This Saturday (April 28th), don’t miss the chance to see the “Down and Ground” Festival. This upcoming festival is meant help the practitioner understand real life distance, timing, skill and technique. It is also meant to instill confidence in one’s ability and skill over conditioning and sloppy sparring.

We will go over front and back sweeps (similar to 1-10 sparring techniques), and also introduce flying leg scissors, flying arm scissors, iron broom and tiger tail sweeps. The best part is, it is all finesse and skill based. There is no heavy lifting or much force at all. The most powerful and biggest opponent does not stand a chance! This is the first class that really gives the practitioner a glimpse of what real skill is and how powerful it can be.

Sweeps, like Tai Chi, are the ultimate equalizer.

The other side to the class is exploring distance, timing, using broken rhythms, combo attacks and how to control a fight psychologically. By disrupting the flow and rhythm of a fight, it can greatly alter the outcome.

If someone is fighting fast, go slow. Disrupt, like with the Number 17 Lohan, bow-natural-bow, the drunken systems, etc. This way the opponent is forced to stop and figure out or think about what you are doing because they have no idea where the flow and timing is.

The same applies to psychology. If someone comes into the fight serious and belligerent, make them chase you and be playful, laughing and smiling. If they are timid, close the distance and remain stern. By reading your opponent’s intent and spirit, you can control them by modifying your own spirit and intent. The main idea is to create a norm and then disrupt it to confuse your opponent and use that opportunity to win.

The majority of the class will then be spent playing with techniques, distance, sweeps and how to counter against them.

Sound like fun? It will be! Join us this Saturday and gain more confidence in yourself with sparring.

I now find myself regularly practicing and exploring Hsing-I as part of my advancement material. As a result I find myself contemplating the concept of intent; a particularly important concept because intent (I, pronounced ‘e’) is in the name of the system Hsing-I. The hope is to use the ‘I’ to strike or otherwise act before your conscious mind has formed the thought; this bypasses all of the slow confused conscious thought we usually have to go through while performing techniques. The obvious paradox: how am I going to not use my preconceptions to practice a series of preconceived movements? Seems silly. My solution: practice. They call it kung fu for a reason after all.

One day whilst helping out I was asked a “what if” question involving a hair grabbing chin-na. As in “what if I ended up facing the wrong direction?” I did what I always do when asked a question where I am not sure about the answer, I told the questioner to put me into said situation so we may observe my invariably spectacular response. Often my invariably spectacular responses vary from the spectacular and result in my face turning blue or something of the sort. However, this is not always the case and my body seemed to know what to do and have a response to this particular variation. While I have not necessarily been taught every variation on every imaginable hold, by learning many different chin-na and practicing them with different people I have gained a rudimentary understanding of the underlying principles. I had no conscious thought regarding the technique, I had not been taught the variation, and I was just as surprised as the recipient as to what occurred. Eventually it occurred to me that I already know how to act without conscious action and do so on a regular (if not predictable) basis.

Upon further reflection, and some time later, I realized that these sorts of things happen regularly when Shao-Lin are put into a position where they are forced to improvise. Given enough time, repetition, training, and pressure our bodies are forced to find a way to cope with surprises if we don’t stop them with erroneous thoughts. The erroneous thoughts part is the tricky bit; it takes time and relaxation to turn off the chattering monkey that tends to rattle around in our heads. Wait a minute, this sounds kind of like hou tien ch’i; maybe there is a reason meditation is taught along with Shao-Lin.

I used to be very proud of my ability to multitask. In college or work it often seems very useful to be able to get homework done during a boring lecture or to type out a report while eating lunch and listening to music. Our culture and technology tends to encourage having as much sound and flashy pictures and computer programs in front of us as possible at all times. At this point, I am very proud of myself on the rare occasion when I can do one thing at once. This is significantly more difficult, but I think having somewhere to be and something to focus on helps. To me, this is the best part about martial arts, it gives me a place to relax and focus on the task at hand; one punch, one kick at a time, no room in my head for taxes, traffic, or television. This is part of the reason we bow at the entrance to a Shao-Lin school, it’s a reminder to leave our mental baggage outside.

