Standing Meditation

I have done Tai Chi standing meditation for 30 minutes a day every day for over 15 years. People ask me about how to do it. In general what you are going to do is:

1. Set a timer (or put clock where you can see it,) for how much time you intend to practice standing meditation.
2. Stand with your feet shoulder's width apart. 
3. Get your feet facing forward and parallel to each other, with the toes not pointing towards or away from the toes on the other foot. 
4. Your weight is going to remain evenly distributed on your feet.
5. You are going to stand as tall as you can, pretending a string is pulling up from the top of your head, a little towards the back of your skull so that your jaw is slightly down.
6. Bend your knees.
7. Slightly tuck your hips so that the curve in the small of your back is flat.
8. Bring your arms forward until your hands are a little above your belly button, and make your arms round, with your palms facing your stomach.  
9. Your fingers should be almost straight, but not tense.
10. While continuing to hold the 2-9 posture above, close your eyes and feel your body, paying attention to each inhale and exhale individually. Relax the muscles in your back and shoulders while keeping your spine straight and perpendicular to the ground.

When you are done, stretch. (In my case I usually do the splits and butterfly stretches. You might want to do butterfly and hurdle stretches instead.) In general, the minimum amount of standing time is 15 minutes. The maximum is 45 minutes. My back usually pops a few times when I do standing mediation.

Here's a short video that explains the simplest way to start doing it:

Here's my favorite video of standing meditation that I think shows the most correct posture. Ironically I think it's Chen Ziqiang coaching in this video, who is also one of the foremost experts on Tai Chi push hands. Notice how he is often adjusting the student's hand position to be lower (instead of higher like you may see many people doing on the internet, my hands are actually lower than this,) and most students he has to have them adjust their hips slightly forward:

This is the best over all Standing Meditation tutorial I know of on YouTube:

Caveats:

• The students toes need to be more forward, less outward.
• The students hands are at about the right height.
• The instructor's posture is a LOT better than the student's (though his hands are higher than I would recommend,) his brief examples are more informative than his commenting on his student's posture.
• Do NOT watch TV while doing standing meditation.
• Standing meditation is MUCH MORE significant that anything else in Chi Kung.