Yang Family Tai Chi Discussion Board

Hi Ron,

My invitation was to “tell me where he got them, and what he meant by them.” You haven’t done so. Should I assume you don’t know? It’s clear you were making a point, but it would help to know whether your point is based upon something you know, or upon something you do not know.

Take care,
Louis

Hi Louis,

Sorry, you're right I don't know where HE got them, or what HE meant by them.

My point is based on something I do know about the transfer of physical concepts to moral/ethical concepts in different cultures, and not the other way around.

And my point is about confusion when metaphors are transfered from different subjects and then back again. In psychiatry it's known as hebephrenia, "word salad", often involving ideas taken from philosophy and religion etc.

This I got from reading books about cognitive development and cross cultural comparisons, and psychiatry, etc.

Do you know where he got them or what he meant by them?

I don't even know where Chen Xin got them from.

But, my point was about such transference in general, not HIM in particular.

Was he the only one to ever use those terms?

If so, he didn't get them from anywhere, and there is no point asking me to tell you where he got them from when he didn't, right?

Take care,

Ron

Greetings All,

Hard hats indeed! Just my 2 cents, but at least this is a worthwhile discussion, I feel, of what we all do and how we try to do it.

Ron,

And thank you for explaining the reasons why you don't lean! You are not alone in your opinion, although your fears as regards leaning are unjustified in my experience.

A point I didn't address earlier, Wu Chien-ch'uan's forms are a bit different from YCF's. The leaning is more pronounced. We still do train WCC's forms in our school, it is just that Wu Kung-yi's (or one very close to it) is taught first.

Wu Ch'uan-yu was the first one to introduce the Manchurian wrestling tradition, but it is done in STRICT accordance with T'ai Chi principles. Those principles really do help the effectiveness of the throwing game. Why should I hit someone with my fist when I can hit them with the floor? You don't throw, we throw, and no one has been able to stop us, even professional throwers. I have several former Aikido and Judo students, black belts, in my classes, and they are impressed with our groundwork, to say the least.

So not all leaning disqualifies a style from being somehow true to T'ai Chi, just the Wu style? Other styles have justified exceptions each time, but not Wu style?You've agreed that other styles do lean sometimes at least. Wu style just works it a little more. The Ch'en Fa-k'e photo that I saw was a very low sitting posture (even for Ch'en style!) rather like Snake Creeps Down, except he had one fist at his waist, Shaolin-style. He was leaning forward over his extended knee. If there are exceptions, many, documented, exceptions (heck, even Cheng Man-ch'ing leaned forward a few times, Step Forward and Punch Down comes to mind) why are they only for what you seem to think are non-leaning styles?

The Ch'en family, Yang family and Sun family (I've got a few photos of them all together like one big happy family, did they not mean it? Could they all be insincere?) did and do recognize Wu style as not just T'ai Chi Ch'uan, but an orthodox training style of same, and FWIW so has three successive Chinese governments in the last 100 years.

In the Wu style walking that I train, I can step backward quite well with all my weight on the forward leg. I even train the same step as a rearward heel kick. Comfortably (for me, at least!). And of course we go to vertical in the stepping. We train vertically at least as much as we do in an inclination. How did you get the idea that the leans are exclusively what we train? We "leaners" do everything that you do, and more, apparently. The walking is only two of the five directions, forward and back. It isn't for stepping to the side, Cloud Hands, Nine Palace, Ta Lu etc. are among the many stepping patterns we would train for that. I could step to the side FROM the walking quickly and comfortably, it just wouldn't be the walking anymore, it would then be some other pattern.

I quite agree with you about Push Hands competitions, your statement makes complete sense to me now. Competitions in general are a pain in the posterior. The technique required to decide a contest, technique in accordance with proper training, technique that we train to the point that it will be simple reflex, will almost always get us disqualified. Why bother? The late Wu Ying-hua told me once, when asked about it, that tournaments were mostly tolerated for promoting the school, or for a hobby, nothing more.

And for immobilizing the feet, the primary reason to do it is training, not fighting, to loosen the musculature, and stretch the legs evenly. I would never do any sort of freestyle like that, unless it was one very specific closing strategy in sparring. The parallel business is a specific training.

Ma Yueh-liang may have twisted his spine, I don't know. Wu Ying-hua's form that I saw didn't twist her spine. Also, in the Hong Kong style there is no twisting of the spine.

