thaddeus

I was being a bit persnickity wasn't I...apologize for the tone in advance..but jeez, put a bunch of martial artists in the room and this will happen.. T

Which of my comments was childish? You're certainly entitled to say that, but it certainly sounds like an insult, attack, etc. which is not appropriate no matter who we're talking about...hmmmm, except when it's you saying it, huh? Uh, please google Mr. Clyman and his relationship with Waysun before saying this. Except for William C C Chen? Hmmmm....read up on the history of Chen Man Ching and look up silk reeling exercise..you might retract this statement. You did say you're just a beginner yet you feel qualified to comment on the higher levels of what you're studying and saying it's 'nowhere else' Fair enough. I stand by my statements..his background is cloudy. CMC style was not practiced in temples. It's fine that he has a serious martial arts background, studied taichi and has some insights, they certainly weren't passed down. Nuff said, if you're serious about having a shop talk on taiji, i'm all for it. I'm sorry if I offended you and your style with my comments, but you should know where it stacks up in the scheme of things. I've been studying for quite awhile and have seen my share of 'bogusosity'. Now that China is relatively open compared to the 70s, alot of the nonsense surrounding many of 'teachers' that came here can't stand up to scrutiny. T

someone understands me!!

If we're going to follow this protocol, then we might as well just go and delete most of the posts here. Then by that token, we shouldn't say anything positive either unless we've personally met and trained under people. We're here to chat, debate, and basically interact. It's a small community. We shouldn't be pulling punches and acting all politically correct. If you can refute my statements, please do so. By reading his book and hearing about Clyman and seeing his ads, it's a way of 'meeting' someone. Do I have to personally meet and interact with Bush to have an opinion on how he runs the country? Of course not. So while what you say sounds great..c'mon..it may be uncomfortable to discuss negative things, but jump in, contribute...tell us your personal interactions with him that can change our/my mind. I personally don't care less, just going from my observations. T

Actually, Buddy doesn't need to answer directly, the answer is obvious. What connections does he have in the taichi community..his background is cloudy. Rumor mill is that he learned a CMC form in a park. Does he produce any noteworthy students? Nope. Anyone making any achievements? Nope. Anyone actually paying attention to him? Nope. Just because someone writes a book or can market themselves well (clyman et. al) doesn't mean they are experts. He wrote a book and has a following, this story is repeated throughout history.. T

I'll definately check this out..funny, I bought an MP3 player a couple weeks ago and was going to post on this site asking for MP3 talks I can listen to..and now you and Sean are posting stuff..very cool.. T

you already do, it's your 'true self'..it's not out there..chasing after spirits and beings only takes you deeper into maya.. T

edited..sorry, just getting a little punchy lately..disregard..carry on..

thanks, will definately check it out..however until then..what is he saying about concubines?? (as if the other stuff didn't matter much)..lol.. T

Here's a good example of what you're talking about: can anyone identify the energies? btw, I don't believe there is much room for argument when talking about peng lu ji an, etc. Some teachers just don't know the stuff and need to fill in the gaps with other things (imo). What style of taiji are you teaching? T

Dude! didn't you learn anything from the movie??? You have abundance!

Just curious..why do you like his stuff? He's a master marketer that's for darn sure. He'll sell you water from your own faucet..

If someone has your arm pinned against the wall and you tighten up your body, that person is effectively 'controlling your center'. From your hand that is pinned throughout your whole body you are tight, like a rigor mortis corpse. You're just one big piece of wood. If you relax your whole body, then he his just pressing your forearm or wrist against the wall. The rest of your body is not held down. Very subtly you are changing the angles of force to reduce his leverage and he can't hold on. It's a combination of subtle rotations that redirect his power and a dropping of your center underneath his. Koichi Tohei from Ki-Aikido has 4 interrconnected principles to explain some of this..which is the relaxation is weight underside (sung or soong). Tohei doesn't get into the rotation or silk reeling part of movement explicitly, but when you relax, your body naturally rotates which redirects your opponent. Doing this intentionally and with control is one of the gems of training internal arts. T

I have a decent korea town near me with lots of restaurants..what's the name of that soup? I remember trying bone soup, and of course ginseng/chicken soup(which was pretty good)... T

I think the book is his translations of the documents. I don't think he actually learned from someone. Check the preface, from what I remember he's upfront about what is his experience, what is his belief and what he actually trained in. But still buyer beware... T

Have you tried cow cod soup? Ask one of your jamaican friends if you haven't heard of it.. Also, on connective tissue..been reading about Vitamin C and L-Proline..google it. T

