Testing In Principle: Focus In the T’an Tien

OK, so you have relaxed, you have found your feet, you stand straight up. How do you move? You can learn a lot about how you move by watching other people move and walk around. Notice where their movement originate in their bodies, and how the impulse flows through them. Some people lead with their head, like they are on stilts and constantly trying to catch up with their noggin. Some people lead with their shoulders, hunched up, or defensive. Some people lead with their knees and shins, banging into things. Some lead with their chest, puffed up and top heavy. T’ai chi practice is to initiate all movement in the center of gravity, called the t’an tien. The masters were not fooling around when they said “all movement” – all physical movement, breath, emotion, thought, everything was moderated by the t’an tien. In fact all sensory intake is channeled to the t’an tien, where it is processed into life energy and initiates our reactions.

The Rapid Tester’s t’an tien is her mission, the goals of the organization for which she is testing. The mission is at the center of the tester’s decision-making process, and everything that she learns is evaluated in light of the mission, and her responses are chosen to further the mission.

You have seen testers who are focussed on everything else. The toolchasers who automate everything regardless of utility towards the mission, are like the guys who walk around with their energy in their heads, lurching after everything that catches their eye. The ones who do just enough to get by and are afraid of anyone scrutinizing their work, keeping their shoulders hunched around their ears. The blunderer, who makes a lot of noise about testing but somehow always forgets to put the “where” clause in the “delete from” statement, and wipes out the test database again. Or the puffed-up process jockey who is quick to ask for the repeatable test script that you used to find the bug, and to knock you if you can’t comply.

I’ve been all of those testers, and many more. But I forgive myself, and remember my mission focus, and return to being an effective Rapid Tester. My first t’ai chi teacher, Dan Ogrydziak, constantly exhorted us, “Focus in the t’an tien at all times. There is nothing you can do that would be better if you were not focussed in the t’an tien. If you forget, that’s OK. When you remember, then relax and focus again in the t’an tien. The important thing is not to remember, but to remember to remember.”

Remember to remember the mission of testing (the t’an tien), let go of all preconceived notions of what a tester has to be doing (relax), and do whatever you think needs to be done right now.