Maybe if I can relax and do one thing at once, I can get good at one thing at once. Maybe if I can do one thing at once, I can act correctly without having to think about it consciously. Maybe all those techniques and training methods amount to something if piled on top of each other for long enough. How does one cultivate ‘I’? Practice, focus, relax, and have fun. Best part is, even if all does not go according to plan, you’re still having fun at the end of the day.

See you in class
-J

Shao-Lin Memory

By Mohamed Seyam

One of the most intriguing aspects of our art is the amount of material we have. This aspect was what really attracted me to the art when I stumbled upon the CSC-Boulder school. I knew I had to be a part of this system right from the beginning. But I had no idea at the time how much it was going to influence my life, especially my memory.

Having never taken martial arts before, I struggled with the material at the beginning. As I white belt, I had a hard time remembering Lohan #2, not to mention the Tai Chi 24 combined form. It took me about a month to get Lohan #2 as well as the rest of my white belt material memorized. After a little preparation, I felt ready to test to yellow belt. I told Jay (yes, CSC-SF’s own Jay), that I think I’ll be ready to test soon. He told me I should do both my yellow belt test and Tai Chi test at the same time. It took me by surprise. I didn’t know the Tai Chi form! But I went home that night and practiced the 24 combined form, and somehow I did know it. I didn’t know where it came from, but it was there!  And so I tested to yellow belt and did my Tai Chi test a couple of days later.

Then I started my yellow belt training. And I faced another challenge: Se Meng T’ao Lien. I was stuck again. But I was able to get it into memory a little faster this time around. Additionally, I decided to start going to festivals to see what they were like. I heard so much about them, but never went to one. My first festival was Fist of the Crazy Mad Drunk. It was so much fun! After that day, I was hooked. I decided at that moment that I was going to every festival that I can! “Who knows how long I’ll be in Boulder?” was what I thought. I had to take the opportunity to see as many forms as possible in case the time ever came for me to move away from a Shao-Lin center.

Fast forward to today. I’ve learned so much in our art, from animal styles to weapons and even internal forms that I never imagined existed. I had gotten to a point where I could have almost any form memorized by the end of the day. I didn’t think much about it, I just attributed my memory gain to just coming to class all the time. But it turns out it was a little more than that.

At the end of class one night, Elder Master Sharon was discussing forms. She mentioned the fact that we have so many forms in our art, and that it’s overwhelming trying to remember all of it. She said that there will be a point where we should memorize some forms to the point that we can do the form at anytime, even if we hadn’t practiced the form for months! Kinda like when you haven’t heard a song that you like for a long time, but you hear it playing and remember all the lyrics.

I thought a lot about what Master Sharon said that day. It made me realize why it was becoming easier for me to memorize forms. It all started when I first learned the Hua 9 Ring Broadsword form. Something about that form just connected with me. The heroic postures and the flow of the form felt right to me. Ever since that time, I felt like it was becoming easier to memorize forms. Rather than shoving the movements into my brain, I would feel the flow of every form, almost as if I found some sort of hidden pattern within the movements. The only problem was that my memory only worked short term. If I didn’t practice a form often enough after I learned it, I would forget it. So then how do you get to a point where you can memorize a form, not practice for a while, and then bust it out any time you want?

Well, I haven’t completely figured out the answer to that, but it’s something I’m working on! Especially now that I did move away from a Shao-Lin. I’ve been devising a method to try to keep forms in my memory longer. I’ve been to a couple of festivals since I moved, and it’s helped so far. I basically practice the form every day for a week. Then the next week I practice it every other day, and so on. I practice the form a little less often, so that I don’t have to practice it every day. I’m still working out the kinks, and I’ll let you know if it works out!

Now if that’s not enough, I’ve got one more little story. It’s one of the reasons I want to keep up my training, besides my love for the art and the people in it! It was the weirdest experience of my life!

