Often I have been asked to explain what Tai Chi is and how does it work.
I have been practicing for almost 10 years now and still, I am not sure there is only one answer for that question.
"What is Tai Chi?"
Recently
I have debuted on radio where I had to speak about Tai Chi, explaining
the benefits and the philosophy behind this ancient practice - or maybe
martial art, or maybe prevention tool, or maybe sport, wait! what about
meditation? - see? It's very hard to find a single word to define Tai
Chi.
Knowing about that imminent interview, I wrote down all the
answers to the journalist questions and I thought deeply about the most
meaningful words to explain the unexplainable energy of Tai Chi.
And yet, the hardest question to answer was really the one I should know the most: what is Tai Chi?
I found myself disarmed in front of that simple query, the very one I explain every day to my fellow students.
I
read a lot of books, consulted with my teacher and researched on the
internet, but the answer were polychrome and I couldn't really sum them
up in a sentence or two.
In the end, I decided I would go with the
flow and follow my feelings about it, after all it was really something a
Tai Chi practitioner would do.
Tai Chi is a way of life. Tai Chi
strips you, taking out all those emotions and feelings you've tried to
bury so deeply you forget about them.
The deeper you go with the
movements and the meditation, the hardest it gets to lie to yourself.
Lies and deception are impossible to hide with Tai Chi. Everything comes
out and sometimes you find yourself feeling worse.
Tai Chi means
live your life with truth. Tai Chi means to face your fears, your
emotions and your limits everyday, accepting them and correct them,
because if you try to ignore the problem, Tai Chi will throw it up for
you, time after time.
Tai Chi is the way of gentleness and
patience: very slow movements which wrap you up in an infinite seesaw of
yin and yang, black and white, right and wrong, rationality and
intuition until you're ready to accept you're both.
Tai Chi means
to finally know your body and soul: you can listen to your body and
discover it has a lot of things to tell you. You can link emotions to
diseases and admit your participation in the process, good news is you
can participate in your healing process as well.
Every movement
is rhythmical and associated with the right breathing, focusing your
attention to present moment and teaching you how to live mindfully.
The
are really so many things I should say about Tai Chi: the benefits, the
beauty, the history and the prevention potentiality. But I don't want
to spoil it all.
You can find all those definitions on the
internet and they will be all different and confusing. Mystery awaits
those interested in Tai Chi and the quest to a new meaning is long and
thrilling.
Whenever you're ready, open the door and do Tai Chi.
