Tai Chi Chuan – The Snake and Crane Art of Kung Fu

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Crane, Personal Development, Shenfa, Snake, Snake & Crane

Even if you have only studied Tai Chi Chuan for less than a month, I still don’t think that it’s possible for you to have escaped hearing about the legendary creation myth where the filthy, mystical, Daoist priest Zhang Sanfeng invents the art of Tai Chi Chuan after witnessing a bird protecting its nest form a snake.

In the legend, “Dirty Zhang” watched the bird and the snake attacking and evading each other, so none hurt the other. And this was from where he got the “idea” to create Tai Chi Chuan. This is obviously just a story and a fairytale. In that myth, the bird was originally a small bird, but somehow, in Tai Chi Chuan, the picture of a crane has taken over its place. Together with the snake, they now both represent the Art of Tai Chi Chuan.

But still, even if it’s just a myth, the symbols of the snake and the crane have more meaning than just being sort of totems for the art. They represent the spirit iof the art, the vigour, the grace and the liveliness of the martial art, as well as the focus on evading and counter-attacking. But how to fully use the Crane and Snake practically in Tai Chi and adapt the essence of the animals in combat is something almost lost, or at least very seldom taught.

I have been lucky to have a couple of teachers speaking about these things and teaching it. I have also heard about others who teach things quite similar to what I myself have been taught. But I have never seen this written down in any book or on any Tai Chi webpage. So I have not looked at any other source before writing this post. Instead I have tried to verbalise myself what I was taught and tried to sum down the important points to be able to share them with you.

I believe that the very most of you will feel that these things represent something that is a bit different from what you have been taught, and some of it might seem strange. But I still hope that you will find these theories and my way of explaining the art of Tai Chi in this way, both useful and helpful. What is described here is foremost from a Yang Style Tai Chi perspective, but I believe that the methods could be adapted to most of the traditional tai chi styles and schools.

What is the Snake and the Crane in Tai Chi Chuan?

In Tai Chi, a few form movements are named after the Snake and Crane as “Crane shows its wing” and “snake creeps down.” Both the Crane’s Beak hand formation and Snake style palms can be seen in Tai Chi forms. This is the simplest version story, but it does not convey any of the real depth that is found in the snake-crane theory.

However, some teachers say that every movement in Tai Chi Chuan is represented by either the Snake or the Crane. In fighting, the Snake represents small, coiling movements – or small frame movements. And the Crane represents large, generous, sweeping, round movements – or Large frame movements.

The Snake and Crane together represent a Yin-Yang pair with two opposites that balance and complement each other. The snake is the Yin animal in Tai Chi. It is so fast that you cannot even see the start of its attack. And when you react, it’s already too late. The Tai Chi snake uses coiling movements to wrap its body around the opponent’s arms, and it attacks from every possible angle and from close range. The power is short, crisp and very hard to counter.

The Crane, on the other hand, is a proud, elegant bird and is the Yang animal in Tai Chi. It stands tall and it has a great power in its large wide wings. It is said that if cranes when they fly comes too close to houses, they can even strike through tiles on roofs and break apart bricks from chimneys. In Tai Chi, such methods as powerful striking and throws using large, bold movements, can resemble the use of the crane’s wings. However, the Crane has a second weapon as it can also use its beak to strike with.

Balancing snake and crane – By using them together

Two of my teachers taught that both small and large movements should be used together when you fight. Or in other words, you should use the Snake and Crane together when you fight, which is explicitly what one of them taught. In practical combat methods, this means that you can either defend with a snake or crane type of movement and then counter-attack with the other.

The snake and crane should work together seamless in action. When the movement from the snake and crane blend together, the opponent cannot tell where one stops and the other starts. Together, they form a whole. One starts and transforms into the other.

But there is also another aspect of the use: It is never you who decide what animal that should be used. You cannot compare the use of these animals in Tai Chi with a Hong Kong movie where a fighter test first one animal against his opponent and than another one if the first doesn’t work. And you can not approach any real Tai Chi fighting method with figuring out intellectually what technique or attack that should be used or what could work.

Instead, you need to respond spontaneously to the opponent. The snake or the crane, what will come out to respond will do so by itself not depending of what you “think”, but depending on what your opponent does. This also means that you will have to learn your snake and crane well before really knowing how they want to respond. But more about this later.

