fitness

Saoirse Ronan’s viral clip and the debate around women’s safety in the UK

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The UK is having a bit of a women’s safety moment right now, and since I’m in the UK and it’s a topic that crosses over into subjects I discuss on my blog, I think I should address it. As well as being about self-defence it’s also about how women and female perspectives are often ignored by a male-focused society. It all relates back to comments made by actress Saoirse Ronan on the Graham Norton Show, a clip of which has gone viral.

You can view the clip here:

She’s sitting on the sofa with fellow actors Denzel Washington, Eddie Redmayne and Paul Mescal. They’re having a lighthearted discussion about training martial arts/self defence for movie roles. While the men laugh and joke about something as ludicrous as thinking about a phone as a weapon of self defence, (can you imagine, lol!?) Ronan points out (she has to try twice to be heard) that this is something women have to think about all the time. The resulting awkward silence speaks louder than anything else.

That this one moment seems to have captured something very familiar to a lot of women – it’s captured men’s ignorance of women’s lived experience in terms of feeling unsafe when moving about in the world and having to think about using things like keys or mobile phones as weapons. Things that men generally don’t have to worry about.

I don’t want to jump on any kind of bandwagon and write an article about how to use a mobile phone as a weapon, because a) you can’t learn self defence from articles! And b) that seems like very opportunistic behaviour.

But what I would say to any women reading this, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu (BJJ) is a great martial art that will benefit you more in the long run way more than a one-off 2-hour seminar on “self defence for women”. If you really want to feel more confident and less unsafe (of course, there is no guaranteed panacea for this, unfortunately) then I’d recommend starting regular BJJ classes at a BJJ Academy you feel comfortable with, and with an instructor you feel comfortable with (please shop around!), rather than going to a one-off seminar that aims to provide you with a quick fix.

And to the men who might need to become more of women’s lived experience (yes, you at the back!) You might like to read this article from the Guardian, detailing six women’s reactions to the clip, that’s worth a read.

And in the words of the sergeant from Hill Street Blues, “let’s be careful out there”.

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!

Tai Chi and the art of occupying the other’s space

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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.

You can train Tai Chi with me in Bath/Bristol, and get better at standing on one leg, twice a week.

Listen to a podcast about this blog post.

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.

A rare picture of Yang Cheng-Fu surfaces

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Is this Yang Cheng Fu, or just a clever AI fake?

Yang Cheng Fu, grandson of the Yang style Tai Chi founder, Yang Lu Chan, is probably the most photographed of all the famous early Yang style practitioners, thanks to the publication of his 1930s books on Tai Chi that showed him performing his Tai Chi form as a series of fixed poses.

Of course, we all know that Tai Chi has no fixed positions, but if you are going to present a series of movements in a book then you either need a series of drawings or a series of photos showing poses. Film was rare and video recorders hadn’t been invented when Yang Cheng Fu published Methods of Applying Boxing (1931) and the Essence and Applications of Tai Chi (1934), which was translated into English in 2005 and published in print.

Yang Cheng Fu posing in Single Whip, from his Methods of Applying Boxing, 1931

Because of books like these we are used to seeing Yang Cheng-Fu in perfectly poised shots for the camera, which was why it was so surprising to discover this week that somebody had an ‘action shot’ of Yang Cheng-Fu taken while he was doing a form demonstration at a martial arts event.

So, full credit to the person who posted this: The photo was posted to Facebook by Wong Yuen-Ming in the Internal Arts Institute group with the message “Today I am making public one such a photo, possibly the only photo that shows Yang Chengfu demonstrating his Taijiquan in public that was shot by a photographer in action. It was taken on October 15, 1928 when Yang was demonstrating at the Chinese National Guoshu championship.” There is no name of the photographer mentioned.

It’s hard to know whether the photo is genuine, especially in the age of AI where it’s very easy to fake photos in a convincing way, but it does at least look like Yang Cheng-Fu. The posture shown also looks like Yang Cheng-Fu’s frame and style.

As for the location and date, that also checks out: The Central Goushu Institute held two events in 1928, the first in Beijing was a highly competitive lei tai tournament and the second was in Nanjing From Wikipedia: “This event came to be regarded as one of the most significant historic gatherings of Chinese martial arts masters. The tournament was presided by generals Zhang Zhijiang, Li Liejun, and Li Jinglin, who separated the 600 participants into two categories: Shaolin and Wudang.[2] After the first several days of competition, the fighting competitions had to be halted because many participants were severely injured. The final 12 contestants were not permitted to continue, with the public excuse being the fear more injury or a death. The winner was determined by a vote by the participants.”

It’s not clear which of these two events the alleged photo of Yang Cheng-Fu was taken at.

Is it genuine? I don’t know, but it’s very convincing. I initially thought he was performing in front of a mirror but the arms are not a mirror image, so there are two performers on the stage.

