Standing, bones and breath

[ChenAn]

You find ZZ as a integral part of Dai Xinyi (that would be pre-1700) and after that it is found in Xingyiquan. There is a variation form Dai Xinyi called Ape standing that did not transfer into things like Hebei Xingyiquan. Dai family could not understand how you could make Xingyi work without Ape standing.

ZZ does not generate power, but it helps you understand how to get things form the root to where you want it to go.

Bottom Line, Zhan Zhaung has been around a lot longer than Chen Xiaowang.

Yes it has, but Chen never used it before. There are other similar semi static drills but not ZZ. Right now ZZ is great deal of taiji marketing. Which takes it out of context or original purpose . Take a private lesson with CXW and enjoy standing in ZZ for $400 in hour..Just saying..


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[Xue Sheng]

Think I may have read that somewhere before

But it didn't cost me $400 and I did not first learn ZZ in taiji, learned it in Xingyi. However my Yang sifu (student of Tung Ying Chieh) does teach it on occasion and he has no connection to the Chen's other than through Yang Luchan. But he does not put great emphasis on it. His feeling is that all you truly need is in the form.

However things were added to taiji and changed by the Yang family. Also coming from Tung Ying Chieh you get some Wǔshì (Wu/Hao) taiji as well.

 

[JowGaWolf]

So I've been standing in training for the last few months. Just standing. Occasionally moving just a little bit, but mostly just standing there. Staring at the white wall. Now it feels completely different. I'm starting to feel my bones. Starting to feel the space between them. Feeling my breath move them. Feeling my feet. My toes. My fourth toe. I started to move again on new years eve. Still not done standing there, but moving again now. It's been interesting. Anyone have any thoughts on that?

It's harder to stand still than it is to move. It sounds like you are starting to gain awareness of your body which is normal for internal martial arts. Standing still or moving slowly forces you to focus on the smaller things about your body that matter. If you think this is exciting wait until it kicks in when you start sparring against someone.

Just recently I was sparring against a Sanda person and my limited Tai Chi skills came into use (I have on video). I didn't do anything incredible, but you can tell by my opponent's movements that something internal was at work. This is only the second time that this has happened and each time is was something that was totally unplanned for me.

 

[Ruhaani]

I personally think zz does generate power because your connecting all the wiring back to the power source you have to have an understanding on subtlety of the human mechanics and besides I think true tai chi is not within the forms but something more spiritual.

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[Elbowgrease]

Honestly not concerned about power generation at the moment. That just is what it is. And my sifu never sold me anything, he gave me things. He talked about what happened when he told sifu Woo he was thinking about teaching. Sifu Woo made him stand there until he told him to move again, and then only do the very first movement of the form until he could do it right. Months of each of them, 6 hours a day, 6 days a week. A little extreme, but teaching tai chi and gongfu is serious. It can't be taken lightly. I wanted to find out what that was all about. Now I have an ever so slightly better understanding of what that's all about. And I'm only just beginning. And push hands is puah hands and not the real thing. I can uproot a push hands champ without even trying and I don't know push hands, but he can't beat me in a fight because he doesn't know anything about fighting. So I'm probably not going to be playing push hands with anyone and calling it tai chi chuan.

 

[Elbowgrease]

And thanks to all for the many great replies.

 

[Xue Sheng]

Honestly not concerned about power generation at the moment. That just is what it is. And my sifu never sold me anything, he gave me things. He talked about what happened when he told sifu Woo he was thinking about teaching. Sifu Woo made him stand there until he told him to move again, and then only do the very first movement of the form until he could do it right. Months of each of them, 6 hours a day, 6 days a week. A little extreme, but teaching tai chi and gongfu is serious. It can't be taken lightly. I wanted to find out what that was all about. Now I have an ever so slightly better understanding of what that's all about. And I'm only just beginning. And push hands is puah hands and not the real thing. I can uproot a push hands champ without even trying and I don't know push hands, but he can't beat me in a fight because he doesn't know anything about fighting. So I'm probably not going to be playing push hands with anyone and calling it tai chi chuan.

push hands is not fighting, it is not even sparing, its a training tool

 

[JowGaWolf]

And push hands is puah hands and not the real thing. I can uproot a push hands champ without even trying and I don't know push hands, but he can't beat me in a fight because he doesn't know anything about fighting. So I'm probably not going to be playing push hands with anyone and calling it tai chi chuan.

My opinion is that you should still do the push hands. Push hands teaches you how to sense the slightest movement through fighting and to recognize the intent of that movement. Push hands trains you to sense changes and shifts in the body's balance. Here's a short video of what I learned in Push Hands being applied to free sparring. I'm still a long way off for being able to actually fight using tai chi but this video represents the second time where the skills I learned from push hands was utilized.
It's not going to look like Tai Chi push hands so I'll explain what is going on.

Description of the video:
My opponent charges into me and is unable to move me by punching. I sense that he's off balance so I push, when I feel that he's off balance from the push, I pull. The key parts of the video is to look at how his body reacts to the push and to the pull in comparison to how much my body actually moves. You can also tell how much energy he's fighting against by the way he spins off and the sound of his foot landing. When you look at me, it looks like I'm doing very little.

Like I said it doesn't look like much but there's a lot of sensing and timing going on, all of which I developed from Tai Chi and as far as Tai Chi goes, I'm barely a beginner in the world of Tai Chi.

 

[mograph]

My opinion is that you should still do the push hands.