Snake and Crane in Tai Chi solo practice

For very good reasons, it is said that you should learn Large Frame first and Small frame later and I have explained my own view here. However, you don’t really have to learn both large and small movements methods very well before you approach the movements from a snake and crane perspective. In fact, playing with the animals can be a good way to attain a certain distance from the common style orthodoxy, and achieve more freedom to your own body method or Tai Chi shenfa.

My own Yang Tai Chi forms, how I perform them, are neither Large Frame nor Small frame. Instead, they are both at the same time. They have both large frame movements and small frame movements. And also, the repetitions of movements and sequences in the form, are performed in different ways when the same movements show up again later. Some of them are at first done in a large manner, in the spirit of the crane. But when they show up again as repetitions, they are done small and coiling with the essence of the snake.

In this way, when the long forms combine both large and small movements, they become a better representation of how to use and flow between tai chi movements in a real fight. The different Large and Small frame formats can and should be taught separately at first. But in my own humble opinion, and in my own experience, Large and Small frame movements should eventually be combined together in the same form. But again, this is only my own humble view, and your miles might vary.

Personalisation and creating attributes

One aspect that can make your own practice more fun and less abstract, is to personalise your animals. What type of snake is your favourite? What personality should your Crane have?

There are many types of snakes, smaller and larger. They also have different types of distinct “fighting strategies”. Some snakes bite their victims, some will hug their pray to death and yet others will swallow them alive. And there is the spitting cobra which spits its venom from distance. So the snake gives you the opportunity to try out larger and smaller coiling movements together with straight and angular attacks that penetrates the opponent’s guard. And then you use these different ways to use your snake to test out different fighting strategies that suites both your own and your snakes different personalities.

If you google up different types of cranes, you will find that there are several species of different sizes and appearances. You might also sense that there are some different kinds of personalities as well amongst different groups and species. If the snake is aggressive and direct, the crane might be arrogant and nonchalant. It could have a mental distance to the opponent or not really acknowledge that the opponent is there. But when it attacks, it attacks with very heavy, relaxed natural power that is very hard for the opponent to block.

So what kind of snake and crane do you favour? Think about it and try to find out. You are free to experiment how much you want with your animals while practicing and explore the possibilities. Go ahead and have fun.

You should try to invent two distinct characters and personalities. Give them as much traits and be as specific as you can. Hopefully, even their personalities can compliment each other and overall have clear, distinct yin-yang characteristics. And then, when you are clear about your animals and who they are, you can bring them to life into your form and drills practice. And try to bring it all into your free push hands play as well to see how it feels.

The real value of Snake and Crane practice

You might think that this is just a game, maybe a play that has no real value. For more traditional or standard type of long-time practitioners and teachers, this type of mind-set and practice might seem too far away from their common daily practice. But if it feels too far off, then you should understand that you are not forced to embrace the crane and snake in any way. Or if you experiment with these ideas, you might practice this way with your animals in mind for a while, for a shorter or longer period, and leave them later.

The real benefit or value with this type of loose ideas, and creative personalised practice, is that it will help you to approach the art from another angle than you are used to. Tai Chi Chuan is very much about experimenting and personalisation. Many teachers and writers of Tai Chi literature say that you need to make your art your own. But still, most students don’t know how to do this. They keep on repeating and doing the same movements as their teachers, often with little idea about that they could do things different and they don’t understand how.

But here, this type of Snake and Crane ideas will offer you a way to explore Tai Chi by your own, in your own way, and in a way that you teacher can not control or interfere with. How you do it, or how much you play with it is all up to you yourself. And what you do with this and how you develop it further, comes from your own personality.

Creating characters is fine, but develop your own integrity first

My teacher, who took the Snake and Crane play far and to a whole different level, said that when you have created your own Snake and Crane, you need to understand the integrity of these personalities and keep their integrities intact. When you experiment with them in your practice, you need to bring the integrity of each animal into the play.

After my teacher had spoken about these things in a lecture, I asked him: “Must you not have your own integrity first, or build your own integrity, before you create the integrity of your own animals?”

And he replied: “Of course. Otherwise you’ll end up with nothing. Your own integrity is the most important thing of all.”

