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One of the most interesting concepts in Chinese martial arts is the theory of tī dǎ shuāi ná (踢打摔拿). Tàijíquán (太極拳) teachers often overlook this and many times it is only taught by traditional Gōngfu (Kung fu or 功夫) instructors. Few Tàijíquán practitioners have heard this, and fewer still know the true depth of meaning behind the theory.

First, let us examine the meaning of the words. “Tī” refers to leg techniques or kicking, while “dǎ” refers to striking (either open hand or closed). “Shuāi” is the same word found in Shuāi Jiǎo (摔角) or Chinese wrestling, and refers to all wrestling techniques. While “ná” refers to the same word in Qín Ná (擒拿) and refers to grappling and joint locking techniques.

On the surface, this appears to be a way of categorizing the multitude of techniques and application found in Chinese martial arts. While it is true that these categories cover every possible technique employed in hand-to-hand fighting, there is more to this than simply labeling categories. These groupings are arranged to teach a basic and profound logic in how fighting works.

To put it simply, these are the scissors, rock, paper of Chinese martial arts.

To explain this, we will first lump kicking and punching into a single category, which we will call “kickboxing.” Then, we will compare the techniques of three fighters each skilled in a single category of tī and dǎ, shuāi, ná.

The first of our imaginary fighters is only trained kickboxing techniques. Our second martial artist specializes in wrestling, while the third warrior is a master of grappling and joint lock techniques.

For the kickboxer to be effective (barring the use of fā jìn or 發勁 which we will discuss in another article), he must keep his opponent at arm or leg length distance. This range allows each of the kickboxer’s punches or kicks to fully extend and achieve maximum power. If the kickboxer’s opponent is either too close or too far away, our kickboxer’s techniques are useless.

This is where our wrestler comes in.

Wrestlers must get close to their opponents to employ a takedown. Once the opponent is on the ground, the wrestler can employ a hold or submission. Therefore, when our wrestler steps in close to the kickboxer to throw him down, the kickboxer will suddenly discover that his punches and kicks have no power. He will also quickly discover it’s hard to kick or punch your way out of a takedown. Then, once on the ground, the kickboxer’s techniques are useless, while the wrestler has a whole arsenal of techniques with which to hurt or maim the kickboxer. We have seen many real-life examples of this in MMA fighting, when a skilled ground-fighter gets a kickboxer onto the ground.

When the wrestler tries this on the grappler, however, he will quickly find himself in some trouble. The moment the wrestler reaches out to grab our grappler, the wrestler has given both his arms over to his opponent who can then very easily twist a wrist, elbow, or shoulder into a painful grapple.

However, anyone who has studied grappling quickly notices that almost all grapplers have to use both hands on an opponent’s single arm or leg. Therefore, if our grappler tries to put the kickboxer in a painful joint lock, the kickboxer will simply attack the grappler with a free hand (or foot).

Just like scissors, rock, paper, each of these techniques is effective against one of the three, but not the other two. Rock can’t defeat rock, just as it cannot defeat paper. But put rock up against scissors, and it will win every time.

So if the kickboxer is like our metaphorical scissors, our wrestler is the rock (no pun intended), and our grappler is the paper.

Therefore, when you train applications of your Tàijíquán techniques, it’s important to pay attention to each of these categories, developing skills from all three: kickboxing, takedowns, and grappling.

The best way to employ is training is to begin developing applications all three categories for each movement in a Tàijí form. Let us take a traditional long form from Yang-style Tàijíquán (Yángshì Tàijíquán or 楊氏太極拳) as an example. If we remove all the repeated techniques from the form, a list of 108 (give or take depending on who is doing to the counting) the number of unique movements from the form is suddenly whittled down to 37.

This means that Yang-style practitioners should be working on all three of those categories with each of the 37 movements. This same math can be used for any other style of Tàijíquán.

Then, to integrate this concept of training into your own practice, start with one or two of your favorite Tàijíquán movement and practice an application from each category until it becomes second nature.

Once you have developed a handful of these, take it to the next level. In a safe pushing hands (tuī shǒu or 推手) environment, practice moving from one technique to the other. Remember to be sure to talk to your training partner so that they are aware of what you wish to emphasize in training (it’s really quite rude to punch someone who’s pushing hands with you if they’re not expecting it). Then, when you can do this effectively while practicing stationary pushing hands, it’s time to integrate these concepts into moving pushing hands training.

