In everyday life, we inefficiently tense and contract our muscles to hold our joints and spine together. This is just because we don’t give ourselves the proper support.  Over time, the tension feels normal and relaxation feels abnormal.

We then establish a tendency to habitually live in a stressed state.

Don’t you want relaxation to be your normal state?

The Cycle of Tension and Stiffness:

If you continue to operate in a state of tension, then you’re going to have a problem as time goes on, as you grow older. When you’re older, you’re no longer as physically active causing your muscles to naturally weaken. For example, when you have no back support, your muscles around your back tense and stiffen. This can move your vertebrae out of alignment, cutting into your spinal cord. Your nerve impulses are short-circuited, weakening the signals to your legs, causing more pain. The support of your legs weakens, which strains your back even more. This causes more stiffness and tension, and the cycle is completed.

You don’t have to feel like this.

Live a life where your body is supported and your muscles relaxed by using efficient structural alignments. These alignments are the building blocks that are stacked on top of one another within your body. Each block supports the other blocks. Each block receives support and supports the functioning of the other blocks.

Tai Chi helps you to align your bones and joints so that they are on top of the other from head to toe. When you have good body alignment, your joints, bones, spinal vertebrae, and internal organs move smoothly in the most efficient manner, with the least amount of effort. This is living in a relaxed state. 

These alignments provide the correct angles to help your feet, ankles and knee joints, to hold up and support your hips, which in turn support your spine. Tai Chi teaches you to have good alignment, relieve pain from your muscles and bones by reducing the strain of weight on them. The weight is the tension you carry.  Otherwise, your muscles and bones can grind and pull against each other.

Tai Chi helps you stay in alignment so it helps you to prevent injuries. It helps you to heal injuries faster, and good alignment also prevents your organs from being in the wrong position.

How does Thai Chi improve your body’s alignments?

Tai Chi’s gentle, bending and stretching movements help you to create space for maximum comfort and aliveness. For example, it creates vertical space between vertebrae and activates the springing mechanism of your ligaments that hold up the vertebrae.

You can stretch your spinal cord with Tai Chi to increase your flow of energy through the nerves, to all parts of your body. This is done through Tai Chi’s waist-turning motions. When you turn your waist, you activate and loosen all the lateral tissues that keep your vertebrae from misaligning.

As you continue your practice of Tai Chi, you notice the subtle tensions in your life. You notice subtle tensions exerting on your spine, and you can then learn to adjust your movements, to release the tension.

You will release the tension in your practice of Tai Chi, but also in your daily life’s activities.

Let’s do some Tai Chi waist-turning exercises.
Follow along with my video as I show full views of how to do the movements.

1. Put one foot in front of the other. Turn the left foot (back foot) 45 degrees and bring your right foot pointing forward.

2. Shift the weight to the back foot and turn your waist to face the direction of your left back toes.

3. Shift the weight to the front foot and turn your waist to face the direction of your right front toes.

4. Shift the weight back and gradually turn your waist. Shift your weight forward. Turn your waist facing front.

5. Shift the weight back, turn your waist. Shift the waist forward and turn your waist.

Get to a point where you’re now comfortable in turning your waist and shifting back and forth.

As you get into a rhythm with these movements, think about your Tai Chi alignments. Think about your head and pelvis and how they connect to your neck, spine, and torso. Then, think about your torso, spine, and pelvis and how they cause your internal organs to sit freely in your abdominal cavity.

Think about how your internal organs are moving freely in your abdominal cavity, as you shift your weight back and forth, turning your waist left and right. Think about your spine and how the spine connects to your toes.  Think about the correct alignments that you’re making so that your feet bones will align with each other.

Think about your upper body, your joints, hands, wrists, elbows, shoulders, and your ribcage. I want you to think about how they connect to the lower body joints, such as your sacrum, tailbone, hips, knees, and ankles.

Also, think about the kwa or the inguinal fold. The kwa extends from the inguinal ligament through the inside of your pelvis to the top of your hip bones. The kwa is a Chinese word for your hip sockets. Feel the crease, the fold as you move, shifting the weight back and front.

Do this for 5 to 10 minutes to see what a Tai Chi action and movement feels like.

Relax, exhale, shift the weight and gradually feel free to move your arms, as you turn your waist.

What if you can reduce the pressure on your body and increase the blood flow to its parts by being in the correct alignment? Would that be beneficial to your life?

Follow me on my social media channels such as Facebook and YouTube and join me for more activities that allow your body to move freely without stress, without strain.