Tai Chi: Art of Moving Meditation

1. Introduction: Emphasize two major principles in Tai Ji, integration and flow. By integration, I mean it in two ways. Whole body integration. The Tachi classics, the root text talks about movement is rooted in the feet, power through the legs. It's controlled by what they call the Dantiana we might refer to as the core and just manifested in the hands and fingers. So that's what you're looking for in all the movements. One part of the body moves, everything is in motion, it's fluidity to the body and connection. We also talk about integration for the body, the breath, and the mind. At the beginning, we learn the technique, as they say, to separate and combine what happens at the hand or the arm, the movement of the legs and feet and the waist. Then when we start putting that together, we link it with the breath, and then the mind becomes completely absorbed in the movement in the body, and you're essentially moving through space in a beautiful moving meditation. The other aspect we emphasize is this feeling of flow. On the mental level with flow, we talk about it as being completely absorbed in the present moment activity. We also talk about it on a physical level. In this practice, we want to flow, as they say, like, a slow moving river. No stopping, starting, no rushing or pausing, just this flowing river like feel to the movements as we move through space. So I welcome you to this program. This is a great balance between learning just a few movements that some people might get taught and you maybe can perfect them, but you're kept with just a few movements, and a lot of people get taught a longer set, and it becomes too complicated. What I've done is I've taken the most powerful movements from the classic Yang style Tai Gi. We're going to be doing a nine move and sequence. The kind of core practices that will help you get the mind and the body, feel this connection of integration and flow. So I welcome you to the program, see you soon, be patient with this, and enjoy the experience. It's better to enjoy and have the movement a little wrong than to tense yourself. 2. How to Approach the Practices : So what is the right attitude and approach to take to this program and learning Tai G in general? The first important principle, I think, is patience. Do not rush it. Do not be hard on yourself. Take your time. That's why we've created this very systematic step by step practice program. Follow it in order. Be patient. Don't be judgmental with yourself. The second important principle is commit and persevere, no matter how hard it seems, no matter how much difficulty maybe you're having of Lincoln movement four with five and letting the sequence flow together, that's right. Just make that commitment to practice a bit every day. The third essential point is, what do I mean by this? Commit to practicing every day. It's what we call committing to short practice sessions many times throughout the day. You're not looking to create a 45 minute or 1 hour block once or twice a week. Yeah, that's better than doing nothing, but you're actually going to get more out of it if you do short little sessions every single day. So, for example, the opening movement, floating arms. You're learning this move. Take a few days. Take a whole week. Don't even learn another movement. And every hour or two, get up from your chair, and just practice this movement for 2 minutes and then go back to your routine or your work or your studying, whatever it is that you're doing at that moment. So short sessions throughout the day, two, three, four, five, six times throughout the day, couple minutes at a time. And sometimes one movement, then maybe start bringing in a second movement. And as you go through the program, you start practicing more movements. You might be a type of person who says, Oh, I'm going to practice for 3 minutes, only one move, or maybe the type of person who might say, I'm going to do six movements for 3 minutes, three times a day. That's to follow your own flow, follow what works for you. But just make that commitment to practice short sessions many times throughout the day. Once again, I want to bring up this notion that they bring up in the Dao starts, which is what they call separate, then combine. So you'll notice that's how this program is created. First, learn every move separately. Make sure you got a certain degree of mastery when you've floating arms, before you move into rooster on one leg, before that moves into Cloud hands, take your time, master every individual movement. Then just practice the stepping patterns, how to step forward, how to step backwards, how to move sideways. Do that without the movements of the arms. Then three, practice every individual move with the stepping, but not linking the moves together. Just say I'm going to do, as we call this throwing the Frisbee. Now I'm going to do block eye, palm strate, and a separate practice. Don't link the moves yet. And then finally, once you've mastered all the movements, standing in a static position, once you've mastered the stepping and then certain degree of mastery of every individual move with the appropriate stepping pattern, then you're ready for the TG flow sequence. Separate, then combine. That's how you master Ti G the final principle I want to really emphasize is really important is just relax and enjoy yourself. It's more important, I always say to put your arm in the wrong position, but the body feels relaxed and loose and you're breathing nice smoothly. Than it is to have your arm in the correct position, but the breathing you're holding your breath and your body feels tense. So let the body be loose. Enjoy the practice. Don't be hard on yourself, relax and enjoy. So I hope this video really helps you with how you approach the practice program to take your time and enjoy the journey. So thanks a lot. I'll see you guys in the next video. 3. Training the Five Regulations: In Tai Ji, we talk about training the five key principles or the five regulations. And what I mean by that is we train the body, the breath, the mind, the energy, and spirit. So what do I mean by that? The body, we train to get, as the Chinese say song, which means an active state of relaxation. The body is open and loose. You feel rooted into the Earth as if someone comes to push you from the sides and you're not going to move. Yet we're very supple and loose. Never locking the joints. There's always kind of the 70% rule that we follow, never extending, never locking, never going past our comfort zone. So as I say, you come to your edge and take a gentle step back because we want to move in a flow like manner and graceful. The breath. The breath should be slow, smooth, quiet, relaxed. And the more you move into Tai chi, you're going to start linking the movement with breath, which makes it a very powerful meditative practice. The mind. The mind should simply be within the movement. You want the mind as to say in the body. There are certain movements where I'll guide you, and I'll recommend that you say follow the middle finger of your lead hand as it comes across your body or out in front. There's a bunch of movements like that. So sometimes you'll have a very specific place to put your mind to put your state of awareness. Sometimes it's just purely in this feeling of being rooted through the feet and powering through the legs coming up through manifesting and finishing up in the hands. This notion of training the energy is very interesting. I want to bring this to a very concise, simple and easy to follow in a principle that you'll be able to actually experience, which is what you're going to experience in Tai Ji is what I call the optimal state of energy. You're going to be calm yet energized. You're going to feel relaxed, yet a bit powerful. That's the state that Tai Ji brings you into, and that's what we're looking for here. We're not looking to relax and we're slumped down, and we're not looking to have power and energy where we're skittish. It's this optimal state of calm energy. And finally, we train the spirit. Now, what I mean by that is not some esoteric, some mystical cosmic notion of spirit. The way it's mostly used in the tradition of Taiji is we raise our spirit, we raise our frequency. We feel really good. We feel alive. We're in high spirits. We feel great. That's the type of spirit we're looking to create that this will make your sense of self feel better. In ti G, everything is integrated. On a physical level, they talk about the movement is rooted in the feet. You power through the legs. You control the movement through the Dantion or what we call the cord and just manifests in the hands and fingers. We integrate the body, the breath, and the mind. And when that happens, that induces this calm yet energetic state and high spirits. In this style that we use, we work with the flow. It's like a slow moving river. So these are the key principles I want you to take as you start practicing the Tai Gi. For the body, the breath, the mind, the energy, and the spirit. Everything is integrated, and just we experience in a state of flow with our movement in that optimal psychological state of being in flow. The more were in flow, the more feelings of genuine contentment and happiness we're going to have in our lives. 