Elder Master Sharon was teaching us He’ Hsiang Ku, the female drunken immortal. It was the last day of the form, and we were working on the second to last bit of the form. Master Sharon had let us practice that section a few times before she showed us the ending. I practiced it a couple of times and then stood around to let it sink into my mind. While I was doing that, Master Sharon had asked Sifu Pat, the Fort Collins instructor, to finish up the form in front of her while everyone else was still working on the previous section. I just stood there and watched as he did it a couple of times. And then it happened. Granted it was a relatively short section, but I had just memorized the rest of the form! It was like my brain just sent me the message “Download Complete.” I didn’t know what to do! I was debating whether I should tell someone or not! I ended up telling a couple of my fellow 1^st blacks, and hurriedly showed them the last section right before Master Sharon taught it to us. It was my first glimpse of photographic memory! Maybe one day I’ll be able to develop that ability!

Good luck with your training, and I hope to see you at a future festival!

Mo S.

Brown Belts:  Hai Loong Chang “Sea Dragon Cane”

Black Belts:  Yang Chia Chiang   “Classical Yang Family Spear” 

FESTIVALS

• HOU TIEN CHI / MARROW WASHING

Saturday, May 5th (9AM – 12PM)  

( Chan(Zen)Breathing / Chi Kung Training )    

OPEN to: White Belts& Above @ CSC SF

• COLORADO SPRINGS ELDER MASTER VISIT 

Sat., MAY 12th Test/PreTest (8AM-11AM) @  CSC C Spgs Park 

SHAO-LIN ZAO LIEN – Single Grass Sickle – Sung Dynasty form )  Sat., MAY 12th (11AM – 3PM)   Open to all CSC students 

**NEW** Sat., May 19th Shaolin Take the Tower!
Run/Walk to Coit Tower from CSC-SF with I Chin Ching, Tai Chi and Chi Kung to the top! Depart CSC-SF at 9AM! Open to EVERYONE, including NON CSC Students! 

• CHUE’ CHIEN     

Sat., May 26th  (9AM – 12PM) 

( 8 Immortal’s Drunken Dbl-Edge Sword form )   

OPEN to: White Belts and Above @ CSC SF PARK

Brown Belts:  Se Pa Kuen    “Single Ended Staff” 

Black Belts:  Se Mien Pa Fang Suang Tao   “Double BroadSwords” 

Brown Belts:  Kwan Kung Tao    “General Kwan’s Long Knife” 

Black Belts: Tien Ta Suang Hu Tou Gou    “Dbl Tiger Hook Swords Shake the Heavens”  

FESTIVALS 

Brown Belts:  Yeh Ch’an Pa Feng Tao      “Chinese Long Knife 8 Directional Night Battle” 

Black Belts:  Tai Chi / Pa Kua      “Sticky-Hand” Sparring & Application (Blindfolded) 

FESTIVALS

• YUEH FEI’S SHIH PA KUAN        

( 18 classical/Historic Chi Kung Postures )   

Starting August 4th (9AM – 10AM) 

OPEN to: Brown & Blacks Belts. (for 4 weeks!) CSC-SF

• PANG vs. PANG 

2 PERSON STAFF SET

Tuesday/Thursday, August 11TH (9:00AM – 12:00PM)                              

OPEN to: White Belts & Above   @ CSC-SF 

• SALT LAKE CITY ELDER MASTER ANNUAL VISIT

Sat., AUGUST 11th  Test/PreTest (8AM-11AM) @  CSC SLC 

( SAN PIEN (Chain Whip) & TAO (Broadsword) )      

• CHI KAI PO AN SHO CHANG  – Pa Hsien – 8 Immortal Weapon form

Sat., August 18th  (9AM – 12PM)  

( Drunken Beggar’s Broken Bowl & Frail Stick )           

OPEN to: White Belts & Above @ CSC-SF PARK

• YANG TAI CHI TAO       

Sun., August 26th (1PM – 4PM)  

( Yang Lu Tan’s Famous Tai Chi Broadsword form )   

OPEN to: Open to All Levels! @ CSC BOULDER school ONLY 

• TIEN HSUI  – 18 “Hit the BronzeMan”  w/ Solutions  Part II of III

 Sun., August 26th (5PM – 7PM)   

( Bring your Double ChopSticks )      OPEN to: 4th Blacks & Above! @ CSC BOULDER school ONLY  

Get ready for some Shao-lin reading! Have you checked out the reading list? There’s gold on here, folks!

