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The Third Rep: 2000-07-01
by Jerry Karin

In Yang Zhenduo’s book, Zhongguo Yang Shih Taiji, 1997, for each move there is a section called “Important Points”. The important points are combined for left and right ward off. Points three and four of this group are particularly eloquent, and we include a translation of them here.

3. When you make a bow step, as the weight shifts from one foot to the other, you should pay attention to the symmetrical arrangement of the two opposing forces – one leg pushing and the other pushing back or resisting. Whether the front leg is pushing backward and the back leg resisting, or the back leg is pushing forward and the front leg resisting, the forces must be coordinated, so as to avoid pushing out too hard or resisting too hard, or pushing out emptily without any compensating resistance. The waist, if firmly in command, can propel the four limbs, cause the upper and lower body to work in concert, and better complete every move and posture. But if you fail to control the lower limbs and they do not match what is going on in the rest of the body, although the waist has the capability of commanding the four limbs, it’s no use. K So in the Tai Chi world when we particularly emphasize utilizing a whole-body movement, that is actually this matching of opposed forces, the mutually restricting coordination of the entire body. As people often say, ‘Tai Chi is a whole body exercise’ and is different from activities which involve moving sections or parts of the body only. I hope you will work hard to incorporate this point in your form.

4. Here’s how to step into the bow step: Whenever the foot which is stepping out descends to the floor, first touch the heel to the floor, next the toes grab the floor, and then finally, the knee bends and moves forward. During the entire process, as the weighted leg pushes forward and the empty leg resists, one sending and one receiving force, (especially in the case of of the resisting, empty leg) you must never stop pushing or resisting but you must also not push or resist too forcefully. If you stop one of the opposing forces then you will lose your balance and if you use too much force then you’ll be stiff; neither of these is good. If you can achieve just the right balance in this, it will create favorable conditions for upper and lower body to work in concert during transitional moves. When extending the weighted (back) leg to its ultimate position in a bow step, just as in the extension of an arm, extend until it is almost fully extended but not quite. If you over-extend then it becomes forced and looks stiff. If the back leg is bent too much, the pushing force cannot come out, and it will seem as if you have a lot of power but can’t use it. The resistance of the empty leg goes through a process of gradual engagement. First touch the floor with the heel, continue by allowing the flat of the foot to touch, then the toes grab the floor, and then let the knee bend forward, letting the bending knee and shin slightly incline forward and increasing the resistance from the front leg so as not to allow the knee to pass the toe. This way, with one leg pushing and one leg resisting, neither force subsiding or becoming too strong, the lower body will become a great deal stronger and more stable. Note that if the knee and shin of the forward leg are standing perpendicular to the ground then it is hard to utilize the resisting force and the back leg won’t be able to develop power in its push forward. If the knee goes past the toe, you’ll lose your balance and the back leg again won’t be able to develop much power Only when you make the knee and shin slightly incline forward, with the knee not going past the toe, can you thoroughly get the full strength of the two forces, pushing out and resisting, to come into play.

The Third Rep: 2000-04-07
by Jerry Karin

Seminars with Yang Zhenduo and Yang Jun these days are typically 3 or 4 days for the entire 103 – move traditional, Yang style barehand form, followed by two or three days of instruction in one weapon: sabre or sword. Sometimes the format varies from this somewhat. So if you attend the whole seminar, such as year 2000 in Portland, August 5 thru 11, it’s a full seven days spent with the Yangs and others who love the art. Seven days of taiji classes (classes are generally in an air-conditioned gym or hall), practice outdoors as well as indoors, alone and with other taiji players, conversation and meals with various subsets of the group (can start out as big as 70 to 100 people and usually filters down to 30 to 40 for the weapon). Nighttime hanging out at the dorm, you’ll find people swapping stories, deep in discussion on some detail of the form, making music on guitars and other instruments, pushing hands in a quiet courtyard, chilling out in the room with the a/c cranked up and a good book…

Who goes? Several of the Yang Chengfu Center directors will generally be there. There will be a contingent of students from the hosting center. Quite a few students from all over the country and the rest of the world will be flying in. There must be 30 of us who attended the Hood College, Maryland seminar in 1993 and never fail to make one or two seminars per summer. There have always been a lot of good push hands players among the participants, including many champs.

Prerequisites? Most participants have learned some kind of taijiquan or other martial art before. Could it be done with no prior taiji or martial arts background? It might be a little hard to keep up.

Approximately 5 hrs of classroom instruction per day is split into two sessions: morning (starting perhaps 8 or 8:30) and afternoon (starting 2:30 or 3).

After class, there generally are organized practice sessions led by experienced players, such as a center director. Small groups of people can be found practicing taijiquan, taiji weapons, push hands, da lu and other forms throughout the day and evening.

