In June of 2020 I put up a notice on a local digital bulletin board, offering free taijiquan sessions every weekday morning. There was a lot of interest, and there are now 28 people in the Whatsapp group. After a while we started meeting on the weekends as well.
Not everyone comes every day. Usually we are a group of three to seven people. When the covid restrictions are over, it would be nice to have a large group – maybe twenty or more at once.
The regulars have come often enough that they now know the Yang style short form (54) really well. They are beyond the stage of learning the shapes: they are beginning to be able to song and feel the movement of energy.
Now that the weather has turned fine again, we feel we’ve come full circle. We have experienced all the seasons together in the park.
For me personally it has been a great way to start each day. And I’ve gained a lot of experience in teaching taiji and qigong.
Here in the Netherlands it is more usual to practice a sport or to work out a couple of times each week. We can really feel the benefit of doing taiji every day.
Grandmaster Cheng Manjing compared daily practice to laying down one sheet of paper per day. “If you persevere, a sheet per day grows into an enormous stack.”
Here, in fact, is a portrait of Cheng Manjing, although most people wouldn’t recognize him as a panda! Here’s a look at the photo underneath my drawing:
That’s grandmaster Cheng Manjing, on the right.