Qigong in circle walking?

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

Re: Qigong in circle walking?

Postby marvin8 on Thu Nov 07, 2019 11:28 am

D_Glenn wrote:Another thing you can work on is finding the control over your Transverse Abdominal Muscles (TVA), and then learn to isolate the contraction of them from your other Abdominal muscles. The TVA are the innermost layer and you want to learn to contract only the half of the TVA that is on the inside of the circle, while the other side is relaxed. This is what Turning your Waist towards the center means. This contraction can be held the whole time you’re turning in that direction, then switch and hold the opposite side. These muscles can be trained to contract for a long time because of their close proximity to the liver. Unlike skeletal muscle that can really only last for 6 minutes.

Some exercises to develop a stronger TVA.

Excerpt from "The Transverse Abdominis – The Spanx Of Your Abdominal Muscles:"
Jennifer M. Regan on June 02, 2009 wrote:How Do You Get A Stronger Transverse Abdominis?

If you dread or despise crunches, you are in luck! To develop and strengthen the transverse abdominis, you do not have to perform flexion or extension exercises. To start building strength in your TVA muscle, you will need to know how to activate it through a series of “draw-in” abdominal maneuvers. “Drawing in your abdominal muscles” is a conscious process and takes a lot of practice, but once you understand it, you will see results like a stronger core, flatter stomach and a beach ready tummy.

Draw In Your Abs

For many people, learning to draw in the abdominals is a difficult process. As mentioned above, most people are used to working their core by developing the rectus abdominis muscles through conventional methods such as crunches, sit-ups, and other flexion/extension exercises. Remember, these exercises push out the abdominal wall. We want to pull the abdominal wall in. The concept of drawing in is the exact opposite of rectus abdominis training. It is the process where you pull IN your abdominal wall.

Five Exercises That Focus On Drawing In The Abdominal Muscles Include:
1. The lying draw-in maneuver (tummy vacs)
2. Foot-hand bear crawl
3. The forward ball roll
4. Hollow body holds
5. Planks


Excerpt from RSF thread "What is Jin 勁? — Scott P. Phillips:"
marvin8 wrote:Scott said "continuous connection," not continuous movement. Don’t use jin use continuous connection. How do you get continuous connection? You get it using four words Xukong Lingtong. We are only going to talk about xu right now, "hollow body” (aka empty body). Xu: empty like a puppet, "dead weight" body, but it is also radiant and luminous. “Hollow body” exercise cultivates maximum gravity, etc.

Hollow body (e.g., NoSword in RSF discussion) is an concept/exercise used by acrobats, gymnasts and aerial artists. Here a Ciruqe du Soleil acrobat does a hollow body exercise. (At 3:30, the acrobat says a celebrity surgeon said you'll never have back problems [e.g., johnwang's hunchback thread], if you do the exercise well):


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b1K0BdjnNks&t=3m30s


Excerpt from "Dustin Poirier’s Coach Expects Fourth-Round Finish Of Khabib Nurmagomedov:"
Jon Fuentes on Sep 1, 2019 wrote:“The goal really is to make sure we’re digging for underhooks and that Dustin has a strong core so he can rotate, as far as the transverse abdominis for rotation, so he can change direction and turn Khabib around and have him facing the cage,” Daru explained. “Then [Poirier] can push off and rain his shots the way he does.”
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Re: Qigong in circle walking?

Postby wiesiek on Sun Dec 01, 2019 4:13 am

Thank you Marvin, nice clip,
however
I`m not quite sure, if set presented there will develop the same "circle walkin`" qualities; specially for Bagua needs.
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Re: Qigong in circle walking?

Postby wiesiek on Sun Dec 01, 2019 4:33 am

@D_Gleen
I would ask you:
Why positions order is significantly different in "sub" Bagua styles? (not to mention different names and hands positioning).
In Li Zi Mings system, presented in Tom B. Book starting position is "Downward Sinking Palm", which I know as the _ "Bear", from Lu Shu Tien`s system. Your advise is - start from the maxi Yang -"Lion", in mentioned Lu`s system - "Dragon" begins.

Tom explained, that:
...Downward SP" is the first palm, `cause it particularly stimulates and opens Du and Ren meridians . When these channels are activated, is easier open the others..."
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Re: Qigong in circle walking?

Postby D_Glenn on Sun Dec 01, 2019 4:29 pm

Downard Sinking is more a health posture to, in my lineage, lower high blood pressure.

Yang postures: Lion, when done with correct palm shape, should build up more muscle mass in your upper body. This promotes more blood flow and as muscles grow the fascia surrounding them also grows. Our bear/ YinYang Fish Palm, will build the muscles of your back. Dragon can build up the ribcage and chest.

