The Art of Taiji is in Decline

I have been thinking about the point of Olympic advancement and Tai Chi decline. Of course I cannot include the real truth of my longtime association with the first school that I started in; it would be too cruel to that crowd. On one hand I have been the recipient of great generosity and must respect the conditions under which that was given. On the other hand I have trained earnestly at Olympic levels for 20 years with unacceptable results. Of course I blame myself but I also blame the system and methodology. I do not blame the individuals but even to voice an honest assessment of current methods and results publicly would come across as disrespectful. Imagine you had a music teacher who told you that they would teach you everything openly without holding back but only when you were ready. After 20 years you were still playing scales and etudes and were not ready for concertos. I would question the pedagogy. Luckily for musicians there is a well-established pedagogy that reliably leads to Mastery and the same is true in sports. My long time teacher in that school was still doing and teaching Tai Chi at the beginner exaggerated level after 20 years. You see, although the muscles are inside the body or “internal”, wiggling them around or the ability to do isolations is not “Internal”. The thing about useful exaggerations is that they are only useful as long as they are useful.

While I do not believe the necessary advances in methodology and pedagogy will come from neuroscientists and physiologists I do believe that the Tai Chi reformers will use the language and science of those disciplines to formalize and make clear those concepts formerly thought to be bound by Chinese language and culture.

My personal belief is that the Traditional Art of Tai Chi must be preserved. The traditional methods of teaching and learning need to be re-examined. Consider the advances in sports. In Olympic competition all breakthroughs trickle down to the collegiate level within years. High school athletes are competing at levels set by Olympians within a decade. Why don’t we see this sort of progress in Tai Chi? I know people who put that kind of time and energy into their training but they don’t get the results. Clearly, if the Ancients were here, with their skill and ability they could modernize the approach. The safety measure is not to modernize the form but to modernize the training method. I know it is not an Internal Art but in Figure Skating for example you can see physical feats increasing along with artistry, understanding and internal grace. These people retain their skills into old age. Maybe we should look at the physical training techniques, apparatuses and principles discovered by modern sports medicine.

The old training methods were in harmony with a different age. The thing about the Daoist Art of Tai Chi is that it is in harmony with its environment. We live in a modern world. Our spiritual advances are being made in a world of phones and computers in buildings of steel and glass. So our world suggests a different way to achieve balance than the old ways. We do not have the luxury of retiring to a cave or a monastery to study in depth. We must find the opportunity in our world to do so.

The idea that Tai Chi players can achieve Forms, Push Hands and Awareness at the Mastery Level by the standard curricula we commonly see just seems wrong. To hide behind pedigree, lineage, secrecy, flowery New Age language, Cultural or Ancient double speak as an alternative to a clear transmission of the structural mechanics also seems wrong when dedicated, earnest students are practicing 3 to 4 hours a day for 10 to 15 years with very modest results and then to say that it will take 3 lifetimes is again just not adequate. I know it’s not the same but still in music, dance, visual arts, sports or even in MMA there are standards and accountability for achievement and efficacy of training methods. Bottom Line.

Most serious students of Taiji have a deep respect for Chinese culture and the gift of Taiji that it has given the world. Without the study of the Authentic Traditional Taiji and the culture that created Taiji it would be unlikely to progress to the higher levels. The idea that the only way to describe the central and universal concepts of Taiji requires a specific language and that to understand those concepts you need to be a native speaker is silly at best. Nobody can own an idea. Once an idea is at large we may and should try to describe it in numerous ways.

Taiji requires the Physicality of doing it and feeling it inside but it also includes an intellectual component. We should certainly be able to describe clearly in modern language what the methods and the results of Taiji should be. One must get the balance of those two components right or the work will not bear fruit.

Neurophysiology is by definition the study of the nervous system and how it relates to movement. This seems like a useful angle to use when communicating and defining what we feel in the body. Neurophysiology is thousands of years old and permeates all cultures so this is not an attempt to Westernize Tai Chi or Modernize it. It is an attempt to Modernize the Methodology for a Western Society. We await an Avatar with an Intellectual approach and sufficient Taiji skills capable of bridging the gap and willing to tell Truth to Power. Until then the Art of Taiji is in Decline.

Emotional Content

I have always loved seeing anyone perform. As a kid I would watch the local weekly talent show, the Lawrence Welk Show or the Ted Mack Geritol Hour to see real people playing music or whatever. As a musician I do love American Idol and will even watch the inferior spin-offs for the occasional moment of brilliance. The big surprise is That So You Think You Can Dance is the show that makes me cry. I can't watch more than one minute of Dancing With the Stars but SYTYCD has given me new vistas to explore conscious movement and focus my Tai Chi work.

