Ng YueWah
(Translated by Sheun Siu Ho)
Master Wang Zongyue (王宗岳) has said that, “ unbalance leads sinking, then body follows. Double heaviness happens, then stagnation occurs”.
If you practice a force (power) boxing, “sinking” properly will happen, but body hardly follows. The “unbalance”(your body weight shifts to one side) is definitely impossible to accomplish and there is no reason to do it too. It is because only water-form boxing needs “unbalance leads sinking, then body follows” and uses “unbalance” characteristic to make our boxing keeps flowing. This flowing action drives the movement of hip and this is the Ta Chi’s characteristic too. Actually, “unbalance leads sinking, then body follows” needs a procedure but the timing of procedure quite short. Only in a special state that will need a “unbalance leads sinking”, and not all the way it happens.
In addition, in terms of “Double heaviness happens, then stagnation occurs”, what does it mean ? It needs to explain from the beginning.
First of all, we have to distinguish between “sinking” and “heaviness”.
“Heaviness” means weight and what is “sinking”?
Boxing needs a structure form so as to make our form be one able to“sink”; otherwise, it is only a pile of sand.
“Double heaviness happens, then stagnation occurs” for a Tai Chi learner is a serious matter because if this situation occurs that means the procedure of “unbalance leads sinking” have not been done properly and it gets stuck right the way and move nowhere. This situation is similar to a wheel getting stuck.
Referring to floating and sinking, we all understand that boxing needs a structure form first, then to make our body achieve “sinking”. However, if the form is bad then “sinking” could not happen. For instance, if our skeleton was in a condition of “loose”(out of control), how could us to make our body “sinking”?
After making our body “sinking”, what should we do next? Actually, our body will float naturally. Because human body’s floating and sinking just like “breathing” and it is the simplest principle. (There is no need using “Chi Chong “ to achieve this; otherwise just gilding the lily.)
Using “Needle at sea bottom (海底針)” as an example, because “Needle at sea bottom” is a significant form of “sinking”, after it sinks to the bottom due to its “sinking”, then the “Fan through back (扇通背)” floats, we could see all Tai Chi Chun acting in a pattern of floating and sinking. In addition, Tai Chi Chun is more than sinking or floating, and this phenomenon is also the characteristic of Tai Chi Chun itself.
If practicing Tai Chi Chun well, all actions are either sinking and floating. But if you feeling “treading on air” during practice, that means your practice still not steady because if you doing well there should not be any “treading on air” happens.
A good Tai Chi Chun learner may not a good observer of boxing. As reading book, a good reader will put books into three categories. First one, those books he has to memorize. Second one, those books are just for general reference or information. The last one, those books he has to forget. ( His meaning is for those bad, harmful or not suitable for reading books, should be forgotten at once.)
For watching boxing is in the same way too. The different between a good boxing observer and a bad boxing observer is obviously.