tai chi and chi kung

[Ish]

I train in wing chun and i have recently started to learn tai chi and chi kung (recently being a couple of months ago). I only practice it once a week. Do you think that only doing it once a week for about an hour and a half will help me much. Im interested in the chi building side just as much if not more than the fighting side of it.

[Repulsive Monkey]

little and often as opposed to lots once a week could be better. try doing it 20 mins a day because the accumulative effects should be felt quicker than just stimulating your Qi once a week. Its better to stimulate a little every single day.

[dave the dragon]

i would agree do it little and often . the best time to do it is either sunrise or sunset , but then again anytime is better than not at all. try just getting up in the morning about half an hour before you usually would and going outside (providing its not ****ing down!)and do half an hour simple exercises. I strted doing this a couple of moths ago and have sustained aswell as my 2 hour lessons once a week and the difference is very noticable.
I wish you luck!

[The Willow Sword]

Good Show ole boy! get the internal going to balance out your wing chun. if you can find a student in your wing chun class to do this with you ,,try doing your stickyhands training SLOW. instead of fast and slappy movements slow it down and begin to let your center work the hands arms wrist and so on. the transition from night to dawn is a good time to do the Qigong and taichi,,and the transition between dusk till evening is another as well. Face south when you do these excersises for south(in chinese fengshui) is the direction where the magnetic fields and energies emanate from,,but in the morning face east,,it seems that in alot of internal philosophies have derived themselves from muslim and obviously hindu precepts.
wish you were here in Taos New Mexico. I need more young students to teach these concepts to.
in any regard good training with your internals
Many Respects, Willow Sword

Whatever you think i am or want me to be,,, i am.
oh and,,,Jesus loves you, everyone else thinks you are an a$.

[Kevin Wallbridge]

It can't hurt your martial arts to go internal, but I wonder just what you mean by "the Qi building side?" I'm not a Qi skeptic, but what you are actually hoping to get from the practice? It may make a difference to the actual benefit you receive.

"The heart of the study of boxing is to have natural instinct resemble the dragon" Wang Xiangzai

[Ish]

Good question. I would love to be able to make someone fly accross the room just by tapping them with my little finger but i dont think its really going to happen. I'm hoping it will make my more relaxed, calm and peacefull. Generaly with the wing chun aplications I'm quite aggressive and i don't want to be like that all the time. I would also quite like to get the whole enlightenment type thing i've read about. Its also good for my health and flexibility. I could probably think of more reasons but i'm sure thats plenty. :p

[Kevin Wallbridge]

If your interests run to the martial I wouldn't try to force yourself to look else where for enlightenment. The martial Qigong path is as good as any other and you may find it suits your temperment.

The big changes to look for from Taiji and Qigong are the qualities of Beng and Song. Beng is a quality of fullness in the tissue and spring-like connection throughout the body frame. Zhanzhuang/standing meditation is a good way to begin to approach this. As you stand think round in all possible ways.

Song is a more difficult quality, but it is the critical balance to Beng that keeps the fullness from becoming stiffness. Often thought of as relaxation it is more than that. Song is a vitalized relaxation that enables deep absorption of force into the structure and creates the possibilty of rapid change of the structure. Song can be trained in Zhanzhuang as well, but the real key is repetition of the Taiji form. This is not a couple of times a week, rather at least a couple of times a day.

When you practice pay attention to the opening and closing in the body and look for places of maximum open and maximum close.

Let the movements be generated from the core of the body and try to let energy move through the joints and not get caught there. If you have a sensation of strength in the joints it is likely a byproduct of tension and a feeling of loose openness is probably quite a bit stronger in terms of body structure.

Harmonize the six directions (up, down, left, right, front, back), paying particular attention at first to up-down. If you lean you have to borrow energy from somewhere else, this is a sacrafice of power for no result.

Beng and Song are keys to real internal martial power. Beng gives full-body connection and allows the skill of sticking and spring-like force. Song generates structure potential and enables absorption and change. If you can find these qualities you will be well on the way to being calmer and more responsive than reactive.

"The heart of the study of boxing is to have natural instinct resemble the dragon" Wang Xiangzai

[Ish]

Thanks for the advice.

Do you believe in moving people accross the room with the slightest of touches? I saw a video about some one called peter yung (I think that was his name) Have you heard of him. On the video he can make his students move without touching them. I'm a bit scepticle because he only does it to his own students have you ever experienced this yourself or seen it done?

[Kevin Wallbridge]

The slightest of touches is something very different from no touching. The ideal of Kongjing or empty-force is to move people without touching them, but all my experience, as well as pragmatic physics, suggests this may be Fantasy Island not martial arts.

That being said it is possible to send people flying with a very light touch, I've had several opportunities to be the flier. It really comes down to a person with subtle body control and excellent structure (have I mentioned before just how important structure is?) is able to exploit the natural errors people make when they engage. We lean forward to extend our range, as opposed to using footwork to control the range; we grasp with the hands, as opposed to twining the whole body to grab; in our efforts to overcome our opponents we forget ourselves. When we do these things a high level practitioner can add their own power onto our initial mistakes and in effect we throw ourselves out. If our initial error is severe enough they just use only our own force, hence the lightest touch sends someone sprawling.

