DISCOVERING THE WORLD OF TAI CHI

THE FIGHT AT THE OLD CRABBY JACK’S

I want to open this Tai Chi section by going back to the beginning. You must know the true story of the big fight at the old Crabby Jack’s and how it led me to the wonderful world of Tai Chi Chen.

My Frat brothers and I were hanging out at the old Crabby Jacks back around 2003-4 having a few beers, chicken wings and shooting pool as we often did. It was an old wooden bar with a large patio area and it attracted a seedy crowd after dark. The place was dimly lit and filled with sketchy people who often had too much to drink. It was a noisy place with a lot of yelling going on late into the night. Crabby Jack’s was infamous for drunken fights breaking out and stories of people pulling out knives or guns, drug deals in the bathrooms and people being hauled away by the police. They attracted even more roughneck locals on ‘lingerie night’, the place would fill up with scoundrels to watch young ladies’ parade about in different half naked lingerie outfits. The girls would work the wolf-whistling crowd, draping themselves lasciviously over the men packed into dark booths collecting tips and handing out coupons for the boutique nearby where folks could go purchase said outfits.  It was not a family restaurant.

Back in the pool room one of my fraternity brothers got into a verbal altercation with another gentleman and before I knew it everyone was fighting! There were about five of my frat brothers fighting about six other guys on the other side of the room! Brother Gordy had gone into his Hulk rage and was holding two bad guys in headlocks at the same time! The other guys were fighting and winning, beating these guys down.

 I however, froze.

AMBUSH IN THE PARKING LOT

My head had locked my body stiff!  I stood behind the pool table clutching the cue in one hand and my beer in the other and the fight raged around me! Doing nothing!

My brothers did a really good job of putting down an old-fashioned beating on those guys and they left. Actually, they pretended to leave but were hiding in the parking lot behind the trees bushes and cars and were waiting for us. One of the brothers saw them in the dark scurrying about and came in to let the rest of us know they were staging an ambush in the parking lot. We finished our beers and later went out to meet them. As I remember there was just some yelling and they threw some rocks or something from behind the bushes but ran away as our guys charged in on their positions.

As you can imagine I received serious criticism for my lack of participation in the not so drunken bar battle. They fraternity brothers expressed extreme anger at my inability to step up.

I thought about it a lot and you know, I have never gotten into a lot of fights in my life, I have always been a very peaceful type, I can count the number of times I have gotten into fights on one hand. I didn’t like the way I felt about all of this.

These feelings continued to linger over me, and I kept coming to a deep feeling that something needed to be done. 

OCEANS 234

It was about a week or so later on a Saturday night me and my co-workers from the Top of the Tower at the Boca Resort were enjoying some late night after work beverages down at Oceans 234. We loved going there after work and hanging out as a group by the ocean at night and getting the twenty-five percent in the biz discount on our tabs.  I told my friend next to me about what had happened the other night at Crabby Jack’s and expressed my discontent with my reaction. He had good news though, he pointed to the guy sitting next to him and said that this fellow was a martial arts know it all, and that I should switch seats with him so I can pick his brain and find out how to develop skills to display next time a dire situation came up. I was thinking, ‘Wow! Kung fu!’, So we switched seats and I began chatting excitedly with the martial arts expert. He asked me what kind of fighting I wanted to do.

    “Do you want to learn how to throw badass open-handed punches and kicks? That’s karate.

    Do you want to learn how to grapple, flip, throw and pin people to the ground? That’s Judo.

    Do you want to learn how to deliver powerful kicks and break bones? That’s taekwondo.

    Do you want to learn how to grapple and take folks down and fight when you are on the ground? learn submission holds? That’s Jiu–Jitsu.”

He kept going on and on like this and although it was an exciting conversation when he got to the end, I really didn’t have an answer for him.

HE GAVE ME MY ANSWER

Fortunately, just like a true kung fu guy, he gave me my answer!

 He said, “Hey listen, there is a free Tai Chi class every Saturday morning right over here in Sullivan Park, and this would be a great place for you to get started. You will learn deep core fundamentals like breathing, balance, meditation and how to control your mind and body.”

I said, “Sullivan Park is near my place and that sounds great! And Free!”

He pointed out that this would be the perfect entry point to the world of kung-fu and that I could use these Tai Chi skills and knowledge to help me to find what area would be best for me to move on to later.  He also pointed out that most kung-fu classes are free the first time and then if you like it you can join and pay next time.

