8 Points of Root—A new perspective If you have ever trained Chinese Martial Arts, then you are familiar with Stance training—Horse Stance, Forward stance, Nail Stance, Crane Stance, Empty Stance, Dragon Stance, Snake Stance—to name a few. To gracefully accomplish these while using them to express power requires Root. Let's go beyond Theory. Try This...

功夫 Gong Fu- Time, effort, [energy], with attention to detail. –Grand Master Wang Tian Min and his Honored Student Shifu Ed. When you watch a master of Chinese martial arts (or any discipline) perform their art, what you are seeing is an expression of their Gong—the minutes, hours, days, and years they devoted to honing the details of their art. When a Master expresses their art form, it appears unique, effortless, natural, and is inspiring to the observer.

In a recent online Tai Chi class, an honored new student asked: "How is your style different from other Tai Chi I find online?" A very important question for anyone interested in Tai Chi. It all comes down to lineage and purpose. Martial? Meditation? Both? Read ahead to find out what makes this essential for all of us with the demands of the pandemic reality we face.

People are suffering. Stress is the suspect. Everything bad is stress. Stress makes everything bad. Many avoid stress whenever possible, resign themselves to what they can't avoid, and seek relief whenever possible. It is as if they believe more in the power of stress than they do in the power or energy. People relate to stress like it is the bogeyman of a horror movie and it is out to get them. Given the absence of energy management in the current models of stress management, they are not wrong, and for most people, it plays out like a horror story. I dislike horror movies. I do not enjoy victimization as entertainment. In a horror movie 15 victims run and scatter and the bad guy monster picks them off one by[...]

Our current reality is the sum total of our best thinking and efforts. Unless you have given up completely, you have to be a little dissatisfied. We can collectively do better. If the current models of change were sufficient and efficient to dynamically evolve our problems toward better solutions at an inspiring rate, we would be evolving. They are not bad, some are quite genius, they all contain a fundamental omission: Energy. None of them address the Energy Paradox that fuels the Extraordinary person to Inspire Innovation and Drive Change. Energy—the capacity to do work or

Do you feel tired when you feel happy, fit, or healthy? Do you feel energized when you feel sad, injured, or sick? Have you ever noticed your energy level when you were happy or sad? Healthy or sick? Fit or injured? It is simple, our sense of wellness reflects our energy level. When we have an abundance of energy, we feel great. When we have too little, we feel bad. When life demands more energy than we have to spend or wish to spend, we feel stressed. Most people do not associate the presence of stress with a feeling of wellness. Usually, wellness involves the absence of stress, but as we know, all the vacation in the world cannot free us from stress. Have you ever felt stressed AND well? If you have the[...]