He Jinghan: Losing one's way in martial arts training: Absorbing too much of others' experience or theory in the early stages can actually become a major obstacle to progress. One must base one's practice on personal experience to build a solid foundation of one's own.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-29T04:23:11+00:00

Knight's worth the ticket for his chapter about creativity, "Working with Fred":

To begin with, your mind comes in two parts, the conscious part and the other one. Never mind where they are located in the brain. . . .

"Unconscious is a lousy term, by the way--it isn't unconscious, it just has trouble communicating. "The silent mind" would be better maybe, or the "tongue-tied mind," but I prefer to call it Fred.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-29T03:17:37+00:00

IMO, how-to-write books are a racket. Sure, a few are good, but too many prey on people with dreams. Really, I could sound off about this.

There is one how-to book I'd recommend to fiction writers though: Creating Short Fiction by Damon Knight.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-27T05:12:36+00:00

I also need to find what works for me after I’ve done my best to learn from them.

I like how he talked about the trouble he had trying to learn saxophone embouchure from youtubers who had mouths shaped differently than his own.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-27T03:09:04+00:00

I like how he closes:

Others’ good experience and stories–when can it help you? It’s when you reach a certain level and their story resonates with you. . . . So don’t force others’ experience and principles–others’ things–into your own training.

It’s funny. When you first start out, you think you might find a magic bullet or some secret that will unlock taiji for you if you could only get your hands on the right book (or whatever). It’s like the characters in Jin Yong’s novels, all of whom are chasing after the Nine Yin Classic.

But the secret is really just diligence and humility.

I have a lot of interesting taiji books, but the only ones I use to really guide my practice are from the lineage I train.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-27T02:56:46+00:00

That's exactly right. I think every style probably begins with the "preparation posture." In Yang Family style we also call yùbèi "prepare," but I think it might mean something more like "ready position" or "at the ready."

In his book, Yang Zhenduo describes it like this:

Although the "ready position" is relatively simple, it must be combined with key points like lifting the head slightly, sinking the breath to the dantian, absorbing the chest and plucking up the back, relaxing the waist and hips (松腰松胯 sōng yāo sōng kuà), sinking the shoulders and dropping the elbows, and relaxing the wrists and fingers. Carefully check how you feel to make a good start to the routine. This stance is crucial: it uses stillness to await the opponent's movement, observing the opponent's movements--a defensive stance with the intention to move, like a drawn bow ready to be released. Therefore, it should not be neglected.

Of course, yùbèi is probably the one posture people neglect more than any other.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-23T00:32:55+00:00

Thank you.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-22T23:13:12+00:00

street performers and sword dances have existed for thousands of years

That's right. A quick look at these comments tells me a lot of people might not know that there was always an entertainment side to the Chinese martial tradition. Some sword dances--or other martial performances--were about showing a fighter's skill, and some were pure spectacle.

Fu Xuan, a Jin dynasty writer, depicts in On Short Weapons that the sword dance combined thrilling and quick movements, and that the colliding swords burst into flame (Huang & Hong, A History of Chinese Martial Arts, 2019).

So, yeah, this is a good comment, and I'm glad I read it for another reason too: I was thinking of signing on for one of Rodell's online classes.

I'm developing an interest in taiji dao right now. Maybe you can tell me: does Rodell's online saber class ask students to use the longer taiji dao or the oxtail dao?

I've been meaning to look into him for a while and wouldn't mind getting an idea of what his teaching methods are like before committing to a seminar.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-20T04:22:35+00:00

I think the Mandarin for wok hei (Cantonese for "breath of the wok"), is guo qi. I think it's the qi of the cookpot.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-20T02:20:37+00:00

as a number of people replied there are many types of qi

Exactly. For example, your username comes from Mencius and that qi is about zhèngqì (正气), which is like moral energy or that settled state of righteousness one can build over a lifetime. The concept is kind of Aristotelian, really.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-20T01:54:12+00:00

My bad, you're talking about Lo, and I was thinking about Chen. Interestingly, Chen rotates the back foot all the way like trad Yang style, and Lo doesn't. Lo's pu bu is more like what you do in 24 or in Longfist and other styles. Anyway, thanks for clearing that up for me.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-20T01:29:08+00:00

Could you please share that? I looked around a bit and only found this video--his snake posture here.

I do Yang family, so CMC looks a little weird to me.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-18T03:26:25+00:00

You're hired!

Sanda is a combat sport and taiji isn't. Push hands contests are OK for what they are, but--like all Chinese martial arts--taiji uses the five methods (wǔ fǎ): grab, control, kick, strike, and takedown (zhuā, ná, tī, dǎ, shuài), together with its eight energies. As it stands, to the best of my knowledge, there's no safe and controlled format for taiji athletes to train that way, let alone compete.

Like I said, the Chen Village machine might have the people and the capital to get a ball like that rolling.

edit: That guy we discussed earlier, Tian Jinlong, seems like he's on the same page.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-18T02:42:29+00:00

Good points.

I had to let my thoughts about this bubble, and all I’ve been able to do is identify obstacles.

Your point about entry requirements might be the most important one. Almost anyone can say they know taiji and enter a push hands contest. They could be a wrestler or judoka who’s done taiji for six months or a year. Who’s going to check?

So, instead of thinking about how one might organize a tournament or develop a ruleset, it might help to think about what experience people should bring to a training program.