4. Qi Gong Warm Up: Here's a warm up chee gong practice we call a simple doesn't. We just moving through all the major joints of our body from the neck to the shoulders, the wrists and hands, the hips, the pelvic region, the waist, knees, and ankles. Just give us a nice warm up before we begin doing the tight chi movements. So starting with the neck, we're going to start with some simple neck rotation. Bring the chin to the chest, or just going to do simple circles. But as you come up, I don't want you to strain your neck. Just bring your neck to neutral. So inhale as the neck comes across the top. Exhale, Chin the chest. Neutral as you come up. Don't strain it backwards. I just want you to go three times each way. Inhale as you come over the top. Exhale, as you come down. The second movement we're going to do for the neck is we're going to bring my right hand to my left shoulder. I'm just going to bring that right arm out in front of me across my body, following that middle finger, turning the head. And as it comes to the side of my body, I follow it down to the side of my body. I bring my left hand touching my right shoulder. Bring it out. Following a gentle turning of the neck. Comes to the side, bring it down. We're doing every movement three times each side. Cross, exhale, gaze at that middle finger. Just getting that nice gentle motion with the neck. Once again, with he gong, we talk more about loosening the joints than we talk about stretching. That's what we're looking for here. Just loosening everything up. Okay, now let's come down to the shoulders. We're gonna do some shoulder rolls. Gonna do three forward rolls. Make sure you don't bring the shoulders and the ears close together. So as the shoulders come up, the ears also come up. Three forward? Three back. This next movement, I'm going to show you sideways. I think it'll be easier to follow. We're going to tuck in the tailbone, tuck in the chin, round out the back, making fists. As we come up, the arms come up and out and the shoulder blades squeeze towards the spine. Then we bring it, we round out that upper back. So really focus on the shoulders. Squeezing the spine, expanding the chest, then round out that upper back. Okay. Coming to the wrists and hands, the first thing we're going to do is a very simple opening and closing. We're just going to take in the fingers and very slowly, joint by joint, making fists and then wrap the thumbs around the fingers, close, and open, spread out the fingers and extend the fingers past neutral. Close open. Close and open. Now we're going to do some wrist coils. Start one hand at a time, palm facing out. Then the palm will face down, face in, face up, and then we turn it out, and then out to the side again. It's a 360 degree rotation. All coiling at the elbow. We're not doing big arm movements. Palm down, palm in, palm out, go back out. Then change the direction. Come in first. Then the palm is up, faces back out. Come in. Palm up, bring the palm till it faces down, back out, one more. In the other hand. Palm facing out, faces down, in, up, straight and forward, back out to the side. Out down, in, up, forward, out, the other way, in, um, up, palm down, facing out, forward. Nice gentle coils of the wrist. Let's come down to the waist. Once again, nice big waist circles. As I come into my left, I'm going to come off the right heel. As you come forward, let the belly forward. I'm going to show you sideways here. As I come forward, breathing in, exhale. When I exhale, stomachs back, chest and head are forward. Inhale, exhale. Inhale. Exhale, and go the other way. Inhale, bellies forward, chest and head back, exhale. Belly back, chest head forward. Coming off the opposite heel. Now let's open up with swinging the legs. Just gonna bring the leg up. Try to get the thigh parallel. If you can't, that's right, too. Just swing it open. Once again, that 70% rule. Don't overdo it. Three side. Okay, let's come down to the knees. We're just going to circle a knee. So put the hands just above the knee. Three circles one way. And three circles the other way. Now we're going to do some gentle toe kicks, bringing the right leg up if you're just kicking someone, this is up to you. If you can't come high, it's like you're kicking someone in the ankle. You can kick higher, you're kicking someone in the knee. If you need to come back down in between the three kicks, let's do that. Let's bring the leg up. One, bring it down. Bring it up. Two, down, three. Do the left. Bring it up, kick the toe. Really extending that leg. Nice range of motion, the leg and the knee. And finally moving down to the ankles and feet. Once again, just like we've done with all the major joints, nice circular motion. Bring up the right foot. The circles one way. I tend to go clockwise first, and then I go counterclockwise. And switch it up. Then feet feel rooted into the ground. We're just going to come off the heels three times onto the balls of the feet and toes. One, two, and three. And just for a finale, even though we've done our dozen, we're going to bring the feet together, bring the palms out and stretching up. Making yourself as tall as you can possibly be. Interlace the fingers, index fingers to the sky. Inhale and stretch, exhale relax, and bring it down. And now ready to move through some Taichi. Thanks for joining me and I'll see you soon. 5. SECTION 2: INDIVIDUAL MOVEMENTS | Standing Stance: Before we begin the tai chi practice, we want to ensure that we have good standing posture. So the Tai Chi stance is actually a stance you want to be using as much as you can throughout your day whenever you're standing. Your feet are about hip to shoulder with apart, even weighted. Want to ensure that you're a little bit more on the balls of the feet than your heels. It's not a lot, maybe about 52% on the balls of your feet, 48% on your heels, but it's a bit about feeling. As they say, feeling is a language. Feel your toes, even if you have shoes on, but feel your toes rooted into the floor as well. We don't need to do a deep end with our knees, but we just want to ensure that the knees are not locked. That's a problem a lot of people have. If they lean back on their heels, they tend to lock their knees, which causes problems in the knees as well as in the lower back. So about 52% on the balls of the feet, feel your toes, connected as well. The knees just slightly bent. Bring your attention to the bottom of the spine, that pelvic bone, and just relax it. We're not trying to tuck it in significantly. We're not sticking the butt out, just relax the bottom of the spine, and that precipitates the relaxation of the chest. The spine rises. You just want to feel this natural rising quality of the spine as if you're separating every vertebrae. It's like a rising, rising, rising, like a string of pearls, and that will continue up through the neck through the crown of the head. Ears are over the shoulders and the chin just slightly tucked. The shoulders are down and their back. Armpits are open. Hands at the sides, palms facing down at the hips. And we sink, do not rush into the first movement. You could take some time here. Very, very important to ensure the start of Tai Chi set starts with this. Do not take for granted that you're standing correctly. You want to feel rooted, feel relaxed. H yourself in optimal posture before you begin the movements. So take a little time. The feet are rooted, knee slightly bent, spine rises, arms are nice and loose, the armpits open, spine rising through the neck, head lifted, feeling the ears over the shoulders, chin slightly tucked. And we're ready to begin the movement of our ti chi flow practice. 6. Floating Arms: Movement number one is what we call floating arms. There's no stepping yet. This is done with the feet rooted into the Earth, palms facing the ground by the hips. You want to sink a little bit more into the heels. So it becomes about 52% into the heels, 48% of the balls of the feet. And then just like you're going to jump up, it's as if you're pushing off the balls of the feet and toes as if you're jumping. So now we shift just a bit of the weight. So there's a little bit of a weight transfer. We shift a little bit into the heels as if we're trying to dig a little deeper into the earth, and then we push off the balls of the feet and the arms come up. Now, remember, the reason this is called floating arms is the feeling we want is that we're not swinging our arms up. The arms are just coming up because we're generating power from the feet through the legs. The arms are just floating up as if there's strings on the pinkies. So we sink into the heels just a bit. Remember, about 52%, not dramatic. Pushing off the balls of the feet. We power through the legs, and we rise. There should be a feeling that you feel a bit taller than you were before. The arms are just going to come up to shoulder height. And then on the exhale, we sink back down. So really connect with this floating feeling through the arms, sink into the heels. Push off the balls of the feet as you inhale, power and relax and sink on the exhale. The feeling you want through the arms, as I say, is this feeling of you're opening the joints. So you can put your awareness on your shoulders. Then if they open, the elbows open and relax, the wrists and the fingers elongate. So it's a real floating and opening up feeling. I'm going to give you a bit of an opportunity to see this from a side position, as well. So you're here, inhale and exhale. Pushing off the balls of the feet, power through the legs, arms just float up, shoulder height, opening the joints, shoulders, elbows, wrists, elongating through the fingers. Give you a chance this opportunity here. Remember, that spine rising, that rising continues through the head. It's a very, very subtle shift of weight through the feet. So remember, as we're doing that movement, you want to have this feeling, probably the number one principle in Tichis this feeling of integration. And right now I want to talk about this whole body integration. It's the first kind of emphasis in the Taichi classics. Movements are rooted in the feet. You power through the legs, controlled by the waist and just manifest through the arms and fingers. Let's do one more here. So inhale, floating arms. When I was in China, when I went to study Tai Chi a bit more intensively, my Tai Chi teacher told me you could really notice someone's mastery of Tai chi by how they do this opening movement. A lot of people go and they think this is, like, just kind of swinging the arms up and down. But someone who really practices Tai Chi at a really profoundly optimal level, you're going to get this feeling of this is a whole body movement, and the arms really look like they're floating. This is the real start, okay? So really take some time with this and do this almost as just a meditative movement practice on its own. Okay, but really this once you get this right, everything will flow together as you start into the rest of the movements. 