Martial Arts Studies Conference, Cardiff June 2024, write up

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It’s really hard to do the 2024 Martial Arts Studies Conference justice in a write up. It’s an intense 3 days of thought-provoking lectures on all aspects of martial arts research that can open up huge vistas of unexplored subjects, ripe with possibilities for further study, or make you reevaluate what you think you already know about subjects you maybe thought were common knowledge. It’s attended by academics and researchers from all over the world and a few ‘civilians’, like myself, who are more populist writers or practitioners.

Maybe I could just recap a few of the things I learned after three days in Cardiff of having my preconceptions about martial subject gently poked, enlightened and challenged.

Firstly, I’m now much more informed on the subject of trauma-informed martial arts practice thanks to the excellent work of Georgia Verry who runs the Conscious Combat Club project and podcast who, as well as delivering a paper, ran a workshop on trauma-informed kickboxing. There’s also Dr Alex Channon and his work with the Love Fighting Hate Violence project on the same subject. I now have a new appreciation of the brilliance of 80s martial arts hero Cynthia Rothrock thanks to a paper delivered by Prof Meaghan Morris of the University of Sydney, and I have new ways to think about questions that used to fox me, like “why do you still do martial arts?”, thanks to a thought-provoking paper delivered by Wayne Wong. Daniel Mroz delivered new perspectives on martial arts history and Adam Frank gave me new ideas on how to think about qi. Scott MacMillan gave me some ideas about why Brazilian Jiujitsu answers life’s existential questions. And Tran Khải Hoài gave me insights into how Communist revolutionary Ho Chi Min may have influenced Taijiquan practice in ways we haven’t thought about. Yes, really!

But that’s just scratching the surface. The full schedule is here. I didn’t get to listen to all the talks as they were usually happening in parallel, so you had to choose which one to go to. However, I’m hoping they were all recorded and all appear on the martial arts studies YouTube channel soon so I can pick up the ones I missed.

But really it’s the meeting of such a great bunch of people and the social elements that really make the event special. From an impromptu push hands session opposite the Millennium Stadium with Ian Sinclair from Canada to little demonstrations of martial technique here and there in pubs and restaurants in the evening (thanks Randy Brown!), it’s an invaluable opportunity to meet with really experienced practitioners of martial arts from all over the world. I got to talk at length with practitioners about Okinawan Karate, French Boxing Savate, Vietnamese martial arts, Capoeira, Mantis Boxing, Taijiquan, Ninjitsu, Aikido, Brazilian Jiujitsu, MMA and probably many more that I’ve forgotten, and regardless of the martial art, the positive conference vibe remained strong.

And let’s not forget the brilliant Capoeira demonstration that sought to teach us the difference between the Regional and Angola styles.

I didn’t want the conference to end, it was great to meet old friends and make new ones, and as one participant said “end of the MAS Conference Blues are a real thing”.

I’ve made lots of contacts so hopefully there will be more new faces appearing on my podcast in the weeks and months to come. Thanks to Paul Bowman for doing a great job organising it. Here’s to the next one.

Tai Chi as a group practice vs solo practice

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A group practices the Tai Chi 24 form together for World Kung Fu and Tai Chi day.

I’ve been getting back into teaching Tai Chi classes recently, and one thing I’ve noticed is the distinct difference there is between doing the form solo in your back yard compared to performing it as part of a group. I’ve been doing the form on my own now for years now. I stopped teaching formal classes in Tai Chi way back in 2011, and although I did a few private lesson things, lockdown really saw an end to that. So, it’s been a long time since I’ve been part of a group all doing the form together.

Group practice changes things. Your awareness in Tai Chi should always be this kind of delicate balance of internal and external. You need to stay aware of your internal sense of self, at the same time as not shutting out the outside world. This is, after all, a martial art, not a meditation session. If you’re not aware of what’s going on outside of you then it wouldn’t be much use for dealing with kicks and punches coming your way. But at the same time, Tai Chi does exist somewhere on the mediation spectrum It demands a sense of stillness and awareness over your inner state. Things like the feeling of your balance, your sense of whether your body is expanding or contracting, your centre of gravity (dantien) and where you are moving from all mater, not to mention keeping your mind fixed on the task in hand and your Yi (intention) flowing with the movements.

Doing that on your own is one thing, but when you are performing the form as part of a group, your awareness needs to also incorporate the group. The group seems to naturally develop a speed together. I wouldn’t say that a group of Tai Chi beginners possess the grace and beauty of a murmuration of starlings (!), but something of the same kind of non-verbal communication is going on. You are constantly picking up on little signals from other people that keep the whole group in check. But at the same time you can’t let the other people distract you and put you off your own job.

A murmuration of starlings

Just like Starlings, we are animals too, so we have these subtle senses and the ability to move in groups. If you’ve ever experienced being in a crowd of people that get a bit paniced you’ll know what I mean. The crowd seems to take on a life of its own and move as one.

