Joy In The Unexpected

There have been several occasions recently that have reminded us of the power of T’ai Chi Chih. Perhaps the most dramatic was a class we co-teach at our local public library. We normally have a group of between eight and ten. The day of our fourth class in an eight-week series, the Library Director told us that a local day school for intellectually disabled adults would be bringing ten students and several of their teachers and aides to try our class. We’d never previously worked with this population.

The room we practice in is small, and we normally limit the class size to a dozen people so it isn’t crowded. Since the group was en route, we decided to go with the flow and see where the practice (and a heavy dose of teh) would take us.

We were reminded of a story where a teacher encountered a class of students who did not speak English and who just said, “Follow me.” That was our instruction: “Just follow what we are doing.” After introducing Rocking Motion and Bird Flaps its Wings, much to the amusement of our new students, we gamely moved forward.

With few words and basic modeling on our part, our newbies soon did some semblance of the movements we demonstrated. There were smiles and giggles, as well as intense concentration on some of the faces in the crowd. When we came to Joyous Breath, one newcomer was so delighted that she laughed out loud, generating more smiles. We told the group that they got the “Joy” part of the movement.

Afterwards, our regular students pointed out how quiet and calm the room had become once we began the movements. Another TCC teacher (who came that day and had worked with this population during her career) was surprised the group lasted more than 30 minutes, their limit for a group like this. Best of all, we witnessed how TCC calms, relaxes and produces joy even during unexpected situations.