Tai Ji Sparring

[ChiDragon]

I think it is pointing at training reflexes to just react, instead of thinking and then reacting.

From a long time practitioner, the mind and the body will become one. It will be a natural relax which does not require thinking. Any movement can be detected by the corner of the eyes and send messages to the brain, the signal comes back from the brain was so quick. The reaction for the completion of a task which was so fast before even one realizes it was done.

[dwai]

I have never heard what you said sung was, may I hear it from you what it is besides wet noodle...???

 

Sung is sung

Taomeow had a very good description of sung in another post (I think in response to your post). I can't do better than that. Only thing I can tell you is if you think you are sung, you will realize you are not sung further down the line, after some more practice (of the right kind).

 

Sung is (imho) an infinitely regressing state. More you become sung, more you realize how you are not being sung. So you try (while not trying too hard) to be more sung and get there and so on and so forth...

 

I feel I'm sung when I'm playing with my friends. But when I push hands with my teacher, I realize I'm not sung. So I try to be more sung and everytime I become more sung, then I push hands with my teacher, who is more sung.

 

My eyes see I'm pushing hands with him, but my body says he is not there. I feel like I'm falling into empty space.

 

And then before I know it, I am off-balance and toppling over...the matter is how long I can last and what energy he is packing into it at the moment.

 

He might be rolling in one direction but driving the energy in another. So my eyes see the hands moving in another direction, but my body and mind is confused because the energy is not flowing in that direction...

Edited June 14, 2012 by dwai

[mYTHmAKER]

For physical confrontation I think I will stick to snapping at the end of a punch. This is evident in both boxing and bruce lee's one inch punch.

 

By staying relax until the final moment you save energy verse being tense. If you punch someone without any firmness you break your hand. By waiting until the last second to stiffen you can increase the momentum of the attack by swinging your hips and and snapping your wrist (or sudden stiffening), like Bruce Lee did with the one inch punch:

 

 

In sparring I don't think the objective is to hurt the opponent, so I wouldn't be using the stiffening or snapping or hips. Probably would use it to just practice the motions and develop reflex of them.

 

Thanks for the video ChiDragon.

 

Stiffen is not quite the correct term. More like adding energy. Stiffen is a no no.

You tell them TM

[mYTHmAKER]

You will never learn to swim if you don't get wet

even if you spend your whole life reading and philosophizing about swimming.

However, you can go on line and believe you are great swimmer

your only fooling yourself

[ChiDragon]

I think I'm going to hear the same thing over and over again for the next few years......

[Informer]

Yah, flex might be a better word. You have to squeeze your fist or you could break your hand, because momentum is being accelerated through the object, so the object being accelerated has to be properly structured and firm so it won't give upon impact. This "flexing" requires energy to be used, so it is rationed until the moment it is needed. When that instant comes then all energy and force is directed towards a single point and allowed to explode through impact.

 

You can get away with staying a bit looser upon contact if you are wearing wrist wraps and punching, because they will support your hands and wrists.

This is in contrast to sparring, in which non of that is used, only speed and reflexes with precision of motion instead of power and force.

 

I think it depends on the purpose for learning to swim. Are you doing it to compete with other swimmers or because its something you enjoy to do? Are you trying to be the best swimmer?

 

Some learn to swim by being thrown in the water, without instruction.

 

Other are schooled in the intricacies for competition, and some go to classes for it. I'm not sure the intended point of the analogy.

 

Edited June 14, 2012 by Informer

[mYTHmAKER]

I think I'm going to hear the same thing over and over again for the next few years......

 

ChiDragon speaks doesn't know,

Tao Te Ching knows doesn't speak.

[mYTHmAKER]

Some learn to swim by being thrown in the water, without instruction.

Other are schooled in the intricacies for competition, and some go to classes for it. I'm not sure the intended point of the analogy.

 

Do i have to have TM explain it LOL

All the examples you gave above interacted with the water thus they learned - improved.

The one i mentioned, the one who never got wet was under an illusion of how much he knew.

Never going in the water, swimming in a calm pool, swimming in a rough ocean - different experiences.

If you swim as 10 laps as fast as you can with no one else swimming against you wow you are great - a real champion. Swim against others and it's another story.

[Informer]

Do you notice how much energy is expelled and the time periods it takes to release it? The OP video was showing conserving energy and drawing it out over long periods, where the one with Bruce Lee showed how to release it at once.

 

So if I'm coming at you like Bruce Lee, you want to do the opposite to absorb the energy and let me get wore out while you would be using minimal energy.

Edited June 14, 2012 by Informer

[mYTHmAKER]

ahhhhhhhh.........Taomeow

The teacher thing again..... Okay, my body can never be sung without a teacher, that is really something new to me. Sometimes, playing with semantics will get nowhere in some communications. Let's not talk about it at all since we have all the experts here which cannot communicate with each other and someone has to speak for somebody else.....

