Feeling Vulnerable

Students have sometimes told me they sometimes feel vulnerable, especially during their early experiences of sticking. I just wanted to write a few words here as another student recently spoke to me about this, and it is a recurring theme. Firstly I must say that I often feel vulnerable when sticking with my teacher, and with other T'ai Chi people too. This is not a bad thing at all. Recently a student asked what they were doing wrong to feel that way. I said that they were actually doing something very much right.

If you are really sticking / listening, or being stuck and listened to, it can be disconcerting, as it is nothing like the superficial listening that characterises much of everyday life. If you are really letting go of self and joining with the other, softening, melting, relaxing; then it is not surprising that communication takes place on a deeper level, tears can well up, we can feel exposed, revealed or uncomfortable. This is alright! Part of us feels like running away at this point, and sometimes students leave class after first feeling this, which is such a shame as they are just beginning to get somewhere.

If you have felt or feel these things, then please know that it is perfectly normal and nothing to react against and become scared of. Class is a safe place. We make sure that there is a supportive and friendly atmosphere. If you feel exposed you may actually be really being listened to for a change. Try to relax and continue, with whatever feelings arise, comfortable or not, and pass through them rather than worrying or trying to think your way round it all to avoid feeling anything strange. You can always speak to myself or David, or with Mark when he is up, if you would like to. The truth is that we learn most in these unfamiliar and challenging places, much more than in our comfort zone of familiarity. There are many T'ai Chi classes as well as other activities where we can feel cozy and never find our edges, or ever have the chance to become softer and work on lessening our reactive habits.

Perhaps gently carrying on when we feel like retreating is the best thing that we can do. I encourage any students to do this with when they feel somewhat vulnerable, as it can be a sign of letting go of resistance and the start of yielding. This practice still seems to be appropriate at whatever level we find ourselves at.

Aberdeen - McLymont Hall

This great hall is the venue for our Tuesday night beginners' class as well as beginners' workshops in Aberdeen, it is warm and has a very good wooden floor. New students are welcome to join any time up until March 2006, just after my teacher Mark Raudva's next beginners' workshop and our weekend at the Absolute Health Fair at the AECC. There are two of us instructing, so it is possible to catch-up with revision, if you are returning to class, or to start from scratch and not be left behind those who have already begun. From March we will continue together in Aberdeen working on the short form. This class runs from 7.30pm - 9pm weekly and costs £5 / £3.50.

Aberdeen Beginners Class 29th November

Tedium

I have had a cold for almost a week and due to feeling ill, had taken a few days off my own T'ai Chi practice, apart from teaching: so maybe 3 days off in all. Doing T'ai Chi with the cold today was a much better idea, even if it was for shorter than usual, in a way it was more intense. I will try not to take time off T'ai Chi in future, it is counter-productive for me. I missed a few days' opportunity to see what it was like to study when unwell, and to see if and how it would help, or just how it would be different. Also, as I am a little tired I am wasting less energy on words and found that we were joining differently in our partnerwork. There was a different quality of softness.

As soon as I take any time off my usual practice I notice hundreds of ordinary things rush in to fill the time. All the little things feel tyrannical. It is all those small things that 'have to be done' that are the hardest to be free of or to not let rule a life. My old busy-ness is of no use, I feel it's avoidance of what really needs to be done.

[It reminded me just now of the 'Terrible Tedium' character in the brilliant children's book by Norton Juster 'The Phantom Tollbooth'. He gets the hero Milo to move a heap of sand one grain at a time with tweezers by asking ever-so-nicely. When Milo finally notices what he is doing, Tedium (portrayed as a faceless but well-spoken gent) gets irate, and Milo flees and gets back to his much more important quest. This has to be one of my favourite children's books, now I remember it. ]

Last Thursday at Inverurie, just 10 of us due to heavy snow and icy weather. Lots of short form and single pushing hands.

Class at the Gateway Community Centre, Turriff on Monday evenings. We now have a good warm room which is the ideal size for the group to practise in.

Beginners 'sticking' (also known as 'listening hands'), at Turriff last week.