People claim that Tai Chi should be empty and ego-less, that it is limited to prescribed traditional methods and that it is not related to dance. I believe that Tai Chi is a multi-faceted Performance Art rooted in Martial Art but also ancillary to it. I am an adult who has spent a large amount of my time practicing and studying Tai Chi for years and America is (at least for the time being) a free country so if I want to improvise, move freely, choreograph modern dance in a Tai Chi style with a narrative story and an emotional rise and fall then I am entitled to do so. Likewise if I believe that partner work can encompass contact improv, energy work and sensitivity training to the exclusion of fighting then again I have earned the right to that approach. It is certainly anyone’s right to declare that this is not Tai Chi as it is also for them to decide what Art is. For me that is a discussion that I no longer am interested in actively pursuing.

The feelings, consciousness, quality of movement, emotional release, creative nuance, artistic expression and audience connection are so deep with the angle of dance and generally not available in the straight ahead Tai Chi environment. The fact that Tai Chi players are unaware or dismissive about this angle is in no way a deterrent for me. I realize that people often only have consideration for what they do. They are not Masters over life, consciousness, ego or the evolution of Tai Chi. Certainly if one does not have interest, after studying intently for 20 years, in finding new methodologies, finding their own paths and evolving the art past where they found it then there is something still missing in my opinion.

It is within improvisational movement, choreographing original routines and improvising within the context of existing routines that we can find levels of emotional release and emotional content.

Why I don’t post on the Taiji Groups

My Teacher can beat up your teacher

If you are not doing X,Y and Z you are not even doing Tai Chi

Tai Chi has a curriculum of skills to be acquired including Fa Jing, Fighting, Internal Power, Spiritual advancement etc. without which the art is empty

This “Traditional” Form is better than that

This system is not traditional, that one is

Spiritual advancement is an emergent property of Taiji

You should bend the back

You should be erect

You should go Low, Slow, Fast, Smoothly and Kick, and Jump,

You should stand on your Left foot for one hour then on your right for 53 minutes, then meditate for 2 hours, then stand like a post for 3 then go too low and then go on Facebook to brag how diligently you are practicing

Length and frequency of practice determines outcome

You need to do the form 10,000 times to get good

No mention of how well you did the form

No mention about the intelligence and understanding of the practice

My No Ego system is better than your No Ego System

Shut up and Go Home

Shut up and I’m going home

No mention of the interesting research methodologies that yield the real results for the serious practitioner.

Yeah, that’s Why I don’t Post on the Tai Chi Groups

First Principles and a Common Language

My point is that looking at the Traditional Chinese concepts necessary to gain Mastery in Taiji from other angles can be illuminating. Even those who are very skilled in reading the classic texts in their native language have differing ideas of what the meaning is. If that was the only path for the Westerner we would be doomed!

There are numerous texts that the serious Taiji student should study and understand; many are written in ancient Chinese or more technically Classical Chinese (gǔ wén).

Some are written in a kind of Literary Chinese (wényán wén) and filled with poetic and prosaic constructions as well. For those who don’t know, this is not like the distinction between Traditional and Simplified Chinese, it’s much more than that. There are many modern Chinese speakers who do not understand the deep meaning of these styles of writing. Some of the best scholars of these dialects like Paul Brennan are not Chinese.

I have said that these concepts of Prima Sapientia may be spoken of in the language of Neuro-Science and Neuro-Physiology without reinventing or watering down the concepts. That is to say that these same ideas may be stated in other terms as it relates to Body Movement and Body Mechanics and the Feeling and Awareness that is associated with movement. That is actually the definition of Neuro-Physiology! It is an obvious modality to talk about internal processes such as Sung and Ting.

Most serious students of Taiji have a deep respect for Chinese culture and the gift of Taiji that it has given the world. Without the study of the Authentic Traditional Taiji and the culture that created Taiji it would be unlikely to progress to the higher levels. The idea that the only way to describe the central and universal concepts of Taiji requires a specific language and that to understand those concepts you need to be a native speaker is silly at best. Nobody can own an idea. Once an idea is at large we may try to describe it in numerous ways.

Taiji requires the Physicality of doing it and feeling it inside but it also includes an intellectual component. We should certainly be able to describe clearly in modern language what the methods and the results of Taiji should be. One must get the balance of those two components right or the work will not bear fruit.

What we are moving towards is a more Universal Understanding of the First Principles and a Common Language.

Where Did You Come To?

