CAT PLESKA
The movements
My earliest thought about Tai Chi is that the movements seem like a dance. There is fluidity, a gracefulness
that one develops as the practice continues. Recently, my teacher told me: stop doing that with your hands.
What did he mean, I wanted to know. My hands are naturally graceful, like a dancer’s. There may not be
much else about me that is graceful, but I’ve known my hands always are. They arc and curve, and my
fingers are long and seem to caress the air. No, he said. That’s wrong. Don’t hold them that way unless there
is a specific application (martial art) you’re going to do. When you bend your wrist, you’re blocking the flow of
chi, the energy.
Oh. And so I began the practice of holding my hands straighter and “with intent.” In Tai Chi, hands are always
active. This means that the fingers are slightly apart and there is a sense of extending them toward the earth
and into the earth, or heavenward. They never hang limp or with the fingers curled. I had to be mindful all
through the form that my fingers and hands behave with intent. To me, at this point, it feels as if there is
tension, and of course, in Tai Chi, tension is not the aim, but for now, that’s all I can manage.
There are 13 principles of Tai Chi that if undertaken and perfected, you will be perfectly balanced and chi will
spiral through your marrow and it can be controlled. These principles involved how you square your
shoulders with your hips, how you hold your head, the alignment of the elbows over the knees, etc. At this
point, I try to remember to keep my hips and shoulders aligned. This is a great deal harder than it seems or
looks. I can’t do it in every posture, and in fact, as I further practice the Yang Long Form (108 postures), I’m
lucky to remember to square everything up in one of two postures. In practice, keeping the shoulders and
hips aligned means that they remain square to one another and there is no twisting that causes a
misalignment. If they aren’t square (and to keep them square, slow, deliberate, small movements are
necessary), then balance can never be achieved. Or at least until you’ve practiced a few decades.
There is a saying about Tai Chi that with practice you develop a steel skeleton that is wrapped in cotton.
What this means is that the strength is built from the inside out. I tell my students in the Sun for Arthritis form
that through practice they are building the small muscles and tendons that underlie the larger muscle
masses. The joints become more flexible and blood and lubricating fluids flow into the joints more readily.
Balance is improved, although at some point deeper into the practice you realize that balance is a relative
thing. Does it mean you don’t fall as much? Do you move more easily? Most likely. But for those who practice
for years, balance takes on a whole new meaning as you develop the martial applications. Then it becomes a
matter of whether an opponent can push you over. Depending on his/her skill and yours, practicing for years
may mean you are further away from balance than you ever believed.
My relationship with my body and with the movements becomes a challenge and a study each time I practice.
I try to remember to hold my head straight, eyes forward, chin back slightly. I relax my shoulders and they fall
just a bit forward, although there is no slump. I tuck my hips under so that the tip of my spine is pointing to
the floor. My knees are slightly flexed. I feel my weight transfer to the bottom of my feet, where it should be so
that there is no weight on the hips and knees. I keep my elbows pointed down and over my knees. I move
slowly to properly transfer the weight from one leg to the other. And I have to remember all this as I move
through each posture.
I am just learning what all this means in terms of yin and yang. That will be the next discussion.
