Exploring Tai Chi with Cathy

When you picture Tai Chi, you probably imagine elderly people in a park moving slowly through graceful forms. But what if I told you it's actually a martial art taught to the Chinese military centuries ago?
 
In this fascinating conversation, host Sarah Gorev chats with Cathy, who started practising Tai Chi at just 14 years old - making her the youngest person in pretty much every class she's attended. What I love about Cathy is how she combines the scientific with the spiritual, weaving together movement, energy, recovery, and finding peace in the chaos.
 
Cathy shares her remarkable journey from Chinese martial arts at age nine to training intensively in the mountains of China for five to six hours daily. But this conversation goes deeper than technique - it explores what Tai Chi and Qigong actually do for your body and mind.
 
You'll discover:
 • Why Tai Chi works as meditation for people who don't get on well with meditation
 • What chi (energy) actually is - and why it's more tangible than you think
 • How slow movement builds tendons and ligaments, not just muscles
 • Why Tai Chi improves recovery time for athletes
 • The difference between Tai Chi and Qigong (and when to use each)
 • How training in China transformed Cathy's practice
 • The motorbike crash that led to discovering acupuncture
 • Why acupuncture brought feeling back after six years of numbness
 • How one client went from walking 10 minutes to two hours without pain
 • Why Cathy's classes are the only peace many students get all week
 
This conversation explores how ancient practices are being validated by modern research - from Korean scientists mapping meridian lines to clinical studies showing remarkable results. Cathy explains how these practices work preventatively rather than waiting until our bodies crumble.
 
Perfect for anyone curious about Tai Chi but thinking it's "just for elderly people," people who struggle with traditional seated meditation, athletes looking to improve recovery time, those dealing with chronic pain or mobility challenges, and anyone seeking one peaceful hour a week away from chaos.
 
 Timestamps:
 [00:02:19] How Cathy discovered Tai Chi at 14
 [00:04:00] What Tai Chi actually is (it's a martial art!)
 [00:09:07] Choosing between Tai Chi and Qigong
 [00:15:58] Training in China (5-6 hours daily!)
 [00:19:00] What chi/qi actually is
 [00:24:11] The motorbike crash and acupuncture miracle
 [00:28:00] Client success
 [00:32:18] Finding peace in chaos
 
 Connect with Cathy:

FB: https://www.facebook.com/share/176TCzEqYE/

Insta: nixonShiatsu 

Web: acupuncturezenshiatsu.co.uk

Shop for digital acupressure guides: https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/AcupressureForYou?ref=shop_profile&listing_id=1565153711

FHT: https://www.fht.org.uk/users/swallow204751

Tai chi membership listing: https://taichi18.com/instructors/catherinenixon/

YouTube: @NixonQigongTaiChi

As Sarah reflects: "In a world that demands speed, the most powerful movement is the one done slowly with intention." Whether you're dealing with pain, stress, or simply seeking calm, this conversation offers a refreshing perspective on ancient practices that are anything but outdated. 

Thanks for listening.

Transcript

​[00:00:00] 

[00:00:05] sarah: When you picture Tai Chi, you probably imagine elderly people in a park moving slowly through graceful forms. I certainly did, but what if I told you it was actually a martial art taught to the Chinese military centuries ago? Welcome back to Exploring Ways to Wellness. This week I'm chatting with Cathy, who started Tai Chi at just 14.

What I love about Cathy is how she combines the scientific with the spiritual. We'll explore what chi actually is and about training intensively in China, as well as the motorbike crash that led her to acupuncture. This conversation weaves together movement, energy, recovery, and finding peace. Cathy shares why Tai Chi works as [00:01:00] meditation for people who don't get on well with meditation, the reality of training five to six hours daily in the mountains.

And why for many of her students, her Tai Chi class is the only peace they get all week. Whether you are curious about Tai Chi, interested in Qigong, or simply drawn to finding calming chaos, Cathy's wisdom shines through.

Let's dive in. 

