No internal without external...

The physical strength of Fu Zhengsong is evident. Fu was a famous master of Bagua who first learned Chen Taijiquan under 16th Generation Chenjiagou master Chen Yanxi..

To the average western Taijiquan student neigong or "internal training" can seem esoteric and is often over-emphasised. In Chinese Martial Arts: A Historical Survey Brian Kennedy and Elizabeth Guo describe internal training as follows: "Neigong includes exercises to train such qualities as coordination of muscle groups to act as a single "whole", the ability to coordinate the breathing along with movements and the ability to stay relaxed and responsive in a confrontation. These exercises are called "internal" because they do not involve any obvious external actions".

In Chen Taijiquan the following are all critical parts of internal training:

Fang Song - loosening the body by relaxing the joints

Peng Jin - an outward supportive strength

Ding Jin - upright and straight

Chen - rootedness

Chansijin - reeling silk energy

But all traditional Chinese martial arts involve a balance of internal and external methods. Without an external basis this internal development is of limited value. ""Coordinated strength" means nothing if you don't have any strength to coordinate".

18th Generation Chen Taijiquan exponent Chen Zhaopi divided the training process into three distinct stages:

First training the body externally concentrating upon the extremities - this stage involved intense physical practice to "open up the joints". This stage, he said, should take about five years to accomplish - five years of daily training under the guidance of a knowledgeable teacher. This stage was deemed successful when:

Stamping the foot in Jin Gang Dao Dui should sound like thunder

Punching during Yang Shou Hong Quan should make a sound like the wind

Leaping up to do Er Ti Jiao, the kick should be able to reach seven or eight foot into the air...

While these past Chinese teachers did express themselves in flowery terms, I think we get the picture - at the end of this first stage a practitioner is strong and agile. While this probably sounds heretical to many Taijiquan practitioners today, Chen Zhaopi was adamant that: "If first you don't train this type of brute jin, the body's joints will not be opened up and flexible. As a result, the neijin (internal energy) cannot be stimulated".

Only when the first stage was complete were practitioners deemed ready to enter the second stage of working towards understanding neijin. Since he was responsible for training the current generation of Grandmasters from Chenjiagou his advice is probably worth listening to. This is in line with a previous post where Chen Ziqiang listed the four qualities necessary for success in traditional Chinese martial arts as: strength, constitution, technique and finally gong. [FIRST PUBLISHE 30/01/2013]

Push hands training with Chen Ziqiang - Some basis of strength and conditioning is necessary to successfully apply the qualities of rooting and sinking against a 110 kg opponent!

The Principle of Gradualness

Chen Zhaopi - live in accord with a higher philosophy

To fully understand Taijiquan it is necessary to understand its underlying philosophy. This is less of a problem for Chinese students as many of the ideas are omnipresent throughout their everyday culture. Western students, on the other hand, need to explore aspects of Chinese thought that have permeated its culture for several thousand years. Failure to grasp its philosophy results in one training a superficial system that is lacking in real foundation. 18th generation exponent Chen Zhaopi believed that this does not just apply to Taijiquan, but that every action a person takes in everyday life should be in accord with a higher philosophy.

At Taijiquan's core is the Taiji or Yin-Yang theory - the search for harmony and balance. In Daoist alchemy heaven, earth and humans are collectively known as the "Three Powers". Humans thrive to the extent to which they conform to the forces that mould and nurture them. It was said that: "Heaven is clear and calm; earth is stable and tranquil. Humans who reject these virtues perish, while those who adapt them thrive".Following its Daoist roots, Taijiquan asks practitioners to seek "ziran" or "the natural state". To do this we must accept the principle of gradualness - the long journey towards mastery can only be achieved gradually. Looking at the normal development of a person from infancy to maturity - each day they may seem the same as the day before, but if all their basic needs are met a fully functioning adult eventually emerges.

Taijiquan places great importance on fulfilling basic requirements which must be trained daily over a long period of time. We all know the rules - suspend the head, store the chest, relax shoulders, sink elbows etc etc... This is the core of Taijiquan skill and no amount of new forms and novel applications can replace it. The following advice from Chen Xin's "Illustrated Explanation of Chen Family Taijiquan", reflects this inexhorable approach to developing real skill: "The Taijiquan practitioner must apply ceaseless efforts to make his mind aware of each tiny transformation taking place in the postures...one must establish full mental control over every movement: from the way one's hand commences a posture, to the area through which it passes, and up to its final resting place". This can only be achieved gradually! [FIRST PUBLISHED 2/01/2013]

Gradual progress from ceaseless effort!

