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The tremendous benefits of practicing Taijiquan
Taijiquan is a mental and physical exercise that starts from the inside and effects the outside of ourselves. This means that the practice of Taijiquan begins on the inside by relaxing one's inner-self, both physically and mentally, in order to bring peace and calm to one's mental state, which in turn helps to better regulate how the outer body works and functions throughout its day. When both mind and body are at peace, we call this harmony.
When the mind is trouble free the body naturally has an abundance of energy, or Chi, to function properly throughout the day. But if the mind is troubled and stressed, then one's thought process becomes bogged down in negative thoughts and feelings. These negative feelings take on many different aspects such as apprehensions and doubts or fears within ourselves, and about our lives. Sometimes feelings of anger or jealousy arise caused by a bruised ego, but whatever the reason, these negative feelings and emotions do have serious effects on us and ultimately cause disharmony in one's spiritual being.
This mental and spiritual disharmony, if left alone, will overtime deplete a person's energy and physical strength, and ultimately cause the body's immune system to weaken to the point that it can no longer fight off the harmful elements that are in the air we breathe, and the water and food we eat. These polluted elements, of which there are many released daily into our environment, cause such diseases as cancer, arthritis, high blood pressure, mental anxiety, and many more related diseases just to name a few.
It is a sad fact that even though medical science has progressed to the point where we can easily exchange body organs, like the heart and kidneys, there is more cancer and disease than ever before in our history.
Western doctors are now learning that Taijiquan can be of great benefit to people who have such illnesses as heart problems, stroke victims, hypertension, chronic joint and back pain, problems associated with AIDS, problems with balance, and anxiety, and many types of cancer.
The reason that Taijiquan is so beneficial for so many health problems is that Taijiquan releases and frees-up one's life-energy that tension, caused by stress, uses up and ultimately destroys. Tense muscles, whether in the neck, or back, or chest, or abdomen, steals one's life-energy that if freed-up could be better used in dealing with life's daily challenges and in the healing of many different diseases.
This is the greatest benefit of Taijiquan, that it greatly strengthens the immune system so that our body's own natural healing ability can better fight off the many diseases that are present in people today. This and the fact that Taijiquan is also a great self-defense system make Taijiquan an excellent exercise for everyone to practice.
Taijiquan is unique in many ways including the following:
- The movements are natural in the sense that they are natural to human nature, not to present-day human behavior. This means that to the average person who has already been heavily influenced by social and many other factors, taijiquan movements are extremely difficult to learn. The practice of taijiquan will "return" one to the "natural way of body movements". This implies a believe that the body "does not move naturally."
- The rhythm or timing of movements in taijiquan is different from any known human activity. There is something very unique about the seemingly slow and flowing motions of taijiquan.
- The structure of taijiquan movements are distinctively different from any known activity.
- The breathing method is unlike that of any normal activity or sport activity.
- The mind-intent is different than any leisure activity or academic activity.
In all, we believe that the ancients must have created something magnificent with the invention of taijiquan. It is to our benefit to learn it, practice it and do more research on it.
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