Wu Yu Hsiang's Four Character Secret Transmission

[everything]

I don't know what you're saying. Are you saying "just keep at it and make progress?"

- I think we'd all agree that if you want to get good at sport x (like judo for example), you just need to go do it for a while, and you will be good at it. right?

- Assuming we all agree IMA has degenerated, if "Qi" and "internal" were attainable the same way, why would IMA degrade over time? Wouldn't all students of YLC have "it"? Just like the 2 hour marathon barrier will be broken, wouldn't we be improving with each generation? But that's not happening. I think it's because this pursuit is far more difficult. Plus people so easily delude themselves (" oh I see... the word 'qi' has a [racist because Asians are mysterious] inscrutable meaning, and really means 'fascia' or some such other red herring"). You can see it on this thread in the replies. I recognize all the red herrings because I've fallen for them all as well. It takes time to realize they are misleading or flat out wrong because our brains are so clever, we think we see the "pattern". Plus I find I'm not "talented" at this. The same way I can (more) easily recognize I'm not talented at music. From "the data", most of us will make very little progress. Subjectively, hopefully that isn't true. Perhaps you are far more optimistic or talented, for example. I do think we have to try. It's more interesting than other things.

[origami_itto]

I guess I mean I would expect something to show for my work after putting in some effort.

I get being patient, but how many decades will you do something without result before trying something different?

So many of these discussions with so many people take such a theoretical tone. When you're actually using what you're creating it starts to be evident what is fantasy and what is reality.

And I don't mean get in the cage, start little and controlled and take it as intense as you like.

[everything]

yeah. think i agree. it's just it seems quite common to try for decades (mostly doing the wrong thing) and get nowhere. or get to "basically just judo" (which is of course more than fine, but not the aim). at least that's what I saw my dad and his friends do (despite having been exposed to far better "data"). and then i did that as well.

and again "basically just judo" is still pretty cool stuff.

but it's not what's "interesting" once you've tasted the "good stuff" imho/ymmv.

years later, some kind of "cultivate qi" and some kind of "jin" happened to me (at baby or lower level) sort of more by accident. just by doing lots of "standing". that is what Ben Lo told us all to do 40+ years ago, but of course I never listened. blocked out the real advice. stupid. if you get the "real data", you have to suspend your disbelief. most people cannot do that (afaik), and most people don't get exposed to the "real data" (afaik). hence we have all kinds of crazy statements here, and no progress.

but if I only stay at infant level, it's not the end of the world. if Rick Beato says stuff like "oh B-flat diminished 7th, sus 2, so cool" and I have no clue what he said, and cannot hear it, so be it lol. IMA will be continued by talented people who aren't "too smart" to be in their own way from the very beginning.

[Taste of Death]

The teaching methods are flawed. Some teachers are delusional and some that have it don't know how to pass it on. The old method of taking classes and then figuring it out and refining it on your own or practicing something 10,000 times and then "boom" you've got it rarely works for ima. In our practice, we show how to do it using force and then how to do it without force (yiquan). Do the movements with a partner providing resistance. See the difference between force and no force. With the five fists have a partner hold your wrists and apply slight resistance as you move. They can apply both verbal and physical feedback to let you know what you're doing right and doing wrong. The difference between the force and no force becomes obvious. Some arts use intent. Some use dantien. Some use both.

[everything]

that sounds really good and really sensible

[Bao]

My interpretation might not be as exciting as one with "mystical energy qi", but it is more practical and applicable.

I don't really believe in "mystical energy qi" myself, but what I feel here lines up with my experience with seizing.

There are places you can touch someone when they are trying to push you that just route the force back into them, and at a certain point you can do it from the point of contact itself. It's not about anything mystical or magical, it's about tuning the senses and developing the right body method.

Totally agree. I understand what you mean. Overall a good post.

[Bao]

it seems more prudent to keep "qi as qi". and do "soft MA as soft MA". at least for a while.

it's not really that difficult to "cultivate qi". and it's not really that difficult to "do soft MA". (at least to low or intermediate levels).

it's really, really difficult to do "IMA". imho ymmv.

Older Chinese is very dense, compact and can be hard to translate. It will automatically be wrong if you don't understand the concepts as they should be understood. The problem is that Qi can mean different things in different context. In Chinese "qi" can mean "angry", "tianqi" means weather etc etc. It doesn't mean that you need to cultivate qi to become angry or that the weather has cultivated qi. So you need to know the context. The qi in cultivation and the qi as expression of refined movement are not necessarily the same "Qi".

So IMHO, it's better to keep cultivation, refining movement and other practicalities separated.

