What is Chen Style Tai Chi?

I have been practicing Chen style tai chi since 1969. Fifty seven years of daily study, research, and practice under some of the world’s greatest masters, including Grandmaster Wang Xi’an of Chenjiagou (Chen Family Village – the historical birthplace of tai chi). In that time, I have watched this ancient art transform thousands of lives, including my own. If you are asking what Chen style tai chi is, you are asking the right question, because understanding what it truly is will change how you think about health, movement, and the potential of the human body.

Chen style taijiquan (also written tai chi chuan aka tai chi),  is the original form of tai chi. All other styles of tai chi practiced in the world today, including Yang, Wu, Sun, and Hao, trace their roots directly back to Chen style. It is a complete martial art, a sophisticated health practice, and a profound philosophical system, all contained within a single, elegant body of knowledge passed down through generations of the Chen family in Chenjiagou, Henan Province, China.

What makes Chen style unique is not just its age or its lineage. It is three core principles at the heart of its practice – principles that, once understood and embodied, produce results that no other exercise system can match.

The Origins of Chen Style Tai Chi

Chen style tai chi was created by General Chen Wangting (1580–1660), a military commander and martial artist from Chenjiagou, a small farming community in Henan Province, northern central China. General Chen was not simply a fighter. He was a scholar of traditional Chinese medicine, Taoist philosophy, and the I Ching. He synthesized all of this knowledge about the family martial art, the medical theory of qi and meridians, and the philosophical concept of yin and yang, into a single unified system of movement.

The name itself tells you everything. Tai chi chuan translates as “Grand Ultimate Fist.” Tai chi, the Grand Ultimate, refers to the dynamic balance of yin and yang, the two complementary forces that underlie all existence in traditional Chinese thought. Chuan (quan) means fist, or martial art. So tai chi chuan is literally the martial art of the Grand Ultimate, a system of movement and self-cultivation based on the universal principle of balance.

For generations, this art was kept strictly within the Chen family in the village. It was a closely guarded family treasure, taught only to family members and trusted students. Eventually, a lineage master named Chen Changxing taught an outsider named Yang Luchan, who went on to develop Yang style tai chi and bring the art to the wider world. From there, tai chi spread globally, evolving into the many styles practiced today.

But the original remains. Chen style tai chi is still practiced today in Chenjiagou, and is passed down via each generation’s  lineage masters. This includes Grandmaster Wang Xi’an, with whom I have had the great honor of studying. It is the root from which all tai chi grew.

The 3 Unique Principles of Chen Style Tai Chi

Every style of tai chi shares some basic characteristics – slow movement, deep breathing, a focus on relaxation. But Chen style is defined by three unique principles that set it apart from every other system of movement in the world. These are not abstract philosophical ideas. They are practical, physical skills that you develop through daily practice. Sometimes referred to as the “Three Pillars of Tai Chi”, they are:

1. Use Intention to Guide Movement, Not Muscle Strength

In Chen style tai chi, the mind leads and the body follows. Specifically, your intention (yi) directs your qi, (vital energy), and your qi moves your body. This is the opposite of how most people move. Most physical training is about building muscle and using that muscle to force movement. In tai chi, you learn to “let go” of that approach entirely.

This does not mean the practice is weak. On the contrary, movement driven by intention and qi is far more powerful and efficient than movement driven by muscular force alone. A beginner cannot feel this. With practice, it becomes the most obvious thing in the world. Every master I have ever trained with, including Grandmaster Wang Xi’an, demonstrates a quality of power that cannot be explained by muscle mass alone. This is intention at work.

2. “Letting Go” – Complete Relaxation of Body and Mind

The second principle is letting go, what the Chinese call “fangsong”. This means releasing every bit of tension from your body and your mind. Not just physical tension in the muscles, but the habitual bracing, gripping, and holding that most of us carry without even knowing it.