Welcome back to Exploring Ways To Wellness. We have this week a very special guest. I came across Cathy when I was looking for some Qigong classes. Following, doing a podcast episode on Qigong and uh, Cathy was running some at a local adult education centre. And I then on doing her classes, found out she does lots of other things too, [00:02:00] including Tai Chi.

So Cathy has kindly agreed to come on and talk to us about Tai Chi and the other wonderful wellness things that she does. So welcome Cathy. 

[00:02:10] Cathy: Thank you. Nice to see you again, Sarah. 

[00:02:13] sarah: How did you find out about Tai Chi as a practice?

What attracted you to it? 

[00:02:19] Cathy: So it's a little bit of a strange one. So usually, um, anytime you read a Tai Chi book or a Qigong book, it's usually. Illness or accident that leads people to Tai Chi. So, um, I come from a martial art background. I started doing a Chinese martial art when I was nine years old.

So from that, um, I got quite immersed in the martial art world, which is where I'm comfortable really. So from there I met my first Tai Chi teacher when I was about 14, I think. 14, 15, 

[00:02:52] sarah: 14. Wow. So really early on. 

[00:02:54] Cathy: Then I started from there. Yeah. I came into it from the martial arts perspective, which not many [00:03:00] people go into too much 

so usually Tai Chi, it's either martial art or it's health reasons, or it's mobility and usually. It's the health reasons or the wellbeing or just the relaxation part. Fundamentally you can trace all of it back to non-movement

And the same with yoga. So yoga practices used to be breathing only. Then they added movements later on, and Qigong and Tai Chi seemed to have come from similar pathways. The people like me that don't get on very well with meditation, it gives you that meditation level without the sitting there staring at a wall and getting bored part.

So it gives you something to do and you're doing something with your whole body, and especially when so much nowadays is sitting down desk jobs, chairs, driving. It is all sitting. So the idea of sitting and doing meditation when you've been sitting all day can be quite a lot on the body. So it's nice to have that contrast.

[00:03:59] sarah: [00:04:00] Yeah, I mean, already in you talking, I've realised I probably don't have the right understanding of what Tai Chi is. So do, because I, I have this sort of mental image of older people, um. Moving through certain movements. And if you don't mind me saying you do not look like an elderly person and you're talking about meditation and things like that.

So do you mind just, um, helping me understand better what Tai Chi is? 

[00:04:34] Cathy: Yeah, so fundamentally Tai Chi is a martial art. It used to be taught to the Chinese military, and we we're talking like quite a few centuries back, but it's there's a lot of the history when it comes to things like this, because they've been around so long, can be quite hard to trace. There's not many martial arts and not many things that focus on slow, on breathing, on just making the body move as one unit because where you're [00:05:00] moving different parts at different times in other martial arts, sometimes you lose that just cohesion of you're working with the body structures and building on that.

So you can use a lot more power when things are lined up as opposed to when they're not. but I do know what you mean. It's for me it's very unusual to see younger people doing Tai Chi. Um, I think that's in part because a lot of the martial arts stuff has been lost a little bit and it's been focusing on health and mobility and those kind of things.

I've always been the youngest in the class usually, which, um, never really bothered me, and it is quite interesting because I came into it from a martial art background,

 it's a very difficult martial art, and a lot of people do give up on it because there's no grading systems, there's nothing like that. So people start losing the why they're doing it and things like that. But for me it's, I can tell if I haven't done Tai Chi for a couple of days because my joints start hurting [00:06:00] and things like that.

Which, which you wouldn't think my age and whatever. But it's just that thing of, your body gets used to a certain standard and you don't feel it as much when you're doing it, but it's, when you haven't done it, you feel, you really feel the differences. 

[00:06:14] Sarah: Right. Okay. 

So it's of a daily benefit to have that practice in your life.

[00:06:21] Cathy: Yeah. 

[00:06:21] sarah: And do you find then that, so you have classes, is it something that sort of, you start at a basic level and then it gets more difficult or you know, the basic steps that are required within it. And it's, it's a repetition or is it like dancing where you put together a sequence, you can see I know nothing about this.

