# Sticky Hands



## 7starmantis (Nov 13, 2002)

Do any of you who use sticky hands as part of your training, train sticky hands with your eyes closed? My training partner and I have been focusing alot of doing it with our eyes closed, it really makes you use your feeling of their hands rather than your eyes!! I'm really enjoying it.

7sm


----------



## Phil Elmore (Nov 13, 2002)

We do this quite a bit at the _Syracuse Wing Chun Academy_.  It's actually a lot easier to do it right with your eyes closed, because you're not tempted to anticipate.  It forces you to react only when you feel force.

To be honest, while I understand the useful nature of the exercise, I can't say I really enjoy it all that much.  I'm not sure why;  there are just other things I'd rather be doing in class.


----------



## Matt Stone (Nov 13, 2002)

Sharp Phil - welcome!  Glad to see more E-budo crossovers...

Try doing any and all of your sensitivity drills with your eyes closed.  Push hands, sticky hands, arnis trapping drills...  whatever.

Try this - 

Stand at normal fighting distance with your partner.  One person (the receiver) either has their eyes closed or is wearing a blindfold.  The other person (attacker) should then begin making light contact attempts at striking.  The receiver should attempt to "feel" the incoming strike and avoid it...

This will make the receiver look goofy at first, and makes for an entertaining evening in the training hall, but in time it will develop a fine sense of response in the receiver.

Give it a try and let me know how you like it...  You can also try turning out the lights.  Be ready to take a few hits, though...

Gambarimasu.
:asian:


----------



## 7starmantis (Nov 13, 2002)

Oh yeah, push hands, sticky hands, we do all of them with our eyes closed. IT is probably one of my favorite things to do!! 
Glad to see others are using it too.
I like the idea of the lights out, I'm going to try that one!!


7sm


----------



## arnisador (Nov 13, 2002)

I've had both demonstarted for me but have never had a chance to learn either. Both interest me.


----------



## Matt Stone (Nov 14, 2002)

Arnisador - 

If you have access to a taiji instructor, then I would recommend push hands training...  But don't get caught in the taiji trap that push hands in anything more than an _exercise_.

It's like doing block-trap-counters or trapping drills in Modern Arnis - sure, they help you develop certain skills for fighting, but they themselves _are not_ fighting...  When you receive a strike with a stick, how many times do you expect to trap the guy up before you are cranking him in the melon?  Same goes for push hands...  How many strikes, pushes and grabs are you going to allow the baddie to toss your direction before you start smacking him like a cheap hooker that owes you money?

There are a lot of folks in the taiji community that fall victim to this, and think their push hands skill substitutes for their fighting skill.  I suppose my comments here will pi$$ them off pretty good...  Sorry!  Not sorry!

If you are nowhere near a taiji instructor, or he/she refuses to push with you because you haven't undergone years of intensive _qigong_ and forms training, then do this - either come up here to SeaTac and train with me (anytime, man, just let me know when you are heading out this way), *or* practice trapping drills in slow motion.  Maintain the fluidity of the movements, don't go so slow that you are starting to yawn in between traps, and focus not on the timing so much so as the feeling of "feeling" his body when you redirect his strikes.

Gambarimasu.
:asian:


----------



## arnisador (Nov 14, 2002)

Thanks for the offer but I'm a thousand miles away! The local instructor _did_ refuse to do push hands--we asked often--and now has moved, so I am without a Tai Chi instructor. I'll think about the trapping hands as a substitution idea.


----------



## Matt Stone (Nov 14, 2002)

Arnisador - 

How long have you been training in Arnis?  How long in MA in general (if other than Arnis)?

Where do you live?  We have an instructor in PA now, too...

I figured that the taiji instructor would balk at opening up to a non-student...  There are a lot of folks that way.  I like to look at it this way (and the view is heavily influenced by what Chufeng and RyuShiKan have taught me): if I show you something, and you train it assiduously, then you will benefit and use it for the right reasons; if you are inclined to use something for the wrong reasons, or you "aren't worthy," then likely whatever I show you will be forgotten a few moments later.

If you _do_ happen to ever make it out Washington way, let me know.  I will make sure there is plenty of available training time so you can get a good look at Yiliquan.

Gambarimasu.
:asian:


----------



## Matt Stone (Nov 14, 2002)

Also, when doing the trapping hands as a substitute for push hands, don't break contact with him if at all possible during the trapping motions...

The whole idea is to "blend" with his body, until it almost feels like it isn't his anymore, but yours...

All these skills end up in the same ball park, really, just in different parts of the stands.

Gambarimasu.


----------



## arnisador (Nov 14, 2002)

I studied Tai Chi for a year, until the instructor moved, but she wouldn't teach it even to her senior students (5+ years). Her English was poor enough that we never really udnerstood why.

