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Why Tai Chi has got an AI problem

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So many Tai Chi books look the same.

I write about technology, specifically AI, for my day job, so I’d consider myself as somebody who is fairly knowledgeable about the subject. And that’s why I think I know what I’m talking about when I say that right now, Tai Chi has got an AI problem.

I got an email recently asking me to review a book about “Seated Tai Chi”. The ‘author’ advised me that the book had been created using AI, so I responded by saying that I didn’t think I’d be able to review it in that case.

They didn’t reply, but I’m glad they were upfront about how the book had been created; really, I only had to look at the front cover to see that it had clearly been made with AI. It was obvious because they’d gone for the most generic “AI Slop” version of an image possible.

It’s that same “AI slop” style that you see everywhere these days – an uncanny-valley sheen to the images, usually a marker-felt style font, and a cover design where there’s no real hierarchy to the different elements. There’s been no real thought into where the eye is supposed to travel around the page. AI Slop designs tend to be like that — overwhelming to look at — they throw everything at you all at once, with an equal emphasis everywhere all the time. It’s exactly the sort of thing human designers are trained not to do.

I went to Amazon and looked up Tai Chi books and immediately saw how large the problem is. There’s an absolute deluge of AI slop-style Tai Chi books on there, and curiously, a lot of them seem to be aimed at the seated Tai Chi market. Why, I don’t know, apart from the fact that seniors have always been the most profitable part of the Tai Chi demographic. You’ll also find a bevy of “Tai Chi for seniors” and “Tai Chi over 60” books on Amazon.

Here’s an image I took of the first results shown when you search for “Seated Tai Chi” on Amazon so you can see what I mean:

Can you see how the covers all have that horrible “slop” style to them?

Look.

I think AI is a tool that can be used for good or evil, just like any other tool. I just don’t understand why people are using it so badly. As an example of a positive use of AI, I wrote an article recently about how AI was being used to get Conn Iggulden’s books about Genghis Khan turned into a TV series, a series that would simply remain unmade forever without using AI.

But equally, I absolutely hate the way AI slop has taken over so many event posters I see either online or in real life — especially posters for Tai Chi events —  and even made its way into posters in cafes or barbers that all have the same generic AI slop look to them. Walking down the street in my city on my lunch break, I can see that AI slop is everywhere and I find it very depressing. A simple poster made in Canva, with two fonts, a photograph and some carefully arranged text, could look far better than 99% of AI-generated posters.

Seeing AI slop designs actively puts me off your brand. I’ll actively avoid you, and I bet I’m not the only one.

In the Conn Iggulden example, AI is potentially enabling something that couldn’t otherwise exist. With the posters, it’s replacing something that people have been perfectly capable of making for decades, often with better results.

I’m not a knee-jerk anti-AI person.  I’ve used AI images on this blog (which I write for free) in the past – just scroll down and I’m sure you’ll find some. I’ve used them when I couldn’t find a suitable image to use from a free photo library. But I’ve tried to make them look as good as possible. It’s been an experiment, but I’ll probably stop doing that in the future and stick to non-AI images simply because AI slop is starting to take over everything.

I get why people do it. It’s very easy to make a poster for something in AI in seconds. I just typed in:

“make me a poster for a tai chi seminar, October 9th at West Hampton Village Hall, 2.00pm, no experience necessary, wear loose clothing, see you there!”

And it made this:


I told it that this looked like a generic AI-generated poster, and asked it to make one that looked like it was designed by a human, and it produced this:

Ok, you could argue that there’s a better hierarchy on this one, with your eye starting on the main heading now, but there’s no real improvement to the AI aesthetic. It just changed one set of visual conventions it was imitating for another, and the legs on the man look completely out of proportion.

And things get worse if you ask to put too much information in. A designer would probably stop you and say you’re putting too much into the poster, but sycophantic AI just accommodates your request:

“make me a poster for a tai chi seminar, October 9th at West Hampton Village Hall, 2.00pm, no experience necessary, wear loose clothing, say “see you there!” – talk about the benefits of tai chi and why you might want to attend.”make me a poster for a tai chi seminar, October 9th at West Hampton Village Hall, 2.00pm, no experience necessary, wear loose clothing, say “see you there!” – talk about the benefits of tai chi and why you might want to attend. Tell them they can sign up to the website for membership at www.taichiwesthamptom.com and say there’s a 15% discount for your first 3 classes.”


You can see it just lets you overcrowd the poster with information. There’s WAY too much on here now for it to function effectively as a poster.

