{"id":6330,"date":"2011-12-20T07:30:21","date_gmt":"2011-12-20T12:30:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/yang-sheng.com\/?p=6330"},"modified":"2012-01-01T20:50:29","modified_gmt":"2012-01-02T01:50:29","slug":"wuji-in-motion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/yang-sheng.com\/?p=6330","title":{"rendered":"Wuji in Motion-The Nurturing Gong of Push Hands"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Nurturing Gong of Push Hands<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n

by Rodney J Owen<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Push hands practice is a crucial component of a complete Taiji curriculum.\u00a0 There are multiple styles, types, and approaches to push hands, but ultimately it is a two-person approach to Taiji practice that serves as a bridge between Tajij form and san shou, or free fighting.\u00a0 However, push hands is not fighting.\u00a0 In my system of study, all of Taiji is seen as gong practice, or the process of improving balance and coordination, and replenishing Qi.\u00a0 It is easy to see how Qigong and Taiji form are crucial gong practices, but many people don\u2019t understand push hands in the same light.\u00a0 However, one can only go so far with solo practice.\u00a0 Partner practice adds another dimension to Taiji, and adds depth to the gains acquired through solo practice.\u00a0 Additionally, push hands, understood a certain way, is as much a healing practice as any component of the Taiji curriculum.<\/span><\/p>\n

There are many practical benefits of Taiji practice.\u00a0 Of utmost importance is the development of Fang Song, or the quality of “being sung.”\u00a0 This is often translated as relaxation in English, although relaxation is not quite what sung means.\u00a0 Many people understand relaxation as implying a limp state with no force.\u00a0 A better description may be the lack of tension.\u00a0 One of my teachers described it as moving without feeling the movement. \u00a0In the practice of Taiji in general, and push hands in particular, one should strive to find the sung state and maintain it.\u00a0 That is no easy task, but is one worth pursuing.\u00a0 Good push hands training helps with the development and maintenance of sung.\u00a0 And this is a benefit that stays with us as we leave the training hall and descend into the streets of life.<\/span><\/p>\n

The development of sung contributes immensely to our health.\u00a0 A relaxed mind\/body is open to the flow of Qi, is not as susceptible to the effects of stress, and is better able to fight off illness and disease.\u00a0 Push hands practice is as beneficial in protecting us against illness as in teaching us to deal with muggers and attackers.\u00a0 In fact we are much more likely to find the need to fight off illness than thugs.\u00a0 In addition, if or when the situation arises that we need martial skills, they are much better deployed by the healthy than the ill.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Our lives are full of potential stressors.\u00a0 Some of us are better at controlling these than others.\u00a0 For example, think of the various ways people react in heavy traffic.\u00a0 Some take it in stride, some get a little stressed, and others develop what is known as road rage, all in the same or similar situations.\u00a0 However, it\u2019s not the stressors themselves that are the problem.\u00a0 It\u2019s our reactions that determine how they affect us.\u00a0 We have the ability to be either adversely affected by or to deal optimally with various experiences.\u00a0 There is no entity out in the world called road rage that is waiting to infect the random unsuspecting driver.\u00a0 There is only traffic; or unemployment, or death in the family, or aggressive bosses and nasty co-workers, or catastrophic weather, etc\u2026\u00a0 These things, these potential stressors, are real and their effect on our health, our lives, and the lives of the people around us are also very real.\u00a0 Fortunately, we have within us the ability to deal effectively with these stressors.\u00a0 Peace of mind is an option for anyone and everyone.\u00a0 It has only to be discovered and developed.\u00a0 Push hands is one of the tools that contributes to this development.<\/span><\/p>\n

Most stress management techniques primarily consider mental and emotional defense mechanisms.\u00a0 These provide tremendous results and should be considered a crucial component of stress management practice.\u00a0 The general idea is that as we engage stressful situations we respond emotionally, which induces a physical reaction, which feeds back to our mental state and may induce another, perhaps different emotional reaction, which induces yet another physical reaction, and on and on.\u00a0 For instance, suppose your boss yells at you and upsets you.\u00a0 You in turn get angry and subconsciously tighten your shoulders.\u00a0 This tension strains your back and makes it hard to maintain a good posture at your desk, which in turn causes back pain.\u00a0 The back pain and shoulder tension make it hard to concentrate on your work, which your mind interprets as another stressor because you have a deadline and are falling behind, and your boss will only get angrier, which adds to the physical reaction, which in turn makes you angry and snappy, etc\u2026.\u00a0 Contemporary stress management techniques work by teaching one to calm the mind and emotions in order to deal with the stressor, or to reinterpret the situation as something not worthy of an adverse reaction.<\/span><\/p>\n

