Traditional Taijiquan

[Hobbs the vagus]

Does anyone have a reference to traditional Taijiquan training? What I am looking for is a book or Internet reference that details a traditional curriculum. What is your experience? Form training for how long, when applications are taught, when weapons and pushing hands are started.

I ask about traditional, because I think that many Western curriculums have been changed to accommodate our Western need for immediate gratification. Secondly, is there benefit in one curriculum over the other?


Hobbs

[bodhitree]

Yang Jwing Ming goes into Tradition training progression in Classical Yang Style Taijiquan. He has a list in it of the progression, I don't have the book on me right now but I could type the list up for you soon(probably after weekend) so that you dont have to buy the book.

[Ron Panunto]

Traditional internal arts training can still be found in the west, but the reason you don't see much of it is thatmost westerners won't put up with the training methodology.

Traditional neijia training requires a lot of standing, and nothing but standing for around 3 years. Traditional teachers will use this to weed out unsincere students, but most importantly, standing and holding postures (wu ji for taiji, san ti shi for xingyi, or in the case of bagua, walking the circle) will build the so-called internal strength.

After about 3 years of standing each posture is taught separately. You would spend a few months on each posture learning how to use it for self-defense from any type of attack.

This effort would take a few years. After you learn each individual posture the teacher shows you the linking moves to make it into a form. Most traditionalists were not into whole forms. They would specialize in just one or two postures their whole lives.

Weapons was advanced training. A lot of nerijia teachers even today won't teach you weapons until you have been doing barehand solo practice for 5 or 6 yaers.

So if you REALLY wan't to practice in the TRADITIONAL manner, start standing for an hour or two a day and in about three years post again and I'll let you know what to work on next!

Ron Panunto

[Hobbs the vagus]

Ron,

Do you think that traditionally trained students were told why they were standing? When and how was theory introduced?

Standing without reason requires alot of faith. Especially for 3 years. (Don't get me wrong, I believe your description accurate.)



Hobbs

[Laughing Cow]

Hobbs.

I don't think so.

Even my Sifu told a senior student recently when he was asked about the sword form the following.

"You are not ready for it yet I will teach you when you are ready."

I once read that the Yang 108 Form took 5~6 years to be taught, never mind mastered.

[Ron Panunto]

Hobbs,

No, traditionally students were not told why they were standing. The "theory" about why standing was good for you was not important. The only important thing was that you stood. Theory and analysis was not productuve, but the actual act of standing or holding a posture or walking the circle produced tangible results.

Traditionally it was considered disrespectful to ask questions of your teacher. You just did or imitated what he did. The student learned experientially by doing, not intellectually by questionong, analyzing, and theorizing.

By the way, I did forget to mention the traditional training sequence for neijia:

Standing (neigong).
Individual Barehand Posture Training, including self-defense applications.
Linked Posture Training (Forms)
Push Hands Training
Saber (broadsword)-easiest short weapon
Staff-easiest long weapon
Sword-difficult short weapon
Spear-difficult long weapon

Ron Panunto

[taijiquan_student]

I don't see sanshou on your list.

[StickyHands]

Originally posted by Ron Panunto
Hobbs,


Traditionally it was considered disrespectful to ask questions of your teacher. You just did or imitated what he did. The student learned experientially by doing, not intellectually by questionong, analyzing, and theorizing.

Ron Panunto

I see, maybe that's why too many teachers went on ego trips and considered themselves superior. When one stops being intellectual, all else fails.... mind over matter.

[Ron Panunto]

Taiji Student, if by sanshou you mean free fighting, it was more or less covered in the posture applications and push hands training. The students also got free fighting experience when their masters were challenged, since the challenger had to work his way up through the student body before the teacher would fight him.

Sticky Hands, I'm not sure what your saying about ego trips. If you are saying that intellectualizing is superior to actual training I can't agree. This thread started out discussing "traditional" neijia training methods. The masters of old were not "intellectuals", they were down and dirty fighters, generally from the lower classes - most were illiterate. They made their living as body guards to the wealthy, as caravan guards, or as soldiers. They were continually being challenged by competing martial artists trying to establish reputations for themselves. Intellectualizing about martial arts instead of practicing could get you killed pretty quickly. Of course today we practice "martial arts" as a hobby and there is plenty time for mental masturbation.

Ron Panunto

[looking_up]

"When one stops being intellectual, all else fails.... mind over matter."


Not so, IMHO - the "intellectual" part of your mind will never be
as fast as the intuitive part of your mind. Turn the intellectual
part off, it creates "noise" that gets in the way of inner stillness.
And this stillness is not just for meditation, it has tangible effects on the ability to sink qi and root.

[Hobbs the vagus]

"Intellectualizing about martial arts instead of practicing could get you killed pretty quickly."

Ron,
I agree with the above. So how did Taijiquan become such a "intelectual" martial art? What I mean by intelectual, is discussion of energy and body movement, perfect alignment..ect. I think you know. As aposed to say Shaolin which "traditionally" was trained to also keep from getting you killed, like taijiquan, but you don't see piles of books and internet discussion about Shaolin microscopic body alignment and movements.

