Mindfulness in tai chi square form and round form

Mindfulness is an important operational concept in the practice of meditation. Yet, it bears different meanings in different schools of meditation. I am not going to discuss that in this post. Here, I shall discuss the meaning of mindfulness as applied in doing tai chi square form and tai chi round form. As with meditation, different schools of tai chi tackle or treat mindfulness differently. No explanation, of course including mine, is definitive. With this preamble, the following is my view on the subject.

For beginning students, they should not overly concern with the concept (and execution) of mindfulness when they learn the tai chi form as a mind-body workout. The best way to learn the form for beginners, in my opinion, is to learn the form together with zhan zhuang and some tai chi chi-kung exercises (like Wu-style 24 styles tai chi nei gong, and/or special supplementary exercises targeted to a student's special needs). It is only when a student has achieved a certain level of progress in firstly Joint-Opening and secondly in Body-connectedness (with breathing controlling to facilitate connectedness) should he learn mindfulness the tai chi way.

I know some tai chi teachers have said that the square form is there in order to set a standard so that different tai chi practitioners will not deviate (too much) away from the standard (like "Received pronunciation RP" in spoken English). This perhaps might be one of the reasons but certainly not the major one, some tai chi teachers also have said that the tai-chi sign is a circle with two round curves (the two fish), and hence true tai chi form should be done in circular rounds, i.e. the round form. Again, this can be regarded as one of the reasons but certainly not the major one.

Square form is sometimes called Form-of-the-joints (関節拳）。The objective is to use (and condition) our joints for chi generation. Mindfulness here means a practitioners shall focus on (the areas around) his joints (primarily his major joints, shoulder and hip). In his mind he should be (or train himself to be) able to FEEL the opening and moving of his joints together with chi-generation arising therefrom. In order to do that effectively, he has to stop momentarily when his joints change to a new direction, as required by the form movements. While he has to find the point-of-maximum-resistance in his joints (and move to overcome such resistance), most of the time, his movement will be in a straight line. Hence, the external appearance of square form. Chi-wise, he will feel chi concentrated more around his major joints (some physical and mental endurance is required for progress - a sign of training effect); and therefore will not be conducive to moving meditation.

Round form presupposes some progress in square form for a practitioner. The reason is that without a certain level of effective joint opening, the round form cannot generate enough chi for mind-body workout purpose, and certainly cannot achieve the objective of further opening the joints and more powerful chi generation. While doing the round form, a practitioner shall focus on the efficient flow and balance of chi inside his body. With efficient flow and balance, his internal sensation will be "full of chi", and therefore conducive to moving meditation. In order to achieve effective whole body chi-balancing, heightened chi generation in the joints need to be dampened (i.e. not done in the square form way). And when chi is thus generated in the joints, such chi shall be mindfully made to flow efficiently to the rest of the body to achieve a state of body-connectedness (as an internal sensation). To achieve the above, the external form will be round.

Last remark: insightful readers might have noticed that, based on the above analysis, a mix of square and round movements (in different degrees and in different choice) can be used in a student's daily practice, based on his own unique mind-body condition - which is exactly what a seasoned practitioner should do!

Japanese Zen and chi

Traditional Japanese art disciplines like Noh (能 theatre), kado (花道 Japanese flower arrangement), shodo (書道 Japanese calligraphy) and Sado (茶道 Japanese tea ceremony) are Zen like, as in some traditional martial arts, like kyudo (弓道) and kanto (劍道). Their graceful movements are activated by chi. Those of us who have learned practising tai chi as moving meditation may wonder: How can quick movements be conducive to chi generation rather than chi dissipation? How can Japanese geidō (The way of arts 藝道) be called Zen-like or meditative-like? Isn’t Zen as a mind-body discipline should be practised as seated meditation?

In the Western world, when a person likes to have some Zen experience, chances are that he will attend a Zen meditation session/class, or go for a Zen-retreat (if he belongs to the middle-class) where he will spend a few days, with his cell phone locked and his mouth shut, doing seated meditation and having vegetarian-meals. The original idea of Zen, as it came from China, was for a Zen-practitioner to be able to practise Zen 24/7: in Zen (Chan 禪) lingo it is called: “Zen in walking, living, sitting and sleeping”. How to accomplish this?

The Japanese way of doing it is through rituals practised into perfection. During such ritual (assuming practised into perfection), a Zen practitioner can free his mind from logical, rational or worldly constraints. In Japanese Zen-lingo, the ability of doing so can be understood through the concept Jo-ha-kyū (序破急), roughly translated to "beginning, break, rapid", it essentially means that all actions or efforts should begin slowly, speed up, and then end swiftly. It is important that in the “beginning” chi will be internally generated (how it is done is another story), and then break/release/explode, and finally a sudden stop. The break is the movement with chi, and the final stop is used to stop chi from further release and hence facilitate the effectively regeneration of chi by retaining chi, and (very importantly) by storing or trapping chi which was generated by the momentum of movement itself! One example, in Noh theatre, one way of forward movement is use small steps in which each foot moves forward with sole touching the ground (like Yi-chuen’s friction steps); and in the end of the small forward movement, the toes will tilt the foot slightly upward and then gently tap back on the floor to stop the chi.

Needless to say, to perfect a Japanese geidō, repeated chi-training with great patience is required. “How to ritualize one’s daily life into Zen” will be another story of a future post. Stay tuned.

