A big welcome to all new T'ai Chi beginners what an amazing joureny you have embarked upon. This journey will open you to a whole new relationship with your self,  your physical self , your emotional self and your consciousness. It gives you the opportunity to experience your life in a new fresh manner . Welcome Welcome Welcome I'm so glad you are opening up to this way of growing in awareness.
Here below are some videos to get you started.

Opening the body and heart to empower your day. ��� from ann on Vimeo.


Parting Wild Horses' Mane posture for beginners. from ann on Vimeo.

T'ai chi Lesson and a few links about The Sedona Methd

Here are some links for people who were asking me about releasing, it is a way of working with our beliefs and feelings that I have found to be really liberating .

Lester Levenson developed the Sedona Method which is a way of dealing with our feelings. You can read his story in this link   Lester.

Hale Dwoskin who worked with Lester and still teaches the method has made a Movie which gives a taste of the work you can watch it on this link . Letting Go Movie



Here is the lesson for Friday morning's class in Blackrock.


Embrace Tiger And Return To The Mountain to Roll back Press And Push . from ann on Vimeo.

Tai Chi Lessons for Mini Form Beginners, Advanced Mini Form , Short Form Beginners and interesting links about Fascia

It's so good to be starting a new term of T'ai Chi meeting enthusiastic beginners and returners to our practise. Such a joy and a privilege to share this journey with you all.

Beginning Posture of the Mini Form from ann on Vimeo.




Full Mini Form from ann on Vimeo.


Here are the first few lessons of the Short Form for Thursday night's class.


Short Form To Single Whip from ann on Vimeo.


Here is a link to a fascinating study of Fascia and how it is changing our understanding of how the body works.
Strolling under the skin

In Memory of John

There is no end to my love and gratitude to John Kells for his teaching , inspiration and encouragement to me in my pursuit of T'ai Chi. 
He is in mind especially now around the anniversary of his death.

John's Heartwork

Heartwork

Real connexion stems from what we call the Heart.
There is a circulation to the Heart – between the Heart and other Hearts –
human and otherwise.
This is the main thrust of my work.
But there is a circulation within the body, not as simple as blood or ch’i, but
something a lot deeper and from our ancestry – as deep as the beginnings of
time.
Real connexion is out of time and passes through bones and sinews from our
ancient impressions through something with the same kind of significance as
genes.
The inter-connexions between ourselves and other humans and all living things
are so complex that there is no intellectual sense to be made of it.
If my writings echo in you it is because you echo in them.
The soul of belonging is the interplay with all whom you meet and is quite
outside of ego.
To hear the truth resound within your own destiny is a great responsibility.
It bounces forwards in a natural way and you must devote yourself to keeping
up with it.
To be alive is to become your destiny and to burn everyone you come across with
a stronger and stronger light.
So from your land of mist and my land of mystery we have a meeting and a
blessing.

Resistance

In T'ai Chi practise we investigate resistance. What does resistance feel like physically? When someone pushes you as in the video below, you can respond by pushing back or by yielding (releasing) and 'allowing' the pusher to fall forward. In this practise one aspect of resistance become obvious, in order to feel resistance you must be Pushing Back.
Wow ! I can still remember my AHA moment when the truth of this struck me.  If I stop pushing back I can't feel like I'm being pushed. If I yield to life and go with the flow I have stopped resisting.

Resisting things in our life is often difficult to recognise. However as soon as you ask yourself to list the things in your life that you want to change you become aware of what you are resisting.

 Wanting to change or control things and people in our lives is another way of thinking of resistance.

How much time in our day do we 'waste' trying to change or 'fix ' people ? Here in Ireland we spend a lot of time resisting the rain, does it work, has the rain stopped? No! And all our resisting does is build up frustration inside of us.

In releasing we remind ourselves to let go of resisting, and allow what is to be.

If this is too difficult we welcome the resistance and really allow ourselves to feel it fully. This is a form of releasing because at least we have stopped resisting our resistance.

If you make a list of the things( and people) in your life that you are wanting to change and let go of wanting to change and or fix them you will notice a change happening.

Firstly you will free up a lot of energy that was being used in resisting.

You will be more present in your life and relationships which will allow you to enjoy your life more fully.

We all feel it ether consciously or subconsciously when someone is trying to control us and we don't like it, it makes us want get away from those people. People feel it from us when we are trying to change or fix them and they don't like it either. When we stop doing this our relationships really blossom.

Investigating Resistance from ann on Vimeo.

