Systema and Tai Chi – similarities and differences

[RobP3]

so training 'blending with and interrupting movement' needs empty force theatrics added in because ..... ?
It might have been a good answer (to me) if training to run fast, specifically needed the addition of a man running behind you poking a spike in your back.

But it isn't empty force. I don't get the second part.

Or would it just be easier, as well as more correct, to say you just don't call it that ?
seeing as "the question" remains unanswered maybe it's not surprising you don't get the second part.

We don't call it empty force cos it ain't empty force. Any more than we'd call it full contact sparring. No theatrics required.

[origami_itto]

ok grass hopper (Itto)
thanks for your help figuring it out.

Rob was trying to argue against it being Live Action Role Play, now you are telling us it is exactly just that.
and i am the one not paying attention.

who should we believe now I wonder.
the grasshopper or the expert?

did your mother not breast feed or something?

[cloudz]

ok grass hopper (Itto)
thanks for your help figuring it out.

Rob was trying to argue against it being Live Action Role Play, now you are telling us it is exactly just that.
and i am the one not paying attention.

who should we believe now I wonder.
the grasshopper or the expert?

did your mother not breast feed or something?

it's not my fault you can't follow my conversations with others. I'm sorry I bothered; but I actually thought you asked a genuine and good question.
you jump in with your agenda; usually against sport or strength or whatever it is you are afraid of today.

Pardon me for trying to take it into the psychological realm...

popping off on me, for what exactly? Did I say anything bad about live action role play. Did anyone bother to ask that meathead sports guy in their lively imagination.. No you just assume you have it all pegged.

what have i said that has upset you so, was it calling you grasshopper ?
never mind, you just remind me of someone. no offence. Are you offended by stories, the story teller.
Or do you offend yourself

we did street vs. sport 15 years ago; if you think I'm talking to that level you have plenty of catching up to do grasshopper.

stay with the training, the force is strong in you.
it might save your life one day.

you should come follow me on instagram, for fun stories and some follow along training.
I'm not looking for frenemies, just friends.

[RobP3]

One potential difference I'd like to address is the question of sparring. I learnt three or four two-person "sparring" sets during my time in TCC. Also, push hands was often described as the bridge between "form and sparring."

However, at least in the teachers / schools of my experience I saw nothing along the lines of what I would call free sparring. In fact, our group started making our own drills up, based on prior experience, or ideas from other sources.

In Systema, there is a defined progression to sparring, and, IME, an element of free play / sparring in every single session. I made a video last year about this - forgive the length but it takes some time to explain things! So does a similar progression exist in TCC, traditional or otherwise?

[origami_itto]

ok grass hopper (Itto)
thanks for your help figuring it out.

Rob was trying to argue against it being Live Action Role Play, now you are telling us it is exactly just that.
and i am the one not paying attention.

who should we believe now I wonder.
the grasshopper or the expert?

did your mother not breast feed or something?

it's not my fault you can't follow my conversations with others. I'm sorry I bothered; but I actually thought you asked a genuine and good question.
you jump in with your agenda; usually against sport or strength or whatever it is you are afraid of today.

Pardon me for trying to take it into the psychological realm...

popping off on me, for what exactly? Did I say anything bad about live action role play. Did anyone bother to ask that meathead sports guy in their lively imagination.. No you just assume you have it all pegged.

what have i said that has upset you so, was it calling you grasshopper ?
never mind, you just remind me of someone. no offence. Are you offended by stories, the story teller.
Or do you offend yourself

we did street vs. sport 15 years ago; if you think I'm talking to that level you have plenty of catching up to do grasshopper.

stay with the training, the force is strong in you.
it might save your life one day.

you should come follow me on instagram, for fun stories and some follow along training.
I'm not looking for frenemies, just friends.

I enjoy conversation, not rudeness. I have no interest in argument. I'm done talking to you here.

One potential difference I'd like to address is the question of sparring. I learnt three or four two-person "sparring" sets during my time in TCC. Also, push hands was often described as the bridge between "form and sparring."

However, at least in the teachers / schools of my experience I saw nothing along the lines of what I would call free sparring. In fact, our group started making our own drills up, based on prior experience, or ideas from other sources.

In Systema, there is a defined progression to sparring, and, IME, an element of free play / sparring in every single session. I made a video last year about this - forgive the length but it takes some time to explain things! So does a similar progression exist in TCC, traditional or otherwise?

So the progression generally is form -> fixed step push hands exercises -> fixed step freestyle -> da lu exercises -> restricted step freestyle -> "sanda" two person "usage" form -> sparring

The problem I see when people try to use Taijiquan in the ring is that they don't know any of those parts of the curriculum. So what they do is they just use the form for conditioning and fight with kickboxing. It winds up being a shitty version of MMA with nothing to do with Taijiquan.

