Push Hands

[LaoDan]

I again agree with the posts by Giles.

I was using “bridging” in the sense of creating a sustained connection between two masses, you and your opponent. I thought this was appropriate for TJQ. I was not implying a rigidity or inflexibility of the connection; perhaps more like a rope bridge where a person on one end can sense activity along the entire length of the bridge. I was unaware of a specific usage by Southern style practitioners like HG that may conflict with this usage for TJQ.

[MaartenSFS]

I have found Qiaoshou (bridge hands) being used with Southern as well as Northern arts. In all cases it involves loose movements, but hard, penetrating contact. They are usually swings that block and attack at the same time and can be trained on trees or with a partner. The goal is to penetrate past their limb and then change directions to a target. Baguazhang has a lot of this and it's sometimes also called Chaishou (wrecking hands). Softer forms of contact are called Tieshou (sticking hands). Even in Yongchunquan (Wingchun) Tie is used to describe keeping contact with the enemy, so this is a general term form all CMA. The opposite is Tuoshou, which means just randomly punching them without keeping control of their limbs. This is shunned in all of these partner drills, as the goal is to develop Tingjing. Once you can easily slap about and gut punch your Tuishou partners (and still push them) it's time to take a step back and begin Sanshou training. At first everything will go out of the window, but slowly you will begin to control your opponent and see the power of that type of training!