Silk Reeling Demo (A)

[Appledog]

This demo of silk reeling shows a basic jibengong, suitable for "100 days" practice. When you reach that level it is often suggested you stop practicing it and just do the form.

In a famous interview with Jarek Szymanski, Feng Zhi-Qiang said, "All Taiji styles emphasize Opening and Closing (Kai-He), Empty and Solid (Xu-Shi), Hardness and Softness (Gang-Rou), Contracting and Opening (Qu-Shen), Yin and Yang, etc. Silk Reeling Power appears in all Taiji styles but Chen style emphasizes it more than other schools and the round movement of all parts of the body is its feature. Other schools of Taiji pay more attention to Opening and Closing. Actually all martial arts contain circular and round, Hunyuan movements. In Xingyiquan this feature is described by Drilling (Zuan), Wrapping (Guo), Twisting (Ning), Overturning (Fan)."

 

[Oily Dragon]

Do you mind if I ask, are you the guy or the lady in this video.

I've watched all the videos in your channel, I'm just trying to get a sense of who is leading who.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

This demo of silk reeling shows a basic jibengong, suitable for "100 days" practice.

In your video, I can only see the arm movement. I don't see "body push/pull arm" movement. I have always believed that the best way to train the "silk reeling" is to put your arms behind your back, and only use your body to do the training.

I like the following "silk reeling" training better.

 

[Oily Dragon]

Like you said, it's all in the arms. Silk feeling, iron thread, iron wire.

Let's see some Tai Chi Chuan with freeweights.

 

[Appledog]

Do you mind if I ask, are you the guy or the lady in this video.

I've watched all the videos in your channel, I'm just trying to get a sense of who is leading who.

Hi, great question. I am the cameraman.

In your video, I can only see the arm movement. I don't see "body push/pull arm" movement.

I like the following "silk reeling" training better.

I like those videos too! Those seem more like practical applications though. That is the "goal". This is just a demo of a jibengong with some kids doing it. They're not masters, just beginners. However, about body leading hands, we are careful about this kind of motion in our school. I asked my teacher about it many times. As for these students, if you look closely you should be able to see the body turning from side to side. I did not have to tell them to do this, so I am proud they were able to express it at that level. I hope they continue to make progress!

 

[Appledog]

Like you said, it's all in the arms. Silk feeling, iron thread, iron wire.

Let's see some Tai Chi Chuan with freeweights.

I am a huuuuge Gordon Liu fan

But his Tai Chi, ahh..

 

[Oily Dragon]

Hi, great question. I am the cameraman.



I like those videos too! Those seem more like practical applications though. That is the "goal". This is just a demo of a jibengong with some kids doing it. They're not masters, just beginners. However, about body leading hands, we are careful about this kind of motion in our school. I asked my teacher about it many times. As for these students, if you look closely you should be able to see the body turning from side to side. I did not have to tell them to do this, so I am proud they were able to express it at that level. I hope they continue to make progress!

Awesome.

About 1:20 into the Shaolin video I posted above is a demonstration of 5 element fist (under a literal waterfall), of which water is one of the Wuxing.

I swear that same question about fluidity of water just came up in another thread about forms. Which makes me think in 5 element theory.

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

5 element theory.

Very few discussions involved with 5 element theory.

I like the "water strategy - the water is calm until you throw a rock into it". It's a bit too defensive for my taste. But I can use it when I'm very tired.

A simple water strategy:

- A straight punches at B.
- B uses stealing step, spins his body, and hook punch at the back of A's head.

 

[Oily Dragon]

Very few discussions involved with 5 element theory.

I like the "water strategy - the water is calm until you throw a rock into it". It's a bit too defensive for my taste. But I can use it when I'm very tired.

A simple water strategy:

- A straight punches at B.
- B uses stealing step, spins his body, and hook punch at the back of A's head.

The Wu xing is a like of Rosetta stone to understanding different CMA dogmas. Tai Chi is snake, water, kidney, qi etc in the old systems. Fluid motion.

It's easy to find a lot of good videos on this intersection.

 

[O'Malley]

This demo of silk reeling shows a basic jibengong, suitable for "100 days" practice. When you reach that level it is often suggested you stop practicing it and just do the form.

In a famous interview with Jarek Szymanski, Feng Zhi-Qiang said, "All Taiji styles emphasize Opening and Closing (Kai-He), Empty and Solid (Xu-Shi), Hardness and Softness (Gang-Rou), Contracting and Opening (Qu-Shen), Yin and Yang, etc. Silk Reeling Power appears in all Taiji styles but Chen style emphasizes it more than other schools and the round movement of all parts of the body is its feature. Other schools of Taiji pay more attention to Opening and Closing. Actually all martial arts contain circular and round, Hunyuan movements. In Xingyiquan this feature is described by Drilling (Zuan), Wrapping (Guo), Twisting (Ning), Overturning (Fan)."

You might like this video by Mike Sigman of Chen TCC. He actually explains the ideas behind the drills in a practical way and then proceeds to show silk reeling and supplementary exercises:

 

[Appledog]

You might like this video by Mike Sigman of Chen TCC. He actually explains the ideas behind the drills in a practical way and then proceeds to show silk reeling and supplementary exercises:

I thought Sigman was more of an Aikidoka? Anyways I've spoken with him many times over the years, he seems knowledgeable, and he has done some good work in reinterpreting the Chinese arts into more Western terms. I think he's on the right track with a lot of his stuff. I have always found his explanations very interesting with respect to Xing yi quan.

