bronzebow

Hi Mouse, Who are the two masters that you mentioned here? It's interesting that I get a feeling from the way that you are describing the type of tai chi you practice as being similar to a teacher I met once who explained that he practiced tai chi with a vipassana and emptiness cultivation that was different from other teachers I met.

I remember S.N. Goenka saying something about a guy he taught who was bouncing on his shoulders because he was a scientist who'd made nuclear war heads or something and all the Sankharas where coming out of him when he did anapana. There were also a few times when I heard people run outside the meditation room and then start vomiting. I spoke to them after the retreat and they said that the energy/emotions where just too much. From what I've seen I'd say what I do is fairly similar to the Ratu Bagus shaking although I haven't met him, just one of his students. I don't really follow any guidelines though for shaking other than to take care of my joints, ligaments etc. It's one of those practices that I just ended up adopting because its so simple and it feels really good for me on many levels.

Some times I get body bouncing and shaking in Vipassana. It generally seems to be an energy working itself out. I have started shaking as a separate exercise though and love, it feels really good.

I'd count the I Liq Chuan guys I mentioned as being well on their way to standing their own against EMA. As well as these guys I've met a few Tai Chi, Taikiken, Bagua, Xingyi practitioners who were very powerful. Chen Yingjun son of Chen Xiao Wang is pretty damn powerful, I'd buy popcorn to be there when someone says that he's ineffective. I'm told his dad is even more powerful and having felt the son in action I can imagine that this must be pretty fearsome power. Also, after quite a few years of having a very low opinion of Aikido, I met two Aikido teachers in Australia who were able to neutralize repeatedly professional boxers/kickboxers such as Sam Soliman, Billy Manne and Richard Norton. Bob Jones who heads Zen Do Kai down here also trains with one of them as does a host of his teachers. Anyone who's been around the martial arts scene long enough down in Oz would know that Bob Jones has come from a hard and external way of MA and yet he's come over to learn from an IMA. The way I witnessed these men be "convinced" was like this: The Aikido teacher just said: "do what ever you want." I saw attempts at take downs, boxing combos - whatever. These were the not the usual over committed lunge punches that you usually see in Aikido, but extremely centered and fast punches, kicks and submissions at a professional level. One of these kickboxers is reputed for having some of the fastest hands in the business and yet I repeatedly saw his center being taken at will by a person who seemed to move like he was out for a casual walk. I kid you not this Aikido teacher's technique looked kind of sloppy, but on crossing hands with him my root was gone so I couldn't generate any power. No matter what angle or disadvantage he let me put him in, no matter what I did my root was gone. He also personally said to me: "you've got to test me constantly otherwise you'll always have doubt, always try to get one on me, try anything you can. You're actually doing me a favor." I was never able to though. He always controlled my center at touch even if I grabbed him from behind or "unawares". To me this is internal MA. I also met a guy who trained with a teacher called Minoru Akuzawa. From what I experienced there is some good stuff there too.

I like to practice one method that comes easily/naturally in the morning and one that I don't like so much in the evening. I often find that the more effortless, "path of least resistance" type mind that I connect to in my more natural practices help me to find the same "consciousness" in the more challenging practices. The type of focus that I develop in the challenging practices brings my more natural practices to a new level of refinement, it keeps me from resting on my laurels and getting complacent. Together this seems to be helping me to find what seems to be a unity between all of the practices that I do, the easy paths open up and reveal deeper challenges, the challenging paths open up and reveal an effortlessness within themselves. What I'm getting from these experiences is that these "paths" of consciousness have always been and are always inside me regardless of whether I've thought I'd been practicing a way that comes easily or not. When I first started practicing the "fire" methods of directly energy I found them quite challenging. Styles such as Vipassana or dissolving methods which many call "water" methods came much more naturally to me. After a while though I realized that the "line" between these two methods at least for me was very fine. For instance, by letting go of the resistances in myself that would "block" the microcosmic orbit I'd find that it would just circulate naturally, there was no need for me to "direct" it. It was already happening, I just needed to allow it to happen. Later when I started with some of Robert Bruce's methods of energy raising I found the same principles would work. I'd let go of the resistances, open up/dissolve etc, let go of any beliefs that the energy "isn't already there" and energy would begin circulating into my dan tien. For me it is a lot more effective, a lot more effortless and a lot less rigid than trying to "push" energy in there. The way I see it I have been using a balance of "fire" and "water". The "water" is the surrendering of what is surrounding or possible "resisting" my intention. I could also call it attachments. The fire is my "intention" or "projection." If I over balance my "fire" then I can actually hold myself back through my own attachment, if I surrender too much then I can have no intention at all. So cultivating a balance of "intention"(fire) and allowing(water) that intention to become something is what I find very valuable.

The guys I trained with could handle it when we were playing at a "light" to "medium" level "ground and pound", but anymore than that and their "structure" started to collapse as did their ability to control my center. In general though I haven't met any internal martial artists who can handle medium to heavy levels of "alive" ground and pound after only 4 years of training. I have met IMA practitioners of more than 10 years though who I've seen and felt handle mine and the best efforts of other players from BJJ, Vale Tudo, MT and Karate.

I've had teachers who've said to avoid the void, I've had teachers who've said to go into the void. Vipassana teachers have generally said the former. Teachers who've taught me to move into the Jhanas have said the latter. In my experience both have been very valuable for my overall progress and understanding. It's actually incredible how much I began to deepen in my understanding and practice when I let go of certain attachments to not do this or not do that and to just let the meditation open up for me.

I've touched hands with a few I Liq Chuan guys and they were good. I practice tai chi myself but I have no doubt that I Liq Chuan is a lot more martially effective then a lot of tai chi out there. Out of the 4 guys I crossed hands each of them had a good ability of controlling the center at touch and by their own admission none of them was at a particularly high level in their school (between 2-4 years of experience).

That would be Peter Ragnar's course. I'm not sure of this particular one, but I know of people who have used the magnetic qigong with good results. Whether additional results were gained from using the gauss magnets or whether it was just from regular practice of the qigong system is yet to be established. I don't own the magnets but I tried them out for an hour and did feel a strong field from them and it felt "nice." I'm not sure of the long term benefits or negatives of this though. Not sure if anyone really does. I've read arguments from people throwing a lot of "evidence" both ways.

I agree that using video/dvd is good when you already have instruction from a teacher, but it would be very difficult IMO to learn the internal aspects from a video. Chen Zhonghua is good IMO at teaching some internal aspects from a dvd but I'd still highly recommend having personal instruction.

I Chuan is Yiquan their foundation is in standing practices(Zhan Zhuang). It's good stuff.

Generally with the martial arts I'll go for a good teacher first and style second. If you had a choice between good teachers though I've been told that Chen is harder on the body for "older" people and Yang, Wu or Hao is better in this case. Personally I like Chen because the martial applications are more obvious to me and this lets me find the internal alignments easier. I actually like what I've seen of some CMC tai chi stylists because they are so relaxed, in comparison the Chen practitioners I know seem a lot "harder." Not sure if this is the norm through Chen styles though.

I've done this diet for about a year now. It's similar to the warrior diet. I'm not doing it for weight loss, mainly for energy balance. During the day I just eat spirulina or chlorella tablets and start to eat at about 5 pm. At the start I used to pig out a bit, but now I find that I'm not really hungry enough to eat more than the usual meal at dinner time.

If he was able to lose it and not retrieve it then he never had a full understanding of what he was doing.

I forgot about Paul Lam, he is good and a few of his videos are with Peter Wu from Melbourne who is really good also.