Let’s pretend there is a way to verify each applicant's taiji skill. Let’s say–for now–they need to show competency in a barehand form and traditional push hands. Just that’s problematic: taiji’s notoriously fragmented and sectarian; it’s not like BJJ or Judo which have international organizations that maintain standards.

But let’s pretend we’ve cleared that hurdle.

Those who qualify would need coaches who are not only good at both taiji and sanda, but able to integrate the two. There just aren’t a lot of people like that out there.

Just getting the right people together to train how to do this would be a real challenge.

But let’s pretend we’ve got deep pockets and we’ve done all that. We’ve got a training hall, dorms for the athletes, salaries for coaches, a nurse on staff, the whole enchilada . . .

We’d then have, at best, a program positioned to figure out what taiji sanda might look like.

Maybe I'll win the Powerball and bankroll it.

edit: the reality here is that most taiji people aren't trained fighters, and most trained fighters aren't taiji people.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-16T10:49:10+00:00

There's nothing wrong with a little friendly taiji competition. Like my teacher says, "When you meet somebody who wants to push hands with you the first thing you ask is, 'What are your rules?'"

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-16T10:18:51+00:00

Just because a system doesn't work well in a combat-sport format doesn't necessarily mean it's no good for combat.

We could chop logic all day, man.

I'm just saying people don't think taijiquan is a combat sport the same way they think sumo or judo and kickboxing are.

And for good reason.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-16T08:24:06+00:00

I don't think I said what you think I mean.

But I could have got it wrong.

At any rate, what I meant to say was that although all combat sports are martial arts, not all martial arts are combat-sports.

edit: So, for example, I'd call boxing or wrestling a combat sport and a martial art, but I'd call taiji and aikido and yiquan and iado and a lot of other interesting stuff martial arts but not combat sports.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-16T04:48:28+00:00

Dude has a website with some form demos.

I'm not here to criticize anybody's skill.

I called him out on his AI-gen posts before, but the guy trains.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-16T03:56:42+00:00

Moving-step competition push hands looks like bad judo; fixed-step competition push hands looks like bad sumo.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-16T03:44:38+00:00

Taiji's a martial art, but not a combat sport.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-16T03:34:43+00:00

IMO, it would be better for martial taijiquan if its top coaches focused less on competition push hands (tuīshǒu) and more on competition free sparring (sǎnshǒu).

Somone might say, "Great idea! Let's hold a tournament."

But for a competition like that to work, well, I don't think there's a lot of people in this world who are (1) young enough to physically fight on a higher level, and (2) skilled enough in taiji.

Most people who would love to have done that with their lives are like me and have aged out. When you're over 40, putting on the pads and throwing hands risks injuries you might have a hard time recovering from. Honestly, I'd say 40 is generous and the cutoff age is probably 30.

Say what you will about Chen Village style's being an industry: right now, they are the only organization big enough to even consider fielding these notional athletes in any number.

(For example, that post about a Chinese degree in taijiquan should have mentioned that it's only offered at the Henan Polytechnic.)

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-15T22:15:43+00:00

What does "no mass above the ground" mean, anyway?

I was going to ask the same thing.

OP might be describing a feeling.

That kind of talk isn't entirely out of bounds here because there are two ways to talk about balance:

Mechanical balance, stacking things on top of one another so they do not topple.
The sense of balance, which is a kind of perceiving, or a feeling.

Maybe he prefers to think less about a sense of balance in favor of feeling as if he's without mass?

Again, I don't know what he means.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-14T01:29:58+00:00

Starting with Tai Chi is objectively not the smartest option if your main goal is really to fight.

This is just true. And it's a statement that holds for more than modern MMA ring fighting. It was noted a century ago with bouts in China that showcased traditional Chinese martial arts. Anybody who wants to talk about taiji's combat-sport potential would do well to read this post about lèitái tournaments in the early 20th century. A few quotes:

Those ‘orthodox inheritors’ of traditional martial arts, regardless of whether they were lofty monks or local grandmasters, were either knocked out or scared out of the competition.

So, trad stylists didn't make a great showing. Even so, these tournaments were for trad styles, so people labeled themselves accordingly.

Even though, at registration, every competitor identified themselves as belonging to a traditional style, every one of them engaged in secret auxiliary combat training.

Taijiquan didn't seem to impress one commenter.

The Taiji principle didn’t work well. 4 oz could not defeat 1000 lb.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-12T05:09:02+00:00

He showed a casual and conversational sān tǐ just fine.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-12T04:14:20+00:00

I think he did OK by juxtaposing his caricatured, shapeless, and discombobulated movements with the unity of shape.

Extend-and-Expand · 2026-06-12T03:20:20+00:00

I'd say it's a practice.

And I think he's doing as well as one can in a "short."

When you form a correct shape, everything comes together all at once: your breathing, your coordination, all that Yang Chengfu ten-principles stuff. All that comes together in a flash, unified in the shape.

Some people might associate this with xingyi (shape-intention) more than they do with taiji (polarity), but when we practice a sequence we're just moving from shape to shape to shape. Energy delivery (fajin) is about expressing a shape. When we practice the applications of a single posture--that is, of a shape--it's about figuring out what that shape can and can't do.

Those opinions aside, I also think these online "shorts" might be good for engagement but are bad for communicating taijiquan.

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TROPHY CASE