Wandering With Quality

We live in a busy world where it is hard to create any time for ourselves and do things that are good for our bodies or our mental state.  

Our jobs, our responsibilities and our obligations can keep us away from doing the very things that could make us happy and improve our lives. 

I know I've said it on this Blog before, but a daily practice is of great importance, possibly one of the most important things we will ever do. If we don’t stop and say ‘I need better, I deserve better’ then it's very easy to keep going down the same road well into our later years and suffer for it. 

I have a very busy schedule and have found after much trial and error that the best time for me to train is first thing in the morning. I try to get to bed by 9:30pm and wake at around 5:30am to 6am, this gifts me between 7.5 hrs and 8hrs sleep. Then when I wake up, I feeling pretty good. In the morning, I have a nice routine. I wake up, make coffee and if it's warm go outside to train, if its winter, I’ll train indoors. Some days I have a couple of hours of study before I’m teaching my first class, other days I have just 10 or 20 minutes to practice.

I try to make sure that whether I’m practicing Tai Chi or Xing Yi, I keep doing something every day. Even if it’s just a little. I must say that I’m lucky, I teach many classes 5 days a week and see my teacher every week, so I’m always able to ‘keep in touch’ with the two arts. They are never far from my mind. 

The more we practice, the more they effect the body and the mind. Our mental landscape changes. For example, what was interesting to me was when I started to not just understand Yin and Yang from and intellectual level, but when I began to feel how the body was both sinking and raising at the same time! I could feel how the release of muscular tension created a sinking force that then allowed for the skeleton to inflate and rise upwards through the tendons and facia. Sinking and rising at the same time. I noticed how I felt as heavy as a mountain and as light as a feather simultaneously. I could feel how Yin softness allowed for the Yang hardness to come out and not only that but how they were intrinsically connected, there could not be one without the other. My mind learnt something directly from my body by experiencing it and took my understanding to a far deeper level.

I really enjoy Tai Chi and Xing Yi because they allow me to grow in multiple directions. It develops the Mind and calms the emotions. It deepens the breath and increases the health of the organs, and it strengthens the entire physical body teaching us how to move in a balanced, integrated and powerful way. My understanding of each of these areas constantly evolve on their own and into each other, creating something that is far greater than the sum of its parts. 

It makes me so grateful, grateful to my teacher for showing me a way, grateful to my wife for being so patient, grateful to my family and my friends and especially grateful to those that come to my classes to listen to me constantly talking out the same things ‘Xing Yi Chuan this, Tai Chi Chuan that’. Their development and participation brings me great joy and furthermore helps me to learn and grow. 

So, I guess I’ll say, if you do anything in this world, make sure that you do something that is good for you, that helps you to grow. The better you feel, the happier you are, the more worth you’ll have in this world and that is something we need right now. 

So, if you’re going to wander, wander with quality. 

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