[windwalker]

The teaching methods are flawed.

Might have more to do with what some teachers felt was important to learn and focus on...
changing with the ability of students and with the times.


"

A: [Wang Xiangzhai’s disciple, now deceased] Ao Shi-peng once told me an anecdote that took place while China was in the thrall of ‘Qigong mania’ [in the 80s].

Ao asked M Yao about the ‘fa gong’ [external release of qi], and asked whether Yiquan could produce this kind of ability too.

At first, M Yao was reluctant to talk about this kind of thing, but eventually, seeing that Ao wasn’t going to drop it, sighed and raised his hand. Bear in mind that Ao and M Yao were separated by a dining table at this point. M Yao lifted his hand and made a very small fa li motion towards Ao’s face.

Ao felt as if a large mass of paper had hit his forehead, it scared him witless. Have you ever come across this ability?

C: M Yao was always reluctant to talk about this kind of thing, even in his books he denied it existed in Yiquan.

His intent was not to lead Yiquan students astray. Actually, the practice of Yiquan can develop this ability. "

From the same linked article..

A: What exactly are the details he was talking about?
C: The details he was referring to were feints and ‘tells’ – both with the hands and feet, and mentally too. Of course, there’s also
shen guang long zhao (‘enveloping aura’?)

The OP question

"
What do y'all think of this.

To spread means that we mobilize our ch 'i,
spread it over our opponent's energy and
prevent him from moving."

Can relate having felt what was "written" about...
In our group, the same idea was used talked about as in throwing a net over something... Essentially outlining what both articles talked about.... "enveloping aura".

[origami_itto]

I think chasing that is a mistake. Not everybody can do everything. Best to focus on what one can accomplish in the here and now and develop that to the highest potential. If the emission of qi across empty space is something you're capable of then it should just follow naturally from quality training, but if it's not something you're capable of, then best to just follow the quality training anyway and get what you can out of it.

Totally agree. I understand what you mean. Overall a good post.

Thank you I appreciate that.

As far as the emission of qi across space is concerned, Yang Cheng Fu (by way of Chen Wei Ming) says that it is possible. T.T. Liang describes a training method using intention and a block of tofu. The Dong curriculum contains the idea of projecting intention/energy out from the body and then gathering it back in as part of qigong and form practice. Adam Mizner had some now scrubbed videos where he demonstrated similar skills and was subsequently dragged all over the internet.

I haven't personally encountered action at a distance yet that isn't wholly based on psychology. I remain open to the experience but so far nobody has shown their hand.

[Steve James]

In general, i believe necessity is the mother of invention. If there's anything supernatural or supernormal in tcc, then YLC had it. I don't know Chen, but I'd assume that YLC's teachers had it too. However, they only had it because they needed it to use. The bigger question is why all the other CMA/IMAs that existed at the same time didn't have it too. If we'd believe the wuxia movies, in fact, many of them did. Do bagua and xingyi people make similar claims about using qi -specifically in self-defense? If it works, everybody uses it.

Afa everyone's ability to achieve it. For any skill, there'll be some people who aren't capable of doing it at all -even walking. Otoh, there will inevitably be someone who is unique. Lots of people will play basketball, but how many will be Jordans? Even if there's some super skill that could be developed, imo it'll be developed only if someone needs it. If it's a martial skill, then it needs to be produced in a martial context -otherwise, I think it'd be hard to develop.

I.e., you're going to need to stop a skilled opponent from punching you in the face, throwing you on your head, or breaking your arm.

Afa secret transmissions, I think there are oral transmissions and texts. Anything that was written down in classic Chinese was meant for a literate audience. If someone didn't get the oral transmission (a teacher telling them directly what it meant), they'd have to interpret the sayings for themselves. That's if they found the texts/notes in the first place. Some books stayed inside tcc families well into the 20th century. Since the 80s, there've been loads of translations, and even more interpretations.

Imo, a student's best bet is to remember their teacher's oral interpretations.

[everything]

The environmental conditions probably had to be just right as well.

Qigong/neigong wasn’t met with ridicule/angst.

MA had a good circle in Beijing.

Students with top talent found a teacher / teacher found them the way Barcelona found Messi. They actually probably listened.

If the circles spotted a “Messi” they helped move him up.

And so on.

None of that exists now, except that there are good MA sports circles (especially wrestling). Imagine if, say, top US NCAA D1 wrestlers had the rest available.

