Chi Iron Guard

A study of twenty years by Kaiser Permanente, between seventy and eighty-five percent of the disease is caused by stress, meaning that the U.S. alone stress is costing us about one billion dollars per year in health care costs. Since most absenteeism is due to stress, U.S. business loses more than 300 billion dollars per year.

On a more personal level, it is disturbing to realize that aging is accelerated by stress and stress is a question more and more with us. Studies show that change is stressful, even "good" change. So as we computer jockeys settle into the saddle of a new age of rapid information, we need a benefit that can help us stay healthy, sane "younger" and more dynamic, as we are often at the center of the hurricane of modern change, such as maintaining new hardware and software.

Ironically ancient mind / body tool provides a perfect balm for the generation of our modern problems - it is called "Tai Chi" (pronounced tie-chee). T'ai Chi is a series of slight relaxation motions that cleanse the body tissue of accumulated stress and, thereby, enhances all aspects of our health systems. According to new research boosting the immune system dramatically resistance while reducing the incidence of depression, anxiety, and even reducing conditions of chronic pain are just some of the myriad benefits of Tai Chi.

What makes ancient T'ai Chi the perfect modern balm is that it requires no special equipment or clothing, and you do not even break a sweat, meaning you can do so by holding office in a empty boardroom just by kick your heels. Yet it offers the same euphoria of a long term, cardiovascular benefit of moderate impact aerobics, and burns almost as many calories as downhill skiing.

Our time is filled with paradoxes. A problem arises in this modern era of the great promise of the information age - a tidal wave of data created by and offered to our "left brain" and this part of our mind that is analytical, calculating, and categorize the world. Of course, this is an important and powerful that we are. This is the part of the mind that gets things done, pays the rent, manufactured homes, and makes cars. Our "right brain"
However, is left in our rapidly changing world, techno, and this imbalance of thought processes is at the heart of modern stress.

Our right brain is the feeling, smelling, sensing. . .
receiving a portion of the mind. This is the part of the mind that feels the flowers, do not analyze the smell, but to be filled with beautiful - and that's the part that was left in the digital world. When you go to the cyber mall, for example, our right brain is not playing. The Cyber Center is a wonderful thing that saves us time, money and gas for our cars (and thus save the environment), but there's Pretzels Auntie Anne's no smell in cyberspace, or warm sun shone by the large skylights.

So what do we do? We get the best of both worlds. T'ai Chi is a series of exercises to balance the spirit. T'ai Chi teaches us to experience life for pleasure, creating a balance in our busy "get things done yesterday"
world. If you learn Tai Chi and practice in the morning before you sit at your computer, your right brain (the sensing and enjoying brain) will be turned over. You'll feel the texture of your computer keys. Remember to take time to get a good cup of green tea or herbal cinnamon spice, and you interrupt your staccato keyboard occasionally to smell the aroma of tea is rich in the, feel the heat your hands, and breathe the breath of life deeply into your lungs.

While you're at the tip of the INF.