Answers to Students' Questions I.

Concerning Chang San-Feng's T'ai Chi Ch'uan Lun
Question 1: If the ch'! is stimulated and the shen is internally gathered, does it mean that the hsin mobilizes the ch'i and the ch'i mobilizes the body? Is this the origin of the inner and the outer mutually responding to each other and also the unification of movement and stillness? Please explain.
Answer: Your question is good. To mobilize the ch'i throughout the body is the basis of the internal. Stimulating the ch'i is the end result and is external. Gathering internally is stillness and stimulating the ch'i is motion. They are mutually responsive and joined together. To excite the ch'i means not only to stimulate one's own ch'i but to join one's ch'! to the ch'! of Nature so as to reinforce each other. Then it is excellent.

Question 2: "Let the postures be without breaks or holes, hollows or projection, or discontinuities and continuities of form." Does this quotation have the same meaning as the description from the Treatise "Strength and Physics" which says, "Slowly without breaks, circularly and continuously repeating itself, wonderful and divine, without end"?
Answer: Yes, but it is not as clear and obvious as the statement from the T'ai Chi Classics that says, "Stand like a balance, rotate actively like a wheel."

Question 3: "The motion should be rooted in the feet, released through the legs, controlled by the waist, and manifested through the fingers." The theory and the details have already been clearly explained in Treatise Eleven, Human Level, second and third degree. What is the method of mobilizing the hands and feet at the same time?
Answer: This is an excellent question. Here it is said, "It is rooted in the feet and manifested in the fingers." The chin is strung together and it is clearly shown in the substance and application. When you discharge the opponent it can be seen as the ch'i arriving. The root can never be dislodged. So you must make the right leg coordinate with the left hand and the left leg coordinate with the right hand. This is called "strung together."

Question 4: When the opportunity and the timing are correct it is the pinnacle of tung chin. This is clearly explained in your Treatise Eleven, Heaven Level, second degree, but to know its application is difficult. Please give some examples. Answer: Study my commentary on the ninth point in the last treatise of the Thirteen Treatises and you will find it.

Question 5: After I read Treatise Seven on "Strength and Physics" concerning the use of leverage I understood the quote, "Up or down, front or back, left or right .... " Is there anymore?
Answer: Just change the position and think about it. The substance and the application are similar.

Question 6: "By alternation of the force of pulling and pushing, the root is severed and the object is quickly toppled, without a doubt." Is that t'i chin?
Answer: To lift up is t'i chin, but this is not the power capable of raising up an opponent. That power comes by first pulling and then pushing, meaning that you first give way before you attain it. It is similar to squatting down first to get the power for jumping up. In physics, the equation is Force x Speed x Time = Energy.

Question 7: "In motion it separates; in stillness they fuse." What is the difference between separating and fusing, bending and extending, and opening and closing?
Answer: With regards to T'ai Chi, in stillness it fuses and in motion it separates. However, opening and closing refer to the body and the ch'i. When the body opens, the ch'i closes, and vice versa. Bending and extending is the same as opening and closing.