So, if a judgment of what is real T'ai Chi or not depends on a book, I guess that, personally, I will choose to believe Wu Kung-tsao's book over the one that you prefer. He (and his sister, son, nephews, niece, grand-nephew and grand-nieces) has made a better case to me, I'm afraid, than you have been able to. His commentary on the documents Yang Pan-hou gave to Wu Ch'uan-yu, supplementing the original documents themselves, is the Wu family standard. The Gold Book is a guideline, nothing more, and quite useless without a qualified teacher to physically demonstrate the principles mentioned therein.

Healthy conflict? The 5 families' mutual respect isn't healthy? Wow, I had no idea. It really sounds like you are saying that you would like to somehow directly impose your own personal view of T'ai Chi purity on what you believe to be the heterodox approaches of others to T'ai Chi Ch'uan training. You are espousing, nay inciting, the non-leaning faithful to rise up and physically coerce everyone in T'ai Chi Ch'uan whom you disagree with to train exactly as you would have them train or quit? Hmmmm. My definition, at least, of "healthy" conflict in this regard would be a conflict in self-defense, applying my technical abilities in order to maintain MY health in the face of what would be just such an apparently irrational, unprovoked threat. Your professed attitude, nonexistent in the traditional T'ai Chi families and their direct senior students, seems a little macho around the edges. Unfortunately, it is a very common positioning in this world, and is very likely to be just the reason that T'ai Chi Ch'uan was formulated as a martial art in the first place. It strikes me as an attitude that you brought with you to your training, an attitude that you would not have learned from the Ch'en, Yang, Wu, Hao or Sun families themselves, by your own admission.

If you are serious about desiring such a conflict, the Wu family are still very much in the public eye around the world. So you should certainly look up Sifu Eddie Wu. I'm sure he'd love to have you show him how what he is teaching violates real T'ai Chi principles. Maybe then he'll get a real job!

Best Regards,
P.


[This message has been edited by Polaris (edited 05-31-2003).]

Hi Polaris,

The conflict I had in mind was a healthy discusssion of principles and very different interpretations of principles resulting in very different practices.

My initial contribution was to include information from anatomy, kinesiology, and bio-mechanics into such a discussion, or at least to have their relevance admitted.

But even a discussion of principles can be offensive to some people because, though this is denied, the different interpretations of principles result in real differences in practices which are not just simple variations on the same principle.

For example, your interpretation of a single weighted bow stance is 100 % front weighted plus leaning, while Wu Hao is 100 % back weighted with no leaning. Both schools are trying to avoid the sickness of double weightedness but by directly opposite, contradictory, ways.


To say that they are both acting in accord with the same principle because both are trying to accord with the injunction not be doubleweighted AND to ignore that the ways they have chosen to do this are directly opposite to each other results in much absurdity.

So in this supposedly orthodox, all following the same principles situation, some people find real contradictions based on what people are doing.

Within each school they follow one way only, their way, and yes just like Wushuer has been doing they ridicule the other schools ways continuously. That is the T'ai Chi Way, its DAO.

Some schools, when confronted outright about a matter of principle, such as the present one, weighting, to end all that impolite discussion they close the discussion board, or when that is too much work they banish offenders against piety.

Your view of conflict is more along the lines of the Macao brawl and you wish to set up a tumble on the tundra.

No doubt the Mongolian wrestling skills in strict accord with Tai Chi principles have been much improved over the last years.

Ok, if you are serious and have checked with Eddie you will have to make enquiries on the rec.martial arts newsgroup list to see if there is anyone interested in such a try at conclusions. That's where your sort of challenges are made and taken up.

A shoot fighter,not literally a Mongolian wrestler but close enough, just recently back from the debacle in Boston where some associates of a Chen stylist offered their master up for a challenge without him knowing about it may be interested.

Their master didn't show for the "demonstration" so there likely would have to be some money up front from your side. You might want to consult with Mike Sigman about how to set up these kind of demonstrations. He can also be found busy as always on the rec.martial arts newsgroups list. Try to hide the Mongolian connection or at least underplay it, so as offer up orthodox Tai Chi for a trial. They are looking for just such a go at the very time that you are reading this.


That's about all the help I give you so as to keep the Wu family in the public eye around the world. I'm sure you will understand that since you did not offer yourself for the demonstration that I am also not willing to offer myself.

I have no interest in advancing the Wu's claim to fame, and besides that,I don't do Mongolian since I am allergic to yak oil.


