A simple way, push and pull

Discussion on the three big Chinese internals, Yiquan, Bajiquan, Piguazhang and other similar styles.

Re: A simple way, push and pull

Postby Trip on Mon Jan 08, 2018 2:36 am

amor wrote:Agree its so much more complex than simple push and pull. But just dissecting your rollback:

Which way does the waist turn when the arms do their movement?

What about the the left leg, does the kua open or close (kua here refers to the hip joint), which way does the femur spiral?
what about the right leg kua, whats it doing and which way does the leg spiral?
What's the left and right shoulder doing, (left feels like it close, right opens imo) is this what you can tell ?

I am not sure this will work for you, but many of your questions might be answered if you grabbed a staff.
Point the tip of the staff to the front.

Sit in a bow stance, Right-foot forward. Then transfer weight more to the rear left foot.
At the very same time of the weight shift, turn the whole torso about 45° degrees-ish to the left.

Also At the very same time, use the hand method suggested
(from my 1st post), to move the tip of the staff
from the front to the left front corner.

In all movements, make sure your knees stay in line with your toes direction
& at the end of the movement, make sure your right elbow is over your right knee.

After getting really familiar with it snap the tip to the corner.
Then, when it becomes a simple movement for you, carefully do the same thing with someone’s wrist & upper arm.

But don't snap their arm.
Just practice.


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Last edited by Trip on Mon Jan 08, 2018 2:41 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: A simple way, push and pull

Postby charles on Mon Jan 08, 2018 10:02 am

amor wrote:Which way does the waist turn when the arms do their movement?

What about the the left leg, does the kua open or close (kua here refers to the hip joint), which way does the femur spiral?
what about the right leg kua, whats it doing and which way does the leg spiral?
What's the left and right shoulder doing, (left feels like it close, right opens imo) is this what you can tell ?

If your familiar with twist towel movement, rollback feels like a diagonal version of twist towel movement, that is complex, what do you think of it?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rj2zCYPrkV8


I think you need to be careful here. Different styles employ different body mechanics.

Hong's/CZH's twist towel and fetch water movements are central to that style and not found in the way most Yang style Taiji is practiced or performed. How "roll back" (lu) is performed in that style is quite different than in most Yang style.

This video shows more explicitly those two exercises and it should be clear from watching them the answers to your questions, for that style/action:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vPjOEFAMhfc


By contrast, this is one variation on Yang style "roll back": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yta9_9mIHjM

It is very difficult to learn by cherry-picking a bit from this style, a bit from that style. Since each style/sub-style has its own variation in how things are done, it will create confusion due to the contradictions in how things are done.
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Re: A simple way, push and pull

Postby LaoDan on Mon Jan 08, 2018 2:29 pm

johnwang wrote:I'm 100% against push. But I'm all in favor of pull.

John,

I think that my understanding of the value and goals of TJQ push-hands differs from yours. From your posts it seems like you think that, in most schools, the goal of PH is to push someone away. But to me, it is practicing to control the other individual so that their attacks and defenses are compromised while your attacks and defenses are enhanced. I do not think that the end goal is to push them away, but rather is to gain control of them while maintaining control of yourself in order to make them less effective and you more effective. The pushing away is merely a safe way to demonstrate the control.

I also suspect that we have different understandings of the term “push” since I understand that there is a push/pull pair in Lei jin techniques, including shuaijiao throws! In your applications of throws, you almost certainly use what I would consider to be a “push” component (although in these it is paired with a pull).
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Re: A simple way, push and pull

Postby johnwang on Mon Jan 08, 2018 6:58 pm

If you use Taiji PH to establish a clinch then I'll agree with you. When my right for-arm touch on my opponent's right fore-arm, I'll

- slide my right hand to grab on his right wrist.
- use my left hand to push on his right elbow joint and cause his right arm to be across his body and jam his own back left arm.
- I'll then free my right hand and do my thing.

I do use my left hand to push. I'll call that "引(Yin)" to guide my opponent's arm to where I want his arm to be. I won't call that push.

If you push your opponent's neck and hook his leg, that's 2 points contact and that's a throw. Any 1 point contact is just a push. I don't like push because my opponent's legs are free. IMO, if I give my opponent too much mobility, that will be my fault.