But despite design considerations, what I don’t get is why people don’t see that it all looks like AI slop?

There’s a parallel here with the martial art itself: somebody who doesn’t understand Tai Chi can imitate the external movements and produce something that looks superficially convincing. But the underlying principles are missing. AI-generated Tai Chi imagery can suffer the same fate – it looks like Tai Chi without actually being Tai Chi.

What if tai chi posture is about class, not biomechanics?

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The debate over leaning vs upright posture may have less to do with force and more to do with identity

Sun Lu Tang performing tai chi


Does your tai chi style lean forward or stay upright? The debate over which is “correct” has been raging for decades now. Well, maybe “raging” isn’t quite the right word for a group of tai chi practitioners, but at the very least there’s been some polite disagreement.

The usual way of looking at this issue is biomechanical. Which structure delivers force—jin—more efficiently? Which alignment is stronger, more stable, more effective?

But what if we’ve been looking at this the wrong way?

What if the difference isn’t really about efficiency at all, but about who the posture was for?

I’ve just been watching a lecture by Sander L. Gilman called Stand up Straight! Cultural Perspectives on Posture, and it adds an angle to this debate that feels like it’s been missing.

Gilman’s core idea is simple, but powerful: the body isn’t just biological—it’s cultural. The way we stand, move, and hold ourselves isn’t neutral. It’s shaped by what society thinks is healthy, respectable, or even fully human.

Historically, posture has been loaded with meaning. Standing upright has been associated with discipline, control, and refinement. Slouching, or anything that deviates from that ideal, has often been framed as a lack of those qualities.

Crucially, those ideas have often been tied to class.

In one example Gilman highlights, early 20th-century medical writing didn’t just describe posture, it judged it. Working-class bodies and rural populations were sometimes compared unfavorably to “primitive” forms, while upright posture was framed as something closer to a civilized ideal. (source).

Strip that down, and you get a striking idea: “respectability” is something performed through the body. Posture becomes part of that performance.

So what happens if we apply that lens to tai chi?

Most histories trace tai chi back to Chen Village in Henan province, but its spread through Beijing brought it into very different social contexts. Some styles developed in courtly or intellectual circles, others among martial artists, soldiers, and working practitioners. And when you look at the postures, a pattern starts to emerge.

Styles associated with more scholarly or “refined” figures, like Wu (Hao) style or Sun style, developed by the famously intellectual Sun Lutang, tend to emphasise a more upright frame.

By contrast, versions of Yang style and Wu style, shaped by professional martial artists and military figures, often include a noticeable forward lean.

Of course, these systems evolved over time and weren’t defined purely by class. But the contrast is hard to ignore.

Even Cheng Man-Ch’ing, often described as a scholar and artist as much as a martial artist, modified what he learned from Yang Chengfu into a distinctly upright form. His idea of the “five excellences” — calligraphy, painting, poetry, tai chi, and medicine — paints a clear picture of the kind of cultivated identity he was expressing.

Seen through Gilman’s lens, this looks like a cultural divergence, rather than one based on pure technique.

Maybe upright posture isn’t just about alignment. It’s about signaling control, refinement, and education. And maybe the forward-leaning versions reflect a different set of priorities: function, application, and practicality over presentation.

Looking for quality BJJ clothing? Try XMartial

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I’m pleased to announce I’m partnering with XMartial for BJJ and general gym-wear clothing. I’ve gone with XMartial because they have a genuinely fun range of designs, and also their website is full of people I actually recognise from the world of BJJ, like John Danaher, Jordan Preisinger from Jordan Teaches Jiujitsu, and B-Mac. Plus, its Reddit customer reviews for quality and shipping to the UK are good and the customer service is highly rated.

Here’s an example of one of their rashguards that I thought was pretty cool:

Shipping in the US is free, but there is a small $9.50 for shipping to the UK. There are lots of different designs, and XMartial sell gis and hoodies too. So, if you’re looking for new, high quality, BJJ wear and you want to support The Tai Chi Notebook then head over there and have a look at what they’ve got. Thanks!

What are ‘traditional’ martial arts?

/ Tai Chi Notebook / 4 Comments

I always find the labels ‘traditional’ and ‘modern’ misleading because something that’s current and popular, like Brazilian Jiujitsu, is actually quite old in comparison to some of the martial arts we would call traditional, like Aikido or Taekwondo. But even recently created martial arts are built on older traditions, so where do we start dating a martial art from? From the day it was named, or from the arts the proceeded it? If it’s the later then all martial arts are the same age and have existed (potentially) forever.