It’s important to remember at this point that other basic fighting theories not covered by of tī dǎ shuāi ná must be integrated into training at this level also (perhaps from a Two-person Fighting Set). However, when those basic fighting theories are combined with those of tī dǎ shuāi ná and the principles of moving pushing hands, the result is the highest level of combat training in Tàijíquán, known as “Tàijí sparring.”

In one of his continuing education seminars, Bob Flaws (acupuncturist, Chinese herbalist, author, and expert in Traditional Chinese Medicine) said, “Mastery of anything is simply mastery of the basics.”

It is an extremely accurate statement, and very simple. In many ways, this statement is like watching an expert practice Tàijíquán. The movements appear slow and simple, but are far more profound than what you see at first glance. This statement is the same. It hints at the true dedication and enormous effort it means to “master” anything.

Take traditional education, for example. Grade school, middle school, high school, and even undergraduate are all designed to hammer home basic information about various topics. It’s is not until grad school or post graduate work that a person might take the information from several basic sources and mold it into something new and exciting.

In many ways, the study of Tàijíquán is the same. Mastery of Tàijíquán basics leads to the ability to synthesize new ideas from remedial material that we know like the back of our hands. Look at masters who have taken what they know and transformed it, such as Cheng Man Ching, who took traditional Yang style and made it into a new style entirely.

Sadly, and particularly here in the United States, I have noticed a huge obstacle to this type of mastery.

Education of the 21st century, particularly in the United States has moved away from dogged memorization of facts. Instead, it emphasizes the big picture, concepts, and relationships. Many schools allow counting on fingers or calculator use, which has replaced basic arithmetic skills or rote memorization of times tables. This new concept of education, however, is a danger to “mastering” Tàijíquán.

In the early days of my own Tàijí education, I went through countless stretches, warm-ups, movement drills, and stance work. All this was designed to give me a firm foundation in the later movements of the form.

My teachers, who were very traditional, often had me freeze in place, holding a position as they walked around class and moved everyone’s body into the correct alignment. The idea being that long periods of maintaining the correct pose would lead to muscle memory, which in turn would mean that improper movements would suddenly feel “wrong.”

Sadly, I have seen countless modern teachers abandon this method of teaching only to offer a class wherein the student simply follows along with the form until they can produce the same movements with somewhat reasonable accuracy. I have even seen teachers who barely understand Tàijíquán basics change the form they teach, adding or subtracting movements at a whim, or combining Tàijíquán with yoga or dance.

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I intend to continue in this article to present the Tai Chi Farm exercises which have been explained in a series format in my previous articles.

While writing about the exercises, I almost neglected one important aspect. They are not to be practiced as an end, but as a tool. This tool is seen as the living embodiment of the Tai Chi principles. These principles are meant to be visible in one’s everyday movement, one’s push hands practice, and if possible, one’s practice in sparring.

But nowhere are the principles displayed in the exercises more showcased as they are in the Chen1 form of master Jou. But even having said that, it is best that they are practiced to such an extent that their traces can be seen in all of one’s Tai Chi forms.

From at least 1980 till the time of his transition, Jou Tsung Hwa had been working on a Chen1 routine
(he stated that the 1st routine came after Cannon Fist) that got away from where the Chen routines he had seen were headed. Independent hand and foot movement, push hands wrestling, and other non-Tai Chi elements were what he was against.

Master Jou’s version of Chen1 is very different from the standard routines that we are used to seeing. There are more leg raises, some moves are more reminiscent of the Yang form, and the “Wave Hands In Clouds” reminds me a little of the Hao form. Actually, the Tai Chi Farm exercises are more of a clue to the Tai Chi Farm Chen form than anything else. There is contraction and expansion, intense spiraling, a great deal of matching of different parts of the body, and total whole body movement.