This is the most difficult principle to master and the one that takes the longest. When you begin tai chi, you are what we call “ten parts yang, zero parts yin” – all tension, no softness. The entire journey of Chen style practice is the gradual process of letting that tension go, layer by layer, year by year. The goal is to reach a state of what I call “full relaxation”, in which every joint is open, every muscle is at ease, and your body moves with the effortless flow of water.

This quality of deep relaxation is why tai chi produces such profound health benefits. Tension is the root of most chronic pain, poor circulation, and accelerated aging. When you learn to truly let go, the body begins to heal itself.

3. Silk Reeling – The Characteristic Movement of Chen Style

Silk reeling (“chan si jin” in Chinese), is the physical hallmark of Chen style tai chi. It refers to the continuous, spiraling, whole-body movement that flows through every posture and transition in the Chen tai chi form. The name comes from the movement of unwinding silk from a cocoon: continuous, smooth, connected, and flowing in one unbroken thread from the feet through the legs, waist, spine, arms, and fingers.

This spiraling quality is what gives Chen style its distinctive look, and its extraordinary power. When silk reeling is correctly developed, the entire body moves as one integrated unit. No part moves independently. The power generated from the ground travels through every joint in sequence, amplifying at each stage, until it expresses itself in the hands. This is the internal explosive power, or “fajin”, that Chen style practitioners develop over years of practice.

Silk reeling is also the most therapeutically powerful aspect of Chen style for health. The continuous gentle rotation of every joint in the body – hips, spine, shoulders, wrists, ankles – acts like an internal massage, improving circulation, lubricating joints, and releasing deep chronic tension that no external therapy can reach.

The 3 Requirements to Learn Chen Style Tai Chi

Knowing what Chen style tai chi is and actually learning it are two very different things. In my 57 years of practice and teaching, I have found that there are three non-negotiable requirements for real progress.

1. Find a Qualified Teacher

This is the most important and most difficult requirement. There are very few genuinely qualified Chen style teachers in the world – people who have trained deeply enough, for long enough, under authentic masters, to transmit not just the external shapes of the movements, but the internal principles that give them life.

I say this not to discourage you, but to protect you. Learning the external shapes of tai chi from an unqualified teacher is far better than nothing. But it will not give you access to the deeper practice, ie – the intention, the fangsong, the silk reeling – without someone who embodies those qualities themselves. The good news is that the internet has genuinely changed this. High-quality instruction from authentic lineage teachers is now accessible online in a way that was impossible twenty years ago.

2. Daily Practice

Tai chi cannot be learned without daily practice. This is not a preference or a suggestion. It is a requirement of the art. The physical and neurological changes that tai chi produces happen through consistent repetition over time. You cannot compress them into three sessions a week. For most students, somewhere between 30 minutes and 2 hours of daily practice is the range. Even 20 minutes of focused, daily practice will produce results that two hours three times a week cannot match.

I have practiced every single day since 1969. I have never once regretted it. Every day I practice, I learn something new. That is the nature of a lifetime art.

3. Patience and Perseverance

Chen style tai chi is not a 10-week program. It is a lifetime study. This is not a warning, but rather it is the greatest thing about it. Because a practice that deepens and rewards you more with every passing year, that grows richer as you age rather than diminishing, that gives you more at 70 than it did at 30 – that is a rare and extraordinary thing to find in any area of life.

Patience means accepting that the benefits come in their own time and cannot be forced. Perseverance means showing up every day regardless of how you feel. These two qualities, built through the practice itself, tend to transform everything else in a practitioner’s life as well.

The 3 Stages of Development in Chen Style Tai Chi

Chen style tai chi has a clear developmental arc that every practitioner moves through over the course of their practice. Understanding these stages helps you know where you are, what to focus on, and what to expect next.

