Our Methods: 70 Percent Principle

In every subject we teach we encourage you to follow what we call the 70 percent principle. In any exercise that you do with us, you try to practice at seventy percent of your maximum effort, physically, mentally, and emotionally. In this manner you "work" your mind/body system, but you do not stress, strain, or build tension into your system.

Only in unusual situations which demand "peak performance" would you exceed your normal seventy percent practice.

The theory here is that if you avoid tension and stress, your body and mind will relax and open further. So what today is seventy percent for you will become fifty percent tomorrow and your new seventy percent will be at a higher level of performance, but still without strain.

Conversely, if you constantly push yourself to 110 percent, you continuously stress your system. Water-method theory says that your body and mind will close down under that stress and tension, and you will not grow.

Or as Liu Hung Chieh, our teacher's teacher, was fond of saying, "You become what you practice." If you practice stress and tension, you become stress and tension. If you practice relaxation, you become relaxed.

At Brookline Tai Chi, we continually encourage you to take on new challenges and learning, but urge you to "be gentle with yourself" in the process.