Welcome to the taichido monthly email Newsletter where we give you news about taichido and Doshi Gary Robinson gives his thoughts on aspects (both practical and esoteric!) of tai chi and related areas.

INTERACTIVE CD-ROM: PART TWO LAUNCHED

Hello and welcome to the 20th Newsletter from tai chi website Taichido.com. This month Gary gives us further insights into the practice and learning of tai chi, plus news of some of his other activities.

As you can tell from the title, I am also extremely pleased (not least because it means that I've finished a huge job!) to announce the launch of the second CD-ROM  in our interactive instruction CDs for the Long Yang Form. The Form in its entirety is made up of three sections, and each of our CDs represent a part. Part Two of the Long Yang Form is in many ways my favourite: As a practitioner of the entire form (although others may wish to concentrate on a specific section instead) I find that Part One is almost like a 'warm up', and by the time you have completed it, you have now settled down in body and mind for Part Two. This part is twice as long as  the previous, with many more moves of greater complexity and is tremendously satisfying to execute. 

As there's no rest for the wicked, we are already starting on Part Three...

We are still pretty sure that these are the only things of their kind that give such a high level of interactive multimedia detail to an instruction of such a long and complex tai chi procedure as the Long Yang Form. If you wish to know more, check out the details at the bottom of this newsletter, or visit our shop: www.taichidoshop.com and www.taichidoshop.co.uk

Please email mark@taichido.com if you have a view. Mark Allen, webmaster for taichido.com

The further you go, the deeper it gets

When simply numbered and listed as separate postures, the most obvious difference between parts one, two and three of the Yang Long Form is that each is longer than its predecessor. However, closer inspection reveals that part 2 does in fact include one repeat and one variation of a sequence that should have been 'mastered' earlier as a consequence of part one study; and that part three contains that same sequence and variations no less that five times. This sequence soon assumes the collective name of Grasp the Sparrows Tail Sequence and the variations are only two - GST Short and GST Long. The second of these is only two postures longer than the other.

Students of any Tai Chi Form should always begin at the beginning. It is my opinion that the beginning is simple Chi Kung (other transliterations include Qi Gong etc.) standing and breathing exercises. Whilst Chi Kung is (mainly) symmetrical and static, this practice allows for intensive self examination and the minimal movements also encourage the practitioner to properly coordinate breath with movement. This, along with the techniques of 'grounding' are essential ingredients to Tai Chi and they must be 'mastered' or at least understood (i.e. 'felt' or 'experienced') at some point to enable proper Tai Chi. It much easier to study this in isolation rather that just squeezing it in somewhere in between the complications of coordinating the arms, the legs, the head, the back ... and all of the other bits. If Chi Kung is studied prior to Tai Chi then the breath coordination becomes perfectly natural. This is surely confirmed by the first moving posture of the Yang Long Form "Beginning" where the feet remain firmly rooted and the body sinks and rises with the arms - imitating "the sun rising slowly over the horizon". As the practitioner raises their arms upwards (Yang) he/she should breath in. As the arms (and knees) 'sink' (Yin) he/she should breath out. This pattern is continued throughout the whole Form. If this is not properly established at the very beginning, and if the rhythm is not so set by the breath, what follows is not really Tai Chi.

Once more from the top!

I have  described how, when taken one step at a time, Tai Chi movement and coordinated breath become 'natural' and easy to understand. The same applies to the Form in general. If you start from the beginning, the Form reveals itself to you and is learnt like music. If you know a tune (or even a symphony) very well, you need only here the opening notes to be able to perceive the whole thing. The finale only 'works' in relation to the whole and the overture is as important as the finale. That Chi Form is just the same - and should be learnt just like learning a tune ... that is ... from the beginning. I used to be a professional musician myself and in rehearsals I got very used to hearing "once more from the top". When ever we made a mistake we went back to the beginning of the tune and started again. By doing this we did get to know the start of the piece very well, in fact we got to know it very very well, but this did us no harm because we became relaxed and more confident and ready for all of the challenges that lay ahead. When it came to the tricky parts of the tune we were 'on a roll' and, with practice, we seemed to instinctively know what to do.

The entire Yang Long Form consists of about 108 postures performed as one. Some may consider the learning and committing of this all to memory to be a daunting prospect. This need not be so. All one has to do is start from the beginning and patiently practice one postures after the other until the movement becomes second nature ... and then move on to the next, and then the next ... and so on.

One of the reasons that the Yang Long Form is not as popular as the Short Form here in the west as it is in the east is simply because us westerners expect speedy and measurable results. In short, we are impatient. But this lack of patience is not the only characteristic of us western 'go getters'. We are also ambitious individuals and thus ... we are stressed. It is as an antidote to this stress that many are attracted to Tai Chi. Tai Chi could be the cure, but the trouble is we bring our impatient attitude with us to the Dojo and nullify any good that may be in it with impatience. This little story (told me by a student) illustrates. A man was seen running along as fast as he was able whist pushing a bicycle. "Why don't you get on the bike?" a passerby inquired. "No time for that" the man panted in reply.

