The goal of practicing Yiquan is to develop your innate abilities (发挥本能) by adopting/adapting any and all maneuvers/techniques/tactics that are useful (无长不汇集). However, in so doing you must adhere faithfully to some proven core principles (拳拳服膺).


A. Principles

To be effective, when practicing Yiquan maneuvers/techniques you must conform to these basic proven core principles:

1. Maintain whole-body harmony unity and synthesize/coordinate your actions/forces at all times (劲力均整). With proper body mechanics of correct connected-ness and alignment (连通一贯), use coordinated sequential overlapping motions to transmit the force from pushing off the ground to deliver your whole-body balanced-force (浑元力).

劲力均整, 连通一贯。

With relaxed-standing (站桩) exercises, you train to coordinate/integrate every part of your whole-body in a maneuver and to use a clean path-of-force-propagation (劲路) to transmit your whole-body balanced-force (浑元力) from the ground to the points of delivery.

2. Maintain flexibility and elasticity in your entire body by using curved form to deliver linear force. Keep all joints slightly bent, triangular in form with obtuse angles.

三角预应, 形曲力直。

By keeping your joints between 90-180 degrees, you can maintain flexibility/elasticity to slowdown an incoming blow and provide elastic spring-like force (弹力) for delivery of your balanced-force onto your opponent. Triangular obtuse angle joints (三角) is the foundation for fast spontaneous responses.

3. By including invisible rotational components (drilling movement, 螺旋) into your movement you will increase their accuracy, stability, and power.

螺旋力无形, 关节力滚丝。

Use your natural muscular twisting movement around the axis along your limbs and rotational movement at your joints to change the directions of incoming forces and add stability and elasticity to your own outgoing forces.

4. Train to use weight shift and whole-body oscillations (整体动荡) to discharge/release power. Push off the ground to deliver your whole-body balanced-force behind all your strikes.

单重发力, 力丛地起。

By pushing off the ground to shift your body weight from one leg to the other (single weight, 单重), you add momentum and power behind your strikes.

5. Learn to use quick directional reversals and opposing-force-pairs (二争力) to deliver snapping whip-like force.

争力: 提顿, 吞吐, 沉托, 分闭。

By using internal opposing-force-pairs (争力) with quick-directional-reversal motions (upward/downward, 提顿; backward/forward, 吞吐; downward/upward, 沉托 and open/close, 分闭), you can generate snapping elastic whip-like forces behind your strikes.

6. You must merge your form (形) and force (力) into one simultaneous whole-body coordinated action/motion. You must become form-less.

形力须归一, 神意不着象。

You must train to deliver your whole-body balanced-force explosively, effortlessly, and spontaneously without conscious thinking.

7. In hand-to-hand combat, no procedural sequential conscious thinking should be involved. Instead, you should let your powerful un-conscious mind to draw on established decision-making-reference-points to use the proper actions at the proper time spontaneously without conscious mind-intent (Bu Qi Zi Ran Zhi, 不期自然至). No conscious mind-intent method is the true method.

无法即法, 法在无念。

Do not use conscious sequential procedural thinking in hand-to-hand encounter/combat; the compressed time-scale of combat demands un-conscious parallel processing. The un-conscious decision-making-reference-points (无意而用) of proper timing, angles, distances, reflexive responses, and courage/determination to win can only be acquired and cultivated through actual experience in push-hands/sparring.


B. Training Method and Procedures

Yiquan skills are not permanent abilities. They have to be learned. They have to be refined and cultivated continually with daily diligent practice. A maneuver is not combat-ready until it becomes “habit”. In hand-to-hand combat, you must be able to execute the maneuver without conscious effort.

有意而练, 无意而用。

Developing, cultivating, and refining a maneuver to attain coordinated whole-body spontaneous movement and harmony is a work-in-progress.

A simplistic description/observation of Yiquan training is: practice maneuvers with different magnitudes and at different speeds of execution to ingrain into “habit” to achieve peak performance. You can roughly divide your training into 5 different speeds of execution:

1. Stillness Training (静功)

This is Zhan Zhuang (站桩). You employ motionless-movement (不动之动) exercises to develop motion-in-stillness (静中之动) to achieve whole-body harmony unity and coordinated actions.

a. Visualization is a device to integrate your mind-body into whole-body coordinated spontaneous movement and harmony, to seek and cultivate paths-of-force-propagation (寻找劲路).

b. Crises Rehearsal is a device to set un-conscious decision-making-reference-points to achieve peak performance in combat (无意而用).

The key steps are: seek relaxation from stillness (由静求松) and cultivate whole-body harmony unity from relaxation (由松求整).

2. Slow-Motion Training (慢动功)

This involves Shi Li (试力) and footwork with Mo Ca Bu (摩擦步) at slow speed to develop whole-body harmony and paths-of-force-propagation. Here, active and passive visualization are employed to integrate your mind-body and to synthesize your form and force (形力归一). By using mind-intent to guide your force (以意领力) and intentional movement (有意运动) in training, you observe, perceive, understand, explore, learn from kinesthetic experience (体认), and preserve connected-ness and alignment (连通一贯), re-patterning your neuromuscular coordination into a whole-body harmony, ingraining the use of drilling movement (螺旋), triangular obtuse angle joints (三角) and weight shift (单重) to deliver your whole-body balanced-force (浑元力). Thus, proper mindset is prerequisite to mastery of the basic skills. When maneuvers/techniques become instinctive, natural, and are done spontaneously with comfortable natural ease with no conscious effort (舒适自然), you are on the right track.

3. Regular Speed Training (动功)

Regular speed Shi Li (试力) interspersed with Fa Li (发力) develops your speed, endurance, and explosive power discharge/release. While preserving connected-ness and alignment (连通一贯), use kinesthetic experience (体认) as the means to cultivate proper relaxation/tension exchanges (松紧转换) in your neuromuscular coordinated actions; merge your form and force (形力归一); develop your whole-body opposing-force-pairs (整体争力). You must also practice push-hands (推手) and sparring (散手) to learn the correct timing, angles, and distance intervals for all your maneuvers. If you have any question about a maneuver, find the answer by practicing realistic sparring (Shi Zhan, 实战).

4. High Speed Focus Training (速动功)

Practice all your techniques on speed pads and heavy bags with focus Fa Li (发力). Take them to the extreme. Pay special attention to proper musculoskeletal relaxation/tension exchange. Stay relaxed, focusing and tensing only when you are striking through your target. Even when executing maneuvers/techniques at maximum speed and focus, be very careful that your executions do not deteriorate into using localized musculature. Always use your coordinated whole-body in every execution.

5. Extreme Speed Focus Training (激动功)

a. High-intensity-burst-in-time-interval training with Fa Li builds your strength, endurance, and explosive power discharge/release, improving your peak performance.

b. Realistic sparring training (Shi Zhan, 实战) is the only means to gain experience and knowledge of timing, angle and distance interval in the execution of a maneuver in hand-to-hand combat. After gaining these experience, you must internalize them to become “habit”, become un-conscious decision-making-reference-points through crises rehearsal training.

A maneuver/technique must become form-less before it becomes useful.

NOTE: All the above principles, training methods and procedures are described in my book Yiquan Beginners’ Guide: Basic Skills (available as PDF download or paperback from Lulu.com).