Training dummies

For a martial artist it is important to have a variety of targets to practice on.  Standard heavy bag, focus mit and muay thai pads all have their merits, but it is better to leave solo training for home and make use of training partners for more complex drills.

Shaolin was said to have 108 wooden men some with springs and levers making them slightly robotic.  Here are some modern renditions of the shaolin dummies that are effective and of good value.

Body Opponent Bag- Bob's are great.  I've worked with these for years.  The bonus is that you can mark acupoints on it to practice targeted hitting.  You can also hit downward and around the neck.  This is also an excellent bag for uppercuts.

Arms: 

Hanging wood- A variation of this can be to put sand bags around the exterior.  They sell 500lb heavy bags, but I think these are of little use.  At this point the bag is mostly immobile, so it makes sense to simply pad a large rock or a tree.  The benefit of wood is that you can find pieces with limbs sticking out.  Cut them to size, pad them or duct take them.  If you can find an old tree, then its even better.

Tires:  Cheap, effective and resilient.  These should be used often for martial arts training.  You can lay them flaw and practice circular footwork.

 

Not a bad idea.

Choy Li Fut Dummy patterned after Shaolin dummies.

Bagua dummy:  I saw versions of this on plum flower posts for stepping patterns  A convenient DIY version of plum flower posts is to fill coffee cans with cement.

Sandbags

Collapse Press Hammer （Beng ya Chuei）

 Hammer Time:  Backfist

By Shifu Andrew Miles

The Chinese word for fist 锤 literally means "hammer".  Let that sink in for a moment.  Think about how a hammer strikes.  Does it resemble the striking we practice?

 Melon hammers.  When they say "fist" they mean this.

One of the eight hammers is 崩锤 beng chui or collapse press hammer.

 Beng chui is more than hitting with the back of the fist.  The purpose of backfist is to crush through the opponent's structure and bounce them off of the ground.  The fist strikes downward and the arm (handle of the hammer) presses against the opponent's body.  Mantis classics say that one should bear down with the weight of a mountain.  Think of the elbow and knee as jaws of life coming together in a pincer movement. 

 

That is also  the way mandibles work.

Li Kun Shan demonstrating beng chui at long distance.

Wei Xiao Tang demonstrating sitting belly posture which makes included beng chuei.  Master Wei was fond of backfist which is why he was called "Thunder fist."

How to practice:

Start swinging a sledgehammer and you will soon notice where your stance is weak and after an hour or so you will have learned a lot about power generation.  Start looking at the fastest ways to knock people to the ground with a large hammer while retaining balance.  Exploring this will give you realistic feel for stances and  empty hand application

The end result is something like this.

Complete Freedom: Forging a Daoist Warrior

 Complete Freedom: Forging a Daoist Warrior

By Shifu Andrew Miles

Emotions hold the body.  They create tension.  They are chemical processes designed to meet the needs of the human body.  We are not our bodies and we are not our emotions.  Emotions can be used to help direct and fuel the body, but past emotions can hold areas of tension in the body that keep us from operating smoothly in the present.  Think of the body as a vehicle.  If it is Summer and you still have chains on your tires, you will be doing damage to your car.  The brakes should be applied sometimes but driving with the emergency brake on will cause you to lose gas mileage.  In the same way our past emotions interfere with our intention and goal setting.

I have used the word intention but I am referring to yi 意。  This is a kind of relaxed intention associated with alpha brain waves.  She xiang 设想 is closer to the word intention.  It has to do with bringing dreams to fruition.  Yi leads qi.  Qi is directed through planning and the qi becomes manifest in the end result.

When we fall down, we feel hurt.  Is it the injury then caused by gravity or from fear?  The change has happened, but we lose the ability to adapt due to emotions.  The seven emotions pull the seven major joints out of alignment.  Over time the effects of emotions may limit my life causing one to suffer pain, injury, emotional frustration and cost a fortune over the course of one's life.

In a Chinese parable it is written that a man who is drunk can fall off of carriage and not get injured.  Wine, rather than fear flows through his veins.  How much safer are we if we rid our bodies of fear and store wisdom instead?

Wine can protect a man who falls from a carriage.  How much more can wisdom protect us?

How do we rid our bodies of the seven emotions to find true alignment with the seven stars (joints)? 

The struggle is between heaven and Earth.  When the body rules the spirit, the spirit is harmed, when the spirit rules the body, the body is well ordered.  Emotions are from the Earth and not eternal, when they interfere with our vision and spirit we must return them to their origin. 

