We can help each other’s t’ai chi practice with imagination. We can stretch our spirits with images, metaphors and partnering exercises that involve listening and following the energy coming from your fellow participants.

For example, indulge your imagination and engage your breathing, body and center. Imagine your whole body suspended as if from a string from the top of your head. Try and actually feel gravity embracing your body weight down through your feet. Think in terms of emptying your mind of chattering voices and daily anxieties that clutter your life and thoughts. Focus on your center, your dan tien, and find reservoirs of calm and attentiveness that result.

Thus the imagination allows us to stretch our possibilities in movement and meditation and facilitates the ‘letting go’ so essential to t’ai chi and Daoism, a Chinese philosophy/religion based on accepting change. When we learn we control nothing, we unleash new potential to manage our attitudes and responses to daily “obstacles,” exercise our imaginations, and live the consequences of our actions and behaviors. Our classes strive to cultivate our minds and imaginations in the t’ai chi journey in a safe and nurturing environment.