by Yeung on Tue May 15, 2018 4:32 am
Practice in reverse. do you mean something like the following:
Sun Fuquan [Lutang]
[published May, 1915]
[centennial translation by Paul Brennan, May, 2015]
上編形意混沌闢開天地五行學
PART ONE: THE STATE OF PRIMAL NONDISTINCTNESS SEPARATING INTO SKY & GROUND AND THE FIVE ELEMENTS
總綱 形意無極學
GENERAL PRINCIPLES
[Section 1a:] NONPOLARITY
無極者。當人未練之先。無思無意。無形無象。無我無他。胸中混混沌沌。一氣渾淪。無所向意者也。世人不知有逆運之理。但斤斤於天地自然順行之道。氣拘物蔽。昏昧不明。以致體質虛弱。陽極必陰。陰極必死。於此攝生之術。槪乎未有諳也。惟聖人。獨能參透逆運之術。攬陰陽。奪造化。轉乾坤。扭氣機。於後天中返先天。復出歸元。保合太和。總不外乎後天五行拳。八卦拳之理。一氣伸縮之道。所謂無極而能生一氣者是也。
Nonpolarity is the state you are in before commencing practice, without thoughts or ideas, without form or shape, without a sense of “me” or “him”. In the mind, all is mixed and without distinction, a continuous vagueness, nothing being thought about. Most people do not understand the theory of reversing conditions, only the way of continuing along with what seems natural to them. Their energy gets constrained and things become hidden, all is confused and unclear, and the body gets to the point that it is weakened. When active reaches its peak, there must be passive, then when passive reaches its peak, there will be death.
Herein lies the art of keeping fit, but generally it is not yet well-known. It is a wise person who can understand the art of reversal, grasping the passive and active aspects to compel Nature to invert Qian and Kun [“Creative” and “Receptive” (When the “Creative” trigram is placed on top of the “Receptive” trigram, they form hexagram 12: “Stagnation”. When they are flipped over so the “Receptive” trigram is placed on top of the “Creative” trigram, they form hexagram 11: “Peace”.)] with the mechanism of turning the energies, thereby reverting from the acquired condition to the innate, returning one to one’s original state, guaranteeing a merging with the “grand harmony”. This is never separate from the principles in the acquired five elements techniques or the eight trigrams techniques, nor the methods of continuous expansion and contraction. And so it is said: “From nonpolarity can arise a singleness of energy.”