 Inner Meditation:  1.  Imagine the floor as a grid of light.  The entire plane comes up through your feet bringing the emotions up and out of your body, your hands raise up and the emotions come out the lao gong point on the hands and out the bai hui point.  They continue upward and taken in a basket by two 金刚 (jin gang) or golden heavenly messengers who bring it to heaven, slice it with a sword of light and let the emotions fall to earth where they become spiders, worms and other creatures of the Earth. 

Jin Gang or Chinese angel depicted riding a tiger.  Armoured in gold, they serve the king of heaven as messengers.  The angel is represented as a general riding a tiger.  The general represents the liver and the eternal soul.  The tiger represents the animal nature.  The general must ride the tiger.

Inner Meditation: 2.  Imagine that sparkling coming is falling from heaven.  First it washes down the Shaoyang meridians, then after 5 minutes it washes down the yang ming and finally down the taiyang meridians.

After these purging meditations the body should be free of obstruction and begin the naturally warm up.

Ritual of Heaven:  The student is lead to mountain precipice and made to stand somewhere dangerous.  They relax and let their body lean and collapse in different ways trusting the seven stars of the body to naturally keep them from plummeting to their death.  In cities, the roof of a building works just as well.

Done properly, it should resemble the collapsing giraffe toy.

Just don't let anyone get the wrong idea.

Ritual of Earth:  The student is then brought into a cave to meditate.  The meridians should be open and filled with heavenly light.  The heavenly light is brought into the subconscious.  Spiders and worms will actually crawl on them, but they should remain aloof.  The body already belongs to worms.  It is dirt.  The spirit already belongs to heaven.  Life is a temporary meeting of the two. 

Sometimes even kung fu masters have to sit in time out.

Exercise 1.  Fall down while holding your breath.  It hurts

Exercise 2.  Fall down while exhaling.  It doesn't hurt.

After you get used to this so that is feels gentle and soft.

Exercise 3.  Fall onto a place that looks dangerous, such as onto stairs or into a corner.  Then do the same exercise blindfolded.

Exercise 4.  Get into your most uncomfortable position on stairs or in a corner and have your training partner choke you with their hands.  Using breath, allow your body to fluidly come out of the awkward position into a position of safety.  Gradually increase the intention of the attacker so that they can experience fear as an illusion which hinders them and train the body to not overreact.

If they are breathing, relaxed and moving is is nearly impossible to strangle someone this way, still countless people have died from this due to their own fear and tension.

Exercise 5.  Stand blindfolded and get beaten up using breathing and relaxation to absorb the strikes.  Flow around the attacker using breath.  The strikes are points of impact no different from falling onto the ground.

Ritual of Mankind:  The student is blindfolded and brought to what they think is the cliff and made to repeat the first ritual.  During that time the master should push them. They will think they are going to plunge to their death.  You can accurately assess their fear of death by seeing how hard or softly they hit the ground. Those who transcend death can become average human beings who can see through illusions and easily attain their goals.

Time to die!  Psych!  Lolz.

Daoist Stepping Patterns

Daoist Stepping Patterns

By Shifu Andrew Miles

Wudang  before heaven and post heaven stepping patterns.

In Sichuan I encountered many family systems of martial arts.  I met people who practiced bagua as well as other obscure systems no one has heard of before.  No matter what they were called, the systems are based on ancient theories.  Daoism in China is grey, drab, and down to Earth and contrasts starkly with the Daoism is the western imagination.  It is rooted in the soil.  Much of what is considered esoteric and meriting special meditation workshops in the west is common knowledge in China.  It is how people farm.  Many martial arts systems don't have names, but the concepts of the family systems are still guided by the Daoist theories.

Many martial artists in China will only show military san da on the surface, but if they come to trust you will reveal much deeper side to their art.  This is similar to the way Chinese families will claim to be be educated and not religious, yet will pray to their ancestors and burn money for them on select days determined by the ancient calendar.    In the west we have a multitude of techniques, and use comparatively few stepping patterns.  I found the opposite to be true in China.  People knew one or two movements from a form and yet had a variety of stepping patterns. 

Stationary
2 steps
3 steps
4 steps
5 steps
6 steps
7 steps
8 steps

Plum flower poles are so named because plum flowers have five petals.  This represents a stepping pattern.

 Posts are used to train stepping patterns, both by walking on top of them and by moving freely between them.  Plum flower posts are found in city parks where children and old people step on them for balance.

How many steps does it take to walk in a circle?  Take 360 and divide by the number of steps and you get a precise stepping angle.

