and asks practitioners to attend to the pauses at rest position.

Eileen Magnuson recounts her accreditation week with Pam in Albuquerque, where candidates and auditors from across the country worked on mindfulness, grounding and finding words to teach, closing with a graduation dinner featuring Justin's artwork.

Susan K. G. McGrath describes how, after a first year of practice spent balancing her own energy, she found herself balancing chi for family, friends, everyone and everything, an experience Justin Stone called "TCC doing itself."

Diane Crago, an artist diagnosed with a vestibular migraine disorder after two years of vertigo and lost balance, sent her teacher Bill Nakao a poem instead of an article because screens hurt her eyes.

Sandra Babka, at 76 and living with nerve damage, recounts a lifetime of exercise and practicing TCC in airports and doctors' offices, paired with an anonymous student's account of letting go through Abandon Hope and a cancer diagnosis.

Linda Robinson describes three years of practising T'ai Chi Chih with a Buddhist meditation community, moving together then sitting twenty minutes in silence, with comments from six fellow participants.

Donna J. Moore takes up the phrase "Let T'ai Chi Chih do t'ai chi" and quotes Alan Watts, from Chop Wood, Carry Water, on sitting and listening without naming.

Donna J. Moore offers the verse she recites while practicing Pulling In The Energy, gathering vigor from red berries, strength from rocks, flexibility from fir trees and joy from the sun.

Pat Moseley collected answers from two conference sessions asking how T'ai Chi Chih affected participants' personal growth, from ending the desire to drink to grief work, PTSD, inner ear incidents and recovery after leg cancer surgery.

Donna J. Moore recounts how she resumed T'ai Chi Chih from a bed and wheelchair after her prosthesis exploded her right femur in July 2010, using seated arm movements and focused breathing to manage pain and fend off depression.

Beth Preston traces her T'ai Chi Chih life in Washington from finishing classes with Patricia Strand to teaching at a community college, a YMCA, a free library practice, and a women's cancer support group.

Physical therapist Sara Nelson picks movements like Working the Pulley for clients with pain or fatigue; Donna Moore and Daisy Hobbs then discuss twenty years of teaching and seated practice.

Phyllis Bagwell describes how years of clenching her jaw and hunching her shoulders against pain gave way after a T'ai Chi Chih class at the YMCA with Beth Preston.

Eric Braff found T'ai Chi Chih easy to pick up and more calming than sitting meditation after a busy day, naming Passing Clouds his favorite for its circularity and shifting weight.

John and Laura Schwartz of Spokane each describe two years of practice with teacher Pat Moseley: no falls in six months after spinal cancer and a broken hip, and fifty pounds lost.

Linda Robinson walks through her morning practice at home, from feeding the cat and raising the shades to the chi rising from the bubbling spring and moments of wordless presence.

Patricia Strand describes the morning practice beside her lake, in soft rain and chickadee song, when she finally understood Justin's phrase "TCC is doing TCC," followed by Pyramid Poems from five writers.

Helen Hill Crozier's sequence of haiku moves through the TCC form in order, from soft Rocking Motion and yin-yang in Bird Flaps Its Wings to the Six Healing Sounds and the Cosmic Consciousness Pose.