Three Aspects of Taijiquan Practice

"There are three important aspects of Tai Ji Quan that should be emphasized in practice. These three are: 1) The health aspect, 2) The martial/self defense aspect and 3) The Philosophical aspect. You can consider these three aspects as the legs of a three-pin chair. If you take one leg away the chair would fall over. Only when you have all three can the chair serve it true function, without one or two it can only serve as an interesting object to look at (at most).

Remember the important points in practice and always check yourself to see if your movements follows these principles. Practice regularly: It is better to practice for 15 min every day than to practice for two hours once a week.

Though Tai Ji Quan is a really wonderful thing it is also one of the most difficult things to study. In order to make progress in the art it requires more than just doing the form a couple of times every day. It requires research:

The way to research the health aspect of Tai Ji Quan is basically to develop your feeling of your body-mind (i.e. become aware of thoughts and feelings coming to you while practicing and also of the changes in your body when executing the postures). After some years of practice with a knowledgeable teacher, you should be able to feel when a movement is harmful and be able to correct it.

The way to research the martial/self defense aspect is to think about and figure out different ways to use the movements in the form in a self defense situation. Remember the Chinese saying "although when practicing there is no one in front of your eyes but in your mind there is, although when defending yourself there is someone in front of your eyes but in your mind there is not."

The way to research the philosophical aspect of Tai Ji Quan to study the literature on Tai Ji (e.g. the writings of Wu Yu Xiang, Li Yi Yu and Sun Lu Tang) and compare the ideas you've found with how the form works.

Let your practice (and life) be guided by the balance principle (not to little and not too much), always seek to find a balance with yourself and your surroundings and you've taken an important step on the Tai Ji way."

- Per Nyfelt and Jiang Ling, An Introduction to Sun Style Tai Chi Chuan


Sun Style Taijiquan: Bibliography, Links, Quotes, Resources, Instructions, Glossary. By Mike Garofalo. 400Kb+.