Yin postures will cause your muscles to become lean but long. You want to do the Yang Postures first because they expand the fascia and heals it up. Then when you do the Yin postures you know you are lengthening and stretching healthy fascia.

Worry about blood flow in Martial Circle Turning, not qi flow. Where there’s blood, qi has to also be there.

.
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Re: Qigong in circle walking?

Postby everything on Wed Dec 04, 2019 10:09 pm

Aside from the opening of meridians (very interested in this) and muscle contraction (lower interest here but some), how about emphasis on gentle stretching and lengthening + (p)rehab through the slow or fast movements? I guess the non-MA monks would've worked on that on purpose or as a side effect? Instead of doing, say, a very "linear" downward dog. What do we still know about that (non-MA emphasis) these days? Getting more into the MA side of things, that leads into the "spiraling" power building aspects quite naturally I suppose.
Last edited by everything on Wed Dec 04, 2019 10:11 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Qigong in circle walking?

Postby yeniseri on Fri Dec 06, 2019 12:13 am

Looks simple enough!
You have the equivalent of chanssujin (silk reeling) within circle walking and the elements of expansion, contraction, opening and closing in a horizonla/vertical positions with bending of knees 'forcing the musculature to operate to maximum efficiency meaning calf muscle 'invigoration' with elements of stomach and heart involvement per the exercising of muscle in various parts of the body. Jingluo (meridians) are 'strengthened", body fat is used as fuel in the maintenance of musculoskeletal integrity. Don't blame the Qi ;D
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Re: Qigong in circle walking?

Postby D_Glenn on Sat Dec 07, 2019 12:05 pm

That also brings up another guideline for martial Circle Turning which is you want to be in the middle basin in regards to the height of your body and amount of squatting down you need to do. The measurements are in cun and specific to the individual which uses the measurement from your own chin to the crown of your head. 1/4 of your own head and up is high basin. One height of your own head and lower is low basin. So in between that is middle basin. Basically you want to try to be about a half head’s height lower. Which requires the thigh muscles to work. Our thighs hold a huge volume of blood at any given moment.

When you continuously work the thigh muscles but only in an aerobic manner. They hold a lot of blood and sort of move blood. In Qigong we want to bend our knees a bit, to get some movement, but you don’t want to move too much because you’re only seeking sensations of qi and blood can wash those feelings away. In Qigong you want to only be in the upper basin position.

In Circle Turning we want the movement of blood as that’s our primary goal is to open up more and more places for blood to go to in our body. It’s slow and gradual though. We’re trying to unblock capillaries and some of the micro-capillaries in our body are only as wide as a single red blood cell and they’re already crammed in there single file. You can’t unblock anything when you’re heart is racing and you’re breathing fast. The blood just rushes past everything that’s blocked up. Circle Turning is exercising without exercising.

Low basin Walking requires that your arms are kept below your heart and if you’re not young and full of strength then it’s unlikely that you could do it. So we want to always push at the boundary between our middle and low but the indicator of this is the rate of your own breath. Is it starting to speed up from complete calmness as your muscles are signaling that they need more oxygen? Then raise up in height a little. If you totally lose your breath and can’t get it to calm down then drop your hands down to your sides and just walk in an upper basin or natural height and look forward, but continue to circle around until your breath calms back down.

The speed of your gait should also be slow and steady the whole time as that’s another factor that can cause you to lose your breath. But not too slow. Just right at that cusp of where you can feel just the barest amount of a forward moving momentum.
Last edited by D_Glenn on Sat Dec 07, 2019 12:18 pm, edited 3 times in total.
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Re: Qigong in circle walking?

Postby wiesiek on Thu Jan 02, 2020 2:28 pm

Thank You D_G.

precious advices
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Re: Qigong in circle walking?

Postby Formosa Neijia on Wed Jan 08, 2020 7:33 pm

wiesiek wrote:Thank you Marvin, nice clip,
however
I`m not quite sure, if set presented there will develop the same "circle walkin`" qualities; specially for Bagua needs.


The exercises show in the Cirque De Soliel clip are done in the sagittal plane (front to back) where it's easier to learn how to contract the right muscles. The bagua works in the transverse plane (twisting the sagittal and frontal plane at the same time) which makes it much harder to feel the connections. People who can't contract the TVA fully in the sagittal plane will likely never partially contract it in the transverse.It's just to hard to feel that connection.

BTW, that Cirque clip is basically an entire iron vest system minus only the breathing. It's gold.
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Re: Qigong in circle walking?

Postby everything on Thu Jan 09, 2020 9:26 pm

I started to do that crunch exercise where one thigh and elbow holds a block. Deceptively simple. Easy at first, even. Then ... I couldn't finish the whole set, lol. It was difficult and good stuff. Already tried various "superman" things and those are always difficult.
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Re: Qigong in circle walking?

