Push Hands

[shoebox55]

Hi can anyone help me understand better how push hands develops a person's ability to read a punch, kick, etc. from a distance before there is any connection?

I'm reading about listening energy that is developed from push hands ...but two people are already connected in practice. I would imagine that someone typically would strike at a distance before there is any connection. My question does push hands develop the listening energy even before connection? If so, how? If not, what is the training method to develop this.

[Yugen]

the listening is within yourself
it's not a drill to develop reading strikes and kicks.

[Steve James]

Hi can anyone help me understand better how push hands develops a person's ability to read a punch, kick, etc. from a distance before there is any connection?

Two issues: 1) the practice of push hands, itself; and, 2, the skills developed while practicing. The more you practice, the better you will become at anticipation, which will be the result of practicing listening. Some old masters (in their texts) argued that listening skill had different stages. The lowest being listening after one is touched (and therefore must feel the direction of the opponent's energy); the middle being while one is being touched (and can feel the direction while it's happening); and the highest being able to know the direction before the energy even develops. The last is listening without touching; so, at least, it involves listening with the eyes and ears, as well as the skin.

[windwalker]

OP wrote: I'm reading about listening energy that is developed from push hands ...but two people are already connected in practice.

The listening "energy" that one develops is to understand and develop "intent"

If you want to move with awareness and yet you do not understand sticking, adhering, connecting, and following, it will be beyond your reach, for it is a very subtle skill.

https://brennantranslation.wordpress.co ... i-fa-shuo/

moving with awareness starts with awareness of ones self,,,

OP wrote: I would imagine that someone typically would strike at a distance before there is any connection. My question does push hands develop the listening energy even before connection? If so, how? If not, what is the training method to develop this.

What you are talking about is called "reducing measurements"

Work first at training gross movements, then finer details. When the gross movements are obtained, then the finer movements can be talked of. When the finer movements are obtained, then measures of a foot and below can be talked of. When your skill has progressed to the level of a foot, then you can progress to the level of an inch, then to a tenth of an inch, then to the width of a hair. This is what is meant by the principle of reducing measurements.

https://brennantranslation.wordpress.co ... i-fa-shuo/

This means that at first one feels the skin, later the hair, and ultimately the air "move"
to be able to sense and use intent...

The how it develops this, depends on teachings, teacher and level of teachers' development.
As with many things there are levels of development.

[Subitai]

Hi can anyone help me understand better how push hands develops a person's ability to read a punch, kick, etc. from a distance before there is any connection?

I'm reading about listening energy that is developed from push hands ...but two people are already connected in practice. I would imagine that someone typically would strike at a distance before there is any connection. My question does push hands develop the listening energy even before connection? If so, how? If not, what is the training method to develop this.

Of the many skills that Push hands develops...all of them are associated with some sort of body connection to another human being. If not, then why would you need a partner?

** I'm speaking specifically in the context that you laid out, the: "ability to read a punch, kick, etc. from a distance before there is any connection"

Anyone trying to argue against that would basically also believe that doing solo forms(only) would eventually turn you into an effective fighter. We all know the answer to that don't we?

You want the training methods to read a punch or a kick from a distance? You gotta fight, spar and train that way...it's that simple. Find a boxing gym, mma club, Chinese San Shou aka(San da)...heck a good kick boxing school could do the job.

[Bao]

Even before physical contact, with a single glance you join contact with the opponent or partner, establishing a firm connection with him. Adherence can begin even at this stage, prior to physical contact. This is important because when you are working in a more intensive competitive or combative mode, if you depend on physical contact to start your adherence, that’s too late and you’re going to be too slow to exploit any advantage of timing or positioning.

-Li Yaxuan

[dspyrido]

Push hands is about sensitivity, angles & positioning. It starts with knowing what are strong positions that align the bones to the ground so that when someone is pushing into the structure they are driving it into the ground while upsetting their own balance. Peng.

The opponent wants to get past the structure so they commit power. The goal is to give them just enough resistance so they feel they can get through while they are being redirected another direction. The goal of this other direction is to move them into a weak position so they can easily be counter attacked. This redirection really does rely on using the twisting of the body while having a strong base.

When these strong & weak positions are understood the objective should be to make this balance/unbalance an innate skill which requires a lot of practice. Someone pushes & before slow conscious thinking is required they have been unbalanced so a counter can be applied. At this stage pushing should not be about following patterns but about testing the ability to do this with eyes closed against hard pushes & random moves that first contact a limb.

Now comes the punching & kicking bit. Can the same skill be applied innately when a fist or kick is heading to the face? The answer is if you can "read" the attacker (which is really about knowing tell signs) then the objective is just to get a limb in the way so that instead of contact to the face it must pass through the hands. On contact if the listening, redirection & counter skill is innate & has been drilled properly then the attacking limb can be moved out of the way, create an off-balance situation which should open the opponent up to a counter attack. Good old sparring is a simple way to test this skill.

[Dmitri]

IME the term "push hands" is way too generic, it is sometimes practiced very differently between different schools, may include (or not) a bunch of various drills, and will therefore be conducive to some specific skill to extremely varying degrees. E.g., specifically, some (most) people/schools practice PH only with immediate physical contact, others include practice without contact.