I guess my confussion is that if "traditional" taijiquan was trained with out the mental masterbation, then is it truely necessary to the development of skills.

Hobbs

[StickyHands]

Originally posted by looking_up
"When one stops being intellectual, all else fails.... mind over matter."


Not so, IMHO - the "intellectual" part of your mind will never be
as fast as the intuitive part of your mind. Turn the intellectual
part off, it creates "noise" that gets in the way of inner stillness.
And this stillness is not just for meditation, it has tangible effects on the ability to sink qi and root.

You're missing the point. When you stop asking questions and rationalizing, perceiving to "your" own ego and self assimilation, then you become a mere drone, a simple soldier. But I can see why you weren't allowed to ask, since it was most practiced by people of lower class or illiterate? But during those times, I understand why it was done so this way in China. But when you're talking about intuitive part of your brain, are you referring to simple survival instincts or reaching that deeper calm where "inner stillness takes place"? If the latter is your conviction, then that is an aspect of intellectuality, you're confusing intellectuality for intelligence, most of us aren't real intellectuals and like having told what to do, in one form of another. How many of us really do become profound and a philosopher? Intellectuality is sort of like reconnecting with your self, pure knowledge which sometimes leads to discoveries. Im not saying disband training over conception of training, but a balance is needed, when you fight without thinking, it's not strategic, when you kill without thinking, well, either it's not moral or doing it to survive, you'd be the judge of that. Example, I would consider Bruce Lee a type of intellectual, not just a MA fighter. I thought Taiji refines the practitioner's character, isn't that a form of intellectuality rather than learning how to fight? If all MA was just about killing, then no need to learn it, just use a weapon. MA served a good portal to defense, more so than offense, and gave you a chance to live another day to be thinking again.

[Ron Panunto]

Hobbs,

The current trend to "intellectualize" the nejia martial arts on the internet is due to a number of different factors, but primarily it's because of the cultural differences between east and west. Taiji has been taught in China for about 300 years and no one had any problem learning it - they just followed their teachers instructions. Those with a good teacher, natural talent, and persistance became good fighters.

Now you bring this art to the west and the Chinese teachers tell us that by relaxing and doing this slow dance form we will develop "chi" and become peerless fighters. Wow, that sounds really cool and easy enough. So people start doing this (remember, this is back in the late 1960's and early 70's) and low and behold after a few years, nothing happens, they can't fight their way out of a paper bag. So people start questioning it. It becomes appartent that more information is needed to make this stuff work.

The biggest mystery to us westerners is what is "chi", and how does it power a martial art? This is where most people are still stuck and the topic that still generates most of the discussion. This is not a problem with the Chinese because "chi" is a product of their cultural paradigm. In the west we use language differently and try to come up with words that specifically define an object, idea, or process. It's not like that in eastern cultures. The Chinese use the word chi to describe hundreds of different phenomena. The food that they eat is chi, the water that they drink is chi, the air that they breathe is chi, the genetics that they inherit from their parents is chi, the magnetic field around the earth is chi, ad infinitum. So where does this leave the westerner when he is told to relax and do this slow motion dance and "chi" will automatically appear and then he can fight?

So the main problem is to first understand that this paradigm difference exists, and the second problem is to isolate the Chinese concepts involved in the neijia arts and then to do a one-for-one mapping of these concepts into the western paradigm.

Another issue that causes endless discussion is the difference in the various approaches to training amongst the different shools, i.e., Chen, Yang, Hao, Wu, etc. In the west we have a tendency to think that like our religions, there can be only one truth and that one style must be the best and the others either poor seconds or totally bogus. Here again, the Chinese don't think like us. They have no problem being Budhist, Taoist and Christian all at the same time. In martial arts development for every system that they have devised someone else has devised a system based on totally opposite principles. They both work quite well and the Chinese have no problem living with these seemingly opposite systems. It bothers the hell out of westerners.

Another issue that causes endless debate is the overlay of two systems over the martial arts. The first is philosophy. The Budhist philosophy is typically overlaid on top of the Wai jia or Shaolin systems and Taoism is typically overlaid on the neijia systems. So the debate is what influence, if any, do these philosophies (like the I Ching) have on learning the martial art?

The other overlay is that of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM). Is it really necessary to buy into the meridian theory to understand and progress in your art?

These are most of the issues that cause western martial artists to spend endless hours of debate while Chinese martial artists just practice. The Chinese know what and how to practice, while we're still not sure what to practice or how to practice it.

Ron Panunto

[dz]

What exactly is "traditional"? At which point did the "traditional" become non-traditional? I'm not talking about family styles vs. contemporary arts.