Recently, after a hard time understanding the concepts of push hands, Sifu Brent recommended reading Wolfe Lowenthal’s There Are No Secrets: Professor Cheng Man-ch’ing and his Tai Chi Chuan. Boy, did this ever give me some insight! I can tell you, the ways in which I think about Tai Chi and push hands are much more expanded by reading Lowenthal’s memoir.

Wolfe Lowenthal was a student of Professor Cheng Man-ch’ieng, a leading master of Tai Chi Chuan, who ran a school in New York where Lowenthal took classes, along with other notable martial artist/writer Robert Smith. The book details Lowenthal’s experiences studying Tai Chi Chuan and his relationship with Professor Cheng Man-ch’ing, whom he calls “Lao Shr”. Woven in are the stories about Lao Shr and his principles of Tai Chi Chuan. What you get from reading it, however, are how the Tai Chi Chuan principles are relevant in your own life.

The time Lowenthal spends on describing the deeper meanings of “investing in loss” and “softness” are particularly helpful. Push hands, for me, is one of the hardest things to grasp in our Shao-lin training because there is just so much to it. I recognize that to start on the path of feeling some sort of improvement, there are a lot of things I need to let go. Lowenthal describes “investing in loss” as one of the greatest lessons the Professor had to teach. The Professor elaborates by saying “Say you push me a hundred times, but I’ll have studied how you did it…Now, that hundred times that you have pushed me, although I’ve lost a hundred times, it ends up that I’ve gained. I’ve stolen your movement, and understand how to do it, and how to get away from it. So it’s like you’re teaching me.”

Click here to view the embedded video.

One of the successes of Lowenthal’s memoir is that it is highly personal. He has no qualms about the level of intimacy with which he shares with the reader. That it is told non-linearly adds to this, because when Lowenthal describes his initial reactions and frustration to push hands, to learning Tai Chi Chuan, and to the teachings of Professor Cheng Man-ch’ing, we move with him through those feelings. You can tell, however, that as the narrator looking back on these experiences, that he’s gone a long way down the path of developing his understanding of Tai Chi Chuan. Lowenthal does not shirk from admitting his perhaps naive reactions as a beginner. As someone who is still beginning, I found this refreshing that though this path is seemingly long and arduous – that it’s a lifetime of work – that the answer is right in front of us. There are no secrets. As Lowenthal describes, “Yet the goal is not in some far-off, inaccessible place. It’s right under our nose, already present within us. We simply put our ch’i in our tan tien, let go of the physical and psychological armor, and become ‘resilient as a child.’”

An added benefit for all you English major nerds and literature fans, is that it flows from one story to the next without hiccups or stopping – just like Tai Chi! Everything loops back around, from anecdotes to musings, as you read more, you realize how it’s all connected and how it all goes back to Lowenthal’s fascination and love of the art, not to mention this warm relationship he was able to develop with Professor Cheng Man-ch’ing and his fellow classmates.

There’s an anecdote I particularly enjoyed that illustrates these relationships when Lowenthal describes how Tam Gibbs, the Professor’s devoted translator, asks the Professor’s help in translating a word from the Confucian Analects identified by the original translator as “friends”. Tam knew the Chinese word to be different. The Professor explained that the word meant “comrades in the same discipline. You’re right, it’s not ‘friends’…it’s a different relationship than friendship and in many ways higher.”

To me, it illustrated my own connection to Shao-lin in a way that I’d been unable to relate to others when asked why I keep coming back to train. Beyond the intensity of the conditioning, the beauty of the forms, and the precision and accuracy of the techniques, is something about the Shao-lin art that is much more personally relevant and profound. As a writer, someone who communicates for a living, I am often at a loss for words with how to describe Shao-lin to someone who hasn’t seen it, or hasn’t truly taken a hard look beyond it’s face value. This book opened my eyes to how that could be described and gave me the language and context towards noticing the small and subtle ways in the training that we begin to see a glimmer of something deeper.

In reading There Are No Secrets, I am continually inspired with how well Lowenthal is able to unflinchingly look at himself and share his own personal truth through his writing. It takes a lot of courage not only to drop your defenses and let go, but also to share that experience with others. Everything he says, though, comes from the heart and you can feel that in reading it. You take away a better understanding of your own relationship to Tai Chi Chuan, and even though you’ve never met them, an affinity for Lowenthal, and of course, Professor Cheng Man-ch’ing.