Stage 1 — Shed the External

In the first stage, you learn the external shapes of the movements – the choreography of the form, the basic stances, the direction and sequence of each posture. At this stage, your body is still operating primarily through muscular effort. Your movements look like tai chi but do not yet feel like tai chi from the inside. The goal of Stage 1 is to gradually begin releasing the superficial tension in your body and to memorize the form accurately enough that you can practice it without thinking about what comes next. This stage typically takes one to three years of daily practice.

Stage 2 — Build the Internal

Once the external form is stable, you begin to develop the internal skills – the three pillars working together. Intention starts to genuinely guide your movement. Fangsong deepens and you begin to feel what real relaxation means in the body. Silk reeling starts to connect your movements from the ground up. At this stage, practice begins to feel qualitatively different. There is a sense of flow and integration that was not present before. The health benefits accelerate dramatically in Stage 2 because the internal practice is now genuinely active. This stage unfolds over many years for most practitioners, it is where the majority of their lifetime practice takes place.

Stage 3 — Unify the Internal and External

In Stage 3, the internal skills are sufficiently developed that they can be expressed fully in the external movements of the form. The separation between inside and outside dissolves. Power flows freely. The form becomes an expression of internal cultivation rather than a rehearsed sequence of shapes. This is the stage of mastery — and it is a moving target that deepens without limit. Even at this stage, the practice continues to reveal new layers. Grandmaster Wang Xi’an, at the highest level of the art, told me he still discovers new things every day. That is the nature of a true lifetime practice.

Chen Style Tai Chi Training Methods

Chen style tai chi is a complete training system with multiple components, each serving a specific developmental purpose. A well-rounded Chen style practice includes all of the following.

Foundation Training

Stances, footwork, basic loosening exercises, and silk reeling solo exercises form the foundation of all Chen style practice. These are the building blocks practiced separately before they are integrated into the form. Foundation training is where beginners should spend the majority of their time, and where advanced practitioners return regularly to maintain and deepen their roots.

Wuji Standing — Zhan Zhuang

Standing meditation is one of the most powerful and most underestimated practices in the Chen style curriculum. Wuji standing, or standing in stillness with a quiet mind, cultivates deep relaxation, develops internal awareness, and heals the body at a profound level. I have written extensively about this practice and published a complete book and an online course on the Wuji Standing Method. Many of the most dramatic health transformations I have witnessed in students have come from this single practice alone.

Solo Form Training — Laojia Yilu

The solo form is the heart of Chen style practice. The primary form, Laojia Yilu (Old Frame First Routine), contains 75 movements that encode the entire curriculum of Chen style tai chi. Every principle, every technique, every health benefit is embedded in this single form. I practice Laojia Yilu every day and have done so for decades. In my view, one form practiced deeply for a lifetime is worth far more than many forms practiced superficially.

Weapons Training

Chen style includes training with traditional Chinese weapons – the straight sword (jian), broadsword (dao), spear, long pole, and others. Weapons training is not primarily about combat. It is a powerful tool for developing specific internal skills that are more difficult to access through empty-hand training alone. The extension of awareness and energy through a weapon demands a level of whole-body integration that accelerates internal development significantly.

Push Hands — Tui Shou

Push hands is partner training – the bridge between solo form practice and actual self-defense application. It develops sensitivity to a partner’s energy, the ability to yield and redirect force, rooting, and the expression of internal power in contact. Push hands practice also serves as a live feedback mechanism: it reveals immediately whether your solo form practice is producing genuine internal skill or remaining at the level of external shapes.

Meditation

The sitting and standing meditation practices of Chen style develop the mental qualities that give the physical practice its depth: stillness, focus, internal awareness, and the ability to direct intention with precision. A tai chi practice without a meditation component will plateau at the level of physical exercise. With it, the practice becomes genuine internal cultivation.

The Health Benefits of Chen Style Tai Chi

The research on tai chi and health is substantial and growing. Harvard Medical School, the Mayo Clinic, and research institutions around the world have documented tai chi’s effects on an impressive range of health conditions. But as someone who has practiced for over 57 years and worked with students across decades, I can tell you that the research only scratches the surface of what consistent Chen style practice actually produces.

