Heart Practice

Early in my training I heard a story about Master Moy Lin-shin. One of his more advanced students asked what was keeping him from making more progress. Master Moy’s correction was for him to stop doing tai chi altogether, give up his job, and work in the kitchen of the Society’s retreat as a volunteer for a year. The student was asked to do a “heart practice.”

My first reaction was “exploitation.” How was volunteering as a chef going to help accelerate tai chi development? Years later, the wisdom of the correction began to sink in. Without a heart practice, a practice of compassionate giving, tai chi progresses only so far. Jef Morris, one of my dear friends and master trainer, would always say -- "Give it away." Good chi is cultivated in the giving.

Offering tai chi to the old souls at the nursing home, special education kids, and people with disabilities is as much a part of my tai chi as my own personal practice. It must also be learned and cultivated. It took me awhile to key into Linda's observation that the practice was not teaching a class but a more a ministry. Now I would be at a loss without my new friends and my tai chi development would be stunted.