"............................... Another mistranslation from the Chinese is this. "If he moves up, I move up, if he moves down, I move down" fine up to here, but now it all goes strangely wrong. It continues, " if he comes forward, I move back! and if he moves back, I move forward"! In this case the translation has given us the exact opposite to what it should be. It should read. "if he moves forward, I move forward and if he moves back, then I move back". This is more martial arts and is not dancing. So, in the normal basic push hands we have to do something that is completely wrong for a fighting art. When my opponent moves forward, I move back and when I move forward, he moves back etc. This is wrong. ............................"
http://www.taijiworld.com/push-hands.htmlTai Chi Self Defense 1/. Never step backwards.
When you are attacked, do not do what most hard style martial arts teach you to do, to step backwards as you block! In the art of fighting This will invite certain defeat. Any fighters or brawlers all work on 'switches'. We are born with switches that tell us to do certain things sub-consciously, like a male puppy that, at a certain age begins to lift his leg, why? He may not have seen any other dogs doing this but he does it anyway as if some programmer has programmed a computer program into his brain. This is not far from the truth. We are all born with switches, those that tell us to cry, to begin crawling etc. Then there are those switches that we learn from experience. It is the same with the Qi that we are born with (pre-natal Qi) and that which we gain as we grow, (post-natal Qi).
A fighter learns certain switches as he becomes more and more experienced at fighting and aggression. However, it is also these learned switches that can bring him unstuck in a fighting situation against someone who knows about switches and the art of fighting. The fighter learns these switches but also learns sub-consciously that his switches will also cause other switches in those who he is attacking, which will in turn switch on more switches in himself. This is the way that a fighter works. He may not know this and indeed it would be rare that any street fighter would know about such things. So, when the expected switch does not happen when he attacks someone, it throws his own switches out of wack, thus putting his timing and co-ordination off. This is where internal gung-fu and the art of fighting gains the upper hand. We know that the fighter expects us to react in a certain learned manner when attacked or when faced with aggression. He expects us to move away from him trying to lessen his attack. So he is ready for this and knows exactly what to do when we do this expected movement. But if we do not, then he is taken by surprise and before he has time to change his method, we have already finished it.
Someone who is attacking you expects you to be where you are when he attacks otherwise he would not have attacked you where you were. Someone throws a punch for instance, they do not throw the punch to where they think you might be, but to where you are at the time of the attack. Remember though, the attacker is expecting you to either be there or to move backwards. So even if you do move back, he is ready for this and will launch another attack to compensate for this movement. So, if you are not where he expects you to be, and more importantly, if you are in his face attacking him, then he is just not ready for this. He has to re-group and think about what he has to do next, giving you time to attack with devastating attacks from the internal Gung-fu system.
Often when we train in tai chi self defense techniques or training methods, we will be taught to stand still and not move. However, this is only in the beginning to get the movement correct. Once you have it, then you begin training in a more realistic manner by moving into the attacker as he attacks.
There is another important reason in self-defence for not taking a step backward apart from the obvious physical advantages as I have indicated above. And it is an 'internal' reason. The 'primordial' instinct for survival is inside all animals including human beings. Although ours has been slowly lost over the years of depending upon others for our defence! It's still in there, but we just have to get at it in some way. Dogs for instance have all kinds of primordial instincts like, at a certain age when a male dog begins to lift its leg to pee. Why does it do this. Well, we know why I guess, some chemical changes happen inside causing the dog to have a need to mark its territory. But how it happens is a complete source of mystery and wonderment to me. Never having seen another male dog, the puppy will always begin to lift his leg at a certain age. He will also at this age, begin to attack, i.e., move forward into his 'opponent'. In order to understand this, we must also know a little about the 'triune brain', or the 'reptile brain'.
The theory goes, that when God, (or whoever) was making we animals, he began with his first creation, the 'reptile brain' which is that brain that all reptiles have. It is a survival brain, totally relying upon instinct and programming, no thought, only reflex reactions caused by its particular 'computer' programming. A snake does not 'think', it does not love, hate or feel resentment etc., it just lives and survives. This is the kind of brain that the snake has. We too have this brain! However, it is only 5% of our total brain size.
Then 'God' tried out a new brain for the more complex animals such as mammals and we call this brain the 'old mammalian' brain. This is that brain that dogs have for instance. A little more thinking for itself and some small amount of emotion even, but still much programming and relying upon instinct and reflexive actions to stimuli. The dog however is able to revert back to its 'reptile brain' any time there is an emergency of survival. And it makes certain body changes to enhance this effect to give it the greatest chance at surviving. Like arching its back as all animals do including sharks just before they attack. We in internal gung-fu also make use of this when we are attacked. The animal also makes use of another area of helping it to reflexively go into the reptile brain. That of always rushing forward. You will only notice this phenomenon in those animals that are closer to the source of 'wild' than many domesticated animals who have also (as we humans) had this sense bred out! Like the Australian Blue Heeler dog that is part Dingo. He is one of the most courageous small dogs on earth. Not because he is courageous however, but because he is closer to the source than most dogs. There is in fact an old saying with regard to this breed of dog here in Australia; "the Blue Cattle Dog (the breed has several names and also comes in the red variety), will eat anything it meets unless it is eaten first".
The last and most sophisticated brain is of course the mammalian (human) brain. However, this brain did not replace the old mammalian or the reptile brain, it simply was placed over the other two. So we as humans still have the 'survival brain' and are able to access this animal brain through training. This training is part of the internal Gung-fu training.
One way that we have to access this reflexive survival brain is to simply move forward as we are attacked. It triggers a switch that causes us to attack and attack again! Just as an animal never stops its attack, so too should we do the same. In my classes when I am teaching the training methods, I have to begin by teaching them incorrectly! This is because if I were to teach the correct way, i.e., moving in as we are attacked in training, we would have many more injuries! Moving in seems to build up an attack energy that is often uncontrollable in the beginner. Even the blocking type movements have far greater impact when the reptile brain kicks in. In addition, it is only those who are trained as advanced instructors that I allow to train in this manner.
http://www.taijiworld.com/tai-chi-self-defense.htmlhttp://www.taijiworld.com/art-of-fighting.html