There is a phrase that describes the learning process of Tai Chi postures very well, this being:
"Do this a thousand times and it becomes yours".

This newsletter announces the launch of the second in a series of CDs on the Yang Long Form produced by us at Taichido.com. The second CD concentrates upon Part Two of the Long Form. The writing of a short piece as introduction to that CD came to be my inspiration for the subject of this newsletter. (By the way, the subject of the last newsletter "Doing just for the doing" was in a way the inspiration behind the production of the CD's!) In that introduction to part two of The Yang Long Form I felt obliged to offer some words of justification or encouragement regarding the length of part two as compared to part one and I quickly point out that those that might have learnt part one from our CD have in fact already learnt some of part two. The sequence learnt in part one and repeated in part two is postures 2-7 on CD1 that, when familiar with, become known as the "Grasp the Sparrows Tail (short) sequence". Thus, I wrote:

By the time a student is ready to venture into Part Two of the Yang Long Form, the GST sequence (which accounts for a part of the time it takes to perform that part) should be more or less committed to memory and muscle groups trained to respond automatically. Therefore, the good news is to those who have properly learnt and diligently practised Part One is that they have already partially-learnt a part of Part Two. More good news is that the GST sequence is the bedrock of the whole form and most postures within the form are variations of postures contained within that sequence. However, henceforth the fresh challenge is one of remembering sequences and then sequences of sequences as opposed to individual postures. There are of course many new postures to learn in Part Two and I suppose it must be said now that the bad news is that yes, each successive new posture learnt is a just little bit more difficult than those that came before. This becomes clear as the Form develops and kicks and turns are introduced. Part Three reaches a finale with Sweep Lotus, which involves a 360-degree turn, executed whist standing on one leg only followed by a kick -remaining stood on only one leg throughout! But that all comes later, and if the practitioner has practiced patiently and diligently they will, when the time comes, be ready for all of this.

With the work on the second set of CD's complete, Mark and I taking are taking a short break before now concentrating on the final pair of CD's which will of course feature Part Three of the Long Form. This project in general has so far has involved almost a year of fairly intensive work - from Mark in particular. For him, this has almost become a part time job and he has been putting a couple of hours work into it every day throughout this whole period. It is holiday season here in the UK anyway so this short pause comes at an appropriate time. However, rest assured the we looking forward resuming work very soon and, because we are 'on a roll' and have well established procedures and systems in place; we know what needs to be done next and how to do it and we confidently predict a revitalized and orderly resumption of work very soon and a smooth run through to completion! I shall of course keep you informed as to progress in this newsletter and the release of the third set of CD's will be announced here in due course ... so keep watching this space!

This tangled web we weave

As indicated above, Mark's very sophisticated and specialist technical work on these interactive CD's can be very time consuming, and his dedication to the project has by necessity been practically obsessive! I, on the other hand, between producing various amounts of texts for him to duly process, have had some time on my hands. I have used this time to update the other websites that I am involved in and, to end this newsletter, I would like to briefly mention those 'others' which (as regular readers will know) are on subjects other than Tai Chi. These 'others' are my own 'other obsession'; that being Buddhism ... with that being an interest that came about through my well know interest in the subject of Tai Chi in generally and 'eastern thought' in particular.

The site that I, as webmaster, am most proud of is www.threewheels.org.uk. This is a site that I have developed for Three Wheels, a Japanese Shin Buddhist Temple in London. This branch Temple of Shogyoji in Japan was established in London in 1994. I have been a member of the Sangha (community) of this Temple for many years and webmaster for the last couple of those years.
The most recent updates and additions to this site are most significant and include pieces from the Head Priest of the Temple in Japan and others by the Spiritual Director of Three Wheels in London. Please do visit that site and enjoy the updates "Dharma Words", "Fragrant Light", "Public Talks and Lectures" and the "Picture Galleries".

One of two of the pictures featured in Gallery Two at Three Wheels (see above) are also on view in the sub-files of "Southampton Shin Sangha" - which is in turn a sub-file of my own "Gary's Home Dojo". My "Home Dojo" site is dedicated mainly to Beginners Tai Chi - and there are plenty of articles there that the Tai Chi enthusiast may be interested in. The Southampton Shin Sangha parts however are dedicated to Buddhism, particularly the subjects that we study here at My Home Dojo during separate sessions 'put aside' for this 'other' form of study.
I am also involved in a web and hard copy magazine called "Pure Land Notes". This was also recently updated to include the Summer 2003 issue. All of the sites mention here may be accessed through a 'portal site' site that I have built called (appropriately I think) Wheels Within Wheels.

I mention all of this only so that I can direct you to the pictures contained within the "Southampton Shin Sangha Scrapbook". Please do, if you have the time or inclination, visit these pages to see pictures of my own re- confirmation as a Shin Buddhist on 15th June, and the confirmation of Tai Chi associates and members of Southampton Shin Sangha Sue, Matt and Gordon. There are plenty of other pictures there that I hope you enjoy clicking through - and more than enough information to keep you occupied till the next newsletter I hope!

Gassho, Gary gary@wheelswithinwheels.net