Tai Chi is not easy.

Since Taiji has very little combat value, the more that I train it, the more that I lost interest in it.

When I look at this clip, I feel young, healthy, strong, happy, alive.



When I look at this clip, I feel old, sick, weak, sad, death.

 

If you feel that way about taiji, then certainly you ought to do something else.

 

If your training in Tai Chi and not experiencing the benefits, then you are not training.

Once you get a taste of it, you'll understand why so many practice it.

Or, you can dismiss it after a few attempts and sneer down at it, for not enabling you to kick ***.

 

KFW, why do you keep commenting on things you know nothing about?
Please, just comment on your own art, and not other people's arts.

 

I started to train Taiji when I was 7. Taiji is my 1st MA system.

Here are my students. They are all Taiji instructors now. Video was made 36 years ago.

 

And yet you do not seem to like it or think much of it, and talk bad about it at every chance. If so then why teach it or do it.

As to no combat value, Tung Hu Ling (oldest son of Tung Ying Chieh) opened a taiji school in Thailand in the 50s and took challenges and did not lose. Chen family has been sparing for years in Chenjaigou and Chen Xiaowang was attacked during a seminar and responded instinctively and the attacker ended up hospitalized. Could it be your lineage did not train the martial side or possibly did not understand it.

Now I am more than willing to admit most Taiji taught these days has little or no combat value, since it is not trained. But that does not mean everyone is trained that way

 

What was your purpose in posting this video? Was it to show an example of bad taiji? I’m just confused about what you were trying to accomplish, since you dislike taiji so much, yet seem to have taught your students taiji and they are now apparently teachers.

 

Please discuss the message and don't attack the messenger.

I liked Taiji when I was young (that was while I taught Taiji to my students). I just don't like Taiji when I'm older.

I express why I don't like Taiji. You express why you like Taiji. There is no need to get into the following argument. The discussion subject is "because ...". The discussion subject is not "YOU" or "I".

A: I like ... because ...
B: I don't like ... because ...
A: You are &^%$#@,
B: You are @#$%^&.

 

I’m not attacking the messenger. I am confused about your message.

I personally am indifferent to taiji. I trained it for over a decade, but it always took a backseat to other training I was doing. I ultimately stopped doing it because I acknowledged the reality that I don’t really understand it and was not really accomplishing anything by training it. That might have been different if I had made taiji my main focus. But those are the choices I made.

I don’t feel that it’s no good. I only recognize that it’s the wrong choice for me.

 

Thanks for your explanation.

When I was young, I didn't mind to

- do slow move. When I get older, I like to do fast move.
- be with old people. When I get older, I like to be with young people.

For example, when I do a 360 degree full body rotation roundhouse kick followed by a spin back fist (with full speed), I feel great. I can repeat it left and right until I can't do it any more. I just don't get that kind of excitement when I drill Taiji "brush knee twist step" over and over in slow speed.

The 360 degree roundhouse kick requires:

- single leg balance,
- body flexibility,
- endurance,
- leg strength,
- ...

IMO, it can give me more health benefit than any of the Taiji move that can give me. So when OP said, "Taiji is not easy". I like to say, "360 degree roundhouse kick is not easy too."

 

I am not attacking the messenger, but if I do not agree with the messenger I need to take a contrary view. Also when by words the messenger continually degrades something I have the right to ask why then they train it. There is no attack there. There is no

But it still begs the question, why, if you continually say Taiji has no combat effectiveness, ad you appear to be very much interested in combat effectiveness, why do you teach and train it?

Also I gave examples of it being used in fighting, sparing and self-defense, why didi you not address those and avoid the discussion by presenting it as an attack, when it was not?

 

If you keep mention the ancient Taiji fighters, you may live in the past. How many Taiji fighters that do we have today? 1% of the Taiji population, or 0.001% of the Taiji population? You said there are a lot of Taiji fighters. I just don't see that many.

 

Ancient fighters!? Since when are the 1950s to now ancient.

Tung Hu Ling died in 1992, (his father, Heck, Tung Ying Chieh died in 1961, he is hardly ancient, and he was big on Qinna) Chen Xiaowang is alive today, as is Chen Xiaoxing, Chen Zhenglei and Chen Yu (who was very effective until is recent stroke). Also Tung Hu Ling's Son Tung Kai Ying is alive and as skilled and my Taiji shifu (student of Ting Ying Chieh) is also alive and equally as skilled. Liang Shouyu is also alive and well and has students who are rather skilled at using Taijiquan as a martial art.

However you made gross generalization that taiji was not useful in combat and qualified that based on your knowledge of training since 7 years old. Tung Hu ling was alive and well and taking challenges in the 50s, Now you are adding a qualifier of "Ancient" and "lived in the past" to your statements to justify your generalization. But yet the example I gave are not ancient and most are alive today.

My point is there are teachers, alive today, that are well trained and know and can use the martial side of it and they have trained people to do the same. I will agree there are not many. I will also add I have never trained the style of Taiji that you trained, it is possible it is rather good, but it is possible it is not, I would not know. But based on this you make blanket statements and generalization as to the ineffectiveness of Taijiquan, and that then it gets interpreted as "all" taijiquan by many. You have not trained all styles so how do you know. I have no idea who you have trained with or with how many. I have trained Chen, and Yang, some Wu and more recently Sun. I have trained with Chen Zhenglei and my Shifu too as well as a few others. I know there are good and bad teachers and I know that most of what you see is taught for health and I would agree most are very ineffective when it comes to martial arts, but not all.

I simply do not feel your statement is correct nor do I feel you are qualified to make such a general statement about taijiquan I also feel you are incredibly biased against taijiquan and I get this from multiple posts you have made on the subject of taijiquan.

I have also trained a little Shuaijiao, but would not for the life of me judge it based on this little training. Same goes for Sanda/Sanshou, JKD, and, even though I have trained longer than the aforementioned styles, I do not feel I am qualified to have any deep discussions about Changquan.

I am not attacking, I am telling you how I feel about what you are saying about an art I have trained for almost 30 years, most of that in the Tung Ying Chieh Lineage.

 

You do know you are free to play, as you wish?



another way to play



and still a third



I had this epiphany years ago. One time I play, as I was taught. The next, smooth but faster. The next, smooth adding the Fa-Jing. I make my Tai Ji, my Tai Ji; I own it.

Before this I wanted to train Bagua because I felt it was more the speed, I wanted to go. But no longer.

Absolutely, there is no reason you can't play your kicking drills. But, Tai Ji offers more; than what is on the surface.

 

I like your attitude. This is how my students do their Taiji in the past 5 years. Is that pure Taiji, I truly don't care.

 

This is a very important concept. Many people train all their life, they never think that "It should be their Taiji and not their Taiji teacher's Taiji".

 

I was always taught, by my teacher, no two people are the same, therefore their taiji will not be the same

 

With Chen taiji I don’t worry about sorrow of practicing slow when get old lol


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My Aiki JiuJitsu teacher is also a Yang Style Tai Chi Master and teaches the combat side to a small handful of his students. Some of what he teaches crosses over into the Aiki Jiu Jitsu he teaches to me. At some point in the near future I will be learning Yang Style Tai Chi and hopefully the combat side. He invited me to his private Taijiquan class and was blown away by his skill level.