Another way of differentiating between traditional and modern is using the self defence vs sporting dichotomy, however so many martial arts exist in a grey area between the two – take Muay Thai for example, that I don’t think that’s a good way to do it either.

Here’s something I saw written by Alexander Ewlad on the Martial Arts Studies Facebook group in a comment:

“For me, one of the best, i.e. concise and precisely written and kind of encompassing scholarly starts on traditional martial arts was and is the following by Moenig & Kim (orig. 2018; republished as a book chapter 2021):

“[T]he expression ‘traditional martial arts’, which has become very fashionable, is one of the most misrepresented and misused terms in the general discourse. ‘Traditional’ projects an image of a long history and of continuity throughout history, without change. In reality, most modern Asian martial arts are only a few hundred years old or are an evolutionary product of the twentieth century. On the other hand, some western combat sports, such as boxing and wrestling, actually have traditions as long as, or longer than, most modern, popular Asian martial arts, and nobody would ever classify them as ‘traditional martial arts’. The term ‘traditional’ seems wholly reserved as a reference to Asian martial arts. However, to the contrary, many present-day East Asian martial arts developed only recently, and are not ‘traditional’ by most definitions. Most traditional martial art proponents do not consider sports as having any philosophical aspects, as being mostly irrelevant, and as ‘merely’ a physical activity without any spiritual merits. Surveying the available literature on martial arts reveals that leaders and practitioners of traditional martial arts have often monopolized the discussion about philosophy, educational values, and realism in martial arts training; labelling the sports aspect inferior regarding educational benefits in addition to being unrealistic for real combat“ (Moenig & Kim in: Hong & Li, 2022: 43).
Original reference
Book reprint/republishing

You might also like to listen to the lecture, Inventing Traditional Martial Arts a lecture by Prof. Peter Lorge from one of the Martial Arts Studies conferences.

The 2024 Martial Arts Studies conference will happen in June in Cardiff, UK.

A quick Tai Chi fix anybody can try: Tracking with the eyes

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FYI: Owls can rotate their necks up to 270 degrees! 

To some Tai Chi people it’s important to know where the eyes are looking when doing a Tai Chi form for slightly esoteric reasons: “your eyes lead your intention and your intention leads your chi.” But I think we can come up with reasons for using the eyes in Tai Chi that require no mention of intention (yi) or chi.

Try this: Sit comfortably. Turn your head slowly to the side, back to the middle then the other side. It’s a typical neck stretching exercise that you’ll find done at the start of your typical Kung Fu, Tai Chi, or Yoga class. It’s good for your neck, but there’s nothing particularly special about it.

Now try this: Instead of just turning your head to the side, actively look to the side. Lead the movement with your eyes looking to the side. Now compare the feeling of doing that to the feeling of just turning your head to the side.

If you’re anything like me you’ll find the experience quite different. When you are looking to the side for a reason your whole body co-ordinates better, not to mention, I think you can turn your head a bit further too. I’m sure there is a scientific word for this purpose driven movement, but I don’t know it.

Think of an owl, when it turns its head to look at something interesting that might potentially be prey – the eyes are always locked in.

When doing the Tai Chi form, try actively looking with your eyes and turning your head in the direction you are going. Hopefully you’ll notice the different in the quality and coordination of your overall movement.

The internal qualities of martial arts

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Photo by Thao LEE on Unsplash

One observation I have on ‘internal’ martial arts is that there there is often very little focus on the ‘internal’ qualities to a human being. Or if they do address them then it is, not directly and often in passing.

I’m not talking about things to do with forces, or the body, like Qi, Xin and Jin. Yes, the Yi (intent or mind) is mentioned all the time in the Tai Chi Classics, but it’s always in relation to fighting, or releasing and accepting forces on the body. “Quelle surprise”, you might say, since Tai Chi is a marital art, but if I contrast ‘internal’ martial arts with ‘external’ martial arts for a moment, the discussion there is often on the internal qualities of a human that internal martial arts, ironically, neglect.

I’m talking about things like self-control (temperance), endurance and patience.

The goal of improving these internal qualities has been the goal of practical philosophers since man first decided to ponder his/her existence. I could quote from LaoTzu here, but I find it more explicitly written by the Greek philosophers, particularity the Stoics.

In Chapter 10 of the Greek classic of Stoicism, The Enchiridion, we find:

“On the occasion of every accident (event) that befalls you, remember to turn to yourself and inquire what power you have for turning it to use. If you see a fair man or a fair woman, you will find that the power to resist is temperance (continence). If labour (pain) be presented to you, you will find that it is endurance. If it be abusive words, you will find it to be patience. And if you have been thus formed to the (proper) habit, the appearances will not carry you along with them.”

