Saturday October 20^th at 3.30pm.

At this seminar Sifu Hine, and some of his senior students, will show you

ü  How and where chi flows around your body

ü  The major organs affected by the 8 breathing chi kung

ü  How to perform ‘chi tricking’ and its health benefits

ü  How to increase your chi in respect of the three items above

ü  Dissection of the stances, your root is very important for building and circulating the chi – learn how to attain the right stances

ü  Arm and hand positions in the first part of the long form i.e. From the opening sequence up to crane spreads wings, to gain the most from your form & increase chi

ü  How to protect your knee and ankle joints from stress and strain

ü  Demonstration of some of the combat applications to show the origin of the moves and why your hands and feet are in the positions they are in.

This seminar will be part talk by Sifu and then participation i.e. we will get you up and doing the form with us. 

You will have a chance to ask questions both during and after the seminar.  The senior students will be wandering around amongst you to answer any queries and to give help and advice.

Seniors Demonstrate For You

 Some of the senior students from Sifu’s Friday night class have volunteered to demonstrate the first part of the form, which you will be focusing on, as well as some of the weapons too i.e. Straight & Broad sword forms (Fan if we have time)

Please Bring

•      A drink
•      A note pad and pen
•      A cushion to sit on (if you would prefer a chair please bring one, there are benches at the school, but seating is limited.  We want you to be comfortable and relaxed so you take in the most amount of information possible) 
•      A cup or mug for tea at half time (we will provide the tea and coffee)

Full venue details and booking form from your instructor or via info@taichi-europe.com

Tai Chi Spine

One word of caution before you start, if you already have back problems it would be wise to see your health care professional first, before commencing on any form of exercise.  Tai Chi posture adjustment is very gentle and should not cause problems, but a word to the wise.

For everyone else;

Stand naturally with your spine straight and lightly stretch your torso upwards, this should feel comfortable.  Imagine that there is a piece of string from the top of your head holding your head up yet relaxed.  Gently roll the hips under; this should engage the core muscles in your stomach and small of the back.  You now have a very powerful structure that is completely supporting your body and allowing it to relax.

In the beginning this may feel a bit uncomfortable, but you will get used to it quickly.  It is the same every time that you start to exercise, you do feel awkward in the beginning, until you are strong enough to no longer think about it.  The effects of holding this posture naturally are positive and quick acting.  You will find that you have more energy, aches and pains will start to fade away and you will generally feel better.

Have a good week, keep healthy

John Hine 

The Main Channels of Power

Under normal circumstances the Qi (Energy) simply circulates predominantly through the two main Acupuncture channels (Meridians) of the human body called the Du Mo, up through the spine, and the Jen Mo, down the centreline of the front of your body.  From those two main channels spring many more that feed energy throughout your body.  The greatest concentration of energy flow is along the two main channels, with less of a flow down through the others.  By doing the form properly, with disciplined correct posture and consciously focusing in the right places, you have the greatest chance of achieving robust good health, a calm mind and expanding your awareness.  In order to achieve all of this, and make the energy circulate to the hands, we use what is called the Tigers Mouth.  Without the Tigers Mouth there is no point of focus for the Qi to go to.

How to Perform the Tigers Mouth

Open your hand with the four fingers lying side by side naturally and gently stretch your thumb out until there is a single flap of skin between your hand and thumb.  It will feel slightly tense, which is what is supposed to happen.  You will become aware of extra warmth, or tingling, in your hands and fingers which means that the energy has started to circulate in your hands.  You can now do the form with your energy actively circulating through your hands, arms and body.

Keep well

John Hine

So far we have discussed how to hold your head in order that the energy can circulate up to your head to nourish your brain and strengthen eyes, nose, ears, jaws and mouth.  The neck aligns your head in the correct position.  The alignment of the shoulders allows for the circulation of energy, and blood, to the shoulders and neck.  Now we come to one of the most important areas in Tai Chi posture and that is the elbows.  

Correct Positioning of the Elbows for Tai Chi form practise.

Imagine that you have tucked an orange under each armpit, or you have placed a closed fist there, this will give you an idea of how far your elbows should be away from your body.  Your shoulders should be relaxed as if you really do have those oranges there and they are naturally holding your elbows away from your body.  It may seem odd when you first do it but it becomes very comfortable after a while and you will not want to do the form without it.  You will hold this shape naturally throughout your form practise.  

Why is the Elbow Control So Important?

Relaxed shoulders encourage your Qi energy to flow down your arm nourishing every cell of its length from elbow to wrist, hands and fingers.  There are three possible states when it comes to controlling the elbows ;

Correct : as above with the gaps under the armpits.

Blocked: Your elbow is against your body with no gap under the armpit; energy is stopped from moving upwards.

Floating:  The gap under your armpit is too big and your shoulders are lifted and tense stopping your Qi from moving upwards.