The Chinese concept of numerology helps to balance systems.  These numbers and the theories they represent would help people to categorize techniques as being more or less yang or yin.

 

2 steps with 5 phase striking= Xing Yi
8 steps with 8 palms= baguazhang
5 steps with 8 postures= Taijiquan

Two step in Xing Yi Quan

Taoist two-step

Within the praying mantis systems you have:

plumflower mantis=5
six harmony mantis=6
seven star mantis=7
8 step mantis-8

The theories and stepping patterns serve as constructs to upload and download fighting skill, theory and training methods.  Animal systems have numbers and systems named after numbers have animals.  Many animals also represent numbers.  Are you confused yet?  Don't be.  Most of it is just code for the stepping angle.

Theory helps, but ultimately its about not getting stabbed.

Overcoming Fear: Interview with Tom Sumbera

Originally from the Czech Republic, Shifu Tom Sumbera's first experiences with martial arts involved shooting machine guns in his physical education classes.  He learned to be calm under pressure.  He later learned martial arts and has explored the fear response to a very deep level.  Working as a fire fighter and EMT, he has seen the most gruesome displays possible.  Working in Seattle, many of the people he is sent to help are dangerous or fight with the EMTs.  His martial art skills have repeatedly allowed him to remain safe and to save the lives of combative patients.


Andrew Miles:  How did you come to explore the nature of fear?

Tom Sumbera:  We all think we are brave, but fear is so powerful, it controls us more than we think.  When I had a kung fu School in Florida a man came in and attacked me.  I didn't expect it.  I was scared.  Instinct took over, I turned with him and when I opened my eyes I had knocked him out.  It looked like I was in control, but I wasn't.  I realized that I had no control of my fear.  I had learned to control it as a firefighter and EMT, but I realized that you must explore it to the core of your being.  For the next 10 years I looked deeply into myself to see where my fear was coming from and how to overcome it.


AM:  What do we fear?

TS:  We fear being hurt and we fear hurting others.

AM:  How does that affect us:

TS: When we are sparring or being good people in daily life we condition ourselves to not be hit.  We are told to avoid harming ourselves or others.  We don't want to hurt others.  Even with the skill to fold a heavy bag, it is nothing if you can't not eliminate your fear of hitting and being hit.  Many young guys look strong, but their fear disperses their own energy and prevents them from delivering a good strike.  They have just grown and have not fully integrated their body.  They prepare a scary shell with puffy muscles, tattoos and piercings, but they are just boys.  Once you break their shell they are like eggs which are soft on the inside.  They do not really know chaos or combat, they know video games and convenient food.  As a result they never come to face their fears and transcend them.

AM:  How do you use this in your daily life?

TS: When I approach people who need help, sometimes their minds are gone and they react with instinct.  Words will not affect them, so I speak through the fear to their nervous system.  One time a guy who was on drugs had a knife and everyone was afraid to come near him.  I approached him without hesitation took the knife and directed him to the police officers who took it from there.


AM: Were you afraid of his superhuman strength or unpredictability?

TS:  His intention was week and mine was stronger and more stable.  I was not angry or aggressive, it just happened.  He didn't react to me any more than he would react to the wind blowing, but if I slowed as I approached or changed my speed it would trigger fear in his body.

AM:  Why didn't you let the police take care of him?

TS:  They were afraid to approach and he was wounded.  He needed help and would have died.  Everyone was afraid.  It was all an illusion and everyone was frozen by a belief.  I couldn't let a man die because of an illusion.

AM:  What process do you use to eliminate fear?

TS:   " I do this through meditation and prayer.  Once my fear is gone I become empty and they do not see me as an approaching force.  If I grabbing the knife or syringe with intention, they will struggle and I will be hurt.  I follow the channels of the body smoothly and they feel comforted as I move them.  It is as though they wanted to move in this way.

AM: Where did you learn to do this? 

TS:  It mainly comes from my training and from nature.  If you go out into nature and see the way things change there  is a rhythm to the changes of the weather, a rhythm to the shifting Earth and a rhythm to changes of living things.  We are programed to react to the intentions of living things, but not to react when the clouds move overhead.  Some things we naturally fear and somethings we don't.  It is good to know the nature of a person and look at their basic motivations.  By nature we avoid fighting if there is another way to get what we need.  We all have the same basic fears.  Only by mastering your own fears, can you control the fears of other people.  This is a simple thing with applications in every aspect of life.

