Students in any subject make mistakes. They are, after all, students and learning something new. Tai Chi Chuan students are no different. This post is about some of the most common mistakes that, based on my teaching experience, students of Tai Chi Chuan make. So, let’s jump right in.
Not Practicing Because They Can’t Do the Form Perfectly
Many new students (and some more experienced students too) do not practice the form at home because they don’t think they do it well enough – i.e., they don’t do it perfectly. They are afraid that imperfect practice will somehow doom them to forever performing the form incorrectly. Actually, just the opposite is true; if you never or rarely practice, you will not improve. Instead, you will repeat the same errors over and over. Proper practice requires the student to pay attention to how the form feels when performed, not how it looks. Practicing, even if it isn’t perfect, lets the student observe those errors and fix them, or ask about them at their next class if they can’t figure it out on their own.
Improper Bow Stance
The most common stance in any Tai Chi form is the Bow Stance or, Archer’s Stance. Therefore, students should pay particular attention to this stance. A proper bow stance has three main elements:
- Both feet on the ground – if you can’t keep both feet on the ground, your bow stance is probably too long, meaning you stepped forward too far. Shorter steps are easier.
- The front foot points in the direction the bow stance is facing, with the front knee also pointing that same direction. The back foot is pointed at approximately forty-five degrees from the front (it might vary between thirty degrees or sixty degrees, depending on what is comfortable for you).
- There is a gap between the heels. The width of this gap is measured at ninety degrees to the heel of the front foot. See the diagram to the right.
See a more complete discussion of a proper Bow Stance in my post titled, “What is a Proper Bow Stance?”
Missing Out on Stillness in Tai Chi Chuan
Meditation is part of Tai Chi Chuan. A big part. Meditation is the stillness in Tai Chi Chuan. And, it is the quickest way to improve your Tai Chi Chuan. The reason for this is that meditation accomplishes two things. First, Meditation cultivates your chi, or at the very least make you more sensitive to the current the chi in your body. Secondly, meditation is also about balance and so is Tai Chi Chuan. Briefly, meditation lets you relax and become more balanced. This is especially true of standing meditation, which improves your balance tremendously and relatively quickly.
Students often say things like, I could never meditate, or I can’t sit that long. The secret is to start slowly and gradually build up your time. Start out meditating for five minutes per day for the first week. Then ten minutes per day the next week. What you will likely find is that the more you meditate, the more you will want to meditate. When you first start, the hardest part is to “tame the monkey mind” or in other words, calm your mind so that you can meditate and stay in the present moment. Thoughts will pop into your head that have nothing to do with meditation. Thoughts that are not about the present moment. This happens to even experienced meditators, just less often. It is a work in progress for everyone. Click here for a post that goes in-depth into how to meditate and its benefits, “What Does Meditation Have to Do with Tai Chi Chuan?”
Not Practicing on a Daily Basis
Daily practice is extremely beneficial. Most students, even long-time students don’t practice daily. They may not say it out loud, but teachers can tell which students practice between classes and which don’t. Recognize too that class is not practice. Class is training; it is about learning something new, or refining some aspect of your form. The students that make class about practice progress much more slowly.
Practicing daily allows the student to practice different aspects of Tai Chi Chuan. Like what? Like paying attention during the form to the principles of Tai Chi Chuan: staying balanced, flow of the form, use of intention, not leaning, chi flow, how the form feels while performing it, breathing, proper stepping, using and integrated body, etc.
Performing Your Form Unconsciously
If you just perform your form the same way each time without being conscious of the form, it will feel the same each time. Pay attention to how your body feels while performing the form. You should feel balanced and comfortable when performing the form – the entire form. If there are parts of the form that do not feel balanced and comfortable, that is something to work on. If new moves are awkward, you may simply require more practice. Or, you may need to pay attention when performing that portion of the form and determining what you can do to make it feel more balanced and comfortable. Are you stepping too far? Are you leaning off center? (Leaning can occur in any direction.) Paying attention to your form actually makes performing the form more fun and interesting. You will notice sensations that you did not before.
Practice each of the principles of Tai Chi Chuan separately and notice how focusing on each principle makes the form feel different. Work on a single principle until it feels “incorporated” into the form, then move on to the next principle. How will you know if a principle has been incorporated into the form? Try doing the form without focusing on that principle. If you still have the sensations that you feel when focusing on that principle you can move on to the next principle. The principle that encompasses all the other principles is feeling balanced and comfortable when doing the form. What can you do to make the form feel more comfortable and balanced?