“World Tai Chi and Qigong Day (WTCQD), also spelled World T’ai Chi and Ch’i Kung Day, is an annual event held the last Saturday of April each year to promote the related disciplines of T’ai chi ch’uan and Qigong in sixty countries since 1999.

The annual April event is open to the general public, and begins in the earliest time zones of New Zealand at 10 am, and then participants across Oceania, Asia, Africa, Europe, North America, and South America take part, with celebrations in sixty nations and several hundred cities, ending with the final events in the last time zones of Hawaii almost an entire day later. Celebrations include mass t’ai chi ch’uan and qigong exhibitions in many cities, and free classes in most participating cities. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Tai_Chi_&_Qigong_Day)”

World Tai Chi and Qigong Day’s stated goals are to (http://worldtaichiday.org/ABOUTwtcqd.html):

1. To educate the world of the profound health & healing benefits of Tai Chi & Qigong for individuals, communities, and nations
2. To thank Chinese culture for creating and sharing these profoundly valuable gifts with the world
3. To bring together people across racial, economic, religious, and geo-political boundaries, to join together for the purpose of health and healing, providing an example to the world.
4. To give a powerful example of how the power of the internet can be used to foster global health & healing.

One suggestion would be to add a fifth goal to include thanking and acknowledging the Taoists and Taoism; if not for their tireless research and cultivation the world would have neither Tai Chi or Qigong, since both are rooted in the Tao of Revitalization. Huang Di and Lao Tzu (as well as other Sages and Classics) both mentioned the importance of the Tao of Revitalization. Huang Di’s (Yellow Emperor) original name for the exercises was Yang Sheng Shu which translates as Tao of Revitalization or

“the achievement of a happy, healthy, and long life through the utilization of a single or a group of mental and physical movements to prevent and correct all ailments, reverse the aging process and improve all functions of the body. (Dr. Stephen T. Chang, The Great Tao p. 56)”

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