7. Crane Spreads It s Wings: Movement number two in this tai chi practice is what they call crane spreads its wings. This actually works as an excellent side stretch through the torso. Once again, these first two steps we're not moving through space yet, okay? We're in a kind of as they say, a static position with the body that we're moving everything on a more subtle level and the upper limbs are moving above the waist. Okay? So the way this works, we're going to have both our hands crossed at the wrist. So I know we have a bit of a mirror problem. I'm going to turn around, as well. We're going to cross the wrist. Right now I'm doing that over my left. Okay, inhale. And then as I exhale, my right arm is going up high. The palms now are going to spiral. So they start with the palms up. So as I go to the right, the right arm goes up high, all my weight transfers to this right side. I'm actually going to come off the left heel. So this right arm comes up with the palm out. Left hand is palm down and away. It's like if you want you could visualize a bird with really big wings, spreading its wings. Then we're going to come to the other side. Cross at the wrist, inhale. This is the exhale. You really want and you should be able when you got this right, you should feel a really nice side stretch. So the weight transfers to the leg where the hand is high. You're going to come off the heel on the low hand. So inhale, hands come together. We come back down. Exhale. Once again, this feeling, I root it in the foot, I power through the leg. The waist should get a bit of rotation towards the high hand side. Exhale, so crane spreads its wings. So it's push off the feet, power through the leg. This waist turns. Crane spreads its wings. I'm going to give you a bit of a back view. We'll go to the right first. So remember, hands over the left leg. Root into that left foot. And then if you're pushing off that foot, you power through that left leg, transfer the weight to the right leg, come off the left heel. Nice side stretch. Crane spreads its wings. Push off the feet, power through the legs, turning of the waist. Nice and loose. There should always be this looseness through the arms. You don't want to lock the joints, open and loose like a crane spreading its wings. This is actually an excellent practice, as well as that first movement we did, which you can do on your own. As I say, this works really well as a side stretch. So you could think if you're practicing this movement on its own, which I highly recommend, this works really, really well as a stretching practice. I love doing this movement for getting a nice, nice side stretch through my whole torso, okay? So just remember that feeling of looseness knowing the arms. A lot of people when they first come to Tai Chi, they're so worried about doing it right that they keep their limbs tight. There should be a loose feeling always. Never locking joints. Enjoy the movement, keep a nice loose flow, and I'll see you in the next video. 8. Cloud Hands: This movement is called Cloud hands. This is many people's favorite movement in Tai Ji. It's a sideways movement. They really click in here with the feeling of, Whoa, I get what you mean about moving meditation. This is a beautiful movement. I've known numerous yoga teachers who do not follow through and practice Tai chi consistently, but they've added this into their yoga classes. So I highly recommend that you take your time with this movement because it's a beautiful way to integrate the body, the breath, and the mind, and a moving meditation. So once again, I'll show you facing you, then I'll turn around. So I'm going to start. The upper arm goes across your body up high. Okay. Now, important thing here is you don't want the elbow higher than the shoulders. You'll see if you do that, you feel tense in your shoulder. So elbow lower than the shoulders. The upper arm is across your body, palm facing towards you. The lower hand is the palm faces in. So you see my left hand is facing towards the right. It's as if you're holding a stick. So you want the hands parallel. A lot of times people do this, and it's almost like they forget their low hand and then they have to change. So keep them essentially parallel. You want to keep it a little bit, the upper hand a little bit below eye level. Okay? We're gazing at that middle finger. Okay. So our weight once again is about 70%, 30%. We're here, 70% of our weight, 30%. Then we start coming across transfer the weight, turn the waist, eyes gazing at that middle finger. Come to the other side, so people will get confused here. So my right arm, the high arm is its same side. So my right arm now is on the right side. That means it's time to change. So this hand will go out like a stop sign. Like you're telling someone, Hey, wait, stop. High hand comes low, low hand comes high. And as we come across, remember this feeling, shift the weight, turn the waist, eyes gazing at that middle finger, make sure the arms stay loose. A lot of problems people have with Tai chi is they're worried they're doing the movements wrong so they get more tense. I'd rather you do the movements incorrectly and the body stays loose and you're breathing well and aware. Then make yourself tense. So the weight transfer can actually be a little more here than 70 30. You can go up to 80 20. Once again, it's very subtle with the feeling. As I say, feeling is a language. It could be very, very subtle. You just want to shift the weight, turn the waist, eyes, your awareness at that middle finger. You're breathing, inhale. As the high hand goes low, low hand comes high, exhale. Come across the body. Upper hand comes out like a stop sign, high hand, low, low hand tie, inhale, exhale. Shift the weight, turning the waist right here. Everything remember should be linked up. Everything's integrated. So when my hands are here, I shouldn't be here with my body or I shouldn't be here. My hands are in the middle. I'm 50 50 with my weight. Then I come over. So everything is integrated. The whole body is integrated, we're integrating the body breath in the mind. Inhale, high, high hand, low, low hand high, come across. Eyes following that middle finger. Remember, shift the weight, turning of the waist. I'm going to turn around. You guys can follow me for a minute or two. We're going to start with the right hand across our body. Once again, elbow below the shoulder, nothing locked, nothing tense. Exhale, come across, shift the weight, turn the waist, eyes gaze at that middle finger. Inhale, high hand, low, low hand, high. Come back. Inhale, high low, low high. Exhale, shift the weight, turn the waist, switching the sides. Want to be somewhere 70-30% weight shift or an 80 20. The feeling you want here is that the arms feel weightless. Do one more each side. Shift the weight, turn the waist. Breathing out. Inhale, high hand, low, low hand tie, push off the feet, power through the leg, shift the weight, turn the waist, and I think Cloud hands is one of the most aptly named, one of the best names for the Tai chi movements, because that's the feeling you want with the arms. Just like we started this practice with the feeling of floating arms. This is an excellent practice now at the end. With Cloud hands, you want the arms to feel like clouds. The movement happens because you're shifting the weight and the waist turns. The arms should feel weightless. The arm should feel essentially like clouds. So as you come across, you should feel like almost that you're not doing anything to move the arms. I feel like when I'm doing this, and this is when this movement feels so enjoyable, is the arm just follows the body. My arms coming across because I'm shifting my weight and I'm turning my waist. I'm putting no effort in moving my arms across space here. It's just moving effortlessly like a cloud through the sky. That's the feeling you want with this movement. So I highly, highly recommend practicing cloud hands on its own. It's a really enjoyable, relaxing practice that really will help you with integrating the body, the breath, and the mind and really get the feeling of moving meditation, I think, quicker and deeper than all the other movements. So thanks for joining me. I'll see you in the next video. 9. Rooster on One Leg: Name of this move is called Rooster on One leg. This is an excellent movement for balance. It's rather simple and easy. Though if you have trouble with balance, it's an excellent way to train to improve your balance and coordination. Once again, we weight one leg. So I'm waiting my left leg here. And I bring up the right leg. You want to aim for getting your upper leg parallel to the ground, but if that's too high and uncomfortable, don't worry about it. Remember, this key principle in Tai chi, the 70%. You never go past your comfort zone. We're not locking joints. So I'm going to come onto one leg and my elbow with the leg raised elbow to knee as if you're going to squash something down on your upper leg. My left leg is planted into the ground. That palm is by the hip facing down. You're going to switch sides, come down, exhale, sink. So we inhale, we wait one leg, bring the other leg up, and just sink in, elbow to knee. Okay? Most you're going to find it much more comfortable to have the palm facing the opposite direction. So I have my right hand up here. That palm is facing left. As I bring the left palm up, let the palm face right. Okay? Two problems people tend to have when they work with balance is this feeling of they start to go on one leg, and what happens, they feel like they're losing their balance. They want to bring their body as far away from the ground as possible. So their center of gravity comes up high, and you actually get more wobbly. So what you need to do is a bit counterintuitive, almost the opposite of what you feel like you want, which is you need to feel more rooted into the ground, kind of like a tree, right? If a tree has shallow roots and a big wind and storm comes, the tree can fall down. If the roots are deep, that trees not going anywhere. It's very stable. We want to do the same thing with our body. So first thing that's important if you're having trouble with this balance is feel yourself rooted to the floor, the ground. What I mean by that ball the foot and toes. Feel your toes. Even if you're wearing shoes, almost like you're trying to grip a pencil or pen off the floor with your toes. So really root into the ground with the ball, the foot and the toes. The second major thing is make sure you bend your knees. A lot of people, as I say, they come up, they lock their knees and they lose their balance. We don't need to come down really far. We're not doing that in this tai chi practice, but just make sure your knees are not locked. Bend your knees a bit, root into the floor, inhale, exhale. You keep your awareness just right in front of you or you could bring it up to focus on that middle finger. But we just want to keep that alignment with the back and the head up. So nice and simple, remember, what's important here is this slow, smooth, continuous movement, this flow, this feeling that you're really improving your balance. Don't worry so much about if your leg is exactly parallel to the ground, the upper leg. It's fine. If this is all you can do, that's okay, too. We really just want to work on this slow, smooth, flowing like feel, working with our balance. So thanks for joining me. I'll see you in the next video. 