Mike Sigman Admin · Yesterday at 12:54 AM

6H Body? What I commonly see in the CMA's.

(Opinion Post)

Most of my interests (and it's a hobby interest, not a vocation) in the Chinese martial-arts was finding
out how to do some of the unusual power I ran into, first in Aikido and later in the CMA's. The answer to
most of the question is simply "jin". Most of what we see in person or on video that is unusual is simply
jin power, with varying levels and different accompaniments. Most of what I see in terms of strength in
exceptional Chinese in Xingyi, Taiji, Hun Gar, Praying Mantis, and so on is jin.

In fact, most of what I see in many Chinese who claim to do various arts is some amount of jin usage. A
lot of people are teaching bogus Taiji, Xingyi, Bagua, etc., based on the fact that they have some jin
skills, not that they can really/fully do the art that they claim to do.

I spotted most of these facts early on, after I began to develop some rudimentary jin skills. I wasn't good
at Taiji, I had some jin skills and I was big and strong, to boot, so I did well with most of the "push hands"
that I did. My "push hands" was, like most people's, sort of my own home-brewed concoction. I used to
judge in some tournaments and often I'd meet up in the hallways after the push hands competitions and
take on some of the winners. After the tournaments got infiltrated with the muscular bozos who
basically did some form of wrestling, I quit bothering. I recognized that to do and learn real push hands,
these people were a waste of time.

So basically, what I see being passed off as Chinese martial-arts has a lot to do with technique and
strength, but occasionally someone emerges with some jin skills. Usually, a little bit of jin skills can get
you a long way ... because in the Kingdom of the Blind, the One-Eyed Man is King.

I had a jaw-dropping experience (told this before) at a tournament in Houston where the mainland
Chinese professional Taiji judges got up and walked out when the Americans tried to claim that the
Cheng Man Ching form was a legitimate variety of Yang-style Taiji. It's not really the Yang-style, as even
a casual observer should be able to spot. However, if you watch videos of Cheng Man Ching, he used a
lot of jin (of sorts) to uproot and push people away. As I personally look on it now, the Cheng Man Ching
style is not really Taijiquan, but my clinical opinion is more than matched by many people from mainland
China who belong to the Yang-style. The families from Tung Ying Jieh and Fu Zhong Wen are less kind in
their descriptions than I am. The point is that some jin skills helped make a reputation.

Once I understood that jin was the essence of Taiji (and other arts, as I learned over time), I began to
look for it in people because those were the people I thought it would be worthwhile to push hands
with.

I didn't really start developing the qi-tissues and dantian usage until the 1990's and I don't think that my
push hands (so to speak) and other movements began to contain enough dantian-controlled movement
until sometime in the 2000's. Why'd it take so long? Because I didn't apply myself vigorously, of course,
and because I've had to collect information from many different sources. The knowledgeable Chinese
don't give away information on body mechanics easily.
So, anyway, my movement and thus my "6H Body" got better and more complete, but only relatively
recently. The point, though, is to get people to notice how long it took me (and the others who are also
looking) to get relatively important information and bring it physically online.

I don't teach Taiji and have mostly restricted the things I do teach (in occasional seminars) to jin and
body mechanics. If I couldn't move comfortably with the dantian until the 2000's, it would have been
wrong for me to claim to "teach taiji" in any complete manner. The name "Taiji" in "Taijiquan" is an
implicit term that you move your body with the dantian. As a matter of fact, the martial-arts councils in
China tend to appoint the term "neijia martial-art" ("internal martial-art") to an art that moves with the
dantian, so if someone is claiming to do an "internal" art, they should also be able to demonstrate
movement with the dantian. Just using jin is not enough to be "internal"; all of the Chinese martial-arts
use jin and most of those arts are openly called "external" arts.

This forum tries to go beyond simple jin, but jin itself is a stumbling block for most members so we're
limited in how far we can explore successfully. Any thoughts?

2 cents.

Edwin van der Laan interesting..... what makes CMC style being “ not really Taijiquan”? Fyi i do both
styles, cmc CMC and Yang.

Mike Sigman Edwin, the CMC story and study was something I was never involved in, other than to
know and watch a number of CMC practitioners over the years. I knew Jane and Bataan Faigao, for
instance, quite well and we often shared the same training space under the Boulder library by the creek.

The problem, it turns out is that CMC fabricated his credentials with Yang Cheng Fu, but CMC must have
felt certain that mainland China would never open back up, so he'd be safe in fudging his bona fides.
Apparently CMC only studied in the general classes that were run by the assistants ... and he didn't study
all that long. Douglas Wile checked dates and itineraries and many of the supposed meetings with YCF
couldn't have happened. The important thing, though, is that the Yang family, whatever "secrets" they
really knew, they didn't even share with YCF's senior disciples, so someone like CMC would have only
gotten forms and maybe some general idea of jin.

Despite politics and diplomatic comments, the Yang family really doesn't want to be associated with
CMC, nor do they think that what he did was Taijiquan.

