the rum soaked fist: internal martial arts forum

wayne hansen wrote:3 types of cmc

American
Taiwan
Malaysian

Not all the same but the 10 does apply to a lot,
Likewise it applies to many outside the cmc cohort.

You left out British/ European. John Yalenezian, an Armenian-American jazz drummer and student of Liang Tung-t'sai, introduced Cheng's taji in London in the 1960s. He had many students, of whom I was one, and raised many of the first generation of British taiji teachers. John later went to live in Amsterdam, where he continued this work. Ben Lo used to give workshops over there for several years to John's students and grand-students.

Perhaps partly due to Master Liang's extensive martial arts background and open mindedness (he fell out somewhat with ZMQ), there has been more cross-training in his ZMQ line in Europe, and the sort of closed-minded stupid arrogance and cult-mindedness we're having fun with here don't exist to the same extent as in the U.S.

daniel pfister wrote:This is all very fine. Now that we've had some fun, can anyone think of any advantages the CMC style offers over the traditional style? I teach both forms and have my reasons for doing so. The CMC form offers something fairly unique. What might that be?

From my experience his short form can be beneficial if the teacher does the following:

1. Mold pastures: make you hold postures and earn the burn in your legs.
2. Loosen waist training.
3. Can teach diffence between lotus leaf palm of traditional and beautiful lady palm style.

Personally both forms have entirely different spirit/flavor to them. CMC is more "sung"but does not have to be limp or arched spine. The spine is more erect. Yang long form is more extended than compacted form. Some say the CMC is compacted mid frame for fajin release if power.

neijia_boxer wrote:3. Can teach diffence between lotus leaf palm of traditional and beautiful lady palm style.

Beautiful lady's hand is for qigong and is good for making you relax your hands and forget them = beginner's choice of palm formation. It has no martial use what so ever.

CMC is more "sung"but does not have to be limp or arched spine. The spine is more erect.

If you relax, the spine and head will automatically raise and straighten. Any person who believe that sung in CMC means limp or ached does not know the style. It also means that he has no clue how being "soft" and "relaxed" affects the body.

However, the straight and unmovable body/spine position in CMC is good for beginners. The CMC form and it's shenfa (body method) was created to teach beginners or people who are only interested in the health aspects in TJQ. This is not a bad thing. CMC people starts practicing Taiji shenfa in a very methodological manner. Other Yang branches and also Chen stylists have more problems with knees, hips and backs. I like ths CMC introduction to Taiji very much. But you must progress away from this. After two- or at most three years of CMC-practice, the student should be given the opportunity to develop his Taijiquan further. The problem is that most of them get stuck in beginners methods.

daniel pfister wrote:This is all very fine. Now that we've had some fun, can anyone think of any advantages the CMC style offers over the traditional style? I teach both forms and have my reasons for doing so. The CMC form offers something fairly unique. What might that be?

No.

Ron Panunto wrote:

daniel pfister wrote:This is all very fine. Now that we've had some fun, can anyone think of any advantages the CMC style offers over the traditional style? I teach both forms and have my reasons for doing so. The CMC form offers something fairly unique. What might that be?

No.

LOL at Ron

After two- or at most three years of CMC-practice, the student should be given the opportunity to develop his Taijiquan further.

That's actually one of the numbers as well:

'I know there is more advanced tai chi practice out there, and I have been doing this for 10 years. But I just feel like I can go so much deeper in to this form and I'm not ready to move on.'

http://stltaiji.com/media/documents/art ... ngyang.pdf

an old article, dont quite agree with his conclusions, thought some might find it interesting to read.

Baguaplayer wrote:'I know there is more advanced tai chi practice out there, and I have been doing this for 10 years. But I just feel like I can go so much deeper in to this form and I'm not ready to move on.'

Many people have this feeling after 10 or even 15 yrs of practice. But I think it's a too humble approach. It's good to explore new things and refine old skills at the same time. Variation and discovery is a must if you are going to keep up enthusiasm for another 5-10 yrs of practice. I don't believe that people are as limited as tai chi people think they are. In fact, most people can actually learn different things at the same time.

Many people have this feeling after 10 or even 15 yrs of practice. But I think it's a too humble approach. It's good to explore new things and refine old skills at the same time. Variation and discovery is a must if you are going to keep up enthusiasm for another 5-10 yrs of practice. I don't believe that people are as limited as tai chi people think they are. In fact, most people can actually learn different things at the same time.

Which is why it is so annoying when I hear it from these people. It's like doing first grade math for the rest of one's life. Never mind algebra, geometry, calculus and everything else that is built on and from first grade math, but just wanna hang out and do addition and subtraction ad nauseum.

neijia_boxer wrote:From my experience his short form can be beneficial if the teacher does the following:

1. Mold pastures: make you hold postures and earn the burn in your legs.
2. Loosen waist training.
3. Can teach diffence between lotus leaf palm of traditional and beautiful lady palm style.

Personally both forms have entirely different spirit/flavor to them. CMC is more "sung"but does not have to be limp or arched spine. The spine is more erect. Yang long form is more extended than compacted form. Some say the CMC is compacted mid frame for fajin release if power.

Good. IMO, anyone who can't do these things isn't really a good representative of the style, and it is really not fair to judge the style based on such people, numerous though they be.

just to be fair:

<strong>*Counter punch-
Top 10 awesomeness of being a Cheng Man ching Taiji practitioner:</strong>

10. Many CMC groups are in parks.
9. Lots of books on Taijiquan by CMC people: CMC, William CC Chen , Ben Lo, Robert Smith, etc.
8. Cheng Man ching studied Art and Medicine.
7. There are people from William CC Chen side who also Fight with Taiji.
6. Many groups do have a large class and gatherings for push hands.
5. Form is middle frame and not large, emphasis on relaxing for fajin.
4. Hand form (Beautiful lady wrist) is more for health and qi flow, fajin.
3. Train root deeply with hold and molding the postures.
2. If you train correctly you will develop real skill and gong fu.
1. many have won push hands and san shou championships from CMC taiji.

"ooohhh, i see you didn't move your waist there"