[D_Glenn]

Someone theorized that these 4 characters are just another way, or a reiteration of these:

綿 Mián (Soft) This character means to be continuous; soft
隨 Suí (Following) This character means to to follow; to comply with; to allow;

粘 Zhan (Sticking) Means to make the opponent stick to yourself.
黏 Nian (Adhering) Means to stick to the opponent.


.

[windwalker]

Students with top talent found a teacher / teacher found them the way Barcelona found Messi.
They actually probably listened.

If the circles spotted a “Messi” they helped move him up.

And so on.

None of that exists now, except that there are good MA sports circles (especially wrestling).
Imagine if, say, top US NCAA D1 wrestlers had the rest available.

It is interesting...I'd say the same conditions exist now as back then...
just not public as was the case back then..More so now,,,
social media being what it is..

There are levels

As mentioned not everyone has the talent to succeed, or fate to find those that can teach what they seek.
It might help those to understand some of the "commonality" of approaches teachers use in other arts in teaching their unique skill sets..

The sense is that Sagawa Sensei would teach the conditioning exercises, but without explanation. The exercises are necessary for developing Aiki, but are not themselves Aiki, so he would watch to see if people could grasp the connection.

If they did then they were worth teaching, if not then…)


Sagawa Sensei would never teach anything about Aiki straight out. There was a heart and soul called Aiki, and he would teach the technical methods on the periphery of it, until he got quite close to the components of the heart and soul. In other words, he would teach that much, and then watch to see if one could grasp the components of the heart and soul.

He thought that if someone could not grasp that then there was no point in teaching them.

Originally, Sagawa Sensei himself expended considerable effort until he mastered it at last, so he thought that it natural that the person learning should invest that kind of effort.


For that reason, it was inevitable that he would concentrate the people that he needed to teach and bring them up intensively. He set up the steps of 1st Gen and 2nd Gen so that people who established their capabilities and zeal could progress ahead of the others.

[windwalker]

Depending on experience and view point. The OP 4 character secret transmission
can mean very different things...

More commonality and standardization then not, expressed in slightly different ways,
among teachers working with on the same aspects..

Master Wang uses internal chi energy rather than external muscular force to move his partner. He must first be sensitive and feel his partner's center and then absorb any force directed towards him before emitting chi outwards. Hands are primarily antennae to sense another person's energy, not an instrument to push. The energy comes from the ground through Master Wang's center and trunk.


Master Fung: Hunyuan strength is not just physical strength. Typically we study three aspects of Hunyuan strength, the actual physical strength, the flexibility of that strength and strength of the associated energy field. By physical strength we mean the actual capacity of the body to generate force. Flexibility refers to the capacity to deliver that physical strength at various angles and circumstances.

Field strength refers to the concentration or quality of the practitioner's energy field. Field strength exercises help us directly develop and utilize this energy field to further refine Hunyuan strength.

[Appledog]

Sagawa Sensei

降る雪や
明治は遠く
なりにけり

The snow is falling.
The meiji era
got further away.

I enjoyed the Sagawa Sensei story. In general I wanted to post the same idea but I decided not to. I was not thinking "because, windwalker already knows this", but perhaps I should have used that as the reason. Mo ga mi ga wa.

Jigoro Kano once remarked that an art (such as Judo) which did not have gokui was not worthwhile to learn.

I have come to understand that gokui does not necessarily mean secrets. It can often refer to an analogy which was used to explain something to people who were involved with the art at the time. That is, the point of a gokui is not to conceal, but to reveal. To reveal by concealing?

For example, in external pill daoist alchemy we have mercury, lead, a burner, and so forth. In internal pill alchemy the terminology was borrowed because it's appellation was familiar to the people involved at the time. Therefore, the mind is mercury, the burner has a specific place in the body, and so forth. Some gokui are very interesting. Did you know there is gokui in the game of Go (Wei-qi) which comes from martial arts? It's true. A stable shape is zhong ding. You must kakari to create aji. The characters involved are 極意 for gokui, 罣角" (guà jiǎo) for kakari. The character here for kakari means "hindrance". There are also forms such as 挂 and 掛 (same sound). The first radical is da, or hit, and the second is to hang on, like I suppose a hook. Also, and advanced version of this concept is the 様子見 (yosu-mi) which I jokingly refer to as yose-miru.

口味 or 味道 means "taste", but 味 alone means "aji". It refers to potential or latent weaknesses in the position of stones on the board that can be exploited later in the game. In Chinese you might say, 潜在的弱点 (qiánzài de ruòdiǎn) or 待发展的机会 (dài fāzhǎn de jīhuì): "potential weaknesses", "latent vulnerabilities.", "opportunities waiting to be developed." and so forth.