Folding my laundry,

Ron

Ron,

Well met! I'm sorry that you have a life goal that dictates that should have such an interest in fomenting controversy where none exists, but it takes all kinds of people. There are some of us out here still who believe in dignity and working on ourselves, and in my school at least, without that no real progress is possible.

My dear fellow, you say things like moving step push hands always turn into clumsy grappling and that conflict in the T'ai Chi arena is healthy, with no other information provided, so I ask you questions or make statements according to the information from you that I have. Then you reply that you really MEANT in tournament, or in debate, not fighting, or even patronizingly directing me to fight challenge posting boards. You expect us to be mind readers eh? I was only replying to what it certainly seemed you were saying, at least to a native English speaker. If you continue to have secret qualifications that you don't show up front, your debating style can get a bit tiresome, as you are apparently setting up little "victories" for yourseflf with special postings in a language only you have privy to. Clumsy.

You can criticize Wushuer for insulting others, yet you indulge yourself in that same pastime repeatedly. It is perfectly obvious why you have been banned before. I have turned your arguments upside down every time, without insulting you once. My comments as to your cynical agenda, undignified attitude and sloppy debating are purely objective, not personal.

Mongolian = Manchu? Umm, no. They are as different as Koreans and Japanese.

I do want to thank you, however, as you have indeed helped me to get quite a bit of good information out here that may be of interest to people of good will that I otherwise may not have had the opportunity to discuss. My main purpose in being here is to promote an agenda in direct oppostion to yours - that there is one T'ai Chi Ch'uan, and at least five very good ways to get there.

Thanks again!
P.

Polaris,

You spend too much time out at night. People are now navigating by other means than the North Star.

Clumsy?

One little hook for Wushuer which YOU took

"
The issue of the Wu style 100/0 front foot weighting is a separate issue since that configuration does not allow for quick neutralizing in ALL directions. That weighting may have some purpose, but it is problematic since it goes contrary to another important injunction of 'not leaning'.

Not leaning is very important to turning with the least effort and the avoidance of loss of balance. But that's for another time."

and you have been demonstrating how easily someone overly inclined to leaning can become unbalanced and end up rolling around on the floor.

Do I say NEVER lean, do I not say in what respects not leaning is important? Where is the language problem?

All I can say is stop walking around like a chicken, stand straight as most humans have done naturally for many thousands of years now and your personal development will be amazing.

You have walked the WU walk (not the TAI CHI walk)for too long. Join us Homo Erectus'!
Become a disciple! See the light!

Solaris

Boys, Boys,....

Relax.

Ron,

One almost would think that there was something to "win". "Rightness" is not very becoming on anyone. Your condescending attitude and veiled and blatant put downs that have accompanied nearly all your posts. Not really all that clever, and not needed at all.

You may have a number of points, and there may be somethings that you know that we all can gain benefit from......BUT no one is going to listen if your delivery remains as it has been.

Polaris and others,

I learned a long time ago that one shouldn't fight with someone who has nothing to lose. The same with trying to have a discussion with someone who KNOWS he is "right" and YOU are WRONG. Fruitless. Waste of time. "That" person may even BE "right" at times, but that does not excuse the behavior. Nor does mean we must tolerate it.

I suggest that if Ron continues in this vein and Jerry doesn't ban him (again), that we not respond to him. I am sure a number of you have already come to that conclusion. I would not like to do that. Hey but if that is what it will take to end this garbage---so be it.

Sorry about this post. We are supposed to be talking about Taiji. Forgive me.

This isn't even "interesting" anymore.

Make it good!

Michael

[This message has been edited by Michael (edited 06-01-2003).]

Ron won't be posting for a while.

Wushuer,
I am presently a student of Yang family TCC but wish to embrace all styles of this great art. The concept of INTENT in the Wu style interests me. As you have diligently pointed out, this idea of intent is absent in Yang style teachings, so I am as of yet ignorant on the subject. The area that interests me particularly is the "intent in the non-weighted leg". What do you mean by this statement? Could you please be more specific? I can understand in physical terms(I think), but on the philosophical side I'm afraid I'll need a more in-depth explanation. You said "ideas (yin&yang) that can be mixed and do exist together but should be kept as separate as possible"... sorry, you've lost me, but I would like to understand.
Your thoughts and experiments with different sized frames and circle ARE fascinating.Small, medium, large frames. Small, medium?,large circles.100/0,90/10,70/30,50/50 weight distributions. I too will conduct similar testing with these factors. That should keep me very busy for a very long time.GOOD STUFF!
Sidebars, tidbits and things for "laughs and giggles are always amusing.(p.s. what did you mean by "swoopy" I can't find it in websters.lol)
I attended a Yang style kung fu broadsword form last year. It was very ENERGETIC! The "little plum blossom kung fu fist form"made sabre form.I don't know if that sword form originated from the hand form or vice versa.(I'll try to find out for my own curiosity).Hope you enjoy the demonstraion in your home town.Always nice to see fellow academecians after a long absence.
Good luck in your pursuits,
Psalchemist.

