Qigong for Seniors

A gentle, beginner-friendly Qigong guide for strength, balance, mobility, and healthy aging—complete with full-color examples and instruction from Qigong and Tai Chi Master Jesse Tsao. Qigong for Seniors: Simple Tai Chi–Style Exercises for Strength, Stability, and Healthy Aging introduces simple Tai Chi–style exercises designed for older adults who want to stay active without strain. With easy step-by-step movements, calming breathwork, and senior-friendly routines, this book helps you build stability, loosen stiffness, improve posture, and create a peaceful daily practice at home. No experience is needed. No special equipment is required. Just a few minutes a day can help you move with more confidence, feel more centered, and support your body through every stage of aging. Perfect for seniors, beginners, caregivers, and anyone looking for a safe, low-impact approach to movement and wellness. Inside, you’ll discover: • Gentle Qigong movements to support balance, posture, coordination, and confidence in daily activities. • Simple Qigong breathing exercises to calm the mind, reduce tension, and help you feel more centered. • Senior-friendly routines that can be practiced in just a few minutes a day. • Step-by-step full-color instructions that make each movement clear and approachable for beginners. Each exercise is designed to help you reconnect with your body, loosen stiffness, strengthen the legs and core, and develop steadier movement at a pace that feels right for you. Whether your goal is to maintain independence, support healthy joints, improve balance, or simply enjoy a calmer, more mindful form of exercise, Qigong for Seniors offers a practical and encouraging path forward. Start with just a few minutes a day—and discover how gentle movement can help you age with strength, stability, and peace of mind.

Born in Penglai in the Shandong Province of China, Dr. Jesse Tsao is an internationally known tai chi master, qigong therapist, alternative medicine and wellness consultant, and founder of Tai Chi Healthways. A tai chi practitioner and teacher for more than fifty years, Dr. Tsao moved to the United States and taught his first tai chi workshop in Tucson, Arizona, in 1987. He gave up his first career as an economist in 1995 to devote more time to tai chi research and teaching. He was the chief master of tai chi for Arizona State employee worksite wellness programs from 1996 to 2015. His creation, Tai Chi Bang: Eight-Immortal Flute, has been offered as a credit course by the Open College Network in the United Kingdom’s Somerset Skills & Learning. He specializes in the areas of self-healing, preventive therapies, stress management, and mind-body wellness. Beginning his training at age seven at the Taoist temple in Penglai, his fifty years of practice include ten years of intensive study with Grandmaster Li Deyin in Beijing, China. Dr. Tsao was a gold medalist in the Beijing Collegiate Wushu Competition in 1980. He is the twelfth generation direct-line lineage holder of Chen family tai chi. He has presented tai chi on a variety of national television programs and has made annual, international teaching tours since 2005. Dr. Tsao was recognized as an Ambassador for Peace and won the Hellenic Wushu Federation Honor Award in Greece in 2018. After his twenty-one-year career as a tai chi master and health education consultant for Cigna Healthcare, Arizona, Dr. Tsao moved to San Diego to train tai chi teachers through his rigorous instructor certification program. He has produced over eighty tai chi and health-related instructional DVDs. His books have been translated into Spanish and Hungarian. His PhD is in Traditional Chinese Martial Arts Education from the Shanghai University of Sport, Shanghai, China, 2013. Dr. Tsao’s tai chi knowledge is a combination of traditional hardship training and formal academic education. His lineage shifu is Grandmaster Chen Zhenglei (陈正雷), one of the ten-best martial artists in all of China, who taught him the hereditary Chen family tai chi and all weapons training. He gained his practical skills directly from hosting countless seminars and workshops for other grandmasters including Chen Xiaowang (陈小旺), Zhu Tiancai (朱天才), Li Deyin (李德印), Su Zhifang (苏自芳), and Xiao Puquan (萧普泉). His doctoral advisor, Professor Yu Dinghai (虞定海), is the top-ranked, double-ninth Duan in both Chinese wushu and qigong. Dr. Tsao increased his understanding of traditional Chinese martial arts from interviewing and taking lessons from many experts including Abraham Liu, Dan Lee (李凯); Zang Hongxian (臧洪先); Liu Wancang (刘晚苍); Chen Yu (陈瑜); Chen Sitan (陈思坦); Xie Yelei (謝业雷), the head coach of Shanghai Sport University; Liu Jishun (刘積顺), the lineage of Hao style tai chi; Liu Peijun (刘培俊), the lineage of the northern Wu style; and Wu Bin (吴斌), Jet Li’s coach of Beijing wushu team. To learn more, visit taichihealthways.com.