Do you still have your vase?

After the strong wind and shower two days ago, my peony is falling apart in backyard.
I need to use string to pull them together. After done some yard work this morning,
cutting some flowers and putting them in to my vase, I remembered the vase story I have heard.

A war general was cleaning his desk. He accidently knocked off his favorite vase. Just right before the vase touch the ground, he caught with his quick hand. He realized he was sweating at the moment. “Why?” he asked himself. “ While I was in the battlefield, fighting with the enemies, I never sweat. Why today, why now. I could lose my life then during the battle but this is just a vase.” After he thought it over, He broke his vase.

I always tell myself, I don’t have any thing when I was first born, and I will not bring any thing with me after I die. Anything I have here are some thing I gained. I should be happy on what I have. Sometimes, arguments and conflict came because something you never had and will not bring to your coffin. I wanted to lose all my vases as well. What about you? After you read this, Do you still have your vase?

Are we really all going to Heaven?

What a beautiful sunny weekend we had! I did some gardening and then joined my friend Teresa’s BBQ at rooftop. If you read our website, you saw we auctioned one of our classes to support woman who had Aids, that’s where Teresa use to work. Teresa is only visiting Boston this weekend because she accepted a job in NC a year ago. She love the food and entertainment here and she had a good job here in Cambridge, but she took that job anyway because she think people need more help there.

Here is a Buddhism story,

Once, a person asked the Buddha,

“Where will you go after you die.”
“Hell, of course!”
“Why hell, you suppose to go to heaven, right?”
“If I don’t go to Hell, who is going to teach these people in hell being a good human?”

I didn’t try to imply that NC is hell, of course not. I am trying to say that some time the most wonderful decision ( good for you) is not the most wise decision( good for the world), so before you make the decision, think three times and choose wisely.

Strong Shower, Tai Chi, and Jade Lady

It rained very hard last night. I thought many people would miss class. What a surprise! Almost every one was there. We went over the movement Fair lady Works Shuttles (to four corners).
People are very careful. They wanted to make sure their movements are right. After I gave applications of the movements to them, they have a better understanding and the movement become smooth. Even though I only taught two corners in last night's class, they got some decent information for this movement.
"Some people translate to Jade lady Works Shuttles instead of Fair lady. Character "Yu" means Jade. When we talk about fine and expensive jade, we talk about a jade with fair color and no black spots. A nice jade looks very fair and even. A better translation should be fair lady since a lady is not made of Jade or wearing any jade."

How to be totally Relaxed in Tai Chi?

Relaxation is the most important principle in Tai Chi.
It’s easy to talk about but hard to do. Here is how Huan's Tai Chi explain it to our students:

Relax your Joints: When you are beginner.
You need to start to try to relax from your hands, arms, elbow, shoulder, waist.
Fingers should not be closed, they should be open and relaxed. This is called relax your joints.

Relax and Gather energy to Dan Tian: When you reach above stage, then next one you want to get is to relax and gather all the energy to your Dan Tian. When your joints are relaxed, then it’s easy to gather all the Qi and energy to your Dan Tian.

Mind Relaxation: Now, mind relaxing is equally important as body relaxation. You mind should not have other thoughts but concentration on your Tai Chi. Without mind relaxation, your Tai Chi is not totally relaxed.

Relaxed on Reaction: many people are very relaxed when they perform Tai Chi, but they get tight and stressed when doing push hands, you need to train to feel relaxed while have reaction with another person. This need to be trained a lot to achieve.

Relax and Connecting: Once you reach all the points above, it’s time to connect all the energy together, and bring energy to any place you wish. When you reach this stage, it’s called using Yi (concentration) but using force. You will be able to use Yi to control energy.

Copyrighted By Huan’s Tai Chi ‘08

Viewing Self-Defense in different ways

I will give a Seminar on Self-defense tomorrow. When people think about self-defense, they will think about how the opponent attack you, and then how you going to attack back or escape. That’s not really self-defense is about, that’s is only a part of it. This is the procedure during the self-defense. There is before and after. In tomorrow’s seminar, I will show how can you prepare yourself before the attack or even prevent the attack, and what if it happens, how you deal with it and how you wrap up. Grandmaster Cai use to teach some of the techniques to the secret police force for the Chinese government. They can use the minimum energy to defeat the enemy with maximum power. I think it will be very exciting for most of my students, since we only discussed about Tai Chi in our public class. It will be some new knowledge for them.