Taiji takes a reverse approach to the management of stress by going to the feedback system first.\u00a0 The physiological response that is engaged by the mental reaction to stress is a feedback mechanism.\u00a0 Concurrently, this feedback also registers with the brain as stress.\u00a0 Hence, a headache can trigger anger, or vice-versa.\u00a0 The practice of Qigong and Taiji form develop sung, activate the various meridians, and increase the flow of Qi, all of which help to develop internal harmony, which in turn calms the mind.\u00a0 These are the qualities of healthy living and it\u2019s easy to develop and feel these in solo Taiji practice.\u00a0 However, we need to be able to maintain these qualities even when our harmony is challenged by stressors.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Push hands can be utilized as a method of stress simulation.\u00a0 In the practice of push hands we try to maintain central equilibrium while challenging the equilibrium of our partner.\u00a0 And our partner in turn tries to upset our equilibrium.\u00a0 In the process we give each other something to work with and the opportunity to deal with stressors while attempting to maintain peace of mind.\u00a0 Another person inside of one\u2019s personal space, trying to upset equilibrium, can be a stressor.\u00a0 While relatively mild, controlled, and simulated, it is enough to challenge the relaxation gained in solo practice but is safe enough to not cause any real harm to the players.\u00a0 Every newcomer to push hands knows this experientially.\u00a0 Most people are not comfortable with another person being in their personal space.\u00a0 It is even more uncomfortable when one\u2019s balance is challenged.\u00a0 The principles and techniques of push hands can be utilized to train our bodies to effectively deal with threats without getting tense or upset.\u00a0 In Buddhist terms, it is a method for developing equanimity.\u00a0 As a healing practice, it teaches the mind\/body to remain calm under attack, which in the day-to-day world could just as easily be from a flu virus, an angry boss, or maniacal drivers in rush hour traffic.<\/span><\/p>\n

While push hands practice is associated with the martial application of Taiji, it is not fighting.\u00a0 To fight is to struggle.\u00a0 Fighting implies diametrically opposed energies colliding head-on against one another.\u00a0 Push hands is more about cooperation, even if it means learning to cooperate with the uncooperative.\u00a0 Push hands is about redirecting opposing energies and learning to go with the flow rather than opposing it.\u00a0 Push hands is about harmonizing with the environment and finding peace of mind in the midst of chaos.\u00a0 Peace of mind is not something reserved for monks and hermits.\u00a0 It\u2019s something inherently available to all of us.\u00a0 It is within us.\u00a0 Solo practices like those we find in meditation, yoga, Qigong, and the Taiji form help us to find and become familiar with this, to nurture it.\u00a0 Partner exercises, like push hands, provide us a way to learn how to maintain it under challenging conditions.\u00a0 Peace of mind, developed and maintained through bodily integration, leads to completeness wholeness and health.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>[Rodney Owen<\/strong> has had a life-long interest in the relationship between meditation and martial arts.\u00a0 Over the years he has followed and studied systems that emphasize that relationship: Aikido, Qigong, Taijiquan, I Liq Chuan, and Buddhism.\u00a0 He practices and teaches Taiji, Qigong, Kung Fu, and Meditation in High Point, NC.\u00a0 His primary interest is in the practical and functional aspects of these arts and in the concept that Kung Fu is a way of life, a methodology for improving and enjoying the content of life, of discovering and manifesting our higher selves.\u00a0 He maintains a blog on martial arts and mindfulness at <\/span>http:\/\/nagualtime.blogspot.com\/<\/span><\/a> Samples of his writing and other interests can be found at <\/span>http:\/\/rodneyjowen.com<\/span><\/a> ]<\/span>
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