Of course, it’s quite possible that you can perform Tai Chi with other people and remain blissfully unaware of any of this, particularly if you are new the Tai Chi and your head is so full of trying to remember the moves, or telling yourself off for getting them wrong, that there’s no room for anything else.

As a final thought, my feelings of seeing people doing Tai Chi together have always been a bit conflicted. On one hand it looks cool to see people brought together over a common goal, all silently concentrating and moving in harmony. But on the other, it expresses some of the worst aspects of the Communist ideas that ended up becoming a part of Tai Chi in the 20th century, that people should be ‘all the same’, bland, expressionless, worker units all doing whatever they are told to with no room for individuality.

There is always this tension between the group and the individual in society. The trick is to try and navigate it successfully.

The whole body is a fist

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There is a phrase in Tai Chi that the whole body is a fist. I think it actually comes from Chen style, but applies to all styles of Tai Chi. Now, you can interpret that in different ways, but I think all of them are valid.

Let’s look at a couple.

Photo by NEOSiAM 2024+ on Pexels.com

Firstly, it’s saying that it doesn’t matter what part of the body you hit with, so if you’re using Jin channeled from the ground into the target, the path it takes could go through the shoulder, or elbow, or head, for example, just as easily as it can to the fist. Tai Chi in application tends to be at close range, sometimes body to body, so limiting yourself to boxing range doesn’t make much sense.

Another way to look at it (and I think this is potentially more useful) is to think of the action of opening and closing the body as being similar to opening and closing a fist. While the concept of opening and closing the body is hard to grok, everybody is familiar with the idea of opening and closing the fist. In Tai Chi (and other ‘internal’ arts) that opening and closing is done with the whole body. While some internal arts (particularly Xin Yi) go for a open/close/ followed by a hard stop then repeat type of action, Tai Chi is particular amongst the internals in that is opens and closes in a smooth, continuous motion in a fluid series of motions. There’s never a hard stop in the form. You could say that this is defining feature of Tai Chi.

Practical training

So, let’s get to practical training. The ins and outs of how you open and close the body are to do with the 6 harmonies and silk reeling. I created a short video series years ago now, that looked at this. Watching the video is a lot easier than me trying to explain it all in text.

But here’s a training idea: do your Tai Chi form, and try and feel where the open and close movements are in the form. Even just doing the form with the mental attitude of ‘listening’ for where the body naturally opens and where is naturally closes is a practice in and of itself, that can reap rewards.

Further listening

There was an excellent podcast interview from the Gung Fu Crew that I listened to recently by Derek Notman of Island Physical Culture on the subject of Xin Yi Liuhequan.

Derek frequently refers to this idea of ‘the whole body is a fist’ in the podcast and how that applies to Xin Yi. I think that it’s a good listen for Tai Chi practitioners because the idea of opening and closing the body and the 6 harmonies all come from Xin Yi – one of the oldest documented Chinese martial arts. That’s where Tai Chi gets them from.

Derek also talks a few times about another interesting idea, which is that Chinese martial arts aren’t there to teach you to fight, they’re training systems. He suggests going to learn boxing, MMA, or whatever it is that appeals to you first, to get it out of your system before you approach Chinese martial arts. Now, that’s going to be a controversial idea for a lot of my readers, but it’s also a very interesting idea that I don’t think is without merit. Have a listen and see what you think.

Shock and awe (in Tai Chi)

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city weather thunderstorm electricity

Photo by Torsten Dettlaff on Pexels.com

Tai Chi Chuan has the 13 postures as its basis, which consist of the 8 powers and 5 directions.

The first 4 powers are well known – peng, lu, ji and an – while the second 4 tend to not be so well known. Li (split), Tsai (Pull down/shock), Zhou (elbow) and Kou (shoulder).

These 8 ‘powers’ are the most common expressions of power in Tai Chi Chuan. No technique in Tai Chi Chuan is really purely a single power – they’re all combinations of all 8 of the powers.

It’s this pull down, or shocking, power I want to talk about today.

Shock is often called Pull down because that’s the direction it’s most often used in, however, it’s actually directionless. I prefer “shock” as a description as that’s what it feels like, rather than a pull. Even if performed while pulling, it’s a sudden burst of focussed energy rather than a long expression of energy over time, like say a push.

A lot of people practice Tai Chi with its soft flowing movements yet are unable to coordinate the body together to produce a single isolated burst of power that’s required in the application of many of the movements of Tai Chi Chuan. Depending on how a Tai Chi form is done it’s quite common to see all the shock power removed altogether in favour of soft, flowing, relaxed movement. Yet without it, something is lacking. You’ll never make your techniques effective.

Take an armlock that’s supposed to break a limb. There’s no way you’re going to get that to achieve the desired effect if you can only do the move slowly and softly.

I’m not talking about a sudden burst of tension there either. A good ‘shock’ is delivered by coordinating the body movements together and generating power from the dantien, legs and waist.

Here’s a video I made whilst working on some Tai Chi – see if you can spot where the shock energy is.