[00:06:45] Cathy: That's okay. So there are forms and sets for things. So Qigong is you have Qigong sets, and it would be one movement. Six to eight times, then another movement, six to eight times like [00:07:00] that. So that has the repetition level in it. There's loads of different focal points depending on what you're looking for, so you can pick I did it in class of the week, could just picking three movements from completely different sets that all had the same function.

So they were fundamentally for supporting the lung and large intestine energy and just that immunity. And to give that extra little bit of energetical boost because we are heading into winter now at autumn, winter, and people are starting to get sick. So that just helps encourage the, which is the body's natural immunity.

So one of those movements is part the eight strands of brocade, which was used in a lot of hospitals in China around COVID time. The physicians just support their own body system. In terms of Tai Chi, there's different forms which have loads of different movements taped together.

and there's also different drills that you can do to [00:08:00] practice footwork, to practice all these different things. Um, 

Tai Chi, it's come down the family branches. So the main branches are Chen and Yang style. So that's the Chen family and the Yang family. There are other families, there are other branches and they all have slight differences to them.

There's also the 10 principles, you can re-go over everything, just focusing on one principle. You could then focus on the breathing. You could then reverse the breathing to see how that feels. There's so much that you can do with it, and it's one of the most interesting things I've trained, because when you think you understand something, someone might make a comment or you'll just have a little moment and then you realise that you don't actually understand it to the depth that there is. It just unlocks more layers and layers and layers. And when you think you're done, there's like, Nope, there's just another door. You open it. There's loads more behind it and loads more opportunity to train some more. So 

[00:08:55] Speaker: that's incredible. So you've got a whole lifetime of learning ahead of you by the sounds of [00:09:00] it.

[00:09:00] Cathy: Yes, and that's, I don't think I'd be done if I make it to 90. I don't think I'd be done at that point, which is, yeah. 

[00:09:07] sarah: So if you were after this, going to say, well, I want to choose a class between Tai Chi and Qigong. What would you recommend is the one that you would recommend people start with, or do you need to know you have a certain issue that you are aiming for, whether that's the relaxation or rehabilitation or recovery from exercise or something like that?

[00:09:34] Cathy: It is different because it's doing different things.

[00:09:36] sarah: So they look similar, but they are different. 

[00:09:40] Cathy: Yeah. Qigong is usually more focused for energy work. So whether it's building energy, whether it's condensing, clarifying or where you've got

certain health issues that you wanna do a certain few movements that work specifically for that, or the sets [00:10:00] for Qigong are usually built around a theme, but they're built for just overall health and wellbeing to balance everything. They're not usually geared towards a particular condition. 

[00:10:10] sarah: Okay. That makes sense. 

[00:10:11] Cathy: So usually if you go to a Tai Chi class, they will do some Qigong, whether they say directly that this is a Qigong set or not. Oh, 

[00:10:18] sarah: interesting. 

[00:10:19] Cathy: So usually it's like a warmup to do more Tai Chi. Mm-hmm. Um, whereas my classes are usually evening classes. I start off with Tai Chi and then go into Qigong because it just helps settle for the evenings.

So. With a lot of the textbooks and a lot of the theories based in Daoist practices. So you would do Qigong in the morning, then Tai Chi, because it's more gentle and it's a gentle way to warm the body up until you're doing something more physical and then you want something nice to wind down before in the evening instead of doing something like high physical energy and then trying to go to sleep because that normally doesn't end well.

So yes, it's just, 

[00:10:59] sarah: I can imagine. Yeah. [00:11:00] 

[00:11:00] Cathy: So it's, it depends what you're looking for really. Um, if you do either work for health and wellbeing and it's more what you feel resonates with you, for me I can be quite particular about teachers. That's just because I've had such a privilege of such amazing teachers 

[00:11:18] sarah: would you recommend trying, just trying things out, trying some classes and seeing what sort of feels good for you? 

[00:11:24] Cathy: Yeah. Sometimes it's about finding the right teacher for you. Because I could have 10 students all coming in for different reasons, but they can put their own influence in on what they want.

So if they're coming for health reasons, they're gonna be focusing on health benefits. If they're coming for martial art reasons, um, I still like to give and show the applications that go with the movement because it, that's the separation between dancing. It's the yi and the intention behind the movement and what you are doing and why to give you that focus. 