Chen Xiaoxing – entering a new cycle!

The birthday cake - 6 tiers topped by a symbolic longevity peach

A week ago I was in Chenjiagou enjoying the 60th birthday celebrations of Chen Xiaoxing. Unlike the West’s obsession with youth, in Chinese culture the 60th birthday is a landmark birthday and is the first birthday to be marked by large scale celebrations. It was fitting of the man that the party wasn’t held in some fancy restaurant, but in his training hall!

The Chinese zodiac is made up of 12 creatures - the rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, ram, monkey, rooster, dog and pig. Each creature in turn is associated with one of the 5 elements of wood, fire, earth, metal and water. Chinese astrologers consider the age of 60 to be the completion of one life cycle – (The 12 creatures multiplied by the 5 elements equates to 60 distinct phases), an auspicious number in Chinese culture. Those who achieve the plateau of 60 years begin a new life cycle at that point.

Chen Xiaoxing has lived in Chen Village all his life. He knows everyone in the village, and they all know him. Surrounded by his family, friends and disciples - like all good Chinese celebrations it began with a succession of speeches. One after another stood up to praise him for his modesty skill and martial virtue or "wude".

When everyone else had finished Chen Xiaoxing stood up and in his usual understated way offered the following advice:

“Don’t criticise other people. Don’t boast about yourself. Just put your head down and train”! [FIRST PUBLISHED 2/12/2012]

Saying my piece - just one of the many speeches

Evening celebrations

You might be doing Chen style but are you doing Taijiquan?

Moving slowly towards correctness

Chen style Taijiquan is a relatively new kid on the block in Western Taiji circles. In a short time many Chen teachers have sprung up – self proclaimed masters proudly proclaiming that they are doing the original, the real, the authentic Taijiquan passed down from Chen Wangting the creator of Taijiquan himself!! You know the type – trained for 2 years and loudly talking about push hands, applications and realistic training… or instructors qualified to teach the Chen short form: Can you imagine a Karate/Judo/Ju Jitsu student training for 6 months and then getting an instructor’s certificate – “qualified to teach up to yellow belt”!! While marvelling at their own achievements they disparage Taiji players from other systems as having too much emphasis on softness, no fajin etc etc.

Let us be clear - the unique features of Taijiquan are song, rou and man – that is looseness, pliancy and slowness. Slowness is the method where we can, as it were, expand time to check that every aspect of posture and movement fulfils the necessary criteria. Through meticulous self-examination and correction from a knowledgeable teacher we slowly move closer and closer to the standard required. Following the traditional method it is accepted that the qualities of pliancy and looseness can only be cultivated slowly. Only when these qualities have been honed are we ready to train the wider parts of the syllabus. Many modern Chen players pay lip service to the traditional way but in reality cannot accept this preliminary stage. I know of an ordained Buddhist who received his appointment after completing a “fast track” course in Zen Buddhism. Comparing a traditionally trained Chen Taijiquan player with these “fast track” Chen players is like comparing western boxing with a boxercise class at the local health studio. [FIRST PUBLISHED 5/11/2012]

Traditional training - precise, meticulous, long-term...

The "inner world" is going mainstream!

The internal training required of Taijiquan and other internal martial arts is often dismissed by some as some kind of esoteric practice. However, it is interestingly to note that many elite level mainstream sports coaches now acknowledge the critical importance of the “inner world” of the athletes under their charge. None more so than top sports psychologist James Loehr, who has trained world-class athletes in many different sports, who asserts that in the final analysis even the thoughts inside an individuals head must be considered as a physical aspect to be rigorously trained if they are to achieve excellence in their chosen discipline: “This may sound quite shocking coming from a psychologist, but all the evidence is there. The body is physical; talent and skill are physical; emotions are neurochemical events and are therefore physical; and thinking and visualising are electrochemical events in the brain and are also physical… let’s get it straight once and for all: thoughts and feelings are physical stuff too; they are just as real and every bit as fundamental to achievement as talent and skill” Loehr, 1995). [FIRST PUBLISHED 15/10/2012]

Source: The Essence of Taijiquan

Words are just words...

