Taiji training with no push hands

[wudangmountain]

Hi all,

Question for all you taiji experts....


What are your feelings about taiji being taught without push hands training? The form and application of the forms are taught...so there is definitely a martial component...but no push hands. Am I missing out on an important principle in training?

[shizenjin]

In my opinion when it comes to Taiji, Qigong is the source, forms are the weapons and pushing hands is the practice.

If you want to use Taiji for its martial art then you need to practise it as a martial art.

Also, Beofre I got into pushing hands I didnt really know where to put my focus when doing forms.

[5Animals1Path]

Yeah, push hands is definetly the practice aspect. When I first started learning the form, I was always told how to move, and knew how I was told to move. After getting into the two handed pushing, I stopped knowing how I was told to move, and started to know how to move. It's a weird way to word it, but that's pretty much how I felt. It'll give you a measuring stick to put your form up against, and as your form gets better, the pushing gets better, and it all cycles through back and forth.

I'm not gonna say it's impossible to learn without the pushhands, but I'm fairly certain it'd take a martial genius, or someone who'd had a seriously extensive amount of work in a similar style to get the best learning possible.

[wiz cool c]

If you want to study Tai Chi as a martail art then you need push hands. If you want to study Tai Chi as a mind body exercise then maybe you don't need it. It's like doing cardio kick boxing for self defence. I have met Tai Chi guys who have done Tai Chi for ten years and never did free style push hands. I push with them and played around with them. I only had two years of Tai Chi training at the time. But I started doing free style push hands from the beginning. Going to open push hand groups. I even enterd a tournament before I was ready and tore up my knee. I had to do three months of physical therapy. After that one year later I competed again and won first place. If you want to use Tai Chi as a fighting art it is going to take hard work. Standing 40 minutes a day doing your forms over and over again. Pushing paterns and free style fixed step moving and restricted. No magic chi is going to make you able to defend yourself or fight against another trained fighter.

[Justaguy]

I've met people who's taiji is great and consider push hands a waste of time.
I've met people who's taiji is great and think push hands is important - but only one of many important training exercises.
I've met people who's taiji is great and think that you only need to practice push hands, saying that forms and qigong is a waste of time.

Find what works for you and go with it.

[lunghushan]

Hi all,

Question for all you taiji experts....


What are your feelings about taiji being taught without push hands training? The form and application of the forms are taught...so there is definitely a martial component...but no push hands. Am I missing out on an important principle in training?

You might actually have found a decent school. You can always practice push-hands somewhere else, but hardly any place teaches applications.

[TaiChiBob]

Greetings..

Push-hands is the bridge between theory/practice and knowledge/application..

Push-hands teaches us the appropriate links, contact, force, and structure for use in a more dynamic and random combat environment.. it would be difficult to teach someone to use "4 ounces to deflect 1,000 pounds" at combat speed.. push-hands is where we test and refine theory prior to applying it.. it's a bit like the internship for a doctor, i don't want my doctor to try jis first coronary by-pass on me.. he needs to have refined his technique under the supervision of a knowledgable and experienced doctor..

The subtle techniques and energies of Taiji are difficult to refine into the Art at the push-hands level.. i can't imagine how difficult it would be at combat speed.. Once we have developed proficiencies at push-hands it's easier to translate that experience into combat applications..

Be well...

[Justaguy]

How approachable is your teacher?

I know that some teachers are not at all interested in discussing the relative pro's and con's of different teaching styles beyond "My way is the best" but if he is willing to talk about it - it might be good to ask him why he doesn't teach push hands and if he thinks there's anything to be gained from it.

[charyuop]

In my little town it took me 3 years to find someone who could teach me Tai Chi. Finally last week I could abandon my Video teacher and go to a real teacher.
The teacher told me clearly that he cannot do Push Hands and he teaches in free of charge classes purely for health reasons. So I guess it is better than nothing
The teacher's master is a nice Chinese lady and she can do Push Hands, she is what people can consider a teacher of the real thing. Unfortunately my teacher told me she doesn't like to teach the martial art part of Tai Chi and in the past she was very picky to whom to teach it.
Who knows, maybe in a couple of years I might convince her to teach me hee hee.

[cjurakpt]

The teacher's master is a nice Chinese lady and she can do Push Hands, she is what people can consider a teacher of the real thing. Unfortunately my teacher told me she doesn't like to teach the martial art part of Tai Chi and in the past she was very picky to whom to teach it.
Who knows, maybe in a couple of years I might convince her to teach me hee hee.

don't be put off by what he tells you, just because she hasn't taught it to him; first off, I would ask him who she has actually taught it to, and maybe you can go play with them; also, why are you training with this guy if you know where is teacher is anyway? since he's not even charging, it's not like you're breaking his rice bowl by training directly with her instead of him; even if she doesn't teach you push hands (although, Chinese teachers are funny - what they might never even think about teaching to one person, they may open up to fully for another, just because it seems to be the right thing to do at the time - "when the student is ready, the teacher appears" - and all that), you are probably still going to get a better level of instruction in the form it self - and hanging around her for a while, yeah, she may decide to teach you to push: have you considered how to get "close" to her? I would start with house cleaning / yard work, with out any expectation of getting a thing...

the othjer answer is to simply find 2 or 3 like minded people in your area, go take a few push hands seminars somewhere, come home and practice together

[lunghushan]

Greetings..

Push-hands is the bridge between theory/practice and knowledge/application..

