Training notes

The uncarved block

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Simple is effective

Know honour,
Yet keep humility!
Be the valley of the universe!
Being the valley of the universe,
Ever true and resourceful,
Return to the state of the uncarved block.

Tao Te Ching, chapter 28

Sometimes we just make it all too complicated, and we forget the wisdom of the uncarved block. This video is taken at a Dennis Jones seminar, showing how to apply martial arts to real self defence. Basically, he’s most concerned with positioning himself (movement) and then delivering all his power to the desired target in one go.

I like the way he’s taken his art (Karate) and looked at what the kata is telling you about movement, and not taking the moves as literally the only way you have to do it.

The mother of all movement

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How one thing leads to another

16

Teaching today’s lesson we strayed into the martial applications of one move the student was having a hard time getting just right. It was a transition move between two recognisable postures, a kind of spiral action of both hands around a circle. In reality of course, there are no fixed postures, and no transitions between them, but when teaching beginners you have to start somewhere, so we did.

To help him get the idea of the way the hands move I showed him an application – “punch me”, I said. I deflected his punch with my left, reached through to the back of his head with my right and spiraled my hands to bend him over, ready for a knee to the temple or to be flipped right over. After we’d worked on this for a bit and he’d ‘got it’, I had to then explain that there was no one application for each move. When you break it down, the move in the form doesn’t work exactly like that application I showed (you have to reach in deeper to get your hand around the back of their head than the way you do it in the form, for example), but you can easily see how it’s the same thing really.

Each move in the form is the mother, and the applications are the children – each one subtly different. I can come up with a lot of applications for each move. For this one I had a strike, a choke, a throw, etc, all with slightly different emphasis. It’s endless, really.

After you’ve delved around in a few applications you need to come back to the mother movement, the one that gives birth to them all.

The road less traveled

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What I’m actually teaching is…

The road less traveled

The road less traveled

“He stood about 20 yards away from me, and I closed my eyes and I could feel the power of his chi coming out of him, pushing me over”

So said my latest Tai Chi student, as we were talking about what styles of Tai Chi he had done before. I just sighed and said “Sorry, but I don’t do any of that. Derren Brown can do it very well though…” and carried on with the lesson, never returning to the subject of Chi again. He didn’t seem to mind. In fact, he seemed to quite enjoy the focus on correct movement – it seemed rather new to him…

I only teach on a one-to-one basis these days. It’s much easier format than teaching a whole class of people, all at different levels, and you can really drill down into what needs to be worked on right now with the student for them to improve. Most of the people I teach are complete beginners, which is fine, but occasionally I’ll get somebody who has had some previous Tai Chi experience, as was the case here. In general, this is more fun, since I can usually ramp up the amount of detail in what I’m teaching. However, it can throw up a few curve balls, like the above.

I often wonder what will happen when I refuse to go down the road of “chi tricks” with new students in conversation or teaching. Will they decide I’m not the enlightened Chi Master they were searching for, and leave disappointed? Will they think I don’t have the ‘real thing’ (whatever that is)?

In the end I’ve decided not to worry about it. I just teach what I know I can do, and leave it at that. It’s up to them if they want to say. They usually do.

Towards the end of the lesson (which went really well, actually) I remember saying “what you’re trying to do here is to learn to use your body’s natural power, through the movements of Tai Chi. The co-ordinated, natural power of the body in motion, which we call ‘sung jin’ or ‘relaxed force’. You don’t need to get too attached to the movements themselves – they’re just examples – it’s what they’re trying to teach you that’s important.”

I think that sums it up nicely.

The Tai Chi magician

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Woo! Everywhere is Woo!

Tai Chi, like all other traditional martial arts, contains some aspect of performance, show or magic trick. See my previous post about meeting Scott Phillips for more on this idea, but in short, public demonstrations for entertainment have always been a part of the traditional Chinese martial arts. Martial arts street ‘buskers’ doing gymnastic performances, kung fu schools doing en masse demonstrations of their skills, the Shaolin Monks touring the world with their concrete-breaking, skull-cracking performances, etc… The list goes on.

