Taiji People by Sam Masich (S01E01) Mario Napoli: The People

[Giles]

Writing about tuishou is always a tricky undertaking. I think we tend just to talk about selected aspects because otherwise you end up writing an essay or an instruction manual around a single tuishou exercise. And even then you may find that you are misunderstood.
If a picture paints a 1000 words and a video is better than twenty pictures, then a few minutes of hands-on contact with somebody is even better and will clear up more misunderstandings than you probably could by filling a few pages on an internet forum with text. But text is our primary medium here.
In this case I took CG Tomash's reference to protecting the head as a kind of placeholder for lots of attacks and factors that are not made explicit in many tuishou exercises. Which is essentially a good thing, otherwise as a beginner one is hardly able to develop sensitivity if one is constantly afraid of actually getting hit in the face. But later you can start to include other aspects/dangers.

PS. Who is exhibiting false confidence here?

[windwalker]

In this case I took CG Tomash's reference to protecting the head as a kind of placeholder for lots of attacks and factors that are not made explicit in many tuishou exercises. Which is essentially a good thing, otherwise as a beginner one is hardly able to develop sensitivity if one is constantly afraid of actually getting hit in the face. But later you can start to include other aspects/dangers.

PS. Who is exhibiting false confidence here?

donno,,,

getting hit in the face is a good way of understanding how not to get hit in the face


if your rolling with some one do you feel its ok to strike them because?

lots of attacks and factors that are not made explicit in many tuishou exercises.

Maybe because the point of the "exercises" are to develop a certain skill sets or awareness...
Not a fan of "tuishou" although I do teach some of the fundamentals of it as a way
to introduce different concepts , awareness in a very restrictive controlled format.


both are training methods that can be be used in fighting or to develop a certain skill set that
can be used in fighting. In each case they are not fighting.

Care to share your thoughts as to why 4oz is mentioned as a contact pressure ?

The four techniques are ward-off, rollback, press, and push.

You have to do a lot of work to get them to be real.
For the body posture, your waist and head-top should both be correct.
When sticking, adhering, connecting, and following, your intention and energy are to be uniform throughout.
Movement and awareness respond to each other.

https://brennantranslation.wordpress.co ... i-fa-shuo/

Good read list many aspects of training and how one should approach it, errors to avoid.

[Giles]

both are training methods that can be be used in fighting or to develop a certain skill set that
can be used in fighting. In each case they are not fighting.

I fully agree with you on that.

donno,,,

getting hit in the face is a good way of understanding how not to get hit in the face

if your rolling with some one do you feel its ok to strike them because?

Of course it's all a question of training context. If you want to develop tai chi-specific qualities such as sensitivity combined with good structure, or relaxing when body and/or mind are under pressure (and without losing your structure in the process!), or issuing force without tensing up, then tuishou can be very useful. For instance for tai chi beginners, who at the same time may sometimes be experiencd martial artists in other styles. Or also for more experienced tai chi people, when you want to return to basics and work on essential principles without any distractions, which is always good.

"Tuishou" isn't one thing, it's a really broad set of parameters, within which there are countless variations. Including intensity and 'danger', among many others.
Whether you can attempt to hit someone in the face while doing some form of tuishou - either just showing gently that the opportunity would be there, or actually doing it in some way slower or faster - is a matter firstly of mutual agreement and good spirit, and secondly, but also very importantly, how this factor can contribute positively to the learning/training process. I mean, you have to take an intelligent approach to this - know why you are doing a particular type of mix of training at this particular moment, and see whether it is useful or needs to be adjusted in some way.

In my experience, tuishou (if you do it productively) has many benefits that extend into other areas. If you train the right kinds of tuishou in the right way (which should also include lots of 'controlled chaos'), then the body and sensitivity and focus you develop can all come back in the few seconds, or just a split second, during a 'fight' situation. That can often involve responding to the first touch / moment of contact. It can also come into play without actual physical touch, giving you a better feel for the other person's movement, balance, openings, even before physical contact. So 'using tuishou in a fight situation' doesn't mean you have to chase the other person's hands/arms and stick to them before you can do something!

- And just to avoid any misunderstanding, I also train and recommend sparring, applications work, scenario training.

Care to share your thoughts as to why 4oz is mentioned as a contact pressure ?

Yeah, it's from one of the Tai Chi Classics, the "Treatise" by Wang Zongyue. http://www.fourseasonstaichi.com/CLASSICS.html
"Use four ounces to deflect a thousand pounds" or similar. The "four ounces" isn't to be taken literally ("No, Grasshopper, you are using only three ounces!!!" ), but stands for what is subjectively a very light force or weight being effective against a much stronger force or weight. With the help of: correct technique!


--> But if anyone is aware of a specific cultural reference that prompted the author to write "four ounces" instead of "five" or "one" or whatever, then I'd love to know.

[wayne hansen]

I reintegrate
Tai chi is LITERALLY passed on from hand to hand
If your teacher doesn't have it there is no way you will have it
As for targets and techniques
There is no target or technique out of bounds
If I layed my dead meat on my teacher he would strike hard
He followed the Hung I Hsiang motto
A student should be stung often and hurt occasionally to gain skill in combat

[cgtomash]

I was not talking about using weapons but a response as though one were present
The four ounce principle

I fully agree with this concept. For push hands training, I train (and teach my students) that even though you might be following a pattern, or no touching the head, etc, you should always have the awareness and attention that your partner might try to clock you upside your head! The saying is that push hands is not fighting, however it is a stepping stone towards the fighting method of Tai Chi and this attentiveness is a must in that process.

You might agree with the concept it doesn’t sound like you understand it.
You mentioned getting clocked in the head but do not mention getting kneed, tripped or kicked,
Why is that

Haha, that is funny. Do you want me to write a whole essay? I fully understand the possibility of the use of elbow and knee strikes, chinna, leg sweeps, etc when doing push hands. My answer was in response to the dialog of the idea of the "hand having a knife" and the attentiveness needed in that regard in push hands.

It is not about having you or your partner trying these things on you, but rather part of the training of being attentive and aware... part of being mindful.That constant awareness brings a different feeling into the basic exercises of the push hands routines. I have pushed regularly over the years with people outside of my school and style. Over that time I have probably had all of those things (knees, sweeps, locks, punches) tried on me without any notice. The basic push hands practice I have trained has served me well...