In seeking to harness the health-giving aspects of tai chi and to share them with the masses, the Chinese government broke the back of the art.
If only they had called their new art something else entirely...

To name the 24 step 'tai chi' is a sad joke.
To equate modern competition forms with the art of Yang-the-invincible is outrageous and sadly absurd.

Why did the Chinese destroy tai chi?
This is a great mystery.

Was it deliberate?
Do they even realise what they have done?

Tai chi was once vaunted as being the greatest system of kung fu in China.
Yet 150 years later and the art lies in ruins.

You can see a student slowly begin to understand.
The confusion fades and they become more confident.
Connections and associations are made without prompting.
There is an inevitable humility.

The student starts to respect the art and gains some inkling of what the instructor is seeking to do.
They see these charlatans teachers with limited experience and no depth, and the student becomes contemptuous; finally recognising the lack, the shallowness evident in so many modern expressions of the art.

The beginner is daunted by what they can see of the syllabus.
Yet, how much more would they be cowed if they understood the true nature of all that work?

In hindsight, the syllabus seems less complex, the various stages necessary and obvious.

Yes, there is much to learn.
So much more than you may imagine.
But not as much as you may choose to learn.

You eventually reach a point where you have enough form, exercises and drills.
Then, you turn inward and really figure them out.

Only the more shallow exponent continues to reach outward in the hope of answers.