I think most of us realize the importance of transitions in taijiquan. Many of the best moves in the art are found as you move between the so-called end points of the postures. Just paying attention to the extension of a kick or a punch often misses the point completely where taijiquan in concerned. The forms we have teach us many wonderful transitions that contain many of the secrets of the art.
But what about transitions between moves that aren’t found right after one another in the form sequences?
Perhaps you can move smoothly from single whip to cloud hands or snake creeps down (xia shi) to golden rooster stands on one leg. Those transitions are all found in the forms.
But what about moving smoothly from brush knee to single whip to wild horse parts mane? How smoothly could you transition from one of those to the other? On both sides?
It seems that many of us are missing this perhaps vital piece of the puzzle.
This initially occurred to me in push hands. I was doing lots of form work, lots of single movement practice, standing, qigong, applications, etc. But in push hands, I had lots of trouble linking my taiji moves together so that they flowed smoothly. I ended up being a “one move guy” in that I would listen for an opening and then do one move. If it didn’t work, I would usually go back to circling hands until another opportunity presented itself or I was able to make one.
The thing is, there would often be an opening that I would see for another move, but I had no way to smoothly transition from my initial move to the new move.
So what about these missing taijiquan transitions? How do you deal with this problem?
23 responses so far ↓
1 wayne hansen // Apr 27, 2008 at 7:06 pm
in pushing you should be beyond form.
your art should intergrate into a wholistic formlessness that just fills up the hollow in your opponents ready to be beaten posture and naturally extrudes him from the confrontation.
2 Joseph T. Oliva Arriola // Apr 27, 2008 at 8:32 pm
Each movement “to” the 13 postures is like a separate picture. If we digitized the every micro change we could see infinite postures (unknown stances between the known endpoints.
In fact, we must understand that the endpoints. the known 13 postures are “somewhat” arbitrary and have become homogenized and institutionalized with use and popular acceptance.
As such, the seeming formlessness (the transitions in movement) takes form with every microsecond. Think of the unrealistic movements within the silent film. Think of the reverse punch in a karate front karate stance. Are they natural movements.
Tai Chi Chuan IMO gives us a chance to apply “natural movement” “natural power” with the “simplicity” of wispful gestures.
Sincerely
Joseph T. Oliva Arriola
3 Casey // Apr 27, 2008 at 11:56 pm
I think the kind of practice you’re discussing is a good idea. This idea that “the real master is beyond moves” is a misleading one, I think. Yes, a master’s body should respond appropriately without thinking, but I think you could only get to this theoretical “master”-level by years and years of working on applying actual moves.
I often see people making comments like “Taiji is a principle-based art, unlike EMAs, which only focus on specific moves.” I think this is mostly an excuse for not drilling lots of applications against resisting opponents. The hope is that if you become really, really good at the form then somehow you’ll know what to do automatically when it comes time to fight. The “principles” it has imbued you with will manifest and your opponent will go flying before you know it.
I think we realize it doesn’t work that way…
4 aedh // Apr 28, 2008 at 1:34 am
I find the push hands patterns to be good way of addressing this. push/press/roll-back/ward-off
similar to combos in other martial arts, only linked in a circular form. Previous training included practicing a move over and over and then chaining another on to the end and so on. This results in short bursts of two or three moves chained together. My taiji teacher was adamant about breaking this habit. His idea was that I should replace 1, 2, 3 with 111111. Even when “just circling” you should be constantly attacking/defending/probing/searching. Might be a matter of style though. The classics say the jing should be 100% focused in one direction, where as Zheng Man-Ching said 70%. Holding back allows for changes and correction should one “miss”. (Might be why you don’t see cmc practitioners tossing people in trees!)
p.s. just following the pattern is booorring. more fun if you change it up. sneak in extra presses, locks, sweeps, etc..
5 Dave Chesser // Apr 28, 2008 at 8:54 am
I believe that the actual taiji techniques are the path that lead to the goals we all seek. If not, then perhaps they all need to be thrown out.
I see lots of people that don’t try to ever do any of the moves out of the form in push hands, and I think that’s a shame. They are there for a reason.
Most people in PH only do peng, lu, ji, and an. But moves outside of grasp the bird’s tail show you how those four jins are combined with the other four taiji jins of cai, lie, zhou, and kao — giving you a rich pallet of material to work from.
Again, if people aren’t going to do any of the moves from the form in PH or application, then I don’t see any point in doing the form at all.
6 Morgan Buchanan // Apr 28, 2008 at 8:55 am
there are two ways of looking at postures from an application point of view. one is that they are a method of attack and defence that are useful against set scenarios, the other is that they are a series of postures that have been formulated as naturally occurring when we stick and follow the opponent and return his energy according to the path that he dictates. it may not sound like much of a difference but in terms of function it is a world of difference in terms of making the art useful and differentiating it from the external arts in which we have formulas like high punch is countered by high block and returned with low punch/kick, etc…
it can be useful to try to image the movements in the form (end postures and transitions) as a series of patterns that map points within a 360 degress sphere. the points are where our bodies end up when the four ounces is activated from a variety of angles. the tai chi body that has absorbed the principles/internal concepts, will stick, absorb and return along set paths dictated by the other person and surprisingly you can find yourself gong through a transition and wind up in an end posture without have intended it. same thing happens to me in swordplay. stick, listen, defelct, return and the other guy is cut and i’m in one of the moves from the form. try it out.
cheers
morgan
7 Ed // Apr 28, 2008 at 11:13 am
Well, let’s look at some example movements from the Yang family 85 form and see what transitions they lead to:
Danbian: Tishoushangshi, Yunshou, Gaotanma, Yunuuchuansuo, Xiashi, Gaotanmachuanzhang.
