How to make things work for real? Now, I am speaking about practical applications, not Qi or magic, just practical Tai Chi application as qinna (like a lock or similar), a take-down, a simple punch or a more complex technique. How to make things work in different situations is a difficult thing to answer because of the complex nature of reality.
I had a teacher that would show and teach many different techniques and many variations on the same method and theme. He was very honest about what he did and said that you should practice applications against as many people as possible, because then you will understand that sometimes some things work and other things won’t. And often you won’t even understand why something works or not. So what you need to do is to figure out what methods and techniques suite you the most, what techniques you like and try to understand what you can make work in different situations.
So a good reason for trying out many different techniques and methods is not really to learn how to make everything work, but a reason to try things out on different people and try to understand your own prerequisites, your own limitations. And try to be very honest about your own lack of understanding and about your own level. This is also the reason why I don’t like grades and belts. Someone else should not tell you at what level you are, what you can do or not. You must understand it all by yourself and it’s very important that you do understand by yourself. We are dealing with the Martial Arts world here, a complex world, that often cross the lines between “reality” and “abstractions”, that teach things through friendly matches and practice, but at the same time wants to teach something else, how to handle yourself and protect yourself outside the school environment. Which means that you need to have an extremely realistic approach towards yourself. Tai Chi is not about paying for diplomas and belts to have something to show up to your friends so you can nurture your vanity. Instead Tai Chi is all about self-knowledge.
So when you try to analyse yourself and your skills, you need to be most brutal to yourself, try understand your own limitations, what you can do and not. You must also understand the nature of Tai Chi combat methods and applications, that different things will work on different people. And that you need to adjust your whole strategy and game-plan according to who you meet and in what circumstances.
Master Li Yaxuan expressed this very well. He said that you need to approach fighting and push hands like you were a medical doctor treating patients. Every patient needs a different treatment depending on the nature of decease or problem. Some people might need medication others might need a physical therapist. Some people just need rest while still others might need surgery. A doctor deals with a great range of methods and strategies. Every single meeting with a patient is different and everyone needs to be treated differently. This is something to keep in mind and work from, even when you practice with different partners inside the school environment and with friends. There is no “one size fits all” type of technique, method or approach. This is also why competing might teach you a false sense of security. Just because you can control the situation when competing it doesn’t mean that the same skill sets you have developed there and can make work there would work on anyone else outside the same arena.
So when you encounter a situation, to make things work in that specific time and place, is to first get rid of any preconceived ideas of what you should or can do and treat every encounter as a new and unique experience. Fighting, even on a friendly basis, demands all attention and focus and great timing. There is no skill that will make every opponent you meet to bounce away just upon touching your arm. There is no method or skill that can make combat easy. It will always be hard and difficult. And there is nothing that can secure a certain outcome. But being very realistic about your own limitations could at least save you from doing stupid things. It might even save your life.
What is Silk-Reeling in T’ai Chi Ch’uan? As you know if you have followed this blog, I have some very strong opinions about T’ai Chi related issues. Here I try to verbalise my idea on what Silk Reeling really is in T’ai Chi in a more general sense and I will certainly try to come up with some good arguments for my case.
Chansi, isn’t that a Chen thing?
First of all Silk-reeling, chansi (纏絲) or chansijin/chansijing (纏絲精), is mostly known as a Chen style specific term. It’s something that Chen style focus very much on and has a huge impact on basic training, both jibengong (foundation practice) form and application. Silk-reeling movement is a twisting or spiralling body movement that has its center in the Dantian, is supported by the gua and legs and spreads out through the limbs, right out to the fingertips. The most common basic exercise is the one arm movement where the practitioner stands in a broad horse stance. One hand rests at the waist and the other one makes a big wide circle with the whole arm while coordinating the movement from the gua and dantian.
Charles Tauber presents his ideas on Chen style silk reeling in very well thought out instruction videos
Chen style has a certain expression, but is it silk reeling that gives Chen style a certain expression, or is it the Chen style specific expression that makes silk-reeling what it is? Some Chen stylists claim the silk-reeling is what separates Chen style from other T’ai Chi styles. So do other styles have the same?
Mike Sigman presents Silk Reeling from a more general Tai chi perspective
Chousi, similar but not the same.