The health benefits of regular Chen style tai chi practice include:

• Stress and anxiety reduction — through direct activation of the parasympathetic nervous system, tai chi shifts the body out of chronic fight-or-flight and into genuine rest and recovery
• Chronic pain relief — particularly for back pain, neck pain, and arthritic joints. The silk reeling movements gently mobilize every joint in the body and restore circulation to chronically tight tissues
• Improved balance and fall prevention — especially significant for older adults. The rooting and proprioceptive training in Chen style develops balance that is qualitatively different from conventional balance exercises
• Cardiovascular health — regular practice lowers blood pressure, improves circulation, and reduces resting heart rate without the stress load of high-intensity exercise
• Joint health and arthritis — the gentle, continuous movement of the silk reeling exercises lubricates joints, increases synovial fluid production, and reverses the degeneration that leads to arthritis
• Sleep quality — the deep relaxation and nervous system regulation produced by daily practice consistently improves sleep quality, often dramatically
• Cognitive function — the combination of focused intention, memorized movement sequences, and meditative awareness provides comprehensive brain training that research increasingly links to reduced cognitive decline
• Immune function — through stress reduction, improved sleep, and enhanced circulation, regular practice strengthens immune response at a systemic level

I want to be honest with you: these benefits do not come from a few weeks of practice. They come from showing up every day, practicing with genuinely full intention, and allowing the art to work on you over time. When that commitment is made, the results are not subtle. They transform the quality of your daily life in ways you will feel in your body, see in your health markers, and recognize in how you move through the world.

Frequently Asked Questions About Chen Style Tai Chi

What is the difference between Chen style and Yang style tai chi?

Chen style is the original form of tai chi. Yang style was developed by Yang Luchan after he learned from Chen family masters in the 19th century. Chen style is characterized by silk reeling, alternating slow and fast movements, and sudden releases of power (fa jin). Yang style simplified and softened these elements, making it more accessible to beginners. Chen style preserves the full depth of the original martial art while also delivering all of its health benefits.

Is Chen style tai chi suitable for beginners?

Yes, with an important qualifier. Chen style is more physically demanding than Yang style in its early stages, and the three pillars require patient, consistent development. Beginners should expect to spend real time on the foundations before the form feels natural. But this investment is exactly what produces the deeper results. I have taught complete beginners throughout my career and watched them develop extraordinary skill over time. The key is finding qualified instruction and committing to daily practice.

How long before I see real benefits from practicing Chen style tai chi?

Most students begin to notice changes in how they feel, ie- reduced tension, better sleep, a calmer nervous system, within the first few weeks of consistent daily practice. More significant structural changes like joint health, chronic pain reduction, and postural improvement, typically become noticeable within three to six months. The practice continues to deepen and deliver new benefits for as long as you continue. At 57+ years in, I am still discovering new dimensions of what it offers.

Can I learn Chen style tai chi online?

Online instruction has genuinely transformed access to authentic Chen style teaching. A great deal can be learned through high-quality video instruction – the external form, the principles, the foundational exercises. The limitation of online learning is the absence of a teacher who can feel your practice and give you direct feedback on your internal development. The ideal combination is consistent online study with periodic in-person training or immersion experiences when possible.

Begin Your Chen Style Tai Chi Journey

If you have read this far, you already sense that Chen style tai chi is something different from what most people mean when they think of tai chi. You are right. This is a complete system of human development – physical, mental, and spiritual – that has been refined over four centuries and transmitted through an unbroken lineage of masters to the present day.

I have dedicated my life to this practice and to sharing it as authentically as possible. Whether you begin with the articles on this site, study through our online instruction, or join us for a course, workshop, or retreat, I welcome you to the journey. It is one that will reward you for the rest of your life.

Explore the articles below to go deeper into the principles and practices of Chen style tai chi, or register for a course or workshop, for those who want to accelerate their development through intensive in-person training.