" When a musician play a lute, if the strings are too tight they will break. If they are too loose they will not make a good sound."—Buddha (200 B.C)

The Three Hearts of Practice and Cultivation

Faith

Perseverance

Intelligence

Faith —After you choose a Qigong or Taiji teacher, you then must have faith in yourself and the teacher. It is like baking bread. You have to trust the bread will bake in the dark oven—if you keep pulling out the bread  to check whether it is done or not. The bread will be ruin. In the same way, do not worry and keep checking on whether there is improvement from your practice. The body and mind needs time to change and develop.  The initial confusion of entering a new practice and unknown is stressful, but faith is the healing balm that lets your heart/mind stay calm.  Of course, blind faith of following a false Guru or teacher could be very dangerous.  But it would take at least a year or two to really discover the teacher's real nature.  Just like using a map that tells you what route to take, innitially, you must have faith on the map but as you drive along the route, you can verify whether the map is correct or not.

Perseverance—How often we gather expensive dust retainers. Those exercises video, the new Kick Boxing work out and after the initial few sessions of following them; they relocate to some corner of our closet gathering dust. Daily practice is crucial, yet, do not set yourself up for failure. Start out small, do not try to practice long and extensive work out routines. Just  5 minutes daily is better then the weekend warriors' 29 minutes jogs. Just like watering the plants, a little water daily is better than the guilty conscious of—oh gee, they are dying of thirst—and drown them with water. You will find that 5 minutes daily  is more effective for improving one's health then weekend binges. I have often taught my busy executives a quick 5 minutes meditation routine—I told them to sit in the bathroom and meditate for  5 minutes.  They were surprised that their stress goes way down.
 
 

Intelligence—If you practice without awareness, then you may repeatedly getting the wrong habit and ingraining it as part of your movements. This requires understanding the principles of Qigong, Taiji and basic movements. Be very simple in your approach. My fundamental guideline for my students are that all movements must come directly from the earth to the feet and ends at the finger tip. I called this sequential movements. At first you may imitate your teacher then after 1 to 3 years, you should understand the principles of the Qigong, or Taiji and apply your own sense to develop your own particular unique ways of moving. Then after 10 years, you break even that formalism, and then every movements even in brushing your teeth expresses the spontaneous wholeness of moving in unity.

So the three stages of learning really are imitation, understanding the principles and finally spontaneity. A great master never repeat even a single move.

" But, Sifu, I have seem you practice and repeating the same Taiji movements in class today?" A beginning student asked.

" Ah, the water that you see flowing in the river—though looks the same— is never quite the same . You may see my movements as repetitive, but just like the water— if you have the insight you will notice how this very day, the White Crane movement is pregnant with the blueness of the summer sky." Teacher replied.

"Hmm." The student looked a bit puzzled, wondering was this another one of those Zenish riddles.  While the advance students bowed in gratitude to the great generosity of the teacher's revealing the heart of practice and moving.  Now, quick and check what is your own reaction to the little drama here.  Are you puzzled? or deeply moved? May be neither.  This three reaction would have indicate the level of your own mastery.  That is why in the Chinese tradition, we do not need or use belt to externally indicate the level of the students' advancement.  A good teacher would have known instantly a students level just by that simple reaction.

The cultivation of the Tao is the complete awakening to our original self nature. Therefor, the student of Tao must also come to their own way of moving. If after 30 years of practice, you are still trying to imitate your master then you are trapped in the circle that he had drawn around you. Walk out and find your true face before you were born to your parent.
 

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