Tai Chi Farm Exercise

Place the left foot to the left of the right foot and to the front with the left heel raised and the toes facing 9:30 or 10:00. The weight of the bodt is on the right foot which is solidly on the ground with the toes facing approximately 2:00 or 2:30. The right hand is placed gently on the abdomen where it remains. The head and the eyes face forward with the abdomen relaxed. Begin to contract the abdomen as the head and eyes and body turn towards the left hand which is rotating the left palm upwards as the left heel turns towards the right front reaching the maximum movement with the abdomen fully contracted and the left palm facing the sky and eyes facing the palm with the head upright. Reverse the movement and return to the original position. From the original position, begin turning the body towards the right as the left palm begins turning and ending facing downward with the body now facing 2:00 or 2:30 [the same direction as the right toes]. At this point, the abdomen is fully expanded. Reverse the movement and return to the original position. After enough repetitions, switch feet and hands. The right hand remains on the abdomen throughout th entire exercise.

Both hands can be placed over both feet, or the opposite palm can be used instead. Also one foot can be raised entirely off the ground. Ultimately, one has to find out the angles and placements best for one’s self.

There are quite a few of these Tai Chi Farm exercises with some being more complicated and difficult than the one[s] presented here. Some of them I don’t like and nver practice, and some of them I really like and almost always practice. Any variations that I present are not of my own making so as to keep what I learned pure.

Although I have spoken of some of the original students in Piscataway previously, I must once again thank Tai Chi Farm students Bob Arietta for his valuable instruction of these exercises and Mike Goldstein.

Most of all I must thank my Tai Chi instructor Larry Banks whom I have also written about. The idea for this series on the Tai Chi Farm Exercises and other experiences was inspired by Loretta Wollering’s presentation of Master Jou’s 6 part interview on YouTube in 1994 at the Tai Chi Farm.

On November 20th 2011, when Master Yang finished his first seminar in Mendoza, Argentina, he told us, “Tai Chi is like a thread that brings us together”. Beyond time and space, without borders, the experience of sharing our love for this martial art with friends from different countries of this South American continent is unique. At the São Paulo Seminar we had practitioners from Venezuela, Perú, Argentina, Uruguay, Panamá and Bolivia. For the first time ever we had the opportunity to have a seminar taught by Master Fang Hong! She was very welcomed by everyone and received a standing ovation when she finished her classes.

Brazil is a big country and it’s impossible to mention all the states that were present at the seminar: Rio Grande do Sul, Santa Catarina, Sergipe, Brasilia, Rio de Janeiro, Minas Gerais and many others. In Mendoza there were groups from Uruguay, Venezuela, Colombia and Brazil. Everybody was sharing the joy of being able to be together practicing what for many people is their life. Many lives here are dedicated to maintaining Yang Family Tai Chi Chuan as a living truth, flowing and growing as a great fabric sewn together by all the cultures and countries, connecting everyone by their hearts. The teachings of Master Yang Jun make this connection, and bring us closer together. It is not often that the world looks at these countries that form our South American continent.

One of our friends from Venezuela said one time, “We are orphans from this kind of knowledge”. There are so many obstacles that are put before us on our path: the language, politics, economy, and distance. But what we are finding out down here when we meet among Brazilians, Argentinians, Uruguayans, Peruvians, Venezuelans, Colombians, Bolivians and Panamanians, is that the love and the strength that moves us and that involves us can make us go beyond all territorial borders or any kind of borders that may hinder us, and change this condition completely. If we open our eyes to look around, and open our hearts to feel the care that all of our fellow practitioners share we know that we are all together. We know that Yang Family Tai Chi Chuan brings us together and makes us one great family. To have Master Yang come to Brazil and Argentina offering us seminars is a good example of that. To have center directors like Roque Severino, Angela Soci and Sergio Arione and many others that dedicate so much to bring us this knowledge, is a proof of that. Every one of us is dedicated to take Yang Family Tai Chi Chuan to every corner of this continent so that our conditions change for the better.

Tai Chi is something to share, to be given and not to be put aside. This is why we dedicate ourselves to this art. One of the Push Hands teachings says, “Forget yourself and follow the other”. At these meetings we have the opportunity to experience a little bit of that, and to be able to truly make ourselves brothers and sisters. Beyond political differences, economical, territorial, languages, cultures, habits, we are all one heart. And as Master Yang taught us, Tai Chi is the thread that brings us together. For ten years he has been teaching in Brazil and with this new appearance in Argentina we hope that we can expand even more and make our family a bigger one. We are not orphans anymore; we are not alone!