Baiheliangchi: Zuolouxiaobu (all three times, the same transition!)
Maybe it was meant as a combo?
8 meow // Apr 28, 2008 at 1:01 pm
imo theres no difference between ext and int, theres only good and bad m.a.
morgan, tai chi is the same as the block and return, trained reaction to response (as always a practitioner has a range of responses he can choose from (hence your various angles)
theres no point doing any m.a. if you dont use its methods, then again, better make sure youre using good methods
9 Morgan Buchanan // Apr 28, 2008 at 3:01 pm
hi meow,
i believe there is a difference between internal and external martial arts.
in terms of trained responses/responses to choose from etc…i’m trying to get away across the idea of not training to block and hit opponent with technique A if he comes at me with attack B - but rather to allow a response to arise spontateously from the tai chi principles (stick, listen, follow,return) that will in the end manifest as a technique.
following the principles gives rise to technique instead of technique being an end unto itself.
this only works if we give ourselves up and follow the opponent. it is a very hard idea to invest in because there is a lot of security in the idea of a set technique being the thing that will come to our rescue in a time of trouble. when i started tai chi i had to spend a lot of time letting go of mental strategies and tensions from hard ma training. i tried training both simultaneously but in the end, practically, i found that it had to be one or the other.
cheers
morgan
10 Morgan Buchanan // Apr 28, 2008 at 4:10 pm
sorry,
just to tie in with dave’s original point on transitions - the idea i’m also trying to get across is that if we consider all of the movements in the form as a library of forms (literally shapes)that arise from responding to listening through the four ounces then there is no strict distinction between finishing postures and transitions, just following the opponent with the “tai chi body” (or if you do hsing yi or ba gua then those bodies) and seeing what happens.
yes there will be methods that arise that resemble transitions and ones that resemble finishing postures, but all of them and variations arise from the principles.
cheers
morgan
11 Iskendar // Apr 28, 2008 at 5:38 pm
Don’t see the problem really. If you know the silk reelings behind each posture, linking them together becomes pretty trivial. Just follow those spirals
Should this be practiced: sure, why limit yourself to the combinations found in the form? Everyone should do some free-form moving now and then, linking postures together as the inspiration brings them. Great way to find the weaknesses in your understanding of the moves.
12 meow // Apr 28, 2008 at 7:01 pm
morgan, its still the same, only an unskilled fighter isnt adaptive to his opponent, and you will always finish with a technique that youve trained (strong biomechanics, keeps yourself defended etc), the moment you dont, youre open or wont have power etc. If the only difference is biomechanics // technique, then there still isnt any major difference between m.a. styles, bagua and xing yi are different to tai chi, liu he ba fa or tong bei, all the ‘external’ m.a. use full body power aswel, diff movement is all it is.
13 Morgan Buchanan // Apr 29, 2008 at 5:44 am
have to agree to disagree meow,
i’m not talking about skilled vs unskilled, adaptive vs unadaptive. just trying to point out the difference between technique and principles. principle gives birth to countless techniques.
i’ve done some boxing, hard japanese and chinese martial arts. with tai chi the power generation is different, and it’s not all about the power (how hard i hit the other guy), sometimes its about the not-power (emptiness/yeild). it’s not just about external mechanics but about how to link the mind and body together. to say that the only difference is biomechanics/technique is mostly correct but it’s not an “only” its a big difference. there is more than one way of using “full body power”. a western boxer’s full body power and a tai chi players full body power is a different kind of power (in terms of the way it is generated and the feeling at the other end).
cheers
morgan
14 meow // Apr 29, 2008 at 12:29 pm
i agree morgan, of course there are strategic differences (yielding vs e.g. striking the attacking limb), what im getting at is, if a hung gar practitioner were to use yielding, he is still using hung gar techniques, just expressing it using a different strategy (and it may be different to how tai ji does it), but in the end, there arent really any fundamental differences, all styles have to be relaxed and contract to generate force, all have to have the mind and body connected, and have the possibility to use all strategy (unless you limit your style to only one way of doing things) but yea i agree, there are differences, i spose it depends on your perspective as to how significant these are though
15 meow // Apr 29, 2008 at 12:31 pm
sorry if i keep invading your threads guys
this is just something im currently thinking about (not so much strategic differences, but the essence of offensive & defensive positioning)
16 YMAA.com // May 2, 2008 at 8:11 pm
Great stuff lately…two things:
If transitioning from one pattern to another, such as Brush Knee to Grasp Sparrow, is practical for a martial application, do it. If the transition you develop isn’t practical for the situation, then don’t do it.
