wayne hansen wrote:Graculus you do realise it is the guy on the right pushing himself away
Partially, right? But the one on the left has to be offering an equal amount of force, and you CAN see him adding some force.
It's the same thing I'm always talking about. The right side applies power, the left accepts it and loads themselves, releases it back into the right side.
Now THAT is what Cheng Man Ching describes as ti fang with fa chin.
There are times, however, when a force comes from the
front causing one side of the triangle to collapse. What
then would be the result? It is illustrated in the following diagram.
As shown here when the force comes directly from the front and without
deviating to the sides or up or down,
we no longer talk about turning left
or right or cycling up or down as the
way to yield. We talk only about
receiving the attack. In T' ai Chi
Ch'uan, we use the opponent's strong
attack against him - which is what the Book oj Changes
describes as K'an, the trigram of "the Abyss" and the
hexagram of danger. This is the primary reason to use
the term "T'ai Chi" to name this martial art, for it
means to cause the attacking force to dissolve in emptiness.
When the opponent realizes that he has failed, his
only option is to withdraw and try to escape. During the
opponent's withdrawal of his attacking force, my abdomen,
which has absorbed and stored the force of his attack,
uses this power to attack his retreat. This response
is what the Classics refer to as t'i-fang. Fang means to
release. I then become a circle again. The opponent will
be at a loss as to what he can do and is thrown out a
great distance. This fa-chin (releasing strength) is a
unique characteristic of T'ai Chi Ch'uan.
SO t'i-fang - uprooting strength, fa-chin - releasing strength.
Left side isn't just bracing and making the other push themselves off, they're accepting and re-issuing the force.
Going to lunch have fun y'all.
