Recently in Foundation Category
Our class tonight was almost exclusively around the concept of energy and mental force. We started with some silk reeling exercises. Master Li made us do larger circles first - hand going down around the leg, coming back up (from the back), stretch the muscles next to the spine, and then collapse on the front. Then we made the circles smaller and smaller, to the point that it was just making little circles in the front-side of the body.
Then we moved to hand-moving (like cloud hands, but only one hand) silk reeling. He was emphasizing on how this is not the muscles of the hand moving, but the internal energy manifesting into a whole body movement, and a mental force driving the hand. The hand dissolves into waves of energy: Imaging a much fatter hand, like beads, and your hand is the string in the center. Your hand is part of it. Any muscle/physical energy is in fact a block in the path of the energy - you have to let go of the physical muscle force to let the energy flow. Just apply the minimum energy that keeps your hand up - nothing more. The rest is your mental force and focus moving your hand. Imagine the flow of blood in your hand - the flow will in fact will be stimulated and you will feel the heat.
Notice that this is not focusing on maridians. If you focus on maridians you're focusing on one part of the circulation in the body. This is about whole body.
Now, when you stop in a posture, you mentally lock into "reaching" for something. Your body stops, but your mental force moves. Moves to reach out to that point in infinity - which does not really exist. It's in your mind.
Then we moved to hand-moving (like cloud hands, but only one hand) silk reeling. He was emphasizing on how this is not the muscles of the hand moving, but the internal energy manifesting into a whole body movement, and a mental force driving the hand. The hand dissolves into waves of energy: Imaging a much fatter hand, like beads, and your hand is the string in the center. Your hand is part of it. Any muscle/physical energy is in fact a block in the path of the energy - you have to let go of the physical muscle force to let the energy flow. Just apply the minimum energy that keeps your hand up - nothing more. The rest is your mental force and focus moving your hand. Imagine the flow of blood in your hand - the flow will in fact will be stimulated and you will feel the heat.
Notice that this is not focusing on maridians. If you focus on maridians you're focusing on one part of the circulation in the body. This is about whole body.
Now, when you stop in a posture, you mentally lock into "reaching" for something. Your body stops, but your mental force moves. Moves to reach out to that point in infinity - which does not really exist. It's in your mind.
Master Li focused on the very beginning of the form (Chen Style Old Fome, First Road) tonight. In doing so, he had a couple of interesting lessons for us.
He made us realize that there is no one "correct" form - it so very much depends on the individual, and how he or she manifests the internal/spiritual energy in his or her moves. He said: "I teach you something when you are a beginner, then for the same posture I make it look different when you are an intermediate student, and then I might make you let go of that form completely and do it differently when you're advanced." The form does not matter all that much. In fact, when you are a beginner, the form is taught so that you have something to practice to and hold on to. But each person is unique, and the way they manifest the energy could be different from the others. The form taught in a class is just a sample of what makes sense to an average student. You as a student have to recognize your own way of doing the same move and your own personal style.
What matters is the fundamentals and roots. The connection with the energy, and keeping the balance with the ground. How that is demonstrated is a matter of personal style. He spent some time showing some details [which I had never noticed before] in some of the very basic moves, and how there are spiral moves built into them, usually unnoticed in the overall forms, to connect the movement to the source of Chi (Dantian) and how to make the whole body rooted in the ground, hence keeping the balance (I sometimes feel proud of calling this blog infinite spirals!)
The second interesting teaching of tonight was focusing on the opening/commencing. Instead of keeping the hands loose, he made us stretch the hands and then keep them stretched and at the same distance from the body as we're opening for the form. It was an interesting feeling of energy. The point was to make us understand that one should mentally stretch the hands. Even if your hands are relaxed and "inward" a little bit, mentally the hands are out there, meaning that you're expanded. Your body expands beyond the physical self.
