What is TAI CHI CHUAN / CH'I KUNG?
Motional therapy - Meditation – Defense system

Tai Chi Chuan is a motional art with a history of thousands of years, which has been developed by Taoist monks. Today it represents the most thorough physical education, because it contains the three “main arts” of the Chinese culture: medicine, philosophy and martial art.
Tai Chi Chuan is based on the practical application of YIN-YANG. The flow of the movements has been modulated in a way, that even the smallest part of the body experience a natural and balanced movement. The use of Tai Chi Chuan as martial art has today not anymore its original meaning.

Ch'i Kung means exercise with purpose to raise and channel the life energy ( ch'i ) in the body. In China it has been applied for at least 3.000 years for psychosomatic strengthening and harmonization. Today it is a stable part of the Chinese health schedule.
Ch'i Kung is an integral method for the regulation of the stance of the body, the breath and the psyche, and it takes action through the combination of relaxation and movement. The circulation and the feed of the organs with blood and oxygen improves, the bones become more compact, the joints more pliable.

Tai Chi/Ch'i Kung intends the practical application of the principles of Tai Chi Chuan and Ch'i Kung and perfection in the movement. The exercise leads to the unification and synchronization of body, soul and mind.
Tai Chi/Ch'i Kung leads to body consciousness, offers relaxation, breath education, psychosomatic therapy, and it is a benignant kind of defense, just as motional meditation. The accumulation of Ch'i, which results from the exercise and the procedures connected with it, starts with an improvement of the physical condition and leads to the harmonization of the entire man. Body, soul and mind become more resistant to attacks of diseases and annoyances of various kinds.
The daily, especially morning exercise, enables man to handle better the difficulties which are presented by the life, the work and the human relations.

" Whoever habitually spars in Tai Chi Chuan
gets the flexibility of a little child,
the health of a woodchopper
and the calmness of a sage."

( Chinese dictum )

The structure of the lessons
The lesson consists in two parts:The first part includes Ch'i Kung of different kinds. Ch'i Kung prepares the learner for the second and main part of the lesson, the teaching of the long Yang style form with it’s circular, slowly transforming movements.

The motional flow of the form contains 108 figures and is assorted in three parts. The learning of the entire form takes approximately one and a half year in the weekly lesson. Hereafter several degrees of close examination follow, like the yin-yang-form, the ch´i-form, the central move-form etc. As a playing introduction to the self defense come the partner exercises "Push-hands".

The teacher.
SPYROS D. EMMANOUIL has studied in the years between 1989 and 1997 the classical Yang style TAI CHI CHUAN / CH'I KUNG at the school of PING LIONG TJOA (ITCCA) in Stuttgart. He was personally instructed by PING LIONG TJOA to be teacher in his school, where he teached for four years. He has been three times successfully examined by master King Hu Chu, the leader of the International Tai Chi Ch´uan Association (ITCCA), with seat in London.