I used to have a copy of his push hands challenge video with, I think it was, Mario Napoli. Interesting stuff ;-)

There is lots of interetsing stuff on Sigman's vimeo. Check this one out, it's a push hands drill based on a silk reeling move known as drilling:

Now, if you are really serious about silk reeling, you need to get in contact with Charles Tauber and buy his silk reeling DVD. His instructional DVDs are probably the best in the business right now:

His channel is https://www.youtube.com/@charles888/videos

 

[Oily Dragon]

Sigman's background is in the Neijia schools, which predate Japan and aikido by a few hundred years historically, and probably a lot more culturally. But he's probably studied hose too.

There are a lot of elements of those older disciplines that made their way into the later empty handed Okinawan, Filipino, Malaysian, Indochinese, Vietnamese, Laotian, JMA etc.

The key element is the focus on use of the middle Dan tian (right below the navel), as opposed to using the force of the arms directly. Which is of course the key element in Judo and Aikido, leverage, rather than wasted energy. The first throws taught into judo are all about lowering your body and allowed your uke to fall over your Dan tian thanks to gravity, not you pulling hard.

It's hard to defy gravity, which is something I think martial arts is all about.

 

[O'Malley]

I thought Sigman was more of an Aikidoka? Anyways I've spoken with him many times over the years, he seems knowledgeable, and he has done some good work in reinterpreting the Chinese arts into more Western terms. I think he's on the right track with a lot of his stuff. I have always found his explanations very interesting with respect to Xing yi quan.

I used to have a copy of his push hands challenge video with, I think it was, Mario Napoli. Interesting stuff ;-)

There is lots of interetsing stuff on Sigman's vimeo. Check this one out, it's a push hands drill based on a silk reeling move known as drilling:

Now, if you are really serious about silk reeling, you need to get in contact with Charles Tauber and buy his silk reeling DVD. His instructional DVDs are probably the best in the business right now:

His channel is https://www.youtube.com/@charles888/videos

Cool stuff!

Sigman is a Taichi guy, Chen I believe. But yeah he hangs out in aikido circles as well.

 

[Xue Sheng]

This demo of silk reeling shows a basic jibengong, suitable for "100 days" practice. When you reach that level it is often suggested you stop practicing it and just do the form.

In a famous interview with Jarek Szymanski, Feng Zhi-Qiang said, "All Taiji styles emphasize Opening and Closing (Kai-He), Empty and Solid (Xu-Shi), Hardness and Softness (Gang-Rou), Contracting and Opening (Qu-Shen), Yin and Yang, etc. Silk Reeling Power appears in all Taiji styles but Chen style emphasizes it more than other schools and the round movement of all parts of the body is its feature. Other schools of Taiji pay more attention to Opening and Closing. Actually all martial arts contain circular and round, Hunyuan movements. In Xingyiquan this feature is described by Drilling (Zuan), Wrapping (Guo), Twisting (Ning), Overturning (Fan)."

Does not seem to originate at the Dantian, just seems to be arm movements. Very different from the silk reeling I learned from Chen Zhenglei

 

[Kung Fu Wang]

"Silk reeling" is CMA DNA. It exists in all CMA systems as long as you let your
body to push/pull your limb. It's not only done in one direction. It can be done in all directions.

 

[Appledog]

"Silk reeling" is CMA DNA. It exists in all CMA systems as long as you let your
body to push/pull your limb. It's not only done in one direction. It can be done in all directions.

Well yes and no. I would say, there are different kinds of silk reeling. There is silk reeling in lian bu quan for example. But it's not the same emphasis as in Chen style. Because of this emphasis it is feels easy to say that some styles (like Yang style) don't have silk reeling. But I've seen some older Yang style forms which have very obvious silk reeling in them. Tongbei is another style which I think has very obvious silk reeling.

Do you feel that there is any silk reeling in tantui, changquan or cha quan? There may be. I am not sure.

 

[Xue Sheng]

Well yes and no. I would say, there are different kinds of silk reeling. There is silk reeling in lian bu quan for example. But it's not the same emphasis as in Chen style. Because of this emphasis it is feels easy to say that some styles (like Yang style) don't have silk reeling. But I've seen some older Yang style forms which have very obvious silk reeling in them. Tongbei is another style which I think has very obvious silk reeling.

Do you feel that there is any silk reeling in tantui, changquan or cha quan? There may be. I am not sure.

Yang Taijiquan, silk reeling is in the form, no need for a seperate practice, but my lineage is from Tung Ying Chieh. But then the Yang family claims to have never had silk reeling... they have silk drawing (pulling) which to me is simply semantics on the part of the Yang family

 

[Appledog]

Yang Taijiquan, silk reeling is in the form, no need for a seperate practice, but my lineage is from Tung Ying Chieh. But then the Yang family claims to have never had silk reeling... they have silk drawing (pulling) which to me is simply semantics on the part of the Yang family

I have heard this before, but after doing Yang style for more than 10 years I would ask, where is the silk reeling, can you give me an example? it may be there, it may not be.. But if you ask this question about Chen style, just do any part of it, and it is visible.

In my experience it was only after training the silk reeling exercises from Chen style that I noticed the internal similarities between the major styles, such as the similarity in internal movement between Yang, Sun and Chen style wave hands like clouds. So I guess you don't need "visible" silk reeling to "have" silk reeling. but I can't see how you would figure it out without specifically training for it.

 

[Xue Sheng]

I have heard this before, but after doing Yang style for more than 10 years I would ask, where is the silk reeling, can you give me an example? it may be there, it may not be.. But if you ask this question about Chen style, just do any part of it, and it is visible.

After doing Yang style for over 30 years, it is everywhere in the form if you do it right, just not a obvious as it is in Chen. I've trained both Yang and Chen, just a whole lot more Yang

 

[Appledog]

After doing Yang style for over 30 years, it is everywhere in the form if you do it right, just not a obvious as it is in Chen. I've trained both Yang and Chen, just a whole lot more Yang

Could you please give me an example of where to look for it in Yang style? thx.