All I can say is AHHHHHHHHH!!!!!! You know, TaiChi in the movies does not convey the amount of practice and perseverance you will need to continue to master this art form. Of course you never "master" this art. You always have something to discover when doing this. Take tonight for example, after our 30 minute warm up (which by the way made me realize how much I sit all day and don't use my legs), we started off by a standing meditation for 5 minutes. Your arms are arced in front of you like you are hugging a tree while standing in your base position. Well 5 minutes while standing like this does not sound like a long time, but when you are starting out, it feels like an eternity. The point of this meditation is to relax the body by focusing on your breathing while keeping your static form. By this time, my quads were screaming and shaking like leaves. However, standing there helped me control that reaction and stay focused on controlling my breathing, which by this time was acting like a bellows stoking a Blacksmith's fire!
After the meditation we performed the "climb the mountain, push the sea", which I know is not the correct name for it, but it is what I can remember at the moment. This is the first Tai Chi lesson that you have to master to move forward in the class. It was pretty easy to follow along, which was great because I was staring at the student instructor the whole time.
Then our other student instructor Tim, brought us over and helped us work on our stances which we beginners were introduced to for the first time. The stances we learned are as follows:
1. Horse Stance (Not Bad)
2. Forward Stance (Not too bad)
3. Backward Stance (I can deal with this one)
4. Cat Stance (Alright, I'm testing out my quads again)
5. Crane Stance (Ahhhh, finally relief!)
6. Box Stance (YOUCH!)
7. Drago Stance (You want me to do what?)
I'll go over these later, but you can at least look them up if you want to. My favorite was the Crane stance seeing I could do this stance fairly well without loosing my balance because of my quivering legs. The other stances I REALLY need to work on. My legs and I were having a not friendly conversation while attempting these pretty simple stances. However, I know that practice makes perfect, which means that I just need to work on it and the strength will come.
More later, but right now I am looking forward to having a menage a trois between me, Advil Gel Caps, and some Icy Hot. NIGHT!!!
LOL! What a fantastic post. I love it. I just started Tai Chi this week and experienced much the same thing. Even as I type this, my muscles all over my body are sore, sore, sore. I've been introduced to the Horse, Crane, and Dragon stances, not sure about the other ones, though. I'm sure that we'll get to them.
ReplyDeleteYou wouldn't happen to be taking this in Charlotte, NC would you? This is exactly the format that we follow. 30 minute warm up, 5 minute post position, 45 minutes of Tai Chi. By the way, it's Push The Mountain, Move The Sea. :-)
Hey Paul, thanks for the feedback. Yes, I take Tai Chi at the Peaceful Dragon in south west Charlotte, NC. When are you taking your Tai Chi Classes? Mine are on Mon, Tue, and Thr. Feel free to search my blog for information. I'm trying to keep it up to date for people like me who are just starting out.
ReplyDeleteI'll be there in Tuesday, though not this Tuesday, Thursday, and Sunday. I just started last week. I wrote about my first experience, too. It was interesting, to say the least.
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