Women And Breathing

理是功能之本，法是功能之基

The intrinsic order is the essence of capability, method is the base of capability.

女子无丹田，炼炁在膻中

Women don’t have a Cinnabar Field, training vapours is in the mediastinum.

男子之命在丹田。丹田者，生丹之真土也；女命在乳房。乳房者，田气之木精也。

Men’s life resides in the Cinnabar Field. The Cinnabar Field, this is the real soil which gives birth to the Cinnabar; Women’s life resides in the breasts. The breasts, those are the real wooden essential liquids of the field of vapours¹.

To understand fully old methods, one has to take into consideration three things: they are, intrinsically, very versatile. Hence, most of the time, they are not governed by rigid rules or principles; they customise training according to each and everyone, there isn’t, apart from some basis, a standard training to be followed. This starts, of course, by recognising and taking into account the obvious difference between men and women and then between all distinct kinds and shapes of bodies; Finally, they come from various traditions that may address or express the same issue in diverse ways, especially because they are meant to be an oral transmission. All this is unfortunately a far cry from most of the training in internal styles nowadays. 

Iron Breath

治身：天門，謂鼻孔開，謂喘息闔，謂呼吸也¹

Cultivating the body: the Heavenly Door, called opening the nostrils, called closing gasping and resting², which is called exhaling and inhaling³.

天門亢，擤鼻，旡

The Heavenly Door is haughty, blowing one’s nose, to choke⁴.

Iron training and its main breathing technique, empty breathing, are exercises less and less witnessed in internal practices. They target the capacity to tense all and any part of the body while relaxing and stretching. They use an old type of respiration, sometimes linked to Taoist practices, which consist of taking a long exhalation to empty as much as possible, not only the lungs but the stomach and the whole trunk for the least, and keep at all costs this state while inhaling. 

Pillars and the Bamboo

練拳無樁步，房屋無立柱

Training boxing without the pillar steps, a house without stud.

練拳不溜腿，終究冒失鬼

Training boxing without kicking¹, this is imprudent after all.

要知拳精髓，首由站樁起

To know the quintessence of boxing, it starts from standing the pillars.

壓而不溜不中用，溜而不壓笨如牛

Pressing but not smoothing² is useless, smoothing but not pressing stupid as a bull.

練功不站樁，等於瞎晃蕩

Training skills without standing the pillars, it is as rocking aimlessly

拳以椿爲根，椿以拳顯神

Boxing has the pillars for roots, the pillars have boxing to manifest the spirit.

For a lot of martists and Qigong aficionados, 站樁 means holding a stance, often as long as possible. This is actually more an interpretation than a real translation, 站, meaning to stand (on one’s feet) or to halt as far as training is concerned, and 樁 pillar or stud. Hence, holding a posture is surely only one of the numerous training 站樁 refers to. Furthermore, this practice is often confused with rooting² while it is actually, first of all, balance which is sought.

Flat Stomach Improved Vitality, Directing Breath To Emptiness

 

得胎息者，能不以鼻口噓吸¹

Who obtains the fetal breathing can, without his/her nose or mouth, slowly breathe out and in.

食氣者必謂吹呴呼吸，吐故納新也²

Who nourishes himself/herself from vapours has to be called the blowing and yawning breathing, spitting out the stale and receiving the fresh.

其息深深。真人之息以踵，眾人之息以喉³

Their breathing came deep and silently. The breathing of the true man comes from his heels, while men generally breathe from their throats. 

鼻息無聲神氣守⁴
Soundless breathing through the nose, guarding vapours and spirit

Breathing is a much more complex subject than it seems. It encompasses multiple exercises coming from various and sometimes quite different, if not opposite, traditions. The general term breathing, therefore, can refer to the lungs main function, a cutaneous possibility, an organ-related capacity, a directional practice and so on… Goals are also numerous, from relaxation to waking, from heating to cooling, from posture to movement, from Berzek to emptiness, etc., a myriad of exercises so that one can easily get lost and most of the time ends up practising a mix of now and again actually incompatible ones.