In Tai Chi the publicly-expected demonstration of skill has turned into something more subtle and suitably ‘Taoist’ than merely breaking concrete blocks, or wooden boards. It seems to come down to a ‘master’ figure demonstrating how far he can push a student back with a very light touch, and while it may not be explicitly stated, the assumption is that the master is demonstrating his Chi Power. Sometimes touch is not even necessary and it is done through thin air by the master merely waving his hands at the student. The bigger the reaction of the student then the better the master, or so the unspoken rule seems to go.

Yes, there can be some functional use to this sort of pushing demonstration as a teaching aid. From the students point of view they get to feel what it’s like when somebody with skill puts hands on them and pushes them backwards. Ideally, from a Tai Chi perspective, it should feel different to a muscular, forceful push. It’s not much use as a self-defence technique, but it’s good for demonstrating the type of force you want to be developing in Tai Chi – using the force of the ground via the legs, controlled by the waist and channeled into the hands. It’s a smooth type of effortless power, rather than using the shoulders or back to do a muscular ‘stiff’ sort of push. The difference is subtle and getting hands-on with your teacher is essential if you’re ever going to learn what it is, because you need to feel what it is not, too.

The problem arrises when when the student’s reactions become hyped up in public. In an effort to not let their teacher lose face they can start to over-react to the push. They start to stiffen their arms, and straighten their legs, resulting in a curious type of ‘hop’. It’s not like an agreement was explicitly made before the demonstration that the student should have a big reaction, it’s more that he starts to subconsciously over-egg his response so he doesn’t make his teacher look bad. Anybody who has taught a group of people Tai Chi will be familiar with this phenomenon. Whenever my students tried to ‘fall over’ for me in a demonstration I always reprimanded them and tried to get them to stop ‘helping’ me do the demonstration, and just act like a normal attacker.

On the other side of the coin, you could decide to view these kind of demonstrations as a simple magic trick. A magician (the teacher) is showing a magic trick, and you all know it’s not real, so just enjoy it for the spectacle it is.

At The Fajin Project Facebook group a chap called Stuart Shaw, seems to have no patience for the Tai Chi magician. He’s done some brilliant breakdowns of how various ‘masters’ of Tai Chi do their tricks (he calles them “Woo Woo”). You might have to join the group to view the videos, but I’ll try and link to them below. Why watch it? Well, if your Tai Chi teacher does this stuff to you, then it’s worth being aware of what’s really going on:

>> Woo Fajin Analysis — Adam Mizner Jalapeños <<

>> Analysis of Woo-Fajin << Michael Phillips

>> Analysis of Woo-Fajin – Seated Push Trick << Chee Soo

>> Woo Fajin Analysis – Huang Shyan vs. Liao Kuangcheng <<

The (martial) use of Peng Jin in Tai Chi Chuan

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Peng Jin gets talked about all the time in relation to Tai Chi, yet you rarely see anything shown or discussed about its usage and relationship to actual fighting. I wanted to make a video that did that, so here it is!

Tai Chi Chuan, after all, is a martial art, and not just a collection of interesting ways of manipulating ‘force’ in the body for purely health purposes. It’s a martial art that uses Sung Jin, or ‘relaxed force’ in preference to hard strength. One of the reasons why it prefers relaxation over hard strength is that it enables the use of Peng Jin. You simply can’t do Peng Jin unless you are sufficiently relaxed. In terms of martial arts it’s a very useful skill that can be used as shown in the video.

There’s much more to Peng Jin than what I’m showing here – but it would require a much longer video to go into all the intricacies. I don’t, for example, talk about how I’m doing what I’m doing, I just show what the effects are.

Another factor to consider is that Peng Jin should also be a quality that’s always present in the Tai Chi practitioner, rather than something you turn on or off for technique purposes. However it’s the subtle, but powerful, effect of the Peng ‘bounce’ on an opponent that I wanted to demonstrate, so that’s what’s shown here.

The classic “Song of the eight postures” describe Peng Jin as:

“What is the
meaning of
Peng energy?

It is like water
supporting a
moving boat.”

Imagine the way a boat bobs on the water, and that will give you a good insight into Peng.