He explained that the best meditation to make the spiritual energy active is the "still" meditation, but it's too hard because it gets boring and tiring. You stand in the "still standing meditation" for ten minutes and your muscles hurt and you get bored. So you do not continue. The next best thing is moving meditation, of which Taiji is an example, where you are moving but your mind focuses on extending the energy beyond your body. Because it's moving, you have more room to avoid being bored and being tired, and therefore you can continue it for a longer time.
He made us realize that there is no one "correct" form - it so very much depends on the individual, and how he or she manifests the internal/spiritual energy in his or her moves. He said: "I teach you something when you are a beginner, then for the same posture I make it look different when you are an intermediate student, and then I might make you let go of that form completely and do it differently when you're advanced." The form does not matter all that much. In fact, when you are a beginner, the form is taught so that you have something to practice to and hold on to. But each person is unique, and the way they manifest the energy could be different from the others. The form taught in a class is just a sample of what makes sense to an average student. You as a student have to recognize your own way of doing the same move and your own personal style.
What matters is the fundamentals and roots. The connection with the energy, and keeping the balance with the ground. How that is demonstrated is a matter of personal style. He spent some time showing some details [which I had never noticed before] in some of the very basic moves, and how there are spiral moves built into them, usually unnoticed in the overall forms, to connect the movement to the source of Chi (Dantian) and how to make the whole body rooted in the ground, hence keeping the balance (I sometimes feel proud of calling this blog infinite spirals!)
The second interesting teaching of tonight was focusing on the opening/commencing. Instead of keeping the hands loose, he made us stretch the hands and then keep them stretched and at the same distance from the body as we're opening for the form. It was an interesting feeling of energy. The point was to make us understand that one should mentally stretch the hands. Even if your hands are relaxed and "inward" a little bit, mentally the hands are out there, meaning that you're expanded. Your body expands beyond the physical self.
He explained that the best meditation to make the spiritual energy active is the "still" meditation, but it's too hard because it gets boring and tiring. You stand in the "still standing meditation" for ten minutes and your muscles hurt and you get bored. So you do not continue. The next best thing is moving meditation, of which Taiji is an example, where you are moving but your mind focuses on extending the energy beyond your body. Because it's moving, you have more room to avoid being bored and being tired, and therefore you can continue it for a longer time.
Tonight we did the same horizontal spiral movement again. This time, Master Li asked us to - slowly and gradually - make the spirals smaller and smaller. As we did that, we also started shrinking, bring the hands in, and putting the hands on the lower stomach. As we were doing this he asked us to imagine the energy flowing in that spiral going into hands, or in other words making the hands part of the circle.
Then, again, slowly, make the circles smaller and smaller, to the point that there is almost no spiral movement. Here's the final step: You get to a point that the spiral movement is only in your mind. Now your mind is circulating the energy. This is huge - I can see that if one keeps practicing, he or she can get to the point of being able to think of circulating energy and make it happen. Awesome.
This was an eye opening exercise.
Then, again, slowly, make the circles smaller and smaller, to the point that there is almost no spiral movement. Here's the final step: You get to a point that the spiral movement is only in your mind. Now your mind is circulating the energy. This is huge - I can see that if one keeps practicing, he or she can get to the point of being able to think of circulating energy and make it happen. Awesome.
This was an eye opening exercise.
This week as a part of our initial silk reeling exercises Master Li made us try a new type of spiral movement. Most of the spiral movements up to this point were horizontal, basically variations of rubbing the stomach or could hands.
This one was different: You take the standing meditation position, hands in front and round in an arch, and then you start moving your weight - in a delicate and subtle manner - from one side to the other. Then you start turning this into round moves of the waist. Think of doing the hula hoop, but in very small circles so that the only part of the body moving is the waist, and only in a very small circle. Concentrating on this move and meditating with it was very interesting.
This one was different: You take the standing meditation position, hands in front and round in an arch, and then you start moving your weight - in a delicate and subtle manner - from one side to the other. Then you start turning this into round moves of the waist. Think of doing the hula hoop, but in very small circles so that the only part of the body moving is the waist, and only in a very small circle. Concentrating on this move and meditating with it was very interesting.
