concepts:- yin/yang
- wuji/tai chi
- posture
- reactive force
- Yang simplified 24 movement
for purposes of this blog, i'm going to denote the tai chi class by 2 days (i.e., days 54 & 55)--the class runs from 8:30-9:50am every Tuesday and Thursday, and since each session is so much shorter than the Saturday class (80 minutes as opposed to the usual 180 or even 240 minutes), i figure it would save time and make for easier reference to combine each week's Tuesday and Thursday session into a single post. each post will be divided up into Tuesday and Thursday components, so you can see the course distribution.
there are 25 students in the class--the full roster cap set by the university. most of the students have no history in martial arts, pretty much like me. from what i've been able to tell, many of them are in the dance/theater program, and so are taking tai chi to help with dance. but a few are in other departments, with Sifu saying a larger number are from engineering, so i'm guessing they're taking the class out of curiousity.
day 54
day 54 seemed to be the actual full start of class. from Sifu's introduction, it seemed like the previous class had been largely spent on taking attendance, laying out the course syllabus, and introducing tai chi. from what i could gather, he had also described to everyone that the course was going to present the Yang simplified 24-movement form, with the 1st quarter teaching the form, and the 2nd quarter teaching basic combat applications. for the 3rd quarter, the course would teach Chen tai chi.
Sifu began by discussing the notions of yin and yang. yin represents the insubstantial, yang the substantial. in terms of physical movement, this means that yin is associated with movements downward, back, or away from the opponent, while yang is connected with movements up, forward, or towards the opponent. in addition, yin is represented with yielding to force, and yang is tied with application of force.
next, Sifu introduced the concept of wuji and tai chi. he said wuji is the state of nothingness, which in Taoist conceptions is perceived as the beginning and end. tai chi is the division of wuji into differing states of yin and yang (so 0 becomes 1, with 1 composed of yin and yang). for tai chi quan, this means that the opening stance is wuji, and the initial step of unloading weight off the left foot and loading weight onto the right foot is tai chi.
with this, Sifu then led everyone through the first 6 moves of the Yang simplified 24-movement form.
following this, we did a brief discussion about the nature of posture. Sifu said that this was necessary for proper biomechanics (proper in the sense of the techniques being effective in combat).
he also used me to demonstrate the horse stance, and to show what was considered correct posture and what was incorrect posture. he pointed out that the horse stance was supposed to be a "horse-riding" stance, meaning that to be done correctly it requires knees in, tailbone slightly rounded, toes pointed forward, back straight, and chin slightly tucked down.
Sifu finished by telling the history of Yang tai chi. the original style was Chen, and was a tightly held secret within the Chen village where it was founded, but a martial arts fighter named Yang who wanted to learn tai chi disguised himself to become a servant to the Chen family so as to observe them and acquire their knowledge. eventually he was caught, but the head of the family, seeing that Yang truly understood tai chi, decided to teach it to Yang, with the condition that Yang never teach anyone outside his own family. of course, over time, this restriction was forgotten, and Yang tai chi has gone on to become one of the more prevalent styles of tai chi known and taught to the world.
this was bulk of class. the remainder of time was spent answering questions.
day 55
today was a continuation of the previous class, with Sifu leading everyone through to the 12th movement of the simplified 24-movement form.
Sifu took some time to introduce some basic concepts regarding shifting of weight. in particular, he emphasized the motion of the hips and the feet in moving from horse stance to bow-and-arrow stance. he also stressed the importance of imagining holding a ball that expanded and contracted in repulse monkey.
this was something we'd covered in the Saturday class, so it was nothing new to me. however, i could tell it was a major concept for people in the class to understand, and that it was something involving more concentration for some of the students--this, i suspect, is because many of them have no history of physical activity, and are probably at the same stage i was at in terms of kung fu-relevant physical coordination when i started (a little over a year ago!).
Sifu also discussed the mechanics of "rooting." he seemed to follow from the arguments he made last Saturday, and described the process of rooting in relation to the bow-and-arrow stance, first using the Chinese terms of "chi" and "dantian" and then interpreting them as essentially nothing more than manipulation of the body to adjust the center of gravity to utilize Newton's 2nd law (i.e., every force produces an equal and opposite force) so that an opponent's push is directed through the body into the earth, which is then used to send the push back into the opponent.
in response to questions, Sifu also demonstrated some combat applications of the 1st 12 moves. this was a revelation to me. Sifu showed that the opening move in the form (a step to the left) is actually a step to throw an opponent off-balance. similarly, he showed that the technique known as brush the knee is a strike to the opponent's knee, pushing them off-balance to trip over the practitioner's foot.
Sifu informed everyone that we would spend more time on the combat applications as the quarter progressed, and that we would definitely devote class attention to it 2nd quarter. for now, though, he said he wanted to do the demonstrations so that everyone could understand the intent behind the movements, and also understand the necessary mechanics to be correct.
Sifu also mentioned that as class went on he would provide everyone with the names of each technique in the simplified 24-movement form. he also told everyone that even though we would finish the entire 24 movements within the next week, that this was because for now we were just concentrating on learning the larger movements, and that we would start to work on the nuances of the form in subsequent weeks.
an interesting side note today was that Sifu gave the story of how he learned Yang tai chi--this is something he's never told any of his classes, including the Saturday class. apparently, it was not his choice. his father had asked Sifu's instructor for help in improving coordination and fitness, and Sifu's instructor had decided Yang tai chi would be valuable. however, his father felt he needed help in remembering and practicing the form, and so asked the instructor to teach Sifu. over time, however, Sifu said that he came to understand tai chi as a very beneficial thing to know in terms of health...as well as its combat value.
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