Tai chi is an individual discipline;
it's not the kind of unison movement you find in set choreography.
When you look at nature, everything has its own motion:
the tree and the rock and the water running
- they somehow tie together without making a point to fit.
(Chungliang Al Huang)
Dance
A truly skilled dancer uses their body in a manner that looks
effortless.
If you watch Zhang Ziyi in House of Flying Daggers, her dancing
abilities are fabulous.
'The Echo Game' scene looks almost like kung fu, but it is dance.
There are many different types of dance that require a level of skill that
is not apparent in the performance.
You may watch it and think that it is easy - until you try it yourself.
Is tai chi dance?
Tai chi may look like dance and move like dance but it is something else -
something far more
complex than dance.
The art has many facets.
It is a
healthy form of exercise, a system of
self defence,
meditation training, the physical
embodiment of
taoist insights and a spiritual
journey.
Self defence
The 'chuan' in
tai chi chuan means fist or
self defence.
The choreographed
routines may look like dance, but they are
actually martial arts applications joined together.
Those graceful, flowing movements are expressions of
kinetic energy, or force.
Inner quality
Tai chi is internal; a student moves from the inside out.
The outward appearance is secondary to the internal work involved.
Outward forms do not reflect skill in tai chi; it is the unseen substance that
counts.
The skill lies
within.
Hiding your skill
Tai chi has an entirely different focus to dance. A dancer performs their
art. They express openly.
A tai chi student must learn to use their body to cultivate and
express energy. But they must also conceal their actions.
The energy expressions must be folded within the art.
This is not so easy.
Relationship
Expressing energy is only one facet of tai chi.
The
application of the system is an exciting
endeavour in which your body must work in conjunction with an aggressor.
Physical coordination,
meditation, timing and energy must combine in one seamless
moment.
What you do and how you do it must be
perfectly
harmonised with the requirement of the
situation.
There must be total
presence and composure.
The challenge of self defence teaches a person how to cope, how to manage
conflict and overcome stress.
Balance
Tai chi is concerned with
balancing
relationships.
It explores how an
unbalanced person feels to be at odds with
the
world and with themselves.
By healing your body and realising
that all things work together, you can
let-go and find freedom.
Liquid
The
beauty of tai chi lies in the fluid grace
of the movements.
Your body must move without
pause or hesitation, unfurling and then
withdrawing without effort.
Every single gesture must spiral throughout the body as you naturally open
and close the joints.
Your body ripples and flows like water.
Chungliang Al Huang
Chungliang Al Huang is a dancer who
practices tai chi.
He found that the challenge of tai chi has taken him much further as a
dancer and that his dancing background has helped him with
tai chi.
For a dancer, tai chi is the ideal way to express your
harmony with existence - to find unity of self and other.
Page created 3 April 2000