The Grandmaster of Chen tai chi
Yesterday I attended an all-day tai chi workshop with Chen Xiao Wang, a current Grandmaster of the Chen tai chi form. He was visiting from China. It was a pretty big deal. We don't think about these sort of time scales in the West, but Chen tai chi was founded centuries ago.
The training was physically tiring (9 am - 6 pm), and yet in that tai chi way, also physically energizing. The workshop was large-- maybe 50 people, (in a hot gym with loud fans.) CXW speaks English reasonably well, or at least adequately to lead a workshop. His voice was quiet and gentle, but he was firm in making us do what he wanted. He was particular about where we stood, and spent a lot of time adjusting us in our rows throughout the day. We alternated doing the form and sitting in a circle while he demonstrated portions of the form. The atmosphere was quiet and formal, with no chitchat among the students except during breaks. As a meditation retreat veteran, this felt normal and comfortable to me. I realized it might not be to everyone when my tai chi teacher (also a student at the workshop) commented on it to me at a break, as if to make me feel more comfortable. I didn't actually need that.
The form we learned was "xin jia" or "new framework," which I hadn't done before. Some of the moves were familiar-- lots of tai chi is combinations of familiar stuff. (Kind of like cooking uses all the same ingredients in different combinations). But overall, I always had to take my cue for the next move by watching CXW or an advanced student nearby. An hour or so into the workshop, I realized that my intention was really not to come away knowing the xin jia form-- that would be impossible in just one day. That made everything easier! Then I just fell into feeling the moves, as clumsy as I was, with no obligation to actually learn the form. In doing so, I learned some tai chi-- how to move the energy and feel the body-- if not the specific form itself.
Learning from Grandmasters and other "stars" has a distinct quality. We can intuitively sense when a person is truly accomplished in an art -- that's why they are respected as a Grandmaster -- and hence we know we are getting a really high-quality lesson. Just watching CXW's body move was like witnessing the purity of nature: A sunrise, a powerful redwood tree, a running hyena. And there is a communication there that goes beyond words. My body can learn just from mimicking his, and the learning is at a direct level that doesn't require my brain to intercede.
At this time in the world, such Grandmasters can travel widely, influencing large numbers of people through these types of workshops (and less intensively through videos). But very few students get access to them as direct apprentices for extended periods because they are so busy travelling the world. (Or at least, the ones I see are. Now that I write it this way, I realize that there are also quiet Grandmasters who still carry the tradition of training proteges directly).
But that leads to the next point: Day to day practice. That's where the real training comes. We can't improve ourselves just hitting the one-day workshops with the highest Grandmasters we can find. We grow through steady, unglamorous work. Now, we do need a teacher. Any skill worth really learning will be hard enough that we need a mentor and guide who gets to know us personally and trains us in a way that works for us. But absent being able to work directly with CXW, the Buddha, or Mozart, we can still benefit greatly from a reasonably accomplished teacher who is both humble and confident, both compassionate and challenging, and who genuinely wants us to succeed.
So if you don't know any Grandmasters, don't worry about it. Just keep practicing; that's what counts.
The training was physically tiring (9 am - 6 pm), and yet in that tai chi way, also physically energizing. The workshop was large-- maybe 50 people, (in a hot gym with loud fans.) CXW speaks English reasonably well, or at least adequately to lead a workshop. His voice was quiet and gentle, but he was firm in making us do what he wanted. He was particular about where we stood, and spent a lot of time adjusting us in our rows throughout the day. We alternated doing the form and sitting in a circle while he demonstrated portions of the form. The atmosphere was quiet and formal, with no chitchat among the students except during breaks. As a meditation retreat veteran, this felt normal and comfortable to me. I realized it might not be to everyone when my tai chi teacher (also a student at the workshop) commented on it to me at a break, as if to make me feel more comfortable. I didn't actually need that.
The form we learned was "xin jia" or "new framework," which I hadn't done before. Some of the moves were familiar-- lots of tai chi is combinations of familiar stuff. (Kind of like cooking uses all the same ingredients in different combinations). But overall, I always had to take my cue for the next move by watching CXW or an advanced student nearby. An hour or so into the workshop, I realized that my intention was really not to come away knowing the xin jia form-- that would be impossible in just one day. That made everything easier! Then I just fell into feeling the moves, as clumsy as I was, with no obligation to actually learn the form. In doing so, I learned some tai chi-- how to move the energy and feel the body-- if not the specific form itself.
Learning from Grandmasters and other "stars" has a distinct quality. We can intuitively sense when a person is truly accomplished in an art -- that's why they are respected as a Grandmaster -- and hence we know we are getting a really high-quality lesson. Just watching CXW's body move was like witnessing the purity of nature: A sunrise, a powerful redwood tree, a running hyena. And there is a communication there that goes beyond words. My body can learn just from mimicking his, and the learning is at a direct level that doesn't require my brain to intercede.
At this time in the world, such Grandmasters can travel widely, influencing large numbers of people through these types of workshops (and less intensively through videos). But very few students get access to them as direct apprentices for extended periods because they are so busy travelling the world. (Or at least, the ones I see are. Now that I write it this way, I realize that there are also quiet Grandmasters who still carry the tradition of training proteges directly).
But that leads to the next point: Day to day practice. That's where the real training comes. We can't improve ourselves just hitting the one-day workshops with the highest Grandmasters we can find. We grow through steady, unglamorous work. Now, we do need a teacher. Any skill worth really learning will be hard enough that we need a mentor and guide who gets to know us personally and trains us in a way that works for us. But absent being able to work directly with CXW, the Buddha, or Mozart, we can still benefit greatly from a reasonably accomplished teacher who is both humble and confident, both compassionate and challenging, and who genuinely wants us to succeed.
So if you don't know any Grandmasters, don't worry about it. Just keep practicing; that's what counts.
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