STANDING LIKE A MOUNTAIN BETWEEN HEAVEN AND EARTH
This exercise aims to raise awareness of the body’s physical support system, and of the relationship between the parts of the body and their alignment, from the feet on the earth to the head in the sky. The thighs and pelvis meet at the hip joint, the largest in the body. Your hip joints are being asked to “soften” and to open up or gently stretch. Your knees are sensitive to alignment. They act as channels, allowing the force of gravity to pass through. The position of the feet affects the alignment of the frame, which rises from them; and from them descends an imaginary channel that anchors the body to the earth center. Become aware of the relationship between your feet and legs and your upper body.
1 Stand comfortably with your feet well apart. Notice how and where the weight of your body comes down though your feet. Is it toward the toes or the heels, the instep or the outside of each foot, or somewhere in the middle?
2 Rock your weight slowly forward to the front of your feet and bring it back. Repeat two more times. When you stop, allow your feet to meet the earth fully, the weight evenly balanced.
3 Bring your weight to the instep. You immediately feel unwanted strain on your knees. They are misaligned and not designed to work properly in this position. Redistribute your weight evenly across your feet.
4 Realign your knees so they follow the direction of the feet. This maintains the correct relationship between the feet, the knees, and the hips. Feel it by dropping your spine a few inches. Look down to see that your kneecap follows the direction of the toes.
5 Stand upright again. Turn your feet to point slightly outward, and once again drop your spine and bend your knees. Check that your knees are in line with your toes. Notice the effect on your hips when doing this.
6 Keeping your legs and upper body still, rock your pelvis backward and forward, then from side to side. Feel your pelvis floating. Circle it a few times in each direction. The pelvic girdle is basin-shaped, a holder and carrier. Feel the link between your lower pelvis and your hip joints, and the relationship between your pelvis and your feet.
7 Dropping the spine and bending the knees softens and opens the hips. Repeat this movement a few times, allowing your hips to move and open. Feel the connection between feet, knees, and hips. Your feet are anchored to give you stability; your hips allow mobility. Now return your feet to parallel.
8 With your feet planted on the ground, your weight distributed evenly so your knees and toes are aligned, and your pelvis free to move, feel how the spine carries you up through your neck toward the sky. Drop your spine to sit into the earth, relax your muscles downward (yin) and simultaneously feel the upward and outward support of your bones (yang).
9 Lift your arms out a little way away from your body. Imagine your shoulder joints open, letting in space. Feel your arms lift farther out. Explore the movement possibilities of your elbows, then your wrists, then turn your fingertips toward each other. Imagine your arms are growing out from your spine, and make a connection between your fingers.
10 Direct your attention to the top of your head. Soften the muscles here and downward through your body. At the same time imagine the bones of your spine lifting you to this point. Feel the polarity between your feet in the earth and your head in the sky. This keeps your spine open or stretched up and down, so that it falls into its natural curved shape.
HERE, WITH THE HELP of two guided exercises, you can develop a practical understanding of the qualities of stability and mobility. Let your feet meet the earth. Let your knees follow the direction of your toes. Soften your hips. Let your pelvis float and your spine anchor you in the earth and carry you to the sky. These injunctions are the basis of stability and the key to understanding the nature of tai chi movement, for the body’s relationship to the earth is like that of an underwater plant, which is anchored to a rock yet moves with ease in the current.
Many people who begin tai chi are not used to maintaining a low center of gravity, or to using their legs so much. Aching legs are a sign that tai chi is gradually strengthening the limbs. The process works in two ways, so it is through the movements that a beginner develops stability. Trying to deepen the stance by dropping the spine while moving accustoms the legs to work harder and makes it possible to achieve a still lower center of gravity.
This exercise in stability begins with the principles expressed in the posture Stand Like A Mountain Between Heaven and Earth. It ensures every stance or movement is rooted to the earth, but reaches up to the heavens.
STABILITY
This is a two-person exercise, although the role of your partner is to act as an assistant. Ask your partner to build up the pressure very gradually as you learn to deal with it. Before you begin, find the position Stand Like a Mountain Between Heaven and Earth, and take a moment to relax into it.
1 When you are feeling comfortably stable and your body has a sense of wholeness, ask your friend to lean in toward you from the side, gently and slowly.
2 Drop your spine slightly and let your arms move a few inches out to the sides, meeting the weight leaning against you and channeling it into the earth. If your partner leans too heavily against you, you may have to hold off the force with your arm. This should not happen, so rest and begin again.
3 As you become familiar with the feeling of the weight of another body leaning into you from the side and channeling down through your body, ask your friend to roll around you slowly and lean into you from different angles. Notice how you have to make slight changes to your frame to adjust to pressure from different angles.
4 Remain solidly stable as your partner turns while orbiting around you.
MOBILITY
For this exercise you need a safe, comfortable space to move in, and a blindfold. Play some of your favorite, soothing music. While doing this exercise you will be blindfolded, so you will not be able to read these directions at the same time. Rather than try to memorize them, record yourself reading them or ask a friend to read them out to you. Take your time with this exercise. It will probably last 10 to 20 minutes, but there is no time limit. You may find yourself drawn into the meditation for as long as an hour.
1 Stand, blindfolded, imagining you hold a ball of light in your hands. Play with it for a minute. Now imagine the light pouring from the ball into your hands and wrists. Imagine the light soothing and oiling the joints, and massaging your hands and wrists.
2 Invite the light to move up through your arm bones into your elbows, bringing them freedom of movement. Feel the folding, unfolding, and turning movements of this complex joint, and its link to wrists and hands.