Go look at my new site, Tai Chi Made Simple to get your copy of my Free Training Guide: The Three Tai Chi Mistakes that Almost Everybody Makes.
This free Tai Chi Training Guide will show you exactly what you need to know to make the most out of your Tai Chi Training. In fact, if you are not doing what this guide tells you to do you are not doing Tai Chi and you will not get the health, wellness, or Martial Art benefits that you are trying to acheive.
Click here to get your free Tai Chi Training Guide now. The information that you get in this guide will be incredibly helpful when you attend the next Tai Chi seminar with The White Oak Institute or attend your next Tai Chi class at Croley's Martial Arts Center!
Thanks,
Derek Croley
Friday, January 25, 2008
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Tai Chi Exercise: The Dancing Bear
By Derek Croley
http://www.thewhiteoakinstitute.com/
http://www.croleysmartialarts.com/
One of the best basic exercises in the art of Tai Chi is called the Dancing Bear. In this exercise you are working on several things all at once. Physically you are working on rotating around your centerline, coordinating your feet, knees, hips, lower back (Mingmen), shoulders, arms and head. This means that you are getting everything in your body working together. When your body is working all as one you greatly decrease the physical wear and tear on any particular part. Mentally you are working on directing a centralized motion of your entire body- requiring a mental focus, while at the same time requiring relaxation to get right. All in all, this is a great exercise for getting your body working as one piece under the guidance of your mind- helping you get focused and relaxed all at the same time!
You may wish to practice this yourself when you need to de-stress a bit, or are working really hard on a project and need to take a second to get your head back on straight. This is also great for athletes to work on body mechanics. I taught this at a running seminar and it was soon the talk of the entire camp! They couldn’t believe how much something so simple could be of such great benefit for their running mechanics. Or if you are a professional counselor, as many of our clients are, this is great to teach an aging population (it is a no impact, easy yet effective workout), a youth group (body mechanics and focus), or anybody who has issues with body-mind connection in any way.
How it works is as follows. Stand with your feet shoulder width apart, knees slightly bent. Lift the back of your head, and tuck the base of your spine while letting the lower back relax and fill outward. To begin with, use your knees as a trigger. Bend one knee slightly more than the other. You’ll find that this makes the hip over the more bent knee go down and forward, while the other knee and hip go up and back. Do this motion back and forth, turning your body from side to side around your centerline (an imaginary line that runs down the center of your body). Never let your centerline bend, rather let everything turn around it. Let your arms flop and turn with the motion of your body. You can use where your arms hit as a measure of your balance of flexibility. If one arm won’t go as far as the other you know that your hip flexibility isn’t as good in that direction.
Remember that your foot, knee, hip, and shoulder should be in a straight line at the farthest point in your turn. It is common to make the error of letting your knee bow in and your hip bow out- don’t do that. Keep everything in a straight line.
As you get better your trigger for the movement will move from your knees up to your lower back- when you have your lower back as the source of the movement of your legs as well as your arms you are getting somewhere with this.
Do this every morning for a few minutes and you will feel refreshed, focused, and energized in a way that will amaze you. For more information about this as well as some of our other exercises check out our upcoming seminar entitles “Tai Chi for Mental Health” that will be on February 9th, 2008 in Asheville, NC. This is geared towards health professional and professional counselors- but will be beneficial for absolutely anybody who wishes to attend. For more information go to www.TheWhiteOakInstitute.com.
http://www.thewhiteoakinstitute.com/
http://www.croleysmartialarts.com/
One of the best basic exercises in the art of Tai Chi is called the Dancing Bear. In this exercise you are working on several things all at once. Physically you are working on rotating around your centerline, coordinating your feet, knees, hips, lower back (Mingmen), shoulders, arms and head. This means that you are getting everything in your body working together. When your body is working all as one you greatly decrease the physical wear and tear on any particular part. Mentally you are working on directing a centralized motion of your entire body- requiring a mental focus, while at the same time requiring relaxation to get right. All in all, this is a great exercise for getting your body working as one piece under the guidance of your mind- helping you get focused and relaxed all at the same time!
You may wish to practice this yourself when you need to de-stress a bit, or are working really hard on a project and need to take a second to get your head back on straight. This is also great for athletes to work on body mechanics. I taught this at a running seminar and it was soon the talk of the entire camp! They couldn’t believe how much something so simple could be of such great benefit for their running mechanics. Or if you are a professional counselor, as many of our clients are, this is great to teach an aging population (it is a no impact, easy yet effective workout), a youth group (body mechanics and focus), or anybody who has issues with body-mind connection in any way.