Postby Formosa Neijia on Fri Jan 10, 2020 8:00 pm

everything wrote:I started to do that crunch exercise where one thigh and elbow holds a block. Deceptively simple. Easy at first, even. Then ... I couldn't finish the whole set, lol. It was difficult and good stuff. Already tried various "superman" things and those are always difficult.


Yep, they're tough for me, too. That particular exercise will lead to the ability to hold the tension on just one side like the circle walking demands. But in southern style neigong, it also teaches the connection between the elbows, knees, and core. In fact, most of the "knee strikes" in some southern styles are actually neigong to strengthen the lower abs for fighting and energetic purposes. The good thing about the supermans is I can do it anywhere with no equipment. No more excuses not to train.
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Re: Qigong in circle walking?

Postby D_Glenn on Thu Jan 23, 2020 9:31 am

We do a plank where you want your hands together but outstretched in front of you as far out as you can, while keeping your body flat. Hold for as long as you can then do the second part where you lay flat on your back and lift your head and shoulders. Holding a static mini crunch keeping the entirety of your shoulder blades off the ground, but no more than that. Everything else can be relaxed.

The original Taibao exercises are a system of Yoga Nauli exercises. My teacher can do all the Nauli Kriya stuff. It’s crazy to see a huge solid Dantian suddenly rolling in the side to side waves and then rolling up and down. He said that we don’t have to train it though. We should be developing those contractions the whole time we’re doing Baguazhang. The key is that having a solid dantian means that there’s a solid spherical surface that’s pressing outward against the contraction, so that when one half of your TVA contracts, it turns your waist to that side. The waist hits, and the waist removes. The TVA are the horizontal power. Adding in the other Abdominal muscles adds in the diagonal/ spiral rotation and the tilt. But the horizontal power of the TVA is the most important and the most powerful and fastest, and the most difficult to do and quickest to become weak from disuse.

.
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Re: Qigong in circle walking?

Postby Formosa Neijia on Sat Jan 25, 2020 8:05 pm

D_Glenn,
Thanks for the details you've provided in this thread. I doubt many of us have had that level of detail taught to us. Not doing the things you described causes a lot of people to twist with the lumbar spine while doing bagua and IME that always leads to low back pain since the lumbar isn't designed for much movement. Without the muscle engagement, all that twisting goes right into an unprepared lower back.

Thanks for the tip on the taibao exercises. I had to learn iron vest in order to get that stuff but this below is a simpler presentation of the material that gets to core of the matter much quicker.


It's also interesting to see how different teacher's interpretation of certain styles can be. I was hot on the trail of this kind of stuff years ago and I got into a bitof a disagreement with a bagua "master" who told me developing the dantian in this manner was the exact opposite of what bagua was about and that I should completely drop all of it or I would never achieve "qi flow" from the dantien. I have focused on southern styles that utilize it ever since.
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Re: Qigong in circle walking?

Postby D_Glenn on Wed Jan 29, 2020 11:42 pm

Those Taobao exercises also have the meditation parts. That’s why my teacher says to not practice what you see on a video like this. While one could easily imitate the physical movements, what you can’t imitate is what he’s doing during the sitting meditation. And it’s usually the meditation part that’s important. Just like some of the serious Nauli Kriya work. From a Western Medical angle it has to have a serious effect on the Abdominal Aorta and the Inferior Vena Cava.

***
People think that a larger Dantian is just more adipose fat or something. But if you look at any muscle in the body that when you strengthen it, then it’s muscle fibers will naturally grow and the muscles get thicker or bigger. The TVA muscles are the same. They become thicker as they are strengthened and the abdomen protrudes more. And who knows how thick they could potentially get since there’s only a small subset of people actually doing this type of focused training on the horizontal or Transverse usage.

The silk reeling exercises of Chen Taijiquan are the same. Only you’re isolating those movements outside of the context of martial movement. It’s better to use the forms and single strike drilling to exercise your silk reeling. I’ve had the rare experience of being able to have the palm of my hand placed over the abdomen of both my teacher and Chen Xiao Wang while they were doing the silk reeling exercises. It’s freaking crazy how much Abdominal muscle control they both have and feeling the micro movements of their abdomen synchronized with the larger movements of their arm.

My teacher says to try and do just the Abdominal silk reeling stuff when you’re driving in a car or other times when you’re just sitting and unable to practice your M.A

.
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Re: Qigong in circle walking?

Postby everything on Thu Jan 30, 2020 1:13 pm

So getting back to my original question. Even if the story isn’t true, let’s suppose Dong was proficient at his MA, met a monk who walked in a circle, decided that was a good idea. What would the MONK emphasize? Probably not power, muscle, etc. I’m not against that, but I doubt that was what he (assume he existed) was trying to work on. Maybe but assume no.
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