All about Drawing

Tomorrow will be a busy day for me. I will have four meetings and a Tai Chi class. I am writing tomorrow’s paragraph today to keep my promise of posting the tulip picture on the blog. I went to MFA after work today for the Wednesday night drawing. I have done a lot of figure drawings while I was learning martial arts to help my self remember the movements, but I am still a beginner on drawing. I am still at the level of filling the blank with shadows. Today’s drawing is to pick an object and draw. I picked a painting and tried to draw the human figure that painting has. It took me an hour and I am still not very satisfied on what I have. I have few phone calls to make tonight, so I need to get home soon. On my way out, I saw few people also doing drawing and they have a teacher. The teacher was showing some of the techniques. Just few simple lines made the figure so alive. It’s almost like Martial arts. It’s all about practice and technique. Once your technique is mature, you can simply draw any thing with simple lines. When we have computers, no one practice their hand writing any more. When we have digital cameras, less people interested in drawing. These are some really good things we need to keep.Because an drawing and handwriting tell people your view of life and your personality, that makes you unique. Will life be bored that every one’s letter is typed in times new roman?

Caterpillar and Butterfly: The Meaning of Life

Last week, I got an email from one of my students, his dog for many years passed away last week and he has tried to stay alone for a while. I have emailed him that he need to talk with friends and go on with life. I am sure his dog wants him to be happy in rest of his life but being sad.

After I wake up today, I see a beautiful day with Blue sky and sunshine! It’s another happy day as always. My tulips are blooming today. ( will post picture tomorrow) As Helen Keller used to say, Keep your face to the sunshine and you cannot see the shadow. There is so much great things you can enjoy in your life, why bother to have negative thoughts.

What the Caterpillar calls the end, the world calls a Butterfly. Things can be change all the time. Ying can be Yang. The grass is turning green. A great season for wonderful activities has begun. Have friends over, drink tea, talk and enjoy the literature and art.

Enjoy food, enjoy work, enjoy your study, enjoy helping people. Being creative and trying to think what kind of fun I can have from this little thing I am doing. When you can turn every little things in your life into enjoyment, you life has it’s own special meaning!

This Article is copyrighted By Huan’s Tai Chi

Tai Chi and Fears

It’s been raining for last two days. Hope it didn’t kill the seeds I planted. Am I worried about the plants or I just love the natural or flowers?
As the classic book “Think and Grow Rich” written By Napoleon Hill mentioned,

People have 6 fears.
1. The fear of POVERTY,
2. The fear of CRITICISM,
3. The fear of ILL HEALTH,
4. The fear of LOSS OF LOVE OF SOMEONE,
5. The fear of OLD AGE, and
6. The fear of DEATH.

I thought I don’t have any of these above, because I have been poor, I have been criticized, I have been sick, I have lost love, and I know it’s human nature we all going to die in the future, I have been on the edge of life and death at least three times. Now, it’s funny to think about sometimes, I am still worried on the flower seeds I just planted. As Napoleon mentioned, worry is based on fear, so I guess I still have fear in my life. In a human society, your joy of life is related to others. When you care about people, you worry. When you care about people, you fear. For example: I was worried what students would do when I was late for class last Thursday.

Why people doing Tai Chi? There are so many reasons people told me.
“It’s really cool.”
“It’s fun and healthy.”
“It can make my life less stressed and healthy.”
“It can make me more flexible when I am older.”

All of these applied to three of the six fears
3. The fear of ILL HEALTH,
5. The fear of OLD AGE, and
6. The fear of DEATH

If Tai Chi can conquer 3 fears for you out of total 6 human fears, isn’t this a great activities to do?

This Article is copyrighted By Huan’s Tai Chi

Seeding for Tai Chi in the Early Spring

What a beautiful day to do some yard cleaning! After blow all the leaves to the corner and collect two bags of leave in my backyard. I did the mulches.

