T’ai Chi Ch’uan: The Internal Tradition
One thing that struck me recently was the significance of one chapter to our current conversation about internal training and fighting. Ron perhaps says it better than I can so here’s a long quote. See what you think:
Body awareness is the foundation of our art. The practice of awareness is simple in theory yet in actual practice demands the utmost study and attention. It is a very radical practice. One is aware or one is not…To be aware is to feel; it is basically a matter of choice. This is where most people get stuck when working with energy. Rather than feel our backs, we want to do something, some technique…don’t become infatuated with techniques…even if they are martial techniques. The technique isn’t “it.” From one’s being mindful and aware of one’s body, qi arises as something tangible and therefore workable. So before qi can be experienced, we must participate and live in our bodies. Put another way: before we can experience, we must feel!
Whatever you experience is energy because everything is energy. Trees, clouds, people, your car; all consist of energy. Increasing our capacity for experience increases our capacity to perceive, to hold and work with energy. There is no separation between you and energy — you are it, this is it. Confusion arises when we put our attention on something other than the present energetic reality. When we have a thought of ourselves separate from the world, we perceive that way…
I don’t know what qi is. It’s an abstraction. I experience sensation; it is real. We don’t feel qi; we feel, period.
18 responses so far ↓
1 YMAA.com // Mar 18, 2008 at 8:57 pm
“I don’t know what qi is. It’s an abstraction. I experience sensation; it is real. We don’t feel qi; we feel, period.”
Feeling is the language between body and mind.
The nerves are electric fiber. Nerves without energy are dead. Nerves WITH energy produce feeling. The more energy, the more sensation.
The Chinese word for energy is…Qi.
2 Dave Chesser // Mar 18, 2008 at 9:51 pm
David,
Having read the whole book, I think that he’s trying to get people to go beyond the abstraction of qi or what they think it might or might not feel like and just FEEL, period.
All of the Cheng Hsin stuff seems heavy into actual experience rather than theorizing or visualing, which is a problem in some energetic systems.
3 YMAA.com // Mar 19, 2008 at 5:05 am
Yes, I get it. Great excerpt. And I agree. Feeling is more important than thinking about theory. But theory serves the very important purpose of informing people how things work. You need both: theory and experience. Just feeling is good. But, feeling with theoretical guidance helps you attain achievements more quickly.
I was only using his statement to illustrate the point for those that still are unclear or somehow skeptical of the existence of bioenergy, that without Qi, there is no feeling. I am reiterating (or perhaps just irritating).
Without Qi, you would not be reading this right now.
Without Qi, your muscles are dead meat. Stare at a ham sandwich. Now go stare at a pig. Does one of those have something that the other doesn’t? (aside from mustard)
Living energy. Call it what you will. What DO you call the energy within the 100 trillions cells your body is comprised of? Each cell has an individual life span. While it is alive, the cell acts as a dipole, capable of giving and releasing a charge.
A charge of…energy, aka Qi. Without this energy, your nerves are dead and you feel nothing because you are dead.
How can living people debate their very lifeforce? How could an Internal arts practitioner question the existence of Qi?
Taijiquan: before you even start the form:
#1. wuji stance:
“Sink Qi to the Lower Dan Tian.” (quoted from Taiji Classic)
If we haven’t practiced and understood that, why move on to “Begin Tai Chi”? Cool outfits? Im trying to be funny, but am just getting redundant.
Great forum, great discussion as always. Let’s have a moment of peaceful reflection for our murdered brethren in Tibet.
As the Tibetan tradition says pertaining to meditation and energy circulation:
“Not too tight. Not too loose.”
4 Buddy // Mar 19, 2008 at 11:59 am
Funny, when I was living in Cali Ron and were up for a tai chi teaching job. I got it.
On another note, if any of you read EF, I was not only banned (I’m Old Guard from WAY back) but banned from their server. I can’t even get to the site from my home computer. ALL because I exposed someone from the recent admin’s real reason for his involvement. I’ve had several conversations with folks who have been approached for commercial purposes so I know I;m correct. It’s a sad thing to see a once proud site end up like this. Anyone remember someone not even being able to get to the site? Anyway, Dave, sorry to take up bandwidth.
Buddy
5 Ed // Mar 19, 2008 at 12:25 pm
Hmm… Let me talk to the other admins for you, Buddy.
6 Ed // Mar 19, 2008 at 12:30 pm
Also, Buddy, I think it may be because your computer has cookies that are trying to log you in as your second (deleted) account; try deleting your cookies and logging in again, that may help. (If I am wrong, sorry…)
7 Dave Chesser // Mar 19, 2008 at 12:54 pm
Buddy,
I can’t tell what the hell is going on at EF. My advice would be to ignore it for a while until things calm down and they figure out what they’re doing. If things don’t calm down, there are other forums. It’s all good in the end.
8 tom // Mar 19, 2008 at 11:52 pm
You had two accounts, Buddy. Your account with username “Buddy” was deleted. “BuddyPilgrim” remains.
As to why anyone might get banned, it must not have anything to do with contributing nothing substantive and engaging in alcohol-sodden, self-pitying solipsistic rants. There is already quite a bit of that going on at eF already that doesn’t result in a ban.
Things will settle down at eF, with multiple moderators helping share the workload.
I don’t have a problem with eF getting a little money from ads, etc. It’s no more “commercial” than Dave’s blog here, and certainly far less so than KFM Online where a certain someone went to pout. Forums and ISPs cost money. DeVere carried the costs for years, without a penny of commercial benefit and having to endure the whines of petulant freeloaders. Phillips picked up the costs with a substanttially upgraded forum capacity and secured professional IT support for free. If he wants to run the contact information for his school in
the signature for his profile, so what? Any other forum member can do the same.