10. Tai Chi Kick: This movement is called the Tai chi kick. I want to just show you a bit of the feeling you want for this. Once again, this is an excellent movement to practice your balance and coordination. The feeling is as you plant the weight into one leg, just like in rooster on one leg, it's as if you're going to there's, like, a bowl of water over your thigh with the leg you're going to kick with. And it's like you put your hands in, you're going to scoops up some water and splash your face, a little bit of a face bath. So you scoop water, splash on your face, and then you're kicking out. We're not kicking right in front of us. We're not kicking all the way out 90 degrees. It's just a little bit in front, and if it's my right leg, a little bit to the right. Don't overthink it. It'll be a natural feeling here. I feel like it's always about 20, 30 degrees and you kick. Okay. Two essential things to think about here, right? So you're here, I scoop up the water. I kick out over that hand. Okay? So if I'm kicking with my left now, you don't want this left hand here. We don't want it over here. I'm kicking out over that hand. My awareness is passed to hand and foot. Exhale, remember the breed, a lot of people have trouble with the kick and they're holding their breath. Exhale on the kick. There's a couple of questions people always ask me with a kick. Okay, am I supposed to be kicking with my toes or the bottom of my foot? Either of them are fine. In fact, I recommend switching sometimes you'll notice it will feel different in your leg and it works different muscles, and sometimes one feels right, sometimes the other. You can just let it happen naturally, organically, or you could say, Oh, this time I'm going to practice it with a toe kick. Next s, Oh, this time I'll practice with the bottom of my foot. So what I mean by that is, this is a toe kick as if I'm kicking someone in the knee with my toes. This is kicking with the bottom of the foot where the toes are pointed up to the sky. Scoop the water, I kick out. My awareness is past that leg that's kicking. The other and probably most important thing that I'm always teaching with this movement is the height of the kick is not important. A lot of people, especially if you go on YouTube and you see especially some of these Chinese women who are, you know, compete, their kicks are up at the shoulder height. Do not try to emulate that. You need to know yourself. And once again, emphasize that principle of slow, smooth and continuous, be within your 70%. What I mean by that is, this is a much better Taihi kick where you almost feel like you're kicking someone at the ankle. I'd rather you do this than do this. I see that all the time. People trying to kick high, they lose their alignment with their back, obviously you can tell they're holding their breath, they look tense. So what you'll notice, and this is true of myself is your 70% will improve through time where you'll be able to kick higher. But don't force it. That will happen naturally. But you're not trying to kick high. For some of you, that might mean kicking the feeling of it's an ankle. It's down here. Some of you, it might be you're kicking someone the thought of in the knee. Some of you maybe you are very flexible and you like the feeling as if the kick is coming above your waist. If you could do that, and you could keep the alignment through the back, that's fine. But I want you to maintain your alignment with the spine, stay upright on the kicks. And I want you to feel comfortable. Honestly, I've worked with some elderly people really trouble with this, and I just have them go here and they just gently place their heel on the ground. That's it. That's fine. That's still training, their balance. They're still in flow, okay? So know yourself, be within your 70%. And once again, feel that feeling of rooting into the floor, ball the foot toes, bending the knee, kicking out over the hand. No you're 70%, alternate between toe kick and bottom of the foot kicks. All right, thanks. I'll see you next video. 11. Frisbee Throw: This movement is called the Frisbee throw. It really simulates and looks very similar to throwing a Frisbee one handed, whether you're lefty or whether you're right and we'll be going both directions. Okay? So what we do is once again, I'm going to show you for a while facing you so you see a little bit more detail with my torso, the arms, and then I'll turn around so you can follow through and follow me in a bit of a practice. So we're going to start with the weight on the right leg, so it'll be a lefty frisbee throw. So a lot of times people get confused. Which hand is high, which hand is low. So where the weight is is the high hand. The hand that's going to throw the Frisbee is going to be lower, okay? And it's almost like you're holding a ball, like bigger than a basketball or the way most of the world thinks about it, a football because I'm American, it's a soccer ball, but bigger than that, okay? But once again, the arms are relaxed. Then we're just going to turn this foot, the left foot, I'm just going to open it up for now. This will be a bit of movement once we start this in the Taichi practice. I just want to show you the move on its own. So it just follows this kind of arch. I want you to put your gaze on your middle finger. And you're right here. So the weight transfers. We start here. I have about 70% of my weight here, 30% here. I exhale, and I start transferring the weight. I'm about 50 50. Now the weight's coming to the forward leg. And as I finish, I'm about 70% of my weight here, 30% of the weight is here. I don't want you to go 100%. You come off. You want to stay with both legs. Once again, that feeling root in the foot, power through the legs, turn the waist. And then it just ends and finishes in the arms and fingers, everything nice and loose. We're just opening this foot now. Just open it up about 20, 30 degrees. I start here, over my left leg, left hand high, right hand, low, sink into that foot. I power through the foot the power is generated from the leg. So a lot of times people ask, where's the arm supposed to end up? They go out here? Is it here? You want it parallel with the front foot. So this is where my leg and foot are. That's where the hand ends up. That's where the awareness is on that middle finger. Just watch that middle finger the whole way through of that lead hand. Exhale. Don't go over shoulder height. Don't let the elbow come up. Elbow stay underneath the shoulder. You don't want to be up here. We don't want to be down here. It's just about at shoulder height. Okay? I'm going to turn around and you can get a bit of a feel following me. We'll go to the right first. So our weight is on our left leg. My left hand is high, right hand's low. I'm opening the right foot about 20 to 30 degrees. About 70% of my weight here, 30% here. I start transferring the weight. I'm watching the middle finger. Now let's come back. Let's go the other way. Right hand, high, left low, weight on the right leg, open this foot about 20, 30 degrees. Exhale. Nice, relaxed. Enjoy the movement. Exhale as you breathe out. Follow that eyes gazing at that middle finger. So that's where your awareness is. Your breath, you exhale as you throw the Frisbee. A nice gentle arching feeling through the arms. You can just get a nice flow here. So once again, root in the foot, open the leg, 70 30. Now, it goes about here, should be 50 50, and then it transfers to about 70 30. Okay? So that's the Frisbee throw. Practice that on its own. It's a really, really nice flowing movement. And you'll see once we bring that in with the step in, it's a really enjoyable movement. So just remember, keep your eyes gazing at that middle finger. Remember to exhale as you throw the Frisbee and that transference of the weight, okay? And just nice open flow in feeling. Thanks for joining me. I'll see you soon. 12. Block High Palm Strike: This movement is called Block High Palm Strike. It's very similar to the Frisbee throw. And there's a bit of a change halfway through. So I want to demonstrate that. Once again, it's as if you're holding a ball. So I'm going to be over my right leg, so that means the right hand is high, the left hand is low. I'm going to open this foot. I'm going to turn it about 20 to 30 degrees. And just like the Frisbee throw, it starts off. As I say, halfway is the same. Now, for me, the only way this movement makes sense is to use a bit of the martial art application. I visualize someone's coming to punch me in the face, so I'm here. And then I start spiraling, which is so good for the fascia and the tissues. You start spiraling the arm as if you're going to block the punch. Another visualization I like to use is if the sun's in your eyes, you're going to block the sun. So halfway through the frisbee throw, you turn that arm up as if it's going to block a punch or to block the sun. This low hand now, the Frisbee throw stayed here. Now, you're here and it goes as if you're going to strike the person in the upper abdomen just below the chest. So you come down a bit. A lot of times people do this and their hands stay together. You want to have a nice separation. We're here. I put 70% of my weight. I open this foot halfway through, start coiling. Block high palm strike. So follow the once again, it's like you're following that middle finger. And then, towards the end, this blocks, then change your awareness that palm strike. Exhale. All these movements, if you notice, it's an exhalation as you deliver the end of the movement. As you deliver finish it up. So we're here, once again, which hands high. My weights on my left. That means left hand is the high hand. It's always the high hand is where the weight is. The low hand starts just like the Frisbee throw open the front foot, 20 to 30 degrees, coil, spiral, block, come down a bit lower, strike with the palm. I'll turn around. You can follow me a little bit from the back. We'll go to the right first. Start with the left high, right low, opening, transferring the weight, turning the waist, block high, palm strike. Just nice flowing feeling with these movements, the feeling of you root into the bottom of the foot. You power through the legs, the waist turns, and you just manifest and finish up in the arms. The arms always nice and loose, never tight, never locking the elbows or the wrists. Shoulders are relaxed. And it's that transference of the weight. Let's do one more. All right. So block eye Palm strike. This is probably the most involved move we've done so far, so practice it on its own. But it's a beautiful movement, and it's really good for as I say, the tissues and the fascia, loosening up these spiraling like motions as we move the body through, okay? So, thanks for joining me, and I'll see you in the next video. 