The Rising Sun School of
T'ai Chi Ch'uan

Practitioners Corner

Expand Your Approach
Study Guide for Students
Improving Form Study
Why Yang Styles Differ
Insight through the I Ching

Our School Lineage
Master Lee Shiu Pak
The T'ai Chi Family
Rising Sun School Faculty
Certified Instructors

General Interest

Books and Reviews
Starting a Peer Group
Instructional Products
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Toronto T'ai Chi Classes at

The
Rising Sun School of T'ai Chi Ch'uan

We have no more than 8 students per instructor and you progress at your own rate. If you miss a class, you pick up where you left off the last time. We specialize in personal coaching!

Come to a free introductory class and find out about how to get one month of free classes!

Study

Carefully study.

Extension and contraction, opening and closing, in all movement be natural.

To enter the door and be shown the way you must be orally taught. Practice should be uninterrupted and the technique will be achieved through self study.

Speaking of the body and its function, what should guide our practice?

The mind and breath are paramount, and the muscles and bones should follow.

Song of 13 Postures (author unknown)

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Commentary

Be natural. Find a good teacher, learn well and practice diligently. Understanding always evolves. The breath is like the edge of the sword. If you listen carefully, it will instruct you.

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The Water Principle

"The highest form of goodness is like water; in choosing your dwelling know how to keep close to the ground. In cultivating your mind, know how to dive into hidden deeps. In making a move, know how to choose the right moment. It is becuase you do not contend that you will now be at fault."

Lao Tzu

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Commentary

Water is used an image throughout the classical teachings of T'ai Chi. The T'ai Chi diagram is called the 'double fish' for the way in which Yin and Yang swim within it like two fish chasing each others tails in a bowl of water. We say at our School that "Over time water smoothes over the hardest edges of stone and so to does T'ai Chi breathe new life into hardened, tired muscle and limbs". Water imagery, when we contemplate it, also keeps our work fluid and sinking.

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True Power

"Energy and Force are not the same. Energy comes from the sinews and force from the bones. Therefore Energy is the property of the soft, the alive, the flexible. Force is then the property of the hard, the dead, the inflexible. What do we mean by issuing energy? It is like releasing an arrow."

Cheng Man-ching

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Commentary

In Zen Archery, the student apprentices to the bow, spending a long time with proper stance and breath, drawing the bow string for many months before an arrow is ever allowed to be released. In T'ai Chi Ch'uan, we apprentice ourselves to the 'bow' of our bones and learn very carefully how to draw the 'string' of our muscles, before we are able to release energy properly through not-doing (Wu Wei).

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You will find many T'ai Chi books and reviews at

If you have comments or suggestions email
Paul McCaughey at

taichitoronto@rogers.com

The first part of this section should help novices when they are shopping for
a style or school. The second part should help intermediate through advanced students with the process
of setting goals for the practice, progression and fine tuning of their T'ai Chi work over time.

Try to find out what your lineage is and how your style fits into the history of T'ai Chi Ch'uan. When you see your work in the context of history you can appreciate the forces that have shaped the material that you are being taught. Even within a great lineage where the preservation of knowledge is strong and the level of skill is high, a lessor student will eventually as an instructor will pass on lessor T'ai Chi. Conversely, within a lessor lineage such as those of the standard forms, (lessor due to their youth and the force of state policy having rendered a homogeneity of teaching and practice) a great student will pass on greater T'ai Chi. A great student investigates the fundamentals of their teacher's system with diligence, maintains an excellent practice and has the courage to explore both within and beyond the limits of their system. What you learn is only as strong as the weakest link in the lineage chain. Strive to be the strongest link you can be and your practice will always thrive.

I prefer a system and teacher whose boundaries are extrinsic, where what you are getting into is layed out from the beginning, and whose heart is essentially light and inclusive. The Master teacher must strive to be the first student of the school, leading by example of her or his enthusiasm for learning. A great practitioner, perhaps a winner of 'awards', is not always a good teacher. A teacher must be able to manifest abundant patience and be able to communicate with and respect the threshold of learning in each student.

I feel a Master Teacher must teach preservation of knowledge through meticulous corrections and attention to detail, while balancing the tendency towards rote practice with drilling of principles and applications. The Form can change, but once it changes, the changes are practiced with equal diligence and even more inquiry. The students gain an unparalleled opportunity for insight into the Teachers process when a change is made. Why did he or she change that?

It is always a good sign when a teacher allows students ample class time to practice a new instruction before moving on to the next thing. It gives he or she the opportunity to give you some feedback as well.