 

I guess a chicken talking to a duck replacing apples with oranges will lead us to the ceiling....

 

I certainly am no expert and have much to learn.

I am very happy to have Tm who knows what she is talking about speak for me on the other hand.......

Edited June 14, 2012 by mYTHmAKER

[Informer]

If you swim as 10 laps as fast as you can with no one else swimming against you wow you are great - a real champion. Swim against others and it's another story.

 

Or just swim with others.

[Taomeow]

Do i have to have TM explain it LOL

All the examples you gave above interacted with the water thus they learned - improved.

The one i mentioned, the one who never got wet was under an illusion of how much he knew.

Never going in the water, swimming in a calm pool, swimming in a rough ocean - different experiences.

If you swim as 10 laps as fast as you can with no one else swimming against you wow you are great - a real champion. Swim against others and it's another story.

 

We're a surfing area, and some native residents have been at it for generations, taught by their parents who learned it from their grandparents -- really very competent and usually obsessed, surfing all year round. Interestingly enough, we had surfers come take taiji lessons, not for the sake of taiji but for the sake of their main passion, surfing. They invariably understand it WAY better than people who come from hard MA -- because, well, they really need the correct set of skills every time they go into the water, their survival depends on it. So, no BS has ever been heard from this source. The ocean is a great teacher... and no one has ever seen the ocean stiffen a wave as it crushes down on you... It is entirely, perfectly sung -- and if you meet this perfect sung with stiff resistance, tightening, compressing, hardening, any of that... you're dead.

[Taomeow]

[Informer]

We're a surfing area, and some native residents have been at it for generations, taught by their parents who learned it from their grandparents -- really very competent and usually obsessed, surfing all year round. Interestingly enough, we had surfers come take taiji lessons, not for the sake of taiji but for the sake of their main passion, surfing. They invariably understand it WAY better than people who come from hard MA -- because, well, they really need the correct set of skills every time they go into the water, their survival depends on it. So, no BS has ever been heard from this source. The ocean is a great teacher... and no one has ever seen the ocean stiffen a wave as it crushes down on you... It is entirely, perfectly sung -- and if you meet this perfect sung with stiff resistance, tightening, compressing, hardening, any of that... you're dead.

 

I like that analogy TaoMeow. Because I think it is like elemental water.

 

I think Bruce Lee had explosive aggression more akin to the elemental fire so the water didn't appeal as much to him.

 

For example he seems he would rather be the wave that you have to deal with in that picture, rather then the surfer.

Edited June 15, 2012 by Informer

[Sloppy Zhang]

Chen Xiaowang vs multiple opponents!

 

 

Obviously a demo, but I just thought I'd throw it out there!

[Taomeow]

I like that analogy TaoMeow. Because I think it is like elemental water.

 

I think Bruce Lee had explosive aggression more akin to the elemental fire so the water didn't appeal as much to him.

 

For example he seems he would rather be the wave that you have to deal with in that picture, rather then the surfer.

 

I'm glad you liked it. Yes, there's a lot of Water in taiji, in fact the most available way to study the infinitely versatile behavior of qi is to start out by paying attention to the infinitely versatile behavior of Water, the closest thing to qi in the world of visible manifestations.

 

I have rather mixed feelings about Bruce Lee. On one hand, he did a lot to popularize and romanticize Chinese martial arts, the image of a Chinese hero in general (before Bruce Lee, the hero in the movie had to be, invariably, white, Christian, and people who were not were always the villains). On the other, I do think his art was closer to Chinese opera than to martial arts. He portrays an aggressive fiery hero very convincingly, but in real life he was a boozing, drug-addicted, sex-addicted, plagiarizing (he was in the habit of throwing around lines from TTC in interviews without any attribution to the source, some of which are still quoted by fans as his own! "Be like water!" Says Bruce Lee and who else?..) egomaniac obsessed with his image. In other words, a rather standard Mister Hollywood, and an unthinkable Mister Taiji. He did something way worse to himself though than a "regular" Hollywood style plastic surgery. Because he moved a lot on the set, he sweated. He didn't like the way he looked on film with sweaty armpits, so he had his sweat glands surgically removed. I seriously think this caused his early death (he took a prescription pill which resulted in catastrophic brain swelling -- I don's see how this can possibly be unrelated to his inability to sweat out any poisons that might enter the system.)

 

So, I'd take the teachings of Sifu Bruce with a grain of salt......

[Taomeow]

Chen Xiaowang vs multiple opponents!

 

 

Obviously a demo, but I just thought I'd throw it out there!

