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T'ai Chi, a 5,000-year-old "slow motion martial art," is a lot more complicated than it sounds.
"Actually, it's not so much a martial art as it is a moving meditation," said Cate Bellafiore, a T'ai Chi instructor and member of The Human Process, an Evanston-based non-profit organization that has been teaching movement and meditation practice in the Chicago area for the past 20 years.
"T'ai Chi is more about centering, clearing the mind, relieving stress and relaxing, as opposed to finding out how to win in a battle or something," Bellafiore said.
The Human Process, affiliated with the T'ai Chi Foundation, an international T'ai Chi organization, will begin its beginner-level T'ai Chi classes January 24 at the Evanston Arts Depot, 600 Main St., a cultural center located in the renovated ticketing offices and waiting rooms of the Main Street Metra Station. Each 10-session course, offered on Tuesdays or Saturdays, costs $150 per student, which also includes a pair of shoes and an illustrated wall chart of the postures. A free introductory lesson will be held Tuesday at 7.pm.
Bellafiore, an Evanston resident, teaches the classes with at least two other apprentices of the Yang-Style Short Form. The style involves 37 different moving postures developed by Chinese Grand Master Cheng Man-Ch'ing and his senior student Patrick Watson, who founded the School of T'ai Chi Chuan in New York
According to The Human Process curriculum, it takes 30 hours to learn the entire seven- to 10-minute series of flowing movements, slow pivots, bent knees, cupped hands and drawn-out stances.
"We're not expecting you to memorize it," said Barbara Martin, a Human Process member and Yang Style apprentice. "We're hoping you embody it."
Literally meaning "supreme ultimate" in Chinese, T'ai Chi is known for its health benefits, resulting from improved relaxation, posture, balance and breathing. It is based on the principle of "relaxed straightness" and meditating on your "dan tian," or "center of gravity," located three inches below your belly button towards your diaphragm, the instructors said.
"T'ai Chi is like a deep internal massage," Martin said. "Daily practice slowly draws us closer to our essential nature."
Traditionally T'ai Chi was considered a highly secretive martial art, passed down through families, from master to apprentice.
"In the Western world, we learn a little bit differently," said Peter Norman, another Human Process instructor. He explained the concept of self-correction, where teachers provide individual feedback to each student to help them improve their postures.
"Stand as though your head is suspended from the heavens above, and your feet and legs are connected to the earth," Norman instructed a class of three students Tuesday night. "Your arms float up, and then come down as though going over a waterfall."
"I feel a little tired," 27-year-old Evanston resident Aaron Bakke said at the end of class. "But it's a good tired; it's a little more relaxed."
Rogers Park resident Duane Dobrowolski, 56, said he increased his sense of self-awareness by taking the introductory class.
"I didn't realize how poor my sense of body was in relation to where I was looking," he said.
Anyone can learn T'ai Chi - all you need is flat shoes, a small open space and the ability to get in touch with your "dan tian." Contact 847-425-9441 for more details.
Reach Erica Schlaikjer at
e-schlaikjer@northwestern.edu.
