Tai Chi For Health

By Edward Maisel

The classic text that introduced Tai Chi to an American audience a generation ago.

Originally published in 1963, it is widely regarded to be the original introduction to the movement art to Western enthusiasts.

“One of the best books on the subject...practical throughout and stripped of mysticism.”—The New York Times

“A tranquil, graceful way of keeping fit.”—Harper’s Bazaar

“You will have to consult Mr. Maisel’s book...Tai Chi could become that all-important exercise factor that stands between you and health problems.”—Prevention

“It is Chinese, old, comfortable, deeply pleasurable. It helps the figure and skin and tranquilizes. It is done in a small space in ordinary clothes without music. It is good for the young, for the old.”—Vogue

• Language: English
• Publisher: Hauraki Publishing
• Release date: Mar 28, 2016
• ISBN: 9781786259028

Edward Maisel

EDWARD MAISEL (1937-2008) was an internationally known writer on music and t’ai chi. He was born in Buffalo, New York and lived in New York City for most of his life. He graduated with a Magna Cum Laude from Harvard University, and was also Phi Beta Kappa. Mr. Maisel wrote the classic Yang form of t’ai chi using the title Tai Chi for Health. His wife, Betty Cage, an administrator at the New York City Ballet, operated a t’ai chi class at the affiliated School of American Ballet until her death in 1999. Maisel was Director of the American Physical Fitness Research Institute and a consultant to the President’s Council on Physical Fitness. He worked extensively with the Alexander Technique and wrote an introduction to a compendium of Alexander’s writings he himself selected.

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Text originally published in 1963 under the same title.

© Pickle Partners Publishing 2016, all rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted by any means, electrical, mechanical or otherwise without the written permission of the copyright holder.

Publisher’s Note

Although in most cases we have retained the Author’s original spelling and grammar to authentically reproduce the work of the Author and the original intent of such material, some additional notes and clarifications have been added for the modern reader’s benefit.

We have also made every effort to include all maps and illustrations of the original edition the limitations of formatting do not allow of including larger maps, we will upload as many of these maps as possible.

TAI CHI FOR HEALTH

BY

EDWARD MAISEL

A fitly born and bred race, growing up in right conditions of outdoor as much as indoor harmony, activity and development, would probably, from and in those conditions, find it enough merely to live—and would, in their relations to the sky, air, water, trees, etc., and to the countless common shows, and in the fact of life itself, discover and achieve happiness—with Being suffused night and day by wholesome ecstasy, surpassing all the pleasures that wealth, amusement, and even gratified intellect, erudition, or the sense of art, can give.—WALT WHITMAN

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Contents

TABLE OF CONTENTS 6

DEDICATION 7

PART I—LEARNING ABOUT TAI CHI: The important health benefits it offers you 8

1—Tai Chi: The What and the Why 8

Tai Chi: A Non-strenuous, Pleasant Conditioner 9

Tai Chi—a Health Secret from Ancient China 9

Tai Chi’s Benefits Endorsed by Medical Authorities 10

The Dangers of Strenuous Physical Activity 11

The Effect of Exercise on Life Span 11

Sports Are Not the Answer 12

2—How Tai Chi Works Wonders for Your Health 13

Tai Chi: An All-Around Conditioner 13

108 Easy Ways to Health—Done Slow and Easy 13

Not a Dance or a Performance 14

No Special Clothing or Equipment Needed 15

Practice Anywhere 15

The Breath of Life 15

The Benefits of Good Breathing 16

How Tai Chi Helps You Breathe 17

Avoid the Oxygen Jag 18

3—Other Health Benefits of Tai Chi 20

Age Is No Barrier 20

A Way to Remain Youthful 21

Continuous Flowing Movement Is the Secret 22

Tai Chi in Three Sections 22

Tai Chi Prevents Freak Injuries 23

How to Relax and Sleep Well 23

Arthritis and Tai Chi 24

If You Are Overweight 24

Other Personal Problems and Diabetes 25

Benefits the Eyes 25

4—Greater Mental Powers Through Tai Chi 27

Tai Chi—The Safe Tranquilizer 27

Furnishes Strong Motivation 27

Never Becomes Dismal or a Dull Habit 28

Awakens Your Mental Powers 28

Become a Whole Person 29

The Crown of the Senses 30

The Somato-Psychic Benefits 30

Advantages Not Found in Yoga 31

5—Tai Chi and Your Heart 32

Heart Trouble Is Widespread 32

Lack of Physical Activity—a Major Factor 33

Daily Exercise—a Preventive Measure 33

How Tai Chi Benefits the Heart 34

What Research Revealed 34

Tai Chi Supplies that Certain Something 35

Tai Chi—the Wise Exercise 36

6—Relaxation and Relief from Body Aches and Pains 37

How to Relax the Entire Body 37

Become a Marionette 38

Your Body Becomes Efficient 39

Tai Chi Relieves Backache 39

Adapt Tai Chi to Your Body 39

PART II—THE PRACTICE OF TAI CHI: How To Do It 41

The Ten Basic Rules 41

A Way to Begin 42

Six Helpful Hints 42

Section One—Lessons 1-15 (Form 1-20) 43

Section Two—Lessons 1-15 (Form 21-57) 69

Section Three—Lessons 1-15 (Form 58-108) 98

Short Tai Chi 127

Continuing with Tai Chi 127

Tai Chi to the Left 128

Tai Chi with Speed 128

To Advance with Tai Chi 128

Handy Check-list of the 108 Forms 129

PART III—THE STORY OF TAI CHI: How It Can Help You Gain New Benefits from Your Practice 133