Walking the circle

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Another of the Internal Arts of China is Bagua, the core practice of which is walking a circle with various different palm positions. While I don’t really practice Bagua I do have a great circle walking training tool at my local park. Check it out:

As you can see, it’s important to fit your training into your life, and the local park provides many different training opportunities.

As it says in the Tai Chi Classic,

“In motion the whole body should be light and agile, 
with all parts of the body linked 
as if threaded together.”

Obviously you need to be light and agile to keep your balance while stepping on this childrens’ ride. Lightness and agility are important qualities that need to be trained in Tai Chi, and always practicing on a perfectly flat wooden floor of a dojo, or the flat concrete of a patio won’t help you. I strongly advocate training the form on a variety of surfaces, both even and uneven, sloping, staggered and even moving, as shown here! Also, it never hurts to have a little fun time with your kids 🙂

Boxing with the legs

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I was talking with a practitioner of a so-called ‘external’ style of martial arts today and he said:

“The kwa is very important. Opening and closing the kwa builds energy in all the stances… A weak kwa leads to weak footwork, which leads to a lack of jin in hand techniques.”

Sounds like an ‘internal’ martial art, doesn’t it? I’ve been thinking about what this quote means to Tai Chi. People can mean all sorts of things like the hip or pelvis by “kwa”, but the kwa in this context is referring to the inner thigh (before you Chinese language geeks leap on this, I clarified that this was the area he meant later in the conversation). Obviously as you move through Tai Chi postures the kwa opens and closes. It does this by itself if you let it, you simply need to be aware of it.

After playing around with the form and having this quote in mind I was reminded of something my Tai Chi teacher once said to me. It sounds like a quote from the Tai Chi Classics, but isn’t (I’ve looked for it) – so it must just have been something his teacher said to him once.

“Tai Chi is often called ‘boxing with the legs'”.

At the time it washed over me, but now I think I understand.

You can think of it as being a more pithy and concise version of the earlier quote. What powers the punch in Tai Chi? It’s the legs. How do the legs do it? Through correct posture – the kwa rounded and firm, upper body relaxed and able to channel the power of the ground up through the legs and into the hand. Every time you punch feel that it’s the legs doing the ‘punching’, not the hand or arm – that’s where the source of the power comes from. Put your mind in your feet, not in your head. Do this practice sincerely and you slowly start to feel how the whole body is involved in everything you do – it’s your whole stance and posture that moves into the technique, not segmented bits flailing in an uncoordinated manner. It’s truly a wonderful, wholesome feeling of unity in your self.

Work at it, get it right and you can start to feel how your Tai Chi can become “boxing with the legs”.


The Song of Peng

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This week in class we were working on Peng Jin (Ward off energy), the fundamental Yang energy (Jin) of Tai Chi Chuan.

A lot as been written and debated about Peng Jin in Tai Chi circles, but I think the following quote sums it up pretty well, for me at least.

From the classics:

“The Song of Peng

What is the meaning of Peng energy?
It is like the water supporting a moving boat.
First sink the ch’i to the tan-t’ien,
then hold the head as if suspended from above.
The entire body is filled with springlike energy,
opening and closing in a very quick moment.
Even if the opponent uses a thousand pounds of force,
he can be uprooted and made to float without difficulty.

I like the imagry of water and a boat floating on water. I also like to use the imagery of a rubber ball when teaching Peng to people. If you imagined that you were punching a large rubber ball then the bounce-back you’d experience is Peng. The hard part is turning yourself into that rubber ball!

To manifest Peng you need to be relaxed (sung) – excess physical tension really spoils the technique. There are various exercises you can do to help you develop the feeling of Peng, one of which I present here: Hold out your arms and get a partner to press down on your arms, then try to compress their force into your centre and bounce them out. The big mistake you’ll make first is to use your arms too much to try to push them off you – that’s not it. In this video you can see that my arms are nice and relaxed. You’re looking for that springy force coming back up from the ground.

This exercises also requires that your partner hold their arms somewhat rigidly. If they let their arms go all soft and floppy as you bounce them then nothing happens. This is just a training exercise after all, and not a martial technique, so it require some co-operation, so give your training partner a hand and don’t be too difficult to work with!

