Uses of the Hara within different traditions
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under the navel. When you hold in your stomach at practice of Misogi, you can see the muscles. When you hold in your stomach during serious practice of Misogi, you would feel that the skin on your stomach sticks to your back. If you practice those 4 kinds of breathing in such situation, you would get great concentration power. You hold breathing in the lower part of lung. This power transmits to abdominal muscle. The abdominal muscle was built up by the practice with breathing. That's why the shape of abdominal muscle built by Aikido is different from the muscle built by push-ups or physical exercise." I've been thinking about this for a while now. Is this part of the body "conditioned" to have different qualities in different arts? For example, would an art such as hsing i condition a harder, more solid hara compared to an "aiki" art which cultivates a softer, more reflexive hara? Or is this "Quality" merely related to different stages of progression? Any thoughts anyone? |
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In a very pure sense of "use the hara for your movements" there is a form of movement that is referred to as "six harmonies" type of movement. In the old days in China, when martial-arts and cultivating the body (as part of the Dao) were more important, a greater percentage of the arts bespoke themselves as utilizing "six harmonies" movement, the hallmark movement of a full-blown "internal art". Nowadays a lot of those arts still exist but they no longer use the six-harmonies movement and use more ordinary "external" aspects of ki and kokyu skills. The more "pure" a martial-art is, the more the hara/tanden/dantien area is used. I've seen practitioners of Chen's Taiji who have a development in the hara/dantien that comes from constantly manipulating the ki and kokyu skills... to the point that they can push out a small mound of specialized muscles at the dantien that is about the size of a large apple. My point being that it's not so much that Aikido is different (there are other arts that pretty much use the hara as much as Aikido does), but that the level of hara-usage can vary. In fact, there is generally a lot of variance even within different martial arts, depending upon the skills of the practitioner. FWIW Mike Sigman |
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Thanks for the considered reply.
So, if I understand correctly (and please correct me otherwise), the use of the Hara and the associated skills required for example to push air through a bamboo flute / manipulate a longbow / lock joints in a grapple are basically the same and are to a greater or lesser degree stages of development towards the fully rounded skills of the six harmonies? (This being opposed to the Hara becoming hyper conditioned for a specific skill.) One of the things that got me thinking about these things apart from my own training and experiences with others is the following quote taken from the blog below http://daixinyi.blogspot.com/search?...&max-results=9 Quote:
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Odd you should mention Dai Family Xinyi.... we were just talking on QiJin about some of the basic (core exercise) training in Dai Xinyi's "Squatting Monkey" and how it relates to some of the suburi that Ueshiba was filmed doing back in the 1930's. The point I was making in the discussion was that the Dai Xinyi's method of storing power and then striking is not functionally different from what is considered "good technique" in a number of Asian martial arts, and surprisingly Ueshiba can be seen doing the same store-and-release in his kenpo. How many current Aikidoists were taught this almost universal form of bokken-swinging that Ueshiba was using as far back as the 1930's, I wonder? Anyway, FWIW Mike Sigman |
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Been following your posts but haven't had anything to add. In the above quote, are you referring to the Asahi film? If so, I'd be grateful for a time signature so I can see what suburi you are referring to. If you are referring to a different film, could you provide a link? Many thanks, Pat |
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It's this one; between 7:33 and 7:50 http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=98yRuBkUBGQ The discussion on QiJin was along slightly different lines than just the hara/dantien and more along the lines of the lower dantien. The comparison was with the last guy on this vid: http://www.youtube.com/view_play_lis...919&playnext=1 Best. Mike |
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Several of those movements track with some of the movements O Sensei is doing in that kenpo exhibition -- he is just doing them singly and connecting them (seemingly) free form (and more variations than I ever learned, certainly), whereas we did ours one at the time and repeated them in four or eight directions. We did the thirty-one jo kata and twenty jo suburi in much the same spirit, too. I know for a fact that Baumgartner Sensei in Santa Fe does the thirty-one jo kata in the same manner in both the solo suburi and in the awase bunkai and I just showed up there one day last year while travelling. About all the aikido I get out of town is what I can pick up while out on work. Nice folks in Santa Fe. Very accommodating, BTW. |
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Regards, Mike Sigman |
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猫に小判. 猫に鰹節 I am not sure which is the correct cat but, one of those, anyway, maybe both. 大同小異 |
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It's rather pointless to engage in a discussion on a forum where distraction and frippery dilutes the thread. If the O.P. and anyone really interested in functional discussion of the topic wants to take it to QiJin or some other forum, p.m. me.
Regards, Mike Sigman |
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The proverbs noted exist to avoid repeated mistakes. I am simply not again engaging any tired dispute over bona fides on standards of subtle movement that are neither in my training lineage, nor within my physical observation to see, or feel and repeat. The bokken swinging in the essential forms seen, however, emphatically is, on both counts. |
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If you wish to comment or pose a question on a subject tangental to the thread (especially when the thread involves a fairly technical discussion), why don't you open a new thread and post the relevant quote along with your questions/comments?