13. Repulse Monkey: This movement is called repulse monkey. This is the one movement we use in the tai chi practice to move backwards. Right now, we're just going to practice it statically without the movement, which we'll get into in the next sections. So the feeling here, once again, I'm going to give you a feeling, almost a martial art application here, and then I'll give you a feeling of how you could visualize this and the feeling you want without the martial application. For me, it kind of makes sense as if I'm grabbing someone by the shirt. So this front hand, the palm is up. The back hand is behind you. Now, it's not directly to the side. It's not all the way behind you. You want it in between. As I say, in between at your side and all the way behind, it's out there. The palms kind of face each other, okay? And it's as if this front hand grabs someone by the shirt. This hand will come by the ear. Even though it's grabbing the shirt, keep the palm open. Then it says if you're pulling someone towards you and this hand pushes away. Then this hand pushes someone in the chest and then you open the palm. This hand comes back by the hip, then it's as if it's circling around a big beach ball. It circles around, returns back to the ear. And when it's at the ear, we pull and push. Hands kind of skimming past each other. See right by the hip, circles around to the ear, pull and push. Now, another key principle here is that even though it feels like we're still, you're transferring your weight here. So right now my left hand is the back hand. That's going to be the hand pushing where we need to generate power. So the weight is on that left leg and my waist is turned to the left. So as I start this push with the left hand, my weight transfers from the left leg to the right leg. Circle back. Now that I'm on my right, the other thing is my waist is not static in the middle. My waist now because wherever is the pushing hand, the waist will be turned that direction. So as I'm here at the ear, I push, I transfer the weight. So the right hand is the pushing hand, my weights on the right. I transfer the weight, I turn the waist, push and pull at the hip, circle it around, bring it to the ear, push and pull. At the hip, palm up. This hand, push someone in the chest, and then you just kind of coil at the wrist, so the palm kind of faces you. Push and pull. So just have that feeling if you get a little confused. It's really just push and pull. Pulling someone by the shirt towards you, but keeping the hand loose you don't want to grab and get tense. And then you remember, a lot of times, also, people begin to do this. Okay? We want to bring the hand to the ear for that push move. And transfer the weight, turn the waist. And we're following that pushing hand. So as we finished here and our awareness is here, now return now to this, follow it circling around, then follow that pushing hand. Pushing hand finished, now it's time to change the awareness to the other hand. Let it circle around the big beach ball to the ear, push and pull. I'm going to do a few with back view so you can follow along. I'm going to start with the right hand back, left hand forward. Come to the ear, push and pull. Remember, you're transferring your weight. Now that I'm pushing with my left, my weights on my left, I transfer the weight as I push from left to right. Now with my right hand, my weight transfers right to left. Also the waist turns very subtly. Exhale as you push and pull. Inhale as you circle around the beach ball, hand comes to the ear. I'll do one more each side. Nice flow. Exhale. Alright, so that's the repulse monkey movement, the one movement we use in Tai chi to move backwards. So practice that on its own and just get that feeling of being very comfortable with it without the stepping because once we add the backward stepping, it gets a little more difficult for people. So you want to make sure you have the movement with the arms and hands and the weight transfer and the waist turn. You want to make sure you're very comfortable with this feeling before you start bringing in the stepping. So thanks for joining me, and I'll see you in the next video. 14. Closing Down: This movement is called closing down. You don't want to just be doing all your tai chi movements and you're moving through space, even if you're feeling nice and relaxed and the body feels good, the mind is calm, you have aware, and then just move into your day. We want to kind of as I say, close off the practice. So what they call this movement, closing down, this is the most common movement you see through different chee gong practices for really kind of bringing in this nice, calming energetic feeling through the whole body. So the way we do that, the last movement, we kind of finish up, we get in a nice stance, everything feeling good. Palms are facing down. First thing we do is we coil at the wrist till the palms face up. Then we sink a bit into the heels. And if you're pushing off the balls of your feet, so you're transferring, remember, it's not 80 20 here, it's subtle. We're a little bit on balls of the feet. Transfer the weight about 52% into the heels and then transfer it back into the balls of the feet, 52%, 53%, something like that, and you rise in quality, almost like you're feeling taller without locking the knees though. When the hands come to shoulder height, you're just going to bend at the elbows. And the hands will come towards the top of the forehead, top of the head. And then on the exhale, as they say, you keep the mind with the hands, and we relax layer by layer. So I think about this as a slow motion shower or waterfall of nice, kind of, you know, warm but not hot water. So when I'm here, what I mean by that is as my hands come down, I relax layer by layer. So I'm relaxing through the forehead, the eyes, face, throat, and neck, relax the shoulders, upper chest, and upper back. Release and relax the lower back and abdomen, and then through the waist, all the way through the legs. And when you come down here, bring the hands to the sides so they're by the hips, it's just a gentle push down, and it's like any last bit of tension. It's as if you're gently guiding it down with the hands through the legs, through the feet back into the ground. Okay? So the movement we go here, inhale and rise. When the hands come even with the shoulders, bend the elbows, exhale. Mine with the hands, releasing tension as if we're going to relaxing the body layer by layer, the final bit through the feet. Inhale and rise. Exhale, relax, sink in any bit of tension through the body and give it just that little bit of an extra nudge when it's at the hips, guide it down through the legs, through the feet into the earth. One more. You come up and relax and release. Now, important thing here is you don't want to feel tension here, right? So we're not bringing the arms out to the sides or behind us. We don't want to make the bi tense. It's not in front. It's just gently a little bit in front of us. Okay? So we're not here. We're not here. This is just a bit in front. And once again, it's this feeling of floating arms, how we started the Tai Chi practice. It's the same feeling here. We're not trying to swing our arms up. The arms swing up because we root in the feet, we power through the legs. The spine rises, and that rising of the spine continues through the top of the head. Once again, like a string of pearls or like a puppet string. And the arms just float up. The arms are just following the body. And then mind with the hands, relax, release any last bit of tension. And that last little bit guided through the legs, through the feet. And that body should feel, as they say, song, this active state of relaxation, where the spine rises, you feel nice and aligned and tall, but the body as relaxed as can be. And that's the way you should be feeling at the end of this tai chi practice is the body should be feeling your alignment feels good, the body feels nice and loose and energized and free of tension. So thanks next section, you'll see we start bringing in some stepping and how we start bringing in the movement patterns to the Taichi. 15. SECTION 3: STEPPING | Forward : So now we're going to be working with the movement patterns we use in Tai Chi. We're going to be working with how to step forward, the stepping pattern for going backwards, and the stepping pattern for moving sideways. In this video, we're going to work specifically with how we move forward in the Tai Chi practice session. So there's four movements we're using in this Tai Chi set for going forward. There's the rooster on one leg. There's the Tai Chi kick. There's the Frisbee throw, and there's the block eye Palm strike. With the rooster on one leg, there's nothing technical about how we step forward. I just want that to be natural for you. So what I mean by that is I'm going to come into rooster on one leg, and we're just going to let that foot just come down natural, okay? It doesn't need to come exactly even with the other foot or behind, just a little bit in front. Okay, we switch legs, and we come down, okay? Same with the Tai chi kick. The main thing I want you to focus on is that slow, smooth, continuous thi kick where you're kicking out over the hand, working with your balance and coordination. Do not worry or think about what is the correct stepping pattern for this. What I mean by that is with the kick, I just want you to do this. You're going to kick out to your right, and then just bring that foot down where it feels natural in front of you. We lean into it, and then we kick out left, okay? What that mostly means is the foot is not going to be 100 per directly straight. You obviously don't want to point it out like that. It tends to come down about ten to 20 degrees to the side that it kicked. So what I mean by that is, if I'm kicking with my left, and then I bring that foot down. I just bring it down like that. Don't overthink it. So I kick. Just let it come down a little bit in front of your back leg and a little bit open. If you want it straight, that's okay, too. I don't want you to hurt your ko, so I don't want you to do that. Just let it come down naturally in front. So once again, I really want to emphasize, do not overthink the