The positive and the negative aspect of any side effect in chi kung

In the practice of chi kung, the same side effect can be either positive or negative! A side effect that some literature talked about is "trapping of chi" in certain parts of a practitioner's body. The general advice is that it is bad for the body and should be avoided; and if it happens to a student, a qualified coach is to be consulted. Dropping out of the practice may end up to be the unavoidable final solution in severe cases. And, if the trapped chi is inside one's head, it might lead to severe headache or can even trigger an onset of psychosis! Doesn't it sound scary?!

Chi is powerful energy. When it is trapped in certain parts of our body, it will try to "reach out" and to "neutralize" itself. The target of reaching out is another chi (or excited) point. In the most generalized situation, it will try to reach out to our stretched hands (and fingers). For seasoned practitioners it will also reach out to their feet and stretched toes. For the most seasoned practitioners, it will reach out to any internal points energized by the practitioners themselves through subtle body adjustment, breathing and mental focusing. These internal points are essential for training. In tai chi chi-kung, these are our joints (that's why tai chi classics says: opening our nine joints), plus our Dantian. In meditation, they are our chakras. In microcosmic circulation, it is our spine.

Now for practitioners who are progressing along their learning path (which incidentally include the most seasoned practitioners), there will be cases, during chi movement, when such chi is blocked in certain parts of our body. With a path is blocked with chi still coming along the way, chi will be highly concentrated in one point (or small area), making the practitioner feel very uncomfortable. It can be quite scary when one experiences it the first time. This is the negative aspect of chi kung side effect. Some students will drop out when they encounter this.

Luckily there is a positive side. Trapped chi is really a challenge to a practitioner who aims high. With or without the help of his teacher, a courageous student/practitioner will try out methods (subtle movements and mental focusing) advised by his teacher. However such teacher-suggested solution is likely to be inadequate because a teacher does not share his student's same internal sensation (a good teacher of course can infer and deduce through observation and touching), and without feedback to any progress (with such progress being difficult to verbalize). Only with good feedback can a student further fine-tunes his solution accordingly. Therefore, in addition to his teacher's advice, a student will also need to try to improvise, and by trial and error, divert chi through the path that has been blocked, say frontal attack to clear the blockage or gently move chi sideways to bypass the blockage and soften it in the process.

His improvisation and trial and error methods, using his own body as his experimental subject, a student will be able to make big progress in his practice - both opening (or softening) the blockage and in the process understand his own body better. Courage and dedication to his art is essential. And only through such experience (which can be many, and will be getting more and more controllable/manageable), can a practitioner progresses to the highest level and become a true master of the art himself. Chi kung is a sophisticated and complex internal discipline. Only masters who have gone through such experiences (and benefited from them) who are qualified to teach.

The above comes from my own experience: learning and teaching.
(edited on 13 Dec 16)

The three ways to do tai chi forms

Most people have heard about the three different ways to do tai chi forms: the square form, the round form and the fast form. The "general practitioners" usually only do the round form. For serious practitioners who use tai chi as the main, or only, system to do workout, understanding and practice of the three different forms are required. And here I am talking about serious training, through which a practitioner can reap full benefits - and therefore a practitioner will/can feel "strong workout/exercise effects" after his training session. Below is the theory behind these three forms, needless to say, actual learning and practice is a more complex matter and most likely will require the personal coaching of an experienced teacher.

Square form: in doing thee square form correctly, a student must carefully align his structure, in particular those joints responsible for the next movement (primarily shoulder and/or hip joints). Like shooting an arrow a slight movement to the opposite direction will be beneficial to initiate the movement.  The internal sensation is finding the points of maximum resistance while the objective is to open one's joints (and strengthen it at the same time). Analogy in Chinese calligraphy is 楷書 (regular script)。

Round form: This presupposes a prior training of square form. With prior proper joint opening/strengthening, round form aims at "rounding the angles in the joints" (as per points of joints being aligned during square form). The movements themselves will look simplified when compared to the square form. Without prior training in square form, round form will look structurally weak. With prior training in square form, the curved angle will have power to deliver a strong rounded structure. Analogy in Chinese calligraphy is 草書 (cursive script)。

Fast form: The fast form as it name suggested is to be executed (visually to an outsider) faster than both square and round forms. Prior training in square and round form is required. Its form is similar to round form but can be much more cursory and is practised in such a way that a sudden explosion of power while doing like the round form. The explosion of power is fast and quick. And the power comes from overcoming the internal resistance of our body (primarily our joints), and thereby trained our body's ability to externalize power with full-body connectedness. A practitioner here is free to choose which individual movements he wants to externalize his power for training purpose. 

The above is the gist of tai-chi's training method as in internal martial arts. It is an excellent way to improve our health and strength for people of any and all ages. Needless to say, full-contact combat training (conditioning side) has to include elements of external martial arts (for example, should include hitting a heavy bag for strengthening one's "points of contact" and building up the line of power transmission between the body and the "points of contact"). But the fact is that those who are interested in full-contact combat will most likely not be interested in tai chi, and those who are interested in tai chi will most likely not be interested in full-contact combat. As a result, the training of modern tai chi will be sufficient using the three different forms (square, round and fast) as far as the interest of students is concerned.

How to breathe in doing tai chi

How should we breathe when we do our tai chi form, of whichever lineage? The correct, but not so correct, answer is 'normal breathing'. Why not so correct? It is because we have to learn power breathing first before we can do proper tai chi form using normal breathing. And tai chi form has to be done using normal breathing that can have the effect of power breathing. If the above doesn't sound too strange to you, read on!

