Doing both BJJ and Tai Chi I love seeing moves from one art crop up in the other. Imagine my surprise when I happened across this BJJ seminar clip where the coach seems to be cycling unawares through a variety of Tai Chi moves.
At one point he says that one of the moves looks like “some karate bullshit that looks silly but works”, which is funny because you could describe Tai Chi like that as well 🙂
If you do Tai Chi or Bagua or pretty much any long fist style Chinese martial art, or probably Aikido, you’ll recognise these moves. I’ll give them Tai Chi names:
Breakdown
It starts with a grip break, that is similar to Hidden Hand Punch from Chen style (0.00- 4.00) The first technique from here is like Needle at Sea Bottom (4.17- 6.15) The second is like Diagonal Flying (6.15 – 9.20)
After that it becomes more traditional wrestling/judo takedowns, but it was nice to see some Tai Chi appearing fora minute there.
While the rest of the video is much more of the usual jiu-jitsu fair, the initial positions have a strong similarity to Tai Chi moves, and could definitely help Tai Chi practitioners become more aware to the martial potential of Needle at Sea Bottom and Diagonal Flying.
One of the first things I talk about when it comes to alignment is:
Head over shoulders Shoulders over hips Hips over ankles
These three are the basic alignments for standing upright at the beginning of almost all Tai Chi forms and looks something like this (ignore the arm positions):
If one of these things is out of alignment then you are leaning forward or backwards, or your posture is out of whack.
It’s easy enough to keep these three alignments in a standing stance, but things can get more complicated in movement, and when you introduce forward and back-weighted stances. At that point I try and keep the following two alignments:
Head over shoulders Shoulders over hips
The ankles can now be in different places, as reacquired by the stance.
It depends on the style of Tai Chi you do, but if you do a style that advocates a forward lean then you need to make sure that there’s a straight-ish line between your back foot and your head. If you do a style that doesn’t advocate a lean, then your back knee must be bent and you want to keep your body upright with your shoulders vertically over the top of your hips.
But the real answer is that no one style of Tai Chi only does things one way. Most styles contain some moves that lean and some that don’t. Wu style, for example:
If you compare late Yang Cheng Fu to early Chen Man Ching postures, you can see that they are very similar, and are both trying to keep the head over the shoulders, over the hips:
While doing the tai chi form, take a moment to think: ‘where is my head in relation to my hips?’ You don’t want to be sticking your bottom out and destroying your alignment, which often happens in transition movements between postures:
A picture paints a thousand words, especially in Tai Chi. I recently found an incredible source of Tai Chi images drawn (I think) by Anthony of Brisbane Tai Chi.
Just scroll down the main page and look at the images – they’re great! Full of tips on alignment and posture for Tai Chi and Zhan Zhuang (standing practice).
One of Anthony’s best images for thinking about how alignment relates to the tai chi form is this one:
Anthony/Brisbane Tai Chi
I think that image very clearly shows head over shoulder over hip over ankle, and how easy it is to mess that alignment up once you start moving in Tai Chi. You basically want to keep the blocks aligned over each other.
Why?
As it says in the picture, if you align yourself correctly with gravity then your legs become the primary weight holders in the body. That means you can be more relaxed (Sung) in the upper body, so that you can use it to transfer force, instead of tensing up to hold weight that is misaligned. Plus, it just feels better.
You can think of the Tai Chi form as an exercise in claiming your space. We rarely think of the space we occupy or move around in as part of ourselves, but it is. We often let others take our space, or give it away needlessly. We move out of the way when people walk towards us in the street. Rarely do we stand our ground and own the part of the earth that is directly underneath us.
In tai chi push hands we learn to claim our space, to gently redirect people that want to come into it and also to take away other people’s space if we need to, and not let them get it back. In the tai chi form we learn to round out our movements, so that (as the classics say) there are “no hollows or projections” in tai chi. Your goal is to create a kind of sphere with your body, as if you were inside a giant beach ball. Your hands extend to the limits of the ball, and no further.