I started seeding after. First, I planted seed for Painted Daisy, and Shasta daisy. It’s nice since they are perennial which means they will come back next year. I also started seeds for carrots, long string beans, and tomatoes. After pruned my roses, I putted some fertilizer all over. Then I watered all of them through.

It’s always nice to create a clean, organized and relaxed environment for yourself. Clean backyard keeps the bugs away because they love to hide under the leaves. You would feel more positive, relaxed, and your mind will be more sharp in an organized environment. After all, who would rather prefer to do Tai Chi or any thing in a back yard coved with slippery leaves and bugs?

Primrose, and strawberry is blooming. The Purple Heart is also blooming, which I moved from living room to out side. Tulips are ready to bloom soon. Probably next month, the peony will come out soon. They are my favorite! It’s the season of spring. When everything had a great rest at winter and now they can’t wait to show off. It’s the season of energy, happiness and hope. It’s also the season of unexpected. You never know maybe some wild flower have visited your garden and now it will come out. Maybe that will happen to your Tai Chi if you have been practice whole winter long!

This Article is copyrighted By Huan’s Tai Chi

Late for Tai Chi

I was very relaxed as always, at a restaurant and enjoying my dinner and then a phone call interrupted me. "hi" I heard. It was David C. I immediately realized its Thursday night and I am supposed to teach the Tai Chi class. "The whole class is waiting for me! Aww!" We had a holiday Monday in Boston and I was in Amherst for part of the weekend. Somehow, I thought yesterday was Wednesday. " Will they be ok without me?" I thought.

After I get on my car and hurried to the studio, I saw people are having fun doing Tai Chi.

David Grant, the beginner class teacher was teaching some movements there. I found out that Eric has lead the warm ups, and then David C. has lead the Chi Kung exercise. Things were working well without me. People felt so comfortable to share their knowledge with each other. I took my time, went to the bathroom and washed my hands. Slowly, I walked in with a wonderful smile ( showing only eight teeth J ), trying not to interrupt this good atmosphere. People started to laugh friendly after they saw me, they are so understandable. Their laugh has so many confidence that tells me they are doing well so far.

I have taught some students before that they only will do some movements if you lead. They don't share with others. If you want improvement, keep doing it even the teacher is not here. If you want to be better, share with others, such as your classmate, so both of you can getting better. Sometimes, late for a class for a teacher is a good thing!

This Article is copyrighted By Huan’s Tai Chi

Shall we close our eyes while doing Tai Chi?

The answer is “no”! Let’s explain why you feel more relaxed by closing your eyes. And why it’s not good and how can we relax yourself using other way.
People find they can relax more while they close their eyes. During Tai Chi, we don’t just need to be relaxed, but have a structure. We don’t want too relaxed. If you are too relaxed,you will be like a mud on the ground. Then you are totally resting. Tai Chi is moving while resting. You feel more relaxed while you close your eyes is because when you see things, you will think things. You can’t relax because you have too much things in mind. A good solution is to keep your eyes open but think less in mind. Concentrate on your moves but think non-related things to Tai Chi.

If you consider Tai Chi as a Martial arts, don’t you think you defiantly will get beaten if you fight with eyes closed? : )

This Article is copyrighted By Huan’s Tai Chi

Daily Tai Chi Meditation

When I first asked my students when we were having class, “Did you do your Tai Chi every day last week?” Only few people raised their hands. I kept asking once a while and I found the numbers has been increasing. That’s a good start!

I remembered that one time a student asked me. “ How many hours I should spend on Tai Chi every day. Do you think I had enough each day?”

I mentioned to her. “Well, you need at least one hour of Tai Chi to help you remember the movements since you are a beginner. Two hours or more if you want an improvement. Now, you spend 8 hours at work, 2 hours on the road from and back to work or walking on the street, to your apartment or to supermarket. 2 hours for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and 8 hours sleeping. That’s total of 20 hrs already, if you spend 2 hrs watching TV or chat on the phone with friends. You only have 2 hours left for Tai Chi. You can tell me if you have enough time for Tai Chi or not.”

She smiled and said, “ Now I finally understand, as much time as possible is the answer!”

This Article is copyrighted By Huan’s Tai Chi