What's New
New Tai Chi Schedule Is Available
Please check the section, Class
Schedule & Location, for updated new schedules, particularly
the section of the Winter Schedule, which our current classes
are following.
The new beautiful and serene Tai Chi class
site:
Direction to the taiji classes' new location:
Decades of Research on Qigong Were Delivered as an Acupuncturists'
Continuing Education Course
Jingyu Gu, PhD, Lic. Acu., our Center's main instructor, delivered
a lecture course, "A New Definition of Qigong Based
on Science and Tradition for Traditional Chinese Medicine,"
in both Chinese and English to Texas' licensed acupuncturists
in Houston on January 21, 2007. This course is for licensed acupuncturists
to meet the requirements for their continuing education.
The lecture addresses current confusions in common understanding
of both qi and qigong. Both qi and qigong touch on some of the
most fundamental concepts in Chinese culture and philosophy, as
well traditional Chinese medicine. This lecture, first, sorts
through the available and authoritative opinions or definitions
on these two concepts. Second, it examines these opinions through
and against the most recent scientific research, history, tradition
and the speaker’s decades of personal experience to arrive
at a better understanding of the issues involved. In the end,
it formulates new answers to the initial questions that are consistent
and logical. A consistent and logical understanding of qi and
qigong can not only benefit clinic practice, offer better guidance
to personal qigong learning, but also stimulate further discussion
on core issues of Traditional Chinese Medicine.
The lecture generated warm reception by both Chinese and English
languages audience. The lecture was offered again in Austin, Texas,
at the Texas College of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Saturday,
March 3, 2007.
Our Mission
Our center's mission is helping people heal their own bodies
and minds and to realize the highest possibility of their
physicio-psycho-spiritual potentials -- that is, immortality
in Daoist sense. We focus on teaching and researching healing
and energizing exercises and arts developed on the basis of
the ancient Chinese tradition, particularly, the Daoist tradition.
Our exercises are designed to cultivate Qi energy, which is
the source for every human life.
We also want to share and verify our view that Qi, or human
life energy, is not a mysterious thing though its physicio-psycho-spiritual
benefits may seem magic. Qi is a physicio-psycho-spiritual
energy, in the sense that it involves an individual's total
being. Furthermore, every human being is capable of practicing
and cultivating this energy. This cultivation will award an
accomplished cultivator with a healthy, youthful, self-content,
hence, happy, and long life -- a realistic human condition
in which the individua's life energy will retain its healthy
and functional vitality for as long as he/she chooses to stay
on earth. This state brings us close to the ancient Daoist
ideal and practice of "immortality."
Dr. JINGYU GU, PhD & licensed
acupuncturist, has had 35 years of experience in taiji and Daoist
Neidan [NAY-DUN](Inner Alchemy) qigong. He was a national taichi
champion in 1991 and a pupil of Master Ruan Rong-gen who was
regarded as one of the China’s living treasures in martial
arts. Dr. Gu established the Taiji and Qigong Meditation Center
in Austin, Texas in 1989, the first and only school in Central
Texas that dedicated itself exclusively to the learning and
researching of taiji and qigong.
Meanwhile, Dr. Gu practices acupuncture and Chinese medicine
on the basis of his deep and solid knowledge and experience
(more than 30 yrs) in internal energy (Qi or Chi) training.
This internal Qi energy and its knowledge is THE
foundation of acupuncture theory and practice. He teaches
taiji, qigong, and Chinese medicine at the Texas College of
Traditional Chinese Medicine. Dr. Gu offers courses on these
subjects that are certified by the TX Medical Board to the
licensed acupuncturists for their continuing education.
Explication on our Center's Logo
This logo contains two parts, a taiji diagram, the circling
black and white image, and two Chinese ancient characters,
ZhenRen. Zhen, in a modern sense means "genuine"
but in the most ancient dictionary, Shuo Wen Jie Zi,
(about 2000 years ago), the definition is "immortal who
transformed the human form and reached heaven." Later,
in Chinese Buddhist classics and Daoist classics, Zhen was
combined with Ren that is a generic term for human being.
While Buddhist classics referred to Zhenren as a human being
that cultivated to successfully purge his/her human desires,
Daoist classics further specified Zhenren as a human being
that has cultivated his physical, mental and spiritual being
to such a degree that he/she masters the techniques of pre-natal
breathing and the principles that govern the heaven and earth,
yin and yang, life and death. He/She will therefore live a
healthy and infinite life (Yellow Emperor's Medical Classic).
The Zhenren in our logo follows this
Daoist tradition. Though the literal translation of Zhenren
is "genuine human being," we would also choose to
render it as "immortals" that renders more
accurately Zhenren's original meaning in Yellow Emperor's
Medical Classic. When the characters Zhenren are combined
with the Taichi diagram, our logo reflects our commitment
to pursuing the time-tested beneficial Daoist tradition in
our modern times. This commitment is not based on any religious
belief, rather it is squarely based on our proven experience.
Daoism in our center refers only to its philosophy and empirical
practice for immortality. In this sense, our use of this term
is similar to modern physicist' application of this term in
physics.
Our center's practice has proven that
through a systematic practice of Taiji, we modern people are
fully capable of realizing the ancient ideal of transforming
our human existence to a level of consistent health, serenity,
and happiness as long as we live. Our experience also
shows that this kind of new successful life comes from a maximally
harmonized life energy. We believe that this harmonized life
energy is closest to the real meaning of "immortality"
in Daoist tradition. Understood in this
sense, our logo quite effectively signifies our center's mission:
through a systematic Taiji training, to help us heal our own
bodies and minds and to realize the highest possibility of
our psycho-somatic and spiritual potentials.
Tai Chi Background
T'ai Chi Ch'uan is a Chinese martial art of slow and holistically
structured body movements, designed to enhance wellness, longevity
and internal peace. Practiced for centuries, T'ai Chi Ch'uan cultivates
Chi, the Taoist term for the internal energy which compels life.
T'ai Chi Ch'uan is considered one of the most advanced of the
Chinese martial arts.
Benefits
Clinical research in the United States and the Peoples' Republic
of China has proven that the practice of T'ai Chi Ch'uan leads
to significantly improved health. Through a moderate, disciplined
training program, mental and physical energies are increased and
health problems remedied. The ultimate purpose of T'ai Chi Ch'uan
is to cultivate whole-body internal energy which can contribute
to a happy, healthy and prosperous life.
Qualities
Well-performed T'ai Chi Ch'uan shows complete peace, harmony
and power. The solo form is at the same time light and heavy,
spirited but tranquil, fluid but with shape. Similarly, dual form
T'ai Chi (push hands) in its effortless fluidity relies on structural
and nervous superiority rather than muscular strength to overcome
force.
Styles
There are currently five distinct styles of T'ai Chi Ch'uan:
Yang, Wu, Chen, Sun and Ho, each of which bears the family name
of its founder. The differentiation into these styles was a comparatively
modern event.
The styles share most of the same movements and names, and all
of the same principles preserved in T'ai Chi Classics. The differences
among them, which are minor, emphasize certain characteristics
of different states of a systematic T'ai Chi training.
Any style, if practiced systematically, should bear out the characteristics
of the other styles at appropriate points in the training process.
There is no need to extol one style over the other nor to learn
all five styles.
© Copyright 2009 Taiji &
Qigong Meditation Center. All rights reserved.
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