Sink the chest and pull up the back

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No.2. in Yang’s 10 Important Points is “Sink the chest and pluck up the back”.

Yang says: “2.) Sink the chest and pluck up the back. The chest is depressed naturally inward so that the ch’i can sink to the tan-t’ien [field of elixir]. Don’t expand the chest: the ch’i gets stuck there and the body becomes top-heavy. The heel will be too light and can be uprooted. Pluck up the back and the ch’i sticks to the back; depress the chest and you can pluck up the back. Then you can discharge force through the spine. You will be a peerless boxer.”

Personally, I like thinking of it as ‘shelter’ the chest, rather than “sink” or “hold in”, even if that’s not the exact translation. I think that works better in English for me, it implies a more natural position with less force being used than ‘hold in’ does. YMMV.

The whole thing is intimately related to the breath and ‘sinking the chi to the dantien’. If you change the focus of the breathing to the dan tien area, so that area expands when you breathe in and contracts when you breathe out (that’s ‘normal’ dan tien breathing, there’s reverse as well, but let’s not get into that) then your upper chest will natural soften and have the feeling of hollowing – so it’s not so much something you actively ‘do’, it’s more like something that happens as a result of doing something else. The old Wu Wei idea of doing without doing. The whole posture in Tai Chi should be as natural as possible without any artificial additions – but it does require effort (including mental effort) to do, paradoxically – you have to make an effort to be as relaxed as possible, usually by getting rid of the unnatural habits we pick up through doing things like typing on this computer or misusing our bodies in other ways, such as stiff shoulders and neck.

If you let the upper chest expand as you perform the movements then you are effectively ‘letting the chi rise up’ rather than ‘sinking it to the dan tien’. In Tai Chi you need to make your centre of gravity the dan tien area, and this requires letting the tension in the upper body release downwards (of course, you still need that opposite feeling of being drawn upwards from the crown that’s talked about in the classics, and in the above quote as “pluck up the back”, otherwise you slump, or get that crumpled ‘old man’ look I see too often in Tai Chi practitioners, which is not good either IMHO).

One of the meanings of chi is air, or breath, so you can see how ‘sinking the chi to the dantien’ relates to breathing from that area, and how ‘letting the chi rise up’ relates to the breath being too high in the body. All the posture requirements of Tai Chi (as featured in Yang Cheng-Fu’s 10 Important Points essay) are all part of the same thing really, so it can sometimes be misleading to consider them on their own as separate things – or as Mike Sigman said:

In relation to the tail-bone tuck (which I think really just says that the tail-bone should point downward and says nothing about “tuck”), one way of looking at that requirement is that it’s for the same reason the gua is sunk and relaxed, the back is relaxed, the head is suspended, the armpit is rounded, the crotch is rounded, the chest is hollowed and the back rounded slightly, and the stomach is relaxed. They are all done to affect the same thing which connects them all.

All this being said, there are a wide variety of interpretations of what these things mean amongst the different styles. Amongst Tai Chi stylists (mainly from Yang Lu Chan lines, since Chen guys seem to want to be a law unto themselves ) ) I think my view above is by far the most common IMHO, but you can counter pose it with the view amongst some Bagua stylists that the chest should be expanded outwards, but this seems to be part of a complete system and way of doing things that is very complete and detailed, and includes circulating energy in directions counter to the more usual way of doing it.

Learning becoming a part of you

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I was doing some push hands today, trying to work on integrating the spiral movement of silk reeling force into the movement pattern of push hands. It became obvious to me that you ability to do this is directly proportional to the amount of silk reeling exercise you’ve done in the past, not how well you understand it. It’s not just an idea that you can intellectually grasp, then apply instantly. With an opponent to deal with you have no time to think how you’re going to use spiral force to deal with their incoming pushes and attacks, changes in weight distribution and changes in force. There’s simply no time – it has to be a feel thing.

The equation is simple. The more silk reeling exercise you’ve practiced in the past the better you’ll be at putting that spiral feel into the myriad of changing circumstance you encounter in push hands. Your only option, if you want to get good at it, is to practice it every day until it the learning becomes a part of you.