FAQ
- What is T’ai Chi?
- What’s the difference between T’ai Chi and Qigong?
- What’s the connection between T’ai Chi and yoga?
- Can T’ai Chi help you lose weight?
- What are the main benefits of T’ai Chi practice?
- What is the T’ai Chi sword for?
- Is T’ai Chi really an Olympic sport?
- Why is T’ai Chi called a Living philosophy?
- Who Needs a Life Coach?
- What is life coaching?
- What is Full Circle Coaching?
- What makes Full Circle Coaching unique?
What is T’ai Chi?
T’ai Chi Ch’uan is a Chinese martial art that is most often practiced in a gentle rather than rigorous fashion, and which has many therapeutic effects. T’ai Chi Ch’uan is a highly developed system of interconnected workouts and meditations which work together to develop the mind, strengthen the body and refine the spirit. In fact, T’ai Chi Ch’uan comprises three distinct but inseparable activities. First of all, T’ai Chi can be described as a Chinese martial art which anyone can do, that combines the fundamentals of self-defense with beautiful and continuous low-impact rhythmic movement. The result is a comprehensive exercise routine that adapts itself to the individual. Practicing T’ai Chi Ch’uan develops strength, expands flexibility, improves coordination and increases cardiovascular efficiency — but T’ai Chi does all these things in a way that may be more healthful than many other forms of exercise, without forcing or straining, and with an inner-directed mindfulness and attention to the breath.
T’ai Chi Ch’uan is also a type of non-religious meditation that combines special breathing patterns with rehearsal in visualization and concentration. The result is a mental workout which produces not only clarity of mind, but also the ability to conserve, regulate and consciously direct the vital life energy in all of us, known in Chinese as “qi,” the Spirit Breath or Life Force.
Finally, T’ai Chi Ch’uan is a game in which two people use their hands, arms and torsos to carry out relaxed and “exploratory” pushes, pulls, grabs and nudges. This game, called Pushing Hands, tests and challenges each player’s sense of balance while simultaneously trying to upset their partner’s. Part of learning the Push Hands game is learning to listen better — not only with your ears, but with your whole body as well as your intuition. The T’ai Chi Classics say, “The hand is not a hand; the whole body is a hand.” The result is an exercise which teaches the fundamentals of relationship skills, and provides an opportunity to practice connecting with another person. It is a “transpersonal” experience which can go beyond physical and mental connections.
What’s the difference between T’ai Chi and Qigong?
Qigong literally means “Qi work,” or energy exercises. Qigong focuses on mastering the flow of qi (vital life energy) in your own body. There are four aspects to this discipline: taking in fresh qi from your food and environment; circulating your qi freely and completely throughout your body; breaking up old, stuck qi; and getting rid of that old qi to make room for new.
The movements of Qigong are generally soft, relaxed and gentle – much like the movements of T’ai Chi Ch’uan. The casual, untrained observer may not be able to tell the difference between the two. In fact, T’ai Chi Ch’uan is actually a form of Qigong – one of the many forms and styles of energy exercises.
The main difference between T’ai Chi and Qigong is that T’ai Chi Ch’uan is a martial art, while most Qigong is not (or not necessarily). So like kleenex and tissue, all T’ai Chi is a form of Qigong but not all Qigong is T’ai Chi.
What’s the connection between T’ai Chi and yoga?
Both T’ai Chi Ch’uan and yoga are part of the short list of Classical Mind/Body disciplines. These ancient and traditional arts share four essential characteristics to conserve and circulate the vital life energy: alignment of the spine, control of the breath, relaxation of the mind and body, and use of visualization.
One of the many allegorical stories in the tradition of T’ai Chi involves the monk Bodhidharama, who brought Ch’an Buddhism from India to China and established the famous Shaolin Temple. According to the legend, after setting up the temple Bodhidharma went into a cave to meditate for 10 years. When he came out, he found his followers to be weak and sickly from spending all their time in meditation and contemplation and not getting any exercise. As a consequence, they were unable to defend themselves against bandits or even wild animals.
So Bodhidharma decided to teach the other monks a system of stretching and strengthening exercises also brought from India – in other words, hatha yoga. As with every import that comes to China, these exercises evolved over time. Influenced by indigenous Chinese martial arts, the yoga that Bodhidharma taught to his disciples became what we know asT’ai Chi Ch’uan.