[00:11:59] sarah: yeah. [00:12:00] And does physical capability make a difference? 

[00:12:04] Cathy: Not at all. So, a lot of the books I've been reading at the moment and just, I always come back to him, is Cheng Man-ch'ing brought a lot of Tai Chi over to America and wrote books and started just making it a bit more well known. And he practiced from young to quite old.

And you can see videos where he's older and it's still the same movements, but they're just not as, like, the squats aren't as deep. The movements that go low don't go as low, but it is still fundamentally the same movement. So it is not really about physical limitation. 

[00:12:41] Speaker: That's lovely to have something that you can take through the whole of your life 

And be so accessible to, to people of different situations. Can you do it seated, for example? 

[00:12:52] Cathy: Yeah. Um, you can do Qigong seated, it's, you can do Tai Chi seated, but it is just, the forms get a little bit complicated when you've [00:13:00] got 24 movements that you've gotta try and get into a way that makes sense on a chair,

[00:13:06] sarah: fair enough. 

[00:13:06] Cathy: Yeah it's incredibly adaptable and it's about working with the body. You've got not the one you want because that's one of the hardest battles you learn over time. 

[00:13:15] sarah: Yeah. Yeah, of course. And it can be a daily, daily top of mind for many people. 

[00:13:21] Cathy: Yeah. 

[00:13:22] sarah: From a physical perspective.

[00:13:24] Cathy: When it came to the Shaolin monks and things like that, they would meditate for as long as they could, but the problem was that their bodies were getting weak because they weren't exercising, they weren't doing anything for the physical side. 

a lot of these movements came from watching animals, watching birds watching just different things. A lot of the names are quite intricate, but it's the way the Chinese language is, it's very metaphorical. So, whereas Western stuff is, you know, the languages it fits in the box, the metaphorical allows you to just get all of that extra context that gets cut [00:14:00] out.

[00:14:00] sarah: That reminds 

me of the Qigong class that you did and everything had such beautiful names and it sort of brought more to it. 

[00:14:08] Cathy: It does. 

[00:14:08] sarah: When you 

explain the name of the movement. 

[00:14:12] Cathy: It helps find the flow of it really, which is a really integral part. So they found that they needed movements to build up their stamina and build up their physical body as quickly and efficiently as possible so they could meditate longer.

It works on what it's built for. 

[00:14:28] sarah: Yeah. And it's very intentional movement, isn't it? So it might be slow. It might not look particularly complicated, but actually the muscles that are moving and the requirement on those muscles in order to make those movements it builds them up, doesn't it?

[00:14:44] Cathy: Yeah, and it's, um, it is a very interesting exercise because it works. On the tendons and the ligaments as well. So it allows that supporting structure. Okay. So where you have people that weight train quite heavily and move into that and then they have, you can get muscles that [00:15:00] kind of burst a little bit from overwork, but if you add something like Tai Chi or Qigong, that can strengthen that and just build a better foundation for what you're working with it's great for recovery times.

Usually people find that they have less recovery time than before. I have a friend who is a footballer, not regularly, but just, you know, occasionally with their friends, but they found that after doing two Qigong classes, they didn't need to warm up as much and they didn't feel as rubbish for the next couple of days afterwards.

So it's just the ways in which we move differently and it just gets the body to work a bit more efficiently. 

[00:15:40] sarah: That's really interesting. Again, I hadn't considered how it could work together with other exercise regimes to actually compliment it and improve things like recovery time.

[00:15:55] Sarah: And have you been abroad and done this as well? 

[00:15:58] Cathy: Yes. So, my teacher [00:16:00] used to go to China once a month every year, and I wanted to go as well, saved up the money and then circumstances and things changed, so it wasn't possible.

So, um, I kind of organised in a placement year for university to have, I started my placement year early so I could finish it early. So I went to train in Long Tou Shan. Which is a Tai Chi school in Yangshuo which is in Guilin province in China, which is, it's incredible.