So if the practice already includes "sensitivity work" related to active martial engagement (i.e. response to punches, kicks, etc.) from a distance, e.g. similar to some of Systema's drills, then there's your answer.
If not -- and IME that's a vast, overwhelming majority of what people refer to as "push hands" -- then you need a separate set of drills, or just plain ole' sparring (slow or otherwise), to develop this type of sensitivity. No amount of competition-style PH (i.e. one that always starts and maintains, or strives to maintain, physical contact) will ever prepare one to actually properly engaging an opponent at a distance.
FWIW

[shoebox55]

Sparring seems intuitive to me to incorporate into training. To me it seems common sense, I mean why would you not have someone punch or kick at you at full speed to know you can properly read and avoid those strikes.

However, from what I hear push hands in the sense of freestyle push hands in Tai Chi but without strikes is the closest thing to sparring in the traditional curriculum. I want to believe that the founder of the system would already realize that a fight would typically involve a punch or kick from a distance. That the training method confined to freestyle push hands would be excellent in preparing one to anticipate any type of strike. Can anyone explain further that sparring is unnecessary in developing this ability to read strikes from a distance?

[windwalker]

Sparring seems intuitive to me to incorporate into training. To me it seems common sense, I mean why would you not have someone punch or kick at you at full speed to know you can properly read and avoid those strikes.

However, from what I hear push hands in the sense of freestyle push hands in Tai Chi but without strikes is the closest thing to sparring in the traditional curriculum. I want to believe that the founder of the system would already realize that a fight would typically involve a punch or kick from a distance. That the training method confined to freestyle push hands would be excellent in preparing one to anticipate any type of strike. Can anyone explain further that sparring is unnecessary in developing this ability to read strikes from a distance?

care to share a little about your back ground.
It might help in understanding the point of your question

[shoebox55]

The point of my question is to understand why push hands doesn't incorporate strikes in Tai Chi, and how push hands is sufficient to prepare one even though you never are punched or kicked at.

I studied cmc tai chi with zero emphasis on sparring and while push hands was taught, I was only a beginner and didn't learn further.

[Bao]

The point of my question is to understand why push hands doesn't incorporate strikes in Tai Chi,

Can't really say it much better than I wrote in my blog a while ago:
"The fine thing about push hands is that you can take away aggression and competitiveness out of the plan and focus on building a solid foundation based on the qualities of things like stance, balance and timing, while keeping away other things from interfering. The real benefit from a self defense perspective is that you will teach your body that it becomes faster and more responsive to action if you are calm in mind and have a balanced body.
... From push hands you will truly learn things about yourself ... that more common or ordinary martial arts practice can not teach."

Taking out punches and kicks and even throws and any kind of "common" attack is just what I like with push hands. Then you can better focus on balance, being calm upon pressure, how your body feels like, etc.

Common sparring focus on technique, timing etc. It's hard to get a sense about yourself and understand how you react and why when you focus on external things that is out of your reach. Push hands is about just these things that is hard to pay attention to when you practice more common combat stuff.

and how push hands is sufficient to prepare one even though you never are punched or kicked at.

Not sufficient, but it helps. No one says that push hands is enough. It's just one sort of practice that helps you to find out more about yourself.

[Giles]

The point of my question is to understand why push hands doesn't incorporate strikes in Tai Chi...

In essence: what Bao said. Apart from that, Tai Chi push hands does incorporate strikes if wished. From a certain level onwards and if it's something you want to train at that moment, you can easily mix in strikes, locks and throws together with the corresponding neutralizations and counters when practicing push hands. That's no essential difference, they are all just expressions of force and intent. Head butts, bites and intimidating expressions too, if the mood takes you. (Kicks are more difficult in the 'connected hands' format, although low kicks and knee strikes are quite possible). But all this should be a direct extension of the basic push hands research mode, where you examine and work to change your own mental and physical responses when under pressure, going slower or faster, more or less cooperatively, as is most helpful and productive in the moment. Incorporating strikes etc. should essentially be no more 'dangerous' than basic pushing as long as you don't go too fast and both parties have themselves well under control. If you find yourself losing the sense of inner calmness and 'sudden relaxation' as a response to pressure, and regressing to 'sudden tension' instead, then throw out the strikes etc. for that moment and go back to 'simple' pushing. Which is the core of the practice anyway. Since push hands is essentially about research and not about competition, it can have a very elastic format.

And of course, as Bao also said, push hands is just one form of practice. It doesn't replace sparring, scenario work, applications etc, but it can give these other modes more of the particular tai chi quality.

[MaartenSFS]

+1

Tuishou is NOT Sanshou and should never be the goal of training. Strikes and kicks are integrated over time and you gain sensitivity. Eventually something just clicks and you begin to use it in Sanshou.

[LaoDan]

I agree with the last several posts.

Additional thoughts on push-hands training and fighting are expressed in the following article:
http://slantedflying.com/taijiquans-tui-shou-push-hands-and-fighting-from-the-middle-range/