Lunarfest Connects Body And Mind

Shirley Chock stood in the upstairs ballroom of the New Haven Museum, her hands poised as if cradling a ball. In front of her, a few dozen people were doing the same. She smiled.

“Everyone is trying too hard,” she said. A ripple of appreciative laughter flowed through the room. ​“Your body is not just letting it happen.” She paused. ​“Tai chi tells your brain to stop getting in the way of the moment…. It’s not about trying to make these movements happen. We’re actually trying to not move at all. We’re moving through stillness.”

Chock, shifu and co-owner of Aiping Tai Chi Center in Orange, had brought a demonstration of the martial art to the New Haven Museum for Lunarfest, the annual celebration of the new year put together by the Yale-China Association.

From 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., the festivities ranged from a lion and dragon parade up Whitney Avenue, a concert and instrument demonstration, calligraphy, a workshop on Chinese film, a shadow puppet show, and traditional dance, taking place from the Ely Center of Contemporary Art to Neighborhood Music School to Harkness Hall. Both the New Haven Museum and the Aiping Tai Chi Center have been participants in Lunarfest since it began in 2012, and from the full room that greeted Chock and other practitioners at Aiping for their demonstration, it was clear that momentum for the annual event was only growing.

Chock began by doing a quick solo demonstration, her limbs moving with a deliberation and fluidity that the audience found mesmerizing. They applauded when she finished, then heard what she had to say.

“Everyone thinks of tai chi as gentle meditation, but there is a martial arts aspect to it that makes it true to Chinese culture,” she said. Tai chi can trace its roots back thousands of years, she explained, and was connected to Chinese medicine; you practiced it so ​“you have a strong body on the inside and outside,” she said.

A group of practitioners then performed their own demonstration. Following that Chock and another Aiping representative showed how the movements in the routine could translate to martial arts. But the main attraction for the audience, apparently, was the chance to try tai chi for themselves. When Chock asked if anyone would like to be guided through a few of the basic movements, everyone got to their feet.

From Body To Mind

The Aiping Tai Chi Center was founded in 1996 by Aiping Cheng, a grandmaster of tai chi who had come to Connecticut from China after marrying an American in China and moving with him here. She taught both tai chi and kung fu. Chock moved from New York City to Connecticut in 2001. Already a mixed martial artist, she ​“visited every single school” in the area and connected with Aiping Cheng. She began studying kung fu, but then tore her ACL. She turned to tai chi as part of her recovery.

“It was supposed to be temporary but then I fell in love with it,” Chock said. ​“It’s actually more challenging than any other martial art because there is such a depth to it.” She continued her study, and continued improving and deepening her knowledge. In 2017 Aiping Cheng moved to Austin, Tex., and Chock and partner Jonas Karosas took over as co-owners of the center.

“In tai chi, when you can do the form without thinking about it, that’s when you can start doing the form,” she added. The depth, Chock said, came not only from the explicit connection of the body and the mind, but from the way she found herself able to apply the lessons of tai chi to other aspects of her life.

“There’s a whole philosophy of conflict management and change engagement” attached to the discipline, Chock said. Rather than meeting force with force, or expending energy to match someone else’s energy, tai chi was encouraging Chock to ​“redirect and resend only whatever the other person is giving you,” she said. ​“When that person doesn’t have that tension” — created by meeting force with force — ​“the conflict can just dissipate.”

“When you practice this physically,” she added, ​“it affects how you approach things that are not physical.”

Fluidity

Chock first explained that in practicing the routines she was demonstrating, it was about ​“how to let the breath lead the movement.” It was also about body awareness. ​“As we get older, we become more asymmetrical,” Chock said. The movements were intended to ​“help get that center back.”

She began with a few steps that got the participants to straighten their spinal columns. She then guided them through slow arm movements, reaching up overhead and bringing the arms back down again. ​“Quiet your head,” she said. ​“Let yourself center.”

Chock then moved into a series of motions that started with the hands close together and slowly widened the distance. ​“Imagine the ceiling is coming down and you need to hold it up” with one hand, she said. ​“Imagine the floor is coming up and you need to hold it down” with the other, she added. These were movements intended to build strength and health. The next set of movements was intended to ​“turn that into power.”

But it was a power deployed not through direct force, but by tapping into something already moving around you. ​“You’re a ball,” she said, ​“that can change and move in any direction at any moment,” the way the ​“wind moves — how forces move in the universe.”

To practice the idea, both physically and mentally, she had the participants use one hand to guide the other from about waist height to about chin height. ​“Your left hand is going to move your right hand up to your chest. Your right hand is not going to do anything.” Then, she had the participants take the leap, and move the same arm in the same way — this time without the other hand guiding it.

“Feel the support in your arm. No tension,” she said. ​“It’s like something else is moving your arm up to your chest.”

She went through the exercises again. Then asked the participants how it felt — particularly doing it the second time versus the first time.

“More fluid,” said one participant. ​“You helped us understand.”

“I was thinking it would be wonderful if everything moved this slowly, not like a rocket,” said another participant. ​“To calm down and focus on life.”

A practicing Muslim, she explained that the Qu’ran had a hadith instructing those seeking more wisdom to look to China. ​“We need to pause,” she said. ​“We need to slow down.”

Chock explained further how tai chi connected the physical to the mental. Straightening your spine, for example, allowed you to ​“lengthen your breathing, and slow down your heart rate.” Then, she said, you could ​“quiet your mind.” Relaxing your body was the first step in relaxing your thoughts. ​“Your mind and your body are so connected,” she said.