Ken Gullette's Internal Fighting Arts Blog

Borrowing Energy in Push Hands and Self-Defense

borrowing energy internal body mechanics internal strength tai chi training Mar 16, 2010

Jieh Jin is translated from Chinese as "borrowing energy." It's one of the many concepts that are abstractly described as "energies" in the internal arts.

As with each of these "energies," borrowing energy doesn't mean you're sucking the energy out of your opponent literally -- it isn't mystical, it's physical just like all the other skills of Tai Chi, Hsing-I and Bagua.

These three photos show an exercise you can do to practice and demonstrate borrowing energy.

In photo 1, my partner is rushing at me to push me off my ground. He will push hard into my folded arms, using his momentum and weight. I'm establishing the ground path, maintaining peng, and setting up the body structure that I need for good internal mechanics.

In photo 2, he makes contact with his force, or energy. I ground it and give it no place to go but back at him. It actually feels as if it bounces back at him.

In photo 3, you can see him bouncing back slightly. All of the internal mechanics are coming into ...

Author - Instructor

Ken Gullette

I have practiced martial arts since 1973 and began studying the internal arts in 1987. My goal is to cut years off your development time by coaching you in the real skills for high-quality Tai Chi, Xingyi, Bagua. To see more about my bio, click the "About Ken" link on the menu at the top of this page.

Ken Gullette's Internal Fighting Arts

Borrowing Energy in Push Hands and Self-Defense

Author - Instructor

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