the Tai Chi......

.....is going rather well.

At first I was doing okay, then we started learning a couple of new moves per session, instead of just one and I just wasn't getting the hang of it. (I wasn't the only one). I'd have my feet in the wrong position so I'd lose my balance and wobble like a jelly, or I'd be watching the feet positions for the new move and not know what the hands were supposed to be doing. Then I'd learn the feet,  so try to watch where the hands were supposed to be when the teacher was going through that move while at the same time moving on to another new move....aarrrgh!

Anyway, there came a day where I could barely move since I'd had a small fall** a couple of days earlier, so I sat out for most of the lesson and just watched. At the next class I was so far behind!

I keep telling myself I'll practise at home, then I don't. I do run through the movements in my head, but clearly that's not enough. Actual physical movement must happen too. Okay, I'll do it.
I actually find it quite energising so first thing after getting out of bed will be the time. 

I decided to find the youtube video of the same stuff we were learning and watch at home, then watch while trying to copy the moves.
It went like this....watch, stop video, back to start, watch while doing, stop video, back to start, watch again and so on until I'd made it to the point where our current teaching had got to.
With that, plus two classes a week, I'm managing to pick up the movements better.

In the beginning we'd been told that Tai Chi also helps with mental concentration. Well that's certainly true.
If you don't concentrate, you don't learn. 

I'd gotten out of the concentrating habit while working, my job was mind-numbingly boring for me, so my mind wandered.
Often and far away.

Ta Chi has helped me learn to concentrate again.
Which doesn't mean that I can write better stories on Fridays, it just means that I'm able to write and watch TV at the same time.  Like I used to. Woo-Hoo!

So we've learned a set of seventeen moves so far. I've heard (today) that when a public display of our brand of Tai Chi is done, those seventeen moves are what people watching will see. We're working now on keeping in time with each other.
Why?
Because there is to be a display and it looks much prettier when everybody turns or bends at the same time.
The display is to be at a fund-raiser fair (held in a couple of weeks) at a park which is two bus rides and a decent walk away from where I live.  I may not go.  Weather will be a big consideration, as will my back and neck. Too much aching and I'll be staying home lying down.

** I'd been down on my knees checking the bottom row in a book shelf, scooted backwards to get a better view, then stood up and crashed my bum straight into a corner of a coffee table/TV unit, causing me to lose my balance and drop right back to my knees. My left butt cheek was an amazing shade of purple for a week. The bruise didn't bother me, but the jarring to the spine caused a couple of weeks stiffness. 
Gotta be more careful!


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