But you don’t have to take my word for it!

For the past year and a half, I have been developing and shaping a writing practice. It started off simple, write three pages a day. The subject matter was not important, nor was the level of skill, or mastery of technique. Instead the idea came back to the idea that being defined as a writer meant you had to write. Pretty simple, huh? In writing everyday you make writing second nature. It takes the fear out of creating “something good”.

I bring this up because I’ve come to a point in my training, where I feel the need to be take what I’ve learned in class outside with me. So, I’ve started thinking about “practice” and how to develop one.

A practice is not necessarily a routine. It is a space in time to continually come back to what you’ve learned and take a second to play with the material so that it makes sense. The key here is consistency and discipline, but I think it is also important to change it up a bit. What’s consistent is the time and space you give to developing new skills and techniques, or attaining certain goals. Changing up a bit (and remembering to have fun!) makes it easier to come back every day and start moving through the forms again.

There’s a tendency when you’re learning something to become hung up on one idea or technique. Sometimes it seems like the more we repeat something, the more we reach a point where we realize, “I’m stuck.” It can be difficult in those moments to let go of the frustration of “getting it right”. But in actuality, this block is great because it gives us an indicator of exactly what we need to work on.

Can’t remember what comes after single whip? Well, then! Time to pay attention to that part next time in class! Not really sure how to do that number 17 lohans? Now’s the time to try it out!

Fortunately, there are so many wonderful things to focus your attention on in our Shaolin training!

When I was fairly new in my position as a grant writer I had a hard time finding my groove. It was the first time I had to structure the day more-or-less on my own. Sure, I was driven by external grant deadlines, but as for the day to day, it was hard to know what exactly to focus on for eight whole hours!

Do I start breaking up a more complicated grant with a later deadline into the pieces and start finding the information I need? Or should I focus on the straight-forward grant with the fast-approaching deadline?

The answer was…both! I remember meeting up with a lawyer friend around this time and describing how I was feeling stuck in the projects I was supposed to be focusing on at work. She described what she did when she was feeling stuck with a particular case, “Start working on another project, and then, when you get stuck with that one, start working on something else.” It seemed counter-intuitive, but I tried it and was able to get substantially further in the more complicated grant with the later deadline. As for the straight-forward grant, taking my eyes off of it gave me the chance to look at it later from a fresh perspective. By then it was easy-peasy! I was able to complete it and easily and continue working on the more complicated grant, which required more time.

I’m trying now to use the same approach in my current Shaolin practice. I’ve started off with very easy, very reachable goals. For instance, one goal is “work on hou tien chi breathing while waiting”. So, anytime I’m waiting, on the bus/MUNI/Caltrain/BART, stuck in traffic, even when I walk to work from the station, I practice hou tien chi. Well, that may not seem like much, but five minutes here, 10 minutes there, pretty soon you have 30 minutes a day you’re practicing the yin breath and the yang breath. Add that up over a work week, that’s already 150 minutes! Over a year (minus those two weeks of vacay), and that’s 7,500 minutes!! Wow, sure adds up!

It all has to start somewhere. Now, I’m trying to use 15 minutes at lunch to run through forms, break down each move to really think about what it is, where it’s supposed to be striking and how to apply it. Then, if there’s still time left over, conditioning, conditioning, conditioning! Eventually, I’m going to use the guide in the manual (section 3, page 27-check it out, guys!) to develop a more robust training schedule. I expect that over time, just like within my work or my writing practice, I will increase my skill level, endurance and memory.

Once things start to get “easy” and “routine”, that’s just a sign it’s time to up the ante. Now, within my writing practice, for instance, rather than concerning myself with finishing a story, I’m drilling down to the minutiae. I’m looking at specific scenes and the transitions, and finding the “holes”. Extra attention to those areas makes them stronger and brings them up to par with the rest of the writing. The same is true of going through Shaolin material. You can use these same ideas to build your practice or enhance an already existing practice.

Hopefully from all this, I’ll be able to build a practice to take with me anywhere!