The consequence of all of this, is that you need to not only understand yourself well, but it would also be wise to develop a “Tai Chi integrity” before experimenting with the Snake and Crane, or at least have your own identity and integrity in mind when you develop your animals and their personalities. It is better to have practiced for some time so that you at least understand some basic Tai Chi body methods, or shenfa, before you start personalising your animals. I don’t want you to risk ending up with confusion or with a split personality (well, I am joking now, but as I know people with mental health issues who has tried Tai Chi practice, I still think it, in a few occasions, could be a fair warning).

What this means is, that even if you play around with this creative method I have proposed here, then in the beginning of your Tai Chi journey, you would probably not understand very well what you are doing. The simple reason is that because you haven’t built up your foundation yet. It will take a while, probably many years of practice, until you could get the benefit from the snake and crane in your own practice.

Of course, you can start experimenting whenever you wish, but again, if you don’t have built a good foundation in your art, the snake and crane method would probably make little sense. But it could still be a fun type of practice to switch to when you feel too bored just repeating your form all of the time.

Maybe this is why this snake and crane method is so seldom taught. Most practitioners will stop developing their Tai Chi at a rudimentary level, maybe mostly just because their teachers themselves haven’t learned any more advanced method. But when you think about it, how many have heard about such a thing as “small frame”, regardless if it’s about Yang, Wu or Chen style? Most people believe that Tai Chi is just a form, together with maybe a couple of Weapons forms, and some basic push hands drills. A good teacher who are willing to teach a more complete, larger Tai Chi system, is always hard to find.

But when you understand Tai Chi well, both in its large and small frame methods, this method of dividing and organising movements into snake and crane movements will become much more logical, and also make more sense from a practical point if view. It will become a way for you to attach different movements together, and from the Snake and Crane practice, it will be easier for you to learn how to flow seamless between movements when you apply your Tai Chi to free push hands, applications practice, or to more combat oriented methods.

So we could say that the Snake and Crane, regardless if you want to use this method in combat or in practical fighting practice, the study as proposed here will offer you a way to connect the dots between theory and fixed patterns of practice, to a more creative, personal way of dealing with the Art of Tai Chi Chuan. Also, if you have a lot of experience from free push hands and fighting in different ranges, you should be able to understand this type of practice faster and the benefits thereof better.

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Summary of Snake and Crane qualities

So let us break down the snake and crane into qualities, methods and techniques, and compare them. This is not an exact science and what will fit in where also depends on your own personal interpretation of the Snake and Crane. And this is a fascinating and fun part with this game. You need to make up the rules by yourself and see how different methods fit your own personalised animals.

Snake aspects

• Closing in
• Attacking from close distance
• Duanjin (Short jin)
• Cold jin
• Small coiling
• Small qinna
• Close-range takedowns
• Straight attacks
• Attacking the nearest door
• Attacking the front door
• Straight footwork
• Ji
• Lü
• Cai
• Zhou

Crane aspects

• Assuming distance
• Attacking from medium/long distance
• Changjin (Long jin)
• Shocking jin
• Large circles
• Joint breaking
• Throws
• Circular attacks
• Attacking a distant door
• Attacking the side door
• Side stepping
• Peng
• An
• Lie
• Kou

Bonus video: Snake vs Hen – A hen defends herself and her chickens from a snake’s attacks:

When Cooperation Is Necessary

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Learning, Teaching

Sometimes I just want to tell people: I am disturbed by your lack of cooperation! So, let’s speak a bit about why cooperative Tai Chi techniques and applications are important – and how to practice in a good cooperative manner.

Tai Chi Chuan as a martial art is not based on individual techniques and specific applications. Instead, it is based on principles that could be expressed in many different ways. The principles could be described by words like adapting, following, blending and mirroring. “Energies” or refined skills as Peng and Lu are not techniques. So how do you practice them? Is it reasonable to practice them as “techniques”?

This is one of the reasons why many Tai Chi people completely reject the kind of practice that incorporates one person launching a punch while the other person do an exact respons. There are many reasons to agree with people who believe that this type of practice is artificial and can lead to bad habits, as well as as a wrong perception of fighting in general.

However there are also specific methods of using things as angles and leverage to break or control the opponent’s balance and structure, that need a very high degree of precision to work. If you want to develop the ability to understand and handle a more subtle use of angles and leverage, it is absolutely necessary to practice in a very precise and exact manner with a partner. This kind of practice demands a high degree of cooperation.