All the exercises and forms are just steps in conditioning. it takes years for the body and mind to be properly conditioned to actually do Taijiquan. I still struggle with it every time I touch another person. The body is there but under pressure with anyone anywhere near my level I lose it and have to struggle to maintain.

It's not something you DO, It's something you BECOME.

The large circles become small circles become invisible circles. Techniques large enough to fill up the universe and small enough to hide in your sleeve.

So what that all means to me is we strip away the external surface muscles, just let them hang out and burn calories. We put all the load on the innermost tendons and postural muscles, then develop using those muscles for movement. With that conditioning and the right mindset, yielding without running, following without being led. all that jazz, wonders, as they say, spontaneously manifest.

We isolate and work them in the large frame, then use that strength and those movement patterns in smaller and more subtle ways manifesting greater amounts of energy until we can release a great deal of energy with very little external movement.

The systema seems like a way that you could learn to use it possibly, but then the mechanics as I've seen them don't seem very compatible.

[RobP3]

So the progression generally is form -> fixed step push hands exercises -> fixed step freestyle -> da lu exercises -> restricted step freestyle -> "sanda" two person "usage" form -> sparring

The problem I see when people try to use Taijiquan in the ring is that they don't know any of those parts of the curriculum. So what they do is they just use the form for conditioning and fight with kickboxing. It winds up being a shitty version of MMA with nothing to do with Taijiquan.

All the exercises and forms are just steps in conditioning. it takes years for the body and mind to be properly conditioned to actually do Taijiquan. I still struggle with it every time I touch another person. The body is there but under pressure with anyone anywhere near my level I lose it and have to struggle to maintain.

It's not something you DO, It's something you BECOME.
The large circles become small circles become invisible circles. Techniques large enough to fill up the universe and small enough to hide in your sleeve.
So what that all means to me is we strip away the external surface muscles, just let them hang out and burn calories. We put all the load on the innermost tendons and postural muscles, then develop using those muscles for movement. With that conditioning and the right mindset, yielding without running, following without being led. all that jazz, wonders, as they say, spontaneously manifest.
We isolate and work them in the large frame, then use that strength and those movement patterns in smaller and more subtle ways manifesting greater amounts of energy until we can release a great deal of energy with very little external movement.
The systema seems like a way that you could learn to use it possibly, but then the mechanics as I've seen them don't seem very compatible.

Yes that largely ties in with the progression I was told. However, at least in the schools I was involved with, I never saw it go beyond the two-person form stage. Maybe that was just a Yang thing, though the YSC line often talked about sparring and something called "Broken Flowers?"

I think there is a similarity between "be" and "do", though, as you say, the mechanics are somewhat different
cheers
Rob

[origami_itto]

I think that most of the taijiquan students you will run into are not really fit for fighting, ever.

There's so much of it being sold as purely health exercises that that's the market. Nobody is really interested in fighting. So you've got to get into the community and find those people from across the schools if you want to engage in that way.

When you're really doing Taijiquan, there is a serious risk of injury. I've seen newer folks fuck up their elbows and wrists pretty bad trying to move up the ladder of aggression before they were ready. Perhaps myself included in some of that, lol.

And even my teacher, when I said I was more interested in fighting, directed me towards Xingyiquan.

in practical experience, I would "use Xingyi" if I was really trying to crush someone, I would "use taiji" if I was trying to control them. Now it's all taijiquan, when I do the five elements, it's taiji.

I dunno, I just think about the last "World Taichi Day" I attended in Austin. About 600 people showed up, every last one of them down to do their various forms at the same time and maybe go through some guided qi gong exercise.

We had Yang, CMC, Chen, Wu, Beijing 24, like some legit folks from China and everything.

Dave Pickens set up an area to do push hands and only six of us bothered to play. I took a picture of him pushing with Guy Forsyth and last I checked he's still using that on his flyers.

It's not that the system doesn't have it, it's that nobody wants to learn it, and even less are qualified to teach it. So we get these incomplete transmissions and start filling the gaps with imagination and bullshit and you wind up with the degraded state of Taijiquan (at least in the United States).

But that's fine, there are still enough of us out there that we can meet and test and exchange and we can at least develop our own tiny little piece of the art to our best ability and that's really all I can ask for.

The last thing I'll say is that for me, this is like pickup basketball or racketball or whatever it is healthy dudes in their 40s do to stay active. yeah there's a combative aspect to it, and yeah I appreciate that it helps keep me capable of defending myself, but like, I'm not out to be some kind of superhero. I just want to keep getting better. Stronger, more centered, more capable of dealing with whatever life hands me. So far so good, just keep leveling up all over.