If I

- pull, I want to spring my opponent's back leg.
- push, I want to hook his leading leg.

I want to interrupt at least one of my opponent's leg mobility.
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Re: A simple way, push and pull

Postby rojcewiczj on Mon Jan 08, 2018 10:25 pm

Another way to speak of push and pull is as extension and contraction. These are the only two actions which change the size of the body, and in doing so produce power. Alternative ways of moving include swinging, swaying, dropping, lifting, turning and tossing, etc. While all sorts of movement may come into play in order to achieve some overall action, the only movements with which the body can actually produce power are extensions and contractions, pushing and pulling. When I hook around my opponents neck and pull him in, if he is pulled, then he will not be able to defend against the movement of my waist as I turn and throw him, or crush him downwards, but all the while it is the power of my contraction which is truly subduing him. It is the same for every other case, where a more complex movement is only possible because of the effectiveness of ones push or pull, extension and contraction, open close, in an out. It is very easy to loose the essence of power in more "complex" techniques. There are complex adjustments which are only possible through an extremely simple set of principles.
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Re: A simple way, push and pull

Postby everything on Mon Jan 08, 2018 10:46 pm

Well said and makes a lot of sense.

I suppose really for muscles there is only contraction. An arm extension is a tricep contraction.

But I like this yin yang kind of view.

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Re: A simple way, push and pull

Postby Trip on Tue Jan 09, 2018 6:33 am

everything wrote:But I like this yin yang kind of view.
Leads to ba gua and ten thousand things.

What's Yin & Yang got to do with Taiji? :)

rojcewiczj wrote:When I hook around my opponents neck and pull him in, if he is pulled, then he will not be able to defend against the movement of my waist as I turn and throw him, or crush him downwards, but all the while it is the power of my contraction which is truly subduing him.

Now that's interesting!
Never knew the power of Taiji was about contractions.

rojcewiczj wrote:It is the same for every other case, where a more complex movement is only possible because of the effectiveness of ones push or pull, extension and contraction, open close, in an out. It is very easy to loose the essence of power in more "complex" techniques. There are complex adjustments which are only possible through an extremely simple set of principles.

A standard Yang style Rollback deflects to the left and outward.
What’s so complicated about that?
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Re: A simple way, push and pull

Postby LaoDan on Tue Jan 09, 2018 7:53 am

I do not know how others view strikes in TJQ, or how (or if) they fit into the 8 jin, but I view them as various expressions of “push” energy (or expansion, or projection...). This can be seen in the thread on Bruce Lee’s one-inch-punch demonstrations. BL’s strikes also push the opponent backward to various degrees, depending on the expression of that energy (it can also have less backward propulsion and be expressed more within the opponent’s body, but I think this would also qualify as a type of expression of “push”).
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Re: A simple way, push and pull

Postby origami_itto on Tue Jan 09, 2018 8:13 am

LaoDan wrote:I do not know how others view strikes in TJQ, or how (or if) they fit into the 8 jin, but I view them as various expressions of “push” energy (or expansion, or projection...). This can be seen in the thread on Bruce Lee’s one-inch-punch demonstrations. BL’s strikes also push the opponent backward to various degrees, depending on the expression of that energy (it can also have less backward propulsion and be expressed more within the opponent’s body, but I think this would also qualify as a type of expression of “push”).


depends on the strike, I think of them as kao or zhao depending on if it's a whole body or folding strike. Push I think of as something that happens after I'm attached.
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Re: A simple way, push and pull

Postby David Boxen on Tue Jan 09, 2018 9:25 am

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Re: A simple way, push and pull

Postby LaoDan on Tue Jan 09, 2018 9:29 am

oragami_itto wrote:
LaoDan wrote:I do not know how others view strikes in TJQ, or how (or if) they fit into the 8 jin, but I view them as various expressions of “push” energy (or expansion, or projection...). This can be seen in the thread on Bruce Lee’s one-inch-punch demonstrations. BL’s strikes also push the opponent backward to various degrees, depending on the expression of that energy (it can also have less backward propulsion and be expressed more within the opponent’s body, but I think this would also qualify as a type of expression of “push”).


depends on the strike, I think of them as kao or zhao depending on if it's a whole body or folding strike. Push I think of as something that happens after I'm attached.