That's what I did. Anyway, it's a moot point at this stage... |
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It doesn't seem moot anyhow. There still ought to be plenty to discuss. |
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The other structural function of the pyramidalis, specifically, is to stabilize the pubic symphysis, in lateral torque. This is a fairly immobile joint at the front of the pubis. It can be damaged by having one limb levered out from the torso while in a loaded condition, often acutely in a tackle, but is also seen in swimmers whose breaststroke causes repetitive use injury from having an strong, but asymmetrical, or uncoordinated stroke. In martial arts where the modulation of periodic torque is a primary mechanical mode (such as aikido) then the pyramidalis acting bilaterally alternately compress and release action on the pubic symphysis to stiffen or relax as appropriate that elastic hinge, so that the continuity of compression or tension is maintained from the torso to the undercarriage, as the body accepts and delivers the torsional shears. In Dai as it is described, the "vertical rotation of the hips" would required constant compression of the symphysis by the pyramidalis both to stabilize the forward shear from the spine in absorbing the reaction of the strike at impact as well as to ensure integrity in the mechanism in the vertical plane from becoming asymmetrical at the hinge in the pubis. I can see that torque sensitive arts like Aikido use different aspects of this sytem.The left pyramidalis for example carries the line of action of its rightside external oblique over to the left side of the pelvis. This means that in unilateral action of the oblique (as in striking),torque naturally stabilizes the symphysis in compression, since the pyramidalis extends the action of the oblique across the gap. to pull it closed. The pyramidalis adds further to that stability, both because it extends the effective arc of the oblique's action and because of its own contraction force. Both the external and internal obliques act as antagonists to the diaphram to compress the abdomen for exhalation, and the pyraqmidalis acts with the rectus to tauten the abdomen. Acting together they modulate the rigidity of the tube and therefore its efficiency in transmitting impulse (rigid tube versus a slack sock). , and modulating how static torque deformations of the torso are received and stored, and then delivered. And that's what I saw in the video. :) |
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Mike-- With respect to use of the hara/dantien and store/release, do you see similarity between the Dai Xinyi and Ueshiba on the one hand (per your remarks above) and the Wu/Hao taijiquan demonstration in the video clip above, specifically between 0:58 and 1:25? Thanks for your feedback. |
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Best. Mike |
Re: Uses of the Hara within different traditions
Same thing, BTW, with this 94-year-old guy. There is no substantive difference between this type of power and what Ueshiba called "the secret of Aikdio":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZdtM5p6ZkA FWIW Mike Sigman |
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Thanks Mike. It seemed to be along the same lines, but I just wanted to check that I was seeing some of what you were discussing.
I appreciate the quick response. |
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What does "asagao" translate into English as? Thanks for your help. |
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Kondo Sensei talks about this in an interview on Aikido Journal and hints that it is Gokui. It took him years to understand the "true meaning" of Asagao. |
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Like the flower, the hands begin to spread from the center, leading the arms spiraling curving and opening outward and spread the chest and belly open -- so that the fore-aft dimension shrinks while the lateral dimension extends. Reverse it and the arms roll inward into a spiral extension forward while their lateral dimension becomes smaller. Look carefully at the blossom -- it swells at the base as with a intaking breath, and as it unfurls and expands the base shrinks again as with a released breath. Kokyu drives the movement from the hara -- asagao is the revealed shape of the breath spiral. Windings, I believe some use to describe what the Chinese arts address in the nature of chan-si jin. Shear is the operative mechanical principle, but it does not work unless it propagates from the center and back again in the nature of breath. One secret is that no change in length occurs, and no leverage is directly employed to expand or retract the body -- as the arm (and by extension the rest of the body) retracts in one dimension, it simultaneously extends in the other, (in-yo ho) 90 degrees out of phase with any "resistance" experienced and with relatively little energy -- this is asagao as I mean it. The proverbial "no inch" punch is simply completing the last bit of this extension in closing -- as THIS is using both opening and closing in succession -- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5z6jg...eature=related(opening first, then closing at 5:30-6:00) and (closing first, then opening at 6:15-6:30) As Tissier Shihan empasizes it is not merely about the arm but about how you move the body, which is harder to describe, except to say that is is the same -- just harder to visualize Emphasis on tegatana in Aikido carries this message in a related form, and in dynamic terms in many of the aiki-taiso. Both parts are found in sanchin no kata, and it is also in o chiburi, and other sword movement - opening asagaois in suriage, for example. |
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In my style we focus on creating a cavity underneath the sternum, which is achieved by not sucking it in, but by the consequence of certain parts of the body being aligned. Shoulders and elbows squeezed, the chest contracted and the back arched. There is no trying to roll anything until the area (dan tian) has built up physically, so for noobs, you are told to sit there and cultivate structure, first by standing and then by contracting and expanding, in squatting monkey posture. This posture, though looking simple is very complicated with a lot of things happening inside and outside the body. Not learning is properly can lead to hypertension/ high blood pressure and unnecessary pressure on the lungs and heart and also the spine, due to the vertical movement of the backbone. Rolling from the hips maybe is not the most accurate expression of what is happening as when you meet someone who is high level, there is little movement from the kua, but the area (which is as large as a rugby ball on my teacher) will rotate independently of anything else going on externally. Dan tian in our style is the engine which drives all of the moves, without this in our system we are severely handicapped. |
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* Standing develops a structure that ties the body together. * Contracting and expanding that structure develops the dan tian, since the dan tian is the center of that structure. * Once the dan tian has been sufficiently developed, you can use the dan tian to actively control that structure. |
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DZQ |
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