Now, there is another, related concept in Yang and other styles, namely Chousi, or pulling silk. What is meant is not the same as twisting silk reeling or chansijin. Pulling silk is the way of performing a movement with perfectly even, smooth movements. When pulling the very fine silk thread out from the silk cocoon, the slightest break or jerk would break it. So you need to move with awareness throughout your movement, move very carefully, perfectly even, just like a surgeon operating with a scalpel. Moving like this takes a lot of focus and attention, but this is the way a Yang style form always should be practiced.
‘If you pull the silk abruptly it will break, when you pull it improperly, the silk won’t come out. This is a metaphor for training the energy (jin) of taijiquan. It cannot be excessively forceful, nor excessively fragile; it has to be just right. These kinds of metaphors are numerous, such as: “mobilize jin that is like well-tempered steel,” “as though drawing a bow,” and “issue jin as though releasing an arrow.” There are some people, then, who have illogically contrived to make the words chou si be regarded as a designation for a kind of jin, even mistakenly giving explanations of some sort of “chousijin.”
So chansijing is something different than chousi as Chansi focuses on a continuous twisting and winding movement? Maybe the focus on twisting and spiralling is what is different. At least twisting and winding does not need to have the focus on exact speed and even, smooth movements? So maybe it’s Chansi that lacks something and not Chousi? But still, can’t you combine chousi and chansi together so that they overlap or at least have the same qualities?
So what about Yang style and Chansijin? Is it a good match or what?
Yang zhenduo, has at several different occasions answered on the question if Yang Style has silk-reeling. A couple of his answers are:
(From an Interview with Yang Zhenduo in 1990): “T’AI CHI: Is there chan ssu jing (silk reeling energy)in the Yang style? Yang Zhenduo: The Yang style does not have such a word as chan ssu jing. Chen style is unique to have that. But in the Yang style what we have is twisting and continuous motion. It has the chan ssu jing element, but we do not call it chan ssu jing.”
(1995, Yang Zhenduo on Yang Style’s Growing Potentials): “Chan Si jing (silk coiling energy) in the Yang style involves changing of the hand positions, Yang said. He cited the example of the movement Wave Hands Like Clouds where there is emphasis on the rotation of the arms and hands. “In the Yang style, it (chan Si jing) is not as apparent as in the Chen style. But that content is incorporated in the Yang style,” he said. “It is done subtly in the change of the hand position. “In the Yang style,” he said,” most energy has the nature of peng jing (ward off) energy. In T’ai Chi’s development, each style has its own characteristics and specialties, and in the Yang style peng jing is No. 1. Everything is based on peng jing and compared to chan Si jing it is totally different. If emphasis was all on chan Si jing, then Yang style would be the same as the Chen style.”
Interesting, but would Yang style style be the same if the focus was on silk reeling? I don’t agree. There are other things in Chen style that stands out and make the movements feel different. Chen style often work with changing tempo, sometimes it’s fast, sometimes slow. When it’s slow it mostly don’t become “Yang slow”. It has jumps and it has movements that are different from other Tai Chi styles. The stances are mostly lower and wider and the limbs can move freely from a stationary stance without the transition of weight. Chen style is not afraid to lose connection or suddenly burst out in fajin. So if all of these ingredients remained the same, Chen style would still look different. Yang style would not be the same.
So what is Chansijin really? I mean from a general Tai chi perspective.
I would rather express silk reeling and its place in Tai Chi a bit different than Zhenduo. Look again at how silk reeling is usually defined, or how I defined it above: Silk reeling is a “twisting or spiralling body movement that has its center in the Dantian, is supported by the gua and legs and spreads out through the limbs, right out to the fingertips.” Think about it. Doesn’t Yang connect the movements to the Dantian? Yes of course it does. Doesn’t Yang have spiralling, circular movements? You often see very little spiralling movement in Yang style performances.
But does it have to be non-present, or even less present than in Chen style? In my opinion. this is more a question about how you as a Tai chi practitioner (regardless style) work active on “kai-he” / “open-close” movements using the whole spine and trunk. If you do that, I am sure that you will agree with me that your arms will automatically attain a natural sort of spiralling movements. Just do this very simple exercis: Stand straight and put out your arms in a “tree holding posture“. Now experiment with trunk and spine and eventually also scapula movements. If you tuck in and untuck your hips and focus on pressing together and release your dantian at the same time as you have this posture, you will see that your elbows will automatically sink and raise slightly. If you coordinate your movements in your form with spine, scapula and breath, this should have the same natural effect and result in a spiralling movement. So why do so many Yang stylists don’t show a circular, spiralling movement? This might depend on primarily two things: The first is that they can hide their body mechanics, or making it less pronounced. And the second is that they still haven’t practiced Tai chi for a very long time, so they focus more on relaxing and keeping their shoulders dropped. In Yang and some other styles, a more active use of spine and scapula movements is often not introduced until the person has practiced Tai Chi for a couple of years, sometimes several years. And sometimes, at least for some players, the body method stays at a rudimentary beginners level. It could be that they focus on health aspect or enjoy a very relaxed way of doing the form. I would not say that this is wrong, not even on more advanced levels, as everyone practice for different reasons.
