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Yet another double post, sorry

I cannot explain that. But it wasn't necessarily an illusion.

Double post, lagging phone!

. Great observation. One of my favorite things my teacher ever said, "the tao is not what you think it is, it is the opposite. You see the effect but not the cause." -Master Chun Man Sit

Double post

I sit on the edge of a chair with my hands palm down on my knees, chin tucked in, head top suspended, eyes not closed but eyelids relaxed

by practicing and reinforcing the neural pathways the same effect can be achieved as in athletics and martial arts

That doesn't matter. Boxers can fight without their gloves. Taiji teachers (most of them) can't fight with or without gloves. And those few who can got their fighting skills from their past experience, not from Taiji Quan practice. Just ask any Taiji teacher to demonstrate his fighting skills, and you'll hear that "it's too dangerous" or something like this. The truth is Taiji teachers don't fight, and modern Taiji Quan is not a martial art.. Taiji in essence is just the practice of efficiency and proper body mechanics. It is very much a real martial art and highly effective but only if it is understood. My teacher who is 62 and about 160lbs can through all of us around truly like is was nothing. He is just really good and very much a fighter. So I am going to have to disagree with you there

The sense of slowing down is an illusion. Your brain turned off all of its information filtering routines and you are experiencing a fuller reality and are utterly focused on the moment at hand. Your perception being altered is the only thing that is happening

On the surface relaxation sounds simple, and it is, but for someone who has never experienced it, it can be terrifying. Tension comes unbidden (relaxation must be invited) and has been with most everyone their entire adult life and for many even longer. The first time I was truly ( well, I say that now) relaxed I felt like I was completely vulnerable. As if, my armor had been stripped leaving my defenseless and exposed. I was scared. Having that experience taught me about myself and how much hard work it takes for living not to be hard work. It isn't something that just happens on the weekend but a continuous process, a mind set. To say, "I will not be tense" is easy, but to truly believe it and to integrate it into your life, not so much, for me. My question to any of you is what is relaxation like for you? And when you find yourself becoming a tension riddled fool then how do you deal with it, personally? I will do qigong and my forms to help me "wake up". I, also, find compassion helps

This is a fun exercise I learned for loosening the pelvis. Start in a horse stance (wider the better but only is as comfortable), put your hands in front of you with your elbows touching your torso, fingertips extended, palms up, then rotate only the hips one direction for a minute and then the other. The motion is like a hula dancer's. This has helped me greatly and just thought I would share

"Bliss is almost like the absence of anxiety", I love this!

Raise your arm and that is yang, let it drop and that is yin. Twist your body to store energy is yang, release that is yin. Yin is always present but cannot be experienced without lessening yang. The doing of non doing is yin. The doing is yang. At least, that is how I have been thinking about it lately

How often do you do reverse abdominal breathing? I just do it while walking mainly or in sitting meditation. Also, to breathe deeper do you exhale more (what I do) or inhale more?

I know who your talking about but I have never even met him. I am with Master Chun Man Sit who teaches Wu Style Taiji, Drifting Cloud Qigong, Six Healing Sounds and Six Elbows Kung Fu (his own conglomeration) . We match breathing (always through the nose) with movement except for natural breathing in certain qigong movements. He knows other things than what he teaches. He has this cool Chen form that emphasizes silk-reeling he learned from the late Master Feng and just has a great depth of knowledge in martial arts in general

Thank you. I hadn't really thought of doing it martially.

The bow itself is usually used for that example while the act of shooting the arrow is more about a ballistic motion.

My teacher says to relax. If you are completely relaxed then you would fall over but who is really that relaxed. So he explains it as telling a lie to tell the truth. You can always be a litte more relaxed since since stress is always asserting itself you must constantly be relaxing. And, yes, the times I have felt a new level of relaxation I have thought now I am relaxed but I have done that so many times I now assume that I should just keep trying to relax and I will always be a little better at it.

I am not sure that I see the difference

Hello. I study Wu Style Taiji, and Drifting Cloud Qigong under Master Chun Man Sit in Kansas City, Missouri.

It just doesn't have that many practitioners and is internal which I always think of as esoteric because the majority of people do not seem to understand that aspect of martial arts

A taoist walks when he walks and and sits when he sits.

Sorry got off track. Back in the good old days gravity, enertia, etc. were not understood. Jins all have a simple physics based explanation. Quite often it seems to be relax/tense the right set of muscles while keeping proper structure.

Basic skills. The building blocks of a system, each has a use. Silk- reeling was the one I had the most trouble understanding which would be the spinning motion. It is a constant smooth motion. Adjust speed as needed. The whole body should always be connected

Warm up stretch then thirty minutes of qigong in the morning followed by Taiji short form done at a fairly slow pace. In the afternoon Taiji forms done slow then fast then I work on any problems I noticed. Throughout the course of the day, everyday all the time, I try to focus on relaxation and proper movement/body structure/breathing. Then on days off I tend to do about an hour to an hour and a half of qigong