What The Water Feels Like To The Fishes

Like the fur of a chinchilla. Like the cleanest tooth. Yes, the fishes say, this is what it feels like. People always ask the fishes, 'What does the water feel like to you?' and the fishes are always happy to oblige. Like feathers are to other feathers, they say. Like powder touching ash. We smile and nod. When the fishes tell us these things, we begin to understand. We begin to think we know what the water feels like to the fishes. But it's not always like fur and ash and the cleanest tooth. At night, they say, the water can be different. At night, when it's very cold, it can be like the tongue of a cat. At night, when it's very very cold, it's like cracked glass. Or honey. Or forgiveness, they say, ha ha. When the fishes answer these questions - which they are happy to do - they also ask why. They are curious things, fish are, and thus they ask, 'Why? Why do you want to know what the water feels like to the fishes?' And we are never quite sure. The fishes press further. 'Do you breathe air?' they ask. The answer is yes. Well then, they say, 'What does the air feel like to you?' And we do not know. We think of air and we think of wind, but that's another thing. Wind is air in action, air on the move, and the fishes know this. Well then, they ask again, 'What does the air feel like?' And we have to think about this. Air feels like air, we say, and the fishes laugh mirthlessly. 'Think!' they say. 'Think,' they say, now gentler. And we think and we guess that air feels like hair, thousands of hairs, swaying ever so slightly in breezes microscopic. The fishes laugh again. 'Do better, think harder,' they say, encouraging us. It feels like language, we say, and they are impressed. 'Keep going,' they say. It feels like blood, we say, and they say, 'No, no, now you're getting colder.' The air is like being wanted, we say, and they nod approvingly. The air is like being pushed and pulled and yanked, punched and slapped and misunderstood and loved, we say, and the fishes sigh and touch our forearm sympathetically.

Dave Eggers: Short, Short Stories, Saturday January 8, 2005, from The Guardian Newspaper

David and Michael pushing hands, Saturday 19th November.

Class Dates Over the Winter Holidays

I now have all the dates in from the various classes. Subject to enough enrollments, these are the dates for T'ai Chi until February.

Last dates of this term: Turiff, Inverurie, Aberdeen and Huntly finish the week ending 11th December. Do get your enrollments in before the break to avoid problems.

Sunday and Wednesday classes at my house continue over the holidays except Christmas Day and New Year's Day themselves. Over this period all my students are welcome to drop in to any class listed below.

Sunday 11th December 2-6pm (with David)
Wednesday 14th 7-9pm (with David)
Sunday 18th 2-6pm
Wednesday 21st 7-9pm
Wednesday 28th 7-9pm
Wednesday 4th January 7-10pm (with Mark)
Thursday 5th 7-10pm (with Mark)
Sunday 7th 2-6pm
Wednesday 11th 7-9pm (will be the final Wednesday at my house if the new Inverurie class begins)
Sunday 15th 2-6pm and each Sunday thereafter

Monday class at Turriff begins 23rd January. If Monday studnets would like to start before then we can have a couple of weeks at the normal time at my house instead, let me know.
Tuesday class at Aberdeen begins 17th January.
Wednesday classes at Inverurie likely to begin 18th January.
Thursday class at Inverurie begins 12th January.
Saturday class at Huntly will begin 14th January

The weekend of 3rd, 4th and 5th February David and I will be demonstrating T'ai chi and having a space at the Absolute Health Show in Aberdeen AECC. If you would like to help out or take part let me know.

Mark's Early Spring workshop will be 11th and 12th February.

There will be no classes at all the week of 4th-11th March as David and I will be assisting Mark teach a week- long T'ai Chi retreat at Newbold House. Please do join us.

Inverurie Thursday Class - 17th November 2005

Inverurie Beginners Workshop Summer 2005

News

I seem to have much less to say about things at the moment, which can only be a good thing. The books that I have been reading lately are full of good advice on practice and attitude, and I will put up extracts when they are appropriate to our T'ai Chi. Dave and I continue to work together daily and it is good to have four hands on deck in class.