Flat Stomach Improved Vitality, Bar, Book and Pendulum

練長使短

Training in length, using short

練重使輕

Training heavy, using light

Most of the devices used in the search of verticality usually target the backbone, a stronger stretch or a better vertically. Two examples can be given, the use of chin-bar like tools for stretching and the book and pendulum-like ones for verticality.

Flat Stomach Improved Vitality, Reaching Higher

天門亢

The gate to the Heavenly Palace is haughty

 

 

 

 

Old practices based on change were very adaptive, a thing which is almost lost in today's mass teaching, posture, routines and exercises being quite standardised and always to be repeated the same way regardless of the different body shape and transformation. Before, they were considered to be tools that one could modify, not only according to its body, mind and level of understanding, but also simply to what kind of objective one would look for.

The Swallowed Third Foot

  

龜縮頸，耕牛之力

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

氣隨糞行
Vapours follow excrement.

五常，全寓性¹

The five constant virtues, all residing in the sex.

Sex remains taboo for some, a power to be mastered for others and often a laughing matter for everybody. Still, old practices aimed to fully understand any and every part of one’s body, nothing was left untrained. Since it used to be a verbal transmission between a teacher and his student, the taboo nature of the topic was actually not a big issue. This is a bit different if it has to be written down and the present post will be as short as possible, most of this kind of teaching should be kept as a timely transmission from teacher to student.

Flat Stomach Improved Vitality, Production&Insulation

 

五臟六腑，各安其位，各司其職

The five viscera and six internal organs, each in its place, each in its function.

肛門不提，丹田氣散，内中空虚，元氣¹虧損
When the anus is not pulled up, the vapours around the cinnabar field disperse, the inside becomes empty and one’s vitality depletes.

A flat stomach is not only an issue linked with the body verticality, it is also an even more important one which concerns our capacity to correctly produce and maintain vitality. As mentioned earlier in this blog, the main machinery used to generate vitality are the organs, hence the first quote. The concept of 气 in its original writing refers to a process between fire and water which creates vapours.

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.

Flat Stomach Improved Vitality, Anti-Gravitational Reconnection, External Connections

 

頭部，身軀，腿足，為天地人三盤

Head, torso and legs, the heaven, earth and human plates

三盤一軸

Three plates, one axle

三盤對天

The three plates face the sky

Some martial art schools use the three plates theory, and the first two quotes are pretty common. As far as verticality is concerned the plates can be extended to any part of the body, the idea being that a vertical alignment means a horizontal one (the third quote and the concept of crosses in training). The best known one is the book on the head.

Flat Stomach Improved Vitality, Anti-Gravitational Reconnection, The Basics

 

低頭彎腰，傳授不高

Lowering the head and bending the waist, not a great teaching.

 

腰與胯合，腰催胯

Waist and hips join, the waist propels the hips

圓襠鬆胯最為良

A round crotch and relaxed hips are desirable

吸胯提襠

Sucking in the hips and lifting the crotch

There are a lot of sayings, from a martial style to another, which insist on the importance of the middle section of the body, from the hips to the waist. They are often, if not totally forgotten (who talks about the crotch, if not just as a joke?), not really a key part of training any more, hips apart. Unfortunately, crotch, hips and waist are all essential parts where the connection between the upper and lower sections of the body is made and the vitality/heat is, or isn't, insulated.

Flat Stomach Improved Vitality, The Method Behind It, Endurance

夫氣足耐寒，血足耐暑，神足耐饑，精足力綿

One can endure cold when vapours are sufficient, heat when blood is sufficient, hunger when spirit is sufficient, the strength is continuous when essential liquids are sufficient¹. 

一日練一日功，一日不練十日空

A day spoils for a day training, ten empty days for a day without training.

肛門不提，丹田氣散，内中空虛，元氣虧損

When the anus is not pulled up, the vapours around the cinnabar field disperse, the inside becomes empty and one’s vital energy depletes.