Shifu Sumbera teaches 8 Step Mantis to law enforcement and to select students.   He can be reached at sumberat@yahoo.com

Wuji as Formlessness

Wuji as Formlessness

By Andrew Miles
 

Emptiness is the most important attribute in martial arts.  Just as nothingness gives birth to something, formlessness must precede form.  Without emptiness all of the postures go from being flexible suits of armor to rusty cages that imprison a fighter.  Postures are a battle arrangement of the major striking surfaces.   

Consider every striking surface to be free floating.  Empty everything else. 

The seven stars and the dan tian fly like a formation of helicopters, each part is small, but the overall area of the whole formation is large and filled with emptiness.  If you shoot into this formation your chances of hitting something are smaller than if you have a single larger target such as a Zeppelin blimp.  A student must begin with emptiness of mind, free from fear of loss or desire to win.  Those who fear a fist, will eat a fist, those who flow fearlessly into the spaces between the firsts have nothing to fear.  Emotions eat away intention and divert energy.  Having no intentions, one may use true intention.  The student must learn to find the empty spaces of the attacker and flow into them.  When the student can enter into the safe empty spaces of an attacker, then formlessness can give birth to form and even the horse stance is enough to overcome a fierce opponent.  If you try to use horse stance out of context, you be destroyed.  Those who have lost this philosophy will begin at form and strive toward formlessness discarding technique in the process.  In the end, what they consider mastery is actually the first stage of training and their lives are over before they can truly begin to learn martial arts.  They curse the form that held them, ignorant that if was their own improper training which bound them to failure.  When one follows the way and trains in accordance with nature one thousand days are more than enough for foundation and ten thousand days are enough to achieve mastery.

In this video Chen Ziqiang demonstrates formlessness in Taji and only then applies the concept of horse stance.  The rules prohibit true combat, but he handles the situation well using these two concepts.  Note his facial expression during and after the bout.  No fear, no celebration.

Formlessness proceeding form in systema training.  Using comparatively few postures he accomplishes creative application by first being empty.

  Learning form before formlessness is like fighting helicopters with a Zeppelin.

Characteristics of 8 Step Mantis

Characteristics of 8 Step Mantis

By Grandmaster James Shyun and Andrew Miles

Grandmaster Wei Xiao Tang in Sitting Belly Posture

Xing Yi Posture by Chen Pan Li

Unicorn posture in Yin Style Baguazhang

Grandmaster Shyun in Sitting Belly Posture

Bagua posture

Sitting on Plate Posture

 

Eight step mantis uses strong, flexible stances, agile footwork and has characteristics similar to ba gua, xing yi, taiji, tong bei and plum flower mantis.  These systems have had the most influence on 8 Steps growth and development.

What is 8 Step and what does it look like?  The definitive answer is the wrong one.  Based on the philosophy of change it should ideally encompass 8 pairs of defining characteristics totaling 16.  This style is all of these attributes depending on the situation.

Full- Eight step moves like a tank rolling through obstacles and destroying with every step and strike.  The fullness makes use of tensile structures that roll through the opponent’s defenses.  Iron body methods are used to protect the fighter.

Empty- Eight step is formless and can’t be attacked.  All attempts end in emptiness.  It looks like nothing happened, but the results are large.  Rather than accept a strike, emptiness and evasion are used.

Long- Eight step uses long kicking techniques and arm strikes.  Footwork covers long distance quickly.  Punches can launch people across the room.

Short-Eight step uses short strikes and footwork.  Short powers enter into internal organs causing severe damage.

Floats- Eight step fighters seems to float across the ground and effortlessly rise up for aerial attack.

Sinks-  Eight step sinks low to the ground, making use of it and shifting fluidly like an octopus.

Follows- Eight step follows the opponent’s force making use of every opportunity.

Leads- Eight step forces the opponent’s choices and leads them into your intended path of destruction.

Sophisticated- Eight step techniques are highly refined and delicately entering and deflecting the opponent.  Medicine and poison making are highly refined sciences and uses technique and tensile connectivity.

Brutish- Eight step smashes people into the ground, picks them and uses them as projectiles.  It smashes people with rocks and relies on physical strength using the most simple, obvious and practical techniques.

Attacks targets- Eight step uses highly targeted strikes to vital points.

Attacks Structure- Eight step attacks the entire architecture of the opponent’s structure making the exact place of impact less important.

Circular- Eight step is highly circular.  Everything rolls and turns.

Angular- Eight step makes use of precise angles which are found in every motion.

Shifu Miles and Navarro demonstrating characteristic mantis techniques which are refined and elegant

Grandmaster Wei demonstrating a technique that involves using someone's head like a paintbrush.

More on 8 Step Mantis
More on Abimoxi, Martial Arts Medicine