There's Master Mei and Master Dazhu. They're just both very incredible Tai Chi teachers. They've trained in the Chen lineage with Master Chen after he'd stopped accepting students, which is quite, quite an honour. And Master Mei travels between China and America to teach. She does occasionally teach in Europe.

But yeah, it's just, it's a purpose-built school. It's in the middle of the mountains. The views are [00:17:00] incredible. You get a great view of the Li River you are just so away from everything, but you're just more engaged with everything that's going on. It was, yeah, it was absolutely incredible. So it was about, I think five or six hours of training every day.

[00:17:15] sarah: Wow. 

[00:17:15] Cathy: Apart from Sundays, but then I'd train anyway because I was there and why not? But it's, 

[00:17:20] Sarah: yeah, it sounds amazing. 

[00:17:22] Cathy: It was, and it's, um, it's a completely different way of training out there because you'll be left to do something for an hour, hour and a half, I think. Okay. And you go through the stages of, I think I've got it.

Getting it. Got it. Have I really got it now I've got lost in the movement. Now I'm getting a bit bored now I'm lost in the movement again. And then like, oh, what was I doing? And it just, but you just get such a depth and understanding out of it because there's so much, I see it a lot with my students as well.

And I was very like that when I went to China. I was rushing through a lot of things, instead of just following through and just doing everything at the [00:18:00] pace that it should be at.

[00:18:02] sarah: Yeah. Yeah. I know when I did the Qigong with you, it was really interesting how, what felt like a simple movement and I, I thought I was, following what you'd said to do, but then mm-hmm. You'd come around and you were able to slightly adjust something and it would just feel so incredibly different.

Like my brain was saying, I'm not really doing anything different. I don't think she's done anything but actually. In just slight change of movement. And I guess that's to do with the different, as you say, the tendons and the physiologically, the way that your body's moving. But you also mentioned qi.

[00:18:42] Cathy: Yeah. So with the adjustments, it's, um, it's something that Rose Fuhrmann taught me and she was a very amazing teacher. She's sadly no longer with us, but, um, if the structure is right that qi will flow. So, if you've got any good teacher, they will make corrections [00:19:00] because there's just sometimes you don't realise you're so close to getting something, but you're not quite there.

So it's just in those little adjustments to just let the body relax and open up and to just let everything start flowing. Um, qi always ends up being a controversial discussion and I just never seem to understand why. So it's fundamentally, it translates over as energy, but it doesn't quite encapsulate what that means because energy can be quite a vague.

[00:19:28] sarah: Mm-hmm. And it seems to, it means different things to different people, doesn't it? 

[00:19:33] Cathy: It does. Which makes it just that little bit more complicated to understand. But from the fundamental point of view, it is just, everything that exists is energy. Everything is made up of atoms and they're moving, and that's the fabric of everything.

So you'll get people that say, oh, I don't feel qi. I don't believe in it. I don't whatever. It's one of those, but we believe in the wind, but we can't see that. We just feel it. We [00:20:00] believe in electricity, but you don't really see it working. You see it's, there's electric running and a light turns on, but you don't actually see the electric part.

[00:20:09] sarah: So you see the result of it, but you can't actually see the thing itself. Yeah. 

[00:20:13] Cathy: Yeah. And she's one of those there are loads of different classes that pop up with loads of different modalities and it's, um, I was chatting with another therapist a while back and they were just like, I don't understand what they're talking about with qi because I can't feel it.

And then, um, we spent 20 minutes and they got it because they could feel it. And it feels tangible. It's one of those like, you feel. How it feels when your hands go under a cold tap. If you're not feeling it tangibly, then you're not feeling it as fully as you could feel it. 

[00:20:44] sarah: Yeah. And you can feel it sort of internally and externally, can't you?

[00:20:52] Cathy: Yeah. So it depends on sensitivity levels as well, because we're taught from a young age to tune out things. So you're not [00:21:00] taught to, you know, when you're hungry and you want to eat, but it's not lunchtime yet. So we don't have dinner at this time, so it's, we spend a lot of time quietly silencing the body's signals.