THE OLD SULLIVAN PARK

So, I became excited and began researching about Tai Chi. I went to the library and checked out some books and got a DVD and planned for my entry into the class on Saturday morning!

  Next Saturday came and I woke up early and got ready to go.  I remember walking to the park and sure enough, there was a little circle of about twelve people doing the Tai Chi warm up exercises together.  I remember being overwhelmed with apprehension, but I kept marching forward. I remember thinking, “You are just going to walk up to a group of Kung-Fu guys and just walk right into the circle? And I said to myself, yes that is the only way to do this, we are not turning around now.”

 Once I got into the circle and began imitating what the other students were doing, I was relieved to see that everyone was very welcoming and nice. They asked me who I was and what is my deal and I told them I wanted to join the group and learn Tai Chi.  After the warm ups were over the teacher, or as I learned ‘Sifu’ in Chinese came over and introduced himself and welcomed me to the group and put me with the others who were learning the basics.

THE OLD CHEN MASTERS

I kept pouring over the books I checked out in the library about Tai Chi Chen and the stories and information were amazing.  I realized the old masters of Tai Chi were these guys who develop an incredible internal energy. I learned about the internal energy versus the external energy.  I was fascinated about these stories of the old Tai Chi masters who are old and thin and to the eye, they look like weaklings. I remember they were describing one master and said he looked like he couldn’t pick up a bowling ball. But when the young kung-fu masters of the hard styles, the kung-fu styles that focus on external energy. Would seek him out to challenge him, the old Tai Chi master would dispense of them effortlessly. They young strong masters would come up to him and attack him and the old master would use the spiraling tai chi techniques and deflect all of their attacks while simultaneously pushing them to the side or into a wall or down into the ground. It wasn’t like he was beating him up or striking him but his defensive moves not only deflected the other guys attacks but he was also able to throw the opponent away! This was the same things we were talking about and training on in class! So, I really gravitated to the Tai Chi class and learned that this was the ancient authentic Chinese style that all other styles of Tai Chi branched off from called ‘Chen’ style Tai Chi.

THE THREE LEGS

I also found the different layers within the training to be fascinating. Not only were we learning Tai Chi Chen but we are also learning Taoism and TCM (Traditional Chinese Medicine)! I was very excited to hear the tenets of Taoism and the stories of Lao Tzu and the Tao Te Ching! Bonus! -There is an amazing beautiful philosophy that dovetails with the Kung-Fu! Sifu explained that Tai Chi will not stand on its own. And the three concepts of Tai Chi, Taoism, and TCM all work together like the three legs of bar stool to create a strong base so if a fat man came along, he can sit on a small wooden bar stool and be secure.

SNAP!

So, I sucked it all up and was doing moderately well in class, and I remember that I started to notice small changes in the way I was thinking and my hands were moving. I found myself much calmer and more focused and a lot more energy and happiness. I also found when I was folding my shirts, I will often use my chin to hold the shirt against my chest for a second, and sometimes while I am folding my shirts like this I will drop the shirt, and without thinking about it, I would have a quick reflex hand motion and snap the shirt up in my fingers without even realizing it. Things might fall or roll off a table and without thinking about it I snap them up in my hand! I was literally startling myself.

I asked some of the advanced students about this and they said yes, as you are doing more and more Tai Chi and progressing, the Chi levels in your body increase and these kinds of things will happen. I heard all kinds of amazing stories of advanced awareness. One advanced student said he suddenly stepped to the left for no reason and a tree fell right where he had been standing! One of the things that was very exciting for me early on is that I would quickly develop a very powerful tingling sensation in my hands after only doing the warm up Qigong exercises for a few minutes! I thought wow! I have the CHI! What if I kept training like this and my whole body was tingling with this kind of new energy!

GOLDEN TREASURE

So that is how I got in and became captivated by the world of Tai Chi!  Now there are a lot more things that I have not covered here. This is not an overview of what is tai chi and everything in it. This is just the tip of the iceberg, the opening story of the big fight at the old Crabby Jack’s and how it led me on the path to find Tai Chi and my initial joy and excitement upon my discovery of this ancient Chinese treasure!

Later on, I will bring up other articles about the other little golden nuggets inside the world of Tai Chi! But for now, this is just a little story to open the topic. Let’s dive into this together and find out how you can benefit from all the wonders of Tai Chi and make your life sparkle!

Xie xie

Todd~