Some Teachers have a lot of inner movement in their work and that comes out in their teaching. They will keep taking you in different directions and not allow you to become fixated. This is great teaching, although challenging. As long as the essential thread of the tradition is still there, you should feel secure that you are receiving both the benefit of what his teacher passed to him, as well as the catalyst that comes with your teachers own emergence within their work.. A colleague said to me once, "The Qi of the teacher leads the Qi of the student." There is no question that a great teacher helps you build a strong foundation and emerge with time into the leadership and creativity of your own understanding.

At the Rising Sun School we have an organized protocol which defines the use of our small space and how we spend our time together. We do not allow the idiosyncrasies of individuals and the tendency towards exclusive behavior to enter into the space of learning. We expect students to pause at the door and take a moment cultivate awareness of the group space. As a result our space is quiet. There is probably less spontaneity and socializing than might otherwise occur at the school, which I see as a drawback sometimes, but not most of the time. We meet and connect to each other through the work, which fulfils the intent of our leadership style. I gave up a few years ago on trying to promote community through my T'ai Chi work. My attitude was that if community evolved as a result of the work we did together then that was good. If not then at least good work could go on, which I have found has historically had more staying power. Over the years we have had a small community evolve around the work and a natural affection we have for each other through having spent time learning with each other.

After three years a student may with the approval of the faculty, apprentice with us as an instructor. It takes at least another two to three years to work the demanding curriculum for an instructors license which has two grades, a basic (Form teaching) and graduate license (All Four Aspects). The most important thing is a willingness to keep learning and to help others do the same. Before one knows it one has finished the work and knows how to teach, if you have the 'heart to learn'.

2. Pursue the principles of softness, slowness, and smoothness, and keep your understanding fluid.

Softness teaches 'enough, not too much power'. Slowness teaches you to observe the enfolding and unfolding of each movement and to be aware on an inner and outer level. Smoothness teaches one to use long even power rather than short erratic bursts. Fluid understanding means that you are always a student and therefore open to reexamination of any part of your work.

Movements constellate from the evolutionary anatomical principles , the martial context or application,and the concious attitude we bring to our work. First learn how to move naturally. Secondly, understand the marraige of bipedal anatomy and martial context and how Yin and Yang are the result. Third, 'the Yang from the Yin to do, the Yin from the Self to do' as Mr. Lee used to say. If you conciously do the Yang through a Yin awareness you Yang will always be soft and you will stay centred. But in order to have the Yin, you must be receptive. It is the openness, attentiveness, and the willingness to wait patiently that makes one an effective receiver. So the third level is how your presence of mind influences your expression of Yin and Yang, or T'ai Chi.

4. Learn an application for each different movement to define your intent and to clearly differentiate the Yin and Yang of each movement.

When you understand any movement through an application with a partner, you will grasp the coordination and muscle engagements on a whole new level. Movements in meditation practice are clarified by the martial context but not defined by it. Movements are defined by the whole of your Intent which involves much more than the application or use. Your Intent is all of your understanding of each movement, your motivation when doing it, and your relationship with the world than surrounds you as well. One cannot remove the person from the experience. T'ai Chi is inclusive, not exclusive.

6. Investigate receptively how the hands and feet shape the breath and clearly differentiate the full from the empty.

When the arms open the air is naturally drawn in and when they close it is pushed out. When the feet are taking a step, breathe into your centre for stability and when shifting your weight for the transfer of power, breathe out. When the outside of a movement is empty or gathered, the inside is full of air. When the outside of a movement is full, or extended, then the inside is empty of air. Also, allow for the inhalation and exhalation to roll through the peak of Yang or Yin waves in your Form helping to engender more continuity in your Form. Exhale through the end of each Yang move and into the Yin or gathering and your Yang will flow better. Inhale at the beginning of a Yang cycle and your movement will open and relax, which is the best place for the Yang to release from softly.

7. Make your attention reflect your intention.

Exercise the eyes and neck, allowing the head to turn as your gaze travels from one Yang hand to the next Yang hand, while encompassing the Yin and then always turn to look before your walk. The Yang and Yin of the hands are determined by your intended application and its timing.

This is a good way to set some goals for beginner, intermediate and advanced levels of study. A beginner should study mapwork to generate an impeccable container for understanding generative principles. An intermediate student should study how as the container breathes, the movement of air from the inside changes ones alignments and ones perspective on mapwork increases. An advanced student should strive mindfully to clarify their intent, so that Yin and Yang are clearly differentiated in each moment of movement.