Before we can put down something we have to lift it up in the first place! It is essentially the same in the practice of tai chi. Tai chi is moving meditation. A student has to do it slowly with a meditation mind in a meditative zone. And only in a meditative zone can a student relaxes his joints and allow his breathing muscles to do their proper job, in addition to allowing inertia and the force of gravity to take part. Such meditative approach however will be ineffective without prior conditioning of one's body - or "lifting it up first".

How to train our body (or lift up our body)? There are two basic areas to be trained: the first one is opening one's shoulder and hip joints, our major joints, primarily using the method of "finding points maximum resistance", and the closely related second one is learning how to do power breathing.

I have explained the former in previous posts. Breathing needs more explanations here.

Firstly, tai chi breathing, when doing tai chi forms, requires a practitioner to be able to generate chi both while inhaling or exhaling. When a student can do it this way, he can forget about when to breathe in, when to breathe out; his simply needs to breathe as his movement flows.

Secondly, while breathing (inhaling and exhaling), our breathing muscles (primarily our diaphragm) must be able to open our joints (hence joint opening has to be/is being trained together with power breathing). Power breathing is like weight lifting. The weight to overcome here is the "sluggishness of our joints".

Thirdly, such power breathing has to be trained separately (with some prior joints opening training) and preferable with the personal guidance of a good teacher.

Traditionally, such training is to be done separately from tai chi form. And it is traditionally call tai chi nei-gong or tai chi chi-kung.

The training sequence should be: first tai chi chi-kung (both power breathing and joint opening), second tai chi form and finally tai chi chi-kung and tai chi form in sequence during a training session.

The concept of touch in coaching

In the internal arts, the most important things happened inside one's body. In training, it is the internal that affects the external. The primacy is in the internal, which however, cannot be observed! It creates a problem for the teacher.

The way to overcome it is through touch. In the modern world where teachers and students are treated as sellers and buyers, with limited emotional attachment (which in the past the relationship is more paternalistic, like master and disciples). Touch is, or can be, problematic, more so, for the opposite sex. So much so, nowadays some teachers do away with touch altogether. And so much so, some teachers have lost the skill of touch in their training repertoire (assuming that they have picked it up in the first place, apparently some of them never). 

In my opinion, the use of touch to gauge the internal chi of a student is an important training skill of a teacher of the internal arts. Reserving the technique in door is not a solution, because touch can be problematic in the modern world - for both teacher and student, and can create discomfort or misunderstanding in either side.

The correct approach is firstly do coaching in the open rather than in private. And secondly limit the touch to the arms (hands, elbows etc) and the shoulders. My experience is that limiting to these areas will be good enough, in most cases, for a good feel of a student's chi level and for the teacher to manage his/her student's chi accordingly. Should an external point force is needed to stimulate chi in a particular area, the use of an external object (wall, table or tennis ball against a hard surface) will be good enough. 

Needless to say the above is my personal opinion, different teachers might have their different approaches to the subject. As the old saying goes: the proof is in the pudding.

The primacy of finding resistance

If you ask me what is the most important training concept conducive to good progress in the internal arts, I will say it is the finding of internal resistance (in both the stationery form and the movement form). It is more obvious in the movement forms and less obvious in the stationery forms.

In the "external" arts, which include lifting weights in a gym and moving our body forward as in jogging. External resistance has to overcome in order that exercise effects can be felt and workout benefits can be obtained. In the internal arts, it is all about finding internal resistance to deliver the exercise effects. In the external form, an appropriate resistance has to be used (from light to heavy in lifting weights in a gym and from variation of speed and duration for jogging, still taking these two as examples). One major difference between external and internal: the amount of external resistance can be seen (or externally determined) while the amount of internal resistance requires a student to "experience internally" (made easier with the assistance of good teacher, but not essential for some students).

Hence, when you do your tai chi form (or tai chi chi-kung/nei-gong), if your internal sensation (and your overall workout effects) tells you that "it is so easy to do the movement", most likely you have not been able to find the appropriate amount of internal resistance. In the movement forms, internal resistance should primarily be found in the movement of your major joints (shoulder and hip/pelvic). When you cannot find it, your teacher will tell you to "relax and open" (Song 鬆). And he is right. If he is a good teacher, he will also warn you against, the other-side-of-the-coin, collapse (relax without open, 塌). And he is right again!

In stationery form (more so in seated than in standing) the issue of finding resistance is more difficult to teach and for the student to "feel" or "learn". The criteria of success though is easy to define. For example, if you do your microcosmic circulation （小周天）, if you cannot feel a strong resistance in or around your spinal cord when you move your chi up, most likely you have not reached the state. Don't worry, practise more (preferably under the guidance of a good teacher). Likewise, when you are doing chakra opening of, say, opening your heart chakra, you cannot feel that there is a resistance working against such "trial opening", you still have a (long) way to go. Again, no worry, the process of "trial opening" is internal workout per se, provided that you are focused and alerted to finding just a tiny bit more of resistance, and trying to work against it, during each session of your practice.

How about the scenario that you completely fail to understand what I am talking about? Probably you have not passed the preliminary stage and you should spend more time in doing zhan zhuang and a few simple movement forms. Zhan zhaung is far better than seated meditation for beginners - needless to say, my personal opinion only.

