YOGA - Moving into Stillness
"Moving into stillness in order to experience your true nature is the primary theme of yoga. Every thought, feeling and emotion, as well as every aspect of your behaviour, is based on the way you feel about yourself. The way you feel about yourself determines how you think, what you do, and how you interact with the world. It's the basic factor that governs the quality of your life, the degree to which you are interested in living, and the way which you interpret what is happening.
Stillness is not the absence of energy, life, movement. Stillness is dynamic. Its unconflicted movement, life in harmony with itself. It can be experienced when there is total, uninhibited participation in the moment you are in. When you are wholeheartedly present with whatever you are doing. When you are not wholehearted, when you would rather be somewhere else, parts of you shut down and begin not to participate. Your energy circulation becomes constricted and the creative life force is unable to flow through you unimpeded. The source of energy does not diminish, but the amount the energy flows through you does. This leads to ill health, lowered vitality, lack of enthusiasm, depression, frustration, unhappiness.
When you are wholehearted however, sometimes enthusiastic, sometimes mellow, you will experience a new sense of aliveness. Whenever you give your undivided attention to experiencing yourself, you will experience the conflict free. calm, dynamic peace and truth about yourself."
- by Erich Schiffmann
From 'Yoga. The spirit and Practice of moving into stillness'
T'AI CHI, What is Taijiquan
by Tew Bunnag
Taijiquan can be practiced as a martial art, as a way of healing, and as meditation in movement. As a martial art (denoted by the Quan) it is often characterised as ‘internal’. Its insistence on the power of the soft and yielding, in contrast to the hard resistance of outward strength comes directly from one of the many insights to be found in one of the Classics of Daoism, the Dao De Jing, the text that dates from the Warring States period in Chinese history (403-221 BCE) and attributed to the philosopher Lao Zi.
Nothing under heaven is as soft and yielding as water.
Yet when attacking the hard and strong there is no surpassing it.
This is because nothing can alter it.
Everybody knows that the soft overcomes the hard.
But no one puts this into action.
- (from Chapter 78)
As a way of healing it is about maintaining the harmony of our vital energy, or Qi and restoring it when lost. This is done through the conscious execution of the movements of the Form, usually in a slow rhythm that allows time for the organism to decompress and to unblock. This aspect of the training is based on the notion of the Yin and Yang that is the fundamental principle of traditional Chinese medicine. It also draws on the understanding of the organism as comprising the Five Elements, Wu Xing, the qualities of our energy that are reflected in our lifestyle, emotions and mental activity.
As a meditation practice it is about establishing the unbroken awareness that is referred to as Yi. This awareness permeates every action, noting emptiness and fullness and the various phases of change from young (Yang or Yin) to old. It is applied when facing a sparring partner as well as any situation of interchange with another person. It is also the basis of a self-knowledge that is fundamental to going beyond violence.
Each of the three aspects of the art is linked by a common language that has its origin in the teachings and insights of the Yi Jing, the Book of Change, that dates from the Zhou dynasty 1122-225 BCE (known then as the Zhou Yi) and the philosophical writings of the early Daoist thinkers. This language is embedded in the Form, in which the same action can be a strike or a throw, a way of unblocking and harmonizing energy, or an expression of centred awareness. This is what makes the Taiji such an extraordinarily rich art.
To integrate its different facets an understanding of the underlying principles is essential, coupled with a familiarity with the symbolism. There is also the mythic level of the art that is reflected in the names that are given to the movements and sequences, such as ‘The White Crane cools its Wings’, or ‘Embrace the Tiger, Return to Mountain’. Far from being merely exotic or colourful they refer to an aspect of the art that contains deep teachings and insights that are intricately woven into the practice and that go beyond the confines of Chinese culture.
- Tew Bunnag November 2019.