7—How It All Began 133

Male and Female 134

Breathing and Butting 134

Imitation of Animal Movements 135

Our 108 Forms and the 37 Actions 136

8—The Search for the Mysterious Old Man 137

Tai Chi and Self-Defense 137

Chang San-feng, Tai Chi’s Originator 137

The Secret of Immortality 139

Effortlessness—the Key to Tai Chi 139

9—A 400-Year Secret 140

The Northern School and the Southern School 140

How the Chens Kept The Secret 140

How The Secret Was Revealed to the World 141

The First School 142

Carrying on the Ancient Tradition 143

10—On to America! 144

Tai Chi in Modern Times 144

Widespread Adoption of Tai Chi 145

Other Forms of Tai Chi 145

The Tai Chi Boom in America 146

APPENDIX—THE THREE CLASSIC WRITINGS ON TAI CHI 148

I. A Discussion on the Practice of Tai Chi Chuan 149

II The Treatise on Tat Chi Chuan 150

III. An Exposition on the Practice of the 13 Movement Forms 153

REQUEST FROM THE PUBLISHER 156

DEDICATION

To my wife,

Betty Cage

PART I—LEARNING ABOUT TAI CHI: The important health benefits it offers you

1—Tai Chi: The What and the Why

The basic, if slightly embarrassing, truth about exercise is plain enough: nobody wants to do the awful stuff. Yet for most of us, calisthenics, that unwanted addition to the unpleasantries of daily existence, has remained the only practical way of keeping fit. Calisthenics, as one report to the nation had the candor to admit, most people won’t touch with a barbell.

Tai Chi: A Non-strenuous, Pleasant Conditioner

Perhaps, then, for many of us the important news about an ancient Chinese system of exercise which has excited the interest of medical men and physical educators is simply this: it affords a deeply pleasurable experience. Tai Chi Chuan (pronounced Tie Jee Chwahn and usually called Tai Chi for short) has almost nothing in common with the heavy-breathing, exhausting gyrations of our own calisthenics. It is an easy-to-do, non-strenuous, pleasant conditioner.

A growing number of people are adopting Tai Chi as an essential part of their daily program, like food or sleep or cleanliness. To them it has become a regular hygienic practice, no more to be neglected than brushing one’s teeth.

And that, after all, is how exercise must be considered if it is to prove truly beneficial to your physical and general well-being. It is not something to be taken up in spurts, something most often left to the occasional practice of sport on a weekend, holiday or vacation. Rather, the consensus of medical authorities emphasizes that if exercise is to do any real and continuing good, it should be incorporated into everyday life as a natural, unforced activity; it should form a necessary ingredient of your daily routine.

The reason, of course, that this has not generally been the case till now is that what is customarily meant by exercise, or calisthenics, is just too unpleasant, a kind of ordeal in fact, and therefore never to be kept up very long, no matter how firm the initial resolution. In due time, moreover, it also becomes apparent to most people that the supposed benefits to be derived from the usual setting-up exercises, or daily dozen, are quite unnoticeable or else far too limited for the effort involved.

People who bother at all with the whole business, therefore, take it up with a kind of grim, virtuous determination at first, and then almost without fail drop it in the end. There are always plenty of convincing reasons they can give themselves, such as having no time, or being in such a perpetual rush that they keep forgetting about it. Nothing much happens after that, unless perhaps after a while there is a new resolve and a next time when the same futile process is repeated.

Tai Chi—a Health Secret from Ancient China

But the exercise known as Tai Chi has been done by the Chinese—the inventors and developers of it—faithfully for hundreds and hundreds of years right up to the present day. And among them it has proved not only its durability but also its worth, many times over, through these centuries of widespread practice. It has been put to the practical test of use. Upon the medical history of Europe and America, as we shall later see, it has also had a considerable effect.

No way of thinking or doing, however ancient, a crusty American individualist, Henry David Thoreau, once wrote, can be trusted without proof. As Westerners we are bound to hold with Thoreau on this point. Especially perhaps do we have the right to be wary of ancient practices from the East, when we recollect how much nonsense with an Eastern label has got itself accepted by the credulous among us in the name of highbrow esotericism.

Tai Chi’s Benefits Endorsed by Medical Authorities

What is perhaps most to be remarked, therefore, by modern Western students of Tai Chi is the way in which it would seem to accord with both biomechanical and neurophysiological concepts and principles in the light of present knowledge. It jibes with the nature of sensorimotor behavior as we understand it today. Such proof is bound to impress us as much as the evidence of continued use dating from antiquity.

Not surprisingly, then, one specialist in internal medicine, Dr. Charles W. Bien, in formulating his opinion of Tai Chi, has stated, As a doctor, I consider such exercise as one of the best methods of preventing illness and of promoting good health. Dr. Bien, who is on the staff of the Kaiser Foundation Hospital at Vallejo, California, perhaps took note of the regularity with which this exercise—because it is so pleasurable—is practiced, when he commended it to all for better health, greater happiness and more successful living.

This book takes off from no mumbo-jumbo or cultist platform, but from the pragmatic viewpoint of what is now understood in such fields as anatomy, physiology and psychology. Unless one is interested in doing so, one need not adopt any esoteric doctrines or occult beliefs in order to