Sung

[middleway]

The best practitioners I've met have been the most soft and relaxed, but they can become like steel in an instant... and revert to softness in blink of an eye.

Agreed!!

cheers
Chris

[RobT]

Peng, Sung and Ting are requirements that all need to be met... "sung" which is wet noodle doesn't have any resiliance and isn't really "sung".

Gang rou xiang ji ... hard and soft smoothly inter-change

[Bodywork]

SUng is not wet noodle. Nothing is wet noodle. Being empty is not wet noodle.
At all times you are supported, leading into a hole while filling from the top, side, or bottom etc.
Offering them something that feels empty, only feels that way. Sung is always supported so even at its most soft it is substantial. and it is why it is so both so fast and why the steel is so suddenly in the cotton. It may feel soft, very soft, but it only feels that way. Wet noodle and "noodling" is a trap that some fall into, it comes from a disconnected body.

[Bao]

The best practitioners I've met have been the most soft and relaxed, but they can become like steel in an instant... and revert to softness in blink of an eye.

Agreed!!

cheers
Chris

Yeah, that is very true. I left out that last part. Didn't think about it, the topics was about sung. But you are right, the ability to change fast between full and empty is a great skill. Reminds me about what Hejinbao's tudi told me about his teacher, that when you try touch HJB, it's like meeting a Taiji master - he is extremely soft and change so quickly that you won't even let you feel him and it's like stumbling in air. But when he goes in to reach you, its like having two gigant rotating iron rods against you. When you see him demonstrate his art in those vids, you almost only see the lion system and lion flavor, but when he demonstrate his art IRL, you understand that he really knows the whole curriculum and is very versatile with it. Actually my friend (and HJBs Tudi) said that Xie peiqi was very impressed meeting Wang Peisheng. XPQ tried to shake hands with him and everybody thought they did, but Wang slipped gentle out of his grip without anyone else noticing it. WPS, known for his ability to disappear, or become transparent is also something you miss looking at the vids of him. He often represent his taiji with a more yang approach. You see how he can easily throw and toss people away, but it is his yin-abilities that made him really famous, even for his ability to fight.

[Sprint]

There is an interplay between tension and relaxation. Most people get some measure of it from experience. But there has to be a reference point. Too tense in relation to what; too relaxed in relation to what? How do we know what is just right?

The heart of tension and relaxation is balance – your physical balance. In order to control your opponent you need to be able to control his balance. But before you can do that you have to be fully in control of your own balance.

So the achievement of balance is relative to the surface that you are [standing] on. It requires physical effort to remain standing and the body continually makes many minute adjustments just to remain upright. What connects us to the ground is our feet, so clearly our feet are really important to our balance and our state of relaxation/tension.

Exteroceptors, such as pressure sensors in the feet, provide the orientation of the body with respect to the ground or support surface. The sensors located on the bottom of the feet also provide information about the ground reaction forces of the surface.

Basically the feet tell the brain what's going on and the legs make the adjustments. But the torso can move quite independently from the feet or the legs and over quite a range of motion too. And the arms can move over a significant range too without the body moving hardly at all. This means that a significant ammount of unbalancing force can be applied to either the arms or the body or both before the feet and hence the brain know what is really happening.

If you were to become physically tense then a force applied to the body or arms would be felt immediately in the feet (as a change in pressure) and the brain would immediately know how balance was being affected. Conversely if you arms and body became really very relaxed then they could be manipulated very close to the limits of their range of motion before your brain had any proprioceptive notion of how your balance was being affected. Neither of these extremes are viable.

What's wanted is a combination of the two states, in which there is sufficient tension in the body that any perturbing force applied to any part of the body can immediately be felt in the feet and hence the brain immediately knows how balance is being affected; secondly there is sufficient relaxation such that an incoming force does not instantaneously unbalance the body.

This is where whole body connectedness comes in and it is in my opinion the essence of CIMA. If you can develop this then it follows that you can develop whole body power and whole body skill. It's not difficult to learn the basics, but the skill is a lifetimes work.

[bailewen]

...Conversely if you arms and body became really very relaxed then they could be manipulated very close to the limits of their range of motion before your brain had any proprioceptive notion of how your balance was being affected....

If the body is really very relaxed then your brain doesn't have any proprioceptive notion of how your balance is being affected because it's not being affected. That's why you need to stay so relaxed. Why give your opponent a direct line to your center like that?

Your entire theory implies a complete lack of mind. If you are really very relaxed AND alive, then you can't really be manipulated at all. You preserve in yourself the ability to move about freely and to operate in an intelligent relationship with your opponent.

[Fubo]

You know it's also got me thinking a lot about my other big .. . .and I mean truly big...realization of the past few years. The one about stances. I kind of abandoned pursuit of "root" in the conventional sense. I finally really "got" that it takes 3 legs to make a table and as humans, we are always falling over, literally. No such thing as a stable stance. There is something that can be called a "root" but it is pretty abstract. Ultimately, all fighting is done standing on one leg. I thought the Mifune clip really highlighted that truth.

Also made the point wonderfully about softness and relaxation.

Nicely put. I think training "dynamic rooting" (rooting depending in the right situation, moment etc...) it important. Being able to turn it "off" is just as important as being able to decide when to turn it on. Also rooting with different parts of the feet and body depending on the situation - this also helps the idea of Sung, IME.

