Taijiquan = supreme ultimate fist
Toyohari = East Asian needling technique

Two seemingly contractory aspects are involved in practicing Taiji forms and needling in Toyohari Japanese Acupuncture, Sung or relaxation and Yi or engaged awareness. How to be aware and relaxed simultaneously?

I started learning Taiji with James Drewe in 1994 and in the introductory class we did an exercise called ‘Unbendable Arm’. Working in pairs, one person places the wrist on their partner’s shoulder and at an agreed time the partner gradually presses down on the elbow with interlocked hands until it bends. The process is then repeated, but this time the person who has their arm outstretched focuses on the arm and visualises energy, as smoke, steam, water, fire, being transmitted out of their fingers and directed at a wall or object in the distance. This time the partner will find it difficult if not impossible to bend their arm. (NB***only practice this exercise in a supervised class!).

This demonstrates the power of Yi or intent and illustrates the Taiji adage ‘where the mind goes, the Qi follows’.

Fast forward almost 30 years of becoming a Taiji teacher, studying on a four-year masters degree in Acupuncture at London South Bank University, culminating in an immersive 5-month clinical placement at Heilongjiang University for Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) in Harbin in 2012, a postgraduate course in Toyohari Japanese Acupuncture 5 years later and finally in March 2022 starting the advanced training program comprising four intense weekends over two years in Amsterdam.

Unaware of what led me here (maybe it was the Dao), the last weekend in Amsterdam resulted in a light bulb moment. The same process of developing intention, attention and then awareness in Taiji is the same as that required in acupuncture. When you learn a Taiji form you use intention. The mind is very focussed on each new move. Then as you develop as a student you can soften to pay attention to your practice and finally once the forms become internalised you are able to relax the mind as well as the body and experience the flow of awarenes.

Acupuncture is all about Qi. It is using a needle (inserted or on the surface) or moxibustion (mugwort cones burnt above the skin) to guide Qi through these channels to restore order or balance and health. In order to guide the Qi the practitioner needs to have the Yi (mind intention or focus) and also Sung (relaxation).

The sensation of De Qi which has been misconstrued as the tingling often painful feeling when the acupuncturist ‘twiddles’ the needle should, according to the classics, be felt by the practioner, not the patient.

He (the practitioner) concentrates the intention and unifies the spirit and refines the division of qi; he does not hear human voices in order to gather their (the patients’) essence and unify their spirit; he commands the intent into the needle
(Lingshu 9, transl Vivien Lo)

“The practice of this art (Taiji) is based on sinking the qi to the dantian and moving solely with the Shen (spirit)” Miguel Angel Cabrer Mir lecturer on the advanced practitioner course in Amsterdam

Staying true to the Classics
The Huangdi Neijing or Yellow Emperor’s Canon of Internal Medicine is the source or seminal text of Chinese Acupuncture. It comprises the Suwen or Basic Questions and the Lingshu or Heavenly Pivot. These discussions between the Yellow Emperor and his physician and also Qi Bo, a courtesan, on ways to maintain health, detail the meridian system and organs as well as offer advice on living with the seasons, what to eat, exercise etc.

In modern times, although I would not expect the NHS to take counsel from the emperor’s courtesan, these pearls of wisdom on Yangsheng or nourishing life can definitely be of use today. Only in 2016 did the NHS remove McDonald’s from one London hospital. There has also been a gradual increase in the implemention of hydrotherapy, physiotherapy and even Alexander Technique for pain management.

NICE (National Institute for Health and Care Excellence) was set up by the Government in 1999. Its aim was to decide which drugs and treatments are available on the NHS in England. Its guidelines recommend Acupuncture for chronic pain, chronic tension-type headaches and migraines. My hope is that they will one day understand the importance of ‘tradition’ and the source or the ‘classics’ in Acupuncture. Merely adopting the tools without mastery of a complete system of medicine and learning skills or Yi required to diagnose patients and perform the needling techniques to guide the Qi and restore health, seems to be (excusing the pun) missing the point of the needle.