Michael,

I'm going to have to agree that the previous debate may have been a waste of time, at least at one level. I could not have proved any of my points to Ron, at least not here. He's probably not a bad guy, he just doesn't believe that there are any good guys in the world. I don't have much hope of convincing him of otherwise, because you first have to know what a good guys are a little bit before you can recognize them. So I make my demonstration...

A "good" person has to stand up for, create an expectation for, behaving well. All the old stories of the former martial art heros defending the weak and living to a high personal standard themselves and having that expectation for their students and, by extension, their communities are so important and can't be left out of modern martial training. This is what the Ch'en, Yang, Wu, Hao and Sun families (and others, of course!) have always stood for, in my experience. To live otherwise would make us simple thugs in the end.

So I'll debate cheerfully and objectively with whoever, if only so that others who may read this can see someone not participating in cynicism. I've met a lot of guys like him in my teaching career, and a few are even still in my classes. I have to ask myself, what kind of teacher would I be if I didn't at least try to present the truths that I am charged to represent to the best of my ability?

That being said, I do also believe in the efficacy of starving trolls on message boards at a certain point. If in a situation any of you who have been here longer care to suggest that, I would be happy to consider the strategy.

Cheers,
P.

[This message has been edited by Polaris (edited 06-02-2003).]

Psalchemist,
Intent is just the "intent" to do something. It has no tangible essence of which I am aware. Simply the "intent" that you could do whatever you needed to do with that leg or, more simply put, the idea that you could do something with a leg or an arm or anything. More the idea that you haven't forgotten about that appendage, just that it's there and you are aware of it and that you could use it if you needed to. "Mind intent" might be easier to grasp as well.
The idea of "intent" has come up in my YCF classes, just in different contexts. Same idea, though.
The "intent" to have Yin is within Yang, as the intent to have Yang is withing Yin. They are both seperate things, wholly different from each other but you cannot have Yin without the intent to have Yang.
You can use any opposites for this; you cannot have up without the intent to have down and vice versa. This example is equally valid and may be easier to grasp for most as up and down are things we can easily identify with. In order to go up, you have to have the intent that going down is possible because if going down is not possible then going up makes no sense.
Therefore, when you go up the "intent" is there to go down.
Is that clearer?

That is very loosely "intent" as I understood it in my training.

Really rushed for time right now. Just wanted to pop in and put in my two cents while I had a moment.

Polaris,
What school do you attend, if you don't mind my asking? Simply curious.
I attended Wu's T'ai Chi Ch'uan Academies, under several different Sifu's. There were two WTCCA's in my local area when I left, and several different advanced students were giving classes on their own wherever they could find a room to hold them in, I was one of those.
Apparently you got more into the theory, I was enamoured of the "doing". Maybe it was my aversion to trying to understand Chinese that led me to that, but I found trying to keep all the words from a language I don't understand straight to be more work and much more confusing than doing the TCC, so I left that for the purists in the crowd and went about my business to learn as much of the "doing" as I possibly could.
I'm regretting that a bit now that I have come here and am trying to learn theory of a different style.
Maybe I'd be better off to get back to my old adage of, "Quit trying to teach me the language, just show me how to do it".

P.S.
Thanks for taking the "hook" for me. I decided that I was better off to "yeild to conquer", as I'd been trained by Sifu Eddie and his disciples. That part of my training has continued in my YCF classes with no difference of styles.



[This message has been edited by Wushuer (edited 06-03-2003).]

Polaris,

THere is no fault on your part, you did your best. Sometimes those guys can be exasperating however. Have not seen anyone like him since the first year I have been here. And I think that has been a good five years at least.

Wushuer,

We belong to the same school---definition doesn't make up for doing it. Though, having some things to think about sure keeps the motivation moving along. Guys like Louis and Audi keep me in the pages of many books. I always found that the secret is not to think too much!

