Sunday, October 10, 2004

Tai Chi in Daily Life

Wolfe Lowenthal, a student of Professor Cheng Man-Ching and author of two books on Tai Chi, once told me about a real life application of the Tai Chi principle. About ten years ago, Wolfe bought a new house in the MA area. Since it was his first major investment for a long time, he was overwelmed by the process of house hunting, price negotiation, mortgage application, and the settlement of the house, which involved much frustration and tons of legal paperwork. He realized that even a long time Tai Chi expert like himself could be affected by the stress of daily life, but he also realized that his training in Tai Chi would be of great help to this situation. He said, “I need to sit back and practice my (Tai Chi) Kung Fu to counter the stresses building up.

Professor Cheng always said that the goal of learning Tai Chi is to learn the Tao and that we must live the Tai Chi way even when we are walking, sitting, living, and lying down. The question comes down to this: how many of us can actually remember to sit back and relax, like Wolfe Lowenthal did, when a problem arises?

1 comment:

veggiedude said...

I like tai chi, one day I'll go back to take the classes again in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. In the meantime, I practice wing chun and some yoga. Visit my site, macdojang.com if you are interested in downloading a free martial arts program which I wrote. cheers!