Zhan zhuang as diagnostic tool

Zhan zhuang can be used as an excellent diagnostic tool for one's structural form (or posture) for an experienced practitioner or new practitioner, provided that he can relax and can focus on balancing his internal chi. A teacher (sifu) will be beneficial to see it happening. Once a person's structural form can be visualized, its perfection, or in most cases, its imperfections can be seen and areas of focus in training can therefore be identified.

The process is simple. With the guidance of an experienced teacher (personal guidance is sufficient for experienced practitioners), a student is to move into the zone between asleep and waking up, with his eyes closed, always tending towards the sleeping side, while maintaining the ability to stand up in a zhan zhuang form. Points (fingers and hands) stretched while body relaxed should be observed. After being in the zone, a student will initially experience an imbalance of chi (if he can actively relax his muscles into deep-dead feel while keeping his stretched parts as slightly stretched as possible to maintain a chi-gradient). A teacher's chi managing help will be beneficial (but not essential) for most students. Such help essentially means managing a student's chi-flow through elbow chi-touch by his teacher.

After ten to fifteen minutes, a student is asked to calmly open his eyes, keep his body form, and keep his chi balance. He will be surprised to find out that his natural chi-balanced posture is far from perfect. Bravo, he starts to "know himself" (a tai chi lingo), and has a visual road-map for training.

Why do you need a teacher in the internal arts

Why do you need a teacher in the internal arts? To phrase it differently, we can say: What a good teacher can contribute to a student's practice? Nowadays we have books, videos, seminars by famous masters (free or paid), do we really need a personal coach to teach us the internal art?

Like every physical (or mind-body) discipline, for the internal arts, a good teacher can lead us faster on our path of learning. A tennis coach once told me that it is very difficult for him to correct the incorrect movements of a player whose muscles have ingrained with inappropriate conditioning, more so for tai chi, chi kung and other internal arts. More so because the internal arts are difficult to teach; another side of the coin is: there are not many good teachers who know how to teach effectively!

A feature of the internal arts like tai chi is, the movements are simple. A student doesn't know whether he is doing it right or not by just comparing externally his teacher's and his own movements (unlike tennis, players can see results and any hindrance to his own progress). As a result, a tai chi student may have been practising his art for a number of years but still not able to do tai chi in the correct way and therefore cannot reap its full benefit (if reaping any significant benefit at all).

What is the most important training tool of a good tai chi (or chi kung) teacher? It is the method of creating the correct chi-movement inside a student's body through hand/arm touching. It is no easy skill. Firstly it presupposes that the teacher can "experience and manage his own internal chi movement"  (well, for simple movements like tai chi [or meditation!] a student really can't tell whether his teacher knows his stuff!). Secondly the teacher has to know the art of "listening to the internal chi movements of others" through hand/arm touching. Thirdly the teacher must have the experience to help "create chi movements inside his student's body" through hand/arm touching.

Needless to say in addition to this major training tool, a good teacher must also have other tools (which I shall discuss in future posts).  My opinion is that this major tool is THE qualifying tool for a good teacher of the internal arts.

To practise in order not to practise

I have often heard students of the internal arts complained that they do not have enough time to practise. As a result, their progress become slow, and when they are busy with other chores in their busy life for a couple of months, they may give up their practice all together. The positive thinkers' approach is to condemn the "lazy" students: "You have to find time to practise!" But how much time is enough? My approach to this issue is "To practise in such a why that you do not need to allocate special time in your daily life to "practise". But how?

One obstacle of the internal arts (like chi kung, tai chi and meditation) is that progress is slow, in particular in the beginning stage (how long is the beginning stage depends on each student and depends on how his sifu teaches; and of course also relevant is his attitude in learning). The reason is that a student needs to loosen his major joints (shoulder and hip) to a certain degree, plus the internal sensation that he can direct his internal chi to nano-ly "move his major joints. In traditional lingo it is called "change of Jing" (換勁). Fair to say, the tradition lingo is not explanatory!

This stage can be jump-started with the good coaching of an experienced sifu. The time needed varies. I have students who can get the gist of it after a few lessons. And I have students who can only get it to a proficient level after more than three years! (Honestly speaking, I have also seen people, not my students, doing the internal art for decades and still failed to get it).

The second stage is a stage of self exploration. In this stage a student, armed with opened major joints (traditional lingo: Song 鬆), will explore changes in his internal sensation (or experience) while doing zhan zhuang, seated motivation or moving forms). At this stage good communication with an experienced sifu will be helpful. Such communications however need not be very frequent, because most of the time a student has to explore rather than to ask. And in asking, chances are that it will be more like: "Sifu, this is my internal sensation, am I on the right track?" In my coaching experience, the best approach for a student in this stage is to focus on healing his specific ailments (like back pain). The reason is that firstly a student will have the necessary motivation, and secondly changes in his internal sensation will come to be experienced as more distinct when he focuses on his own problems.

After these two stages, a student can decide how much time he spends on his practice. To maintain his level of proficiency in the art, he only needs very little to practice. Very often, he can incorporate such fine-tuning in his daily life (for example, when he is commuting in the subway: the way he stands and the way his connects different [his chosen] parts of his body.) If a student wants to further progress, in addition to learning more techniques from his sifu, he should try to teach what he has learned to other people. Teaching the art is far from easy, any one who has taught the art and are honest enough to measure the progress of his students (vis-a-vis time spent in coaching and practice) can appreciate the depth and breath of the internal arts. Yet, to maintain one's level of proficiency at stage two, one really doesn't need to spend much extra time in practice!