Have no regrets! I enjoy your posts!

Michael

Michael,
Thank you for your kind words.
I have been avoiding the board in hopes that things would improve.
I am relatively new to message boards, this is my first place to hang out on one, so have not the experience to deal with someone like that. His posts were confusing, his logic was suspect. He would appear to compliment, then turn and dig.
Do many people do that?
I have been into computers and networking for many years, in fact I'm a database administrator now, have been (and still function as when necessary) a help desk guy and a network admin, so I'm not a total nincompoop with the hardware. However I have never been one to "surf the web" much, don't usually have the time, so I have no experience with boards like this.
I came here because of my confusion between what I was learning, and what I had learned. I found this discussion board and have been loving it, so have burned it up quite a bit I'm afraid.
I sincerely hope no one else sees my desperate cries for help in understanding as disparagement of YCF style TCC or any of its practicioners or Masters!
While Wu style makes better sense to me, the YCF style I have been learning holds a distinct fascination and there is much genuine TCC there to learn.
I hope I do!
Just because it's different, doens't make it worse. At all!
Well, I'll leave it at that and try to move on with this discussion. That will be much healthier than lingering on our recent upleasantness.

The tapes I have of Section one and Section Two of YCF style with Han Hoong Wang, a disciple of Yang Zhen Duo, does show me clearly that there are points in the YCF form where she goes 100/0 weight distributed. These times are telegraphed most apparently when she raises the toe of her foot on the Yin (empty) leg and this is almost always just before she makes a step.
One of the things I've noticed that are distinctly different between YCF and NAWS forms is that almost every NAWS form I have learned ends with your toe up on your empty leg, clearly defining this 100/0 weight split.
I have noticed she doesn't lift the toe up as high every time when she does, though. In NAWS I was trained that you raised your toe to roughly a 45 degree angle from the floor when in 100/0. In her YCF form, sometimes she does this, sometimes the angle is very slight and hard to notice. I have watched these tapes very closely since I noticed this and have been wondering what the reasons might be for the different heights.
Does YZD or YJ do this same thing? I don't have a copy of any of their tapes, yet, to compare.
I would have to imagine there was a reason for this, but can't figure it out for myself. I kind of figure it has to do with not telegraphing your movements to an opponent, but I'm not sure.
While figuring the toe raise points out has helped me immensly in my form training, because it shows me where in the forms to be completely weight seperated as opposed to less than completely and that has helped me to keep a firmer foundation at the proper times in the form, the greater and lesser degrees of toe lift have confused me somewhat.
Watching these tapes with this in mind has also helped me to NOT go 100/0 and lift my toe in places in this form where I'm not supposed to, like I had been.
My mantra has been "If she lifts her toe, I should be 100/0, if she doesn't, stay 70/30" and that seems to have evened out my form and has definitely firmed up my foundation, my legwork, with YCF principals in mind. It has even helped me to keep myself much more "upright and centered".
Maybe I'm making much more of the angle of lift than I need to, but it is sort of confusing.
I will watch tonight with more of an eye towards which forms exactly this occurs between, but wanted to get this question out there for general perusal and comment before I got too specific.
If it's a non-issue and the height of this toe lift is unimportant, then let me know and I'll just keep going without worrying about it anymore. However I have often been told that there is NO unimportant point anywhere in TCC. That all movements, no matter how small, are important and should be considered.
Anyway, that's how I've been spending my time, watching toes go up and down on different tapes.
Do I know how to have fun, or what?

For those who care, when I practice what I call Middle Frame I have been going for a happy medium with the toe raising and weight distributions. Depending on the form and how I perceive the energy flowing I'll either go all the way 100/0 or keep a 90/10 split. I've been finding the closest correlation of forms between NAWS and YCFS, seeing how each does their version and then trying to decide, all on my own, which way seems more applicable in my strange version of Middle Frame. Sometimes I find that staying closer to the Wu style works better, sometimes YCF is the way. Sometimes I go a few times thinking that one way should work better only to find with experimentation that the other does.
NO. I'm not inventing my own form! Wouldn't go there. I'm using both the Wu style form and the YCF form that I know and do each as I feel it would be performed in Middle Frame.
I'm also attempting YCF forms as if they were Wu style and Wu style forms as if they were YCF style. Moving them into the different body frames and using the differing weight distributions.
Mostly, I'm screwing around and having fun with it. I am also learning quite a lot about energy flow and body movement in the process.