Can T’ai Chi help you lose weight?
Yes, T’ai Chi can be an excellent exercise to help you lose weight – or more technically speaking, to burn fat. Everyone knows that the two main ingredients to losing weight are to decrease the number of calories we take in (diet) and to increase the number of calories we put out (exercise). But did you know that there is a third necessary ingredient?
When we “burn fat” in the body, we’re converting it from stored energy to usable energy for work and play. But that conversion can only take place inside tiny little parts of the muscle cell known as “mitochondria.” The thing is, if you’re not regularly using your mitochondria to burn fat (in other words, if you’re too sedentary), then your body reabsorbs them. Then even if you do cut down on the calories, and start back on your workout routine, there’s no place to actually “burn” the fat! It takes a certain kind of physical stimulus to trigger your body to start making mitochondria again.
It turns out that T’ai Chi Ch’uan is a perfect model for this special kind of exercise. The long routines of T’ai Chi take a little less than half an hour to complete, and are done at the ideal level of intensity. These routines also really work your legs – where there is the greatest typical density of mitochondria – not to mention all the calories you put out as you sweat your way through a good T’ai Chi workout.
What are the main benefits of T’ai Chi practice?
Have you got an hour? I might be able to list all the benefits of T’ai Chi then, because there are so many! In a nutshell, T’ai Chi Ch’uan practice improves muscular strength, endurance, flexibility and cardiovascular fitness. But so does almost every other form of exercise. So what, exactly, is different about T’ai Chi? There are five important ways T’ai Chi is unique and beneficial.
- T’ai Chi develops synergist muscle strength. T’ai Chi practitioners seem to get immensely strong legs — without looking bulky or hyper-toned. This is because synergist muscles are generally smaller and deeper than the large prime movers like the quadriceps and hamstrings
- T’ai Chi enhances balance and coordination. In T’ai Chi, the eyes are constantly following the movements of the hands as they circle and spiral, push, pull, grab and punch. This slow, controlled eye-to-hand coordination is actually a more advanced version of the techniques used to treat people with inner ear disorder, a common pathology which causes loss of balance, headaches and mood swings, among other things.
- T’ai Chi improves aerobic conditioning. In 1995 Johns Hopkins University published a study that showed T’ai Chi just as good at lowering trait blood pressure as conventional aerobic exercise, but without the side effects of temporarily raising your heart rate and blood pressure.
- T’ai Chi Ch’uan is easy to modify for special populations. T’ai Chi, on the other hand, has a tempo, a calmness, and a central theme of “attention” which not only promotes but rewards modification of posture and intensity. There are no contraindications and no side-effects inherent in T’ai Chi practice.
- T’ai Chi teaches kinesthetic awareness. Built into the very core of T’ai Chi practice is the philosophy of greater awareness – first of your body, then of your thoughts and emotions, and then of the world around you. Dissociated body awareness accounts for a high percentage of sports-related injuries and may contribute to the conditions of chronic pain.
What is the T’ai Chi sword for?
One of the most beautiful renditions of T’ai Chi Ch’uan is the T’ai Chi Sword routines. The T’ai Chi sabre slashes and cuts like a tiger, while the T’ai Chi straight sword swoops and spirals like a phoenix in flight. Although performed slowly and gently just like in the empty hand routines, T’ai Chi weapons routines still utilize all the techniques of traditional attack and defense. But in the end, it’s really all about energy.
In the ordinary “empty-hand” routines of T’ai Chi Ch’uan, the goal is to master the flow of the qi (vital life energy) inside your own body. But what about sending qi outside your own body? In fact, we’re trading energy all the time – it’s how we create connections in communication and relationship. The goal of the T’ai Chi sword is to learn to send energy into an external object (in this case the sword) and then draw it back again – mastering the flow of your qi from you to the outside world.
Is T’ai Chi really an Olympic sport?
Yes… and no. Any sport that wants to join the Olympics must follow a rigid procedure of organizing regional and world championships and submitting their applications to the IOC. They are first accepted as “associate members” of the Olympic movement and then they apply to be full members and included in the Olympic program. Sports that are already in the Olympics can apply to the IOC to add additional events.
