Energy should circulate throughout your entire body, without disruption in a smooth and vigorous fashion. If the circulation of your energy is blocked, then you have pain and disease.

If your life force energy throughout your entire body is fully connected and circulating without blockages, then you won’t have pain or disease, which makes your energy flow smoothly. This is the most basic goal of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM).

Tai Chi falls under the category of TCM. It follows TCM principles and the benefits from doing Tai Chi are all the evidence you need. Tai Chi aims to balance and connect your energy so that there are no blockages in your body. It will help you to get rid of pain and make you even feel that much better. 

What is this energy and what are these energy blockages? It’s not easy to see energy, and it’s even harder to comprehend and see your blockages.

However, think about your thoughts and emotions. Can you really see them?

Your thoughts and emotions are creations of the mind. Yet, you know they are there. You don’t necessarily see them, but you can feel them. You can sense them, and they’re constantly changing. Chi is the same way. It may not be as real as your body. However, it does have an impact on your physical matter because you feel your thoughts and emotions. You feel how your energy is making up your day. Throughout the day, you can sense any blockages, anything that is impeding your progress.

According to TCM, both your body and mind are composed of energy and they are very much influenced by the state of your energy. For example, if you are low on energy or your energy has a low vibration or frequency, then there’s an imbalance. The body and mind are agitated.

There is an uneven flow of energy leading to discomfort. Illness can arise through the medium of energy. Your mind can affect your physical body for good and for ill. Therefore, mental and emotional stress creates physical illness.

Now having emotions is quite normal. But they can be damaging when your emotions are overly excessive or repressed. From the lens of TCM, organic disease, how your mind operates, your emotional predispositions are all interconnected. Excessive emotions can lead to unhappiness and allow your mind to fall into a very destructive path. This can be destructive for both you and for others around you.

How do you avoid this? According to TCM, there are essentially three simple ways to develop your health and live a long and good life.

1. The first step is to take good care of yourself and maintain your body and mind so that they can last longer and be used with pleasure and not be used in pain.

That sounds simple enough, right?

2. Step number two is to achieve optimum performance in all areas of your life. You’re only gonna be able to do this if you have a good and strong body, both on the outside, as well as on the inside. Having a powerful body on the inside is done by strengthening your internal organs.

3. Step three is to heal yourself from specific problems. You have to know what your problems are in order for you to heal. You have to get to understand your body, your mind, and your temperament. Then once you know your problems, you can develop a program to help you to solve them.

There are many programs to achieve all this from Tai Chi to Chi Gung, to nutrition and diet, to massage, herbal medicine, and even acupuncture. Tai Chi teaches you to use your mind, to move your energy inside your body and find out if any problems exist. It increases your healing rate at times when you have to have physical rehabilitation. Even in times of post-operative recovery, you can often reduce the time the other treatments need to take effect.

That’s very important because Tai Chi can help with whatever you’re dealing with. It can enhance your treatment and make you feel better fast.  Tai Chi therapeutic movements, relax and transform your central nervous system. This is done by balancing your yin and yang energy. 

Yin has the qualities of water. Yang has the qualities of fire.

Every part of your body has a yin and yang energy aspect to it. So you may feel dry and hot one day. You may feel damp and  cold the next. These are simple examples of yin and yang imbalances. Both must be in balance for optimal health and wellness. If yin and yang are not balanced, then your internal organs weaken. You feel sluggish or get burdened by dis-ease.

A good Tai Chi program is extremely effective in helping you keep your yin and yang in balance.

Let’s do some Tai Chi, and follow along with my video.

1. Exhale, relax, and then energize. Expand out. 

2. Exhale, sink back down. Energize, open up.

3. Exhale, relax, close back down. Energize and make your shape. 

4. Exhale and energize. Make your next shape. 

5. Then exhale, relax, sink back down. Energize, rise up.

6. Exhale, sink back down, and then energize.  Make your shape.

7. Exhale, deflate, and then inhale, inflate. 

8. Then exhale, relax back down. Settle down into your feet.

Let’s do that one more time.

1. Energize, open up.

2. Exhale, sink back down.

3. Energize, wake up.

4. Exhale, fall asleep.

You can see in these very few movements, the principles of yin and yang at play in Tai Chi. So both have to be in balance and they’re in balance when you go from one to the other. Back and forth. 

Do you want to learn more about Yin Chi and Yang Chi?

And are you interested in doing some Tai Chi? Do you feel that you have insufficient energy in your day to enjoy life and want to do something about it?

Follow me on Twitter, find your energy flow, and make it circulate throughout your entire body.