the rum soaked fist: internal martial arts forum

i have always used the phrase "Xinyi is more about how one feels than how one looks"

Strange wrote:As a person with engineering background, i think it is better that the teacher can explain stuff in direction and magnitude
of force. Otherwise, i feel it is true that "normal" chinese method of writing about cma can lead to many errors in thinking.

Greeting Strange

In Yang Taiji, Sensing and taking advantage of the magnitude and direction of an opponent’s force is one of the keys to successful neutralization and using the opponents own force against them (the attacker).

Could you share a few words why this important to a person with “engineering background”?
And, how you personally use magnitude and direction of force in the application of your style of martial arts?

Thanks in advance

Trip, what i meant was that it is easier for a person with engineering background to
understand what is going on; why a stroke is done in a particular way; how come it works/does not work, etc.

For me personally, seeing cma from this aspect ties in with what LHBF states that it itself is a
study of extreme logic. this point also ties in to my doubt about whether it is good to bring in one's emotion.
No doubt, as CJW's shared article mentioned: there are examples of humans exhibiting extraordinary strength
in particular urgent/dangerous situation; it is hard to say this can be attributed largely to emotion or
having a clear, single-minded intent of which a pure, unadulterated brain signal was sent to the muscles.

of usage, I feel it is hard to describe in word but i can tell you after my understanding of this point that
my movements are almost never in a simple straight line; always a curve, arc or elliptical in shape.
because in nature, there is no perfectly straight lines.
Also, very small movement can have a very huge difference. maybe just move, bend, arch, drop, raise one inch.
And many cma talk about uprooting, if you can understand the forces, i think you can do it much better.

as a student in the Way, I must say there as in all matters there are yin and yang.
one can understand it as an engineer, but it will not help in understanding real internal qi/energy power,
or about heavenly orbits, etc.
Or how a practitioner can calm and control his mind, not to be controlled by emotions or distractions, etc.

Some western philosophers believe that if you cannot control one's mind; one cannot totally be free.

Strange wrote:…easier for a person with engineering background to understand what is going on; why a stroke is done in a particular way; how come it works/does not work, etc.

…hard to describe in word but i can tell you after my understanding of this point that my movements are almost never in a simple straight line; always a curve, arc or elliptical in shape.

…as a student in the Way…

Understood
Thanks for sharing

☮☮☮