Finding your centre
In tai chi there is ‘finding your centre’ within yourself, but there is also ‘finding your centre’ when in contact with another person. When two people are in contact, especially if engaged in some form of conflict, they are rarely both in balance, usually the advantage lies with one person or the other. The one in control is usually the person who has made both people part of their ‘centre’. Viewed from above, they become the centre of the circle, around which the other person is orbiting.
In class today I was working on the ward-off posture. I think by far the best way to think about ward off, as a martial posture, is to think about having just slipped a straight punch over your right shoulder by moving your head and turning your body to your left, you then step diagonally into the space occupied by the other person, right under their armpit using the familiar ‘ward off’ posture to keep them off balance. You need to keep that full, rounded, ‘peng’ aspect to your arms here, and once you have them off balance, you never retreat or give up the ground you’ve taken. If you do then you’re simply giving them their balance back. You need to keep them off balance continually, so that they can’t recover and they end up open to strikes or to being knocked over.
That ability is one reason why, while strikes exist in Tai Chi, they’re not really emphasised in the form. Instead, in the form you’re continually learning how to take ground from the opponent and occupying it while remaining in balance. As a means of self defence, it is highly effective, but not easy to understand without feeling it, which is another reason why so many people are confused about how Tai Chi works as a martial art.
Thank you for supporting The Tai Chi Notebook. If you are reading this on a website that isn’t thetaichinotebook.com, then it’s highly likely it’s been stolen. Please let me know so I can issue their webhost a DMCA takedown notice for copyright breach. Thanks.And if you have the great idea of starting a tai chi website by stealing other people’s work to fill it with content for clicks then take a good hard look at yourself, and do better.
The latest episode of my Tai Chi Notebook podcast is slightly different to a regular episode. There isn’t a guest, but that doesn’t mean I’m entirely alone…
This episode is brought to you using the power of artificial intelligence. I fed a recent blog post about the Five Points of Control into Google’s NotebookLM, an AI that produces a podcast based on your article, just to see what would happen and the result was so good that I decided to put it out as a real episode!
Paying attention to your inner thighs can bring better structure and a feeling of power to your tai chi form
If you’ve read my last post about keeping the knees bent during tai chi practice, and most importantly can do your whole tai chi form without violating this principle, then the kwa (inner thigh) is a good thing to focus on next.
Quite often in Zhan Zhuang chi kungstanding practice we use the imagery of balloons supporting various parts of the body. You can imagine balloons supporting your arms, under your armpits and that you’re sitting on an imaginary beach ball. Balloons are soft but strong when pressured, so they’re a good image to help with the idea of staying relaxed and that feeling of springy peng (‘bounce’) energy that needs to be in the body during tai chi.
We don’t tend to use the supportive balloons imagery when explaining tai chi because it’s a moving practice, so the imaginary balloons would inevitably float off at some point! But you can still use the imagery in a couple of places – imaging balloons under the armpits and one held between your thighs that is gently pressing the knees outwards is a good place to start.
The kwa needs to be kept open at all times in tai chi practice.
One of the things beginners often fail at in Tai Chi is sufficiently rounding the kwa. By kwa I mean the area of the inner thigh and groin. I’ve been told that this area is more correctly called the dang in Chinese, but kwa/dang/whatever, I mean the arch formed by the inside of the thighs and containing the pelvic floor. As I’ve discussed before, beginners tend to want to straighten their legs, rising everything up in their stance, which has the effect of collapsing this kwa area, so that it effectively closes as the thighs move together.
In tai chi we always want to maintain the feeling that we’re holding a small balloon between the thighs so that this area is always rounded. Of course, there is opening and closing going on in tai chi all the time. As you progress through a move, one side of the kwa is opening and the other is closing, but regardless of any opening and closing movement that is going on, you need to keep a general feeling of openness in the whole area throughout the form. Even in postures where the feet are together. If you stand with your legs together, then that is considered a closed kwa, but in tai chi that area always has the feeling of being open – even when the legs are together.
