Jim Anderson is a former collegiate wrestler who went to “the” Ohio State University, and still coaches at the high school level.
He’s 69 and still strong as an ox, and in the past, before learning tai chi, he sometimes felt as immobile as one, especially when I demonstrated on him.
Jim travels to see me four times per year with a group of others who always want more in-depth hands-on instruction. Quite often, when I demo a technique, Jim asks to see it once again, and by now he knows what this means. I will show it again, on him, and more than one more time. That’s because I love to practice.
Last month when Jim was in town, I showed him how to put more lightning and thunder into a move, without any external effort. He put his hands on my shoulders, as though we were going to wrestle, and I snapped his arms so hard with a light touch that his head rattled, his spine went haywire and he staggered to find his footing.
“Could you show that to me again,” Jim asked, with a crooked smile and curious laugh.
“Why certainly,” I said.
This time the inner whipping motion was even quicker and more forceful. It not only caught Jim by surprise, but me, too. My index finger banged on my thigh and cracked. Thought I broke it, but I continued as though nothing had happened.
Over the next couple days my index finger turned brown, then blackish purple. Jim couldn’t care, neither more nor less, I’m sure. And if he knew he’d probably be thinking, that’s what you get for whipping me around.
People often wonder, how can you be forceful with a light touch? These people think you exert more force when you flex your muscles as hard as you can, but that is not the secret.
The more you muscle up by flexing your muscles, the more your body resembles a piece of wooden furniture. You are not only as stiff as wood, you are also much easier to move. But 200 pounds of relaxed goo, you’d have to put it in a stiff container to move it.
Consider an athlete who is swinging a club, racquet or bat of some kind. The athlete with the smooth, effortless swing is the one who has access to the greater power. The athlete who “muscles up” is stiff, robotic and almost useless.
And so it is with my Badass Tai Chi and Warrior Walking courses. To make the greatest strides, you relax and let your body do what it can only do when you’re not “trying.”
Trying is dying within.
It’s cutting yourself off from what is natural, from what flows when you stop overdoing it.
This is why you don’t try harder – and if you insist on trying, you put yourself through an unnecessary trial.
The key is effortless effort.
You do without “trying” to do. You bid adieu to the overdo.
Want more doing without trying? Want more oomph as you triumph? Then click the links at the bottom of this page.
Matt Furey