All structural problems can be solved...almost!

Japanese are great preservers of traditional Japanese internal arts. They also great carriers traditional Chinese internal arts, interpreted in their own cultural way, oftentimes also using modern concepts. The Japanese are very systematic in their disciplines. Recently I came across the writings of a lady healer who among other things claimed that 99% of her patients' bodily pains caused by structural imbalance can be cured. I can't agree with her more. Why? The theory goes like this.

Our joints, primarily ball-and-socket and hinge, are there to facilitate our movements. As such the articular cartilages need to be separated by the synovial fluid inside the joint, the cartilages being held in position by the ligament and supported by our tendons. Joint pain arises because some parts of the articular cartilages of the adjoining bones touch and scratch upon each other. It is ultimately caused by an overuse (at certain angle or orientation), and it is immediately caused by the collapse of a certain point(s) separating the cartilages and weakening and shortening of the affected tendons. What makes a cure by chi kung possible is that the collapse is only one pointed or single sided. If we can lift up (or slightly separate) our joints, train our tendons, re-position our bones, so that our bones will be jointed together at a slight different place (with strengthened tendons), then the articular cartilage will not touch upon each other while the joint is in action (i.e. the person in movement in respect of the joint concerned). And we are cured!

It can be done by finely-conditioning of our tendons around our joints. And it can be achieved with a good practice of chi kung, starting with zhan zhuang. The Japanese master said she had many examples of successful cases of healing, and so have I. One caveat, a continual practice is needed to stabilize and/or further improve the situation. Lack of continual practice can easily make the joint fall back into its original (wrong) place!

Note: A number of anatomical terms were mentioned above. Readers have to check their meaning for a good understanding. In future, I will do some explanatory drawings for a better explanation. Until then, do some research for a better understanding.

Healing joint pain with zhan zhuang chi kuing

Pain at our joints affect most of us when we approach middle age, affecting avid sportsmen as well as couch potatoes. A standard advice for many doctors in Hong Kong is to get rest to alleviate the pain, swallow some pain killers and in future, when "it is cured", refrain from strenuous exercises, no more jogging and no more badminton. The theory goes like this, "after decades of wear-and-tear at our joints, we have to accept the situation, after all, ligaments between joints cannot repair themselves". In severe cases, i.e. even the above cannot help, surgery will be needed. The above advice looks sound to most people, but not to practitioners of zhan zhuang chi kung whose practice has such healing effect. What is the theory behind such claimed healing? I shall explain.

The fact is that total wear-off of ligaments between joints is rare. In most cases, pain at joints is caused by bones in joints being pressed together, which is in turn caused by blockages limiting joint movement. Such blockages will inevitably accompanied by weakness in muscles that are supposed to be responsible for otherwise possible movements. Lack of usage causes a weakening of the muscles concerned. This explain the case why seasoned athletes can also suffer from joint pains. They may be able to move smoothly in ways demanded by their sports, other degrees of movements can be hindered due to insufficient usage.

In zhan zhuang chi kung, joint opening/relaxation (song 鬆）is of primary importance. The ultimate requirement of the practice of song is an internal sensation of "floating", most significantly (and importantly) being felt in our major ball and socket joints, our hip joints (kua 胯 ) and our shoulder joints.  Whereas floating is the condition or sensation achieved by the advanced students (and whose continual training rests on the basis of floating joints), the intermediate students' training focus is to open the blockages. The simple rule is that when in nano or mega movements (the former refer to "movements" generated by our breathing muscles in zhan zhuang), our focus should be in the points of maximum resistance. Focusing as such requires a highly focused mind resulting an internal experience of exercise effect.

In standard zhan zhuang or combat stance, the process is called "listening to Jing" (聼勁, a tai chi lingo, in Yi-Chuen, it is called six direction tag-of-force 六面爭力). A practitioner has to patiently find the blockage or point of maximum resistance (which has to be listened/tested in three-dimensions, therefore six ways) and to direct jing (or force generated by breathing muscles that activates our body holistically) to ease open the blockages. It needs regular practice with a focused mind. When one blockage is cleared, the next blockage will appear. With a focused mind, your body will lead your way.

The importance of tendon conditioning in tai chi

Although there are different ways to practise tai chi, the importance in training one's tendon is universal to all serious tai chi practitioners. Tendon conditioning usually means lengthening and strengthening one's tendons, in particular tendons around one's shoulder joints and hip joints. There are however lots of confusions around the practice of tendon conditioning in tai chi.

The main issue is: How is tai chi tendon conditioning differs from normal stretching?

Before I tackle this question. Let's see how important is tendon conditioning in tai chi. In tai chi classics muscle training is usually associated with external martial arts, while tendon training belongs to tai chi, in particular as it is the power behind Fa Jing (發勁), or the externalization of internal power. So much so, some tai chi purists will insist that only tendon conditioning belongs to tai chi. They only train their tendons and refrain from training their muscles. They practise tai chi pushing hands with only tendon fa jing (also know as long jing 發長勁) in which people will be pushed to "fly" but without harm. It works on condition that both are of high skill level and both are focusing on tendon connectedness during practice: i.e. prepared to act and prepared to receive the act.

