the rum soaked fist: internal martial arts forum

Just as a random aside, being as we live in the 21st century and we have some unique contextual metaphors to power our mechanics, whenever I do Tzuan I always picture the release of the bullets from the depleted uranium gun in Quake 2 used as an alternate weapon and by the Gladiator robots shown here from 5:50 to 6:30.



FWIW.

S

Quake 2 was the best. I preferred running backwards with rockets and grenades though

Bao wrote:The basic postures and a lot of the strategy comes from spear and staff fighting. In spear fighting, the movement of the spear can go up or down and at the same time the force can be straight forward. How we play the five elements is very similar.

This may be taking things off-topic, or maybe not – but I was wondering if the wuxing are also used to describe XY spear techniques, and which element/phase would correspond to which spear technique.

In the version of Taiji spear that I learned, there are five main techniques (some schools only emphasize three...open/close/issue):
Press/Down
Spread/Open (deflecting from inside to outside)
Covering/Closing (deflecting from outside to inside)
Snapping/Upward
Thrusting/Issuing

These seem like they could be fit well with the wuxing, if desired, although I was never taught to do so. I was just curious if XY spear has techniques, which correspond to the wuxing, which may be comparable to TJ spear. Note: I know little about XY and nothing about XY spear, so I cannot really add much to the OP.

LaoDan wrote:.. I was wondering if the wuxing are also used to describe XY spear techniques, and which element/phase would correspond to which spear technique.

In the version of Taiji spear that I learned, there are five main techniques (some schools only emphasize three...open/close/issue):
Press/Down [=pi]
Spread/Open (deflecting from inside to outside) [=heng]
Covering/Closing (deflecting from outside to inside) [=zuan]
Snapping/Upward [=pao]
Thrusting/Issuing [=beng]

These seem like they could be fit well with the wuxing, if desired, although I was never taught to do so. I was just curious if XY spear has techniques, which correspond to the wuxing, which may be comparable to TJ spear. Note: I know little about XY and nothing about XY spear, so I cannot really add much to the OP.

Pi is a forward thrust/strike from above or used to parry high attacks.
Beng is a thrust from waist level.
Right zuan is an inward (to the left) circular parry, twisting the wrist inward. Or a circular strike to the left
Rught Heng is a sideway parry (to the right) or strike to the right
Pao is striking with the backside of the spear/staff. It can also be used to first blcok with one side and strike to the other.

Combine zuan or heng with pi and you have the two most common spear combinations there is. All of the five elements postures are identical to five of the absolute most common spear postures.

Some of the animals like the Dragon is directly taken from spearplay as well.

yeah i check if i am able to hold a spear in the form
if not i do not think it is correct.
but that's just me

My 5 element spear is a little different

Metal down from above
Water Up. From below
Wood straight thrust
Fire diagonal up
Earth horizontal

I don't have time to sit and quote every particular classic (i.e. "old" book written about Xingyi). If I am using a "spinal wave", even an imperceptible one, pi quan should still be downward. In the Xingyiquan that I have learned from Tim, we do an application of Pi that seems it would be more horizontal, like an extended hook. A good example would be similar to the Diaz brother's Stockton Slap. The force of the blow comes from up to down though.

In regards to the movement going forwards, your body is moving forwards utilizing footwork, it's not the upper body movement that is necessarily moving forward at this point. Pi quan is not a push though, when I see people try to do it as a push, it looks terrible.

The five shapes (Wu Xing) are not powered by individual jins, i.e. pi jin, zuan jin, etc. Never seen that in any Xingyi text, nor from any other Xingyi teacher. The wuxing, and all movements in Xingyi contain what Robert mentioned above: rise, drill, fall, overturn; these are the fundamental forces involved in the movements.

Yes each day I practice the raise,drill ,fall and return drill I think how lucky am I to have this drill
That energy is in each of the 5
There is nothing sadder than to see power expressed at the detriment of form

TJ spear has many more techniques than five (or three) and often lists 13 to be consistent with the 13 for weaponless TJQ. But there are often more techniques, depending on the particular school. The TJ spear forms that I learned do have a pi/chop that comes down vertically. However I cannot think of any moves that may be considered as being angled pi/chops.

There are a variety of chops in TJ dao, including angled chops, but they use different names. In TJ dao there is also a downward pi/chop (like splitting firewood) that uses the entire arm. Chops that use mainly the forearm are given a different name. Angled chops like would be used for chopping down a tree are given yet another name.

I am beginning to wonder if XY spear has numerous other techniques that do not fit into the 5 wuxing, and that the downward vs. angled... may stem from other valid techniques that are left unassigned to the wuxing, but may be a part of the system. This could lead to someone trying to include these unassigned techniques into the wuxing scheme? Could this be a contributing factor to the uncertainty being discussed in this thread?

[Again, I know very little about XYQ, so ignore this post if it seems ignorant!]

Can't quote every Xingyi classic..... right.....

The earth is flat because my teacher says it is! Lol.

LaoDan wrote:This could lead to someone trying to include these unassigned techniques into the wuxing scheme? Could this be a contributing factor to the uncertainty being discussed in this thread?

The problems are:

1. Using descriptions like jins, dantien rotation, spinal wave, magic elemental theory etc in the end contribute nothing & distract a lot. Xy is very physical and is all about "whole body" coordinations ie engaging the related muscles with the right coordination to support the movement (most often done fast and fluid).
2. Taking a view that the 5 elements are techniques and need to encompass everything to sound holistic. It's not. 5 elements is to teach the coordinations. They establish the body and much like any good excercise change it. Same happens with the mind based on the focus and drilling.
3. Those who take up santi to fight & attempt to pi a bung will get killed. Fighting is mixed and the elements teach how to power the engine. The next stage is about mixing it in with applications some of which exist in the 12 animals & 2 man forms. Personally I think these are ok but more forms just lead to more robots. They need to be mixed up and learnt with sparring.
4. Basing views on what they were told or what was written. In the beginning it's important to listen and learn but at some point it becomes vital to adopt and understand. Xy only works when it becomes ingrained in movement. More importantly when the sensation of power is understood and can be applied dynamically. It's impossible to be able to read and understand it. It only happens with a shed load of drilling which gets mixed with applications.

TLDR: XY is all about drilling and then it's about discovering how to apply.

5 elements...

Metal = horizontal
Earth = verticle
Wood = front/back
(Guess what - thats 6 directions & done with "long" power)

Water = spiralling (yes it can be argued there are smaller spirals in all forms but water brings focus to it)
Fire = sharp, shuddering (short power)
(These 2 are there to emphasise the importance of these 2 concepts)

These power the applications and all the elements get mixed into them & most importantly rely on the right coordinations that really need to be taught by someone who gets it.

Want to blow your mind?

Ask how do these concepts get applied to the 7 stars.
Or the how concepts are applied to movement (stepping).
Or that each of the elements contains a grabbing chinna move which is driven by the element. How far reaching could this be?
Or that the same engine concepts cross over to many weapons.


Suddenly the 5 seeming simple forms become "magical" in a very real tangible way. These concepts only come a long way down the training path and telling people about them is a waste of time if they have not drilled the basics.

Sorry--but if Xingyi is this complicated I don't think I'll bother.

i really do not think xingyi gives a fuck

Ojibwa wrote:Sorry--but if Xingyi is this complicated I don't think I'll bother.

People are complicated not Xingyiquan, the more people involved the more complicated it gets. Just find a good teacher, that's enough