Another attempt to make the simple obscure, the easy complex and the understandable mystical... why what do you see... (oh and by the way the pic with the body builder missed some of the finer or not so finer points and musculature that is worked... but nice try)... its not that people are ignoring your posts because they are not understanding them... its just that its pretty obvious you dont get it... good luck with that though...
I think I will need all the luck in the world if things keep going this way. Not a spark of insight anywhere. I am persistent though. I know I can light that spark of intelligence in the brain of a person if I have the chance. Even if all I have to work with is quitters. Let's see..................."I obviously don't get it". I love this kind of sentiment. I have a goal. I am a patient person so it doesn't bother me to wait a week to make a point. I am completely confident in where I am going. You have nothing but doubt, or the unwillingness to look. I will win. You will see what I am getting at, and when you do, you will feel foolish about how obvious what I am saying is, and how doubtful you were that I am a good person trying to do good for free. Here is a different picture of the slinky. I never do anything without a reason. Keep in mind my written contributions to this discussion, and more importantly the pictures I have posted. I try to write for people that don't know english. A persistent person should be able to look at the sequence of pictures alone and get what I am trying to say. The writing is just a crutch. I promise you will be rewarded if you persevere.
The problem isn't that people don't understand what you mean; the problem is that you come off as arrogant and hideously patronizing. I don't much care, since there's nothing online that I'm gonna get better than I get from my teacher, but it can be annoying. You act like you're a great master, here to share your wisdom and insight with us lesser mortals, if only we weren't too blind to see. Like I said, it's patronizing, and that's not gonna win you any positive feedback or appreciation. Even if you really do have something worthwhile to share, you'll never get the message out if you treat your audience like a bunch of uneducated children.
OK thecycle, I'll play along for now in order to try to get you to explain your point, but you must realise by now that your patronising attitude is acting as a huge barrier if you want anyone to listen to you. If it is an attempt to get others to drop their ego, I would have to argue that to take such a stance with people (assuming to try to teach the poor fools the error of their ways) is in itself a massive ego trip. But I digress. The first picture shows a slinky opened out. If it represents a slinky on the move, then I guess it is in a state of momentum. All the weight will gradually transfer from one end of the spring to the other and then, tipped over by its own momentum, the weight will gradually transfer to the other end and so on until it comes to rest. The closed up slinky needs someone to come and give it a pull to get it going again. It also has a picture of Snoopy on it and I love Snoopy. Maybe you could explain what you are driving at and what the slinky is a metaphor for, for those of us who do not think exactly like you. Spirals, weight shifting, momentum and coiling and uncoiling spring to mind [pun intended!], maybe you can tell me if that is what you meant. p.s. I bought a slinky when I was little but it didn't work so I took it back. Mine didn't have Snoopy on it though and I think that might have helped. I love Snoopy.
and it has opening and closing / expansion & contraction and it needs someone to set it in motion by pulling it and... it is one long piece of metal wound in a spiral. I must be getting close. If this has any particular relationship to the following picture (or similar ones) I'm afraid you are going to have to spell it out. I normally respond well to instructions I can actually do, such as "stand in a horse stance and raise your left hand to an outstretched, palm-up position in front of your shoulder..." that kind of thing. Or you could tell me that it relates to advancing or retreating unbroken spirals where the interplay between flow and counterflow rotation allow the limb to continue circling, or something.
I wonder why the thread on the other forum was closed. Perhaps he's only allowed out on certain days.