Like, to see my progress? Keep me accountable! I’ll detail my challenge here. They say it takes two weeks to develop a habit, so, I’m going to try for three weeks and then see if it “stuck”.

Share your own experiences in practicing! What works? What doesn’t?

Balance. It’s not just a word reserved for the out-there self-improvement crowd. Though, by mountains of vague articles available that try and describe what it constitutes, you’d never know it. There are many articles on the virtues of eating a balanced diet, finding a work-life balance, balancing our individual needs within our relationships with others, striking a balance between strength, cardio, and flexibility in our exercise routine. The list goes on. And on.

From all that’s out there, an alien from another planet might think we are so incredibly bad at “finding a balance” that we are constantly searching for the answers to what “balance” is from others. And I wonder whether 1) that’s achievable and 2) whether we really need to try that hard.

In our Shaolin training, we have two classes: our internal tai chi class and our external kung fu class. Two classes that seem to become more closely interconnected as we progress. They are thought of as separate, but really this is like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich – an incredibly amazing combination which compliments one another! It can sometimes be hard to see how they work unless we look a little deeper.

For me, initially, I could see the connection/importance of going to tai chi class to develop my kung fu. How being sensitive and yielding could unlock opportunities for attacks in our external sparring rounds. I had a hard time realizing the connection and importance of my external training on my internal training until fairly recently, the light bulb illuminated.

I happened to walk in on a chi kung class locally and was asked to join. Sure, I thought, good time to practice my hsien tien chi. So, I’m doing my chi kung thing, getting all into it. And then… we were asked to break down into groups and practice pushing someone’s hand while in single whip. Our instructor asked us to “send our energy” through our partner into the wall. I’m sorry guys, but while I’ve felt tingling and something in my body when doing hou tien chi class and hsien tien chi as well, I was at a loss for how to shoot my chi out through this guy into the wall. This is maybe the best I can come up with…

But in learning about hsien tien chi this past week, I had a particularly powerful experience after we had finished working on one of the brown belt forms and my heart rate was elevated. As we sat down and started going through the small circle of heaven, it was simple enough to find my heart beat and focus on it. Then, while doing the crane postures, balancing there while also trying to breathe correctly, I thought, huh, it’s like these two classes go together.

Genius!

You need a balance between the two. The external focus on the physical keeps us grounded so we’re not so airy-fairy with our material that we’re trying to develop a practice that understands nothing about where the energy is developed. We are physical beings and we live in a physical world. Being too caught up in the more spiritual aspects of the practice can leave us with a false sense of the world. You end up thinking you can throw chi balls at people like Ryu. Get too external in your focus, however, and you loose all the sensitivity and awareness cultivated in internal training.

“Everything in moderation,” says Aristotle, and in training, it’s no different. No sooner do you start to completely focus on one area of training, and you lose another. It’s a continuous dance. It’s less about “achieving” some sort of equilibrium when trying to “become balanced” then being constantly aware and making slight course corrections.

A friend of mine told me recently that life is all about adjustments, and I think those words of wisdom are very apt when thinking about internal and external training and what your focus “should” be on. It’s different for everyone, but the training is all designed to compliment one other. So, what are you missing out on lately? Have you been slacking on your tai chi class attendance? How does that affect the rest of your training? How can you course correct?

For instance, I’m starting to work more on practicing applications in push hands sparring. I’ve been so focused on being sensitive lately that it’s probably just a mess of waving hands around to spar with me. Focusing on applications in real time has me experimenting with how I would actually try to use some of the postures in the 24-posture tai chi form. The focus I placed on sensitivity previously is not lost either. While doing push hands, I’m able to sense or feel like I might be able to execute a particular move. Rather than throw away my previous focus, it’s actually enhanced because I’m adding something to it.

Within any kind of pursuit towards balance in your life, there’s always an ebb and flow. It’s a continual process that’s not strictly defined by what’s missing. It’s important to differentiate between “balance” and “perfection” here as well. Sometimes, it’s as simple as moving with whatever is naturally pulling you in a certain direction rather than forcing a kind of regiment because we think it must be good for us. It’s paying attention to our whole lives holistically, and not just one area.

Take notice of it next time you come to class. It may lead you down an interesting path of discovery!