William C. (Bill) Phillips began his study of T'ai Chi with Stan Israel in  1967 (He had also studied Judo and Ju Jitsu with Stan from 1965).  He moved on to become a student of Prof. Cheng's at the Shr Jung in early February of 1970.  Prof. Cheng wanted him to study the form, and when the rest of his class moved on, Prof. Cheng suggested that he do the form again. At that time Bill had already been doing the form for years and thought of it as a demotion. However, Prof. Cheng wanted to give him more correction. When he finally got to push hands, Morty Raphael was assigned as his mentor, under Prof. Cheng.  It was Morty who got a lot of the "karate stiffness" out of him (he had studied karate under students of Herman Kauz). He studied form, push hands, sword form and fencing, as well as Confucius and Lao Tzu, with Prof. Cheng.  He was one of the few students of Prof. Cheng that had permission to make audio and film of his teacher, and has an extensive collection of audios and several films of the venerable Professor. He assisted Ed Young and Herman Kauz in teaching at a Yale club in Connecticut. Ed Young was his mentor in teaching at the Shr Jung school, where he taught a form class on Sundays in 1974 and 75.

Bill founded and went on to teach at the Patience T'ai Chi Association and as an adjunct instructor at Kingsborough Community College.

Bill has appeared on  radio shows, and cable TV shows to promote T'ai Chi, including, Health Update and most recently the O'Reilly Report on the Fox Cable News Network.  He advocated teaching T'ai Chi to children as a presenter to the Elementary Physical Education Section of the New York Association of Health, Physical Education, Recreation and Dance.

Bill has written articles for, The Journal of Traditional Eastern Health and
Fitness (Qi), Natural Physique, Inside Kung Fu, Full Circle, and has appeared
often in the pages of  T'ai Chi.

Bill has also appeared in national and local mainstream print media, offering interviews and referring students to local schools, nationwide.  A sampling of these magazines include: Glamour, Fitness, Self, Harvard Women's Health Watch, Men's Health, Kiplinger's Retirement Report, Health Diary (A publication of Consumer Reports) , Eating Right, Living Well, Men's Journal,
and USA Today.  He was interviewed for, and appears in the book, Superlearning 2000, and in the T'ai Chi periodical Full Circle.

His organization was recommended as a resource by The Presidents Council on
Physical Fitness and Sport.

In the ‘90's, Bill demonstrated at the American Athletic Games, and judged many tournaments, including, Taste of China, United States National Chinese martial Arts Competitions, Dobbs Ferry Tournaments, North East Regional Kung Fu and many others.

Sifu Phillips has coached many skilled tournament players, most notably Avi Schneier and Mike Pekor.  Other medal winners include, Jill Basso, Thomas Casale, Rob Weber, Marisa Coluccio and James Leporati.  He is the teacher of many teachers, including Richie Perpignand in AZ, Jill Siegel in ME, Greg Hammond in IN, Terry Wertan in GA, Alex Marino in NY & NJ, Marc Isaacs, Evie Graham, Mike Pekor and Sal Casano on Long Island, Jill Basso in Upstate NY and James Leporati, Avi Schneier and Kurt Griffith in Brooklyn.

He is also available to do seminars, including form correction, neutralization exercises for push hands and pushing after neutralizing  pushing.  He has a video for sale and a web site: www.patiencetaichi.com.

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