My training philosophy is that every training program shall be structured according to one's training objectives.  And for most people (in both training for health and combat) both muscular training and tendon training will be needed. Muscular training in tai chi is similar to core-muscle training and the power base is our Dantian. Tendon training on the hand is training the connectedness and power of our tendons. The combat execution of the former includes short jing or more popularly called inch-punch (as popularized by Bruce Lee) which is useful in close combat.

Now let me get back to the issue of stretching versus tendon training. Both involve lengthening our tendons. In tai chi tendon training there are more to it. Firstly, the lengthening mechanism is spherical in nature rather than two dimensional and secondly, tendons in our body should have interconnectivity (the internal sensation is like chi running from tendon to tendon) and thirdly the muscles around the tendons will vicariously be trained too (which involve aligning or fitting our joints). However, the above features also create a constraint: our joints will not be conditioned to as flexible as in conventional stretching training.

(The above is a set of condensed notes to the subject)

How to do full lung breathing

When I learned how to play Chinese flute (笛子) in high school, I had to do full lung breathing. Chinese flute is a loud instrument. The sound it created is being maximized by a reed membrane. It usually plays the theme in group ensemble, which part is played by violin in Western instrumental music. I was so amazed by my sifu's ability to increase his lung capacity when he played his instrument. "Takes time to increase your lung capacity" that is what he said. Somehow I got it after a year into training.

The benefit about playing the flute for increasing lung capacity is that there is always a feedback. Lacking in powerful air outflow, the reed membrane cannot be fully vibrated, and that can be readily noticed! And without the required length of breathe, the tune will have to pause in the wrong places The negative part is flute teachers do not know how to teach you how to do full lung breathing "Takes time to increase your lung capacity". Your only advice.

In doing chi kung, the case is just the opposite. You do not have the necessary feedback but, given a good teacher, there are ways to train you to do full lung breathing. Below is the way I use in my coaching. Please use it only as a reference, you will need the personal attention of an experienced teacher to do it properly, which essentially means your teacher needs to judge whether your are using the correct muscles and be able to correct you on the spot.

Your lungs are caged in your body in the bottom by your diaphragm, at the top by the muscles around your neck and shoulders, and at the sides by your rib cage.  Full lung breathing means expanding your lungs maximally downward, upwards and sideway. During the whole process, your hands are to be in "zhan zhuang stretch" (that's way zhan zhuang is so important) and the power of the stretch has to be synchronized with the contraction of your breathing muscles. In other words, you have first to learn zhan zhuang before attempting to do full lung breathing in chi kung.

The next thing you should note is that you should image your lungs in the form of a cauldron, or housed inside a cauldron. Cauldron visualization is of paramount importance in Taoist meditation (Neidan). A good practice of Taoist meditation presupposes the ability to do full lung breathing. The mental focus during full lung breathing is on the outside (the shell) of the cauldron. A success criterion is the internal sensation of feeling your cauldron expanding and contracting sluggishly.

The mechanism is not complicated. The steps are important. The first step is a deep breathing focusing on expanding your cauldron upwards and downwards only. Expanding means breathing in, contracting means breathing out. Expanding downwards is what people call abdominal breathing, but that is NOT enough, slight expanding upwards is also required. Expanding upwards is difficult because it can easily make you raise your shoulders and your breathing will be out of good control. To counteract this tendency, your head shall bend down synchronically. And your sternum shall be relaxed (in tai chi lingo: 函胸), you will also feel chi running up your back during breath-in (in tai chi lingo：拔背).

After you have done the up/down breathing to its maximum, hold your breathe for just a second and you do the second left/right expansion of your rib-cage. The key is to straighten your head to facilitate the breathing. This is what people called chest breathing, in which the sternum raises as well.

Many tai chi sifu do not teach (or do not know how to teach) full lung breathing. Many meditation teachers do not teach (or do not know how to teach) full lung breathing. "Take time you will have it", a possible response. As I explained above, unfortunately there is no good feedback system in tai chi and meditation like when learning how to play a Chinese flute.

Fitness industry and "musical tai chi"

Fitness is a big industry in Hong Kong. I am talking about the bourgeoning fitness centers around town. Now the in-things are yoga featuring Cirque du Soleil kind of hanging from fabric wraps and Thai-boxing, both for men and women alike. The latest game joining the "in-thing group" is boxing, after local wonder kid Rex Tso's success in the ring. Rex is the first Hong Kong professional boxer. He has an impressive recording of 18-0 (with 10 KO/TKO). Second in line for world champ, title fight said to happen in his next. It all looks impressive until some gyms having expanded too quickly that they started selling packages with high-pressure selling. The most recent case is a local gym after having sold a 1-2 year gym package to a lady, a week later, sold her a 1-2 year private coach package with a personal trainer on Thai-boxing. Apparently the personal trainer was so delighted that he gave the lady a bear hug from the back which the lady was not too impressed. The lady reported the case to the Consumer Council and the police. The gym and personal coach contracts were cancelled, they settled the money part with the lady with a confidentially seal. The personal trainer however is facing a trial for indecent assault in a Court of the law.  Things are getting unreasonable, and sometimes farcical, here.