I agree - training these transitions is a good idea, to keep the art alive, and to further build the patterns into your body memory. We practice drills of this kind sometimes in our classes to work on angular stepping, or creating practical applications of movements not connected in the sequence.
In the Taijiquan sequence, every single transition has a purpose, a martial application, with the exception of a few ’signature’ movements.
And, the other point, why practice the sequence at all? The form is its own entity outside of push hands (I see you are on a serious push hands kick). Only by practicing the sequence a thousand times will you program your body’s reflexes to ‘own’ other movements, which may then come out naturally in a push hands situation, or a real fight.
Peng, Lu, Ji, An are used so often because within those 4 movements is a vast array of possible practical applications, especially for a push hands competition.
Practicing the form also gives you an opportunity to practice all your other internal skills: abdominal breathing, five gates circulation, energizing the body, raising the Spirit, and development of your fa jing (internal power emission) through gradual increase of your Qi in the dan tians. Without these internal aspects, your taijiquan and push hands are not the internal arts they were intended to be.
And SO OFTEN you see people pushing hands with muscles tense, gritting their teeth, shoving each other with no internal cultivation whatsoever. Muscle tension creates Qi stagnation. That kind of pushing hands should not be called Taijiquan pushing hands.
17 neijia // May 2, 2008 at 10:40 pm
>Only by practicing the sequence a thousand times will you program your body’s reflexes to ‘own’ other movements, which may then come out naturally in a push hands situation, or a real fight.
Practicing a sequence is like performing a classical music piece the way the composer intended and “expressing” within that structure. Fighting/sparring/combat sports/ph competition/self-defense/combat/whatever you prefer is not “classical” but improvisation. More like jazz. To learn jazz, you don’t practice a classical piece 1000 times. “Owning” a movement comes more from “jamming” and doing “licks” 1000 times, not doing prearranged pieces note for note from rote which can lose “aliveness”, though starting with what a genius composer wrote is helpful and interesting. I practice a long and a short form but not to gain those benefits you cite (drills, free form push, sparring, improvisational form, focused qigong, zhan zhuang seem more important), more for fun. It’s still good “music”. I don’t want to copy the genius’ composition forever as 1) I’m not a genius 2) I need to “own” my own improvisation.
Iskendar said it all already:
>Don’t see the problem really. If you know the silk reelings behind each posture, linking them together becomes pretty trivial. Just follow those spirals
Should this be practiced: sure, why limit yourself to the combinations found in the form? Everyone should do some free-form moving now and then, linking postures together as the inspiration brings them. Great way to find the weaknesses in your understanding of the moves.
I would change “now and then” to “as much as possible” - hopefully that inspiration comes more and more the better and better we get.
On throwing out techniques - if you take a combat sports master from the “freest form push hands formats” of combat sambo and Pride mma like Fedor Emelianenko (probably the greatest ever) - he probably has mastery of 100’s, maybe 1000’s of moves. In each fight his “style” is slightly different - always “following” the “energy” of different opponents. His improvisational, fluid mastery is always there. The move he “applies” depends on the circumstance … yet he tends to win by a limited set of armbars. Even the geniuses seem to have some favorite moves.
18 Joseph T. Oliva Arriola // May 3, 2008 at 12:18 am
Neijia,
Agreement.
19 wayne hansen // May 3, 2008 at 4:31 am
1000 times is only once a day for 3 years.
20 meow // May 3, 2008 at 2:42 pm
1000 moves? probably more like 10, he just knows when to do them…
21 YMAA.com // May 3, 2008 at 9:51 pm
Good points…agreed…
but as a musician, I must also say that before one starts improvising and composing, putting in the hours of ‘owning’ the compositions of others is needed for you to truly be qualified and prepared to compose something substantial?
But, yes, what’s that story of the Xingyi master who was undefeated for years in all competitions about 100 years ago who used 3 or 4 moves to kick all asses immediately?
22 Joseph T. Oliva Arriola // May 3, 2008 at 10:45 pm
The 1 becomes the 2, the 1 and the 2 become the 3. The 2 and the 3 become the 5 and the 3 and the 5 become the 8. After awhile they spiral in repetition. Simple to the complex, complex back to the simple.
23 neijia // May 4, 2008 at 11:28 am
I think that’s overly emphasizing classical, personally. To extend the analogy,
1. I won’t compose a long piece. It’s been done, I can’t and won’t do it.
2. I aspire only to jazz.
3. I’m currently playing a crude rock. 3 chords, lousy scales, off tune, tempo is messed up, etc. I might not get to the jazz, but my rock is improving, and it works ok. It’s still art. Incidentally, my 3 chords are currently peng , lu, cai. No ji or an so much.
4. Sometimes I play with musicians of other genres. I wish they appreciated my preferred genre but hey, we all have preferences. I wish my fellow neijia genre enthusiasts would appreciate punk rock more. These are all influences for my personal fusion. It’s all good music.
Someone said we talk like theorists. I think it’s just that when we’re not playing, it’s fun to talk about music, and it provides some ideas for the next jam.
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