THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY

Discussion on the three big Chinese internals, Yiquan, Bajiquan, Piguazhang and other similar styles.

THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY

Postby willie on Tue Oct 24, 2017 6:42 pm

The good, Not everyone who tells others exactly what they want to hear are their friends.
The bad, Not everyone who tells others the things that they don't want to hear are their enemies.
The Ugly, Everything in between...

I had to remove the video, sorry for the inconvenience, But at least many of the board members that
I respect got to see it.
Thanks
Last edited by willie on Wed Oct 25, 2017 11:57 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY

Postby origami_itto on Tue Oct 24, 2017 6:49 pm

Cool speakers!
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Re: THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY

Postby origami_itto on Tue Oct 24, 2017 7:05 pm

Also thank you for sharing your perspective in such detail and with passion. You can tell that you care a lot about your art and your study.

There are many things that I agree with in your explanations.

One thing that stood out, though, was the skepticism concerning a lack of apparent motion with a large effect.

What is your take on invisible circles and techniques large enough to fill the universe but small enough to hide in your sleeve?
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Re: THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY

Postby willie on Tue Oct 24, 2017 7:22 pm

oragami_itto wrote:Also thank you for sharing your perspective in such detail and with passion. You can tell that you care a lot about your art and your study.

There are many things that I agree with in your explanations.

One thing that stood out, though, was the skepticism concerning a lack of apparent motion with a large effect.

What is your take on invisible circles and techniques large enough to fill the universe but small enough to hide in your sleeve?

That is a really good question so I will answer it the best that I can. In order to get to the very small circles or no Circle at all you have to go through the large circles first then the medium then smaller and smaller and smaller without skipping a step then you will really have it. Recently I ran into somebody who claim to have no Circle. Yes he had no Circle but he had no power. Basically it was only shoving . So There is no shortcut. My teacher is pretty much an expert on short power, I only have some of it. It was the questions that I asked that gave away people who were basically acting like they were flying. As I had stated there must be internal power somewhere or it is basically fake.
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Re: THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY

Postby windwalker on Tue Oct 24, 2017 7:22 pm

Nice clip,

I once asked my teacher about short cuts he said " if there was one, my grandson would be the first one to know it"
It was at this point that I understood a lot of things I'd have to figure out and find out on my own. In talking to people I work with
many long term students of taiji, its the same the things that make it work are not shared so openly.
Which in some aspects is understandably. :-\


As far as tossing people a distance, I can toss people quite far with what seems like little to no movement.
However my explanations for the what, why and how are based on physics and examined using this lens.

There are aspects that don't quite fit into it, these are addressed once a person has developed a sound understanding,
ability and skill based on what is thought to be happening explained with physics. Otherwise IME people start to get stuck on the "qi"

explanations with no real understanding based on things that can not be empirically tested.

Oh yes, way cool speakers btw 8-)
Last edited by windwalker on Tue Oct 24, 2017 7:26 pm, edited 3 times in total.
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Re: THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY

Postby origami_itto on Tue Oct 24, 2017 7:42 pm

No short cuts! I want my money back!

They told me the short cut was training every day the lying bastards!
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Re: THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY

Postby origami_itto on Tue Oct 24, 2017 8:29 pm

willie wrote:
oragami_itto wrote:Also thank you for sharing your perspective in such detail and with passion. You can tell that you care a lot about your art and your study.

There are many things that I agree with in your explanations.

One thing that stood out, though, was the skepticism concerning a lack of apparent motion with a large effect.

What is your take on invisible circles and techniques large enough to fill the universe but small enough to hide in your sleeve?

That is a really good question so I will answer it the best that I can. In order to get to the very small circles or no Circle at all you have to go through the large circles first then the medium then smaller and smaller and smaller without skipping a step then you will really have it. Recently I ran into somebody who claim to have no Circle. Yes he had no Circle but he had no power. Basically it was only shoving . So There is no shortcut. My teacher is pretty much an expert on short power, I only have some of it. It was the questions that I asked that gave away people who were basically acting like they were flying. As I had stated there must be internal power somewhere or it is basically fake.


That's the progression as I understand it. From large and open to compact, yes.

Regarding flying back, where I've done it for example was in a snake creeps down style shoulder stroke shape. He was pressuring me up top so I dropped down and back, he followed and off balanced and I pushed with the shoulder. The actual amount of force I applied wasn't that great, but since he was off balance, first coming towards me and then away from me, it was enough to keep his feet from getting under him and he stumbled back quite a ways trying to get his balance back.

If I'd used the same external shape to strike with proper kao to the sternum as he fell towards me it would have been a lot less polite, could easily break things. Just toying with it lightly I've dropped people. Likewise if I'd pushed full strength and launched him up or into a tree there.