 

Good find. Yes, a demo, but Xiaowang is powerful beyond comprehension in real life too. He did a workshop at our school a few years ago and "showed off" a bit pushing against eight people simultaneously. None of them were cooperating students of his, and none of them were inexperienced taiji players. Everybody went tumbling down.

 

But he also showed how this kind of skill is worked at. He made everybody stand in a horse stance for an hour, then do silk reeling while digging the sign-of-infinity-shaped hole in the ground with an imaginary tail for another hour, and only then start the routine -- and take 30 minutes with Laojia! At a normal pace it takes 15, when you're making progress you can tolerate 20... 30 is brutal. In fact, impossible. He demands the impossible of the students though, because that's what high level taiji is... the impossible made possible. Oh, to start like he did, at 7! Where's the freakin' time machine?..

 

But, OK, forget 7... but 17?.. 27?.. All the young kids out there who talk outta their assorted.... um... points of view... about whether a real teacher is necessary or not... while the real teacher, today, is freakin' available, which wasn't the case at all a very short while ago... who do not take the opportunity, do not use the advantage... boggles the mind.

[ChiDragon]

Guess what style are the two attackers using...???

[gatito]

We're a surfing area, and some native residents have been at it for generations, taught by their parents who learned it from their grandparents -- really very competent and usually obsessed, surfing all year round. Interestingly enough, we had surfers come take taiji lessons, not for the sake of taiji but for the sake of their main passion, surfing. They invariably understand it WAY better than people who come from hard MA -- because, well, they really need the correct set of skills every time they go into the water, their survival depends on it. So, no BS has ever been heard from this source. The ocean is a great teacher... and no one has ever seen the ocean stiffen a wave as it crushes down on you... It is entirely, perfectly sung -- and if you meet this perfect sung with stiff resistance, tightening, compressing, hardening, any of that... you're dead.

 

I love this analogy. It's like aikido really, except that the surfer would never come to harm when faced by the poterntial tsunami of the Sensei.

 

Although, more recent developments led to percussive elements (atemi) being reintroduced by Nishio Sensei (for reasons that deserve a separate thread), as a Master, he would not have employed such techniques against an "opponent". That would run entirely against the spirit of aikido.

 

Only a beginner would strike an "opponent" because such actions harm only themselveves. Real aikido is non-duality dancing. It is also an extremely effective martial art that strives to leave the opponent intact.

[ChiDragon]

I love this analogy. It's like aikido really, except that the surfer would never come to harm when faced by the poterntial tsunami of the Sensei.

 

Although, more recent developments led to percussive elements (atemi) being reintroduced by Nishio Sensei (for reasons that deserve a separate thread), as a Master, he would not have employed such techniques against an "opponent". That would run entirely against the spirit of aikido.

 

Only a beginner would strike an "opponent" because such actions harm only themselveves. Real aikido is non-duality dancing. It is also an extremely effective martial art that strives to leave the opponent intact.

武德

I believe that was called the "virtue of martial arts" by the masters in the orient.

[mYTHmAKER]

But, OK, forget 7... but 17?.. 27?.. All the young kids out there who talk outta their assorted.... um... points of view... about whether a real teacher is necessary or not... while the real teacher, today, is freakin' available, which wasn't the case at all a very short while ago... who do not take the opportunity, do not use the advantage... boggles the mind.

 

Yes hard to believe but there's a lot of ego involved.

 

A teacher has the ability to transmit to teach by example giving individual attention.

A video show the same action over and over and over. It doesn't accommodate variation or individual needs.

My teacher who speaks very little English teaches me what he knows i need at a particular time to progress.

He teaches through feeling and showing. I am not always aware of what he is teaching me until at some point i

realize i have learned and understand something new.Sometimes words and long discussions and theory don't cut it until you have a certain level of awareness in your body.

He also has Chinese students who speak Mandarin but they don't all get his explanations as they don't have the understanding the vocabulary the time into learning taiji.

i can read his body and understand more than they do.

Of course there still is plenty i can't see.

So i guess i am tired of beating a dead horse as they say re the merits of a real teacher.

[Informer]

Can you define what is a "teacher" MM? I think that's most of the confusion.

 

Sounds more like you want a boss or master to tell you how it is. If that is the case then One will never progress beyond the master or boss.

