For Dr. Zibin Guo, tai chi isn’t just a martial art. It’s a philosophy of resilience, a “flow machine” that transforms perceived weakness into quiet strength.
A longtime faculty member at UTC, Guo has spent more than two decades exploring how ancient traditions can help address the challenges of modern life. That research is now the subject of his second book, “Adaptive Tai Chi: An Accessible Practice for Empowering Body and Mind,” which will be available in July.
“This book reflects my 20 years of work on applying traditional cultural wisdom to remedy modern challenges,” said Guo, a UC Foundation Professor of Medical Anthropology who joined the UTC faculty in 1998. “To recognize vulnerability is a constant. Vulnerability is not a problem; the problem is our mind.
“Tai chi is a metaphor. It is an example to demonstrate how when you use your mind to engage the body, how much power you have, how graceful you can become.”
“Adaptive Tai Chi,” published by Shambhala Publications and distributed by Penguin Random House, presents a complete, illustrated program designed to make the benefits of tai chi accessible to people of all physical abilities, Guo said. The sequences include standing and moving, stationary standing, seated and wheelchair-based practices.
While the book includes step-by-step instructions, it’s ultimately about using time-honored practices to meet today’s realities.
“I’m a medical anthropologist. I study human engagements, belief systems to life and health, mind and body from a cross-cultural perspective,” Guo explained. “There are many great traditions—yoga, acupuncture, meditation, tai chi—that continue because they meet our needs. They answer questions that modern technology cannot. In fact, the modern world tends to intensify our vulnerabilities, especially of the mind. These traditions focus on transforming vulnerability into a source of power.”
Guo said the vulnerability of the human body is not a weakness but a starting point for strength.
“We cannot run as fast as tigers. We cannot even catch a chicken easily,” he said with a laugh. “We cannot fly. We cannot swim as fast as fish. Physically, we are vulnerable compared to all those other species.
“But what we have is the mind—and the mind allows us to work collaboratively, to build strength together.”
For Guo, the book represents a milestone on a journey that began in 2005, when he developed a wheelchair tai chi chuan program. After debuting at the 2008 Paralympics in Beijing, the program gained international recognition for redefining how martial arts could support physical and psychological wellness in people with ambulatory disabilities.
Over the past two decades, Guo’s work has been supported through seven consecutive grants from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. From 2016 to 2023, he and his team conducted 85 instructional training sessions for more than 1,500 VA health care providers across 46 states.
“Working with VA health care providers and veterans with disabilities, they all found this to be a really powerful empowerment tool,” Guo said. “It’s not just for a particular individual. It is for everyone.”
He recalled a conversation with one veteran in a wheelchair who shared how practicing tai chi made him feel free like a bird. “He told me, ‘When I’m in a wheelchair, wherever I go, I have to assess how far I can go. If I turn left, if I turn right, can I turn around? Everything has to be very calculated. But when I do tai chi, I become infinite. I can make a circle. I can move in all kinds of martial arts movements within the space I have. My perception of space changes.’”
Through these kinds of interactions, Guo said he came to understand how meaningful adaptive movement can be—not just physically, but psychologically and spiritually.
“With tai chi, the movements aren’t just ordinary movements. They’re purposeful. They’re a narrative,” he said. “The body becomes a story. When someone says, ‘Stand like a tree,’ or, ‘Sit like a mountain,’ those metaphors—combined with the movement—create a powerful, lasting impact.
“Tai chi is about not making your body some kind of mechanically defined parts. Rather, it’s the mind and body moving together to make the body become a flow machine. When things flow, there is no difference … It’s a system.”
He compared the experience to trying to explain the taste of papaya to someone who has never had it.
“You can describe it and they might understand,” Guo said. “But until they actually try it, they don’t know. Once they do, that experience stays with them. It’s in their body. It’s the same with this. The movements and the story together become something you carry.”
For Guo, who previously authored “Ginseng and Aspirin: Health Care Alternatives for Aging Chinese in New York” in 2000, this new book project felt more personal than professional.
“People say, ‘It’s work.’ I say, ‘I never thought it’s my work. I did it for myself,’” he said. “I’m a human. I go through all kinds of things other people go through.
“But it’s the wisdom left by pioneers that helps us overcome our vulnerability. That’s what martial arts is. Everything we create is to overcome vulnerability.”
While “Adaptive Tai Chi” brings together decades of fieldwork, Guo is already looking ahead.
A memorandum of understanding was recently signed with the International Centre of Martial Arts, which is affiliated with UNESCO. This fall, he will travel to Bangladesh to begin training health care providers and martial artists interested in introducing adaptive tai chi practices to women and children with disabilities.
“If it goes well, next year we’ll go to other regions in Africa and Latin America,” he said. “It’s exciting to see this program grow from something we developed right here in Chattanooga into something that’s now going to the world.
“Rehabilitation is such a tough journey. If we focus only on the medical side and forget about humanity, we go too far. Tai chi provides something empowering. It makes people feel beautiful and graceful, and that’s something we all need.”