Epictetus, The Enchiridion

Sure, these internal qualities can certainly be learnt from any martial art, however I find it is the external martial arts that really emphasise them. Many Taekwondo schools use the goal of improving your inner qualities as the main sell in their marketing approach. For example, I just did a Google search for Taekwondo clubs in the local area, clicked on Tiger martial arts, and what do I find written on their website, in all caps, so you can’t miss it?

“WE BELIEVE MARTIAL ARTS IS ABOUT MORE THAN JUST KICKING AND PUNCHING”.

This is followed up with “We give students the focus and confidence to achieve in all areas of their lives.  Yes, you can learn to take care of yourself in dangerous situations, but really it’s about learning to use your mind and body like a martial artist – learn how to control your body and your mind, and you will be set up for life.”

It’s the same with Karate. I did another random search on Karate clubs and found Bristol Karate Academy whose motto is “virtue in industry” from “Virtute et industria” — or by virtue and industry — from the city of Bristol, which dates back to at least 1569. They explain how that relates to the values of their club on their About us page:

“So what does that mean for us?

Virtue (美徳): We have integrity, in our commitment to traditional, effective Karate and integrity in the way that we treat others. We are respectful, fair and aim for high moral standards. We build character, strive for excellence and show courage in the face of challenges.

Industry (勉励): We work hard to reach our goals. We’re diligent and determined to get better at every single training session. We are rigorous in our approach to improvement and dedicated to our own and each other’s development.

Through hard, honest training we become our best possible selves”

Again, while I’m sure they can kick-ass with their karate, the emphasis in their motto is on the internal qualities of a human being. It’s about becoming your best possible self.

I know what you’re thinking – “perhaps it’s about teaching children?” Things like Karate and Taekwondo can be very orientated towards teaching children, and you obviously don’t want to be raising a hoard of little ninjas who have no idea about the moral implications of using their marital arts. However, it’s not just non-Chinese marital arts that have a heavy emphasis on building moral character. Similar ‘external’ Chinese martial arts do too, and those tend to have as much emphasis on adults as children. Also the moral aspects were there right from the beginning in the Southern arts.

Photo by Nikita Belokhonov: https://www.pexels.com/photo/a-boy-participating-in-a-dragon-dance-6673225/

For the history of Southern Chinese martial arts I’d recommend Ben Judkin’s excellent book “The Creation of Wing Chun”. Its tag line is “A social history of the Southern Chinese Martial Arts” because it covers all of them, not just Wing Chun, and particularly Choy Li Fut. When the first professional Choy Li Fut school opened in 1836 a moral education was seen as part of the ethos of the school. The school had 10 rules that had to be followed at all times:

Ten Points
1 Seek the approval of your master in all things relative to the school.
2 Practice hard daily.
3 Fight to win (but do not fight by choice).
4 Be moderate in sexual behavior.
5 Eat healthily.
6 Develop strength through endurance (to build a foundation and the ability to jump).
7 Never back down from an enemy.
8 Practice breathing exercises.
9 Make the sounds (“Yik” for punches, “Wah” for tiger claws, “Tik” for kicks).
10 Through practice you cannot be bullied.

Wing Chun also initially had a similar set of rules. I’ve written before about Choy Li Fut’s 10 rules and Wing Chun’s 9.

While some of the rules are to do with body use, like making sounds on punches, others are more moral, like being moderate in sexual behaviour. And also eating healthy is a rule! Can you imagine going to a Tai Chi class or a Xing Yi class today and being told that healthy eating is now a rule, and if you don’t follow it, you’re out? In fact, I’d go as far to say that many internal martial arts teachers were renowned for hard drinking and over eating!

(It should be noted that Bak Mei tended to not have this moral emphasis. Reasons for this are explored in the book.)

Moving forward in time and changing locations to Brazil… Carlos Gracie also created a set of rules called the 12 Commandments when he started Brazilian Jiujitsu as an offshoot of Judo.