You might find that last statement confusing, but it’s helpful to remember that in tai chi we are not performing an exact science, but we are dealing with feelings. The feeling of being open is what I’m talking about.
The last thing to mention is the why. Why do you need to do this? That’s where you need a teacher to give a demonstration of the application of tai chi against a simple push. With the kwa rounded you create a good base from which you can receive and launch attacks. When pushed, you can use that base the rounded kwa gives you to receive and then bounce away an attacker. If your kwa collapses when your upper body is pressured then you can’t do this without using a lot of effort and strength in the upper body. In tai chi this is wrong. Using your legs is always a better way.
Thank you for supporting The Tai Chi Notebook. If you are reading this on a website that isn’t thetaichinotebook.com, then it’s highly likely it’s been stolen. Please let me know so I can issue their webhost a DMCA takedown notice for copyright breach. Thanks.And if you have the great idea of starting a tai chi website by stealing other people’s work to fill it with content for clicks then take a good hard look at yourself, and do better.
Change from being ‘stuck’ in your form to smooth, effortless movements.
People often say that Tai Chi is a moving meditation. But what does that really mean?
I can think of two distinctively different ways of mediating (there are others, too). One is to focus on an object exclusively. This is a type of concentration-based meditation. Your goal is to keep that object in your mind so that other thoughts can’t intrude. The other is an awareness-based meditation. Instead of focusing on one object, you have an overview of everything going on: you, what you are doing, and the space you are in, and you try and maintain that open awareness without getting distracted. If something comes up you notice it and let it go, returning to the awareness.
An awareness mind, reflected in nature.Photo by Noelle Otto on Pexels.com
In Tai Chi we want the second type of practice. When you’re are a beginner, learning the movements, you are akin to somebody learning to drive – it feels like there’s too much to do at once. Your mind is completely occupied by what you are doing and there’s no room for anything else. The more experienced Tai Chi player knows the choreography of the form, they know what’s coming next, and they don’t need to be in the movement so much. They can afford to step back and take a more general view of the activity.
If you’re in the more experienced camp on your Tai Chi journey, then try this the next time you do your form: imagine that ‘you’ are in your head, watching yourself do the form. You can be aware of yourself, your movements, your breathing and the space around you simultaneously, without getting ‘stuck’ in any one of those things. You’re just watching them happen.
I went to see an Alexander Technique teacher for lessons once and she told me to imagine a stage, with every element that’s happening to you and around you is on that stage. In normal every day life we have a spotlight on the one thing we are doing. In Alexander Technique, she said, we allow everything to be in the light. For me that made immediate sense. Maybe it will for you? It’s the same with Tai Chi. When doing the form, we need to expand our awareness to include everything that’s going on with us right now, and not get stuck in the one thing we are doing. It’s a bigger, more expansive feeling that leads to smoother, effortless movements.
In my training my Tai Chi teacher described something very similar to this as ‘man’ in Chinese, which translates as “slowness”, which is misleading since it wasn’t about moving slowly, it was about hanging in the moment without rushing. Rushing is often the thing that takes us out of the moment.
So, slow down, stop rushing, and when you’re doing the form allow yourself to mentally step back a little so you can be aware of everything that’s happening on your stage. For me the results of doing this are profound and immediate. It’s like a light bulb going on. It also feels like the release of a lot of mental tension you didn’t even know you were carrying. And it doesn’t need to be limited to the times you are doing the Tai Chi form. You can do it when you’re sitting down and having a cup of tea, watching TV, playing with the kids, or even ‘meditating’.
Some comments from Lao Tzu, in the Tao Te Ching come to mind:
“Do you have the patience to wait Till your mud settles and the water is clear? Can you remain unmoving Till the right action arises by itself?”
― Lao tzu
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Tai Chi could be the secret to improving your balance and living longer.
Standing on one leg is one of those things that’s supposed to be very good for you, especially as you get older. It’s the sort of thing that you keep hearing studies about. It’s supposed to reduce falls and make you more coordinated. It’s even an indicator of when you will die. People who cannot stand on one leg for 10 seconds are found to be almost twice as likely to die within 10 years.
