Sewing Seeds in January

Whew. It was a whirlwind Sewing the Seeds retreat and practice with Sr. Antonia Thursday night through Sunday brunch. Here's my abbreviated report since I'm still circling with chi....

Friday, January 29, 2010

Today's session with Sr. Antonia in St. Paul, MN was wonderful; a long overdue opportunity to deepen my practice, refine my movements, and be in the moment and in my body.

Sister encouraged us to become aware of the ways Chi does not balance and circulate as well as it could as she broke movements down into segments; first, practicing our weight shift, then noticing how the t'an t'ien inspired the movement of arms, hands, legs, and feet.  She asked us to pay close attention to our bodies and ask ourselves: "How does it feel in my body when I do this? ... How does it feel in my body when I don't do this? ..." Practice, of course, offers a constant opportunity to adjust and refine our way of moving in order to experience the free flow of Chi.

Sr. Antonia quoted from Justin Stone's book, Spiritual Odyssey (p. 15) near the beginning of our practice when she encouraged and challenged us by reading:

Trying is not the Way.
Not trying is not the Way....

Our group practice came at about 4:00 pm when 29 of us stood in three circles within a circle: the inner circle contained Sr. Antonia and four teachers certified before 1995, the next circle contained the rest of the certified teachers, the outer circle held the 12 attending students.

We circled the Chi; the room circled with Chi. It was ... a wondrous experience.

Saturday, January 30, 2010

Already these t'ai chi chih moments blur into a composite picture of Chi-practitioners-students-teachers-refinements-practice-shared meals-conversations-laughter-more conversation-Chinese brush painting and so much more.... I realize that I've had a headache since shortly after my arrival and that my life in the woods has slowed and quieted me to the point where I'm overstimulated by the abundance of information-conversation-practice with others.

I ask several teachers and students for help with my headache and receive pain relief in several forms: Ibuprofen and a qigong treatment. The spirit of generosity is overwhelming and in short order I'm feeling better (thank you Carol and Nan).

The theme of today's practice/refinement is "t'an t'ien, t'an t'ien, t'an t'ien." Sister asks, reminds, coaches, and expects of us that we will continually search for and discover the ways in which t'an t'ien inspires our movements and the flow of Chi through our bodies. By the end of the day when Sister inquires, "What allows our body to do this? or our hands to rise? or our heel to step out?" we reply in unison: "T'an t'ien."

Sunday, January 31, 2010:

Many highlights to our too-brief final day. After practicing Healing Sounds we share the Chi with each other by placing a circle of five chairs in the middle of the room. Group members take turns sitting as other practitioners perform the Healing Sounds in a circle surrounding them. I couldn't wait to sit in the center of our circle because I knew that the power of the Chi would have transformative effects. Sure enough, emotions surged through me as I sat and afterwards I returned to my room to lie on the floor and continue grounding the energy.

The room vibrates with Chi during our final full group practice. Afterward some group members attend mass in the small chapel across the hall while others re-watch the film On the Road Home: A Spiritual Journey Guided by Remarkable Women by Christina Lundberg. Sr. Antonia was one of the 12 remarkable women who appeared in the film. What a beautifully filmed, delightful exploration of the sacred feminine....

Soon our final shared meal is over and I'm on the road back to Bayfield, WI. I think of the words I copied down from the wall at St. Paul's Monastery because they reminded me of home:

          Safety in Trees
Climbing into Grandfather's arms,
I rest my cheek on his strong shoulder.
His clothing is rough and earthy smelling.
Pine needles tickle my nose. 

                      Author Unknown

I feel gratitude for the thriving t'ai chi chih community in Minneapolis/St. Paul that hosted this retreat, to Sr. Antonia who led it, and to my fellow retreatants and roommate who formed--and completed--the circle. The Chi is flowing still....

Retreat into Silence

It snowed all day yesterday and will likely continue today. Our outside temperature gauge is stuck at 20+ degrees. I'm grateful. When I'm blissfully unaware of the actual below-zero temperatures outdoors, I'm not intimidated by the extreme cold. I take every necessary precaution and dress warmly when I go out and I tend to spend more time in this moment without anticipating the next--colder--one.