To me, a from-contact push is a subset of “push”; or a push-from-contact is a type of push. From contact is like an adjective which modifies the primary energy of push, as are long/short, or fast/slow, or soft/hard, etc.

The shoulder or elbow (etc) can be used to push as well as strike; it is just that a different section of the body is being used rather than the hands (or feet). I also think that one can peng/lu/ji/an with body parts other than the hands/forearms and, at least in Chen style, these four primary energies are also practiced during knee to knee contact drills.

So, to me, a strike (or push) with the elbow would be “zhou an” and a strike (or push) with the shoulder would be “kao an” etc.
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Re: A simple way, push and pull

Postby origami_itto on Tue Jan 09, 2018 10:05 am

The way I see it, it's not the body part but the way it's being used that determines the energy. Kao is that full body connectedness best expressed in the shoulder, but it could just as easily be a hip, knee, elbow, fist, etc. It's hitting with the whole body mass. A football "straight arm" is kao. Zhou is folding, so the elbow as a rotating force instead of a direct force, circling around the block or simply chaining strikes. If they block the hand, strike with elbow, then shoulder, then head, or even foot knee hip, depending. "Chopping fist", preying mantis beng bo stuff.

They're both corner techniques meant to make up for deficiencies in the sides, like push. You don't attach with push. You attach, then push, or pull, or whatever. If you fail to attach properly, you're striking, aka, kao or zhou.

Now with the strikes, you've got long and short power. You've got the kind that spreads the impact out and lets the root break first, which is nice, very "push" like what you're saying. And then you've got the kind that concentrates it into a tiny point in time and space with an intact root. I think of time and space like two circles and the amount of time it takes and the surface area it disperses over are represented by how full from center the circles are. Those are the variables you have for the nature of the strike. Sudden or slow, pinpoint or spread. The same amount of energy delivered to the same place with different values for those variables is the difference between falling down, breaking a rib, or internal organ damage.

But the kicker is you have the same considerations concerning power (and a host of other possible deliverable energies) in the an as well as the kao and shou.

All, of course, in my own humble opinion. Your mileage may vary
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Re: A simple way, push and pull

Postby LaoDan on Tue Jan 09, 2018 10:22 am

One thing that disappoints me about TJQ is that different groups (schools, traditions, individuals...) do not seem to agree on something that is presumably as fundamental as the 8 jin.

To me, John’s “fist meets face” is “an” and thus, to my understanding, John absolutely uses “push”. Others probably understand a punch to the opponent’s face differently, but it is not clear to me how they describe a punch to the face in terms of the 8 TJQ energies. There are other described energies (supplemental energies), so perhaps others use those concepts to explain a punch to the face???
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Re: A simple way, push and pull

Postby wayne hansen on Tue Jan 09, 2018 12:42 pm

Punch to the face=push
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Re: A simple way, push and pull

Postby charles on Tue Jan 09, 2018 2:53 pm

LaoDan wrote:One thing that disappoints me about TJQ is that different groups (schools, traditions, individuals...) do not seem to agree on something that is presumably as fundamental as the 8 jin.


My take-away from that is that what one calls stuff doesn't really matter. What matters is that one can do it. Do it and label it anyway you chose. Seek out and follow skills, rather than labels and those who have the best labelling system.

To me, John’s “fist meets face” is “an” and thus


I've been taught "an" is a downward action, as in "push down". Peng is upward/outward, an is downward, ji is forward, lu is backward/inward. It's all "Peng". After that, call it whatever you like.

What is more disappointing to me is that few agree on what Peng Jin is. With sufficient variation in meaning, the term no longer has any common meaning: it means whatever one wants it to mean.


it is not clear to me how they describe a punch to the face in terms of the 8 TJQ energies.


Call a spade a spade: a punch to the face is a punch to the face. How one conceptualizes that, or what label one places on it, doesn't matter. A punch to the face is a punch to the face. It doesn't need to be pigeon-holed to understand it, or, better yet, do it.
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