But my point is that what is described with the concept of chansi is not only something styles specific or Chen related. In fact, what Chen style describes with the term Chansijin is just good, solid Tai Chi body mechanics. If you work with whole body movement that works around keeping zhongding, is rooted in the feet, is controlled by the Dantian and use open/close movements from the spine and scapula, well, then you will have exactly what is described with chansi. You don’t need to accentuate the spiralling movement, just coordinate the kai/he movement with your overall coordination and it will be there. Add the concept of chousi as well and regardless the style you are practicing and you’ll now have a great kind of body mechanics for your Tai Chi movements. This is in my own opinion the essence of the concept Chansi and chansijin.
In Tai Chi Chuan, all knowledge comes from doing. As I wrote here, Tai chi is a very different art from all western arts of body movement, It needs time to understand. It took me about two or three years of practice before understanding what it really is. The key is practice.
One of my favourite Chinese quotes comes from Wang Yangming (1472-1529), a philosopher and great thinker from the late Neo Confucian “school of Mind”, or “Xin Xue”:
(Courtesy of AZ Quotes)
People don’t know this, well no one knows who this person is, but Wang Yangming had in fact a great influence on the Chinese teaching system in general and especially on how martial arts are taught in East Asia. Without him East-Asian martial arts might have looked quite different today.
What he thought was that no knowledge is valuable if it hasn’t gone through the body by doing. All real knowledge comes from doing. How isn’t this true about Tai Chi! If you haven’t learned enough about this art by doing, you can not even explain for yourself what it is. At least some of it must become the property of you own body. And still you won’t be able to explain properly to others and even if you did they would still not understand, because they have no practical experience in the art by themselves.
It’s a funny thing to compare, but everyone know that you need to practice an instrument for quite some time before you can learn how to play good. And still people can’t understand that it’s the same thing with Tai Chi, you learn by practicing. People still keep asking about this or that. They want answers they can not get. They see things and want logical, intellectual explanations. Mostly, their thinking is too complex, too complicated to understand what most too often is all too simple and obvious for them to understand. Sometimes I can understand and have sympathy for teachers who often talks about qi, yi, jin and all sorts of mystical mumbo-jumbo. This is exactly what many people wants to hear, and students especially. They are all too complicated and have studied too short of time to understand that most of what their teachers say is all rubbish. Many of the teachers know this as well, but they don’t have any other way of communicating. Many students just won’t accept simple, logical explanations. This talk is a way to reach students even if it’s the wrong way and mostly means a detour of practice and learning.
I know very good teachers and practitioners who have complained on their own teachers about their lack of instructions, their lack of teaching capacity. They complain about why they wasn’t taught this or that. I remember myself, when I already had about 6 or seven years of practice, asking a senior student to one of my teachers something, how he did something and he refused to answer. “You need to figure it out for yourself.” I was frustrated back then and thought he was dishonest. But he was correct. Some things just needs to grow. You need to find your own way to discover things, finding your own way to be your teacher and learning by doing. There is just no way around this.
I asked the only person I’ve met that I would consider calling a “master” about my practice, how I could become better. He smiled and said. “Just practice.” He was correct. Time will work for your advantage if you are just stubborn enough and you will learn and become better. By putting more things to do into your body and refine them by practicing, you will gain more and more understanding of the art. If a good “understanding” of Tai chi as an art is your goal, you will eventually come to the understanding of all of the mechanics behind every single performance feat or trick you can see in Tai Chi videos on the Youtube. But you need to walk the road first by Doing. “Knowledge is the beginning of practice; doing is the completion of knowing.” Just practice.
I am always surprised when people don’t believe that Tai Chi is enough as a combat art. So many people try to add things like striking techniques, finishing strategi and throws from outside to cover the holes where their Tai Chi lacks. They spar in a common sparring formats and use strikes from Sanda, Boxing, Kick-Boxing, MMA and others. Why? Isn’t Tai Chi enough? Is Tai Chi really enough as a form of combat?
