THE ROLE OF FORM

 

Masters Wu Chien Chuan, Wabu Young, Stephen Hwa with Sihing Jim Roach

"When you have something that works well, why complicate it?"

The study of Kata cuts across all martial arts, and Classical Wu Style Tai Chi is no exception.  In Tai Chi, of course, the term Form is most often used instead of Kata.  Prof. Geoff Lane of the Danzan Ryu JuJitsu system in Chico, California has written an article entitled "Back to Basics."

In the article, Lane pays tribute to Grandmaster Young Wabu's devotion and adherence to fundamental principles.  I include the excerpt here:

"Another martial artist I was very fortunate to meet with a similar quality was Linyi Maslin's father: 

Master Wabu Young, a Tai Chi master.  He studied in Hong Kong under Master Wu Chien Chuan in the 30's after he came to Hong Kong from Shanghai to escape the Japanese.  He spent his whole life perfecting one kata.  Doing it square, round, regular, and mirror image; fast and slow; large and small...the basics...doing the same Tai Chi form for 70 years.  

He passed away in 2004 (correction: note that Grand Master Young Wabu passed away on April 18, 2005, at the age of 101 in Rochester, NY), dying a "typical Zen Master's death (but that's another story), exuding power and grace to the end.  The basics served him well.  When you have something that works well, why complicate it?"

 Professor Geoff Lane teaches jujitsu at the Nibukikan in Chico, California.  Grand Master Young Wabu's daughter Lin-Yi Maslin also teaches Jujitsu and Wu Style Tai Chi at the Nibukikan in Chico, California.

You are exactly right. While Kata is the standard term in Japanese martial arts like Karate, Form (or Taolu in Chinese) is the preferred term in kung fu and tai chi. 

Despite the different names, both serve the same fundamental purpose: they are choreographed sequences of movements designed to preserve, practice, and transmit the core defensive and offensive techniques of the art. 

The Role of Form in Classical Wu Style Tai Chi:

In Classical Wu Style Tai Chi—which traces its lineage directly through the Wu style—the Form is unique because of its strict adherence to internal body mechanics.

Internal Discipline: The focus is entirely on Internal Movement (the rotation of the spine and hips) rather than External Movement (just moving the arms and legs).

Self-Defense Blueprint: 

Every slow, deliberate posture in the Form contains hidden applications for striking, joint locks, or throws. 

The "Square" Form: 

Beginners often learn the "Square Form," which breaks movements down into distinct, angular components to master precision, posture, and internal muscle activation.

The "Round" Form: 

Advanced practitioners transition to the "Round Form," where those distinct components fluidly blend, hiding the internal power generation from onlookers. Whether called Kata or Form, these sequences act as a living textbook.

Slow-Motion Fighting

 

One inch punch was learned slowly, a video

(see 2:20 the punch demo)

Slow learning video for the punch

(see 8:20 to learn)

Why do people poke fun and express derision at the slow movements of Classical Tai Chi?

People often poke fun at or express derision toward the slow movements of Classical Tai Chi because, as assumed with any Tai Chi, they contrast sharply with modern, westernized, and stereotypical views of "effective" exercise or martial arts. The ridicule typically stems from a lack of understanding of its internal principles, its common branding as a gentle "park exercise," and its often-slow, public performances. 

Misunderstood and mocked:

1. Many martial misconceptions

• "Slow-Motion Fighting" Joke: The assumption is that because the training is slow, the fighting is slow. Said to

The “NOT” moving

 In Classical Tai Chi, the "NOT" moving at the junction of Yin and Yang represents the essential principle of Internal Discipline. The "junction" is a specific area in the torso or joints—such as the waist or upper-quarter body—where the stationary "Yin" (supporting structure) connects with the active "Yang" (moving part). 

This concept can be understood through the following key points:

• Fast Relaxation/Energization: The "not moving" (stillness) at this junction is not passive. It requires rapid relaxation—called Song (松)—to release tension and "energizing" to maintain the structure at the same speed or faster than the moving Yang part.
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• The Goal is Internal Power: When the junction is held still and relaxed, it allows the internal energy (Qi) to compress and flow across that point, creating a "whirlpool" or spring-like effect. This builds immense internal energy in a relaxed body, which can be instantly released.
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• Preventing "Double Weighting": It is the "pivot point" where one side of the body acts as a support, allowing the other to move freely. Your body will not be “double weighted”, aka “double heavy”. Being still at junctions will enable this, and your balance will be maintained. 
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• Distinction Between Yin and Yang: Master Stephen Hwa emphasizes that to distinguish between stillness and motion truly, the Yin part must not move at all, while the Yang moves. As Yang is "hidden" within the stillness of Yin, the contrast between them is heightened, which is key to developing Fajin (the release of power).
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• How it feels: When performed correctly, the practitioner feels a stretching sensation and intense energy flowing across the junction in an otherwise relaxed body. 

