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New Instructors Graduation Ceremony Address

given by Master Heg Robinson

Welcome to the first graduation ceremony for teacher certification from the Roxbury Tai Chi Academy. This is a momentous occasion, representing hard work and determination. Since we have members of the community here as well as the graduates, I want to use this opportunity to plant some seeds that, if properly nourished, will reap grand benefits.

I'm going to start by giving you an overview of the Academy, which includes the history, mission, and operation.Secondly, I will share with you the significance of what these graduates have accomplished, and share with the graduates my vision of how they will impact the community through their teachings.And last, I'm going to share my vision of what the Roxbury Tai Chi Academy will mean to this community going forward.

The Roxbury Tai Chi Academy began as part of The Innovative Learning & Training Center.We practiced in one room in the Center's building. Later, this center closed and moved south under a different name.It was then that the Roxbury Tai Chi Academy was born.Our official start was in 1973 with the mission of teaching Tai Chi, Qi Gong, and other holistic approaches for the maintenance of sound health.We are a private organization and receive no outside funding.We exist solely through memberships and community workshops.We welcome all people—seniors, youth, and all in between—from all communities.

One unique part of our mission at The Roxbury Tai Chi Academy is our holistic approach for health maintenance.Let me explain what I mean by that.The body consists of different systems, such as the respiratory system, the vascular system, the nervous system, and so on, but these systems do not work in isolation.They are interdependent, so if you do something to affect one, it will have effects on the others.As human beings, we also have minds that affect the body, and vice versa.Take being obese, for instance.Why is obesity referred to as the number one health problem facing Americans? One major reason is that being obese means your heart has to work much harder.When your heart works harder over an extended period of time, this leads to chronic high blood pressure, which has a cascading effect on your health, from kidney and eye disease, to strokes or heart attacks.Now if you go to the doctor and she finds that your blood pressure is elevated, the first thing she's going to tell you is to lose weight.You lose thirty pounds, and like magic, your blood pressure goes down, and other medical problems you've been having disappear as well.

Now we get to the part the mind plays.Any of you who have tried to lose weight knows how hard it is.Not because the body won't respond when you give it the right mix of calories, nutrients, and exercise, because it will.You also have to affect the mind, or the will, so that when you get the urge for a thick slice of moist pound cake, you can make a different choice.Or when you come home from work and you just want to sit in front of the tv, if your mind is properly conditioned, it will get you up and moving.Just giving you a prescription for what to eat will not work for most people.Most people will need strategies for training the mind.That is what I mean by holistic, or bringing together the body and the mind, as opposed to focusing only on individual parts.If you practice Tai Chi and Qi Gong on a regular basis, you will develop mentally as well as physically.And your whole family can come and enjoy the activities together.

I want to shift focus and speak to the graduates.When I give you your certificate, it means I am certifying you to go out and teach, the way my teacher, Grand Master Chu, sent me out.By going through this certification process, you have demonstrated that you have the discipline to be a teacher.Every Sunday, from 10 a.m. until noon, no matter the rain, cold, snow, extreme heat, for three years you came.The training was intense, and all of you did internships on top of that.All of that took commitment.Your next challenge—to go out and spread Tai Chi—also takes commitment.I challenge you to teach Tai Chi to anyone who will accept it, particularly people in the African-American and Hispanic communities, who can benefit most from the health-giving aspects of Tai Chi.

If you commit to teaching Tai Chi, you will be rewarded, but not necessarily with a lot of money.I do Tai Chi because it is my life's purpose, my destiny.Tai Chi has made me a rich man, not financially, but rich in that I can make a living doing something that gives me joy, the richness that comes with excellent health and the ability to heal others, and the richness of friends who are always willing to help me in whatever way I need.

Being a committed Tai Chi instructor does not mean you need ten to twenty students.Remember that the first student is you.If you go somewhere to teach, and no one else shows up, just start doing Tai Chi.I guarantee there will come a day when the students do show up, and if you've been practicing all along, you will be ready to teach them.Not only that, your chi will have become stronger, because in Tai Chi, you never arrive.You can cultivate chi until you breathe your last breath. So commit to teaching for life, whether to your family or a large group.By so doing , you will pass this art on.

You can teach Tai Chi to anyone.Tai Chi as an art has an internal focus.It finds you where you are, and so your challenge is not to be better than someone else.You want students, not with abilities, but with inabilities.Teach the most difficult students.Giving someone the same lesson one thousand times should be a joy.

One caveat—never teach for free.That doesn't mean you turn down a student that has a legitimate need.If you can't find any other way for this student to pay, then give them the hardest task you can find.It could be meeting very early morning, or having the student do the most difficult moves over and over.But only by paying in some way will the person truly benefit.

Before closing, I want to share my vision for the Roxbury Tai Chi Academy as it relates to this community.When people think about Tai Chi, they think Chinese, and they certainly don't visualize a group of African-Americans in a park early in the morning moving in sync with the postures of the Tai Chi dance.My vision is to change that thinking.For instance, we're here at the Reggie Lewis Center, and we're proud of this great institution in our community.This center is named after the Celtic's basketball player.When we think basketball, we automatically picture a black man.

There's another famous Reginald Lewis.Reginald F. Lewis, who was the owner of Beatrice Foods before he died in 1993.When you read the business sections of newspapers and see stories on mergers and acquisitions, you likely picture a bunch of white guys.But here was a black man who in 1987 completed the largest off-shore leveraged buyout at that time.This man dared to be a player in areas where he wasn't “supposed” to be, so young black men could look to him and dare to do similar things.

I dared to become a Tai Chi Master. My vision is that the Roxbury Tai Chi Academy will break down similar mental barriers when this community proudly displays the fact that we have in our midst a black man with over forty years experience in the art, who loves to teach, and who is expanding Tai Chi in the black community through these new teachers. You should value and embrace the Roxbury Tai Chi Academy because it will give back much in return. Teachers, you are the seeds that I've planted. Go out and plant some of your own, because one seed can yield a thousand crops. The Roxbury Tai Chi Academy will be here to provide nourishment throughout.