Bones and the Force

氣沉骨堅

Heavy vapours and strong bones

骨堅筋柔

Firm bones and supple fascias

As far as the body force is concerned, the external part, the most important was neither muscles nor even fascias for the internal arts, but it was the bones. Bones and force are the typical example of how internal arts work, body force was first about a stronger structure and, to achieve it, stronger organs.

Sturdy Structure

拳怕少壯

The fist fears the young and robust¹

膂力過人

An outstanding backbone strength²

打拳壯筋骨

Training strengthens fascias and bones.

刀越磨越亮，體越練越壯

The more is polished a knife the brighter it is, the more is trained a body the stronger it is.

冬養骨，夏伸筋

Winter to grow bones, summer to extend the fascias

The need to first transform the body, stressing on fascias and bones, which has already been described in length in this blog, is the basis of the external training of internal practices. 

Health

然而練筋易而練膜難，練膜難而煉氣更難也

However, it is easy to train the tendons but harder to train the membranes; and as hard as it is to train them, it is still harder to train vapours*

If you are to meet two sharpshooters and one comes with a weapon that seems a bit shady and especially not well taken care of while the other person with a perfectly maintained one, you may not know who shoots best but you will definitively know who is the professional. In the old days, the body was an essential machine for a Martist, it had to be kept fit and in perfect health.

Flat Stomach Improved Vitality, Tiny Details Great Impact

天門亢

The gate to the Heavenly Palace is haughty

含胸拔背

Containing the chest and pulling up the back

提肛吊肚

Lifting the anus, hanging the stomach

Tiny details inside the body are always hard to describe and may slightly differ for each student according to their body built. Looking for them often leads to investigating more and more the different possible meanings of the sayings. Indeed, at this point, one should not try to reproduce externally what they illustrate, such as the ones quoted, but analyse the internal process which produces such results. It is, after all, the internal arts main focus.

Acrobatic Die

未学功夫，先学跌打

Before studying skills one shall study acrobatics

One shall keep in mind, as it was reminded in Standing, that old schools used to be for professionals, their usual students were teenager, if not kids, whose body could be transformed very quickly. Hence, the extreme flexibility required of martists described in the quote was something so obvious that the reasons behind it and part of their training methods have been lost in our modern leisurely times.

Training acrobatics was a way to improve one's elasticity as well as reconnect all the fascia lines, allowing more freedom and smoothness in one's moves. It was also a means for the losing battle against ageing and gravity. Nowadays, students being most of the time adults and the heavy stretching exercises often demoted from their status of basics to useless acrobatics, it may be necessary to remind what were some of their former goals and how can we get back some key points in our trainings without having to aim for an acrobatic flexibility.

Shining Eyes, Light Hands & Nimble Body

内練精氣神，外練手眼身

Inside essential liquids, vapours  and spirit are trained; outside hands, eyes and body are trained.

The concept of internal and external is a basic of Chinese culture.

Light And Athletic Foot

手腳眼為根

Hands, feet and eyes for roots

足膝效法乎坤，取其鎮靜厚載*

Feet and knees model themselves on The Feminine, fetching its unruffled largeness which supports and contains.

腳為四肢百骸之舟楫，一身之領袖，稍有不合，全體之氣俱不入矣，不可不細為區別**

Feet are the oars of all the limbs and bones, what leads the body, just a little bit uncomfortable, none of the whole body vapours can enter! They cannot not be meticulously diacritical

With 26 bones, 33 joints and more than a hundred muscles, tendons and ligaments, the foot is a complex machine often overlooked in training.

Train, Refine, Temper

練形術

Art of training the body

煉石補天

Refine the stone to repair the innate

千錘百鍊

After hard work and numerous revisions

練, 煉 and 鍊, are all pronounced liàn. They are all made of 柬, to select, but written with different radicals*. They all can be used as to describe one's training. Even if they seem interchangeable, those three characters actually refer to different parts of training in internal arts.

Flat Stomach Improved Vitality, The Method Behind It, Changes

窮則變，變則通，通則久 

At the extreme change comes, changing then accessible, accessible then enduring¹.

物極必反

Things turn into their opposite when they reach their extreme

三伏練筋, 三九練骨

Training the fascias in the hottest summer days, training the bones in the coldest winter days.

If obviously you can’t escape changes when deeply modifying one’s body, this also remains a truth for each and everyone. Indeed, every day, if not every second, our body changes. It evolves, grows or decays according to our age and reacts to our environment and our intake habits. Even our emotions, when heightened, can have a visible impact, white hairs being the most noticeable one.

Transforming First the Body

三年樁，兩年拳

Three years of postures, two years of boxing

百折連腰盡無骨*

A hundred twists linking the waist, a boneless utmost

練形者，又名曰展筋脫骨**
Who trains the shape, also called spreading out the fascias and bones coming off

Different athletes have different bodies. From a weightlifter to marathon runner, because the physical abilities required and the motion imposed are very different, the type of bodies are very distinct. Even for Martists, sometimes one can recognise who is practicing what just by looking at their bodies and how they move.

Style

把勢、把勢，全憑架式。没有架式，不算把勢

Martial arts, martial arts, it is all a question of posture. No posture, no real training.

把勢 is an old way to say training martial arts.

