At lunch Master Chen compared learning Taiji to boiling water: The requirement for boiling water is 100 degrees, even if the water is 99 degrees it is still not boiling. From one perspective the water might as well still be cold because it is still not boiling; 99 degrees might as well be 1 degree. In reality 99 degrees is only 1 degree away from boiling while 1 degree is still 99 degrees away from boiling.
Many people give up even if their Taiji is at 99 degrees because they don’t realize how close they are. To them 99 degrees feels the same as 1 degree; they are still not at the boiling point. It is that 1 degree of difference which makes the Taiji work.
