Hugging the chee ball

[Ian]

Fong,

Hunyuan zhuang as I learned it in Wang Xian's Chen style is sort of like this



but arms a bit lower and feet in mabu.

Santi zhuang is like santi shi but using gongbu instead of xubu.

[nianfong]

so hunyuan is basically wuji with empty leg? or is that like...70-30?
classic santishi, btw, is 70-30.

I usually just do wuji zhuang for "holding the chee ball". I feel like it opens up meridians, and kinda connects me up to heaven and earth. and it strengthens my lower basin as well as my back as well.

[Ian]

I learned wuji as arms by your side / at your dantien.

Hunyuan = what you would call wuji. And like that picture but feet in mabu.

You're right about the 70-30; my mistake re: xubu.

Shawn, nice post. I agree with most of what you say.

Could you please explain what the purpose of the following is?

It burns the shape you are holding into your nervous system

[Eric]

I recently broke the 15 minute mark for static pushups.

Is this where you hold the push up position at the top, or something else?

[Ian]

Hi Eric,

That's held at the top. Holding halfway down with the arms at 90 degrees is a lot harder.

[shawnsegler]

Could you please explain what the purpose of the following is?

It burns the shape you are holding into your nervous system

If you have a held a particular shape for a considerable length of time, your ability to replicate that shape is greatly incresed.

If you hold it long enough you start release all your muscles and use your frame and tendons and stuff.

If you have a couple of these postures then you take your two strong, relaxed postures in which you have the ability to align your body with gravity and completely relax while allowing your frame to hold things up and maintain a steady, full frame connection to the ground and you should hopefully begin to extrapolate how to move between those postures and maintain that...right?

So then you have the ability to turn your static postures into dynamic movement where you continue to be able to create the requirements for that whole body connection/power thing.

I'll leave it to you to come up with the best applications for that stuff. It's kung fu...you hit em with your structure and it's like being hit by a fast moving car, and of course if you know how to really how to turn it off and then you can get creative and lead them to emptiness...ostenibly.

Best,

S

[Darthwing Teorist]

I did something nasty to one of my ribs last Thursday, not sure if it is cracked or what, (going to the doc today), but ZZ seems to help relieve the pressure in the area that hurts. So, maybe it is helping?

From my experience, it helps the healing process if you sleep on you back. Later on, you can turn on the opposite side but avoid sleeping on your stomach or the injured side for a while. If necessary, use rolled up towels and pillows to prevent you from turning over.

[Walk the Torque]

What do you get out of your static zham zhaong practice?

I'm talking about static postures like hunyuan zhuang or santi zhuang where the movement is mostly small and imperceptible, rather than dynamic postures like kaihe zhuang where the movement is obvious.

Do you feel that it strengthens the tendons? Does it make your bones more dense? Does it give you striking power and does it improve your movement? etc.

I'm confused.

Thanks!

Hi Ian,

Mate of course this is a huge subject, but there are a few things that are worth mentioning as far as help in martial pursuits goes. One is the stability that is brought about throuch standing practice, and the anchouring effect it has on the body. This results in increasing the effeciency of the body as a functional unit. Also doing those "small and imperceptible" movements trains your nervous system to produce complete clarity in whatever movement you are doing, cutting out extrainious movement.

On top of these, is the fact that to maintain perfect alignment through an entire session of standing requires constantly miniute adjustments, which bestows the ability to regain/maintain balance far more quickly than those who have not undergone this type of training (generally speaking). This means that an advantage is gained in stand-up grappling and also on point of contact/bridging/clashing or being taken by suprise from a blind angle.

It follows that given this ability, ones agility is also enhanced, and from personal experience, I would have to say speed. When I have gotten back to standing after a break, the increase in speed is quite noticeable. I think the reason for this is partly from being able to make smaller tighter movements (as a direct product of standing), and partly from the smoothness of the messages being conveyed by the nervous system.

In terms of power, learning how to throw force out of the body requires being able to feel the originating point of that power so great control can be exercised over it.