“When you attempt the one leg balance, your brain is performing a remarkable amount of coordination. It integrates signals coming from the fluid in your inner ears, visual cues from eyes, and even feedback from your joints and muscles. Signals from your eyes play a big role in maintaining your balance, which helps explain why standing on one leg is significantly harder when you close your eyes. If you can reach 10 seconds with your eyes closed, you’re doing well.”– Michael Mosley.
As you can see, the process of balancing is a lot more complicated than most of us realise. Of course, standing on one leg is also something that we do in Tai Chi a lot, we just don’t make a big deal about it.
Therefore, to hear that a one legged stand has all these extra health benefits is great news, since we’re doing it anyway in our Tai Chi kicks, which are often done slowly, so can take 2-3 seconds to accomplish, all of which is time spent with one leg off the ground.
(That photo, by the way, is a free image from the Unsplash website – and it’s actually very nicely done. A lot of the images on Unsplash that appear for a search on “tai chi” are so bad I can’t use them here, but that one is pretty good. Look at that nice vertical alignment from head to foot down the spine and leg. Perfect!)
I find that balancing on one leg is something that beginner students in Tai Chi really struggle with. They wobble, a lot, but I think it’s just from lack of practice, and as the article says, you can get better at it very quickly. You build new nerve connections and recalibrate your brain, simply by practicing.
As this article by fellow Bath resident and journalist, Joel Snape, explains, having good balance becomes increasingly important as you get older. He also makes the argument for Tai Chi as a great way to improve your balance, and makes the important point that the standing leg needs to be bent:
“Standing on one straight leg isn’t the same as standing on one bent leg,” says Locker, who began practising tai chi with a master who “could throw guys half his age and twice his size around the room”. “When the leg is straight, the skeleton supports the body, not the postural muscles. Older people are commonly advised to practice brushing their teeth standing on one leg to build their balance, but in order to train the postural muscles to support the lower body, you should use one bent leg.” This way, over time, you’ll build not just balance but work capacity.– Joel Snape.
So, it’s important to bend your knee (even if it’s just slightly) when standing on one leg. This is something I notice about beginners in Tai Chi. Whenever the feet come together it’s natural to want to straighten your legs, as if you were doing a Waltz. Learning to keep your feet together and your knees bent is a skill that has to be learned over time, and is much harder to do than you think. As soon as your mind wanders off, your legs will straighten. If you can get good at this, then when it comes to standing on one leg, it will be much easier to keep the standing leg slightly bent at the knee.
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Do you want to find out what traditional martial arts are practiced in Vietnam? Do you want to know what Tai Chi is like in Vietnam? And what Ho Chi Minh had to do with the development of the 24-step Tai Chi form? You do? Well, you’re in luck!
This episode of the Tai Chi Notebook Podcast features martial artist and author Augustus John Roe who lives and works in Vietnam. Enjoy!
“The origin of internal arts” is probably what I’d have called this really interesting podcast with Peter Lorge about the history of internal martial arts, however Kung Fu Genius decided to name it “Chinese Martial Arts History is Mostly FAKE” because, well, it probably generates more clicks, or something. Anyway, Lorge turns over a few sacred cows here, and I also liked what he had to say about BJJ.
Have a listen:
I think Peter makes a great point about all these different ‘internal’ things throughout Chinese history all definitely existing, but all being completely separate and unconnected until the 1920s Guoshu Institute needed to create the category of “internal” to exist in opposition to shaolin and external, so it brought them all together. (The gentleman whose name he forgets when talking about this is obviously Sun Lu Tang.)
I do wonder if instead of looking back for mentions of “internal” throughout Chinese history a look back for the phrase Liu He “six harmonies” would make a better connection between the dots of Chinese martial arts history. While the term “Neijia” may not appear very often pre-1920s, Liu He definitely did. If we’re looking at how we got where we are today, then that’s probably a better bet.
The Tai Chi Notebook 