As leisure and for show, training has evolved towards performance arts. Most of the classes being taught in a short format, less than two hours, and the proliferation of demonstrations have forced the old practices to reorient themselves in that manner.

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.

Flat Stomach Improved Vitality, The Method Behind It, Intertwined But Body Comes First

玲瓏變化布周身

Exquisite changes arrange the whole body.

法是功能之基

Method is the foundation of capability.

脾藏營，營舍意，脾氣虛則四肢不用，五臟不安，實則腹脹經溲不利

The spleen stores the reconstruction, in which abides the will. When the vapours of the spleen are empty, the four limbs are then of no use. When the five organs are not at ease, it makes the stomach distended and inhibits urine and defecation¹.

As far as the machine, the body, was concerned, deep transformations were sought after in internal practices. The goal was to make it more efficient and better suited to the needs of combat. The nurturing of vitality targeted the former. The method acknowledged the fundamental intertwinement between the body and the mind, the former actually being the lead. 

Flat Stomach Improved Vitality, Introduction

 

五臟六腑，各安其位，各司其職

The five viscera and six internal organs, each in its place, each in its function.

喜怒哀樂之未發，謂之中

When happiness, anger, sorrow and joy have not appeared, this is called equilibrium1.

A great part of improving and keeping vitality comes from the organs/emotions duo. Simply put, organs produce vitality when we exercise but lose some when faced with emotions. Hence, internal arts do not consider that post-training and post strong emotion/stress fatigue are the same. One is healthy (building vitality) and more external (moving the body) while the other is harmful (losing vitality at a high pace) and more internal (the organs are ‘moving’, not the body).

Forever Young

 

拳怕少壯

The fist fears the young and vigorous¹

少時練得一身勁，老來健壯少生病

A whole body strength trained when young, robust, healthy and rarely sick at an old age.

練出一身汗，小病不用看

Training to sweat all over the body, no need to worry about minor illnesses.

身體鍛鍊好、八十不服老

A body well trained, eighty but not acquiescing to old age.

二五更的功夫

Skills coming from an early sleep and an early wake².

A part of old practices, which is almost lost nowadays, is the training of the organs and its deep transformation of one’s body. To stay fit, for old internal practices, was to upgrade one’s organs, the internal alchemy, which, amongst other things, led to slowing down the ageing process and keep one’s vitality at its best for a long time. 少壯, young and vigorous, stresses on such need.

Fully Empty

虚則實之，實則虚之，虛實互用

Emptiness then towards fullness, fullness then towards emptiness, emptiness and fullness using each other alternatively.




Another translation would be “False then real, real then false, false and real used alternatively.”

Bamboo, Iron And Cotton, A New Realm

一层功，一层理

One level of skill, one level of intrinsic order¹.

古者謂是采真之遊

This is what the ancients called plucking the genuine wanderings².

Old practices were about constantly evolving, which meant changes, which meant to sometimes reach something totally new with very different rules or principles to be followed.

First In, Last Out

後發先至，後發三至，後發後至

Shooting after, reaching first; shooting after, three reaching first; shooting from the rear, the rear reaching.

“Shooting after, reaching first” to be linked with “he doesn’t move, I don’t move; he moves, I arrive first”.

Closing the Doors

肛門不提，丹田氣散，内中空虚，元氣*虧損

When the anus is not pulled up, the vapours around the cinnabar field disperse, the inside becomes empty and one's vitality depletes.

As it has been mentioned in the previous post, one could compare training teenagers and adults to fixing new or already used cars. Hence, when training adults, one has to consider the body deterioration, a thing teenagers have not yet undergone. As far as internal alchemy is concerned, it is mainly about the organs and their capacity to generate heat. Hence, their place, size and insulation are important matters to deal with when training adults. Right place and size are determined by the capacity to keep the stomach flat and insulation is working on the sphincters so that the sex and the anus are kept as closed as possible most of the time. Both issues are mainly solved by working on the pelvis and the perinea.