Push-hands teaches us the appropriate links, contact, force, and structure for use in a more dynamic and random combat environment.. it would be difficult to teach someone to use "4 ounces to deflect 1,000 pounds" at combat speed.. push-hands is where we test and refine theory prior to applying it.. it's a bit like the internship for a doctor, i don't want my doctor to try jis first coronary by-pass on me.. he needs to have refined his technique under the supervision of a knowledgable and experienced doctor..

The subtle techniques and energies of Taiji are difficult to refine into the Art at the push-hands level.. i can't imagine how difficult it would be at combat speed.. Once we have developed proficiencies at push-hands it's easier to translate that experience into combat applications..

Be well...

It seems like this kindof depends upon your definition of applications. Like a while back I got a video of the 13 form. It had this taiji form, and then the guy showed the 'applications', and they were all off of push hands. Every application was a push-hand type throw.

???

So I walked around asking people, about their taiji applications. One conversation went like this:

Sifu: "Taiji applications are all push-hands."
Me: "Then why does your form have a fist in it?"
Sifu: "There is no striking in taiji."
Me: "Then why does your form have a fist in it?"
Sifu: "Taiji applications are all push-hands."
Me; "Then why does your form have a fist in it? There must be striking if there if fist, right?"
Sifu: "The form is just an exercise. There are no striking techniques in taiji."

That's basically the B.S. you'll find most everywhere. So if you say that taiji applications are all push-hands, well, then I guess, maybe yes then you will have to have push-hands.

[Wood Dragon]

In my little town it took me 3 years to find someone who could teach me Tai Chi. Finally last week I could abandon my Video teacher and go to a real teacher.
The teacher told me clearly that he cannot do Push Hands and he teaches in free of charge classes purely for health reasons. So I guess it is better than nothing
The teacher's master is a nice Chinese lady and she can do Push Hands, she is what people can consider a teacher of the real thing. Unfortunately my teacher told me she doesn't like to teach the martial art part of Tai Chi and in the past she was very picky to whom to teach it.
Who knows, maybe in a couple of years I might convince her to teach me hee hee.

You might find it possible to attend a seminar, and at least pick up the basic elements of Push Hands.

[cjurakpt]

Sifu: "Taiji applications are all push-hands."

of course, that's not true: push hands is just one type of training exercise to develop hands on sensitivity at a certain range (trapping or pre-grappling); unfortunately, when it's all you know, it "becomes" the actual appliations, rather than a training tool...it's also a relatively safe training method to teach, so it's one that you can show to people who aren't serious fighters that they can do without killing themselves...

Me; "Then why does your form have a fist in it? There must be striking if there if fist, right?"
Sifu: "The form is just an exercise. There are no striking techniques in taiji."

that's also a load of BS - tai ji has plenty of striking - most of it is open hand / palm, but it has a few fist techs, as the form demonstrates (although they can also be interpreted as joint manips as well); also, the form is not "just" on exercise - it's another type of training method that is designed to get people to be aware of their own movement patterns, habiits and inefficicencies; it is not intended to be done slow for 100 years either if you want to fight with it - but again, if it's all you know or want to teach, then it becomes an end unto itself;

a lot of tai chi fighting stuff got "lost" because a) the teacher's didn't want to teach it as fighting, for whatever reason (for example, much easier to make a living teaching it as health pracice to lots of rich Mandarin nobles than it is to teach it as fighting to poor serfs; that is, the kind of people who might need you to SLOW THINGS DOWN so that they can get what you are doing and practice it in a way befitting their genteel status...); b) the teacher didn't know it, which, given a situation like in a) above, kinda makes sense;

my teacher has shown me some of the methods his teacher taught him to train fighting in tai chi - although it's unlike what you see in most tai chi schools, it isn't anything particularly esoteric and mystical, it's basically their version of the types of single and two-person training / conditioning stuff you see in a lot of different TCMA styles;

usually, the reason that things are the way they are, are for very simple, straighforward reasons that just get "forgotten" after a while...all you are left with are the BS justifications that fly in the face of common sense...

[lunghushan]

Well unfortunately it seems a lot of taiji teachers make up a lot of excuses to justify their existence.

Anyway, whatever. I've given up on looking for good CMA instructors. For some reason most instructors seem to not want to do very much in the way of applications -- instead they seem to want to argue for just wushu.

[TaiChiBob]

Greetings..

lunghushan: I hope my post didn't leave you with the impression that Taiji has no punches, or.. that push-hands is the top of the game.. neither are true. Push-hands is the "bridge" to applications, it is the training that sensitizes us to the subtle energies and delicate balances that can be managed in an application format.. Once you have a depth of "skilled" pushing experience, opportunities for strikes and kicks are apparent.. but, much of the pushing i have seen was no more than crude wrestling with weird rules.. Good pushing illustrates how to manage the action, good striking and kicking brings the management to a conclusion. Though, it is my opinion that one seldom needs to take it to that level, more often than not, it goes to that level strictly as a preference..

If your Taiji teacher(s) are only demonstrating "clever wrestling" as push-hands, that is a superficial element.. there should be much time studying effective power cultivation, expression, and control.. FaJing training is a basic element of Taiji, it can be manifested in every aspect of the forms, but is most evident and easiest learned as a strike.. Taiji is a fighting art, that is its heritage.. systems that have removed that crucial element are more appropriately described a Tai Chi QiGong, not Taijiquan.. When someone says Taiji is for health, i ask them how healthy they would feel when they are hospitalized by an attacker when their Tai Chi QiGong failed to manage the conflict.. it's okay to present Tai Chi QiGong as a health exercise, but it is irresponsible to let students believe it will serve them as a self-defense.. but, to teach Taijiquan it is essential to teach it as a martial art first, and other benefits as by-products..

Be well..