Finding Bamboo, Iron and Cotton

筋是功能之本，骸是功能之基，氣是功能之源

Fascias are the origin of capability, the skeleton its foundation, vapours its source.

筋骨之強弱，肌肉之堅脆，皮膚之厚薄，腠理之疏密，各不同

The sturdiness of the bones and the fascias, the firmness of the flesh, the thickness of the skin, the density of the lineaments, are each not alike¹.

Before starting with the Bamboo training, one has to realise where this new realm of training comes from. Being an oral tradition, there are still a lot of training in Chinese martial arts which haven’t been put into writing or systematised. Furthermore, with the decline of such old practices, a lot has been lost, including independent practices, such as animal walks, which disappeared and spread out, becoming a particular training in different styles. Bamboo, Iron and Cotton, BIC, wasn’t an independent practice, just some training for already transformed bodies.

Hitting a Wall

打人千萬，不如一紥

Countless hits cannot compare to one prick

Sharp beats blunt.

Back to the Fascias I, New but Old

然而練筋易而練膜难*

However, it is easy to train the tendons but harder to train the membranes

筋有十二經絡**

The fascias are twelve net channels

足太陽之筋***

Fascias of the Foot Great Masculine

Internal practices centre themselves around three notions: fascias, vitality and breathing. If fascias seem to deal with the body power, the external force, vitality with its internal aspect and breathing with rhythm, they are actually intertwined. Indeed, the work on fascias improves one's organs, hence one's vitality, and regulates one's breathing. Vitality, through swifter moves, improves fascias resistance and stronger organs allow a deeper and uninterrupted breathing. Breathing, through relaxation, improves fascias stretching and saves vitality by keeping the emotions under check. One could say the bones, our frame, should be also mentioned as a very important issue. Still, they are a byproduct of vitality through the kidneys and thus included in this one. Since training is often about repetition, it seems opportune to revisit those three concepts from time to time.

The concept of fascias, or connective tissues, which seems to have appeared around the 19th century in modern medicine and became more and more known recently**** is a notion very close, if not alike, to what one of the best known book of Traditional Chinese Medicine, the Yellow Emperor's Inner Classic, describes as 經筋, the fascia channels (a modern fascia line compared to an old Chinese fascia channel). Still, 筋, which is often taken in its meaning "tendons" for a lot of martists, is and has not been the only term used to describe connective tissues. Therefore, it seems necessary to first deal with the terms covering the concept of fascias in Chinese.

The Way you Move

先看一步走，后看一出手

First watching the steps, then looking at the hand movements

With 26 bones, 33 joints and more than a hundred muscles, tendons and ligaments, the foot is a complex machine often overlooked in training. 

Deciphering Martial Arts Poems

理是功能之本，法是功能之基

Theory is the essence of capability, method its foundation

皆由渡水不知津，登山不識徑*

All because they cross waters without knowing the ford, climb a mountain without the knowledge of the path

As it was already mentioned in Method, old practices favourite method of teaching was through enigmas to be solved by the students, the best ones having more than one level of understanding. Since most of the teaching were done through oral transmission at the beginning, it may be interesting to first have a brief introduction of the oral ones. Still, with the emergence of the boxing manuals, 拳譜, roughly starting at the end of the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644) and the decline of old martial arts practices, the main work nowadays remains in deciphering those texts.

Light Heavyweight

無力優力

No force is the better force

重裏觀輕勿梢留*

Watching lightness inside heaviness, leaving no extremities

練重不如練輕

Training heavy cannot match training light

Weights used to be a very important part of martial trainings, it was, after all, already part of the military exams during the reign of the first Chinese female emperor, Wu Zetian (AD 624–705), as well as later for higher levels examinations when military exams were taken seriously. Therefore, in the old days, training with weights would never have been an issue, just regular practice. Furthermore, it was also a way to further understand some of the meanings of the oxymoron of the first quote, being powerful without using force.

A Bit Of A Stretch

練形者，又名曰展筋脫骨
He who trains the shape, also called spreading out the fascias and the bones coming off1.

Flexibility has been researched for over 100 years. Its track record is unimpressive, particularly when viewed in light of other components of physical fitness. Flexibility lacks predictive and concurrent validity value with meaningful health and performance outcomes. Consequently, it should be retired as a major component of fitness2.

Open societies in our times suffer from a never-ending flow of information on any and all subjects and coming from virtually anybody with a computer who decides to write on something. Adding the marketing, political and other agendas people tend to push through information, the result is more confusion or a return to just one’s own beliefs, even though they are totally false. Old oral transmission was all about self-discovery, which meant information was scarce and shared only when time was ripe.

Right Intensity, Right Time

練功講究火候

Training is particular about the crucial moment

一日練一日功，一日不練百日空

A day spoil for a day training, a hundred empty days for a day without training

If there is an old method definitively lost in modern times, it is the idea of a crucial moment in training, basically having to do the right effort at the right moment. Indeed, modern training not practised on a 24/7 basis and not focusing on deeply transforming one’s body, such method has become obsolete. The timing issue is very similar to forging a sword, when and how are crucial, hence the use of 煉 instead of 練 in some texts regarding training.

Back to Square One

内外合一，形神兼备

Internal and external combine into one, having both shape and spirit

The body is the container, the spirit the content.