Zhan zhuang

[qin00b]

Do you all find that there's a minimum time to practice ZZ to get any benefit? Obviously, longer is better, but if one has four minutes while waiting for the coffee to brew, is that too little a time? I oft try to work on a deep horse stance in such situations, in addition to the 10+ minutes I practice after my regular qigong session. 

[thelerner]

I don't do ZZ regularly, but it is a world of lines.  When I'm in one I'll watch my alignment, hit the position and stand still. 

 

For coffee, when I hand grind the beans I'll turn it into a kind of Pangu Meditation.. overhand right side, 26 grinds, left side, 26 grinds, middle 26 grinds.  Probably the kind of bastardization that'd get me slapped upside the head in a respectable learning establishment.  

[blue eyed snake]

20 hours ago, qin00b said:

Do you all find that there's a minimum time to practice ZZ to get any benefit? Obviously, longer is better, but if one has four minutes while waiting for the coffee to brew, is that too little a time? I oft try to work on a deep horse stance in such situations, in addition to the 10+ minutes I practice after my regular qigong session. 

 

Due to age and all kinds of fuckery in my body I can't anymore, but i did. Like, every standing i did was with slightly bend knees, not the full deep ZZ when waiting for a bus or something, but shift in way the body was held upright. same for doing dishes, waiting in whatever line.

 

It got me a change in awareness as the ever busy monkeymind was sorta pushed out of the place it had illegally taken over.

[ChiDragon]

On 8/14/2023 at 12:38 PM, Daniel said:

https://scottjeffrey.com/zhan-zhuang/

 

The exercise at 2:35 is no longer recommended. It has been determined to be very harmful to the knees.

[qin00b]

The answer I've arrived at to my questions is, "if you end up with more energy than you started with, it was worth it."

[ChiDragon]

16 minutes ago, qin00b said:

The answer I've arrived at to my questions is, "if you end up with more energy than you started with, it was worth it."

Yes, I agree. Only if the practice has done more good than harm without side effects.

FYI There are many Taiji practitioners only turning the knees, instead of turning the whole leg with the foot simultaneously, they ended up traumatized their knees permanently and have to quit the practice for good.

[qin00b]

Just now, ChiDragon said:

Yes, I agree. Only if the practice has done more good than harm without side effects.

FYI There are many Taiji practitioners only turning the knees, instead of turning the whole leg with the foot simultaneously, they ended up traumatized their knees permanently and have to quit the practice for good.

 

My first tai chi teacher taught in this manner. He taught in a side room of a very busy martial arts school and it only took a couple classes to realize why none of the other martial artists stayed for more than a couple classes.

[qin00b]

On 2/28/2024 at 11:15 AM, blue eyed snake said:

 

Due to age and all kinds of fuckery in my body I can't anymore, but i did. Like, every standing i did was with slightly bend knees, not the full deep ZZ when waiting for a bus or something, but shift in way the body was held upright. same for doing dishes, waiting in whatever line.

 

It got me a change in awareness as the ever busy monkeymind was sorta pushed out of the place it had illegally taken over.

 

Towards the end of Steve Gray's Tien Shan exercises, they have a seated meditation session which includes what he refers to as seated ZZ. He also writes about this in his ZZ book. Spoiler alert:  the most important part is hand positioning and not visualizing. He claims that you can do ZZ lying down as well, tho' it won't be as powerful as doing it standing as you won't be generating enough energy from the stance (then again, you can likely hold the position longer, so you'll ultimately generate a decent amount of energy. I think he says it's six of one….But I have no idea how you measure such qi generation, so who knows?). 

Somewhere else, he mentions doing ZZ _after_ your qigong session. I had been doing ZZ for 4-10 minutes without much result, but after incorporating it at the end of the TSCK sessions, it feels as if my progress took off and now doing ZZ by itself elicits that same response. 

 

All that's to say - maybe try while seated and see if that offers any benefit. 

[blue eyed snake]

I was taught sitting and laying down practice too, it was not called ZZ but at least for me it worked out well.