1 Be so strong that nothing can disturb the peace of your mind.
2 Talk to all people about happiness, health, and prosperity.
3 Give to all your friends the feeling of being valued.
4 Look at things by the enlightened point of view and update your optimism on reality.
5 Think only about the best, work only for the best, and always expect the best.
6 Be as just and enthusiastic about others victories as you are with yours.
7 Forget about past mistakes and focus your energy on the victories of tomorrow.
8 Always make those around you happy and keep a smile to all people who talk to you.
9 Apply the largest amount of your time on self-improvement and no time in criticizing others.
10 Be big enough so you can feel unsatisfied, be noble enough so you can feel anger, be strong enough so you can feel fear, and be happy enough so you can feel frustrations.
11 Hold a good opinion about your self and communicate that to the world, but not through dissonant words but through good works.
12 Believe strongly that the world is in your side, as long as you stay loyal to the best of yourself.

Carlos Gracie

These are mainly forgotten about these days and I’ve noted before that a lot of them were borrowed from somewhere else but they are almost exclusively about internal qualities of a human being.

If you contrast these sorts of rules to what you find in “internal” marital arts schools, well first of all, there are usually no set rules like this at all! Secondly, we tend to look to the classics for our ancient sayings, and finding moral instruction in them is like finding a needle in a haystack. Instead you find simile – for example, “be still like a mountain and move like a great river” from the Tai Chi classics, or philosophy from the Xing Yi classics like The 10 Theses of Yue Fei:

“From the beginning, that which is discrete must have its unification.
The divided must be combined. 
Therefore, between heaven and earth, all that is disordered has its abode, all the thousand branches and the confusion of then thousand endings, all have their origin.
This is because one root divides into ten thousand branches, and ten thousand branches all belong to one root.
These events are natural“.

– The Thesis of Integrity

Or you find descriptions of body use and strategy.

The jin should be
rooted in the feet,
generated from the legs,
controlled by the waist, and
expressed through the fingers. 

The Tai Chi Classic.

What you don’t find a lot of is moral instruction or a reflection on the internal qualities of a martial artist that you find emphasised right up front in external schools.

So, why is this? Good question. One possible answer could be that ‘external’ arts historically coming from the Shaolin Temple (in the usual origin myth, at least) always had a Buddhist religious and therefore moral aspect to them. The internal arts in contrast tended to evolve out of the (violent and bloody) countryside, or they evolved from a Taoist approach to life, which was less prescriptive.

I don’t know – what do you think? What explains the internal/external difference? Let me know in the comments.

The Power of Chi – Damo Strikes Back!

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Notable Tai Chi teacher, Damo Mitchell, just released a new video with Adam Mizner where he addresses some of the controversy over The Power of Chi documentary that is worth watching, if you care about these sorts of things. 

Damo Mitchell and Adam Mizner are a couple of the most well-known modern Tai Chi teachers on the seminar circuit, both of whom have a lot of followers on social media, and large organisations of students behind them. The Power of Chi was a movie where Adam Mziner demonstrated his chi/qi on a number of athletes from various sports. The movie has since mysteriously disappeared from the Internet, as far as I can tell, but the trailer is still on YouTube:

You can see from the start of the clip where Damo’s thinking is at (around the 4 minute mark) – the reason people criticise the movie, or himself and Adam, is because they are jealous of how well he and Adam are doing and that the people who criticise them have less followers so are below them and it’s therefore wrong to “punch down” by replying to them. These low level people also “are not in a good space mentally”’.  His other point is that the movie was not made by Adam, he was just a paid performer in it, therefore everybody’s criticism is misplaced.

Well, talk about missing the point entirely!

At no point does he address the central issue I and many others had with the movie – that all this “chi” stuff is nothing to do with chi/qi!  

Now, I’m not egotistical enough to think that Damo is addressing this video specifically to me, but my original post about the documentary is still there for everybody to read. As you can see, I said I thought the whole thing was a bit silly. That’s about the worst of it! 

You can decide for yourself if that means I am racked with jealousy about how many students Adam and Damo have, and how great their lives are… I really am not even playing in the same league as Adam and Damo – they are professional Tai Chi teachers making a living off this, I’m not. I have a real job, and just run this blog in my spare time for fun. It’s the same with my podcast. But that doesn’t mean I’m not serious about my practice.

The other thing I did in my original post was link to my friend Rob Poyton’s video response to the trailer showing how all the supposed Chi feats in the trailer were really done – which I thought was quite cool, but seems to have really put the cat amongst the pigeons. I mean part of the attraction of seeing a stage magician is working out how the magic is really done, right? 

Rob Poyton explaining how to do the feats seen in The Power of Chi movie.