[Ron Panunto]

Well I think that the difference between "traditional" and "modern" is the relationship of the student to the teacher. In traditional schools the master was very selective of his students. He usually only had a few and they were recommended to him by a close friend, family member, or other martial arts master. The prospective student had to undergo the bashi ceremony of swearing allegiance to his master. He then became an "inner door" disciple and was shown most of the training secrets. The best of these students was then selected to be the next lineage holder after the master died. This disciple was shown all of the style's secret training techniques. These disciples typically took care of all the masters needs and treated him like a father. All fellow students were treated like brothers. It was actually an extended family.

Modern, or non-traditional, is where a teacher is willing to accept any student who walks in the door and is willing to fork over $60 a month for training. There is no implied student/teacher loyalty in either direction and the traning is softened to meet the student's needs and to retain students. After a few months the student leaves, declares himself a master and opens his own school.

Ron Panunto

[looking_up]

Originally posted by StickyHands


You're missing the point. When you stop asking questions and rationalizing, perceiving to "your" own ego and self assimilation, then you become a mere drone, a simple soldier. But I can see why you weren't allowed to ask, since it was most practiced by people of lower class or illiterate? But during those times, I understand why it was done so this way in China. But when you're talking about intuitive part of your brain, are you referring to simple survival instincts or reaching that deeper calm where "inner stillness takes place"? If the latter is your conviction, then that is an aspect of intellectuality, you're confusing intellectuality for intelligence, most of us aren't real intellectuals and like having told what to do, in one form of another. How many of us really do become profound and a philosopher? Intellectuality is sort of like reconnecting with your self, pure knowledge which sometimes leads to discoveries. Im not saying disband training over conception of training, but a balance is needed, when you fight without thinking, it's not strategic, when you kill without thinking, well, either it's not moral or doing it to survive, you'd be the judge of that. Example, I would consider Bruce Lee a type of intellectual, not just a MA fighter. I thought Taiji refines the practitioner's character, isn't that a form of intellectuality rather than learning how to fight? If all MA was just about killing, then no need to learn it, just use a weapon. MA served a good portal to defense, more so than offense, and gave you a chance to live another day to be thinking again.

I could very well be missing the point. We might be talking about two different things too.

Brief preface: I've been an amateur philosopher for some 9 or so years, mostly because I used to be very depressed and wanted to understand the meaning of it all so I could be happy. So I know all about that kind of stuff, and much good can come from deep thinking about things. But it won't really help your training, if anything, it will help you understand what's happening as you train.

I've made lots of mistakes in my taiji training, and I've found that the answer is always to stop thinking so much and to do the training. I always make things complicated, when they are really *so simple*. There are some things that your heart/mind will begin to understand, which could never be conceived by just thinking about things. And you will be strengthening your will
at the same time, which can become a formidable commander for your body and energy to follow.

It's not like I know that much about taiji, and maybe I'm already preaching to the choir. I just wanted to share my own experiences so that others could learn from my mistakes. But in reality, everyone has to figure things out for themselves through trial and lots of error. There's no easy way. This is one aspect of "traditional" style training, you have to figure a lot of things out yourself - but I benefit from "modern" style training too, my teacher will answer questions and repeat things more than once or twice. Traditional style teaches you to teach yourself.

Thanks.

[MaFuYee]

Standing without reason requires alot of faith. Especially for 3 years.

hobbs, (hobbes)
anyone who practices 'standing' doesn't need any explanation, because it becomes all too obvious after only a few minutes, why you are doing it.

standing/holding postures is a training/development method. - it's as simple as that.

some people would rather spend hours doing mental masturbation, trying to figure it out, but the truth lies in experience.

[HuangKaiVun]

Read Nigel Sutton's "Applied Tai Chi Chuan", Hobbs the vagus.

That book talks about the training of authentic Yang/Cheng style Taijiquan, though it doesn't give many specific examples. It pretty much matches up with the stuff Ron Panunto posted here.


As an instructor myself, I fall under Ron Panunto's "accept any student for $$" category.

Aside from the fact that I charge more than $60, I'd say that my economic survival as a sifu depends on NOT softening the training. This is because the students that come to me are forking over good money to learn and thus don't want me taking it easy on them.

Because I don't do contracts and charge month-by-month, I have to teach every single class as if it's going to be the last one for the students attending.

I am happy to admit that I'm deathly afraid that I'm going to lose all of my students by the next month, and that's what keeps me sharp. Most of my students have stuck for a few months now - and I basically opened my doors in January.

EVERY student that has signed on with me thus far has been interested in hardcore traditional combat training, not in softened training. I know that when I was a student, I didn't want to be babied and coddled in class. Neither did my training brothers, for that matter.

None of my few-month students have gone out to open a school yet at this point, though. All of them feel that they have a ways to go (at this point) before they feel ready to open a school, especially since they are getting in-class teaching experience on each other.

I welcome anybody to try our class, but the truth is that kung fu is pretty self-limiting. A lot of people see our men and women grappling around and run away. Basically, the reality of seeing and trying a class helps people figure out if kung fu is for them. I have never turned a student away, though obviously many students have chose not to study at my school.

There's a huge amount of loyalty at our school between myself and the students, and it goes both ways.