"The heart of the study of boxing is to have natural instinct resemble the dragon" Wang Xiangzai

[EARTH DRAGON]

many 100's of times I have seen people bounce and shake and even roll around on the ground from my qi-gong teachers treatments,I my self have only studied with her for 6 years and can already make peoples hands shake and move from a 10 or 15 foot distance. this is common to a high level qi-gong master, also their is a tape a usheiba throwing his students around without physical contact,that can be bought in the back of any black belt magazine, and it is very real,

http://www.kungfuUSA.net

[Nexus]

Who needs guns with super qi gong! Just point your finger and the people fly backwards. If that was the case, who needs airplanes either. Just keep pointing and they'll keep flying backwards until landing at their final destination. What a future we hold with the gullable and easily lied to people who are sadly enough, intelligent people of the martial arts community.

I wonder how you can throw someone who is well trained backwards 35 feet but a 45 (gun) does about 6... *shrug*

- Nexus

Freedom is what you do with what is done to you. - Sartres

[EARTH DRAGON]

I believe your post is a little out of context dont you think?.......PS you can only buy super qi-gong from super hero's, not available to the general public

http://www.kungfuUSA.net

[PlasticSquirrel]

something like that is far from the ultimate attainments in qigong. it really is not hard to believe at all. since you have never seen something like this, or heard of it, you assume that it is not true. you are forgetting that this is china, and we haven't known all that much about it until recently, much less qigong of a higher form than gentle exercise.

a high level master of qigong has no need to demonstrate these things, however, and will most often feel bad after showing them off to people.

[Nexus]

you must first see the real thing in order to believe it or happen to witness and that is the only way to validate it. But in that same sense, if what you continually see is fake even if you are told its the real thing, how are you supposed to believe it?

I have an open mind and am willing to allow people to unveil their skills as they see fit, but people in the martial arts community are more concerned with becoming super men then participating in the art aspects of the art. They want to walk around pointing their fingers and draining peoples qi from a distance while teleporting and drinking a cup of coffee all at once. Its a shame. And if you jump to the conclusion that I have not been shown these things and told they are real, I would tell you that I have seen several of these demonstrations, participated in a few, and would agree with people who say 95-98% of it is hypnosis garbage that people "WANT" to believe and so they do.

Believe what you want, it wont make you a better martial artist knowing there are floating qi gong masters living on top of mountains in china hiding behind their temples hidden deep within a cave. This is the 21st century, even if there was some true legitamacy in that, it is unlikely the people who are showing it off are any different from the people who want to believe it is real. They are just getting paid for their beliefs also.

- Nexus

Freedom is what you do with what is done to you. - Sartres

[taichi108]

Kevin, excellent explanation of the soft touch and the importance of structure. We use the same principle in Seven Star Mantis, and Yang Style. Fair Lady Works Shuttles turning, upward and out body structure with proper turning of waist with wrist turning out can be done so lightly, yet produce great results against attacks. Great post.

Steve

[EARTH DRAGON]

According to your comment
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you must first see the real thing in order to believe it or happen to witness and that is the only way to validate it. But in that same sense, if what you continually see is fake even if you are told its the real thing, how are you supposed to believe it?
not to sound crazy but this sounds like a UFO experience.... If you have an open mind nexus and never seen one how do know they dont exsist. Do you beleive their is life on other planets? and again I have never seen a flying squirrel but I do know they are out ther......

http://www.kungfuUSA.net

[Nexus]

will not make you nor I a better martial artist. Practicing my martial arts will, and even if I saw someone do the super distanced qi attack or whatever, it wouldn't give me any clue as to how it was done. Even if it were carefully explained, I would imagine it takes years of practice to become proficient at it. And even more odd I wonder why with all the intelligence the military has, why thats not its number one weapon. Just train all of your soldiers in distanced qi attacks and you would save tons of money on bullets and ammunition. You could just point in the direction of the country you wanted to attack and all of their soldiers would collapse under your qi fireballs.

Realistically though, it very well may exist, and until I see it, I will continue practicing what I have learned and keep an open mind. But in the same sense I will be skeptical with what I see so as to not spend years studying something that was created for the sole profit of its interpreter.

- Nexus

Freedom is what you do with what is done to you. - Sartres

[EARTH DRAGON]

that is true ... but you know what will make you a better martial artists......................opening up to the wisdom and power of things you are already practicing............kung fu

http://www.kungfuUSA.net

[The Willow Sword]

I think all that perpetual light is getting to you brotha man,,,,,,, :eek:

Whatever you think i am or want me to be,,, i am.
oh and,,,Jesus loves you, everyone else thinks you are an a$.

[Rory]

you shouldnt be praticing wing chun and learning tai chi do one or the other if you do both it could seriously hurt you internally and put you behind many years.

[Nexus]

What proffessional opinion is that quoted from? Your own? Is that a scare tactic to people who practice more than one style or do you have some evidence to back that statement up?

Thanks,

- Nexus

Freedom is what you do with what is done to you. - Sartres