Tuishou in Southern France
Near the love village of Monestiés, is a charming little retreat centre run by people who are so nice that even the wild animals come to them for help. Jean-Jacques and Annie, the marvelous hosts of Maraval, are well known to the tai chi communities in this part of the world.
Jean-Jacques' cachet got an added boost when one of my students arrived for the workshop, having only heard of the Chen style tai chi expert, to find the impressive Mr. Galinier casually greeting arrivals with a raven perched on his head like a wizard's familiar.
This is my second time teaching at this centre, and my third time in the region. Three years ago I wisely accepted an invitation to a school in Albi, and the friends I made there have improved the quality of my life, my teaching, and my tai chi.
While there were students enrolled from other countries, most were from France. I tried to learn more French for this trip, and while I did not make the linguistic progress I would have wished, I was able to make things a bit easier for the volunteer translators than last year. I am already booked for next year, and hope to be fully fluent by then.
This workshop was orginally intended to cover more of the tai chi tuishou curriculum, but an interesting thing happened.
There was some variation in the level of skill amongst the students. But, they were all somewhat experienced, and had good basics. Paradoxically, this meant that I was able to focus on fundamentals more than usual.
With workshops, especially with beginners or people who have only practised other martial arts than tai chi, there is a common trend to add more material, more exercises, or more forms, with the expectation that people will go back to their own schools and practise. But with tuishou, this doesn't works out so well.
Tuishou needs the right kind of training partner. It needs people who know the difference between improving your skill and merely proving your skill. Tuishou practice requires a partner who understands the fundamentals, and whose goal is to improve your skill, while yours is to improve theirs.
When people treat tuishou practice like a tuishou competition, no real progress can be made.
With the students in this workshop, everyone was eager to learn how to make the practice work, and were willing to cooperate in a way that raised everyone's skill level. This meant that everyone was skilled enough that I could teach them from the beginning. I didn't need to entertain them with demonstrations of advanced techniques. We could just focus on getting better at the things that really matter.
I was able to cross hands with everyone and could feel the tangible changes as understanding dawned for each person.
It was glorious.
I look forward to going back next year.
Samedi 26 juin - mercredi 30 juin, 2027