Back in the early eighties when I started Taiji, the BTCCA (British T'ai Chi Ch'uan Association) held a seven hour Intensive on the first Saturday of every month. Toward the end of each of these sessions, Grand Master John Robert Kells, who always led the proceedings, gave an inspiring talk (effectively a dharma talk). These would always start the same way: "The most important word in Taiji is RESPECT," and then would go off on a wonderfully inventive tangent. I always tell my students that the most important word in Taiji is LISTENING. Respect & listening are really the same thing.

Choiceless awareness

Find out for yourself.
This is why we practise.

Everyday consume something fermented: kefir, sauerkraut, kombucha, yogurt, miso…

MEDITATION

Imagine you're at home, seated comfortably in your favourite armchair, watching television. The lights are low and the programme is entertaining. Suddenly, for whatever reason, the TV dies and you're left in the dark. You pull yourself forward to the edge of the seat, readying to arise and check the electricity. As you sit, perched on the edge, your eyes start to grow accustomed to the dark and you notice the gentle luminescence of the room. It's as though the surrounding objects slowly start to come alive, revealing a very different reality: more subtle, more mysterious, more natural.

Empty your mind
Empty your life

The more mind empties, the more spacious it becomes.

Only tolerate company you admire: those that elevate, edify and leave you cleaner.

We are so much more than what we think we are.

Spirit fires up – ignites – and you become a firebrand lighting up the way.

Listening for possibilities we haven't anticipated.

Spirit is the agent of becoming. Without spirit the past repeats itself and the real future never properly opens up.

Dantian: a place that, precisely because it is so empty and inhospitable, offers the possibility of dwelling.

Spirit: a willingness to dance / play

Rather than verb tenses inscribing our metaphysics of linear time into consciousness, classical Chinese verbs are unconjugated, simply registering emergence, occurrence appearing of itself in a kind of boundless present. And classical Chinese has minimal grammar, so pictographic ideograms seem to be each emerging from a generative emptiness.

—David Hinton

Love is a burgeoning heart.

Poetry is language invested with spirit

Thinking (mind) is a morass of prejudice.

An important element of a short poem is the white space that surrounds/contains it.

Spirit is the unbearable lightness of being.

Science's obsession with the material & measurable.

Monotheism is simply the deification of male Ego.

Acting creatively rather than reacting habitually.

The abuser always forgets but, for the life of them, the abused cannot.

Advice:

• Follow your nose
• Do as you're told

Until we move towards a broader view of self which incorporates spirit – an Atmavidya – psychology will remain simply the study of our psychological surfaces.

—Elliot Cohen

Aware: Middle English waren "to be mindful, be on guard," going back to Old English warian "to be wary, guard, protect," going back to Germanic warōjan- (whence Old Saxon waron "to attend to, protect," Old High German biwarōn, Old Norse vara "to warn," varask "to be on one's guard")

Awake: Old English wæccan to watch, Latin vegēre to enliven; Norwegian dialect vok, Old Norse vǫk hole in ice

I distinguish three fundamental sets of Taiji principles:

• Principles of Station: sink & relax; upright spine;
• Principles of Motion: single-weightedness; turning the waist;
• Principle of Continuity: keeping the mind on the job, also called Mind Continuous or the Principle of Flow.

Mind Continuous is the space in which the first two sets of principles (the physical principles) operate. It allows them to work together and regulate each other, each creating, preserving, and negating the others.

Attack from the heart
Yield into the belly

The Spirit of Hope
Is this not a tautology?

Practice expresses faith, generates love.

As dantian contracts into the here & now, mind expands into the ever-increasing void. Condensation & evaporation.

Soft mind connects
Hard mind controls

The main function of the rational mind is not to think but to blot out energy.

Birth was the death of him.      (Beckett)

Taiji mind: awake, attentive, alert. Neither desire nor need to know. Knowledge unnecessary clutter.

Keep the mind on the job. If I manage that, and keep repeating the exercise, I will be taken, via central equilibrium, into heightened awareness, into spirit. If my mind wanders at all, I won't; I will be simply wasting time.

As dantian contracts into the here & now – the local – the mind expands into the ever-increasing void. Condensation & evaporation.

RESPECT: the proverbial second glance

LISTENING: our first act of compassion