Demonstration at World Tai Chi Day

Monroe — Many have seen the commercials of people doing the slow, flowing exercises known as tai chi. Or they have seen news clippings of groups of people in China getting together in the parks to do tai chi. World Tai Chi Day in New York City, on Saturday, April 29, was a chance for people to discover the many forms now available in the area. Instructors and students from over thirty-four clubs participated in the event in the East Meadow of Central Park. The morning program began with each group doing their own set for a half hour, followed by over 50 demonstrations. One of the demonstrators was Daryl Bailin of Monroe, who has been teaching tai chi in the area for over 20 years. What she offered was an innovation, expanding the range of tai chi to people with disabilities. It was a sequence of moves, done in a chair, designed for those who cannot use their lower body, either through disability, weakness or poor balance. The set was an adaptation of a style, the Lok Up Ba Fa form, which she had developed while working with a student with polio. Bailin generally teaches the more common Yang form, along with the simple, repetitive exercises of chi kung. She presently offers classes in Chester, Harriman, Middletown and Goshen. When she tried the sitting Lok Up form out on a few of her more able-bodied students, they found the exercise, with its focus on the upper body, to be very effective at opening up the lungs and feeling the chi energy. And for Bailin, that is what tai chi is all about - learning to feel chi, the electro-magnetic flow of energy that sustains the body and mind. Discovering this has profound implications for each practitioner, and it is what makes tai chi so powerful, to not only relax the body, but calm the mind and restore the spirit as well. Instruction on the sitting Lok Up form will be offered at 11:15 a.m. on Saturdays, beginning May 6, at the Chester Town Hall on King’s Highway. For information about this or other classes, call 782-3849.