In summary, this concept means the junction should not move externally, but must remain dynamically alive and "ready" through instantaneous relaxation and structural integrity. 

Internal Discipline "Folding Movement"

Excerpted  and some editing from "Uncovering the Treasure, Classical Tai Chi's Path to Health & Energy" by Stephen Hwa:

Please go to this link:
Internal Discipline Folding Movement Video Link

The folding move involves only one side of the body; but in this case it is not the entire side (includes legs which is shown in the photo above) which would be known as "hand follows foot , elbow follows knee", so please do not confuse this with that movement

This is just the upper quadrant of the body moving/folding as a unit. It is a QUARTER-BODY move.  In the case shown in the video, the right side of the body is folding or unfolding by keeping the left side of the body stationary.  The stationary part provides support, some of the power for the move but the lower 2 quadrants (legs) provide grounding.  The Right side of the body is yang, the left side of the body is yin.  The Yin-Yang junction is at the spine. One can visualize that the spine is a hinge, so each side of the torso, down through the buttocks is like a door which folds or unfolds using that hinge.  If the leg was involved in the movement, it would be a HALF-BODY move.

Even though only a quarter of the body is moving it is still an important example of how to make a move but still keep a portion (in this case 3/4 of the body) still.  It is also of importance as an example of how to make a move but keep a significant portion of the body alignment intact.  Whether half body or quarter body, whether the leg moves with it or not it can only be achieved when the turning power comes from the waist and the entire back's muscles.

If this is done correctly , one will achieve a continuous energy flow in the body.  It is a "neigong" exercise. It is tailor made to be a "silk reeling exercise" which might be defined as a continuous symmetrical simple internal movement or movements.  Doing this, one will be able to learn gradually how to move with internal discipline and enjoy the sensation of internal energy circulation. This exercise emphasizes the stimulation of muscles, tendons and blood flow along the spine and the back.  Those who practice this regularly experience a sense of rejuvenation and improved well being.  If one has spare moments during the day, particularly if the exercise can be carried out in a casual and relaxed mood, there will be more chance for the subconscious to play a part.  The ultimate objective is to learn internal movements like this in more or less a piecemeal fashion then integrate them into the Form play.

4 Oz. deflects 1000 Lbs. is also a "Ratio"...

“The true health benefits and the foundation for martial arts application of Tai Chi can only be achieved when the practitioner incorporates “Internal Discipline”…using internal movement/internal power to direct and empower external movements into Tai Chi” .    The difficulty with doing this is that there is so many things that can go wrong in the process of sensing where the movements are originating from.  “For the beginner, the difficulty lies in the mental discipline in which all attention has to be concentrated on the core of the body”.  (In the debate about use of hips vs. waist), If the beginner thinks even one little bit about the hip  for instance, then a turning move, etc. will partially be initiated from the hip.

In Classical Tai Chi we have to become not only aware of the sensory signals of our body but also to focus and catalogue them.  As I am falling asleep at night I can often both feel and hear my heartbeat, I feel when my posture has excess muscular tension. I can,  much like the weightlifters flex certain muscles which I feel (without using weights).  Finally and most appropriate to Classical Tai Chi I can not only feel but also acutely control the movements of my body core.  The problem for beginners in Classical Tai Chi is that all of these tactile “feelings” must focus on relatively miniscule nerve signals of sensation.  Those small nerve signals are overwhelmed by the background “noise” of the other body sensations.  This is why, for example,  when I was learning to shoot the M14 rifle in the Marines I learned instinctively to hold my breath and “squeeezzze” the trigger.  It actually is a delicate and complex task to fire a rifle accurately (my breathing with its innate sounds and tactile sensations in the body can interfere with the coordination of firing).  The same goes “in spades”,  for the multi-faceted and complex movements of Classical Tai Chi.

So we want to cut down on the background signal  “noise”  and in the case of Classical Tai Chi this means several things not the least of which is reducing  the amount of extraneous or “external” movement from the body.  Specifically,  I mean the extraneous movement from the limbs.  Our nervous system (my teacher says a “well tuned nervous system is prized in China”)  is hard wired to take things like tactile stimulation in terms of its ratio to other senses, it does not do this in absolutes. 