[wayne hansen]

Rob you talk about your tai chi but I don’t think you have really told who your teachers were
I always get the impression that it is somehow connected with erle M
Am I wrong

[RobP3]

Rob you talk about your tai chi but I don’t think you have really told who your teachers were
I always get the impression that it is somehow connected with erle M
Am I wrong

I trained with Erle once. My full history is started around 1981 with John Ding at his very first class. He was then under Chu King Hung in London.
Trained with CKH at a couple of workshops. The JD switched to the Boston Chu's, so trained with Gin Soon quite a few times.
After 10-12 years or so , a group of us left JD and set up our own school. Continued to train with GSC, and hosted his son Vincent in the UK many times.
Also began training with Jim Uglow, largely in EM's Old Yang form
Over the next few years I went all over. So trained workshops with Chen Xiao Wang, George Xu, Yap Cheng Hai, and a few others whose names escape me.
Also hosted Ji Jian Cheng in the UK a couple of times, and had that session with EM too. Met most of the UK TCC crowd, the Watsons, Bob Fermor, Chris Pei, Peter Young (!) etc Oh, and Mike Sigman.
Also trained with people like Dave Turton, Peter Conserdine, Steve Morris, various pressure-point people, etc.
Met Vladimir in 2000 and Mikhail a year or so later.

Cheers
Rob

[cloudz]

I enjoy conversation, not rudeness. I have no interest in argument. I'm done talking to you here.

perfect!
next time when all you have to respond with is a personal attack or want to mention my amazing mum, you can PM me can't you.

[cloudz]

We don't call it empty force cos it ain't empty force. Any more than we'd call it full contact sparring. No theatrics required.

Well the discussion can't progress unless we agree some terms. And when I say progress, I mean talking about psychology.
If you would rather not do that, then that's fine.

Your statement above makes things difficult. You can either take my point and we move from there or you reject it. What I see there is a misunderstanding, but I'm not clear if it's particularly intentional or not.

You say it's not empty force ?
You say it with the conviction that I think it is... Is that true Rob? Think again.
"empty force" is specifically a cultural label attached to a psychological phenomenon.

so it's not that I think what MR is doing is "empty force"; it is psychology - more to the point, a form of mind control.
This happens to be the exact same way I categorise Empty force; as psychological/ psychology - that plays out in the use of mind control techniques. Some aspects of these subconscious communications may remain unconscious amongst participants to various degrees.

Some things have to do with rapport; we are always leading and following for example in our interactions. Even from the most simple basic principles of rapport. We find things like mirroring and matching, leading and following. Is it any wonder that the soft style interactions of Systema and tai chi lend themselves to situations where people rather choose subconsciously not break rapport they have otherwise been building up.

There is obviously a lot more to this subject.

[origami_itto]

I enjoy conversation, not rudeness. I have no interest in argument. I'm done talking to you here.

perfect!
next time when all you have to respond with is a personal attack or want to mention my amazing mum, you can PM me can't you.

You know bud, that was just when I got tired of your bullshit and was curious as to the source of your constant need for conflict and ill manners. I'm not saying I'm not good at rudeness and argument, I just don't enjoy it or really want to participate.

I mean, I get it, just not my kink.

But you do you, leave me out of it.

[cloudz]

This is silly, I'm just going to PM you
jeez

[cloudz]

that's their tai chi re-enactment

Nope. Not larp either.

well we share training method across many martial arts.
we take on roles

when we reduce the set roles and introduce freedoms we move from Live Action Role Play to Live Action; play or not, I guess that's a matter for the moment.

These are really just the most broad terms i think fairly apply across the board.
Like i was trying to explain, we could try and agree some broad strokes to progress to the psychology - maybe, maybe not?

Yes Rob "fall guys"
why not ?

Those guys are playing along with MR's game; subconsciously or otherwise. Why do you feel it's important to take that as a negative judgement ?

[RobP3]

You say it's not empty force ?

There's no "force" involved"

"You say it with the conviction that I think it is... Is that true Rob? Think again.
"empty force" is specifically a cultural label attached to a psychological phenomenon."

This is not from that culture, and is explained entirely in psychological terms.

so it's not that I think what MR is doing is "empty force"; it is psychology

That's what I've been saying all along

- more to the point, a form of mind control.

It's just training, not turning people into zombies

This happens to be the exact same way I categorise Empty force; as psychological/ psychology - that plays out in the use of mind control techniques. Some aspects of these subconscious communications may remain unconscious amongst participants to various degrees.

I agree, that has been my experience. Which is why I am so confident in saying what we do is different

Some things have to do with rapport; we are always leading and following for example in our interactions. Even from the most simple basic principles of rapport. We find things like mirroring and matching, leading and following. Is it any wonder that the soft style interactions of Systema and tai chi lend themselves to situations where people rather choose subconsciously not break rapport they have otherwise been building up.

Yes, all part of the work. But that dynamic exists in any relationship, not just "soft" ones. That's then down to everyone being as honest as possible in training, and why everything has to be tested. But again, these are not separate "magic tricks" they are one thread of the overall work. All of these things you mentioned, and others, are important in dealing with conflict and confrontation.

There is obviously a lot more to this subject.

There is, absolutely
cheers
Rob