Now that video by Rob seemed to raise the ire of many of Adam’s followers (who posted in the comments section of my blog, which are still there and you can read) who replied with such gems as this:

“I’m disappointed in your entire take on internal power, as indicated by your dismissive way of talking about those who actually do possess some genuine internal power as using “tricks”. To be blunt, you’re just ignorant–that is, you have no personal experience with real practitioners and assume everyone showing such power must be a charlatan. “

“Why do you have a website about Taiji (that’s the correct pinyin spelling btw) when you’ve never met any of the top taiji practitioners – and refuse to meet them before publishing negative theories about the limits of the art? So the best explanation to you is that the top practitioners in the world who have trained thousands of students are merely liars with fake reviews from professional athletes and professional teachers?”

“So you did not see the move, or met anyone in the movie to experience this skill/ attribute first hand. Kind of strange to have such strong opinions on something you have no experience in….”

You can see from the comments that the followers of Adam and Damo really do believe that the feats presented in the movie, The Power of Chi, are real demonstrations of chi power, (or Qi power.) Again, that’s my issue with all this stuff, not that they’re making a good living off teaching Tai Chi.

As a complete co-incidence Rob just released another clip in the last few days, this time about the subject of Empty Force, that’s also worth a watch, and will undoubtedly upset all these same people all over again, for exactly the same reasons:

There’s a long history of the Tai Chi magician. Empty Force is something that the Tai Chi Magicians of the world engage in regularly, and once again, I think it’s cool that Rob is posting a video showing how it works.

As for Damo and Adam, I hope they keep enjoying their cocktails and cigars – they seem to be having a great time, hidden away in all that smoke, being Tai Chi Gurus. I’m not jealous that we have very different lives at all. I wouldn’t trade mine for anything. Spending a month on a retreat in Thailand training Tai Chi full time, (let alone a year!), sounds like absolute hell to me. I’m sure it would send me potty! I’d rather be with my family, friends and pets, thanks. 

It looks like Adam and Damo have some real skills in Tai Chi push hands – I’m not doubting that. After all, they’ve had years training full time to get good at this stuff, so they better have something by now. But as with everything in the internal arts – it pays to keep your feet firmly on the ground.

For me the latest video from Damo and Adam is just another fascinating glimpse into how the mind of a Tai Chi Guru works.

A deep dive into Xing Yi Monkey

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Golden snub nosed monkey, native to China.


I had the good fortune to guide a group of people through some Xing Yi Monkey recently, which made me focus on it more and practice it a bit harder in the run up, which was a good thing. (I’m also available for children’s parties and Hen parties too, btw). Anyway, I wrote some notes about it, which I’ve typed up below.


A unique animal

When it comes to the animals in the natural world that we can look at for inspiration for martial methods the most obvious place to start is with one of our closes cousins, the primates. Like us, monkeys can stand upright, if only for short periods in some cases, they have hands that can grip and even a bit of limited tool usage. However, monkey is not a good place to start your journey into the 12 animals of Xing Yi.

The first thing to realise about monkey is that it breaks a lot of the ‘rules’ of Xing Yi Quan, which is one of the reason why it’s often taught last amongst the 12 animals. My teacher taught the animals as almost self-contained mini martial arts – each one had a different strategy and techniques, but Monkey wins the award for being the most unique amongst them. It really does stand up on its own as a complete martial art.

Almost all of the rest of Xing Yi Quan can be performed in formation, standing in a line with other people, since you generally move forward and backwards along a straight line (except for the turns, obviously). Whether this really harks back to an ancient heritage of soldiers moving in formation is speculation of course, but it should be noted that a row of people holding a spear and standing side by side can perform the 5 elements and most of the first 11 animal links while all facing in the same direction without impending each other, provided they all turn at the same time. That’s possibly one reason why Xing Yi is so obsessed with keeping the elbows near the ribs.

But Monkey doesn’t follow these rules – it’s breaks the line. Or more accurately, it’s what you do when the line has been broken. Attacks in monkey are reacted to and defended at diagonal angles – there’s footwork you don’t find in the rest of Xing Yi and there are changes in tempo, bursts of speed and jumping. It’s as if your nice orderly line of soldiers has been broken up and the battle has become more of a melee situation.

All the different types of monkey have similar movement, but the monkey native to China that Xing Yi is probably using for inspiration is the Golden Monkey. And thanks to the BBC there are plenty of Golden Monkey clips available to watch – this one of two tribes coming together and fighting over resources is particularly good:

And here’s an interesting clip of a group of wild monkeys who have learned to trust humans for food:

Both clips are a gold mine of information about how these animals move.