 

Edited March 1 by blue eyed snake

[ChiDragon]

1 hour ago, qin00b said:

Towards the end of Steve Gray's Tien Shan exercises, they have a seated meditation session which includes what he refers to as seated ZZ. He also writes about this in his ZZ book. Spoiler alert:  the most important part is hand positioning and not visualizing. He claims that you can do ZZ lying down as well, tho' it won't be as powerful as doing it standing as you won't be generating enough energy from the stance (then again, you can likely hold the position longer, so you'll ultimately generate a decent amount of energy. I think he says it's six of one….But I have no idea how you measure such qi generation, so who knows?). 

Based on the fact that, not long ago before he passed away, Steve did asked me to translate the definition of Zhan Zhuang for him, I assume that he didn't know what it means to begin with. The definition of 站樁 is standing on poles. Please understand that I am not trying to condemn the person that is no longer here to defend himself.

I know what I am talking about. Peace. If you have any question, I am glad to clarify for you. Please don't insult my intelligence!

[ChiDragon]

Here is an example of Zhan Zhuamg performed by a Taoist priest. 

[ChiDragon]

This is the original Zhan Zhuang

Edited March 1 by ChiDragon

[ChiDragon]

[silent thunder]

1 hour ago, ChiDragon said:

Based on the fact that, not long ago before he passed away, Steve did asked me to translate the definition of Zhan Zhuang for him, I assume that he didn't know what it means to begin with. The definition of 站樁 is standing on poles. Please understand that I am not trying to condemn the person that is no longer here to defend himself.

I know what I am talking about. Peace. If you have any question, I am glad to clarify for you. Please don't insult my intelligence!

How I miss @freeform

 

[Forestgreen]

3 hours ago, ChiDragon said:

Based on the fact that, not long ago before he passed away, Steve did asked me to translate the definition of Zhan Zhuang for him, I assume that he didn't know what it means to begin with. 

I had a conversation with Steve years ago, before he started to write the practical book. 

He was quite clear in his description that his methods was based on "this is how you do it, and you will feel the ******* result when it kicks in". 

Knowing theoretical definitions of things wasn't his thing then.

 

I guess he felt the need to put it in the book. Book buyers like information, needed or not. 

 

[qin00b]

13 hours ago, ChiDragon said:

Based on the fact that, not long ago before he passed away, Steve did asked me to translate the definition of Zhan Zhuang for him, I assume that he didn't know what it means to begin with. The definition of 站樁 is standing on poles. Please understand that I am not trying to condemn the person that is no longer here to defend himself.

I know what I am talking about. Peace. If you have any question, I am glad to clarify for you. Please don't insult my intelligence!

 

I have no knowledge of the Chinese languages and certainly don't presume to have direct translations. In fact, I gave up after not being able to figure out what qi translates to, if there's a difference between nei gong and qi gong, does wu wei have an equivalent in English, etc. It also became evident that many of the [Western] people I ran into had unsatisfying definitions and/or knew that theirs was right and alternates were wrong. 

 

From talking to various enlightened/spiritual types, it's obvious that they're oft describing the same thing with different words or perhaps the different things with the same words - so I decided that if I'm not studying anything legalistic, I'll just figure out what the teacher means and go with that. 

FWIW, Steve doesn't define ZZ until 44 pages into his book (!) and even then has a couple suggestions which include, "to act out the part of being still" or "to battle against action." He settles into "physical stillness" and then "holding a posture" to differentiate it from tai chi or qi gong. Somewhere in this forum, he also describes Tien Shan as being performed relatively slowly compared to other forms to try to split the diff. between moving and stillness meditations (somewhere he described TSCK as "moving ZZ". I assume what he meant was the posture is done as slow as possible to avoid tension to get the benefits of the stillness practices but with the moving practice benefit of moving qi around).

 

But as @Forestgreen mentioned, Steve's all about practice and not theory (at least in his books and vids). Is it because he doesn't know the theory? Is it because he did but didn't want beginners to get caught up in something unhelpful? Is it because theory is not helpful? Did he just skip over the form and go to formlessness? I dunno. 