There is even a “law” governing this that was coined by E.H. Weber in 1834 that essentially states our “ratio” of signal to noise is constant however. Speaking of “signal” to “noise”: Looking at the  videos attached to some of the other blogs, we see Master Hwa speaking in what is quite a noisy environment.  He had to speak up to be heard over the ambient room noise, the sounds of the students, etc.  So it is not a simple matter of my increasing the volume on the video when before I render it, for to do that would also increase the room noise.  If we were in a really quiet environment he would only have had to whisper. I’m not sure if the law always holds true but as a rule of thumb it does seem to work.

In Classical Tai Chi we do some work with Tui Shou or “push hands”.  If you close your eyes as we push and I press down with one pound of force on one of your hands, then I added another pound of force you would notice the difference immediately.  That extra force sent a “signal”  that equaled the intensity of the original force.  If I took a feather and put it on the “one pound hand” you would not notice the extra weight. A feather has a sensory input that is too miniscule to be “heard” or in Tai Chi lexicon “ting jin” over the initial one pound weight.   If you are pushing me with 100 pounds of force, then I only need a figurative“feather”  or as the Classics say “4 oz.” properly applied (internal energy) at the right angle, with good timing…to send you flying. Now looking at the "after" image with Master Hwa and a student here you can see the results of 4 oz. properly applied:

Why is this a “ratio”?  In Tai Chi there is a saying that “a feather cannot be added; nor can a fly land without setting the practitioner in motion”. Well, if a fly lands   on your “push hand” instead of my one pound of force,  then I add a feather (we will all need good luck with getting the fly to stand still long enough) you will notice the difference in weight right away. 

Our perception of any sensation uses the same ratio principle, particularly when we focus on it.  The “signals” that a beginner senses from their movement of the core are much too small of a “ratio” to make it through the many external distractions of their environment, their extraneous movement of their bodies, the many extraneous thoughts of the mind,  etc.  A student of Master Hwa’s had achieved some internal movement but complained about cold fingers.  Watching her form he noticed that she had “flourishes” type movements, the extra movements were unnecessary.  These are “extraneous movements’ or nerve signals along the path of qi.  Other examples are extraneous shoulder, arm, elbow, finger, etc. types.  These disrupt the flow of qi (nerve signal) between body and fingers, body and feet, etc.

As Master Hwa says: “It is important to keep localized nerve activity dormant and let the qi from the body take over…all good reasoning why one should also learn “Square Form”  so practitioners can get used to movements with steady arms and hands and thus no localized nerve impulses. “

Thus,  here for instance,  are only  a couple examples of why we do not want to add in things like extra “breathing techniques” (breathing qigongs) a “top down discipline” to the “bottom up” discipline of Tai Chi; why we do not want to do Tai Chi to music, adding weights to the hands, why we want to stand still while our teacher is explaining  how to do something in Classical Tai Chi (our time will come to do it with them), why we want to stand still while our teacher is demonstrating how to do something for that matter (our time will come to do it with them), why we don’t want to “push” or “turn” our opponent with a lot of force if we are trying to keep focused on their movement.

As you can see from the picture above, Master Hwa has allowed the practitioner to generate lots of momentum in a straight ahead direction, (he did not resist or push back with lots of force when the opponent attacked) then when he was stretched out, Master Hwa used a “feather” to attack from the angle.  The opponent was generating so much “noise”, he could not hear any other “signals”, namely the “feather” of 4 oz. that Master Hwa used from the side angle.  As a teacher I experience this "signal to noise" paradigm from students who just start to learn both the form and push hands.  Even more experienced push hands players have to be reminded of this, please take this to heart.   

In the Tao of Martial Applications video of Master Hwa and a student pushing hands, he speaks of the “cooperative”  as well as “competitive” push hands. In either case one has to (along with other requirements)  use fluidity of movement, sensitivity to the opponents movements, stick to the opponent, follow rather than resist the opponents force and finally use four oz. to deflect a thousand pounds of incoming force.  If Master Hwa is pushing back with a thousand pounds on what “ratio” will he have to rely?  “Ratio”…what ratio?

Using too much force are we?

Push hands is not "Trench Warfare", here's a couple of experiments to show the dangers inherent in using too much force, too much resistance, too much rigidity, etc. I think overall however what is implicit in the experiments is that trying push hands before internal discipline becomes 2nd nature will frequently result in trench warfare.


