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Wanted to know if anybody is also doing taichi practice or something similar in addition to meditation and how they work together? Also wondering if you could suggest any learning materials on that. Thanks a lot!
Hi. I think a lot of us are doing tai chi or bagua in addition to meditation. I’ve been to a number of workshops with Bruce since 2002 on the topic of tai chi and meditation. He has several books out that deal with tai chi, bagua and meditation that are pretty interesting. “The Big Book of Tai Chi” (which I think has been re-titled “Tai Chi, Health for Life” ) discusses the relationship a bit. He has a new book, called “Ba Gua and Tai Chi” (which I received as part of the Bagua Mastery program but which isn’t generally available yet) talks about this as well. Bruce has a unique perspective on meditation that isn’t widely shared. The relationship between the martial arts and buddhism has been the subject of a quite a few books and you can find a lot of these out there. There’s a really good book by Livia Kohn, “Meditation Works,” that’s a scholarly look at meditation in its various forms, specifically discussing Taoism, Buddhism, and Hinduism. It’s worth a look if you’re interested in the larger perspective. Hope this is helpful.
Best wishes,
Matthew
Hi, I did tai chi and other martial arts in the past and while meditation was not taught as part of the martial arts or tai chi classes it worked it’s way into what I did in both of those. I had meditated before but I didn’t try to work it in, it just happened. It was especially true in tai chi, maybe because of the slow movement. I know that I had to learn the form and be very comfortable doing it before it started feeling like meditation. That is when I didn’t need to concentrate on the form and the movement then the space started opening up. Not to say that my form was perfect or anything like that but you reach a point where you are comfortable with what you are doing and you don’t have to think about it at every step. I don’t know if one would be able to meditate in the beginning if one was starting out with that aim.
i’m currently studying chen style taij and am adding the meditation to enhance my taiji standing and reverse or pre natal breathing is a big part of it.im currantly reading the TAI CHI CLASSICS as well as bruces RELAXING INTO YOUR BEING both seem to help
Thanks for the suggestions! But can you really learn tai chi from books, is it possible? The reason I am interested in tai chi or bagua is because I think that learning meditation alone, and being just ‘in the head’ is not very good for me because of my emotional issues.
You also mentioned learning to meditate WHILE practicing tai chi. Is this really the ‘standing meditation’ that Bruce suggests to do in addition to sitting in the audio instructions? I assumed ‘standing meditation’ is just standing, without moving.
I think you can learn tai chi from books to some degree. The problem with just learning it from a book is that if your posture is not quite correct you don’t have any feed back on how to correct it. It helps to read the instructions several times and then do it and then read it again. This should be repeated several times. Also taking it very slowly. It helps more if there is a demonstration to watch but the feedback is something you can only get from a teacher.
I agree that the standing meditation that Bruce talks about is just standing for the meditation class. The meditation I was talking about with tai chi just happened once I was comfortable doing the tai chi and I didn’t need to concentrate on the form as much. Tai chi was very relaxing to me once I got the form down. So once I was relaxed then it seemed to allow or even encourage the expansion of space or maybe it’s that you become aware of the total space. Not an easy thing to explain, however.
Bruce makes a distinction between something that is meditative and meditation. I think tai chi can be done with presence and full, relaxed attention, and you can really get into the “flow” with it. However, Bruce’s definition of meditation really deals with inner work that clears blockages out of the various bodies according to his Taoist cosmology.
Anyway, I’ve been to 3 or 4 workshops with Bruce where he presents various ways to do tai chi as meditation and it’s more similar to what he’s teaching in the Bagua Mastery program. Some of us are doing that as well as this meditation circle.
What books would you recommend for a total beginner? Are the TAI CHI CLASSICS (translated by waysun liao) as well as bruces RELAXING INTO YOUR BEING good for the start? I already ordered RELAXING INTO YOUR BEING, would you suggest anything else? Thanks in advance.
After spending a lot of money on a lot of different books, I’ve decided to just stick to Bruce’s system. He has a comprehensive and coherent approach to the whole world of tai chi, chi gung, and meditation. The other thing that’s important is a teacher. I know that can be hard, but if you can find someone who has really mastered a particular thing and knows how to teach it safely, that would be great. Even if it wasn’t Bruce’s system, if there was a good teacher of any of the various styles of tai chi or chi gung, it would be worth studying with them. I forget which book it’s in, but Bruce talks about how to pick a teacher. I’m lucky because Bruce comes through Boston once a year or so, so I’ve been able to study with him. I spent the time and money and went to one of his retreats in California.
That said, the classics are a really good resource. I have several different editions. My favorite is “The Essence of Tai Chi Ch’uan: The Literary Tradition” by Lo/Inn/Amaker/Foe. All of Bruce’s books have some good stuff in them. I also like T.T.Liang’s “Tai Chi for Health and Self-Defence.” Good luck!
another book i read years ago that i plan to reread is the” dao of taijiquan” by jou tsung hwa along with volume two of bruces book “the great stillness”
If to stick to Bruce’s methods, would you recommend a specific Bruce Frantzis’s book to learn tai chi? I mean with movements and all, not just theory.
Bruce actually doesn’t have any books that teach the moves of the tai chi form. There are several videos available – one by Bruce, and I think Brookline Tai Chi has their own practice videos as well. Even with a video, it’s very hard to learn the form properly without someone to check your moves occasionally and make corrections.
I don’t own a lot of tai chi books, really just Bruce’s book “Tai Chi: Health for Life” (which has the section on selecting a teacher), for the reasons already mentioned – most books seem to be geared more toward learning the moves of that particular teacher’s form. Good books on theory seem to be few and far between, although there are probably a few decent ones out there.
As Catherine said, it’s best to have a teacher. If you did want to learn from videos and books though, probably one of the best sources I’ve found is YMAA. I have some of Dr. Yang’s material on 8 brocades and chin na that is informative and well done.
As to theory, there is a book by Robert Chuckrow called, surprisingly, “The Tai Chi Book.” He covers alignment, breathing and so on. Also shows Cheng Man Ching’s short form at the end.
When I did hard styles there was always an attitude of our style is the ultimate. The nice thing about the internal styles is that I don’t see that much. There is more openness to listen to and look for many viewpoints.
I just finished reading bruces book “relaxing into your being”in the faq section bruce talks about exercises to lenghten the muscles and strengthen the nerves .are the exercises listed and i missed them or are they in another book?if one of bruces longtime students could help i’d appreciate it thankyou don,
………I think it importatnt to develop individual judgement in the selection of books as sources of information – authors vary hugely in capability, capacity and competence and are driven by many different motivatory factors, also publishers have many different types of portfolio, targetiing wide ranging market segments of readers. There are manuals, textbooks, reference books, classics translations, how to picture books and a lot of weird stuff too. If you have access to a big bookstore I suggest you just brouse and begin to get a feel for the range of stuff – also reader feedback in Amazon often offers useful insight. I’ve always found Bruce’s books to be outstanding. Re. muscle lengthening and nerve strengthening exercises, I have the impression that these are core facets of a lot of what Bruce teaches – Energy Gates is an excellent starting place – better still find an Energy Arts instructor
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