Finding Balance

Inside Kung-Fu
“Finding Balance”
By Addy Hernandez
February 2008
Pg. 24

I have been a business partner and student of Joseph Simonet’s for about 14 years. It has been an amazing delight and a daunting challenge to keep up with his energy and creative mind. Joseph has explosive motor skills, coupled with an innovative mind. I’ll never have his size, speed or strength. However, I am developing physically, spiritually, intellectually and creatively on my own.
As a female martial artist, it is up to me to extract and discern the value of the lessons I am taught. It is my choice and/or decision to understand that Joseph, as well as other influential people in my life, are my guides not my guardians. It is through my eyes, and my eyes alone, through which I view the world.
I choose to be the perpetual student. I maintain an insatiable appetite to grow and become an evolved woman/person. My fields of interest are endless: martial arts, cooking, running, gardening, pottery, reading, collecting wine, business, teaching and herbology.
I have met a lot of high achievers in my life. However, many seem to be out of balance and out of sync with those around them, as though they have sacrificed love, serenity and the simple things in life for money or places of high social rank. To me, the key to a life of harmony is one of balance.
Finding balance and peace in one’s life is all about making the right choices. I am convinced that I can make positive choices, which will almost always produce harmonious results. Certainly, life confronts us with many challenges and sometimes seemingly insurmountable obstacles. I am, however, a believer in the old adage, “chance favors the prepared mind.”
One of the ways in which I prepare is a combination-training program I have personally developed called, “Yo Qigong.” This is an abbreviated term, which combines yoga, tai chi and qigong.
I have been developing and teaching Yo Qigong for about 10 years. I do not have any official certification in yoga. However, I have learned from books, DVD’s and by attending yoga classes. Whenever I travel, I always seek out a yoga class. I am always open to new experiences and methods of teaching and learning. From San Francisco to New York, Toronto to Shanghai, I have experienced a wide variety of yoga practices and ideas. Every yoga class I attend sheds new light and perspective, which then enriches my personal yoga growth.
One of my first martial arts lessons as a 17-year-old schoolgirl was in Yang-style long-form tai chi. My teacher, Joseph—yes, that Joseph—started me on my lifetime path of Chinese internal arts. One of Joseph’s first points to me as a beginning tai chi practitioner was that it takes about 20 years of internal training to begin to understand the value and way of the art.
I was intimidated and humbled by Joseph’s words. However, it also galvanized my resolve to learn, practice and live the way of tai chi. I have been practicing Yang style for about 14 years, with a lifetime to go.
Joseph learned the long form from John Candea in Manitou Springs, Colo. Mr. Candea was a doctor of acupuncture and herbology. Joseph always felt privileged to have Mr. Candea for his first instructor. I say “first” because Joseph has ought out many tai chi and qigong instructor over the years.
Perhaps the most notable of internal teachers Joseph learned form was master Gao Fu. It was summer 1994 when Joseph trained with Gao Fu privately in Seattle, Wash. Joseph’s eyes always sparkle brightly as he recalls lessons he learned from her. He refers to her as “living light.” Gao Fu died in 2005. And though I never met her, I swear I feel her spirit move through me as I practice my tai chi.
When teaching my Yo Qigong, I alternate yoga positions and tai chi flow with natural patterns of spontaneity and organic feel. Depending on the energy of the students, each class is like its own entity – unique and full. Some aspect of yoga, tai chi and qigong is represented at every class. All these arts are energy-cultivating activities, with a combination of harmony and vitality emerging form our efforts.
I am only a beginner, one barely scratching the surface of such ancient and holy disciplines. It is with my deepest love, respect and humility I open my heart to the universe. To those over-achievers whose life seems to be out of balance, try yoga, tai chi or qigong classes and discover the harmonious and balanced life awaiting you.