stepping pattern for rooster on one leg and the tai chi kick. Just let the foot come down a little bit in front of your rooted back leg and move through the steppings. For the Frisbee throw in the block high Palm strike, we have a specific way that we move forward. I'm calling it a two part step. Okay? So I'm going to demonstrate the stepping without the arm movements. And this is how I want you to practice. I want you to practice. Okay, I'm practicing the Frisbee throw on its own, with just this kind of sideways movement. Now, separately, you're going to practice the stepping, and only later do you bring it all together. So the way the forward stepping is going to work is the front foot is not directly straight. It's not pointed out 90 degrees. Obviously, that puts a lot of strain on the knee. It's just going to be open about 20 to 30 degrees. Then this back foot, it's as if you're peeling a band aid off. It's you peel the heel, the ball of the foot, and the toes off the floor, and then you bring in your toes close to this foot. You want to be about two fists width apart. A lot of times people do the step in and they do this, and then they lose their balance. Keep a bit of distance. Then we step this foot forward, about 20 degrees open, so not completely straight. I'm just going to open it about 20 degrees. And the way we step down is very important, is heal, ball of the foot, toes and sink in the ball of the foot. So the two parts step in back foot, peel off heel, ball of the foot toes, step up, half step, on the toes, close to the foot, then step forward, heel, ball the foot toes, sink in. There's two important principles here that I want to mention because this is something that sometimes people have a problem with. One is sometimes people tend to open their angle a bit. So they're here, and then they step and they're doing this and you're transferring your weight, okay? There's nothing wrong. In fact, it's actually correct ti G. I just don't want to give you too much to think of to take your back heel off a bit and turn that back foot on the ball of the foot. You really want to make sure you protect your knees, okay? So there's nothing wrong once you started the movement, let's say the Frisbee throw. If my back leg is here, and I start to feel a little bit as I turn my waist towards this front leg, just let that back foot naturally turn forward. That's completely fine. Remember, there's this theory in Tai Chi that once one part of your body moves, everything is in motion. We don't want to lock the body in place. Listen to your body, let everything flow naturally. If there needs to be a certain kind of movement to straighten out that back leg, that's completely fine. In fact, that's very correct Tai chi. The second thing people bring up is, how far should I be stepping? Once again, I really want you to think about this 70% rule, okay? There's these really kind of what I think are pretty cool metaphors in the Tai hi classics, which is what Tai Ji is based on that talk about you want to step like you're on the edge of a cliff or like you're an animal on the hunt or a burglar in someone's home. The whole point being the stepping needs to be very soft and quiet. You don't need to make big steps. Big steps is not better Tai chi. What they talk about is like a frame, okay? Like a small picture frame is not worse than a big picture frame. It's just what do you need it for? And a lot will depend on your age and the health and the power you can generate in your legs. I always bring this up. The most impressive Tai Ji I've ever seen was in Hong Kong with this guy must have been around 80. He had unbelievably small steps, but everything was integrated. Everything flowed. He had this feeling of this flowing and softness to his whole body and movements. So what I mean by that is, if I step too far, I have to kind of jerk off this back foot. It's not slow, smooth, and continuous. It's not in flow. Make your steps smaller. So when you lift off this back foot, it's very soft and control. Remember, have that feeling of, like, you're trying to sneak in in someone's home or an animal trying to be as quiet as possible. So you peel off the back heel, peel off the ball of the foot and toe. Cat stance, they call this or half stance, step forward, sink in. I want to do a couple of these steps facing you so you'll see some of the detail. Then I'll do it turned around. I'm going to do this without the hand movements for now so you just get the feeling of the stepping. I'm going to step my left foot forward and I sink in, remember, 70 30. Part one of the stepping, peel off the back foot. Just on the toes. Step, very soft. See, I'm not going very big. Does not have to be big steps. Sink in. Remember, make sure your knee doesn't go past your toes. Just keep this lower leg, the shin perpendicular. Peel off the back leg, half step. Remember, it's not straight, it's not out here, just a little bit open. Sink in, turn your waist towards this front leg, shin perpendicular to the ground. Make sure your knee is not going past your toes. Peel off the back heel. Ball the foot, toes. Half stance. Remember, really soft, really in control. This is why T G is so good for balance and fall prevention because it essentially simulates walking, but you're having to do it much slower, you're spending more time on one leg and very subtly learning how to transfer your weight to the point where walking becomes so simple and easy, even on difficult icy terrain or up and down hills and sink. Can we do this facing away. I'm going to do my right foot first. Just keep your arms loose so you keep your arms on your abdomen. Remember that slight subtle turning of the waist towards the front leg, shifting the weight So there we have it the TaihiFward stepping. I highly recommend doing that on its own. And a lot of the Buddhist meditation traditions, they have walk in meditation. Treat that as a walk in meditation, practice that for a while on its own without the complexity of combining it with the movements. It's a beautiful practice for balance, coordination, for awareness and focus. So treat this as a practice on its own, just two parts. Sink, peel off the back foot on toes, heal, fall the foot toes a soft, quietly, slow, smooth, continuous, relaxed, flowing patterns. Okay. So thanks for joining me. I'll see you in the next video. 16. Backward: Now moving backwards in Tai Ji. This is obviously more difficult than moving forward because we don't see ourselves walking backwards. We never do this naturally in our daily lives. So there's a few really important details I want to teach you here because these are very common problems people have. So as we're stepping backwards, there's a problem people have because we don't see ourselves. So if you think when you walk forward, we're always hip to shoulder with apart, right? We walk forward like this. Now, we want to keep that same distance between our feet as we step backwards, but because we don't see ourselves, it's very common people start moving backwards and they're crossing their feet as if they're trying to walk backwards on a tight rope or a slack line. Obviously, it's hard to maintain balance that way. So I'm going to teach you a way to step that keeps the awareness in the positioning of the feet and legs on its own side. I also want to emphasize a very, very important thing you need to do so you don't bring any pain into your knees. So the way we're going to be moving backwards. So I'm going to start. I'm going to show you my right foot is forward, my right foot is back. I'm going to take off the front foot, take off the heel, even the ball of the foot where I'm just kind of on its big toe. And it's as if I'm drawing a half circle back. And then I plant it down. The thought is, I want you to think that you're not necessarily just stepping back. You're stepping out and then back. So that's what this half circle is. It's like you're a kid learning to draw a circle. It's this motion. So I take my big toe, and it's as if I have a crayon or a colored pencil and I'm drawing a half circle. So I go out and back and I plant the foot. Now, very, very important. This front leg you start doing the move, which we do repulse monkey and our body will start turning to the back foot. If this front leg is pointing the opposite way, we can hurt our knee. Before we do anything, now we straighten this front foot. We pick up the heel, straighten that front foot. Then we do our movement, which will be repulse monkey. Once again, two important things here come off, so you're just on the big toe, draw this half circle out and back. Pick up the front heel, straighten that foot, and then we'll move. Once again, the steps don't need to be huge. Also, it's up to you. You can keep this big toe on the floor. You can lift it. But for now, I suggest keeping it on straight in the front foot. Pick up out and back, straight in the front foot. I'll demonstrate a couple more times. M right leg is forward, left leg is back. I'm going to pick up, half circle back, pick up the front heel. Come down. Pick up. A good way to test yourself if you notice my feet here is you want to make sure the back heel and the front big toe stay on their own side. As I say, a lot of people tend to do this and it crosses. So you see it's cross, and you're going to lose balance. So it's actually a very nice practice to do this if you have a natural line in the floor. And you can make sure the left stays on the left, the right stays on the right. So that's why I'm emphasizing this half circle going out and then back and having that in your mind. The step in is out and back, not just back. So I pick up the front heel, half circle out and back, the big toe, straight in that front foot. Pick up, half circle out and back, pick up the straight in that front foot, very important. So those are the two most important things. I'm going to give you a back view. I go out and back. I straighten that front foot. Then I'm going to do the move. Pick up. Remember, left heel is on the left, left heel, back heel, front big toe, do not cross. Okay. So remember, this is not that easy because we're not used to moving backwards. So I really just want you to focus on a couple of those thoughts. The stepping is out and back, not just back, and you straighten that front foot before you do that repulse monkey move. That protects the front knee. Okay? And if you have a line in the floor, you want to draw a line or put some rope or string to make sure that the left stays on the left, the right stays on the right, and we're not crossing the back heel with the front big toe. Out and back, straighten, out and back, straighten. This is an amazing practice for body awareness because you're not seeing yourself moving backwards. It's something we're not used to doing. So take your time with this before we start bringing in the movements of repulse monkey with that backward stepping pattern. 