A student of mine recently told me that he attempted an "experiment" using the Ward Off movement that I have shown him. He stated he had a much larger person push against his arm but also states that he was pushed back. I should state that I have shown Ward Off to my students while they pushed on my outstretched arm. Each time I demonstrate, I reiterate that my arm is not rigid and that I am using a minimum force necessary to ward off their push. Often, students will push "off center" on my arm and I still continue to ward them off but point out that I am redirecting their push. In other words, I am being discriminating in the amount of force that I use. I think the use of an image to explain this might be of help here.

Take an air filled ball and float it in some water, now try to sink the ball by pressing down on it from the top. The ball does not push back with a rigid force, yet it supports your press. If you press off center on the ball however, it rotates and your arm goes lurching forward and to the side. This is what I mean by "off center" push and redirecting the opponents force.

By saying that my arm is not "rigid", I mean that it is not stiffened up to any degree. The student cannot remember whether he stiffened up his arm but my guess is that is what happened. Pushing slightly on his outstretched arm I see this happening myself. I would recommend to any student to try an experiment that Master Hwa has recommended in Forum 11, previously: "Try to press the back of your hand against a door frame, just like you are blocking an opponent's arm. Do you find that one side of your forearm muscle is energized while the other side muscle is relaxed?"

People report:

• Tightened forearm and back arm
• Tightened whole arm
• Resistance from door jam which seems to push them back

Please take the time to click this link I call "Door Jam" experiment , read the results and it is the very first article . I think it gives good insight into why the student got "pushed around".

Blog 5 Video of Basic Walking for New Students...it's not "Like" anything you've done before

THREE BLIND MEN AND AN ELEPHANT

Can any of them formulate a good "concept" much less a "true" one of what the elephant is? There is a saying in Chinese (pinyin) which is zhǐ lù weí mǎ…”pointing at a deer and calling it a horse”…literally twisting the truth. This is only remedied by wǒ zuò wǒ liǎo jiě…I do and (only then can I say) I understand. The basic walking we are going to show below is not "like" anything you have done before and neither is the vast majority of the Internal Discipline we show in this Blog... We'll also attempt to explain here why students should not fret over "concepts".

"The study of Classical Tai Chi in the beginning through advanced stages is as logical and rigorous as the study of any scientific discipline"...Master Stephen Hwa, Ph.D. What beginning students run up against however is the desire to conceptualize something that is based almost entirely on an individual's personal experience. 3 blind men will surely each have a different "concept" of an elephant when touching it for the 1st time, how should the zoo keeper provide a "concept" of the elephant for them by mere explanation? Won't their "concept" be considerably different in 1,3,5 years if they faithfully come back each day and touch more of the elephant each time?

The other problem is that a lack of a concept sometimes seems to spur students to try harder to intellectualize what is experiential. For instance, one hears pronouncements or affirmations about what "Qi" is from beginning students. Or one hears "conceptualizations" from beginning students about the Internal Discipline. "Oh, that is like belly dancing", "Oh, that is like an exercise I used to teach in Karate", "Oh, that is like the 24 Forms of Wu Style Tai Chi, etc. Or regarding the subject of "Qi": "Oh, I know what that is, it is like energy, it is air, it is like...", or "I teach Karate and since I have experience with that it stands to reason that I can not only teach Tai Chi but I can articulate what "Qi" is..." Let me get this straight, science cannot thoroughly articulate what "Qi" is but you can? The question I have to remarks like that is, "Why is it such a persistent issue that everyone assumes they can explain "Qi" or teach how to cultivate it, when they have not gone through the "beginning through advanced" stages we mentioned previously? Science has no answers at the level of understanding we talk about...how would someone who has not studied Classical Tai Chi or Qigong in depth have an answer. It is only when one reaches the advanced stage and contemplates such problems as by example "conceptualizing what Qi is" where one truly sees Science has no answers... it should be a humbling experience. How then is there any "conceptualization" to be had for the beginning practitioner?

What the blind men actually said:
“This queer animal is like our straw fans swinging back and forth to give us a breeze. However, it’s not so big or well made. The main portion is rather wispy.”
“No, no!” the first blind man shouted in disagreement. “This queer animal resembles two big trees without any branches.”
“You’re both wrong.” the third man replied. “This queer animal is similar to a snake; it’s long and round, and very strong.”
How they argued! Each one insisted that he alone was correct. Of course, there was no conclusion for not one had thoroughly examined the whole elephant. How can anyone describe the whole until he has learned the total of the parts.
(Kuo, Louise and Kuo, Yuan-Hsi, Chinese Folk Tales, 1976, Celestial Arts: Millbrae, CA, pp. 83-85.)