Mm-hmm. And in doing that, you silence some of this, so it takes a long time to build that up because. In some circles, it's known as the sixth sense of feeling because we just try not to feel things, whether it's emotions, whether it's stress, whether it's tension, whether it's pain. All of these things that, and a lot of time people get very, very sick from just pushing all of those feelings down because you get the little warning sign, it's in the back of your head and you go, oh, 10 minutes.

Oh it, it can wait. It can wait. I just need to do this. This is more important. And eventually it will catch up because it's going to at some point. So it is about tuning into those kind of things. And then that as well as training will just help increase the qi sensitivity so you can do something with it.

So then you can start feeling it on the outside, [00:22:00] on the inside, and then you get to a certain level of training where you don't try and chase the feeling. Because sometimes you get caught up with feeling the qi, and this feels amazing that it's, it then takes you away from the actual practice and then you go down this rabbit hole of you're chasing a certain feeling instead of working with the rest of what the body's doing.

[00:22:23] sarah: That's really interesting. 

I could imagine me doing that actually. Like wanting to reach this utopian situation. 

[00:22:32] Cathy: Yeah. 

[00:22:32] sarah: Forgetting that it's the, everything around it is the important bit as well as 

[00:22:38] Cathy: Yeah, it is very hard. 'cause there are some, there are some movements where you do get really carried away with because it's, you can just feel that expression going out.

So one that we did, which was 'Wild Goose Spreads it's Wings'. Your hands come up and you come up on tiptoes at the same time. Rose taught me to do that differently by your [00:23:00] knees coming up when the hands go down. So you get this it's the fourth of the 10 principles of Tai Chi that you have, substantial and insubstantial.

So you've got movement going up and down at the same time instead of both going up or both going down. So it just, it's one of those, it's a small adjustment and after a while it feels so much better to do it in a way that works with opposing forces. The way that feels great the first time round,

[00:23:26] sarah: Have you had any health issues, for example, that then after your Tai Chi you felt have improved? 

[00:23:35] Cathy: So from, from all the other martial arts I've done you pick up injuries and like little things that you've done that may not have been the most sensible thing at the time that you get those aches and pains from.

And it's always it's one of those you don't realise when you're training Tai Chi until about four hours afterwards and you're like, oh, well I'm not as stressed as I would be if I hadn't have done that. So [00:24:00] with the bike crash it. Um, I crashed my motorbike by accident with the car and it wasn't one of the best, the smartest things I've done.

Incredibly painful. 

[00:24:11] sarah: That sounds painful. 

[00:24:11] Cathy: Yeah. Your accident. But it was it helped just get everything straightened up again. Yeah, quite a few aches and pains. But it just helped settle everything out and make every day just that little bit less painful. It started to, I could get to a point where I could start rebuilding muscle and all the things that I couldn't do before.

I had a patch quite a large patch in my leg where I got my leg crushed between a car and a motorbike. So, um, I lost all the feeling in that for about five or six years. And then when I was out in China, I had acupuncture out there and that actually just started bringing the feeling back and then through more acupuncture sessions, I've got full feeling back, which I didn't think was possible. 

The doctors just said that, that's how you're gonna live for now. And it was like, right. [00:25:00] Okay. So now it's actually just back to normal. Really. 

[00:25:03] sarah: That's brilliant. And I think you, you then went on to train in acupuncture as well, didn't you?

[00:25:09] Cathy: Yes. Yeah. Because of just so from the Tai Chi, I went to Shiatsu, which is like thai massage, but that works along the same meridian system and the same system within the body. So it just uses the acupuncture points. So, um, the acupuncture just, it just targets things just that little bit deeper. 

[00:25:29] sarah: Yeah. 

[00:25:29] Cathy: And, um, I've always wanted to train in it and it was, um, things have changed.

In terms of training courses that are offered. And there was one that was offered for people that have trained in something else, which is great because it used to just be you had to do a degree and I couldn't afford to do a second degree.

[00:25:48] sarah: Yeah. 

[00:25:48] Cathy: It would've been lovely to have the opportunity, but it is very hard to just, you know, drop everything and especially the university fees.