Cheng, in my opinion did the typical mixing of some jin skills with some techniques, but there was no use
of the dantian, so what he did could not logically be Taijiquan. As I've mentioned before, the Yang-style
downstream seems to have devolved into something that doesn't use the dantian. Again, you have the
situation where various people who are strong, conditioned, and use some degree of linear jin are
considered "powerful representatives of the Yang-style Taiji". I did a lot of the Yang-style for a while, but
there is no cohesive message to be found from different instructors.
Graham Barlow Just an observation, and on the philisophical side, but... - most of this post is just about
categorisation of things. This is that, that is this, etc.. is it possible that this emphasis on categorisation
limits progress because it places a restriction on things?

Mike Sigman I'm not sure what you mean, Graham, if you don't mind explaining further.

Reminds me, BTW, that from a number of incidental things that Chen Xiaowang said, they apparently
view young up-and-coming Chen stylists as "developing". In other words, he made a big distinction
about the steps of progress, indicating, as an example, that just because someone had "studied Chen
style for 10 years", that didn't necessarily mean that that someone had all the skills and *body
conditioning* that he would have later. So the expert older practitioners will be more "developed". CXW
said something once about the stomp in Jin Gang Dao Dui and said that just by listening to someone's
stomp, you could "tell how developed they are".

Doru-Mihai Muntean The question is obviously whterh CXW actually has the skills that he claims to
have. Or that you seem to be assigning to him.

Mike Sigman Well, I think he has the skills I personally assign to him. I've seen and felt what he can
do. ;)

John Wilmshurst Well I'm puzzled as to what skills you might be referring to. Certainly from the plethora
of video and information on the internet his 6H skills, dantian centric movement, jin etc. is pretty self
evident. Are you referring to evidence of practical application in actual combat?

Mike Sigman Well, I've sparred with him, John, and he's pretty much an extreme professional (or
"was", I should say: that was back in the mid 1990's). I'd forgotten the thing about him accepting
challenges from anyone when he went to Japan (Jeff reminded me yesterday). He never lost, yet won
easily.

One thing I remember was that when CXW first visited the United States (at a tournament in
Winchester, Virginia), at several places people complained about him because they thought he was too
rough. He learned to tone it down, of course, but they're a pretty rough bunch in Chen Village. They
don't do Taiji like old people in the park. ;)

John Wilmshurst Mike Sigman sorry Mike I was actually referring my question to Doru, rather than you.
But thanks for the answer

Brian C. Allen Mike Sigman , I remember reading that a few people died at some of his workshops. Some
guy in Italy, I think, insisted on being hit with fajin, and he had a heart attack. I don't remember anything
about the others. Anyway, supposedly, he became less rough at workshops after those few incidents.

Mike Sigman I didn't hear of anyone dying, personally, but I perhaps downplay how strong I think he
is/was. I'm a pretty big guy and have been very strong at some points in my life, plus I've been around
some fairly hard martial-arts, here and there ... but his power was frightening. It was outside of anything
I was familiar with. That's why I roll my eyes when people would start bad-mouthing him or trying to
smear his reputation. The "need" to put Chen Xiaowang down is something I really enjoy watching and
reading: it immediately categorizes someone for me when I see it being done. ;)

Jeffrey Smoley Mike Sigman I may be the only one eyed man in this group, but I'm not that good. I was
bigger than Mike, spent many years in external arts and used those skills as a bouncer, as a military
contractor and as a teacher to local LEOs, FBI types, DEA and Coast Guard law enforcement crews. My
first experience with real Taijiquan started with Yan Gaofei. I thought he was pretty good, since I was
easily twice his size and he was able to keep me from locking him up. Then I met his teacher, Chen
Quanzhong. Not only was I nearly twice his size, but I was 24 years younger than he was. He made me
realize that almost all the other "masters" I had previously met were more experts than masters. Then I
met Chen Zhenglei. If I hadn't been on the old Neijia list, I would have though he was doing magic. Chen
Quanzhong told me he (CQZ) was about an 8.6 on a scale of one to ten and the 4 Chen Tigers were
between 9.4 and 9.6. He also said Chen Fake was the last 10. That scale might have some logarithmic
qualities.

Grant Beachley There is this thing, a very special thing, that has been defined by time and will at some
point be surpassed by it. 😉

It's not a 'whatever'. It is exactly what it is.

There are multivarious methods to train it it and while they serve together to define it by their
intersection they can also tend to fracture it.

So, something distilled and economical that yet leaves nothing out.

Zac Alstin You've done a really good job of conceptualising and explaining jin, using some different
approaches, and you've been able to teach basic jin to people in seminars. Part of that success is
because there's a frame of reference for how jin is used by everyone unconsciously in everyday life
when we carry objects. It's really cool to have a conceptual shift that translates into a physical skill.
Qi is quite a bit harder to grasp, and it's not something you can teach someone to do in a short time. It's
also not an obvious extension of jin...it doesn't build intuitively on top of it, even though they are
complementary and interwoven.
So in a sense this forum is trying to convey information about jin in the first instance, which is already
mysterious and hard for people to get their heads around. And when they do get their heads around it
to some extent, then there's this other even more weird thing called qi to try to understand...and
understanding qi is contingent on practicing it correctly for long enough to start to feel it.
Considering the difficulty, things are probably going really well! ;)