[Sprint]

...Conversely if you arms and body became really very relaxed then they could be manipulated very close to the limits of their range of motion before your brain had any proprioceptive notion of how your balance was being affected....

If the body is really very relaxed then your brain doesn't have any proprioceptive notion of how your balance is being affected because it's not being affected. That's why you need to stay so relaxed. Why give your opponent a direct line to your center like that?

Your entire theory implies a complete lack of mind. If you are really very relaxed AND alive, then you can't really be manipulated at all. You preserve in yourself the ability to move about freely and to operate in an intelligent relationship with your opponent.

The theory implies using a system other than thinking and rationalizing, which is a good thing when you fight for real. Could you give me a concrete example of what you mean by "can't really be manipulated at all" because you've lost me?

[bailewen]

Take a look at the video of Mifune that Bodywork posted yesterday:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uFXbuszi ... re=related

He does it constantly. Some specific examples:

10 seconds - big guy goes for a shoulder throw and Mifune just goes limp. He certainly makes a lot of minor adjustments to make sure he doesn't get thrown over the shoulder but he never "roots". Both his feet are lifted off the ground even. His arm is grabbed but he disconnects it form his feet.

15 seconds - Different throw, same dynamic.

18 - 20 seconds - Big guy goes for a hip throw and Mifune counters by just shuffing lightly to the side messing up the angle. He doesn't break the grip. He allows the big guy to grab his jacket and he just uses footwork to neutralize.

In none of the attempted throws does he allow his grabbed body part to connect all the way to his feet. He can sense through the contact points (and just plain old intuition) what the other guy is trying to do but does not allow himself to be manipulated.

Look again at 2:38. What in the world stopped that huge guy form lifting up such a tiny little Japanese man? His grips were solid. What happened? Likewise, look at the throw that follows a couple seconds later. Why was his root able to be plucked out so cripsly and lightly? Notice how the big guy maintains full body connection even as his feet are sent into the air over his head.

[shawnsegler]

using some point of cognitive dissonance in the body where the person can't change. If your opponent can grab you and get to tightness in your body where you are too stiff to change then you can be changed.

If I grab you and your first reaction is one of tension, then you've given me something to work with, but if you give me relaxation I don't have anything to work with, right?

Of course, if they are too limp at you, you just hit them, right?

Best,

S

[bailewen]

p.s.

The theory implies using a system other than thinking and rationalizing....

Yes. I suppose it does. It is a bit counter-intuitive at first. I just would say that it still requires much thinking (but not rationalization) to figure out. Just not only thinking which, as you pointed out, can be counter-productive in excess.

I am worried that maybe my comment about "lack of mind" was misread. I think you got my meaning but let me just try to be more clear. I am referring to "yi"/意 and how it infuses the body. Yi and Li (power/strength) are too separate ideas. A limb can be filled with intent/yi but still empty of "power". It can be soft and relaxed even though it is full of intent. That way it is still lively and mobile. Funny how the same root, "live" appears in both English AND Chinese terms for the idea: lively/活泼（huopo）

[Sprint]

[quote=
He can sense through the contact points (and just plain old intuition) what the other guy is trying to do but does not allow himself to be manipulated..[/quote]

What do you think it is that he senses? In my view his feet are telling him the effect of the force before it is fully applied. Remember the pressure sensors on your feet can differentiate between you being lifted, pulled or being pushed, which side of the body the force is being applied and by how much, if you are connected. His experience then tells him what to do about it. I would not get too carried away with this old guy. What he is doing is nothing special - well it's special for an old guy, but in and of itself no big deal. Someone else on this forum said that those judoka weren't trying too hard to throw him and that's true, so it's not miracles we're looking at. The attacks were pedestrian and lacking commitment.

[Ron Panunto]

Sung is relaxation of your musculature over your structure. Be "relaxed," but never surrender your structure (i.e., skeletal relation to ground (or pengjin)). This is the concept of "needle in cotton."

[bailewen]

Spring,

First of all, you do understand who that was in the video right?

Yeah sure. Special "for an old guy". . .

I think that without being able to feel it for yourself and considering that you don't seem to be able to see what the old guy is doing, there's not really much constructive conversation to be had on the topic. Maybe a little, but not much.

有眼不识泰山

To answer what I think can be answered though:

What do you think it is that he senses?

"What" or "how"? If I take your question at face value and address the question "what", the only real answer is: everything. If you meant to ask what part of his body you think he senses the other persons center with, I would say that he senses it with whatever part of his body is in contact with the other guy and also with his eyes and with his gut.

Then there is also the question of how he senses where his own center is which is done through good old fashioned proprioceptive sensor that we all have to tell us where our body is in space. That and the other compass point known as "gravity".

[Sprint]

"If the body is really very relaxed then your brain doesn't have any proprioceptive notion of how your balance is being affected because it's not being affected. That's why you need to stay so relaxed."

"If you meant to ask what part of his body you think he senses the other persons center with, I would say that he senses it with whatever part of his body is in contact with the other guy and also with his eyes and with his gut."

These two statements appear to me to be contradictory. Also I don't think you can tell someones balance just by looking. By "gut" you mean some ill defined intuitive sense, maybe you mean experience.

I'm sorry if you feel insulted by what I said. I can see well enough what is being done and it is skillful but not incredibly so. Sorry I have my views you have yours.