Two months ago today--Thansgiving Day 2009--I began this daily t'ai chi chih practice and blog. I realize now that combining my t'ai chi chih moving meditation with my writing gave me an unexpected gift: each day I'm inspired, energized, motivated. Calmer, quieter, happier, more peaceful. When I arise, I immerse myself in these wonderful moments of quiet contemplation. And I know that for this hour--maybe two--I am blessed.

I lit six tea candles on my mantle this morning before I began practice. What a wonderful, special, celebratory effect these flickering flames had on my mind/body! For the moment, at least, these were my practice partners. I thought of my students as I moved and how they, too, are like lighted candles who burn, glow, share their light, and sometimes, perhaps, hide it a bit too.... (Don't we all??)

I look forward to several continuing TCC classes which begin again next week. There is nothing better than the gift of silence and Chi shared among many. Sure, I have my own experience with Chi every day as I practice, but Chi shared is Chi multiplied. And, as Justin Stone reminds us, if we all do t'ai chi chih practice, we will have peace in the world....

In several hours I drive to the Benedictine Center in St. Paul for a t'ai chi chih practice and retreat with Sr. Antonia, t'ai chi chih guide. It's entitled Sewing the Seeds of T'ai Chi Chih: *Self Compassion *Loving Kindness *Grounding *Letting Go. I'll be back home on Sunday. Again, I'm unsure whether I'll have access to a computer at the monastery. If not, I'll write notes in my journal and record my Chi-full experiences of learning, sharing, moving, slowing, and quieting when I return. I'm off!! to fill myself with silence.

Praise flow and change...

Praise wet snow
     falling early....
Praise
god or the gods, the unknown
that which imagined us, ...
Praise
flow and change, night and
the pulse of day.
               Denise Levertov
               From: Earth Prayers, p. 222

It's another exceedingly quiet, grey-white day.... I'm low-energy, tired.

I look to this day with gratitude even as I know that, in the rock bottom depths of me, I long for more light. My health care provider told me last week that area residents' levels of Vitamin D are exceedingly low. I hunger for light even as I'm surrounded by the whitest of white ... snow upon snow upon snow.

During this practice I bring my attention back to my rear leg and knee. Observing. Wondering. How much does this leg straighten when I shift weight forward? How--and when--do I allow laziness or inattention to abbreviate my weight shift so that I don't really shift my weight fully forward?

I'm attending to these fundamentals, I suppose, in anticipation of the t'ai chi chih practice and retreat scheduled for this weekend in St. Paul. Sr. Antonia, Justin Stone's appointed t'ai chi chih guide, leads the retreat and I registered because I want to meet her as well as continue to improve my practice. I'll gladly apply conscious effort Friday through Sunday in order to learn how to become softer, lighter, and even more effortless in the coming days and years of my practice.

Crystal of New-Fallen Snow

Fresh snow drapes across the landscape in a beautiful display. One of my students told me over the telephone yesterday that she didn't understand why anyone would use the words beauty and snow in the same sentence. For me, beautiful isn't a big enough word to contain all the purity, fragility, and wonder of fresh-fallen snow.

We're covered in newness once again ... rebirthed. Snow rests atop and along tree branches and creates sparkling white-tinged sculptures throughout the forest.

It's a fresh start. And I think of my practice in a similar way while I move today ... as if it is all new. It may contain the same view, the same 20 movements, but it is reimagined each time we practice based on landscape, temperature, time of day and time of year, weather conditions, conditions of body and mind, mental attitude, inner stillness or lack thereof, intention, and expectations.

My little kitten goes back to bed and so, minus her revved up distraction, I watch the sky transform from silver to pink ... blue ... white. A blue sky appears and, eventually, the sun. I continue my movements--soft and slow--as a flock of bluejays arrives and, bird-by-bird, sinks softly into the snow beneath the feeder.

As I float down into Resting after standing quietly in Cosmic Consciousness Pose, I become as light as a snowflake, drifting down, down, down ... landing softly and weightlessly amid the snow around me. I come to Rest gently ... one more crystal of new-fallen snow.