Point being, that's not so much any sort of special internal power, it's just effective physics. If you're on your heels and get just the right push at the right angle, it's not enough to topple you completely, but too much to just snap out of easily. Nothing magic or mysterious about it, taijiquan just gives you a fine degree of control regarding how much energy to put into it, where it goes, and when. So while I suck and don't understand anything and do everything wrong and to get the effect live somebody has to make a huge mistake and I have to make a huge movement, I imagine if the theory holds true that after a few more decades or so of bitter practice I'll get to some medium circles and be able to use it against a 12 year old taekwondo blackbelt.

But these 80 year old asian dudes who were studying with guys better than I'll ever meet from the time they're old enough to take direction have put enough hours in to roll them up pretty small I'd wager.

Getting back to the point though, I've just discussed what I consider three completely different applications possible in the same situation with the same form/shape/posture with three different effects.
1. A polite and extremely safe unbalancing and stumble back
2. An impolite and extremely dangerous strike to the sternum
3. A fun but potentially injurious short flight

Do you think this is how it should work, or some sort of degradation?
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Re: THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY

Postby Bao on Wed Oct 25, 2017 12:15 am

Nice vid on "body connection", indeed an important part of the puzzle. 8-)
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Re: THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY

Postby willie on Wed Oct 25, 2017 11:02 am

oragami_itto wrote:No short cuts! I want my money back!

They told me the short cut was training every day the lying bastards!


Haha! Forget the money, you can always get more, I want all the years that I wasted back!

After reading your other post, It surely sounds like you're having a great time.
That's one of the most important parts of tai chi. The ability to be able to integrate with others in a special way.
Thanks for your post.
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Re: THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY

Postby willie on Wed Oct 25, 2017 11:05 am

Bao wrote:Nice vid on "body connection", indeed an important part of the puzzle. 8-)


Yup. I already received the cautionary memo, lol!
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Re: THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY

Postby Appledog on Wed Oct 25, 2017 6:48 pm

Hello! Originally I wanted to have a "cool post count" of 108, or something like that (something associated with Tai Chi) but that does not seem possible here. Therefore I am editing this post to point out that users here cannot delete their own posts. I do not understand why users have the ability to edit their posts but not to delete their posts.
Last edited by Appledog on Mon Apr 04, 2022 2:47 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY

Postby willie on Wed Oct 25, 2017 7:40 pm

Appledog wrote:
willie wrote:The good, Not everyone who tells others exactly what they want to hear are their friends.
The bad, Not everyone who tells others the things that they don't want to hear are their enemies.
The Ugly, Everything in between...

My interpretation of real taiji. ...


The fall was quick and fast, and happens between 0:49 and 1:17. The climax being 1:14 where you say it's all BS.

You're also wrong when you say there is only one way. Nope, there are many ways. Two points make a line, willie, not a 'right' and a 'wrong' -- that comes later.

Actually when I first learned to fajing it had nothing (apparent) to do with circles and everything (apparently) to do with being empty. It's like a negative charge repelling another negative charge; there wasn't any visible force I decided to create. I simply became empty, and whoosh--out came the force. Saying that I became empty or created emptiness or 'relaxed' are all very very accurate descriptions I could give you about what I did 'directly'. None of it would help you do it though, but it would help you do it IF you did the work and was ready to express the skill but just hadn't came to the realizations you needed first, or perhaps if you just had one or two blockages left to remove in some other area.

Now, there are prerequisites that I later figured out you would need. And there are rules, and ways that A, B and C all work together to create various effects. Just speaking generally; it's what is required to make links between arts to see how they are connected. And how they are different. It may very well be that only I can understand what I understand because I pieced it together myself; but I tend to think otherwise because I am not really covering new ground here, am I? I'm actually at a very basic level.

The point being that if the explanation didn't make sense that's on you not the explainer (unless he's lying, but let's assume you're smart enough to realize when someone has a modicum of skill and when they don't). So when I asked how it was done I listened to the answer and I searched for the meaning and did not think that it was BS at all. It was this process which allowed me to discover that if I turned the idea this way or that way, I could see what I was looking for, I found the connection.

Back in the day, before modern distractions, western science, and critical thinking, a younger Chinese gent living in the middle of nowhere or in a smaller farming community would not have the luxury of rejecting an elder's explanation or immediately coming up with his own (flawed) side-door explanation. He would be left to ponder, maybe for years, because that's just how it was understood, and it was on him if he didn't get it. Maybe he just had to practice harder.

That is the problem with making up your own analogy -- "like ball bearings" -- for example. It comes with a host of additional baggage and is missing a host of "standard additional baggage" that was intended to come along with the previous/old/in-door way of explaining things. Go too far down that path and you will end up somewhere else. You still have no way of discerning the end-truth of what you are shooting for by going down that road. Helical gears is another one. I might as well say "A big fat stick". Or using physics explanations. Ok so you're telling me that if I use a stick to perform rollback, or cai (pluck) or any similar technique, it is based on physics. Sure! But what's going on inside the stick? So you see even the very definition of internal and external hasn't been grasped properly, it seems. And if it has, just go and do the work. Don't add on all this additional stuff and make up your own stuff, it won't work. Or it will and you'll end up with something that for better or worse is "like a different religion" -- some kind of different power generation. And it's not traditional and that means it's basically untested. Then again this has happened before, and sometimes leads to a new art, sometimes even a better art. So it's not all bad.

