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In my own experience, there are two very distinct types of “feel” of high level Tai Chi practitioners. For beginners, one of these types feels like they are stumbling in clouds, there’s nothing to touch, and yet they are easily swept around like a leaf in a storm. Then you touch the other type this kind of practitioner can feel soft and relaxed, but also hard, stiff and unmovable at the same time. It is very hard to explain this contradiction and for Tai Chi practitioners at an average level, this can feel quite confusing.

I remember meeting one of my teachers the first time. I was invited to try penetrating his guard punching at him. He didn’t do much at all, he hardly moved, yet easily evaded all of my strikes and punches. I was surprised how easy it was for him, how precise, small adjustments could left me feeling puzzled and somewhat helpless, like his skill was a whole building of levels ahead of me. But I was also puzzled about that he felt hard. Pushing against his arms it felt like pushing against a wall. Despite this apparent hardness and stiffness, a complete solid structure, he always spoke about relaxation and softness.

So what you need to understand, is that whatever you feel, when you touch a high level practitioner it is the result of a long time of practice. If you strive to mimic and do the same, having the same feeling as your teacher, you are doing wrong. Especially if you try having a certain structure, a hardness, you are just fooling yourself. Many do this because they believe they need to have a certain “peng”, or maintain structure to not collapse.

This is a common view, but it is also a big mistake that will keep you from understanding the real strength and power that can be developed by Tai Chi practice. You need to let go of all urge to use muscle strength to resist. You need to learn how the body and structure will keep up itself if you just let the body keep up itself. And also, when you play push hands or do other partner work, you need to be as soft as possible and relax into your shape and structure instead of forcing it.

You really need to listen to what Yang Chengfu said, that extreme softness automatically gives birth to strength and power. This is the real path to mastery, to first build your ability to be soft and relax into a real skill. You need to not just be not hard, but first you need to learn to become soft and supple and how to keep being soft and relaxed while people try to push and drag you. You will learn how to use it later.

Of course, how to achieve it can be hard to understand. If you haven’t already got it, this might feel confusing and like something impossible to achieve. The only way is to keep trying, keep losing, keep feeling stupid when others easily use force to push or throw you down. Always keep in mind that all great practitioners you will meet have felt the same. They have felt embarrassed, humiliated, many, many times until they learned to “let go” while sticking to the most basic, humble Tai Chi principles. And everyone can do the same. All it takes is time and practice, as well as some courage to continue striving to “get it.”

Tip: I wrote about the same things in this post, but also more about the problems and how to achieve it.

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