Every four years, the Olympic games move to a new host country and that country has the opportunity to add their own their own event. In 2008, Beijing will host the summer Olympic games. Since the late 1980’s, China has been leading the movement to elevate their national sport Wushu (martial arts) to Olympic status. Now there are regional, national wushu championships held every year, and world championships in Wushu held every two years.
The international sport of Wushu currently has three barehand events as well as a variety of weapons event divisions. One of the three barehand events is T’ai Chi Ch’uan. In 2008, an exhibition Wushu competition will be held concurrently with the summer Olympic games. The competition will be held in the Olympic venue, and all winning competitors will receive official Olympic medals.
It remains to be seen whether Wushu will go on to become a permanent Olympic sport like Judo or fencing.
Why is T’ai Chi called a Living philosophy?
T’ai Chi is more than just a martial art, or a physical exercise or a means of health and healing. T’ai Chi Ch’uan is actually a physical embodiment of the fundamental principles of the universe. The over-arching principle of T’ai Chi is balance and harmony, and the idea that everything in life is either a step towards balance or a step away from balance. When you are moving toward balance you start to experience your life in a very specific way: you have more energy and power, you have a greater sense of freedom in your life, and your life has more flow.
But as with any philosophy, if we only talk about balance, power, freedom and flow those concepts are little more than words. The philosophy has no “life.” But T’ai Chi Ch’uan goes beyond mere words, and brings you into direct experience of moving towards balance or away from it. For example, the elements that contribute to physical life energy are spinal alignment, control of the breath, relaxing the mind and body, and developing the ability to make vivid mental pictures. When you can do all these things simultaneously, you discover that you have abundant and powerful qi flow.
In exactly the same way, the elements that contribute to personal power (having what you want in life) are alignment (beliefs and values to actions and behaviors), being in the moment (not dissipating your focus to the past or future – just like the breath), letting go of “doing too much” (do you “use a bulldozer to move a china cup?”), and expanding your imagination (like Emily Dickinson, who dwelt in possibility).
Who Needs a Life Coach?
Smart, educated, actualized people should always be able to achieve their goals and find the health, wealth and romance they want in their lives. Why then don’t they? Because there is an internal dynamic — an unseen, unconscious pattern of thought, perception and behavior — that gets in the way.
It is virtually IMPOSSIBLE for you to find and fix these roadblocks to happiness, because by their very nature they are invisible to you. This is why a coach is essential to your growth process: because he or she is trained to see your patterns, to mirror for you the things you cannot see, and to mentor you in the things you don’t yet know how to do.
“It’s not whether you win or lose, it’s how you play the game.”
What is life coaching?
Originally, the term “coach” applied to the world of sports. Your coach is someone who will guide you step by step through the learning and training process until you excel at your sport. Well, now the idea of coaching is now applied to the world of everyday life – job, family, relationships, health and even financial excellence.
Life can be thought of as a series of cycles. Each cycle is like a game, and each game is simply an opportunity to learn and grow. Some lessons are big, some are small. We complete the game and learn the lesson only when we complete the cycle – in other words, come “full circle.”
What is Full Circle Coaching?
Full Circle Coaching is about getting more out of the game of life. The game of life is not an event – it’s a process. An infinite number of factors can affect the win/loss outcome of a game. It’s completely unpredictable and cannot be forced. What a coach does with his athletes is help them be better prepared to win. Coaches do this by helping tier athletes get more out of the game itself – in other words, get more out of the process. In the same way, a life coach helps you to master the processes of life.
If you think about it, athletes train in order to get better at handling challenges. Sports and games are nothing more than a series of deliberately designed challenges – and the individuals or teams who get consistently better at meeting and mastering those challenges wind up being champions. In the same way, we find joy and fulfillment in life the better we get at meeting and mastering the challenges of everyday life.
What makes Full Circle Coaching unique?
Full Circle Coaching has two parts: talking and T’ai Chi. Yes – all of our coaching contracts involve learning T’ai Chi. This ancient martial art is based on physical and philosophical principles that teach you to meet and master challenges. Like most other life coaching formats there is conversation involved – the narrative of your life story, the introduction of basic principles, and deconstruction of certain events, beliefs and perceptions. But we believe that some point coaches have to stop talking with their clients and start physically “doing” things with them. Imagine a basketball coach who sat his players down and just talked to them about the upcoming game – but never had them shoot free-throws or run plays. Practicing T’ai Chi will get your coaching breakthroughs out of your head, and into your body.
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