It wasn’t Brian who deleted your account, Buddy. It was a volunteer moderator who cleaned up your duplicate account. Try writing down your password somewhere instead of opening up a new account when you forget it.
9 Dave Chesser // Mar 20, 2008 at 7:42 am
Tom,
Fan/Brian was the first on my ignore list. He’s disgusting as is the way he conducts himself. He and his buddies Chris McKinley and Moling can have that place.
10 tom // Mar 20, 2008 at 8:43 am
2 things Dave:
I wasn’t talking talking about Brian’s conduct, just the “commercial” aspect of the forum.
Also, I was addressing Buddy’s contention that he was banned–his account was deleted, which is why he didn’t have access. Now it is true his other account is restricted, but that is a temporary timeout. He won’t have to kiss anyone’s sss to be reinstated. I”d suggest he check the vituperation, though.
Funny . . . I spoke pretty directly and critically to all 3 of the guys you mentioned and did not get banned.
But I’m quite glad not to be a moderator, there or anywhere. I was asked to during the course of the recent shake-up at eF, but respectfully declined. It’s a largely thankless task (I’ve done it before), and I have enough to do just moderating myself. ;- ]
11 Dave Chesser // Mar 20, 2008 at 8:59 am
Tom,
Understood.
12 Buddy // Mar 21, 2008 at 8:55 pm
“As to why anyone might get banned, it must not have anything to do with contributing nothing substantive and engaging in alcohol-sodden, self-pitying solipsistic rants.”
Tom,
You presume too much. I never offered you insult, that you do here is telling about you.
I joined Devere’s board not Brian’s board. When I hear that Brian slags Devere in private for “wasting EF” (when, in truth there is none) it makes me sick. I’m done with it, and won’t watch it devolve into KFO, which it will do. BTW it has nothing to do with signature lines. Clearly you’re in the dark. No matter. Don’t address me again.
13 Buddy // Mar 21, 2008 at 9:06 pm
BTW Tom,
Here’s what I get when I try to got on the site”
Forbidden
You don’t have permission to access /forums/index.php on this server.
Huh..
14 tom // Mar 22, 2008 at 4:30 am
“As to why anyone might get banned, it must not have anything to do with contributing nothing substantive and engaging in alcohol-sodden, self-pitying solipsistic rants. There is already quite a bit of that going on at eF already that doesn’t result in a ban.”
Sorry you think that was directed at you, Buddy. I have no idea if you engage in alcohol-sodden, self-pitying solipsistic rants. I was referring to the fairly extensive postings and the even more frequent chatroom conversations with those qualities on eF. That’s one indicator of the often-low level of discourse on that forum.
I was involved with DeVere when he was first collecting and organizing material for eF, back in 1999. I’ve been with the forum since its first incarnation. I helped moderate it for awhile. As long as it was run by Bido and carried by DeVere, I liked the whole loose, voluntary confraternity, sharing of knowledge and bad humor. If this had happened three or four years ago, I would have picked up the cost of new forum software and/or a new ISP with volunteer administrators and moderators. But my own CMA and cultural interests stopped being informed by eF back then, and my participation since was purely casual.
When Felipe announced the move to eF.net, I expressed serious misgivings about the arrangement. But I wasn’t invested in the forum anymore in any respect, and as Felipe pointed out, there wasn’t any other choice. So for me it was just a shrug of my shoulders.
As far as you being banned, well it’s pretty clear from the “Forbidden” message that you’re being blocked. That is from your home connection . . . the IP address for which is what would be used to block your access. What I was reflecting is what I was told when I mentioned your complaint to a number of the moderators (i.e., that your duplicate account had been deleted but you could still post through your other one).
In support of your contention, either Brian (”Y.”) or his software witch (”Z.”) could, with the Invision software, block forum access from your home IP address without action by any of the administrators/moderators. So I stand corrected, despite the “explanation” given to me by the admins/mods which I related here. Thanks for showing that message you received from your home connection.
As far as addressing you, well, I’m not going to stop. If you post here and make a point on which I have something to say, it’s an open forum in that regard. Feel free to ignore anything I say. And while I may disagree with what you say, I will give up my beer money defending your right to say it (not Voltaire, but close).
cheers,
Tom
15 Dave Chesser // Mar 22, 2008 at 1:34 pm
“I have no idea if you engage in alcohol-sodden, self-pitying solipsistic rants. I was referring to the fairly extensive postings and the even more frequent chatroom conversations with those qualities on eF. That’s one indicator of the often-low level of discourse on that forum.”
Yes, EF isn’t going to become like KFO — it already is like that and has been for some time.
Why?
One of the biggest trolls on the old board ended up buying it and his values rule. From that, certain individuals have spread like a disease and choked off any intelligent conversation outside of their narrow little parameters. That trolling should have gotten them banned. But not on a board where the owner himself values rudeness and confrontation.
Then those two disrespect the head moderator, another action that should have gotten them outright banned, but no again. Then that moderator steps down. At this point, EF is just a dog and pony show for the rudeness crowd.
But no matter. There are other venues for expression.
16 Buddy // Mar 26, 2008 at 3:29 am
My apologies Tom, it was I who assumed too much.
Thanks.
17 Herb Rich // Mar 26, 2008 at 10:19 pm
Dave, you nailed it with that one.
18 Dave Chesser // Mar 27, 2008 at 8:36 am
Herb,
It’s good to know I’m not the only one that feels that way.
Leave a Comment