Like an Ancient Gnarled Tree ...

This morning we're swathed in a thick layer of snow. All through the night our trees plopped their huge clods of moisture-drenched delight upon our roof. They landed with thunderous thumps then slid heavily--with equally loud thuds--to the ground. Since yesterday's snowshoe through heavily-laden trees, still-warmish temperatures and gusts of wind whisked away the artful loops, and curls, and draping coils of frozen white that snaked over thick branches and feathered along their thin branched fingerlings.

As I move I watch the high tops of trees move with me, their upper branches swaying and dancing as they engage in dangling conversations. My practice passes quickly; thick clots of clouds on the distant horizon form a heavily curtained backdrop to the dance of branches and treetops.

An ancient gnarled tree:
Too fibrous for a logger's saw,
Too twisted to fit a carpenter's square,
Outlasts the whole forest.
          From: 365 Tao, p. 25, 'Uselessness'

Deng Ming-Dao, 365 Tao's author, explains in his reading for January 25 that, just as strong, beautiful, and useful trees are cut down, useless ones survive. The same is true for people, he says, with those of us who are too plain to be noticed left undisturbed and unexploited.

Just because we are plain, writes Ming-Dao does not mean we are without value. For, if we are considered useless, we may live freely without interference and have the opportunity to express our own individuality.

And so I perform my daily practice in peace. No one expects too much of me since I am neither strong nor beautiful. Still, these daily t'ai chi chih moments add up to a greater whole over the long-term. Because of my flaws, my wounds, my imperfections, I do become stronger. The beauty within me grows.

January Rainfall

Total darkness. Total silence ... but for the sound of rain falling, falling, falling into forever.

Rain? It's late January in northwestern Wisconsin. As usual, we're thoroughly covered and caked in snow and this rain--as soon as it freezes--will add a layer of icing that covers everything in its slippery smooth glaze. (Hmmm. I'm unsure how I'll get down--or up--my quarter-mile driveway once the temperature dips slightly....)

What would the world be, once bereft
Of wet and of wildness? Let them be left,
O let them be left, wildness and wet,
Long live the weeds and the wilderness yet.
               Gerard Manley Hopkins
               From: Earth Prayers, p. 154

I play one of Marina Raye's CDs as I write my blog. I want to revisit the feel of the season: "Snow Falling on Silence," "Delicious Silence," and "Deep Peace" (the names for several of her selections on this compilation of native flute and Paraguayan harp). I have to admit, though, that rain sounding on our metal roof provides a wonderful tempo for this morning's practice. It soothes and slows me as I move gracefully from Rocking Motion to Bird and on.

Today I pay attention to how my back leg straightens as I shift weight forward. Then, again, to how and when my back knee softens, facilitating weight flow backward. I watch the reflection of my long underwear-covered leg as it straightens and bends, straightens and bends.

There's a certain comfort in this on-going examination of the form. It is never perfect. But it offers me opportunities to pay attention ... make improvements. It requires of me that I simply feel what my body feels as it shifts and moves, rocks and dips, rises and sinks....

The River and its Waves are One....

My practice began in darkness today; the only rosy glow I saw was the pink-orange of my t-shirt reflected in the glass patio door. Bit-by-bit the day lightened and a pencil-thin line of scarlet ran along the horizon.

Today's practice was a going-through-the-motions' day. That is, until I got to Perpetual Motion Taffy. This movement felt so good that I added another set of repetitions and rested, simply, in its flow and comforting softness.

When I arrived at Passing Clouds--one of my favorite movements--I didn't feel the same soft flow that I felt with Perpetual Motion. Why is it, I wondered, that one TCC movement feels so scrumptious one day and an entirely different movement feels delicious the next?

Or ... why do I feel so engaged in--and embraced by--my practice one day and the next day I don't? It's a mystery....

The river and its waves are one surf:
     where is the difference between
     the river and its waves?
When the wave rises, it is the water;
     and when it falls,
     it is the same water again.
     Tell me, Sir, where is the distinction?
Because it has been named as wave,
     shall it no longer be considered as water?
               Kabir
               From: The Mystic Vision, January 15