Okay, I’m getting at least an inkling of how the body is supposed to work in Hsing I.
But…
Are the legs supposed to be solid and muscular?
Or are the legs supposed to be springy?
One style is “in laymen terms”: Right hip connects to left shoulder, right knee connects to left elbow, right foot connects to left fist (and same goes for other side, left hip->right shoulder, etc).
This is the foundation for power generation, and is taught in hsing-i qi gong forms. A few you can learn from are at www.qigongmaster.com
The legs should be as relaxed as you can make them each time you practice Xingyi San Ti. Practice is about doing the best you can where you are at presently, if solid is what your legs are but you hold the strong intant to be more natural and relaxed each time then you are doing good pratice. I don’t know Nexus was trying to help you out on that but go way to worm into a side topic I guess…
So the legs are also at around “sung” tension?
Sure… but sung is relaxed, so as relaxed or sung as possible each time.
Relaxed is a loose translation of sung, that has lead to a fair amount of confusion, i.e. “loose” relaxed, “dead” relaxed, “limp” releaxed, or “alive” relaxed, personally I like “springy”, FWIW.
Just a reminder that translating from one language to another, especially chinese to english, should be done carefully.
Walter, any plans for another Mike Sigman seminar?
It’s a shame that the September seminar was cancelled, as I was looking forward to it.
Muppet,
So was I. the best I can offer is that negotiations continue, the sticking opoint is the start time of the workshop.
Chen Zhu Lei is in town this weekend, one of the four tigers of Chen village. Wang Hei jun, his student, should be back in February, and I’m also trying to get Tim Cartmell out sometime. If anything is going on, I’ll post here, rest assured.
I’ve learned to claw/grab onto the floor/ground with my toes in San Ti. When my sifu describes “sung” in English, I’ve known him to use two terms “relaxed, but not dead” and “alert”.
I have given this a lot of thought myself, and I do a lot of San Ti. I think it comes to this: You need as much tension in your legs as you need to hold the posture. I make sure to keep relaxing different parts of my thighs that do not really need tension to hold the posture. I have found, at first, that I have more tension in my legs than is actually neccessary, so I am always working on that aspect, but even relaxed it is a very powerful stance. As your legs get stronger in that stance over time, they need less tension and feel more relaxed just as in resistance training.
To me it is like a guy that starts out doing push ups but on the first day, he can only do 2. Over a year, he builds up to where he can do 100 push ups. After one year, when he compares himself to his first day, he finds that there is much less tension and effort associated with his first 2 push ups than on that first day, where he used all the effort and strength in his pecs, shoulders, and triceps to get out those two reps.
Go spar - or hit a wall - using the San Ti posture.
You’ll find out what the legs are “supposed” to do.
HKV - A little cryptic there buddy. When standing in San Ti, your legs are supposed to do what they are doing. When hitting a wall or sparring, they should at the very minimum be moving. What exactly are you trying to say?
I’m learning a Shanxi style of Hsing I and the teacher keeps stressing “slow and soft, like tai chi”, so I’ll pass on the sparring bit.
To me, going slow makes a lot of sense since I’ll pick up a lot of bad habits by sparring before I have the internal body mechanics down pat (or at all).
And yes, I would ask my instructor this question except I’ve barraged him with a lot of questions already and unfortunately, I don’t speak Mandarin so I can’t communicate with him directly.
Hey Muppet, just a note I have about your question on the hard and muscular legs issue. I used to run, which is leg intensive. I noticed many runnerns who had very strong legs but did not have muscular looking legs, while others did. Same thing with guys who lift wieghts.
My legs are hard and slighly muscular. However, I cannot tell if it is from tennis every week (3-4 hrs), or from standing practice. They seem to have become harder after a year of standing and postures. We are told to stay very relaxed in our style too. The fact is, you must have good leg strength to do internals well. Undue tension is the enemy, not muscle.
As far as your own legs, and what you expect them to do over time; I don’t think they will do the same exact things as everybody elses in regards to size or hardness. Part of that is genetic. Your legs will develop strength that is useful for what you are doing with them, that much is certain.
Or as HKV suggested, you could just go out and kick a brick wall to see what your leg is ‘really’ supposed to be doing?! :rolleyes: On second thought, maybe you should pass on that bit of advice.
"The fact is, you must have good leg strength to do internals well. Undue tension is the enemy, not muscle. " CDLee
Excellent point.
It’s in the feet…
…or at least so I’m told by many different masters. They all say the key to xingyi is in how the feet grab the ground, like what iron thread was saying. I’ve been experimenting with this a lot. I can’t say I’ve got it at all yet, but I’ve gotten little flashes of insight where this seems to work.
In traditional internal training, CD Lee, one is supposed to test his posture against all sorts of objects.
Trees, walls, opponents - all of those help a person determine the proper posture one should hold to get maximum efficacy. Holding a posture that hasn’t been TESTED is considered a waste of time.
Now if one is doing Hsing Yi for strictly meditative purposes, testing one’s jing against hard objects or opponents is absolutely unnecessary. But if you’re training Hsing Yi for combat, then you have to be able to issue a hit against a totally uncooperative opponent - and take one as well.
Whatever weaknesses a guy has will be uncovered via this active resistance training. The San Ti stance done against resistance shows the practitioner his own weaknesses in the most unflattering light.
And that’s the best way to learn how to do it RIGHT.
subjective
Tests are important, that’s true, but somewhat subjective. The test is relative to the practitioner, not like the SAT. Are you going to hold up the same type of test for a 200+ lb 18 yr old male to a 100 lb 70 yr old male? Who do you think might have better Xingyi?
This is just a hypothetical question, but one that always bothers me, especially with internal styles.
Walter - Thanks!
HKV - Now that you have clarified your original statement, I see that you mean the application in fighting or motion using a San Ti posture to fight in. Now that is an interesting thought to me. Are you saying to stand in San Ti, and deliver a punch without stepping or moving the body?
“From stillness comes motion” - can’t remember who said it.
I agree that taking your lead hand, and having someone push agaisnt it reveals your postures weaknesses, and bad alignments, but I have not seen people really use fists from that static position, or spar in San Ti?
The original question; should the legs be strong and muscular or springy? I say both, maybe not muscular per se, but then San Ti was brought in as the fulcrum of the question as to what should be happening in San Ti involving musclular tension.
San Ti is a standing posture. A meditative posture that also has martial structure and intent. His main concern is the attributes of the legs, manifested externally and internally. He is just starting to understand as he states. Do you really think he can go out and hit a wall or spar and suddenly understand the intricate details of the aspects of San Ti?
Gene Ching:
Are you going to hold up the same type of test for a 200+ lb 18 yr old male to a 100 lb 70 yr old male? Who do you think might have better Xingyi?
Fair question. I think in regards to posture and stances, yes. We will use San Ti I guess as an example. If standing in San Ti correctly, both men regardless of weight, height or age, should be backweighted, with an upright ridgepole, lifting the head, sinking the hips, back straight, relaxed and taught with intent.
At this point, if you pressed in thier lead hand, if everthing is properly aligned, both will transfer the energy into their back leg, rooting into the ground. ( I know theres more..but just for discussion sake)
Now…all else being equal, if they are both doing this correctly, if the big guy can take more pure force, I think this is just physics. The effect of the force will be different, but the handling of the force by the participants should be identical. I think this phenomenon is the subjective part of the test. The subjectivity that you mention is most likely due to the ‘interpretation’ of what is seen, rather then what is acutually happening.