How it works is as follows. Stand with your feet shoulder width apart, knees slightly bent. Lift the back of your head, and tuck the base of your spine while letting the lower back relax and fill outward. To begin with, use your knees as a trigger. Bend one knee slightly more than the other. You’ll find that this makes the hip over the more bent knee go down and forward, while the other knee and hip go up and back. Do this motion back and forth, turning your body from side to side around your centerline (an imaginary line that runs down the center of your body). Never let your centerline bend, rather let everything turn around it. Let your arms flop and turn with the motion of your body. You can use where your arms hit as a measure of your balance of flexibility. If one arm won’t go as far as the other you know that your hip flexibility isn’t as good in that direction.
Remember that your foot, knee, hip, and shoulder should be in a straight line at the farthest point in your turn. It is common to make the error of letting your knee bow in and your hip bow out- don’t do that. Keep everything in a straight line.
As you get better your trigger for the movement will move from your knees up to your lower back- when you have your lower back as the source of the movement of your legs as well as your arms you are getting somewhere with this.
Do this every morning for a few minutes and you will feel refreshed, focused, and energized in a way that will amaze you. For more information about this as well as some of our other exercises check out our upcoming seminar entitles “Tai Chi for Mental Health” that will be on February 9th, 2008 in Asheville, NC. This is geared towards health professional and professional counselors- but will be beneficial for absolutely anybody who wishes to attend. For more information go to www.TheWhiteOakInstitute.com.
Monday, January 14, 2008
Tai Chi Mental Balance and Connection
By Derek Croley of
Tai Chi Made Simple, and
The White Oak Institute.
Let’s begin with the concept of mental balance and connection. To be balanced, you must understand the three main balance connections
1) The logical and emotional mind connection
2) The conscious and subconscious mind connection
3) The past and future mind connection
You must strive to achieve balance logically and emotionally, consciously and subconsciously, and with your past and future. Do not think that you must be perfect in any of these things- but get to work on the path to balance. After all, isn’t perfect a matter of perception and opinion anyway? Isn’t enlightenment simply the ability to see- not to be “perfect”? If you try to be perfect you will always fall short of what you are truly after- improvement in the direction that your goals should take you.
Now let’s discuss the concept of mental connection. This is the idea that not only is your mind attached to itself, it is also attached to the rest of you. How it works is like this:
1) your body is controlled by your chi,
2) your chi is controlled by your mind, and
3) your mind is controlled by your spirit.
This series of relationships is extremely important for you to recognize. The idea of explaining it this way is to present the notion that your body, mind, and spirit are not separate things- there is you and you are comprised of all of these different aspects.
Well, believe it or not, this focus tool will become a focus for your mind, then your chi will follow it, and finally your body will follow your chi. As we will discuss later, this concept is extremely, extremely important in terms of getting Tai Chi or any other Martial Art right.
Let’s begin with the concept of mental balance and connection. To be balanced, you must understand the three main balance connections
1) The logical and emotional mind connection
2) The conscious and subconscious mind connection
3) The past and future mind connection
You must strive to achieve balance logically and emotionally, consciously and subconsciously, and with your past and future. Do not think that you must be perfect in any of these things- but get to work on the path to balance. After all, isn’t perfect a matter of perception and opinion anyway? Isn’t enlightenment simply the ability to see- not to be “perfect”? If you try to be perfect you will always fall short of what you are truly after- improvement in the direction that your goals should take you.
Now let’s discuss the concept of mental connection. This is the idea that not only is your mind attached to itself, it is also attached to the rest of you. How it works is like this:
1) your body is controlled by your chi,
2) your chi is controlled by your mind, and
3) your mind is controlled by your spirit.
This series of relationships is extremely important for you to recognize. The idea of explaining it this way is to present the notion that your body, mind, and spirit are not separate things- there is you and you are comprised of all of these different aspects.
Well, believe it or not, this focus tool will become a focus for your mind, then your chi will follow it, and finally your body will follow your chi. As we will discuss later, this concept is extremely, extremely important in terms of getting Tai Chi or any other Martial Art right.
Assistance for Seminar Participants
Welcome to our blog. My name is Anna Boggess and I am the Office Manager at The White Oak Institute. Please feel free to call or email me if you have questions about or seminars. I can be reached at 828-551-0320 or aboggess.woi@gmail.com. I look forward to assisting you!
Saturday, January 12, 2008
Upcoming Tai Chi Seminars
We at The White Oak Institute are providing seminars utilizing Tai Chi for dealing wiith the stresses of daily living. Our next seminar is Febuary 8th and the information is on our web site
http://www.thewhiteoakinstitute.com/. More information will become apparent on this blog adddressing concerns about our seminar system.
Jim Green green3176@bellsout.net
Anna Boggess annawoi@bellsouth.net
http://www.thewhiteoakinstitute.com/. More information will become apparent on this blog adddressing concerns about our seminar system.
Jim Green green3176@bellsout.net
Anna Boggess annawoi@bellsouth.net
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