My answer on this questions would rather be an annoyed head shake or a loudly “duh.” Does your lack of skill depend on Tai Chi? If you are not convinced I will tell you this:
– If you can fight or not doesn’t depend on tai chi.
– If you can fight with tai chi or not doesn’t depend on tai chi.
– But if you understand fighting and at the same time understand tai chi, you should be able to use your tai chi to fight with.
Understanding fighting is easy. To understand tai chi is hard. If you try to add other things to the pot to compensate your lack of understanding, you’ll just make it even harder to understand Tai Chi, and it will take even more time. If you think that you need to add other things to make your tai chi work, or to change it to something else that it is not, then …well, this means that you are confused. If you confuse things even more, you’ll become even more confused, not less. It’s the understanding of tai chi that most often is lacking. You need to get to know Tai Chi in a clear pure form, without changes, without distortion. If your knowledge lacks, you need to learn and practice tai chi more, not to search somewhere else. It might be your teacher that lacks tai chi or tai chi teaching skills. Then go on to find another teacher or try to teach yourself what you yet don’t understand.
Tai Chi has its own mechanics for generating destructive punching power, it has its own fighting strategies, entering strategies and finishing strategies. Tai Chi fighting depends on Tai Chi fighting rules. You need to let Tai Chi rules dictate the procedure and outcome of the fight, not general sparring rules, boxing or MMA rules. Tai Chi is complete, it has everything that is needed. But still there is often a lack of confidence due to little or no sparring and fighting experience. So to be able to fight with Tai Chi, often some basic understanding of real fighting and real violence is needed. Then how do you get to a point where you can really use your Tai chi to fight with? First you need a really good understanding of Tai Chi as self-defense and as a combat system. Then you need practice.
Again, fighting is easy. But understanding Tai Chi is not. You can start from any of the two ends, with fighting or with Tai Chi. But you must walk the Tai Chi road until you have reached a certain understanding. Then you need to practice that knowledge and understanding in a as realistic way as possible. And still without even slightly compromising your Tai Chi. Throwing other things into the bin won’t help to see your Tai Chi more clearly and definitely it won’t help you use it. Understanding Tai Chi is to keep the integrity of Tai Chi. Understanding fighting is to keep your body and mind intact where they are in danger. Breathing will help you to keep your mind intact. Breathing and thinking clearly will help you survive a combat situation. Keeping the integrity of Tai Chi intact while fighting will help you to breath and see things clearer. But fighting with Tai Chi is still not just to fight. It’s not to think or act like a common person do in a fighting situation. And you learn this from understanding fighting alone, but to look at violence and fighting solely from a Tai Chi point of view.
So what is a Tai Chi point of view on fighting? This is maybe the toughest question to answer. Tai Chi is a practical art, it’s learned and understood by practical practice alone. So most of this answer you need to find yourself by understanding T’ai Chi Ch’uan, by practice this art and walk the road until that point so the answer can reveal itself. So again, the best answer to give anyone who ask a question about Tai Chi and fighting is still the somewhat discouraging answer that the eager intellect desperately wants a quick and simple answer: “just keep on practicing.” So is Tai Chi alone enough as a form of combat? Why don’t you practice and test it until you can answer the question by yourself?
Just a notice that I’ve added some links to resource pages to the blog. You find them in the side-bar to the right, below the comments and links to other blogs. I’ve been thinking about doing this for a long time, but it just hasen’t happened yet.
Amongst my favorite links you’ll find Brennan Translation. In a time span of just a few years, Mr Brennan has translated the vast majority of Tai Chi and Tai Chi related classics. This is a page everyone who has a serious interest in this art should know.
Another top favorite is The Rum Soaked Fist Forum. This place developed from the old Empty Flower Forum, originally on the late David DeVere’s own homepage, has some very special members. Some of them are really, really, good long-time practitioners who deserves a whole lot of respect and yet they make very little fuzz about themselves or about their skills. Amongst the other ones, who are less skilled and not seniors yet, you’ll find yours truly under the name “Bao”. It’s an honor to be a part of this community. If you do a little bit of search, you’ll find much said about every possible aspect of this art.
I can also recommend another page that few seem to visit nowadays, The Qi-Journal. Here if you deep into the page you’ll find interviews, translations and many other interesting things about Tai Chi and Qigong.
There a few more links in the side-bar and I’ll try to add a few more later. Don’t forget to check the blogs as well. If you know pages you believe should be highlighted or you think I have missed, please feel free to add them to the comments below. You can also suggest more blogs and other related pages.
