Yesterday, 4th February I started the Devon Tai chi instructor and the Chengman Ching development course with Matthew Rochford and Luke Shepperd and had a truly brilliant day. The course objective is to deepen our understanding of internal Tai Chi processes, use of mind intention (yi) and issuing forces that will lead us (the practitioner), to a deeper appreciation of taichi and our inner processes, over the course of the next eleven months.
One of Chengman ching’s students, Master Haung Xiangxian was renowned for his refinement of the art. Patrick Kelly trained closely with Master Haung for 22 years and his student Luke Shepherd (who has 25 years experience) and will be leading the development group during 2007. All training is held on a Sunday, 2-5.30pm at the Spanda Studio, Harbour House, Kingsbridge.
Patrick A Kelly was born in New Zealand in 1950. He studied martial arts from childhood. While completing his BSc in pure mathematics, he began Taiji with an experienced student of Master Huang Xingxian in 1973. In 1977 he moved to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia where he studied full time in Master Huang's school. In 1979, following tradition, Master Huang accepted Patrick Kelly as his personal disciple - the only non-Chinese to ever enter Huang's inner-school. From that time Patrick Kelly travelled and taught between Asia, New Zealand, Australia and Europe establishing a school in Auckland, NZ, in 1980. Huang often visited to teach in the NZ school and obtained permanent residency for NZ in 1992 shortly before he died. In that year, at the express wish of his teacher, Patrick Kelly established a Europe wide teaching network, where 20 senior students (20+ years Taiji and 10+ years with Patrick) and 80 close students (average 10 to 15 years Taiji) teach some thousands of students through their independent schools.
Luke Shepherd (b.1961). is the Principal Instructor and founder of Open Palm Taiji. He is a student of Patrick Kelly and has been training Taiji since 1981. His first 15 years training were with Richard Farmer of Rising Dragon Tai Chi. Rising Dragon's teachings emphasized meditation and personal development with a strong focus on connecting Taiji ideas to every day life. Luke taught as a Rising Dragon Instructor for 5 years in Cardiff prior to moving to Devon. Between 1991-97 he periodically lived in India under the direction of Ramana Maharshi's disciple Sri HWL Poonja. In 1997 Luke met Patrick Kelly. Since that time he has trained the internal aspects of body and mind under the guidance of Patrick. He formed Open Palm Taiji to share this with others.
He divides his time between teaching taiji, his personal training and his work as a sculptor and bronze caster.
Matthew Rochford. Matthew has been practicing Tai Chi since 1991 and completed a six year senior teaching course in 2002. During that time he has learnt many Tai Chi Forms and worked with leading teacher Peter Warr and trained with Professor Li De Yin from Beijing. Working professionally as an instructor Matthew has taught in a wide variety of locations from sheltered housing projects to The Mind Body Spirit Festival. He has also appeared on TV and Radio, sharing his enthusiasm for the art. As a professional writer on Tai Chi he has been published in national magazines and his first book ‘Total Tai Chi’ (MQ Publications) was released in the UK and USA during April 2003 and was recently translated into Spanish.