This is by no means all I or others could say on the matter, but I only have so much time. Moreover I'm sure you know most of these arguments anyhow.

[qiphlow]

Could you please explain what the purpose of the following is?

It burns the shape you are holding into your nervous system

If you have a held a particular shape for a considerable length of time, your ability to replicate that shape is greatly incresed.

If you hold it long enough you start release all your muscles and use your frame and tendons and stuff.

If you have a couple of these postures then you take your two strong, relaxed postures in which you have the ability to align your body with gravity and completely relax while allowing your frame to hold things up and maintain a steady, full frame connection to the ground and you should hopefully begin to extrapolate how to move between those postures and maintain that...right?

So then you have the ability to turn your static postures into dynamic movement where you continue to be able to create the requirements for that whole body connection/power thing.

I'll leave it to you to come up with the best applications for that stuff. It's kung fu...you hit em with your structure and it's like being hit by a fast moving car, and of course if you know how to really how to turn it off and then you can get creative and lead them to emptiness...ostenibly.

Best,

S

that, shawn, was quite profound.

[shawnsegler]

Don't get too profounded. I don't know anything from anything about this stuff. Just ask Sigman.

S- mostly I just make stuff up...mostly...

[Mike Strong]

I don't know what is correct in other schools, but ...

... I would weight 99/1 or 100/0.

[Chanchu]

most difficult no fun practice that I do - the best one imo

Does condition (train) tendons and strenthen muscle does increase striking power trains use of tendons for this..

real benifits to over all health

How ever-Because it is difficult and no fun neglect it to much

real hard to be quiet and control- ez and fun to jump around and bash things

[jjy5016]

I thought that this subject was gone over a few months ago.

The posture that master Yao is doing is known to me as mao dun, or spear and shield, not hun yuan zhuang. But it doesn't matter. Both names for the posture have more important meanings in yiquan theory than just names for postures. We don't even use names for them in our school.

Tendon and bone strengthening in zhan zhuang practice doesn't come from just standing there. If it did then half of the morning subway riders in NYC would be masters from standing on the platform every morning waiting for their f_ _ _ing trains.

There are certain small actions one must do in order for the tendon strengthening to occur. The change in bone density comes from two things, one is the stretching of the tendons which causes the bones to compact against each other from all angles and the second is from the thundering or shaking the body does after a posture has been held for a lengthy period. Like the article that someone posted about the mice on the vibrating platform that was posted several months ago. The vibrations affected the bone marrow, bone density and fat cells were burned up.

I wouldn't say it gives one more striking power. It helps the body to be connected so that instead of hitting with a fist and arm that weighs maybe 10 - 20 lbs. you have the weight and mass of the whole body behind it. Also instead of having to do a large movement in order to build up speed and momentum zhan zhuang practice helps one to develop the ability to issue the same amount of power in a small movement.

The only problem is that one must have faith in it and the drive to do it every day for quite a while.

[Sprint]

"The change in bone density comes from two things, one is the stretching of the tendons which causes the bones to compact against each other from all angles and the second is from the thundering or shaking the body does after a posture has been held for a lengthy period. Like the article that someone posted about the mice on the vibrating platform that was posted several months ago. The vibrations affected the bone marrow, bone density and fat cells were burned up"

Do you have any proof of this or is it just your opinion? The study with vibration looked at bone density in rats that had their hind legs suspended, so that they did not put any weight on their rear legs at all, other than 10 minutes a day for the vibration therapy. The researchers were trying to overcome problems of bone loss in astronauts working in zero gravity.

On Earth their bone density is just fine.

[jjy5016]

The proof I have is in my own results as well as those of my teacher and other teachers I know who have done the same practice. The results of the studies that I read are very much in line with the bone marrow & tendon changing methods of shaolin as well as verbal theory passed on to me concerning the results of the vibrations on the body when one practices standing.

On earth one will inevitably lose bone density with age yet I know some guys in their early 70's who have done the standing practice and do not seem to have lost any yet.

But the only way to really find out for one's self is to do the practice.