9. Integrate the down with up, forward with back, inside with outside, left with right and once you achieve unity, allow everything to have it's place.

When one thing is still , another is moving and then vice versa. Study to overcome disunity through unifying principles. Then study to find diversity within unity. Otherwise the mind (will) overcomes the elemental (Yin and Yang). An example of this would be when a student over applies the principle of continuity by making everything continous and loses the elements of stillness in the evolution of a movement.

Push Hands teaches us to appreciate our resistance, our investment in results, our camouflage, and to pursue letting go of power so that we may find the power of not-doing.

11. Keep your eyes on the Boxing, not on the Boxer (your performance).When you spar, then you can watch the other boxer.

Do this and you will find inspiration instead of desperation. I find that a students performance anxiety is often at its worst during sparring practice, when enculcated models of success versus defeat invade the mind focus and principles practice is lost. If you can aknowledge your fear then you are at the beginning of having the courage to work through your fear. T'ai Chi principles are there to slowly extricate you from both your primal and egotiscal fears. When someone attacks they must join you. Here in lies the irony of the attack. Harmony is always possible if you can learn to dance with them. 'Many times to do and you can do the Boxing' (practise a lot and it will come).

12. Learn Weapons forms to expand your knowedge of movement.

Weapons teach you to unite with the weapon, to learn from it's intrinsic structural intent (the sword has an edge and that teaches you how to move with it) and to find longer extensions of power.They are also a pleasant alternative to the empy handed form.

Through massage you learn to relax, both from giving and receiving it. This is no different from the Boxing practice where learning to give and receive is equally important. Both are T'ai Chi. This also assures you of being able to help if you hurt someone accidentally through practise or unavoidably through defending yourself. It is also true that knowledge of acupressure points and stretches may translate into boxing strikes and leverage techniques when applied combatively rather than therapeutically. In many, many ways, Medicine and Boxing are interchangeable. Herbal medicine helps with acute and chronic illness. Even the self cultivated person is not immune to the many sources of illness.

14. Explore T'ai Chi Philosophy.

You may find that through meeting the challenges of study in T'ai Chi, that this helps you to meet the challenges of life. We are at our most positive I feel when we are motivated to learn something. 'Open the thinking, you can be larger.' - Mr. Lee used to say. We come to T'ai Chi to let go and let be. We come to recover our equilibrium. We come to learn to be more receptive to ourselves and others. As you study the physical exercise, because it calls on these virtues, you will find yourself moving differently on an inner level as well as an outer.

There are many roads to the top of the mountain. Only fools criticize what they do not practice, without having truly studied it. Just because it is different does not make it erroneous. Just because something is popular and people say things to you with conviction does not make what they do or say necessarily more valid. Beware of seasonal T'ai Chi shopping, you may be in fashion, but only for awhile. When you own your own truth, you are always in fashion with yourself. Who knows, perhaps one day you will be in fashion with others....

16. Take care of the things and people, which feed and support you.

This also means dedicating yourself to the Preservation of Form. You have to serve that which serves you, but not blindly. You should be able to find validation for what you have been taught. In the end you are responsible for your intent ( Yin and Yang). Keep squeezing your roots for more, stay open to discovery and then go back to your roots. Most often you will find what you discovered elsewhere was right in front of you in your lineage Form. When you discover a divergent method that has truth, do not abandon your roots, just understand them better through contrast.

My apprenticeship to my teachers work has spanned 25 years at this writing and I am still finding spaces to move into that are new. Each time I find greater unity and understanding with what he practiced. Even if you do not have a strong a Form to follow as we had in Mr. Lee, your Form can become that strong through practice. It is through the time of practice that ultimately we penetrate and understand our work. Commit to defining your intent in each move through the T'ai Chi principles and perhaps one day the clarity of your Form will be something which students carefully preserve through their practice and teaching.

18. T'ai Chi helps people to help themselves and allows people of good heart to aspire to uprightness.

When people come together in this way the energy and good will can be wonderful, warm and healing. So we help ourselves, while we are helping each other. Mr. Lee called this T'ai Chi Family. If you are an older student, do not forget to help the younger students, both by example and by intervention. If you are a younger student, be proactive and ask older students questions when you need some help. If you are peers, enjoy comradeship and positive competition. Help each other to get better at all aspects. Be careful of competetiveness. If you win superiority and lose a comrade you both lose.

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"If you laugh, you (both) win."
Master Lee