East Brunswick, NJ center director Andy Lee:

“A seminar, according to Webster’s Dictionary, is a group of supervised students doing research or advanced study. Why do I enjoy these seminars, and why do I continue to attend? I love to make new friends, to meet old ones, and to be totally immersed in the art. There’s not only the physical endurance of continuously doing the form, but also the mental work of correction and observation that I enjoy . In the morning, we all have breakfast, and talk. Talking about tai chi chuan, we discuss and share our opinions of the class. The fun of lining-up and learning Chinese, so we can say “HELLO”. The joy of holding the posture as Yang Laoshi moves through the lines trying to check each student. And the delightful way we can laugh. A group of supervised students doing research and advanced study of tai chi chuan with not only the watchful eyes of Yang Laoshi, but also the helpful eyes of other players. I cannot see myself do the form, but others can. Consequently, their opinions, be they new in the art or be they old, are valuable. I came to understand this philosophy at these seminars. Moving to the sound of tai chi chuan being chanted by Yang Laoshi, surrounded by sixty or seventy players, all moving together, all breathing together, all exuberant – it’s an experience! There is no better intoxication then the surround-sound of tai chi chuan. After lunch, practicing; before the session begins, practicing, and in the evening, practicing because I have no other responsibility but to practice. Attending a summer seminar is like going away for a spa vacation. Except that in this case, the spa is devoted to good people and phenomenal Tai Chi Chuan.”

Thanks to Andy Lee for the photo from the 1996 New York Seminar.

Want to share your stories or impressions from past seminars? Email them to me at Jerry@yangfamilytaichi.com and I will publish them here. Pictures would be wonderful.

Responses

Jerry, I’ve attended seminars the past two summers and have enjoyed them both very much. A friend and I first went down to the Winchester, VA seminar in July of 1998. While we had studied a variation of Yang style tai chi it was different from the traditional Yang family style. We studied hard and took many notes. It seemed a little overwhelming , yet it was very rewarding. Last year four of us went down to the seminar in NY. We all had a great time. People we met the year before were there; it was great to see them and talk of how we were doing with our tai chi. I found the second seminar to be even more beneficial to me than the first. I had a better understanding of the form and was able to get more of the details that Master Yang was explaining. I found it interesting that while it was the same 103 posture form Master Yang was teaching his explanations of the moves were from a different approach. In Virginia (1998) he talked more of the energy and proper posture. In NY (1999) he gave explanations from a more martial viewpoint. I enjoyed the different approaches to the form. I realized that you can always continue to grow and learn something new from each seminar. I have enclosed some photos I scanned in. […]the photo of the group practicing is from NY 1999.

Michael R. Coulon.

by Yang Chengfu
Translated by Jerry Karin

Although there are rather a lot of different styles of Chinese martial arts, they are all alike in that successive generations have striven all their lives and with all their might to explain the principles and theory contained in these techniques, but these efforts have never been totally successful. Nevertheless, if a student will expend the effort of one day of practice, he will receive the achievements of a day of work. Over days and months this accumulates till everything falls into place naturally.

Tai Chi Chuan is the art of letting hardness dwell within softness and hiding a needle within cotton; from the point of view of techniques, physiology, and physics, there is considerable philosophy contained within it. Hence those who would research it need to undergo a definite process of development over a considerable period of time. Though one may have the instruction of a fine teacher and the criticism of good friends, the one thing which is most important and which one cannot do without is daily personal training. Without it one can discuss and analyze all day, think and ponder for years, but when one day you encounter an opponent you are like a hole with nothing in it – you are still quite inexpert, lacking the skills (kung fu) borne of daily practice. This is what the ancients meant by “thinking forever is useless, better to practice”. If morning and evening there is never a gap, hot or cold never an exception, so that the moment you think of it you proceed to do your training, then young or old, man or woman, you will alike be rewarded with success.

These days from north to south, from the Yellow River regions to the Yangtze River regions, more and more comrades are learning Tai Chi Chuan, which is heartening for the future of martial arts. However, among these comrades, there is no shortage of those who concentrate and practice hard, study sincerely, and whose future ought to be limitless, yet typically they fail to avoid two kinds of pitfall: in the first case they are very talented, still young and strong, able to apply one criticism to many places, their understanding surpasses that of most people; alas once they make some slight achievement, they are satisfied too quickly, stop in the middle and never really get it. In the second instance, the person is anxious to make rapid progress, throwing it together sloppily, so that before a year is through, they have gone completely through barehand, sword, knife and spear. Although they can ‘paint a gourd by following a template’, they really haven’t achieved the enlightenment in this. The moment you scrutinize their direction and movement, upper and lower body, internal and external, none of it turns out to be standard. In order to correct them, you have to correct every move, and corrections given in the morning are forgotten by evening. That’s why you often hear people say: “it’s easy to learn tai chi, but hard to correct it”. The reason for this saying is people trying to learn too fast. Such a group takes their mistakes and transmits them to the next generation, necessarily fooling both themselves and others, and this is the most discouraging thing for the future of the art.