Monkey Pi

Pi (splitting) is the main energy from the 5 elements that is used in monkey, but while in Pi Quan the arm uses the elbow joint as a pivot point for delivering the downward chopping strike (a bit like the swing of an axe), in monkey it’s the wrist that is the pivot point. The monkey Pi is more like a slap, but don’t think that makes it ineffectual. A relaxed and loose slap delivered using good body mechanics to the head can easily result in concussions.

Monkey also tends to eschew single strikes – everything is done in quick flurries of 3. This is called a triple palm. Often the first strike is to open up their guard, or intercept a strike, the second is to hit the head, and the third can be done as a grab and pull on their limb or head, leading to your own head butt or knee strike – an action called ‘wrapping’. The back of the hand can also be used as an upward deflection to the opponents arms, for when the monkey wants to enter deep.


Range

Talking of entering deep, Monkey wants to either be too far away for you to hit (beyond kicking range), or right in at what would normally be called grappling range, (i.e. too close for what is generally called striking range) but the use of close body palm strikes delivered by turning the body sharply and the cross stepping opens it up as a striking range too.

Take a look at this video of a monkey antagonising a Tiger cub (I don’t think he’d be brave enough to try this on a fully grown tiger!) to get the idea of range:

As you can see, monkey is something of a trickster engaged in a war of attrition. A tiger generally wants to finish the prey in one big action, monkey will keep attacking, wearing it down over time. Often the monkey’s goal is simply to drive the opponent away out of its territory.


Agility, but with stability

Obviously to close the distance from outside kicking range to inside punching range you need tremendous agility to play monkey, however, agility without stability is a recipe for disaster, which is another reason for teaching monkey last – it requires a very solid understanding of the footwork methods of Xing Yi Quan. It uses a cross step frequently, and also spins and jumps.

Monkey requires you to be agile, but rooted when you step. Without that combination the movements of monkey can become just a dance. The stability also relates to being relaxed in your movements. Because monkey movements tend to be done fast the tendency is to get tighter and more tense as you do them. I find consciously trying to relax while doing monkey is required more so than in other Xing Yi animals.


Tea cups exercise

The arm methods of money require more utilisation of the joints of the wrist, elbow and shoulder than the other methods of Xing Yi. Techniques like “Reach around the back of the helmet” require significant mobility of the arm joints. The best way to achieve this is to become adept at the famous tea cups exercise. You should practice this is with actual tea cups full of tea (or water) and try not to spill any. This is incredibly difficult!

Here’s a basic instructional on the tea cups exercise:


Yin and Yang

Finally, we do a Yin and a Yang monkey in our Xing Yi – the Yang monkey is the bright, lively, younger monkey, while the Yin monkey is the more older experienced monkey who uses heavier techniques. Almost all the video you see of Xing Yi money on the Internet are showing the Yang version. The most famous move from Yang monkey is the upward ‘flying’ knee strike. Here’s a good example:

To be honest, I haven’t seen any other Xing Yi group do a Yin monkey like we do, but here’s a little clip of me doing some Yin monkey so you can see what I mean:

You might also like to read my previous post on the Heretical Baguazhang and Xing Yi Monkey connection and also episode 65 of the Heretics podcast.

Tai Chi Notebook News, May 25th 2023

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So, a heads up about a couple of new books on the way, a robot teaching Tai Chi and a seminar write up that’s worth a mention. This post actually makes me think, should I be doing a newsletter? What do you think? Do you want one? Would you read it? Let me know!

XING YI NEWS

Dragon Body, Tiger Spirit

Byron Jacob has a new translation of the Xing Yi Classics, Dragon Body, Tiger Spirit, coming out, which looks like it will include a chapter on the history of Xing Yi written by Jarek Szymanski who you may know from his popular website China from inside.

Image Credit: Mushin Martial Culture

This is looking like it’s going to be good. The title is a nice play on “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” and it refers to things mentioned in the Xing Yi Classics. The cover also features a nicely-colourised version of the only photo we have of the famous Xing Yi master Guo Yun Shen, which has been very nicely done. (Master Guo is the guy seated centre right, and wearing the light blue tunic, next to Master Che.)

There have been many books that contain the Xing Yi classics translated, of course, but I’m hoping that Byron’s commentary will be the thing that makes this one different.

Byron says: “Dragon Body, Tiger Spirit will be available in hardcover, softcover as well as digital versions. To be notified of release visit mushinmartialculture.com and sign up to the newsletter.”

I’ll do a review once I get my hands on a copy.