[00:25:55] sarah: So on the subject of acupuncture, I guess it's, and [00:26:00] come from an ancient system, if you like, ancient technique once again in terms of its roots. But there's research been done into these things all the time, isn't there? So have the been any updates recently to, to things like acupuncture? 

[00:26:17] Cathy: Yeah, so, um, acupuncture can be traced back to 400 AD with uses of bone shards as needles, which is quite impressive.

And there's also links into tattooing where they used to grind little rocks under the points to keep them kind of permanently pressed for like long-term issues. So, oh wow. It's got such a rich and deep history behind it, the Meridian system was established that early, that's back before we were cutting open people and cadavers, like with the early development of Western science as we know it. Mm-hmm. So in Korea, there were a few scientific studies they did with acupuncturists to inject dyes along the meridian lines because the scientists 

[00:26:59] sarah: I did hear 

this.[00:27:00] 

[00:27:00] Cathy: Yeah, so scientists said that it didn't exist because they couldn't find it, and then worked with acupuncturists and it just lit up the whole system. And there's a lot of theories that it works within the lymphatic system as well. So there's still more stuff being developed, more things coming out.

So recently I had a client approach me with meralgia paresthetica 

[00:27:23] sarah: okay? 

[00:27:23] Cathy: Which is, it's one of those 1% conditions where only 1% of the population has it. And they approached me with this amazing scientific study done on that condition with acupuncture, with electrolysis, and it. It was a really well-rounded study and it listed which points were used, um, and it listed that you used it in electrolysis as well, but, um, for me, I'd have just liked to have seen which points and how they wired it up.

Yeah. We've made quite a good amount of progress, and I didn't know at the time, but they had dropped their physio appointments and were [00:28:00] just using acupuncture and on their regular checkups to keep. Keep it managed. The nursing team said that this is outstanding. They didn't expect the results that this person has got.

They didn't expect it to be as manageable as it has been, especially with the flare up that they had, which had caused then the other situation where they contacted me. 

[00:28:22] sarah: Wow. 

[00:28:23] Cathy: Because they were looking on groups and got sent that study. So 

[00:28:28] sarah: yeah. 

[00:28:30] Cathy: It used to be part of the NICE guidelines and it got taken off a while ago, but because of this, the nurse that's working with them has started to do the paperwork to get acupuncture added back as a NICE guideline because of how much benefit they've seen with this one client.

It's been quite amazing to see such a great change. 

[00:28:50] sarah: Yeah. That's fantastic. And as you say, because it's measurable. You can directly attribute well that's happening because of, of what [00:29:00] you've been doing. 

[00:29:01] Cathy: Yeah. And it is so nice to, from when they first came to see me, they couldn't walk very far.

I think it was maybe 10 minutes tops. And then they walked longer distances. Now they walked for two hours the other day without any flare ups, any repercussions. And it's, and yeah, it is so nice to make such a lasting difference. For everyone, but just in the cases where acupuncture really does work for you and how far that can go we do have a very strange culture and where it's just, we just ignore the pain or we just, manage it in a way that's not really managing until just it falls apart and our body crumbles a little bit rather than just.

Getting things looked at as soon as to make sure we're working in the way the Chinese medicine, the traditional Chinese medicine works, if it's preventative, instead of getting to the point where you're then having to build back up from injury, from illness, from those kind of things. 

[00:29:58] sarah: So you offer all sorts of [00:30:00] things, which is fantastic. And it sounds like they all kind of compliment each other. 

[00:30:04] Cathy: Mm-hmm. 

[00:30:04] sarah: So you've got groups that people can go along to if they want to try something out. And do you do one-to-one work as well, or is that mainly with your acupuncture?

[00:30:14] Cathy: Um, yeah, I do one-to-one sessions. It's um, it's just if people want or need or something specific. Sometimes people want, health benefits for Qigong because it's really great at stress reduction for anxiety disorders, for depression, for sometimes you've got PTSD and kind of panic disorders and that just helps settle the body on a physiological point of view.