In Tai Chi Chuan, we first learn the form or frame. That is to say, according to each posture name from the manual, we are taught the postures by a teacher, one at a time. The student does his best to calm his mind, and silently attentive, pondering, trying, he performs the moves: that is called ‘practicing the form’. At this time the student focuses on ‘inner’, ‘outer’, ‘upper’ and ‘lower’. ‘Inner’ means ‘using intent rather than force’. ‘Lower’ means ‘the chi is sunk to the cinnabar field (dantian)’. ‘Upper’ means ‘Empty, lively, pushing up and energetic (xu1 ling2 ding3 jing4 – refers to requirements for the head). ‘Outer’ means: the entire body is light and nimble, all the joints are connected as a whole, (movement proceeds) from foot to leg to waist, sink the shoulders and keep elbows bent (low). Those beginning their study should first take the above several instructions and perfect them, pondering and trying morning and evening. Move by move, you must always carefully seek these. When you practice a move, strive for correctness, and only when you have practiced it till it is right go on to the next move. Proceed in this way until you have gradually completed all the postures. This way there is nothing to correct and you do not tend over time towards violating the principles.

In practice as you are moving, the bones and joints of the entire body must all relax and extend and be natural. The mouth and abdomen must not block breathing. The four limbs, the waist and the legs must not use strong force. Something like these last two sentences is always said by people learning internal arts but once they start to move, once they turn the body or kick the legs or twist the waist, their breath becomes labored and their body sways; these defects are all due to stopping the breath and using strong force.

1. When you practice, the head must not incline to either side or tilt forward or backward. There is a phrase ‘you must suspend the tip of the head’. This is as though something were placed on the top of the head. Avoid at all cost a stiff straightness! That’s what is meant by ‘suspend’. Although the gaze should be directed levelly ahead, sometimes it must turn in accordance with the position of the body. Even though the line of the gaze is empty, it plays an important role in transformations and supplements what is left wanting by the body and hand positions. The mouth seems open but it’s not, seems closed but not quite. Nose and mouth inhale and exhale: do what is natural. If some saliva accumulates below the tongue, swallow it; don’t spit it out.

2. The torso should be centered and not leaning. The line of the entire spine should hang straight and not be bent to one side. But when you encounter transformations between open and closed you should have the flexibility of waist turn which comes of sunk chest, pulled-up back and lowered shoulders. This is something you need to attend to in the beginning stages of learning. Otherwise, as time goes on it will become hard to change and will turn into stiffness, so that although you have put in a lot of practice, it will be hard to improve your applications.

3. The bones and joints of the two arms all need to be relaxed open. The shoulders should hang down and the elbows should bend downward. The palms should be slightly extended and the fingers slightly bent. Use intent to move the arms and chi to suffuse the fingers. As the days and months of practice accumulate, the internal energy connects and becomes nimble, and mysterious ability grows of itself.

4. In the two legs you must distinguish ‘empty’ and ‘full’. Picking up and dropping (of the feet) should be like way a cat moves. When your body weight shifts to the left, then left is ‘full’ and the right is termed ‘empty’. If you shift to the right, then right is ‘full’ and the left is termed ‘empty’. What is termed ‘empty’ is not really empty, the position still hasn’t been abandoned, but rather there is the intent of (possible) expanding or shrinking left there. What is termed ‘full’ is just weighted and that’s all, it is not using too much force or fierce strength. So when the leg bends it should go until it is straight up and down, further than that is called excessive force. The torso will tip forward and then you will have lost the centered posture and the opponent gets an opportunity to attack.

5. In the kicks we must distinguish between the two types: toe kicks (in the manual left and right separate leg, also called left and right flap legs) and heel kicks. In toe kicks, pay attention to the tip of the foot, whereas in heel kicks pay attention to the entire sole of the foot. When the intent arrives then the chi arrives and when the chi arrives then energy arrives by itself. But your bones and joints must relax open and you must stably kick out the foot. This is the easiest time to give rise to strong force. If the body is slightly bent then you will be unstable and the kicking foot will not deliver much force.

In the process of learning Tai Chi, we first learn barehand form (a solo exercise), such as Tai Chi Chuan, or Tai Chi Long Fist; after that comes single-handed push hands, fixed step push hands, moving step push hands, big rollback (da4lu3), sparring (san4shou3); and finally comes the weapons such as Tai Chi sword, Tai Chi knife, Tai Chi spear (13 spear).

As to practice times, every day after getting up practice the form twice. If you don’t have time in the morning, then twice before bed. You should practice seven or eight times a day, but at very least once in the morning and once at night. If you have been drinking heavily or have eaten a lot, avoid practice.

For places to practice, a courtyard or large room with good air circulation and lots of light are suitable. But avoid places directly exposed to strong wind or places that are shady and damp or have poor air quality. Because once the body starts exercising, the breath naturally becomes deeper so strong wind or poor quality air, because they would go deep into the belly and harm the lungs, might easily cause illness. As for practice clothes, loose Chinese clothing or short clothing along with wide-toed cloth shoes are suitable. When you practice, if you happen to perspire a lot don’t remove all your clothing or rinse with cold water; otherwise you might get sick.

Translation Copyright © 2000 International Yang Style Tai Chi Chuan Association. All rights reserved.