 

Having seen a bunch of ZZ demos which ranged from "absolutely nothing moves" to "pretend you're Jack Kerouac humping a tree," I found Steve's "just stand mostly still and see where the energy goes" to be most suitable for me at this time. If I stop noticing benefits, I'll look somewhere else (that said, I think I have a copy of _Way of Power_ coming from the library). I'm not saying those other methods are good, bad, etc. Just I found one that is working for me. 

Edited March 1 by qin00b
clarification.

[thelerner]

I agree with qin00b but have much sympathy for long time old school practitioners like Chidragon who dislike seeing terms and practices watered down changed to suit another culture.  

 

Formal class, tradition teacher, you watch your etiquette, be precise.. see and do. Maybe outside of class you can ask questions.  With a modern synthesizer you ask questions, explore movements and metaphors etc.  Both styles have benefits.  With a traditional teacher you 'surrender' or have problems.  

 

 

[qin00b]

20 minutes ago, thelerner said:

I agree with qin00b but have much sympathy for long time old school practitioners like Chidragon who dislike seeing terms and practices watered down changed to suit another culture.  

 

Formal class, tradition teacher, you watch your etiquette, be precise.. see and do. Maybe outside of class you can ask questions.  With a modern synthesizer you ask questions, explore movements and metaphors etc.  Both styles have benefits.  With a traditional teacher you 'surrender' or have problems.  

 

 

100%. Always respect the teacher - they're teaching me their way, I'm going to learn their way. 

[silent thunder]

Respect is earned, not owed.  

It arrives as the merit of a person is revealed through their character and sharings.

 

 

[qin00b]

4 hours ago, silent thunder said:

Respect is earned, not owed.  

It arrives as the merit of a person is revealed through their character and sharings.

 

 

Maybe I should have added more nuance. The way I learned from my martial arts background was that respect (for a new teacher or student) was the default - and rather than being something earned, it was something you lost. 

 

Although, barring outright fraud or danger, we were taught to let the teacher do their thing. I recall being in a self-defense seminar held by my company. They brought in a JKD guy who taught the general sort of self-defense stuff you teach to beginners with no training. However, I surmised that the guy was a total clown and couldn't fight his way out of a paper bag. Unbeknownst to me, another coworker had some basic MA training and wanted to call the guy out, so asked to be the uke and blasted him with a different combo than what the drill was (I think dude actually split the instructor's lip). To his credit, the instructor stayed calm and said something like, "sometimes you get hit and that's OK. You can keep moving." Next demo, he looked for a new uke and I subtly raised my hand. Should have been obvious to him that I had some training, so he chose me and was tense for the first exchange, presumably fearing I'd try to show him up as well. I fired off whatever the combo was, quickly and accurately, but light and with no intention to land, but to allow it to look as real as the dude who attacked the instructor, but so he could finish his demo. I finished out the class getting swept, taken down, etc. as a good uke would. 

 

I'm 100% sure the instructor knew I could flatten him and could have taught a more helpful class, but I gave him the respect due an instructor doing their best. I was a student and he was a teacher….Had anyone asked me if they should train with that guy, I'd have said no, he's a moron. But all the same, I wasn't about to disrupt the class. 

[silent thunder]

So he earned your respect as a human.

But as a teacher, I suspect your assessment of his level left him wanting...

[ChiDragon]

4 hours ago, qin00b said:

I'm 100% sure the instructor knew I could flatten him and could have taught a more helpful class, but I gave him the respect due an instructor doing their best. I was a student and he was a teacher….

I'll say that you have the virtue of martial arts, 武德.

Edited March 2 by ChiDragon

[ChiDragon]

On 2/29/2024 at 6:00 PM, ChiDragon said:

This is the original Zhan Zhuang

Please notice that the upper leg of the white statue is at 45 degree.

Please notice that the practitioner has the angle formed between the upper leg and the lower leg is ninety(90) degrees. In addition, the lower leg is straight and the knees did not pass the toes. That is the highest realm that one wants to be accomplished. It can be said that he has a high level of Neigong.

[ChiDragon]

On 2/29/2024 at 6:17 PM, ChiDragon said:

This Zhan Zhuang position is at amateur level. It is because the knees are passing the toes. This will put lots of stress on the knee joints.