TAI CHI NEWS

Yang Style Short Form

Another nicely presented book on my horizon is Yang Style Short Form by Sifu Leo Ming and Caroline Addenbrooke. The short form in question is the Cheng Man-Ching Tai Chi form, and calling it the “Yang Short Form” is a bit of a liberty, since it is not the official Yang Short Form. But names aside, it looks like it’s going to be interesting.

Image Credit: Ming’s Martial Arts Academy Publishing

Here’s the description:

“A beginners guide to Taiji Chuan is a comprehensive training guide for all students of Taiji who are serious about mastering the art of Taiji. It is unique in that it details each of the forty four postures that make up the complete Yang Style Short Form, and it does so in a way that the student can experience the smallest nuance of each movement, from the opening sequence to the closing posture.”

It sounds interesting, especially since it goes on to say it will teach you how to breathe correctly during your practice and how the “Tan Tien drives all movement, opening the meridians so that the universal llife [sic] force can flow through you. “

A spelling mistake in the description of the book on the website (“llife”) is a bit of a red flag, but that could be Barnes & Nobles fault, and nothing to do with the book. However, I’m curious about the use of “Taiji Chuan” as a Romanisation on the cover though, since it seems to mix both Pinyin and Wade-Giles Romanisation systems. I have genuinely never seen anybody mix the two quite like this before. It’s usually either “Tai Chi Chuan” or “Taijiquan”. This will upset some people, I’m sure, but I don’t mind.

I’ll be reviewing the book soon.

Robot Tai Chi

I guess it was inevitable, but somebody has made a life-size robot that teaches Tai Chi.

Image Credit: Credit: Rochester Institute of Technology

Depending on how it works (there’s no video!) this looks quite impressive, however, I’m left with one burning question – why? I don’t know how many thousands or millions of dollars it took to create this robot, but economically I’m pretty sure that paying Bob, your local Tai Chi teacher $50 to teach Tai Chi to the people in the old folks home once a week is a business model that is going to be hard for a multi-million dollar robot to beat. This looks like a solution in search of a problem to me.


Chen style seminar write up

Let me give a shout out to my friend Ken Gullette of Internal Fighting Arts for his write up of a recent seminar with Chen Tai Chi mastermind Nabil Ranne in Philadelphia. Here’s a quote:

“What impressed me most about Nabil’s teaching was the level of detail. And there were differences — in the shorter stances where feet are parallel most of the time, in the shifting of weight, in the awareness of different jin in each movement, the fullness of the dan t’ien and the coordination of the mingmen, the opening and closing of the chest and back, the folding of the chest and stomach, the closing power in the legs, the grounding from the heels, the stability of the knees and the spiraling through the feet, and connecting it all in each movement; and peng — always maintaining peng, which I have worked on for over two decades but still learn new aspects.”

Image Credit: Ken Gullette

Nabil teaches Tai Chi in the Chen Yu lineage, and to my eye seems by far the best of the teachers available if you want to follow that particular line of Chen style. Plus, you can learn with him online at the Chen Style Taijiquan Network

If you want to get a quick glimpse of his style of Tai Chi then check out this Instagram page.

MORE LINKS

Recent Tai Chi Notebook posts

Here are 3 things I wrote this week that you should read:

1. The power of connection with Henry Akins:

I came across this video recently of Henry Akins explaining the concept of connection in BJJ, as taught to him by Rickson Gracie, and it doesn’t half remind me of Tai Chi…

2. Way of the Warrior episode: Shorinji Kempo

The classic BBC TV series, Way of the Warrior’s episode on Shorinji Kempo just appeared online, and it still holds up today.

3. Where should the elbows be in Xing Yi?

This blog is about a weird quirk of the Xing Yi world. There’s a surprisingly large amount of online debate in Xing Yi circles about where the elbow should be when performing Xing Yi.

If you haven’t checked The Tai Chi Notebook out on Facebook then please do, and why not give our Instagram page a look too, and our YouTube channel?

1,000 followers on Facebook! (and my most popular posts of all time)

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The Tai Chi Notebook Facebook page has finally got far enough over the 1,000 followers milestone that I feel confident in shouting about it a little bit! So, here we go – 1,000 followers!

Thanks to everybody who has liked, subscribed and commented on The Tai Chi Notebook over the years – it’s all very much appreciated!

If you haven’t checked us out on Facebook then please do, and why not give our Instagram page a look too, and our YouTube channel?

Also, I’ve changed the sidebar on the blog over to the right —-> It now shows the most popular posts on the page by views and likes, so if you’re looking for something interesting to read about martial arts and Tai Chi, then look here to find something.