Our public parks are getting farcical too. Tai chi and chi kung have always been a quiet game in our public parks. People do tai chi elegantly in the open, fees are low and folks can just pop in. Easy come easy go, except for serious practitioners and sifu who insist on doing their art in the inner circle way (I shall talk about what I consider modern inner circle training in a later post). The way they do things in mainland China is sometimes quite different. People in China have a high tolerance to noise, some say a remnant of blasting loudspeakers in the heydays of the Cultural Revolution. Walking down a busy pedestrian street in any city of China during public holidays can convince overseas visitors that wearing a pair of nice ear plugs while shopping is not a bad idea at all! Some tai chi groups in local parks have picked up the habit, or more likely the habit has been brought in by teachers from the mainland, or trained in the mainland. No, they are not dancing. Steps are not following the music when doing tai chi forms. They just love the loud sound! And for that matter, chi kung and all kinds of schools of exercises/movements as well...all being accompanied by this or that kind of music. Fair to say, fortunately, they are still the minority.

As a final touch, one or two teachers are beginning to incorporate "yelling" into their training too. It is a fact that "voicing" is a training technique for some legit schools/lineages, but with due consideration to passers-by, and not to scare the kids, practitioners would reserve that part to their private practice at home. Not so nowadays. When people walk through Victoria Park (in Causeway Bay) on Sunday morning, the "lucky ones" will be woken up by some folks suddenly started yelling" HA, HA, HA, HA...".  Having seen/heard that, I bet laughing yoga folks will come to Hong Kong pretty soon.

Laughing yoga

Will tai chi hurt your knees?

Students of tai chi may have heard about tai chi knees. Some people do tai chi for years and end up with knee pain. So much so some doctors in Hong Kong advised their patients with knee pain not to practise tai chi! Is tai chi really the cause? Is the condition of tai chi knees a result of good tai chi practice or faulty tai chi practice? I put myself to the test yesterday.

It is the beginning of Autumn in Hong Kong. The weather is still very hot (some 32 degrees Celsius) but eager hikers can't wait any more. I started my walk from my alma mater The University of Hong Kong up the Victoria Peak. The uphill road I chose, Hatton Road, is of moderate gradient. It is a family trail with moderate difficulty. Most of the path is shaded, though the weather was so hot that my sweater was soaked with sweat when I arrived the public toilet at the end of the road which joints the level circular trail round the peak. I changed into a dry sweater. After finishing my bottle of mineral water,  I turned left and proceeded along the longer end of the trail. Along the route, there are a number of sighting points where one can enjoy different panoramic views of the city. Tourists enjoying the view and some took selfie. Locals like me moved on.

At the Peak one can take a break and enjoy a bottle of cold drink. The unsuspecting tourists lined up at the prominent 7-11 for a coke while locals like me took the elevator to the third floor to buy the same drink from the supermarket there saving 30 to 40%.

After refreshing myself, I took the challenge going downhill Old Peak Road. According to official statistics, Old Peak Road has the greatest gradient in downhill road in Hong Kong. Its maximum gradient is 17 degree and its total length is 560 meters. Not easy task for senior citizens at 60! Downhill I walked, without stopping. It took me some 40 minutes to sea-level, arriving at Admiralty MTR station passing Bank of China Building where there was a magnificent sculpture - Tai chi by famous Taiwanese sculptor Zhu Ming.

I did not feel any knee pain yesterday nor any discomfort in my knees as I am typing on my laptop now. I passed the test.

In a coming post, I shall discuss what chi kung training methods will be needed to protect our knees instead of hurting them.

Zhu Ming's famous Tai chi sculpture in Bank of China building

The importance of training our diaphragm - as in Dantian

In the literature of internal arts, we read about concepts like Dantian, controlled breathing, muscles-as-one, punch absorption, navel gazing, peng-jing etc. The above seem to be different concepts, yet they are all related to one important organ of our body, our diaphragm, the strongest muscle in our torso, if not in our whole body. There are different techniques to work with the above concepts. Yet, the conditioning of our diaphragm helps all to become operational. 

Take an example, Dantian. In tai chi the working concepts of Dantian are Dantian roll (丹田内轉）and Chi-sunk-to-Dantian (氣沉丹田). These two concepts maintain that the power source is at our Dantian. What is Dantian? Dantian is the imaginary point a few inches behind (or below) our belly button. It is a point among our large intestine. A point of void. How can a void point be the source of power. Yet, generations of practitioners felt that it is where their power came from! The key word is felt. Dantian roll and Chi-sunk-to-Dantian are understandable power source concept if we adhere to the assertion that they are internally-sensed empirical concepts, rather than physical concepts.

A question more relevant to students of internal arts: How can such power source be trained? If we want to train our biceps, we grab a dumb-bell and repeatedly lift it up through contracting the muscles in our biceps. It is simple. Training Dantian is more problematic: it is not even a physical part of our body! The answer is we don't train our Dantian, we train our diaphragm. After we have trained our diaphragm, the key to activating power in our trained diaphragm is a point in the center of our belly, a point a few inches behind (or below) our belly button. The point that we call Dantian.

"How to train our diaphragm" is a question that I shall tackle for some future posts. Stay tuned.

Where phycial fitness and mental healing meets

Internal martial art, like tai chi, is about physical fitness. On the other hand, meditation, like Zen and Taoist meditation, is about mental healing. They are both internal arts. The question is: where do they meet?

To answer this question, we must first identify which part of our body can be both responsible for physical fitness and mental healing.

To answer the above identification question, we have to look at a practice that can be used both for physical fitness and mental healing. And then we have to answer why it can achieved the results of both physical fitness and mental healing.

The practice is the now rather popular zhan zhuang - standing meditation.