I've been at the martial arts since the late 1970s, arnis since the mid 1980s. I'm in a small town in Indiana now (Terre Haute, Western-Central Indiana).


----------



## Matt Stone (Nov 14, 2002)

What other martial arts have you studied?  I am trying to find a corrolary somewhere else in your training to try to talk you through something that would be akin to push hands...


----------



## arnisador (Nov 14, 2002)

Isshin-ryu, Goju-ryu, Uechi-ryu...

Judo, BJJ, Aikido...

Tai Chi...

Iaido...

Mo Duk Pai Kung Fu...

Uechi and Isshin had some exercises that involved pushing against one anothers' arms (Kotekitae).

I've seen push hands and sticky hands done but never "felt" them! It seems both confer some body sense that could be useful. I've had the Shotokan-style method (_kakie_?) demonstrated for me also.


----------



## chufeng (Nov 14, 2002)

Arnisidor,

We have an Isshinryu school very close to our training group...they even participated in our last YiLi seminar...

We could use that as a jump off point if you decide to travel this way for a training seminar...maybe dovetail it into a YiLi/IsshinRyu workshop...

I'm sure the guys here would be up for it (especially if we let them be primary and let them collect the gate)...

You are welcome up here any time...

During our last seminar, they discovered many applications in their forms that they had been missing...likewise, we learned about specific Isshinryu techniques found within our system...

Lots of fun.


:asian:
chufeng


----------



## arnisador (Nov 14, 2002)

I appreciate it. The arts I listed above are for the most part former arts; right now I train Modern Arnis, JKD, and BJJ only. The Tai Chi teacher moved away and the others are even further in the past (I have moved frequently for school/work). Isshin-ryu is now many years in my past.

I travel often and may be able to take you up on that offer some day. Next year I'll be in San Diego, Montreal, Chicago, and Buffalo at the very least. Business has taken me to Vancouver before and we visited Seattle for a family vacation. I have tried often, as Mr. Hubbard will attest, to find a Wing Chun practitioner to show me some sticky hands. At least then I'll know what it is that I'm missing.


----------



## chufeng (Nov 14, 2002)

A very close friend of mine lives at Ft. Leonardwood Missouri...
He is an excellent Wing Chun practitioner...
He will deny it but it's true...


John Wong...LTC, AN, Chief, Anesthesia Nursing...


Look him up if you're ever in the area.

Sticky hands...yes, very sticky....


----------



## 7starmantis (Nov 17, 2002)

I don't know where you are located arnisador, but if your ever in the East Texas area, your welcome to visit my school as well. I don't claim to be a sticky hands expert but I'll deffinatly train with you!
Alot of people don't put much importance on sticky/push hands, but the skills and techniques learned are invaluable to me!

7sm


----------



## theneuhauser (Nov 17, 2002)

ok, what the hell,


arnisador- come on out and see us here in AZ after youve finished the-missouri to florida to washington and down to texas circuit.


----------



## arnisador (Nov 17, 2002)

Work is sending me to San Diego and Montreal next year; Modern Arnis will send me to Buffalo, as will family obligations. That's likely to be it!


----------



## Matt Stone (Nov 17, 2002)

Arnisador - 

You are friends with nbcdecon, right?  He is the one that was teaching me Modern Arnis in Japan...

Anyway, I am going back to Japan in June.  I am planning on spending time with nbcdecon, and I will make sure that I pass on what little I know about the whole push hands issue.  That way, should you and he manage to link up in Buffalo at any time, you can at least get an idea of how we do it in Yili.

Good luck.


----------



## arnisador (Nov 17, 2002)

Yes, I expect I'll see him at the camp in Buffalo May! Mr. Hubbard will appreciate this also.


----------



## Kong (Nov 19, 2002)

> I studied Tai Chi for a year, until the instructor moved, but she wouldn't teach it even to her senior students (5+ years)


Is this common in Tai Chi? I`ve only been training Tai Chi for a few months now, and our instructor has us doing push hands every session, he also shows martial applications to the form from the getgo!
Granted I joined the class a little late, the others have been with the instructor for about a year, most of them at least, but he (our instructor) seems to be very open about martial applications and focuses alot on push hands.


----------



## 7starmantis (Nov 19, 2002)

> _Originally posted by Kong _
> 
> *Is this common in Tai Chi? I`ve only been training Tai Chi for a few months now, and our instructor has us doing push hands every session, he also shows martial applications to the form from the getgo!
> Granted I joined the class a little late, the others have been with the instructor for about a year, most of them at least, but he (our instructor) seems to be very open about martial applications and focuses alot on push hands. *



It is fairly uncommon to find a teacher that focuses on the Martial application as much as your's does. Stay with him and learn, its worth it.

7sm


----------

