Roots Over Principles

 

歸根到底

Getting to the root of it.

沉肩墜肘氣到手

Sinking shoulders and dropping elbows, vapours reaching the hands.

含胸拔背

Containing the chest and pulling out the back

全身備五弓，以腰為大弓

The whole body is equipped with five arches, with the waist as the great arch.

It is common to mistakenly have people obey principles as if they were ironclad rules in modern-day leisurely practices. Old practices were about change and body transformation. Hence, they did not abide by strict rules or principles; they just followed opportunity. Furthermore, they were about self-discovery, not learning by heart. Therefore, most of the descriptions of ancient idioms about the practice do not explain rules or principles to heed but are riddles giving the end results, the ‘how to obtain those’ that the learner must solve. There were ways to solve them, and it never mattered whether something should count as good or bad. It was, for the least, about when, why, how, the inherent negative effects and how to offset them. For this, it may be interesting to go back to some known principles and rules of internal arts and show, without answering (to keep the self-discovery method alive), the appropriate method to try to solve those enigmas.

Mnemonic Breathing

起吸落呼，開合有度

Rising while inhaling, dropping while exhaling; opening and closing (will be) balanced.

蓄勁如開弓，發勁如放箭

Gathering strength is like drawing a bow; releasing strength is like shooting an arrow.

Directional breathing, even though a large part of one’s training from the beginning, is not often mentioned in old practice sayings, maybe because of its versatility. Indeed, from the simple need to find proper relaxation to have the body form the right angles or even tense it, inhaling and exhaling can both be used as powerful mnemonics.

Hearbeats And Dyspnea

如意抽絲，綿綿不断

Like drawing silk from a cocoon, continuous and unending.

綿綿瓜瓞，呼吸悠悠

Like the continuous growth of spreading vines, the breath flows long, deep, and serene.

吸如抽絲，呼如吹灰

Inhale like drawing silk from a cocoon; exhale like gently blowing away ash.

Those three quotes follow the usual trend one can witness as far as breathing techniques are concerned in old practices. Still, this rule, which often makes someone unable to see the forest for the trees, represents a tendency. Indeed, if taken too strictly, limited to such breathing, one would miss, for the least, the gulping/regurgitation and apnoea techniques. As always, this depicts an oxymoron that has already been solved in this blog.

Till One's Last Breath

導氣令和，引體令柔

Guiding the vapours to attain harmony, stretching the body to achieve suppleness.

龜縮頸，耕牛之力

The turtle retracts its neck, the strength of the ploughing cattle.

龜尾升氣，丹田煉神

The turtle tail makes vapours rise, Cinnabar Fields refine the spirit.

What if keeping a flat stomach for the author of this blog requires imprinting various motions on a rather tiny segment of the body while breathing in and out? Devoid of any muscle contraction, this leads, among other things, the abdomen to be swallowed, the whole body fascias to extend, the backbone to straighten all the way up to the cervical vertebrae, the buttocks to tense and the eyelids to open¹.