Many types of practice demands a high degree of cooperation. For instance, if you want to understand how to make a throw or a joint lock, you need the opportunity to practice the exact angles which will give the beast leverage and the best effect. For a throw or for a take down, you need to know how to step in and how close, and in what angle to apply pressure or pull. In a real fight, how will you ever be able to apply any technique if you don’t understand them in a precise manner? For sure, in a real situation, you might apply something in a different manner, in another way. But to be able to do anything more specific, you need to the angles and positioning where to apply force.

But here’s the problem: Many people just don’t want to cooperative. They don’t want to help others to succeed. I believe that there are many people who will never reach any respectable level in Tai Chi Chuan merely by their lack of ability to cooperate. Over the years, I have practiced with so many people, or rather tried to practice with many different people, who just don’t know how to – or even more common – don’t want to cooperate.

I remember countless of times in different martial arts classes when the partner didn’t understand what to do, or how to do something, or just didn’t want to follow a teacher’s instruction. I remember many different times like once in a Bagua class when we practiced a technique about how to handle an incoming kick. The so called “partner” would pull back the leg before I had any chance to step in. I guess that practicing how to grab, hold on to, or how to pull back a leg while kicking, could be good things to practice. But here, the task was to get a sense of how to hold a kicking leg, and step in to apply pressure in a certain manner on the opponent’s body and guide him to the floor.

Oh, I really hate this type of person who just don’t want to cooperate. And frankly, Tai Chi people are the worst of all martial arts practitioners I have met and studied with. They can handle cooperative push hands drills to a certain extent, but many people have a problem with anything beyond that. One problem is that they mostly don’t have any other kind of martial arts background, so they don’t even know how to throw a general punch.

And a part of the other problem is that many just don’t want to play a neutral “dumb” attacker. Instead they will try to use Tai chi methods to counter-counter the application and technique. This is the most obstructive a practictioner can do, both against others and against themselves, because they will never step outside of what they want to do for the moment and in that moment also close themselves to learn more.

Yes, you can see overly cooperative videos everywhere. When a teacher wants to give the impression that something overly compliant is “real”, then we might have a problem with it. It’s something disingenuous and deceptive about much what you see out there. But still, your own mind-set when you practice with others must be a cooperative mind-set.

But here is the thing: In my own experience, it’s always the people who know how to cooperative and help each other who will learn fastest, and have the best development in their overall Tai Chi journey. And they are in fact often the people who a teacher will be willing to teach more advanced things to. If you don’t want to cooperate and learn things in the specific way your teacher wants to teach, how can you ever expect your teacher to open up and be generous about what he teaches?

I would like you to know that, in fact, it is very often the students themselves who are the cause of different teacher’s reluctant attitudes and unwillingness to teach any more advanced stuff. You really need a humble approach and show that you are wiling to listen and to do what your teacher says.

I remember interacting with one of my own teachers who I have no contact with these days, and sadly in opposite roles. He would ask me things when I had been to seminars and summer camps, about what we did and asked me to show him. But soon I stopped trying to show him anything, just because of his own attitude. He always had a very dismissal attitude. More than to understand, he wanted to show how something didn’t work. He often complained that people could never show things they practiced in seminars. People were indeed reluctant to show him things. But I soon learned that it had to do with his own attitude and not with theirs.

And there are other reasons. Some people keep on to small things they have learned very hard, and treat what they know as treasures. They don’t like to show or tell others about what they have. They are afraid to test what they have learned on others, because the other person might learn something.

Their own selfish, greedy attitude is what makes them stop developing. I can see the same tendency in every aspect of interaction in the human society. Greediness, stinginess, pettiness, not being able to generous and not being able to give will always halt your progress regardless what you want to achieve in life. Regardless it’s about business, building relationships or Tai Chi, this kind of attitude will never lead to anything good.

So in Tai Chi, as well as in life in general, it is extremely important to attain a generous attitude, share and give what you have. A good way to show a good attitude and that you are willing to share is by cooperating, by cooperating with your classmates and with your teachers. And as a teacher, you need to have the same attitude to your students. Cooperate by giving good replies to their questions, showing them what they ask about and make sure that they, by your own actions, feel just as much respect from you as you want them to show you.