17. Sideways: Stepping sideways. The movement this corresponds to is cloud hands. This is an easy stepping pattern, easier especially than going backwards, but I really want you to refine it and perfect it to make this a really, really powerful and enjoyable practice. So while we're moving sideways, we're actually wider than shoulder with apart because we're going to be here and then we're going to be bringing the foot in. Once again, the steppings though need to be that really, really soft and quiet type of stepping. So the movement here will be, let's say we're going to start here with the feet wide. I'm going to be moving to the right first. Okay? Remember, corresponds with this movement. I peel off, once again, that feeling of peeling off a band aid. You peel off the heel, ball the foot toes. And then as you bring the foot in closer, it's toes, ball the foot heel. We step out. Remember, as you bring up the foot, heel, ball the foot toes, then you step out, toes balls of the feet, sink into the heels. Coming back in, now I'll go the other way. I put the weight on my left, I pick up the right. Slowly sink in. Peel off, heel, ball of the foot toes. I step out, first my big toe, and the ball of the foot bite the big toe, then the rest of the toes, the outside ball of the foot, and then you sink into the heel. Weight comes in here. Pick up, bring it in. One major thing people ask is, well, how close should the feet be when you bring the feet in closer together? Once again, is a lot of people bring their feet in too close. To problems with that if you do something like this. First problem is, people tend to lose a bit of balance. The second problem is their cloud hand tends to be very stiff. They're getting very little weight transfer. They get very little waist movement. Remember, that's very important in all our Tai chi moves that we're transferring our weight, and we're turning the waist. So when you bring your feet in, and if you bring them close together, there's nothing much happening. A lot of people feel like they don't feel much weight transfer, and they get practically no waist turn. So I recommend is about two fifths width apart, minimum. So here, when we step out wide, once again, you want it wider than shoulders. But once again, you don't want to go so wide that when it's time to pick this up, you need to flick off the foot. Remember, every movement should feel slow, smooth, continuous. So I'm going to demonstrate a couple of movements right. I want to demonstrate a couple of movements left, and then I'm going to turn around and you can follow along if you like. So once again, step out, big toe, ball the foot behind the big toe. The rest of the toes the outside ball the foot, then the heel. Peel off like a band aid. Heel, ball the foot toes, bring it in, keeping it two fifths width apart. Soft. Pick up and move out. Sink. Move in, go back to the left. You don't need to be bringing this leg really high to move it. Just get off the ground, bring it in, nice and relaxed, sink. Let me turn around. So a few of the key concepts in the sideways stepping. When you pick up the foot to move it, you pick up heel, ball the foot, then toes. And as you place down, it's big toe, ball the foot behind the big toe, the rest of the toes and the outside ball of the foot, and then you sink into the heel and the rest of the foot. When the feet are close, try to keep about two fist width apart. As you step out wide, wider than shoulders, but comfortable enough that it's not hard to lift that leg up before you move it back in, as I say, big frame, big steps do not make better Tai chi. What makes good Tai chi is that feeling of being in your comfort zone, 70%, slow, smooth, continuous, where everything is integrated and you're in the state of flow. 18. SECTION 4: STEPPING WITH MOVEMENT | Forward: Okay, so now we're learning how do we do the movements with the corresponding stepping. This is just before we're going to start learning how to do the whole practice where we do it all in a flowing sequence. For forward movement, the first forward movement is rooster on one leg. Now, remember what I was saying there's nothing technical about how we move here because we're mostly focusing on the movement itself and on the importance of balance. So we're going to come in Rooster on one leg and don't think, wait, does my foot come back? Do I come out here? Do I step completely forward? Just let it come down where it naturally wants to come down. You bring the foot down. For me, it tends to come down just a teeny bit in front, if you see, I'm not even. I'm not stepping a half a meter or a meter in front. It's just a little bit in front. So I come up on Rooster on one leg. It's once again, that feeling of the elbow coming down to the knee, pop them down, and then I just let that foot come down just exactly where it was. So it's here, I sink, and I come in. The Tai chi kicks. Same thing. I want you to just let that leg come down where it naturally wants to fall to the ground. We really want to get you in this feeling with Tai Chi, of being in flow and of getting in that feeling of, like, natural flowing movement where you're balanced and coordinated. So what I mean by this is I scoop the water, I do my kick. And then I just let that leg come down where it naturally wants to come down. For me, what does that mean? It means I kick. I'm looking out over that hand. I bring that foot down essentially just how I was kicking and it comes down. I do the other leg. Don't overthink it. Rooster on one leg, Tachi kick, you perform the movement. And let the foot come down where it wants to, sink down, perform the movement, and just let it naturally come down where it needs to. With the Frisbee throw and the block hi palm strike, we need to do the two part forward stepping. So I'm going to demonstrate how this works together. You've done the, the arm movements of the Frisbee throw and the blockiPom strike. In the previous section, we practiced the two part stepping. Now let's put it together. So my weights on my left. My left hand is high. The right hand is lower, like I'm holding a big ball. Remember, cat stance or half stance. I'm here. I step forward, heal, ball the foot and toes, and then I come forward. Transferring the weight. You want to feel about 70, 30. You can even practice this rock and back feeling. I'm here. What's the two part stepping? I come in, I peel off this back foot, and as I come into here, I hold the ball. Let that come together. Peel off the back foot and let this back hand come with the foot. Hold your ball. Step forward, throw the Frisbee. Remember, in parallel. So what do I do now to trance to do the two part stepping? Part one of the step. This back foot comes up in this bottom, and this hand comes along with it. Just on toes, step forward. Remember, we're not going completely straight. On every step, it's as if the feet go 20 degrees open, but by 20 degrees open, left, 20 degrees open, right, means we're walking straight. Do it turning back, so I'm left. I've just completed the Frisbee throw. Arm, right hand, right arm, right leg come forward together. Step, transfer the weight, turn the waist. Left arm, left leg come together, step. Now with the block high palm strike, same thing as a frisbee throw. My weights on my left, left hand high, right low. I step to the right, watching the middle finger, halfway through, I go to block high Palm strike. I step forward with this back foot till it just comes on toes. Remember, two fists width apart. You don't want to be on top of each other. If you're confused again about the hands, remember, my weights on my right, right is the high hand. I step forward. So, half step, empty stands, as they call it. And then you're going to step forward. I'll give you a back view of that. I'm going to start with the right foot forward. So what does that mean? Block high. So if you wait, which swarm does what here? My right leg is forward. That's the blocking arm. The palm strike is with the back leg hand. So it's half step. Once again, which is the high hand? My weights on my right, right hand is the high hand. Step forward. Half step, what they call empty stance or also cat stance, step, transfer the weight. Turning the waist, block eye palm strike. Remember, we really want to work with this feeling of flowing movement, slow, smooth, and continuous, this nice light stepping pattern. You don't need to make the steps really big, and we just want everything to flow together, gazing at that middle finger, transfer the weight to part stepping, half step, step forward, heel, ball, the foot toes, transfer the weight. There you go. So that's how we're going to be moving forward in this tai chi practice. The kick, rooster on leg. Don't think about it. Let it be natural. I want you to focus on your balance and your coordination and doing the moves well and being relaxed and breathing. Frisbee throw, the two parts stepping, the block eye palm strike, the two parts stepping. 