Simple advice to my students at the moment is this: if you do not yet do some T'ai Chi each day yet, then now is the time to begin. I suggest lightly doing the Form if you know a third or more of it, or the warm-up set if you do not. If you do have a daily practice then practising longer, lightly and with spirit would be a good idea, especially if you are prone to distraction, boredom or despondency. Steven has written several good blogs about this recently (see link at side).

There will be a special class open to all my students on Thursday 5th January 2006 7-10pm, here at the house, which Mark will teach, a good 2 weeks before most classes begin, so an ideal time to reconnect after the stupefying effect of Christmas excess. The cost will be £10/£6.

Knowing

Below is an extract from 'Rolling Thunder' by Doug Boyd, (1974).

"Rolling Thunder had explained at Council Grove that his training was experiential. In his first conversation with me he said that truth cannot be expressed verbally, that it can only be experienced: "You have to live it and be part of it and then you might get to know it." My first step was to learn what Rolling Thunder meant by understanding. Understanding is not the sort of thing my modern, establishment education had me believing it was. Understanding, to what Rolling Thunder calls the establishment mind, is simply a rather low-level dance and shuffle, a kind of churning process by which a number of ideas and concepts are juggled around with the newcomer idea until they all somehow fit together. This fitting provides a feeling of knowing which gratifies the mind. A person simply feels the satisfaction of having all his assumptions fit together, and he says, "I know."

"To Rolling Thunder, knowing is being. His simple description of the arrangement of the universe is that there is a right time and place for everything. That cannot be understood by any process of speech or thought: "It's easy to say but hard to understand. You have to live it to understand it."...he is talking about becoming part of the right time and the right place. To put it another way: first you identify the principle, then you practice it Gradually you understand the principle, that is, you become one with it. When you become one with the principle it responds to your will."

Classes Up Until Winter Holiday Break

All classes are running as normal until the second week of December, here are the details.

Monday: Turriff, last date of term 5th December, new beginners are welcome to enrol for January 2006.

Tuesday: Aberdeen Mclymont Hall, 43a Holburn St. 7.30-9pm. You are welcome to drop in and try this class even if an absolute beginner. We will have a rolling enrolment for a while yet so that new folks can join. Last class of term 6th December.

Wednesday: At my home, 7-9pm, all students who have done two terms with me are welcome to drop in any week. The class will probably run all over the holidays and right the way through to January 11th 2006, which will be the last date. I will almost certainly be starting a new beginners' class at Inverurie on Wednesday nights, 7-8.30pm in a room at the Academy, organised by the GEC as usual. The Thursday night class is a good size now and it makes sense to start a new night for beginners.

Wednesday: starting January, David will be starting a new class at Alford 6.30-8pm, details TBC.

Thursday: Inverurie, last date 8th December. Do get your enrolments in early so they don't leave you off the register. New term starts either 12th or 19th January 2006. All students who have completed at least one term with me are welcome to join this class.

Sunday: From now onwards there will almost always be a drop-in class at my home on a Sunday from 2-6pm and all students are very welcome to attend. Call me on the Friday or Saturday to check unless I have mentioned it at class. You can come for all or part of the afternoon. Students have asked for at least an hour of partnerwork, we may do two hours and include Ta Lu and other work such as entering/joining/yielding outside the usual pushing hands format. This class will have plenty of time to catch up on any postures missed if you couldn't get to your regular class as well as revision of any sticky bits. We will look at any issues or aspects of your practice that you feel need further work and also introduce some simple standing practice as well as plenty of spiral warm-ups. There will be a break for tea and the cost is £10 or £6 concessions.

Any queries, drop me an email.

It is in changing that we find purpose.

Heraclitus
(thanks to anonymous blogger for the correction)

Tai Chi Northeast Event: Sunday 6th 2005

Don Wells, the Aberdeen T'ai Chi instructor, has organised an afternoon of mini-workshops and a great chance to meet other T'ai Chi folk in the area. All are welcome, whether beginners, experienced or totally new to T'ai Chi. All the donated money goes to charity and the suggested donation for the event is £10. It will run at the Inchgarth Centre, Craigievar Cresent, 12 noon to 4pm. I will be taking one or two sessions: ('softness' and 'investing in loss'.) If you are free it would be lovely to see you there.