It just aids that support. The acupuncture has really just opened up a world of changes really, because it's. I've got friends that have had problems for years and now they don't have problems, and it's just amazing to make those changes. So, I can't promise miracles, but the thing I do guarantee is that I will do [00:31:00] everything I can and when that runs out, then I've got a referral base because I sometimes when you've got.

You've tried every possible thing. You've gone through so many NHS referrals, it's got nowhere. They've just gone well, we dunno what else to offer you. And then to find something that doesn't quite work and then you're left stuck there looking for something else. But it's, yeah, and I don't want clients to feel like that 'cause it's, it is not a nice feeling, so 

[00:31:30] sarah: No, no, of course. So I'll put links in the show notes for everyone to be able to follow you on social media, find out more about the plethora of things that you offer, including Tai Chi, Qigong, acupuncture we said as well, and shiatsu. So there's all sorts of things there to follow and to join in some of Cathy's classes.

I know I'm gonna be looking for more Qigong classes and maybe I do try out some, um, Tai Chi as well. [00:32:00] We actually, it's just reminded me that we went to a family festival a few years ago and they were offering Tai Chi classes and, um. It was amazing how peaceful you could feel despite being not very far away from absolute chaos.

[00:32:18] Cathy: Yeah, that's the, um, that's one thing I do find that no matter how chaotic things are, you can always just get everything to stop for a minute. And a lot of the people that come to my classes, that's the only peace they get in the entire week. But it just, it's that moment where they can fully. Be away from all of it because it's we live in such a very strange society where everything is so busy, so immediate, so urgent.

The notifications that, you know, you should be responding to everything all the time and it's, and to just be able to say, no, I'm busy, and just, yeah. Or to just have that space to not need to respond or react. It's quite powerful. 

[00:32:58] sarah: Yeah, that's beautiful [00:33:00] and very attractive. 

[00:33:01] Cathy: Yeah. 

[00:33:02] sarah: Piece of peace. Fantastic.

Yeah. Well, thank you so much, Cathy. There was a lot to go over today and I'm sure I've only just scratched the surface, so I'll be popping along to your website and having a look and finding out more. Thank you so much for today. 

[00:33:17] Cathy: Thank you.

[00:33:21] sarah: What a generous conversation. Cathy's journey from martial artist to Tai Chi at 14, training in China and the motorbike crash that left her leg numb for six years before discovering acupuncture could bring feeling back. It's quite a path, and I loved how it all connected. A few things really stayed with me.

First, that Tai Chi is actually a martial art taught to the Chinese military centuries ago. I had no idea.

The meditation for people who don't get on well with meditation [00:34:00] description was perfect. When so much of our lives is sitting, desk jobs or driving, the last thing many of us want to do is sit more to meditate. So Tai Chi, giving you a meditative state while actually moving your body. And the fact it works on tendons and ligaments, not just muscles, means you are building that deeper supporting structure.

 Cathy's explanation of chi was one of the clearest I'd heard, and it was so true that we've been taught to tune out our body signals. Great to hear that Tai Chi helps rebuild that sensitivity. I loved her description of measurable changes, the motorbike crash leading to acupuncture training, and how seeing clients make remarkable progress, like the one who went from walking a few minutes to two hours. Results so impressive

the nursing teams working to get acupuncture back on the NICE [00:35:00] guidelines. But perhaps most important for many of Cathy's students, that class is the only piece they get all week. In our busy, urgent, immediate world, the power of saying, no, I'm busy, and just having space to not respond.

That's profound. In fact, reflecting on my music festival experience too, being able to find a peaceful activity despite loud, crowded chaos nearby, that's not just a nice idea. For people managing stress, anxiety. PTSD, panic disorders,

that skill of finding calm in the storm is life changing. As you heard, Cathy offers Tai Chi, Qigong, Shiatsu, and Acupuncture in Rugby in the UK, and the information's in the show notes. So whether you try a class or simply remember that finding peace doesn't require [00:36:00] perfection, just practice, I hope this gave you something valuable. Until next time, take care of yourselves. And remember, there are many paths to wellness. Sometimes in a world that demands speed, the most powerful movement is the one done slowly with intention.