So now you have some of the most important body positions in Tai Chi and your energy should now begin to circulate freely.

Have a good week

Kinds Regards

John Hine

Weekend Migraine

Did you know that there is something called Weekend Migraine? Yes I know it sounds farfetched, but there is.  Weekend migraine symptoms appear on the Friday evening and start to disappear late on the Sunday.  The next morning the sufferer is feeling fine.  Do you know what the cause is to this mysterious condition is?  Stress induced tension in the shoulders! 

This is how it works, the person involved is stressed all week at work and this causes tension in the neck and shoulders.  The tension restricts the blood flow up into their brain and, over time, the person gets used to poor blood flow.  When the weekend comes along the person relaxes their neck and shoulders and the increased blood flow causes the migraine!

Get More Energised

That is just one condition that chronic tension causes.  Low energy can be traced back to physical and mental tension too.  If you are tense all day through there will be a lot of energy being used up.  Just learning to relax while you are doing Tai Chi quite often creates a lot of energy and the desire to be more active. 

Alleviate and Cure many conditions with Tai Chi

The nice thing about Tai Chi is that it allows you to really relax the muscles that sap your energy the most.  Just the act of relaxing can alleviate a lot of chronic conditions and cure others completely.

Relax Your Shoulders Correctly with Tai Chi

When we spoke about the role the neck plays in Tai Chi the neck was gently lifted and stretched clearing the neck of tension and allowing energy to pass through easily.  The shoulders, on the other hand, simply hang off of the straight spine.  Just let them hang, relaxed, don’t stoop forward when you do this.  This will allow your circulation to fill the shoulders and leave you feeling relaxed for the rest of the day.

Until the next time stay healthy.

John Hine

The one thing that many people cannot do is relax.  In fact, just by telling yourself to relax, you tense up even more!  It is better to just think “let go”, it tends to work much better.  However, to get your body to relax you need a certain level of tension in the joints in order to allow the muscles to relax.  It sounds strange, that slight tension can cause relaxation in your body.  The tension that I am talking about is the natural sort that holds your body upright and allows your body to function properly. 

Proper Posture So, let’s go through the whole body and experience what it’s like to relax for Tai Chi practise.  We will begin with the head and neck.

Stand upright and imagine that a piece of string is holding your head upright.  Take it gently, do not force it.  Once your head is being held gently upright it tends to pull your chin slightly in, that’s ok, it’s supposed to happen.  If you have neck problems it is better to be on the safe side and see your health professional before starting these gentle exercises.

Relieve tension relax and be more energised

By gently holding your head in this way tension releases and your neck softens, allowing more blood to your brain.  The effects of this happening mean that you can think more clearly and remain calmer during the day.  Tension can just melt away and you relax.  Feeling relaxed has a knock on effect of relieving stress and giving you more energy. 

It is amazing how much stress and tension people carry around, it has become so normal you don’t even know that it is happening.  By holding your neck correctly it also allows your shoulders to drop and the tension to just flow away.  The shoulders are one of the main places that we all carry tension in.  The other two places where tension is evident are around your eyes and your jaw.  A good exercise each day is to become aware of your shoulders, around your eyes and tension in your jaw.  By simply being aware of this tension automatically causes you to relax.  If you cannot feel tension in the three places it is a good indicator that you are relaxed.

Until next week, stay healthy and relaxed,

John Hine

Arthritis

Back Pain

Low bone density

Breast cancer

Heart disease

Heart failure

Hypertension

Parkinson’s disease

Sleep problems

Stroke

Stress

Anxiety

Depression

To name just a few. 

A note of caution here, not all Tai Chi is the same.  The difference between Tai Chi done well, following all of the traditional training instructions taught by a competent instructor and Tai Chi done badly, from a less skilled source, is profound.  Poorly done Tai Chi either gives little, or no, benefit to the person practising it. 

Over the next few posts you will learn how to apply the correct body positioning, to move through each movement perfectly, the timing necessary to achieve perfect balance of mind and body.

Each week we will cover just how to get the best results from your Tai Chi practise and achieve the best health of your life with a calm and stress free mind.

To your very best health

John Hine

 A research project has found that not only does it make your brain big, but it also improves your memory and thinking too.  They have also suggested that it might delay the onset Alzheimer’s disease.  

Conditions like Alzheimer’s and Dementia are a real problem for the future of mankind, as our populations grow progressively older.  This becomes not only a huge burden on health services, but a big financial problem due to the extra cases.

Tai Chi

Tai Chi increases mental activity and may slow the onset of degenerative conditions like Alzheimer’s disease and Dementa.  In these two mental conditions the brain shrinks prior to the onset of the illness.

Scientists already know that brain volume can be increased by people who take part in aerobic exercise; however this is the first study to show a less physical form of exercise, like Tai Chi, can have the same effects.

