I remember reading back a few months ago an article by a Chen Taiji practitioner who was saying that the goal in Taijiquan was to “lock out” the Mingmen point of your opponent, without having your’s “locked out.”
I didn’t really know what this meant until the other day. I was doing a stepping push hand excercise with my teacher. To describe it briefly one person puts their bent arm out in front of their body and assumes a shallow bow stance. The other person puts their palms on the other persons elbow and wrist.
As the person with the palms out steps forward and pushes slightly the other person retreats and follows.
Now what I noticed is that when I stepped back my teacher would add to my backward energy. The sensation was like being folded in half and pushed back. It was like my lower body separated from my upper body rendering me helpless. The “folding point” seemed to correspond to the ming men point.
Any thoughts on this.
Fu-Pow
“He who knows does not speak;
He who speaks does not know.”
The dantien goes from the point of the navel to below the waist in the area of pelvic region and upper thighs. The point below the navel is a focus point for meditation, but by no means is it the limiation of the lower dantien. Just like the upper dantien consists of the entire cranial sphere, not just the single point between the eyebrows. And the central middle dantien is expansive of the entire chest, not just the very center of it. Focus points for meditation and actual regions are quite different and distinct when t’ai chi is taking to it’s application.
I had a teacher once ask me, “Where is your dan tien?” and I pointed to the point a few inches below my navel. He says "No No No, This Poopoo, Dantien Here to Here point from the navel to the upper thigh region. After realizing that to be the case through practice, my t’ai chi improved dramatically as I become much more aware of the lower dan tien as a whole.
for giving words, explanation, for something I had physically perceived, but had no words for. I knew the mingmen was involved, but didn’t put it together completely.
appreciated this discussion.
This is an area I need to work on in fighting, tucking that tail bone when giving slight ground, dropping or loading into a good pushing angle. Constant work. I’m surprised more men haven’t gone mad studying this $hit.
There is just so much and so little time. What I need to do is somehow free myself from this 9 to 5 drudery – God dam n torture. Yet I know I have to be here, learn what I have to learn at this stage of the game.
Anyone who is doing taiji application, should at some time or another be introduced to reverse breathing. Reverse breathing involves contraction of the mingmen as well as the anus and perrenium and also the abdomen rather than expansion of the abdomen on inhale. So of course the mingmen’s application in ones taiji becomes more obvious as they progress through the stages that their instructor introduces them to.