19. Backward: Now let's put together the repulse monkey movement where we do that pull and push with the backward stepping. Be patient with yourself. Take your time. This is the most difficult physical movement we're doing in this tai chi practice. So don't worry about it. Don't force yourself. Don't become tense and annoyed if it's taking time. So a good rule of thumb when you're starting is, wait, which hand does what? What foot? Corresponds. My right leg is forward right now, that means the right arm is forward. Left leg is back, that means the left arm is back. Remember, the palms are facing each other. The first I want you to think about this in four parts. Part one. We lift up that front heel. We're on the front big toe, half circle back. Second thing to think about, we straighten that front foot. What we do is we pick up this heel of the front leg, straighten that foot. Three, back hand comes to the ear, P four, pull and push. You notice when we do this pull and push, I want you to transfer your weight to your back leg, as well as turn your waist to the back leg. That's why it's very important to straighten this front foot. We're here by the hip, circulate around back so the palms are facing. So remember, four things Part one. We pick up the heel, half circle out and back, not just back out and back. Part two, straighten that front foot by picking up the heel and straighten on the ball of the foot. Part three, hand to the ear, four, pull and push as the weight transfers to the back leg, and we turn the waist towards the back leg. And then you do the circle, remember the circling around a big beach ball. Palms face each other. Part one, half circle back with the right big toe. Step two, straight in the front foot, three, hand to the ear, four, pull and push. I'll give you a bit of feel of this moving backwards. I'm going to start with the right foot forward. Left hand back. Step one, half circle out and back. Step two, straighten the front foot, three, hand to the ear, four, pull and push, weight transfer to the back, turn the waist. Here the hip and out. One, two, straighten, hand to the ear, three, pull and push, four. So right now I'm teaching it to you as a one, two, three, four, and it might not feel very flowing. That's okay for now. It will get that way. So right now it maybe feels a little bit. So what I mean is you feel like, Okay, one, everything feels stiff. Two, three, four, okay? That's not how it's going to feel after months of practice. I want you to just start with this. And then what will happen is you start to get into flow where B, and because this will start moving together, but this will not happen right away. Once again, be patient with yourself. I would say it's going to take three months of pretty daily practice till you're going to feel that's really flowing like, okay? For now, let's just work with this let's start here. Left foot forward, right foot back. Right hand back, left arm forward. Pick up the front, big heel, big toe, traces out and back, two straighten that front foot, hand to the ear, pull and push, transfer that weight to the back. Circle. One, two, straighten, three hand to the ear, four, pull and push. Circle back, straighten that front foot, hand to the ear, pull and push. As I say, things will start flowing later on, but don't worry that it doesn't feel very flow like. You'll feel a bit mechanical at the beginning. But remember, this is the most difficult move. Be patient. Take your time. A little bit of daily practice will do wonders for you and it'll be much better to practice 2 minutes a day than to practice 20, 30 minutes twice a week. So what you're looking for is that it will feel like this that these things start flowing together. But once again, I don't want you to think that it's supposed to do that right away. Remember, don't overthink it. Just knees slightly bent, nothing fancy. You're just looking for a nice. And remember, back heel, front big toe. Do not cross. So what we don't want is this. This is what happens if you don't do that half circle. Later on, maybe you don't need to do the big toe, doing the half circle. Your body will naturally just go back like that. For now, I really want you to do that because I'd say 95% of people, if you don't teach them that way, they end up crossing their feet, they lose their balance, and then everything falls apart. So take your time, practice this on its own, the backward stepping, then bring in the repulse monkey, the pull and push movements with it. And then you'll just see it will just get easier and easier, and it'll feel more flow like as time goes by. So enjoy the practice, take time with these things. A little bit of daily practice will be much better than a couple times a week of longer practice. I'll see you soon. 20. Sideways: So now, how do we bring in cloud hands with the sideways stepping? As I said, this is probably the easiest of the stepping movements physically. What I really want you to focus on is how this works with the mind in the breath and this really getting into this meditative state. Remember, starting with the arm across, the legs are wider than shoulders. Okay? So we're going to be moving to the right. Then we're going to move to the left. And I know it's confusing because I'm facing you, and then we'll do a bit of practice with my back to you. So if you're moving to the right, legs are wide, I come across with the right. Remember, this feeling of shift the weight, turn the waist. Arms feel weightless like clouds. I'm here. So what I want you to think is we peel off the foot, heel to toe, bring it in toe to heel, two fists width apart. Then we change the hands high to low, low to high, sweep back across. We step out, toes, ball the foot heel, change the hands, high to low, low to high, sweep across. Eyes gaze at that middle finger, weight shifts, waist turns, eyes gazing at the middle finger. So have this step change hands, sweep across. Step out, change hands, sweep. So now if you're going back left, how do we step? I come back left. So remember, when my arm high arm is on the same side, so now my left arm is on the left side, it's not across the body. I step in. I change the hands, I sweep across. Never hand out like a stop sign. I step out, big toe, ball the foot behind the big toe. The rest of the toes outside, ball the foot, and then sink in. I Step, change hands, sweep across. Step in, change hands, sweep across. Step out, change the hands, sweep. Now, just like we've done previously, this might not feel very flow like. I'm giving you this three step, part one, part two, part three, right? You step, change hands, hi a little low to high, sweep across the body, right? We step, change hands, we sweep across. It will get more flow like, as I'm saying later on, start with this. Take your time, start. Okay, I step. Okay, now I change hands. Then I come across where I shift the weight, turn my waist. I step in. Another reason I want you to think in terms of it is step one, step two, step three is I really want you to do all those parts correctly. The flow will come later on. So I step. I change the hands, I sweep across. I step in, change the hands, and I sweep across the body, shifting the weight, turning the waist. Peel, nice, gentle step out, and the flow will come. Once again, you just want to work on this. You're going to get into that flow like motion where the arms feel like clouds. Let the stepping be nice and light. Remember, it's not better to do the big steps because every time we pick up our foot, it should feel soft and quiet. So if I step too wide, when I pick up this foot, I don't want that kind of jerking motion, almost like I need to force it up. I want it to be in control, I'm peeling off a band aid really slow. And then when I step in, keep that two fist width apart, so you get some shift of the body weight side to side and a little bit of the waist motion. So thanks for joining me. And what you'll see in the next section, we're going to put it all together. And you're going to see how we bring all these nine movements in as one practice that will flow naturally, organically through some forward step and backward stepping and finishing with the cloud hands and closing down, and how you just make this a really enjoyable moving meditation. So I look forward to seeing you soon for the real Tai Chi practice. 21. SECTION 5: Full Set: So now let's begin the Tai chi flow Practice series. Remember, this works on, as I call it, the rule of threes. We're going to do every movement three times on each side. So for the first movement floating arms, we just do three times. After that, we're doing every movement three times on each side. We're going to start with the forward movements. Then we go backwards with a pulse monkey and we finish with the cloud hands and closing down. So I'm going to do one practice right now facing you, and then I'll do one where my back is to you, which be much easier for you to practice along with and follow. Once again, as I always say, it's much more important when you practice Tai chi, to maintain those essential principles of the body. Feeling this active state of relaxation. Nice alignments, the body is loose, free of tension, you're breathing well with nice exhalations on all the movements. Your mind has focused in the body and following that middle finger. All those are much more important than if you're doing the moves exactly correctly, maintain that 70% rule. Don't try to kick too high. Don't try to do rooster perfect. Make your stepping slow, smooth, continuous, and soft. Alright, so let's enjoy this and Tai Chi practice. F Series. Once again, starting off in your standing posture. Root into the feet. Slight end of the knees. Slight drop of the pelvic bone, relaxed, spine rises, palms facing down. Sink a bit into the heels. Pushing off the balls of the feet, power through the legs and the arms just float up to shoulder height. Exhale, sink back. Bit into the heels, push off the balls of the feet, power through the legs, exhale, root back down. Next, crane spreads its wings, starting with the right arm going high, so we bring both hands above the left. Right arm up, left arm low, off the left heel, nice side stretch. Exhale, stretching up. Exhale, you spread the wings, nice and loose with the arms. Opening, loosening, and stretching. Now beginning the forward movement, rooster on one leg. Weight on your left leg. And remember, just let the stepping happen naturally. Root into the earth, bend the knee, grab the floor with your toes, Tai chi kicks. Scoop the water. Kick over your leg. Keep that awareness past the foot. Keep the alignment with the kick. Slow, smooth, continuous. Moving into the Frisbee throw, starting with the right. Gazing at that middle finger, exhale. Half step. Power through the leg, turn the waist. Now, block High Palm Strike. Starts the same as the Frisbee halfway through, block the punch to the head or blocking the sun. Is down Palm strike. And the last one. Now moving backwards, repulse monkey. Left legs forward, right legs back. Left hand forward, right back. Back, straight in the front foot, hand to ear. We go. In finishing up with cloud hands, we bring the legs even. We go right first, right arm across the body, shift the weight, turn the waist, step in, change hands, sweep across. H. So step in one more time with the left. Come back. We're going to do one more neutral. Come here, come back right. Now, without the stepping, change hands. Now let's move left. Step, change the hands, shift away, turn the waist, eyes gazing at that middle finger. We'll do one more where we just step out. No stepping. We're gonna do a couple of these, shift the weight, turn the waist. I'm gonna do one more each side. And then bring it down. Closing down three. Keeping the mind with the hands.