Hi Plato, I'm curious about something you wrote in your blog about knowing a guy who is working on the ability to 'bust out' an erection on demand... Obviously, being a guy, this sounds like a worthwhile way to spend my time... On a more serious note, I wrote many posts ago about how I've been studying nitric oxide on my own. I'm wondering how this guy is approaching the 'busting out'..is it using mental imagery or is he doing some kind of breathing/tension/relaxation technique? I can definately understand how training a visualization would work..i'd be really interested in a breathing technique that affects blood flow to one area of the body.. Also, a general comment to all, notice how in the thread about the qigong abilities there is more than one reference to abilities with the reproductive organs. I don't think this is for prurient interests, I think the muscles, fascia, nerves, etc in that area are vital to our practices and if we are not actively engaging that area in our say yoga or taichi practice, we are probably not practicing correctly..anyway, my two cents on that. T

I guess another way of saying this is that in taiji power needs to be expressed to the extremities (usually fingers)..so if you're just dancing around mindlessly, it's cool to do that, you just can't call it tai chi chuan. Also from a health perspective, the mindless dancing might be relaxing, but it will kill the joints and ruin your health in the long run. Real taiji movement is specifically trained and the side effect is improved health and healthy joints and body. Anyway, my two cents on this.. T

I think what you're saying is another way of saying 'training from hard to soft and from soft to hard'. The tension exercises, I consider to be outside to inside method of training--basically stretching the body to force the relaxation. The other way, which I feel is largely missed by some styles, is to train from inside out to release tension to get the stretch. The end result is the same, a relaxed extension. In the clips, akuzawa is not straining to force a cross in his body. That's how I understand it. As long as you understand the goal and the purpose of your training, I think either approach is fine. Some say Westerners are better suited for the inside out, because we are already too tense.. T

For kid training, there's alot to be said to just making it fun. I think there are two main goals, having fun and overcoming fear/challenging them. For example, teaching them to roll. You could get nuts over the specifics or you could just applaud the fact they tried and sort of did it. Overcoming the fear was the most important part. I think many of us are self motivated to improve. Kids shouldn't be forced, they should be 'hooked' into it...training should happen by accident..a by product of having fun.. T

I think if you simply release tension, your body naturally expands in 6 directions. If you try to force it, you end up doing something largely non-internal. That's my take on it. T

What is Stocking's stuff? I couldn't really tell from the website..what's his background on the chi stuff?

i knew that would be coming.. Yeah, but..more often than not the person with the experience can get it wrong..'yeah, i know that, it's just like xyz' when it's not. Yeah, ultimately we are our own teachers. I believe the taoist approach is probably more of 'daily decrease' rather than adding more practices. I think adding a bunch of disassociated exercises is *probably* not productive in the long term. So in my post I said it's important to understand what is the core of training. There are thousands of chigung forms..what's the core thing that makes it all make sense. The choreography is irrelevant. That's why I wonder about all these new things that keep popping up from the same people with exaggerated claims of enlightenment and sexual prowress and youthful glowing health.. T

words...sword...coincidence? i wonder if they have a common root word.. T

Thanks for the write up. I think you said it best..imagination is the horse (mind) leading the cart (energetics or chi). Without that connection the movements are worseless. Like I said before, however, I have studied this stuff for a long time. And you have too, so you'll understand where I'm coming from. For all these things, and the simple exercises are probably worse--one can't just learn it in a few weeks and then start teaching it. Some of these teachers say things like.."I went to china and met this crazy old monk who taught me this *form*, etc. etc." --you know the drill. The reality is that without long study and constant review, it's worse than junk. Every single time I learned even a simple exercise, like one of the brocades, for example, the next time I reviewed it, I realized there was either something I didn't understand correctly, something the teacher forgot, or something the teacher explained better given my level and practice. So, I'm not really sure why people are following people who collect exercises like this with no cohesive underlying foundation. I would be even extra careful with the 'energetics' part. Careful is a strong word..I don't think there will be any harm other than wasted time. I prefer a system that builds off of related components. Something like, 'i added ocean breathing I learned from Joe to the beginning of this sequence, cause I think it's a great idea' is suspect to me. Not that I'm a hardline traditionalist..it's something one of my teachers called 'chop suey'. I liked the question you asked earlier..about what 3 things..my thought on that was..what's the 1 thing..and when I study in a system, I try to find out...what's the 1 thing here..what's the thing all these exercises are trying to get me to understand..I don't see that in the system we were discussing before.. anyway, hope that makes sense.. T