 

The philosophy of Jeet Kune Do may open your mind to what I'm talking about and using Bruce Lee as example:

 

 

 

I have not invented a "new style," composite, modified or otherwise that is set within distinct form as apart from "this" method or "that" method. On the contrary, I hope to free my followers from clinging to styles, patterns, or molds. Remember that Jeet Kune Do is merely a name used, a mirror in which to see "ourselves". . . Jeet Kune Do is not an organized institution that one can be a member of. Either you understand or you don't, and that is that. There is no mystery about my style. My movements are simple, direct and non-classical. The extraordinary part of it lies in its simplicity. Every movement in Jeet Kune-Do is being so of itself. There is nothing artificial about it. I always believe that the easy way is the right way. Jeet Kune-Do is simply the direct expression of one's feelings with the minimum of movements and energy. The closer to the true way of Kung Fu, the less wastage of expression there is. Finally, a Jeet Kune Do man who says Jeet Kune Do is exclusively Jeet Kune Do is simply not with it. He is still hung up on his self-closing resistance, in this case anchored down to reactionary pattern, and naturally is still bound by another modified pattern and can move within its limits. He has not digested the simple fact that truth exists outside all molds; pattern and awareness is never exclusive. Again let me remind you Jeet Kune Do is just a name used, a boat to get one across, and once across it is to be discarded and not to be carried on one's back.

 

— Bruce Lee[3]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeet_Kune_Do

 

So my question is, who would have been the one to teach Bruce Lee Jeet Kune Do?

Edited June 15, 2012 by Informer

[Taomeow]

Can you define what is a "teacher" MM? I think that's most of the confusion.

 

MM will hopefully give his own definition ('nuff putting this cat's words in his mouth ) but mine is rather simple. A real teacher of the traditional art of taiji comes from a traditional lineage of taiji and is qualified by his or her teacher to teach the art upon ascertaining that he or she has grasped it enough to teach it. This is transmission of lineage and it is always put in writing. If a teacher is illiterate (the way it was with the Chens for many generations before the current 12th-19th), he or she may not bother putting it in writing when teaching his or her own son or daughter, nephew or niece. If it's not a close blood relative, however, and the art is transmitted to an outsider, then someone literate will write it down at the teacher's request. That's all there is to it. Not every student of a particular lineage is qualified to teach it by any stretch of imagination. Especially today when a master may have hundreds or even thousands of students. Only a few of them will be getting the transmission of lineage though. The modern way to do it involves certification by your teacher and (sometimes) a group of other teachers, and you must fulfill specific requirements to get certified.

 

This does not mean someone talented can't mix and match and improvise and create their own style. My teacher has created several. But when transmitting this new art, they don't call it "Chen taiji" or "Yang taiji" or "Wu taiji." Most of all they don't call it "just taiji." There's no such thing. They call it something and take responsibility for being the authors of what they've created and are willing to teach. They don't teach it as traditional taiji and they don't say that what this is is "traditional taiji' or "just" "taiji." So if you want to learn someone's new creative accomplishment, unproven by centuries of use, if it doesn't deter you that you're being experimented on as a student of this new unproven art, by all means, go to a teacher who teaches that, learn Jeet Kune Do or "Taoist taiji" or "Yin yang taiji" or whatever.

 

My teacher teaches traditional taiji styles and his own creations, giving you a choice which ones you wish to learn. For traditional taiji styles, he has an endorsement from his teachers, in writing. For his own styles, he doesn't need it, he clearly states it is created by him, for such and such purposes that traditional taiji does not serve. E.g., he created Compact Taiji to be practiced in modern cramped up spaces, small apartments, offices, even cubicles. What's the purpose of creating something new just to satisfy one's ego? A new style has to have a new purpose. What's the new purpose of Jeet Kune Do that traditional taiji styles fail to serve? ???

 

So my question is, who would have been the one to teach Bruce Lee Jeet Kune Do?

 

His ego.

[dwai]

Can you define what is a "teacher" MM? I think that's most of the confusion.

 

Sounds more like you want a boss or master to tell you how it is. If that is the case then One will never progress beyond the master or boss.

 

The philosophy of Jeet Kune Do may open your mind to what I'm talking about and using Bruce Lee as example:

 

 

 

 

So my question is, who would have been the one to teach Bruce Lee Jeet Kune Do?

Some people have ability to adapt and learn to fight...they are good fighters. That doesnt make them martial artists. Bruce learnt wing chun from ip man. He used that as the basis of jkd...he added fencing and wetern boxing strategies...so who taught him jkd...all the teachers of his vrious systems helped him get the knowledge to create his medley...

 

But jkd is not an ima...there is no internal aspect to it. Cant compare with taiji...the principles are radically different imho.

[mYTHmAKER]

Can you define what is a "teacher" MM? I think that's most of the confusion.

 

Sounds more like you want a boss or master to tell you how it is. If that is the case then One will never progress beyond the master or boss.

 

To be succinct.

A few thoughts

A teacher is someone who loves what they teach - who wants and has no fear of their students becoming as good as they are - who is always learning and progressing on their path - who knows what the student needs - who is kind - has no need to prove him/her self - who can control their power so as to never hurt anyone.

 

As to your take of me wanting a boss or master i can't imagine how you deduced that from what i have written.

Do you have issues in this area?