days 67 & 68: clarifications & tai chi qi-gong

concepts:

• shaving
• rooting in a push/punch
• ball qi-gong
• awareness & imagination
  

forms:

• Yang tai chi, simplified 24 movement

this--and the next few posts--is going to be short, since things are extraordinarily busy right now with my dissertation and job hunt. so forgive me if things are a little curt. i'll try to note everything covered in class, but it won't be very expansive this time.

day 67

we reviewed the entire 24 movement set in class, and then took some time to clarify the last few movements by going into detail with the ending sequences. Sifu made the following comments:

• turning reverse punch--it is important here to not raise the hand too high, since it's meant as a guard for the head. if too high, it leaves the head exposed and the arm vulnerable. the punch is not a straight punch, but angled so that the knuckles aim for the opponent's temple.
• parry--the transition from the reverse punch to the parry involves a slight circular motion of the punching fist, so that it brushes down and deflects an opponent's strike. the other, open hand comes forward near the deflecting fist. Sifu noted that the open hand should be pressing down on the opponent's arm. in addition, he said that the sequence should proceed with the fist coming back at the same time the open hand goes forward, and that the open hand should be shaving up the opponent's arm to their head.
• punch--after the parry, the rear fist should then come forward. Sifu noted that this is not just a punch, but can also be a push into the opponent. either way, the power should be coming from the root (legs, hips, and waist) rather than from the arm. for this to happen, the weight has to shift forward into bow-and-arrow stance, with the rear leg grinding into the ground in conjunction with the fist going forward.
• seal the door & cross hands--Sifu showed that the closing movements of seal the door & cross hands are actually joint locks, with seal the door being an entry and cross hands being a joint lock on the opponent's arms.
  

we finished the day with stances.

day 68

today was the beginning of tai chi qi-gong, with the class starting with ball qi-gong. i had this before from a previous seminar Sifu presented (reference: day 49: palm change 6, side B & tai chi qi-gong), so this was to some degree review, although i had forgotten most of it.

Sifu explained that qi-gong, at least in its initial stages, is meant to increase awareness of the body's internal systems, and also help train the mind's imagination. ball & bowl qi-gong, in particular, involve awareness through timing and control of breathing in synchronization with expansion and contraction of imaginary balls and bowls. he said both are useful, not just in terms of health (physical and mental relaxation and focus), but also in terms of fighting, since they develop skills needed for subsequent training--awareness helps the body manipulate force and imagination helps prediction and reaction to opponent actions.

today, we focused on imagining a ball held in our hands. as the hands expand, you're supposed to exhale (i.e., inflate the ball from the air in your body), and as the hands contract, you're supposed to inhale (i.e., deflate the ball so the air goes into your body). Sifu showed you can do this movement standing, with the hands expanding/contracting in the following ways:

• side
• top
• bottom
• diagonal upper-right and lower-right
• diagonal upper-left and lower-right
• in and out
  

after practicing this, he then showed us how to apply it in the first few movements of the 24-movement form. this involved a slight modification of the techniques so that we could visualize holding a ball in our hands. he focused on breathing in conjunction with each movement.

Sifu finished by saying that sometimes people do this using a real ball. he said this is a mistake, since it 1) distracts attention from breathing, suppressing training of awareness, and 2) removes the visualization of manipulating a ball, preventing training of imagination. in both ways, it defeats the training purpose of the qi-gong exercise.

we finished the day with Doria reading Sifu's bio--pretty impressive. i'm thinking she should probably make copies for class, since it's the kind of thing that would be good to know...not just in learning about the instructor, but in seeing an example of how one person pursued their path to knowledge.