Chenjiagou Taijiquan GB's Mary McGregor feeling the correction

During his seminar at our school recently Chen Xiaoxing said that one of his aims is to train students not to be dependant. He would demonstrate a movement and then expect everyone to train themselves. People often like to have the teacher leading them all the time. And if he is not leading then many people soon stop practicing and start to talk instead. Chen Xiaoxing's approach is that if you want to get the skill yourself then talking and just following him is not the way to do it. Don't be so quick to ask questions - "watch carefully and then practice yourself". His brother Chen Xioawang, similarly often says to "practice more and a question may not be a question any more". During one of his workshops Wang Haijun said simply - "beginners ask too many questions"! Of course sometimes we have a real question, but what we are talking about here is the learner who asks question after question, often barely pausing for breath after one question has been answered to ask the next... In The Tao of Zen Ray Grigg put it nicely when he said: "Look in mind to find mind; look in things to find things; look in words to find words. But words chase themselves in circles trying to explain things that are not words". If a teacher corrects your posture then the most appropriate thing to do is to train and try to replicate the corrections he has just made. Unlike the modern "Zumba-world" - with the ever-changing fitness classes as entertainment model; running on treadmills with tv screens and book-holders - progress in Taijiquan is built upon careful study, introspective training and perseverance. As it has always been!!!! [FIRST PUBLISHED 25/09/2012]

CTGB's Adrian Murray - after seeing then training hard!

Follow the Rules!

Got a great few weeks coming up!- Just picked up GM Chen Xiaoxing from the airport. He returns to our school to do a week-long seminar on the traditional Chen Village staples - Standing Pole/Reeling Silk, Laojia Yilu and Erlu. Then for the next few weeks we'll be accompanying him to the South of England and then to Poland, to my pals Ben Milton (Bristol School of Taijiquan) and Marek Balinski's Chen Academy in Warsaw. In both places covering these same fundamentals. One of my earlier postings highlighted Chen Xiaoxing's "village style" training and his simple advice to anyone trying to emulate the skills handed down by successive generations of Chenjiagou practitioners - "Know the law" and then "follow the law".

Two generations earlier his illustrious grandfather Chen Fake divided the training process into three stages:

1. Learn the basic movements correctly

ACCORDING TO THE RULES

2. Become proficient in practising the form ACCORDING TO THE RULES

3. Thorough familiarity WITH THE RULES and understand clearly why there are THESE RULES

It's funny how different people percieve this kind of approach to training. In the world of traditional Chen Taijiquan there really is no other way. One of my long-time students who has trained in China and attended many seminars happily anticipated Chen Xiaoxing's basic training workshop calling it the "torture session". Others are looking for new exciting things all the time. I guess you take your pick. [FIRST PUBLISHED 5/09/2012]

Natural is the First Principle

Standing in the Olympic National Park

The Daoist sage Zhuangzi advised - "It takes a long time to do a thing properly... Follow with whatever happens and let your mind be free; stay centred by accepting whatever you are doing. This is the ultimate... It is best to leave everything to work naturally..." Chen Fake is reported to have frequently advised his students to ting qi ziran, literally to "listen to nature" or perhaps more accurately to "go with what is natural".

During my recent visit to the USA I had the good fortune to visit the pristine wilderness of the Olympic National Park's temperate rainforests. On the flight back to the UK I reread the following passage from The Essence of Taijiquan:

"Taijiquan is rooted in Daoist philosophy. Daoist thinking holds that nature is as it is and that within the cosmos everything has its natural place and function. This can only be distorted and misunderstood when it is defined, labelled or evaluated. "The object of human wisdom is to fall in line with the Dao or the ways and laws of nature and live in harmony with them". Trying too hard is the surest way not to achieve - for example the Taijiquan practitioner who makes the mistake of "trying" to relax instead of just relaxing. Generations of teachers have instructed their students to practice according to the correct principles and let nature take its course".

It is important to be clear what it is we are trying to achieve in our Taijiquan practice. Take the training method of zhan zhuang (standing post) - why do we do this exercise?