Yes. Standing can complement push hands, and does not replace it.

 

[Elbowgrease]

I have mixed feelings about push hands and very little knowledge or experience with it. It was never taught where I train and there was a reason for that, although we do have some paired exercises similar to it. I don't know it and have no way to learn it. So I can't really pursue it.

 

[JowGaWolf]

I have mixed feelings about push hands and very little knowledge or experience with it. It was never taught where I train and there was a reason for that, although we do have some paired exercises similar to it. I don't know it and have no way to learn it. So I can't really pursue it.

Then that's a different story and it's not really by your decision not to do it. Push hands requires training because there's more to it than just pushing someone. If there is no one there that can guide you with push hands then it will be very difficult to learn it on your own.

 

[Elbowgrease]

And I'm really not interested in learning it. There is someone around who knows it, and is trying to teach it, but he's not much of a teacher.

 

[JowGaWolf]

And I'm really not interested in learning it. There is someone around who knows it, and is trying to teach it, but he's not much of a teacher.

That's a good reason for not learning it.

 

[23rdwave]

Chen family was doing just find before Chen Xiaowang introduced ZZ.

I guess modern taiji marketing really works. People are reciting something they don't really understand. ZZ has nothing to do with generating power. Before practitioner even can think about power he has to learn a proper body method - shenfa and stepping method -bufa.

Given that practitioner understand basic body method there comes jibengong and etc.

It's just like a Lego pieces that has to come together before you can build anything else

As mentioned before ZZ may make feel people comfortable and happy. However, ultimate test of gongfu come under stress of actually using it. We can all talk about great benefits and theory. But unless any of us able to manifest it, it really means nothing.

Standing endlessly in ZZ see will not provide practitioner with much benefit or practical usage. Yes one will gets stronger legs, but so what? Weight lifters have strong legs as well does it make them great taiji practitioners? No!

Taiji is alive art not static, so maintaining body composure in the motion is very important. There is a taolu practice for that..



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I learned Yiquan zhan zhuang first from Henry Look who learned from Han Xing Yuan who learned from Wang Xiang Zhai. I was then taught the Han Shi Yi Quan method by Han Jing Chen, son of Han Xing Qiao. Han Xing Qiao and Han Xing Yuan were brothers and two of the Four Diamonds who accepted challenge matches on behalf of Wang Xiang Zhai, the founder of Yiquan.

I practice Han Shi Yi Quan and Guang Ping Yang Taiji not Chen Taiji.

Without zhan zhuang there is no proper body method.

Read my earlier posts about movement in stillness and not wasting one's time standing for long periods. I do zhan zhuang for just a few minutes at a time.

 

[ChenAn]

I learned Yiquan zhan zhuang first from Henry Look who learned from Han Xing Yuan who learned from Wang Xiang Zhai. I was then taught the Han Shi Yi Quan method by Han Jing Chen, son of Han Xing Qiao. Han Xing Qiao and Han Xing Yuan were brothers and two of the Four Diamonds who accepted challenge matches on behalf of Wang Xiang Zhai, the founder of Yiquan.

I practice Han Shi Yi Quan and Guang Ping Yang Taiji not Chen Taiji.

Without zhan zhuang there is no proper body method.

Read my earlier posts about movement in stillness and not wasting one's time standing for long periods. I do zhan zhuang for just a few minutes at a time.

Correct me if I'm wrong Yiquan doesn't have any form sets aka taolu, just drills and "standing poles" aka ZZ? Well Chen style has set of postures that included in taolu. Each of them can represent similar concept as ZZ if enough time spent. But ZZ by itself which adopted by Chen taiji doesn't carry the value than one in Yiquan. Chen taolu if done 30-40 minutes designed to serve the same purpose as ZZ in Yiquan.

Here is what adopted ZZ looks like in Chen

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

Here is what adopted ZZ looks like in Chang Taiji.

 

[Xue Sheng]

Correct me if I'm wrong Yiquan doesn't have any form sets aka taolu, just drills and "standing poles" aka ZZ? Well Chen style has set of postures that included in taolu. Each of them can represent similar concept as ZZ if enough time spent. But ZZ by itself which adopted by Chen taiji doesn't carry the value than one in Yiquan. Chen taolu if done 30-40 minutes designed to serve the same purpose as ZZ in Yiquan.

Here is what adopted ZZ looks like in Chen

Yiquan has push hands and if you look up Wang Rengang you will see a kind of taolu. You will also find sanda in Yiquan as well, especially in Beijing from Yao

 

[23rdwave]

Correct me if I'm wrong Yiquan doesn't have any form sets aka taolu, just drills and "standing poles" aka ZZ? Well Chen style has set of postures that included in taolu. Each of them can represent similar concept as ZZ if enough time spent. But ZZ by itself which adopted by Chen taiji doesn't carry the value than one in Yiquan. Chen taolu if done 30-40 minutes designed to serve the same purpose as ZZ in Yiquan.

Here is what adopted ZZ looks like in Chen

In Han Shi Yi Quan we do our version of Xingyi's five elements fists and San Ti. There are eight postures in the zhan zhuang and sixty-four in Guang Ping Yang Taiji. All of the taiji postures contain several movements within them. There are over 100 postures of zz to explore.

 

[mograph]

23rdwave, could you recommend any resources for standing practice?

 

[23rdwave]

For books: "The Tao of Yiquan" and "Masters of Perception" by Jan Diepersloot

For videos:
韩星垣 - Хань Синъюань Ицюань