But it ceases to be "tai chi" or whatever art you are learning and becomes something else. And if you find yourself in the unenviable position of not knowing the real and believing the fake is real because it works or because it feels special, I'm not sure what to say about that. Maybe you get lucky and figure out something from another art and start buying into that, and you end up practicing some other art, or a hybrid. At worst you will end up embarrassing yourself. The way out of that is testing what you know, being humble and allowing yourself to invest in loss when appropriate.

If you find yourself in a situation where you feel stuck or that you are not making progress, there are two solutions.

The first solution is to increase your practice time. You want to be a master? No? Okay fine, go do your hobby when you have time, i.e. you didn't wake up late after a party, or whatever. Fine. Oh, you want to be a master? Fine, go train four or six hours a day. Now if you find yourself in that situation, that you are dedicated and getting some kind of benefit, but it's not enough for you, then find another teacher. If you stop making progress don't sit there in a rut for years, get out there and get involved. First remove the easiest obstacle -- yourself. And if there is still a problem it is the teacher's problem.

It is possible that in your area there is a teacher, an older Chinese gent perhaps, who can feed you the energy you need right away and pull you up. Sometimes all you need is a fresh perspective. Be giving and humble. Get away from too much of the modern world.

I just had to quote this one. This one will keep me laughing for quite a while. Apple Dog you don't know how fortunate you are to even be able to see that. Get over yourself.
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Re: THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY

Postby Appledog on Wed Oct 25, 2017 8:11 pm

Hello! Originally I wanted to have a "cool post count" of 108, or something like that (something associated with Tai Chi) but that does not seem possible here.

Therefore I am editing this post to point out that users here cannot delete their own posts. I do not understand why users have the ability to edit their posts but not to delete their posts.
Last edited by Appledog on Mon Apr 04, 2022 2:48 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY

Postby willie on Wed Oct 25, 2017 8:26 pm

Appledog wrote:
willie wrote:I just had to quote this one. This one will keep me laughing for quite a while. Apple Dog you don't know how fortunate you are to even be able to see that. Get over yourself.


Ok, then I'm wrong. Can you tell me where I went wrong and how I should train in the future? The only question I would have is if I just sit here being wrong and you never help me or guide me, in such a case wouldn't it be better to follow my own advice (that you laughed at) and look for another teacher? That's why it's so confusing. I'm wrong -- okay -- but now what?

Apple Dog you don't know me I don't know you. But I can tell you that you are operating completely on assumptions. First off I train only for me and my family mostly for my son. I have no desire of being named a master . I train several hours a day Apple Dog. Helical gears? So you think that I made up the theories? You better go back and read what Charles had wrote about not only helical gears but standard gears rack and pinion gears bevel gears. also you think that I'm the one who made up the theory of a man made of ball bearings? You better do some research because Charles and I are both correct. And one more thing from your comments. You said that they were left to wander and Ponder. That sounds like my old yang style teachers words. The truth is no, I do not have to ponder anything. in fact the more pondering that I do the more corrupt the art becomes. Why? Because I paid for a direct transfer. Every single thing is answered, there is no pondering
Last edited by willie on Wed Oct 25, 2017 8:51 pm, edited 3 times in total.
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Re: THE GOOD THE BAD AND THE UGLY

Postby Subitai on Wed Oct 25, 2017 10:45 pm

Ok Willie you put yourself out there so you shouldn't mind some questions or comments right?

Just watched it and you begin by saying your going to cover some info about "internal power, spiraling energy and Fa Jing".

Then you say you were told(by someone)that "Being Empty is the cause of making people fly off of them"? Wow, I've never heard this. I think you either got POOR answers or you are confused:

1st, we all need to have some sort of Peng in our structure...that's true, you can't just be a limp noodle.
However I've never heard of anyone saying that Emptiness is used to produce the effect of people flying off. As you said it's NOT logical so whomever gave you that answer is full of shit.

2nd, The terms can also be a cause for confusion. Plus different people describe things or DEFINE them differently.

Are you sure you're NOT confusing the term "Empty" with people who claim to be Song / "relaxed into your structure"

===================================================================================

Empty and Emptiness can be used differently...but I'll give you some more ammo for your research;

About Empty,
If one side of your body is empty / the other side can be full. There maybe some confusion or loss in translation in what you're receiving...just saying.

About Emptiness,
I don't know who's telling you that emptiness (alone) leads to internal power but you're correct that it doesn't make sense in that regard.

But if you're trying to say that the Skill of being empty or allowing someone to fall into emptiness is NOT a worthy pursuit then I call BS on your research.

Nobody should just be 100% empty when receiving force! There's always peng somewhere...the question is, after you have allowed the persons attack to become empty (and they are OFF balance for example) in that moment if you attack with internal power ====> THEN they go FLYING!

P.S. were you drinking just before making the vid...or are you always that Amped Up and puffy??? :D
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