A few essential concepts for the Taiji practioner
Posted: September 22, 2009 at 11:17 pm | Tags: health, Martial Arts, Tai Chi, Taiji, Wellness
Wuji is a Daoist concept which roughly translates as “no extremes”. It is often referred to as emptiness, or nothingness; however this definition can be vague or even misleading. Philosophically, Wuji means the One, or Whole from which all things emerge and to which all things return. A helpful analogy may be a placid pond. The moment you drop a pebble, ripples appear. After some time, those ripples dissipate, and the pond returns to a placid state. My own definition is to say that Wuji is everything before there is anything in particular.
In Taiji practice, Wuji means stillness of mind and body. Mentally, it implies having no intention to act in any way. Intention takes a backseat to observation. Our awareness is allowed to turn inward to observe the body’s postural alignment, balance, breathing and patterns of tension. Physically, it is the aligning of our skeletal structure so that it evenly distributes and disperses the pressure of gravity, releasing and sinking excess or misplaced tension through our structure and into the ground; deep slow, smooth abdominal breathing, and a sense of suspending one’s body from the center point at the crown of the head. Though the body retains its structural integrity, all joints are to be relaxed and permeable (like a spring-able to transfer energy).
In totality, practicing Wuji meditation means allowing mind and body to settle, so that all parts unify and reach their natural balance and harmony as one. The goal of practicing Wuji meditation is to progress through a process of physical, and consequently-mental, change in which the body and mind reorganize the way they deal with pressure (that of gravity or any other) making us stronger and healthier.
While Wuji is the perfect balance of such a profound harmony that no one thing can be distinguished, the moment that one thing is distinguished so is its counterpart. Once there is life, there is death; male/female, hard/soft, light/dark, thought/action, and so on. The principle of opposites in Daoism is the Yin-Yang principle. Nature, is constantly moving, shifting and cycling, always s in a process of balancing infinite aspects (or examples) of Yin and Yang. The Daoists call Nature’s principle of balancing Yin and Yang the Taiji principle. Taiji roughly translates to mean “grand-ultimate”; in other words, the grand-ultimate principle, or law, of nature.
In our Taiji practice, this applies to our rhythm of breathing in and out, from bottom to top, to the raising/extending and lowering/retracting of our limbs, to the shifting of our weight and balance from one foot to the other, to the way we sink our weight and energy when a limb raises up, and in the way our torso turns and circles. When an arm is extended that is Yang. Exhaling is Yang. A leg bearing weight is Yang as well. When our leg is without weight it is Yin. Inhaling is Yin. When an arm is retracted to the body, this is Yin as well. For every Yin aspect of our posture, movement, or energy, there must be an equal and opposite Yang aspect. The same is true for the reverse. This is how we balance Yin and Yang aspects within the mind and body, and that is why our practice is called Taiji. A way of putting it in western terms would be, practicing to act in accordance with the grand principle of nature.
Qi is a very broad Chinese term. The most direct translations are roughly: “Life force, breath, and energy.” The term Qi has been the source of a lot of debate. The following is my own understanding of the concept and how it applies to Taiji practice. I have reached these conclusions over many years of study, practice, and thought.
Qi is a term for energy. In physics, energy is defined as the capacity to perform work. Work is defined as motion over distance (and/or time). Applying these terms to the body and mind, and their relation to each other and the world around them, we can understand Qi as energy and evidence of energy.
Energy in the form of fuel (which is defined as stored energy) is taken from food, beverage, and air by our bodies daily. Likewise, our minds receive emotional energy-experienced as motivation-which comes from a variety of obvious as well as more subtle and subconscious sources (the study of which is the province of the scientific discipline of psychology, and beyond my qualifications to discuss). Our bodies convert this fuel into various forms of energy to perform various tasks such as mental processes, heart-beat and blood flow, various organ functions, and movement via the contraction of skeletal muscles. In an ancient world where microscopes had not been invented and molecular levels could not be seen, individual biological processes could not be identified. In order to understand, or grasp, some concept of what made all these functions keep going (as well as harm or improve them) what other answer was there but the energy of life. Observing that life required food to continue, but could do without for weeks, that water and sleep though necessary, could be forgone for days; but air, air could only be fasted from for minutes-and only a few at that. It would stand to any reasoning mind (in the context of their current knowledge of biological function) that air was the primary source for this energy of life. Qi.
Of course, there were more easily observable examples of that allusive force that creates movement and animates flesh, for instance, gravity, the movement of our bodies, wind, the changing of the seasons, the movement of the stars (which was actually the rotation of the earth, of course). These phenomenons, as well as others, were observed by the philosophers of the time. During such times, philosopher, priest, scientist, and doctor were more or less the same job. A sect of such men, called Daoists, put all phenomenons they observed in man and nature together into an integrated system of how the universe functioned. Observing that all phenomenon followed certain patterns, and all were affected by each other; they deduced certain principles of the way of nature. The most fundamental of these being the Taiji principle, that nature is comprised by opposing aspects continuously shifting from one to the other as nature changed and balanced itself. So, Qi, energy, or the concept for that which is the source and result of motion and change, is observed in our practice as the shifting and cycling of the various aspects of Yin and Yang within our own bodies and minds. It is our physical movement, the pumping and flow of blood through our vessels, emotion, intention, lymphatic flow, breathing in and out, nerve tingling, and more. It is a concept that subsumes the force behind and evidence of all motion and change. Concerning our practice, we align and relax the body, marry movement with awareness and intention, and allow all forces mental and physical, internal and external, to find their natural harmony and balanced flow. In other words, Qi flow.
One of the greatest misunderstandings about Qi is that it’s a substance in the body. Scientists and researches have been working with great effort to find and measure Qi. Students practice for years waiting to feel some foreign and magical energy suddenly manifest itself within them. The downfall of this is that, as I have alluded above, Qi is not a substance. That’s why they haven’t found it. It means energy in all forms and its nature. Since all processes of life involve energy, the more conducive circumstances are to energy flow, the better all such processes will function. Further, the necessary conditions for good flow of energy are the same: no blocks (excess Yang), no leaks (excess Yin), and continuous awareness and adjustment to insure those conditions. This is what makes the Taiji principle the “grand-ultimate” principle, applicable to everything in life.