The study compared two groups over an eighth month period, one who did Tai Chi, and the other which did not.  The group who did not practise Tai chi demonstrated shrinkage in the brain over the eight month period whereas the Tai Chi group did not

The research suggests that disciplines like Tai Chi with are an important mental health component for brain growth.

Dr James Mortimer, of the University of South Florida, said

“The ability to reverse this trend with physical exercise and increased mental activity implies that it may be possible to delay the onset of dementia in older persons through interventions that have many physical and mental health benefits.

Epidemiologic studies have shown repeatedly that individuals who engage in more physical exercise or are more socially active have a lower risk of Alzheimer’s disease.

The current findings suggest that this may be a result of growth and preservation of critical regions of the brain affected by this illness.”

The study, helped by Fudan University, China, was published in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease.

Over time you want to build up to a minimum of twenty minutes a day and see where you go from there. Gently ease yourself into Tai Chi training and allow the benefits to become apparent. You will find that you naturally increase your time spent training and practicing as your knowledge increases. It is better to do 20 minutes each day than spend an hour over the weekend. By training in this way your Tai Chi will become a pleasure, and not a chore, and it will never be boring.

You might wake up one day and decided to run through everything you know and then, the next day, decide to just work on the moves you learnt at your last lesson. Depending upon how much energy you have, and how your head is, will dictate how much training you do at any given training session. Sometimes you may just work on your legs, moving your chi or refine a couple of moves which your teacher polished up for you.

You may find that you wake up one morning late and feeling a little low in energy. If this happens just go with the flow, just do some gentle Chi Kung and don’t push yourself or guilt trip yourself. Your body often knows what it needs so listen to it. You may find that later in the day you want, and can, do a bit more training. Tai Chi is all about yin and yang, give and take, training hard and training soft. In this way you will be able to make your mind as flexible and strong as your body.

With your twenty minute training session include a warm up to loosen your body, the Tai Chi form itself and practise what you have learned in class.

Tai Chi Warm Up

Unlike more vigorous forms of exercise you are not training to quickly warm the muscles and increase your heart rate but to loosen instead. Try to be as relaxed as possible, get into the stretch position and then relax and let go as much as possible. You shouldn’t feel and pain, just a gentle stretching of your muscles and tendons. If you break out into a sweat you are going at it too hard!

Some chi kung routines are good enough to be used as a warm up in their own right, e.g. the 12 Pieces of Brocade.

The UK is facing a “tsunami” of joint pain with an aging population and the numbers of arthritis cases expected to soar, a leading expert has warned.

Arthritis cases are expected to double by 2030, Arthritis Care (a charity) has predicted. One person in eight complains that at times their arthritis is unbearable.

Philip Conaghan, professor of musculoskeletal medicine in Leeds said “Britain is facing a tsunami of pain due to osteoarthritis as the number of people over 50 increases dramatically and obesity levels continue to rise. Action is needed immediately – we have to bust this myth that painful joints are an inevitable part of getting older that we have to put up with.”

Not only is unpleasant for arthritis suffers, but also the extra cost to the NHS is likely to run into billions of pounds a year, putting greater stress on the health service. In addition many of the people questioned said that they had had to give up their jobs because of the condition putting even greater stress on the sufferers. Again, this has adverse affect for the economy.

Professor Conaghan complained that many people become less active when diagnosed with arthritis with evidence suggesting that this is the worst thing that you could do, just keeping moving can actually strengthen joints.

Tai Chi Eases Joint Pain

As one of our valued readers you will know what I am going to say- Tai Chi is good for joint pain, fact. There has been so much research on the effectiveness of Tai Chi and joint pain that you would think that everyone would know by now. Research has found that Tai Chi is good for painful knees, backs and joints in general. Just holding the Tai Chi posture can give the necessary support and exercise that can ease, and in some cases, even cure some back conditions. One of the most common of arthritis conditions, painful knees, responded very well to regular Tai Chi practise. The excellent posture that Tai Chi gives you, added to the slow, low impact controlled movements helps strengthen joints and build supporting muscles.

Nutrients that Help Ta Chi

In addition to the excellent Tai Chi exercise, certain nutrients have been found to have profund effect in diminishing joint pain. Many drugs used in arthritis are what are known as Cox 2 inhibitors, which prevent an enzyme causing the pain and inflammation. There are also nutrients that also are Cox 2 inhibitors. These include;

Turmeric - the yellow herb that gives curries their distinct colour, is a potent anti-inflammatory. Don’t worry if you do not like curries, this beautiful yellow herb is neither spicy nor hot tasting. You can obviously add to your cooking or take as a capsule that you can buy from most heath food shops.

Zyflamend – a herbal nutrient that you can purchase on line. A great deal of research was done on this 10 herb combination, containing all potent Cox 2 inhibitors. The scientific reviews were very good.

Hope you have found this short post of interest if you suffer from any form of joint pain. Remember to ask your health care professional before engaging in any form of exercise.

Have a good week

Kind Regards

John Hine