Ken Gullette's Internal Fighting Arts

This class was recorded on Saturday, October 15, 2022. I invited the members of this website plus people who are on my email list who receive my Internal Tip-of-the-Week emails.

In this video, I go over the first silk-reeling exercise that I teach students. I learned this exercise from Chen Xiaowang and my first Chen taiji teacher, Jim Criscimagna. The instruction also reflects insights I've picked up from others along the way, including Chen Xiaoxing, Mark Wasson, Chen Huixian and Nabil Ranne.

This is a good example of my live Zoom classes, which I hold for members of this website. I do two live Taiji classes on Wednesdays, and I do live Zoom classes on Xingyi and Bagua at varying times. Members of the website get all the content on the site (close to 1,000 videos and pdf downloads) plus live classes and live one-on-one sessions, at no extra cost.

This video runs 32 minutes but it contains information you won't find on most silk-reeling videos. 

I am experimenting with interactive videos. Here is my first one. Please watch it and let me know what you think. It allows you to choose which application you will see for the opening movement in a Taiji form.

I will be in Madison, Wisconsin starting this Friday, Nov. 1 through Sunday, Nov. 3 to study with Chen Huixian. If you live within driving distance, I hope you'll join me and train with one of the best.

Chen Huixian is an in-door disciple of her uncle, Grandmaster Chen Zhenglei. Other uncles include Chen Xiaowang and Chen Xiaoxing.

She grew up in the Chen Village and is highly skilled. Each time I train with her, I come away with deeper insights because of the personal corrections and coaching that she gives me.

She is teaching a workshop that will include the following:

Friday Night 6:00 to 9:00 p.m.

** Zhan Zhuang (Standing Stake)

** Silk-Reeling

Saturday 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. (with a 2-hour lunch break)

** Chen Straight Sword Form (1st half)

Sunday 9:00 a.m. to Noon

** Chen Straight Sword Form (1st half)

Sunday 2:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.

Laojia Erlu ("Cannon Fist") Review and Corrections

Chen Huixian's workshops are punctuated with laughter. It is very refreshing to have a...

In Taoism and Chinese culture, the term wuji (pronounced "woo-zhee") means a state of harm ony and balance -- emptiness, stillness and peace. It is limitless, infinite.

It is when everything begins moving and you lose balance that you also lose wuji.

In the Taoist view of the universe, if we were to look at it from a modern scientific view, the universe was in a state of wuji just before the Big Bang. There was a state of perfect peace and then all hell broke loose. Things separated into yin and yang. Dogs and cats living together -- MASS HYSTERIA! (Sorry, I watched Ghostbusters a lot when my daughters were little)

In Tai Chi, the goal is to maintain a sort of wuji -- balance and harmony; to remain centered. When someone attacks, and you must adapt and change to accept this person's force, your goal is to return to wuji -- the state of balance you were in before the attack. 

I enjoy working with people who have never studied the internal arts. Almost every time when a newbie is wo...

Here is a high-quality video, apparently shot perhaps in the 1980s, showing Chen Xiaowang doing Taijiquan. 

Master Ren Guangyi, one of Grandmaster Chen Xiaowang's senior disciples, is an amazing martial artist -- very strong and athletic. I was fortunate to be introduced to him by my teachers Jim and Angela Criscimagna years ago when they hosted Master Ren for workshops in Rockford, Illinois. I learned the Chen 38 and the Broadsword form from him and refined them with Jim and Angela.

Apparently, Master Ren created his own compact Cannon Fist form for Hugh Jackman, as Jackman was preparing for a movie.

This is a beautiful and powerful example of real tai chi, and so much more difficult than it looks. His stomp at the end of "Buddha's Warrior" almost knocked my computer off the desk. :)

Have you ever seen a dog shake water off itself? There is not one tense muscle in its body. The dog is totally relaxed and if you watch carefully, you'll see it grounding from its rear legs when it shakes the front half of it's body, and it will ground from the front legs when shaking the tail and rear half.

Without realizing it, the dog is practicing fajin.

Have you ever had something on your finger and tried to shake it off? Let's say....water. You have water on your hand and you give it a good flick -- a good shake. How tense are you? Not tense at all, are you? In fact, you relax it like a whip and snap it.

That same type of relaxation is needed for good fajin.

Good fajin is a matter of connecting all of the key internal body mechanics and taking full advantage of the relaxed power that can result from these mechanics.

--by Ken Gullette

I'm often stunned by the literal-mindedness of some internal arts folks (that's no secret, is it?). The subject of fajin is one example of how a simple concept is misunderstood and misinterpreted.

Fajin means "issuing energy." Unfortunately, the people who desperately need to believe in the supernatural think that in doing fa-jing, you are shooting chi out of your hands or body. They take it literally.

It's not magical or mystical. It's a matter of physics. 

If you are a boxer, you're issuing energy when you deliver a jab, a cross, or a good left hook. If you're into kali, you're issuing energy when you hit someone with a stick (or even when you block another stick with yours), and if you're into karate, you issue energy when you break a board with your foot.

In the internal arts, fajin -- issuing energy -- is more complex, but the end result is the same. You knock the hell out of something or someone.

Grandmaster Chen Xiaowang (shown in the photo above working with students on fa...

Grandmaster Chen Xiaowang was teaching a workshop in the U.S. when one of the students commented about how difficult tai chi is.

If you've ever attended a workshop by a member of the Chen family, you understand why the comment would be made. Students hold postures while the instructor walks around the room, correcting each student individually. By the time he gets to you, your legs are often shaking with fatigue, and if he puts you into the correct posture, you may just collapse to the floor (photo at left shows Chen Xiaowang correcting me during a private lesson a few years ago).

This is one of the reasons I get annoyed when I see online ads that promise "easy tai chi." I'm sorry, my friends, there is no such thing. Fake tai chi might be easy. The health type of tai chi for "moving meditation" might be easy. Tai Chi for senior citizens might be easy.

Real tai chi is very difficult and takes years of practice to even begin to see proper body mechanics.

So when the comment was made ...

A member of the online school asked a question on the discussion board and I thought it would also make for a good post here on the blog.

What are the Six Harmonies and what does it mean? Does it mean the hands move with the feet, the elbows move with the knees and the shoulders with the hips?

Some people say the Six Harmonies are:

1. Shoulders

2. Hips

3. Elbows

4. Knees

5. Hands

6. Feet

So the shoulders harmonize with the hips, the elbows with the knees, the hands with the feet.

That isn't the complete story, however. These three groups of two (hips/shoulders, elbows/knees, hands/feet) make up the THREE EXTERNAL HARMONIES.

The other three harmonies that make up the six harmonies would include Yi (Mind/Intent, which is frequently paired with "Shen" or Spirit), Chi (Energy), and Li (Strength, pronounced "Lee"). These are known as the Three Internal Harmonies.

The "Shen leads the Yi," the "Yi leads the Chi," and the "Chi leads the Li (strength)."

You must have a strong spiri...