Master Jesse Tsao has done a new DVD on Taiji fundamentals for beginners. It discusses the Yin and Yang and how they manifest in different basic moves and postures of Taiji. He also discusses the thirteen essential techniques of Taiji. Here is a preview of the DVD. The DVDs can be ordered directly from his web site, TaiChiHealthways.com:
When doing the form, one should not lock his or her joints at all. Aside from the "external" aspects of it - where locking a joint makes it more susceptible to being hurt or in the case of an actual combat situation making it a good target for "breaking" - there's the flow of energy.
The whole concept of silk reeling is around making the flow of energy (qi) easy in the body. The energy moves from Dantian to other parts of the body in a spiral way, like a screw going into the wall. In order to do that, the muscles and joint should let the energy flow easily. As I mentioned before, some of the silk reeling exercises are actually designed specifically for that, to open certain parts of the body and enhance the flow of energy.
Locked joints are the opposite - the do not let the energy flow freely. So by locking a joint one is in fact blocking the energy and preventing proper circulation of qi. This is specially important in the case of knees and elbow, because the form makes you stretch your legs and arms quite a bit. So if you're not careful, you can easily lock the joint as you're stretching.
The whole concept of silk reeling is around making the flow of energy (qi) easy in the body. The energy moves from Dantian to other parts of the body in a spiral way, like a screw going into the wall. In order to do that, the muscles and joint should let the energy flow easily. As I mentioned before, some of the silk reeling exercises are actually designed specifically for that, to open certain parts of the body and enhance the flow of energy.
Locked joints are the opposite - the do not let the energy flow freely. So by locking a joint one is in fact blocking the energy and preventing proper circulation of qi. This is specially important in the case of knees and elbow, because the form makes you stretch your legs and arms quite a bit. So if you're not careful, you can easily lock the joint as you're stretching.
The foundation of Chen taiji is built through a special form of Qigong, called Silk reeling on Chan Si Gong. Silk Reeling is a set of standing movements (I have seen a couple of "steps" also, but for the most part like many other forms of Qigong the form is done standing in one place) focusing on rotating the Dantian.
One of the key, basic moves is in fact placing both hands below stomach, on where Daintian would be (Dantian is the center of the body both vertically and horizontally, so the actual Dantian is inside the body) and rub it in spiral moves (some time in each direction). There are other moves in which you would move one hand in spirals, like the cloud-hands moves, and then two hands, and so on and so forth. In fact, these are the basis of most of the spiral moves in the form. The fact is that cloud-hands is built using these moves, so no wonder they do look like cloud hands!
There are also certain moves designed to stimulate the flow of energy by opening and closing certain muscles and areas around the Dantian, such as ribs.
Master Li says learning the form (such as the Chen routine) is relatively easy and can be done in no time. The real focus of a student should be on building the foundations using silk reeling exercises. Feeling Dantian and being able to control the muscles to rotate it is what takes time, practice, concentration, and patience.
One of the key, basic moves is in fact placing both hands below stomach, on where Daintian would be (Dantian is the center of the body both vertically and horizontally, so the actual Dantian is inside the body) and rub it in spiral moves (some time in each direction). There are other moves in which you would move one hand in spirals, like the cloud-hands moves, and then two hands, and so on and so forth. In fact, these are the basis of most of the spiral moves in the form. The fact is that cloud-hands is built using these moves, so no wonder they do look like cloud hands!
There are also certain moves designed to stimulate the flow of energy by opening and closing certain muscles and areas around the Dantian, such as ribs.
Master Li says learning the form (such as the Chen routine) is relatively easy and can be done in no time. The real focus of a student should be on building the foundations using silk reeling exercises. Feeling Dantian and being able to control the muscles to rotate it is what takes time, practice, concentration, and patience.