Were you transformed

 

What was the cost

 

What was the pain

 

How did you lose your way

 

How did you find yourself

 

What did you achieve

 

How did your goals change

 

Did you become a better person

 

How do you feel about what has happened

 

Was it worth it

 

What are you working on now

 

What’s next for you

 

How is the road opening up unexpectedly in front of you

 

Where Did You Come To

 

New and Old Training Methodologies

I am still looking to find Training Methodologies that go beyond Standing, Holding Postures, Doing the Form Repetitively, Push Hands Practice as I know it, etc. all of which do not seem to yield for me the Basic Skills that I would like to acquire.

All Martial Artists use the opponent’s power against them, use their reflexes and timing to dial down strength and speed requirements but Tai Chi is supposed to do something different which is to be able to merely use the surface energetics to trigger those myo-facial, sympathetic and parasympathetic responses or to cause the adrenaline dump shunting off any possible prefrontal cortex activity in the opponent. There is a clear neuro-physiological explanation for the majority of this which often ascribed to etheric effects or hidden behind a cultural barrier.

A runner does not achieve faster times only by visualization and running the course in slow motion, a basketball player or skater or swimmer or diver does not achieve Olympic levels by simply going through their event practice and likewise the Tai Chi player will never achieve mastery by just doing form. There are specific exercises, stretching, conditioning, training and optimization of action, muscle groups, theory and more that are either part of closed door teachings or have recently been scientifically developed.

The idea that Tai Chi players can achieve Forms, Push Hands and Awareness at the Mastery Level by the standard curricula we commonly see just seems wrong. To hide behind pedigree, lineage, secrecy, flowery New Age language, Cultural or Ancient double speak as an alternative to a clear transmission of the structural mechanics just seems wrong when dedicated, earnest students are practicing 3 to 4 hours a day for 10 to 15 years with very modest results and then to say will it take 3 lifetimes and the like is again just not adequate. I know it’s not the same but still in music, dance, visual arts, sports or even in MMA there are standards and accountability for achievement and efficacy of training methods. Bottom Line.

Well Bottom Line I want:

Ø Reflexive control of the partner without “doing techniques” on them

Ø Ability to stay in Taiji against very strong, uncooperative individuals who are not doing Taiji

Ø Ability to yield from any part of the body

Ø Ability to issue from any part of the body

Ø Extremely fast reflexive action (which BTW does not seem to be an emergent property of doing form slowly ;-)

Ø Ability to issue a Classic Taiji Push which from their perspective has no clear Point of Contact and the Partner flies a good distance without having been struck or jarred – Just Sucked in by the Undertow and Accelerated Away

Ø Ability to get a Radar Lock on the partner and see and understand everything in 3D

Ø Ability to Improvise freely with a Partner in Tui Shou / San Shou practice

Ø Ability to catch pushes and strikes like catching a child on a swing and returning the volley

Ø Ability to see inside your own body and Conscious of how it feels

Ø Ability to become Conscious of the process of becoming Conscious

Ø Natural Emergent high level Real Fighting Skills (It seems that in order to achieve these you Must not try to achieve these!)

Ø Beautiful and Graceful Forms practice

I am convinced that there are core curricula preserved from Traditional Methods that I am missing and I am more sure that there are emerging New Training Methodologies that are even better. We have to ask ourselves not what the Ancient Masters did but what would the Ancient Masters have done if they were living in this Age. I am pretty sure it would be a combination of New and Old Training Methodologies.

 

 

 

The Return Home

 

 

You, who are on the Road of Martial Arts have had had an Experience. Sometimes it seems that people will try to steal your experience, will tell you how to tell your story when they weren’t there. This inexorably leads to a combative kind of verbal exchange whenever we try to explore our ideas, assumptions and Ideologies and sort them out for the Better.

 

To those who think this is headed toward Gestalt therapy or something I will steer you back on course. This is basic Humanity. We have all been somewhere and it cost something and we gained something and we lost something and it mattered. It was important. It’s up to those on that Path to take care of each other. We brought such a high standard to it and some of it was met and some of it was not, that is a burden for some and a bitter pill for others. The very fact that is mattered so much is what fuels the endless bickering and perceived disagreements when we discuss our points of view.

 

Nobody is trying to make some rules that bind us here; nobody has taken anything from any of us. Everyone is telling their story and describing the area of the Mountain that they are currently engaged with and that makes us the same, not separate. The world in general requires many competing and Mutually Exclusive theories to describe it and why would the complex world of Taiji be any different? To me the subtext of these little skirmishes is a chance for various folks to step up and describe their field of study with the passion that a tale like this needs to be told.

 

We are all fellow travelers on a Mythic Quest to obtain the Golden Fleece and to make the rarest of all mythic quests - The Return Home.