Mastering an Instrument: Does Your Playing Share Soul Energy?

In one of my independent study projects as a graduate student at Rice University, I posed the question: “If two soloists perform the same concerto on two different days with the same orchestra, playing the same right notes at similar tempos and dynamics; why is it that one artist’s performance moves you tears and the other leaves you bored, looking for the exit?

After a whole semester digging through volumes by psychologists, philosophers, aestheticians, musicians, composers and artists, I came across way more opinions than fact, far more conjectures that consensus. But looking back, I see now that an important seed was planted. It led me to my “burning question”; and that led me to Tai Chi Gung.

Through the study and application of Tai Chi Gung, I discovered a simple answer. It makes common sense, and it has served as an incredible creative foundation.  Among other things, it has unlocked creativity. I once wrote, recorded and published a new music piece every day for 225 days.

But I think more important than having creativity “on tap”, it has brought incredible life changes. There is profound inner contentment when your professional life flows from one of your life’s passions. Since discovering “how” inspiring music works, I knew what I wanted more than anything else.

Can I play music and create music with the angels of heaven and know that this is true? Can I experience it directly as I create or play? Can I feel their divine presence with absolute certainty? Can I do this every single time?

In Tai Chi Gung, Lao Tzu discovered a simple formula for health and vitality. Go into Nature. Send Her life energy with sincerity and pure heart. She will return that life force 10 fold, even 100 fold! Master this flow of energy and you will unlock the secret of long life on the earth.  

This going out and coming back forms the flow he called the “Figure 8”. It is the core of one of his fundamental exercises we do in every Tai Chi Gung class. With consistent practice, a student learns to feel this figure 8 as certainly as a child looks up to the sky on a clear, sunny day and sees the color blue.

This communion with Nature, this figure 8 pattern of chi leads one to extraordinary regeneration. (Lao Tzu lived in the same physical body more than 300 years.) Lao Tzu not only learned how to do this, he taught his students how to sustain this energy flow, increase it, magnify it, even share it with others when it reached abundance.

In music, this same figure 8 is completed between souls. When the soul of the performer connects to the souls of the audience through the music, the crescendo of life force grows. This figure 8 can flow between the performer and the angels themselves. Often, it starts with the soul chill up and down the spine. That is actually just the beginning.  

You can listen to pieces based on Lao Tzu’s figure 8 with Nature by visiting www.MusicInspiredByNature.com . You can discover more about Tai Chi Gung by visiting www.CircleOfChi.com/david During the music class there, I share this approach to playing music with students of Tai Chi Gung.