Fear A Block To Living Freely

Fear is major blocks to living a life free to pursue one's heart's desire.
Let's have a look at Fear.
Fear of rejection, or failure often keeps us stuck repeating old patterns afraid to change.
In releasing we learn to welcome fear into our awareness, by saying Yes to the fear and allowing ourselves to really feel it we discover that it's power over us diminishes.
This saying Yes to the fear is not that easy to do, we are often so used to suppressing the fear that we are really scared to feel it. We need encouragement and reassurance that the fear will not actually kill us. Once we learn to Release our feelings we discover the courage to feel our fear, to embrace it fully and then we discover something wonderful, the fear was never actually real it was a fabrication of our Mind and only seemed real because we were afraid to feel it. Wow!  This is a big experience and brings a huge sense of freedom.
So next time you notice some fear which is holding you back, start by asking yourself to say YES to the fear. Allow yourself to really feel the sensations that this fear brings into your body and give them permission to be there, Allow yourself to feel the discomfort, very soon you will notice that the sensations begin to ease, as long as you are willing to stay present to your body and its feelings the sensations ( or energy ) will dissolve and you will begin to feel free and light. You will have released a block to being the free spirit that you were born to be.

Celebrating 10 Years Blogging

A Big Thanks to Feedspot  for this medal so happy to be on their list of top bloggers.

What a lovely award to help me celebrate my 10 years blogging.

Tai Chi Blogs List

The Best Tai Chi blogs from thousands of top Tai Chi blogs in our index using search and social metrics. Data will be refreshed once a week.

These blogs are ranked based on following criteria

• Google reputation and Google search ranking
• Influence and popularity on Facebook, twitter and other social media sites
• Quality and consistency of posts.
• Feedspot’s editorial team and expert review

Top 25 Tai Chi Blogs Winners

CONGRATULATIONS to every blogger that has made this Top Tai Chi Blogs list! This is the most comprehensive list of best Tai Chi blogs on the internet and I’m honoured to have you as part of this! I personally give you a high-five and want to thank you for your contribution to this world.

Releasing

Releasing is a way of  ' Letting Go  ', we can let go kinesthetically or mentally. 
The awareness we develop through T'ai Chi training is a great help when letting go kinesthetically. In our training we learn to feel consciously the unconscious habit of holding tension in the body,  once we are conscious of the feeling of 'holding on' we can easily learn to release that tension from the body.
The second way of releasing is the letting go of feelings. Feelings often run our lives and many of us spend huge amounts of our energy trying to handle our feelings. We often deal with feelings either by suppressing them back into the body ( where they can cause more tension and disease). 
Or we express them often causing us problems in relationships when  we say things that we later regret.  Some people even spend decades mulling over feelings from childhood trying unsuccessfully to 'figure out the issue'  instead of getting on with living a full and happy life right now.
Learning to release on feelings frees us to have a more clear open spacious mind, or in fact allows us to become conscious of the space in which the mind operates.
One simple way to release is to just drop all your thoughts and feelings and become conscious of the quiet space. Just trow away all your thinking and feeling just for a few seconds and notice how nice it feels to be free.
As we learn to 'let go ' are no longer fully 'lost ' in our thinking and feeling but are aware that this process happening in our minds is just an old habit and not really who we are.
We are the awareness in which all feelings , emotions and thoughts happen.
 Of course this doesn't happen over night just like T'ai Chi it is a practise with lots of exercises to help us become more conscious and free.
This is not just an intellectual response but an experiential knowing.
Releasing allows us to get to know ourselves beyond mind activity, allows us to access that vast eternal ISness or Beingness that is our true nature.
T'ai Chi brings us to this recognition through our body and Releasing brings us to the same realisation through ' Letting Go '.

Welcome 2018

What an amazing year 2017 Was !!!!
We had two great Retreats i Dzogchen Beara and week after week of T'ai Chi lessons.
It excites me to imagine looking back this time next year and remembering even more wonderful times.
If you read my blog you will know that I passionate about T'ai Chi and equally passionate about Releasing.
T'ai Chi is a form of magic that uses the physical body to work on all aspects of our existence, physical, emotional and mental. When we learn to listen to and understand the messages from our body life feels more connected and flowing. This is an on gong process demanding daily practise.
Practising our T'ai Chi has an calming effect on our mind allowing us to become more conscious of the reality that we are not just out thoughts but are something quite beyond the thinking mind.
So in T'ai Chi we avail of the wisdom in our physical body to take us beyond .   ..... ..........
Must dash off so I'll write about Releasing later .

Best wishes for a fabulous 2018