- mental calmness

-postural awareness & structural integrity

-lower body stability,/upper body lightness -etc etc

Every Taijiquan student knows this, but how many achieve it? A saying in the Taijiquan classics states that we must go through the process of calming the mind - from this the emotions become stilled - from this the body begins to relax. An inevitable and inviolable sequence. Watch the masters standing - they look comfortable, often stirring slightly, readjusting their positions - clear in what they are trying to achieve. Contrast this with many people who turn standing into a kind of penance. Is someone standing rigid and unmoving really engaging with this process (calm mind/emotional stillness/bodily relaxation)?

It is important to sometimes let go of the desire to over-analyse. Get back to nature and experience its forces instead of reading about them. For a short time perhaps see the world a little more like the Daoists whose thinking shaped the art we practise:

Inward to outward expansion

Back to the forest.- the concentric circles within the trunk of a fallen 400 year old tree aptly illustrates the idea of inward to outward expansion (Taijiquan's peng jin). Also the layers of circularity hidden within the straightness of the trunk.

- trying to cross the Queets River my legs were taken by the power of the water. Not in a predictable direct push, but in a swirling uprooting motion - instantly finding any weakness of balance or moment of indecision as I try to find a firm foothold.

- watching the branches of the 10,000 year old forest move with the breeze - neither before nor after - neither purposive nor pre-emptive -but exactly in accord. Isn't this a perfect example of Taijiquan's listening skill or ting jin?

Respect to our friend and guide Kevin Fetherson (right) - ecologist/professor/man of the forest - for a great wilderness Taiji lesson. [FIRST PUBLISHED 26/12/2012]

Don't Just Look for the Good Things!

Training with Zhu Tiancai during his first UK visit in 2001

We are all striving to improve as we learn - even Chen Xiaowang says he's constantly examining and refining his practice. Some years ago, another great contemporary teacher of Chen Taijiquan, Zhu Tiancai, stayed in our home for about a month during his first visit to Europe. One of the things he encouraged us to do was to watch films of well-known practitioners, to see if we could spot any mistake in their practice. He explained that even if a master's skill is higher than your own, when you can pick out a mistake, then you have understood something important and can begin to work on this aspect within your own training. If the mistake is there and you cannot see it, this is indicative of your own level of understanding. Also, just because you have spotted some deviation doesn't mean you can do better, or that that practitoner's overall skill level is not superb. Here we are not talking about differences in choreography, but in deviations from Chen Taijiquan's core principles. Some people never get past the stance of seeing all famous practitioners as perfect and any suggestion that they could be making mistakes as almost sacriligious. Even highly skilled practitioners have deviations within their forms. Your ability to spot these is indicative of your own level of understanding. Drawing motivation from the fantastic skills of the famous teachers is great, but do it with your eyes open! [FIRST PUBLISHED 7/07/2012]

Chen Ziqiang - showing 100%

Chen Ziqiang - showing 100%

After the big response to a recent post about the pros and cons of simplified forms I found Chen Ziqiang's stance on Taijiquan training/teaching to be illuminating. He has just finished teaching a series of workshops at our school. Participants ranged in age from 14 to 75 with a great mix of backgrounds and abilities - professional Taijiquan and other martial arts teachers, lawyers, labourers, business people, teachers, an artist, some retired homemakers etc... All serious enough to attend the workshops, but obviously having different goals and reasons for training. Some travelled a long distance to be there (coming from Italy, Slovenia, Poland, Slovakia, Ireland...), others were students nervously attending a seminar with one of the Chen family for the first time. How did he deal with this mixed group?

Simple - "show them 100% of Taijiquan with all its possibilities, then they know what it can be. Then if they apply themselves 100% from their current starting point even if they ultimately only achieve 50 or 60% of this they will still have attained a worthwhile level of skill". To his way of thinking people should be exposed to Taijiquan with all its content and difficulty. All the low stances, powerful and intricate movements and martial content. Then they themselves can approximate and modify movements that are, at this moment, beyond them. He was adament that if students were shown things in the beginning in too simplified a format (or 30% of Taijiquan as he put it) then they were much less likely to be inspired to stretch themselves to the limit and reach their own true potential. [FIRST PUBLISHED 20/06/2012]

CTGB Laojia Yilu group