What is the difference between yoga and Tai Chi

The core difference is actually that the underlying cultural logic is completely different - yoga originated from the body-mind spiritual practice system of ancient India, and ultimately points to the connection between the individual and the cosmic consciousness of "the unity of Brahman and self", while Tai Chi was born out of traditional Chinese Taoist guidance techniques and traditional martial arts thoughts.

I have been practicing both intermittently for almost five years. The most intuitive feeling is that the requirements for "strength" between the two are completely opposite. Last time our yoga studio held Tai Chi experience classes and Yin Yoga open classes at the same time, I took both classes, and the contrast was particularly strong. In the yin yoga class, the teacher kept reminding us to "sink into the poses, feel the stretch in the hips, and try to accept it even if it hurts a little." I persisted in pigeon pose for three minutes. When I got up, my legs were numb, and my whole body felt like a refreshing feeling after stretching. When I went to the Tai Chi experience class next door, the teacher's first words stunned me: "Don't exert force. All movements are carried out with the belt. When you raise your hands, it's not the strength of your arms but the air that pushes them up. If you force the movements, it's better not to practice." I followed suit and always thought at first. I had to raise my arms to shoulder height. The teacher came over and touched my shoulders lightly and said, "Loosen it down. It doesn't matter if it's ten centimeters off. It's only when the strength is smooth." After the class, I didn't sweat much, but the tightness in my shoulders and neck that had been tight for several days disappeared silently.

There is quite a quarrel on the Internet nowadays. Some people say that yoga is an IQ tax. Hard concave postures are particularly easy to injure the waist and knees and are not as gentle and safe as Tai Chi. Some people say that Tai Chi is a slow exercise for the elderly and has no effect on young people. In fact, both opinions are quite biased. In the past few years, I have seen an uncle who practiced Tai Chi so hard that he stepped on low poles and bruised his meniscus, and I have also seen office workers who practiced classical yoga with a reliable teacher and had their lumbar disc herniation relieved after practicing for three years. This is not essentially a problem with the program. It is that many commercial classes now have taken both of them astray - yoga has been shaped into a fitness program of "concave difficult postures and quick weight loss", and Tai Chi has been simplified into a slow broadcast exercise, which has long been far away from the original core.

I used to have a friend who was an Internet operator and suffered from severe anxiety and insomnia. The doctor asked her to try mindfulness exercises. When she first started practicing yoga, she couldn’t help but compete with the people next to her to see who had a deeper waist and who had a better straight line. There is also a friend who plays CrossFit. He only uses yin yoga for muscle recovery after a game. He said that the rhythm of Tai Chi is too slow for him and he cannot sit still. The stretching of yoga can accurately target his tense hamstrings and trapezius muscles, making him feel comfortable after every practice.

If you have to use an analogy, yoga is a bit like precise "disassembly and maintenance" of the body. You can clearly feel the tightness of each muscle and the mobility of each joint, and talk to your body bit by bit; Tai Chi is more like a "system upgrade" for the whole person. You don't have to pick whether a certain muscle is tight or not. As long as the energy of the whole person is smooth and the breath is clear, the minor problems of the body will naturally improve.

I still spend 40 minutes on weeknights doing yoga to open my shoulders and loosen my waist. When I have free time on weekends, I go to the park with my dad to play Tai Chi with the elders for half an hour. There are also many friends around me who practice both.