Empirically, the good benefits of zhan zhuang for both physical fitness and mental healing have been reaped by countless practitioners around the world, quite naturally mostly in the East with increasing number in the West.  Decades ago, motivational speaker Tony Robbins said in his unlimited power seminar (I paraphrase): "you don't need to understand everything about the internal wiring to get the benefit of electricity. Your only need to know how to switch on the light!" True, and more true for zhan zhuang. Reading my explanations doesn't mean you can get the benefits out of zhan zhuang, while practitioners who don't know anything about its internal logic can still get good benefits, well, with the help of a good teacher! What I am also saying is that "you still have to practise after understanding!"

The gist of the matter is, if a practitioner can activate a certain group of muscles he can deliver both physical fitness and mental healing benefits. Such connection, in physiological terminology are muscles being connected/excited by their connecting fascia. And in chi kung's terminology, a practitioner can fill chi in that particular muscles group during mindful breathing. I mean chi-sensation (得氣感).

Where is the fascia/muscle group? In zhan zhuang, it starts with our big toes, running up through our inner thigh, via our pelvic floor muscles, Dan Tien, diaphragm, passing through our heart's fascia and up to our throat and tongue.

Readers who have some experience in internal martial art (such as tai chi) can perhaps understand why their teachers asked them to use their toes to grasp the floor (actually it should primarily be their "big toes") and to touch their pallet with their tongues (actually it should be "to energize your throat and tongue"). And readers who have some meditative experience can perhaps understand why their teachers ask them to visualize "a loving or passionate heart". Those who are familiar with Taoist meditation, may perhaps recall the requirement of "breathing from your ankles" (呼吸以踵) (seated meditation is from ankles rather than big toes).

If you still don't understand what I am talking about, not to worry, just follow your teacher's advice, practise, and you can get the good benefits. On the other hand, if you smile, perhaps you have experientially understood what I am talking about, then I find a kindred soul. Most others, assuming that they are interested in the subject matter, need more time to explore.

Training notes to students

The following is one of my training notes to students.

"Practice focus for the month:

1. Try to incorporate your practice into your daily life, like doing Zhang Zhuang while watching (boring) TV, or focus on your stretched hands and wrists while traveling on, say, subway.

2. Our practice is about healing and fitness. Try to identify healing areas (physical only for the time being) you want to tackle. Having identified such areas, focus on those exercises that you find more relevant.

3. Focus on building stronger chi (or chi sensation) through focusing either more on meditative mind or more on joint opening. Both focuses are needed, but at your stage of development, you will progress faster this way."

Paul's comment: practice of the internal art is a self-discovery and development process, at different stages, a student shall focus on different things. My advice to students: always focus on your own internal sensation. Follow your teacher's advice to the extent that such advice fits into your own development at a particular point of your progress. This is especially important nowadays because, for variously reasons, financial included, most students learn in a group setting. Needless to say, the sensitivity of a teacher to the progress of EACH individual student is also very important.

Internal arts - allowing a pattern to evolve

What is the difference between internal martial art and external martial art? One obvious difference is that the former trains students from inside out while the latter trains students from outside in. I have previously written posts from this perspective. From another perspective, perhaps more interesting, internal martial arts training aims at allowing a natural pattern to evolve. I shall explain below.

I have often been amazed by the elegance and power of a professional baseball player swinging his bat, or an Olympic swimmer swiftly and elegantly move through water. Such elegance can also be found in a tai chi master when he does a tai chi form. What is the difference? Both are doing elegant patterns.

To become a professional baseball player or an Olympic swimmer, you need certain talent. And your talent will be discovered because it will shine at an early age. So much so, trainers roam among kids in schools seeking out those with high potential and enroll them to touch training, though not all of these talented kids can become pro one day. How about tai chi? In the old days, kids weak in physique were sent by their parents to study under tai chi masters or Taoist masters. Prominent tai chi master Wu TuNan was an example. He studied under Wu JianQuan (not related) because he was a sickly child. And he became a great master decades later.

In tai chi and other internal arts a student needs not be talented, as a child or as an adult. Why? It is because through a meditative state of mind, a student's innate pattern (which incidentally comes with every one of us) will be allowed to evolve and to "take over".  Such evolvement and "taking over" will achieve the training objectives that we set, irrespective of a student's initial conditions. It is only a matter of time, and the length of time depends more on his ability to "waken up" his innate source of power more than his initial conditions (of course it will be better to have both, plus longer hours of training).

In tai chi and other internal martial arts the most important source of power is the innate pattern of muscles-as-one (or full body synchronization) as when one is still born (and a few years after birth with natural growth setting in to gradually breaking this pattern). In deep mediation, it is human archetypes, as explained in Jungian psychology (the details I shall not dealt into here). 

The superiority of internal martial arts is this evolvement of our innate pattern, through training techniques which will be different for different lineages or masters. But to get the best results, a meditative mode of mind is essential. Those who have experience in zhan zhuang can appreciate this. And this is also the reason why some students never get into the heart of the internal arts (and many quitted because of this) - caused by the dominance of their rational mind that does not allow their meditative mind (or "their suspension of disbelief") to play its vital role.

Corollary, it is not too meaningful to compare internal martial art and external martial art by "which has more students winning ring fights". Those kids who love to fight or are talented fighters will probably not join a tai chi academy when they were young, not to mention that many tai chi masters (like famous Wu tuNan) have little or do not have enough ring experience in the first place.

Wu TuNan's tai chi nei-gong