Thank you for demonstrating insight, curiosity and intelligence. You are not exactly right, but you were getting close. Actually you kind of jumped ahead to where I was going. Not bad. If someone is playing guessing games with me, I look at it logically. I came here to a kung fu forums and started talking about kung fu silk reeling exercises. Then I posted pictures that seemed completely unrelated to kung fu and started the guessing game. If I was one of you guys, I would look at the information I was provided with. The latest question was, what do you see when you look at a slinky? What does a slinky have to do with kung fu? A slinky is a child's toy. It seems like there can be no connection. What do I know about kung fu? I know that all kung fu is based on a few things. Kung fu is based on geometry and kung fu is based on physics. When I read about Tai Chi or kung fu, there are a couple of things I seem to read every page. I read about circles and I read about spirals. Tai Chi and kung fu are about circular and spiral power. Then I look at the slinky again. What do I see now? I see a circle. A slinky is a circular piece of metal. Then I ask the guy who started the guessing game. "A slinky is a circle and all kung fu talks about circles. Am I right"? Then the guy says, "Exactly! That is exactly the most obvious thing in the world I was getting at. A slinky is metal, and a slinky is a circle. Kung fu is not metal, so kung fu and the circle part of the slinky must be related." ( I am purposefully ignoring the things listed by Jkor because it ruins the story) Next I think to myself, what other information do I have for this guessing game? We are talking about silk reeling, and the guy posted some pictures he swore up and down were related. So I go back and look at the old pictures. What do I see? There are two pictures of a reel, two pictures of a weightlifter and one picture of a slinky. I throw out the other slinky picture because I already have one. I throw out the reel pictures because they are not about kung fu. That leaves me with the weightlifter. He is a human being so he has something to do with kung fu. Then I notice that one of the weightlifter pictures has a circle drawn on it. There is a slight problem though. The circle on the man is oriented horizontally. The circle on the slinky is oriented vertically. To help me think, I rotate the slinky so it presents a horizontal circle. Now the circle of the slinky and the circle on the man are oriented horizontally. I turn to the guy running the guessing game and I say "Am I on to something? Is aligning the circle of the slinky horizontally like the circle you drew on that picture what you want me to look at?" That is exactly what I want you to look at. The next step in this process is to align the slinky horizontally so the open circular mouth is aligned on the circle on the side of the weightlifters body. This thread is about silk reeling physical exercises for human beings. A reel is a circle with the silk wound around it. You have a picture of a human being with a circle drawn on a specific part of his anatomy to point out it's generally circular shape. You now have a horizontally oriented slinky who's end presents a circle like the circle on the side of the man's body, and like the circle of a silk reel. Just a step or two more and you learn one of the secrets of Tai Chi and most all other kung fu styles. And the step or two more is just as easy, logical and straightforward as the pedantic speech above. What else is left with the two pictures above? What else could you do with just those two pictures above, and the properties of the objects in the pictures? Read Jkor's post while you think about this question. Or just look at the pictures. The answers are right there in the pictures. And there are only a few things to look at.
Does this have anything to do with the vertical circle - i.e. spine engagement? The way you keep talking in riddles bugs me a bit, but I can't help being curious about what you are driving at...
That is good - the second half shows the need for the limb rotation. "All movements, flow & counterflow, reel silk" (from Chen Xin's Illustrated Treatise on Taijiquan)
It is my feeble attempt to Hijack this thread and turn it into the famous Test No Topic thread on Flower, as I can see all kinds of Yin Yang symbol rubbish on the horizon. I could be wrong, it wouldn't be the first or last time I am wrong. I do Chen (CXW lineage) - we do Chansi every session and the red bit receives no significant work out. Bits that get worked out are legs due to weight shifting and lower back / abdomen due to the twisting and kua movement. We try not to twist the knees so the legs act like pistons and the twisting is all at the middle. I believe you have done Chen as well JK so do you remember or still do the Chansi excercises? Would your experience concur?
Hi - yes that sounds about right to me. I do still do reeling silk type exercises, but as I learned a big developmental reeling silk set for Gao style Bagua (called tian gan) along with reeling silk type hand methods, as well as some other Bagua reeling silk methods from other lineages and then the Chen style xin jia reeling silk on top, I re-organised and standardised it all in what for me seemed to be a more complete and coherent way. It is probably the most significant solo aspect of my training, but even this we apply sometimes and perform versus resistance. Something I differ with many Taiji people on though is that I was taught specifically NOT to turn the waist - the hips remaining aligned with the shoulders throughout. This is just the way I was originally taught, and I've tried both a firm and a loose waist, but prefer the firm waist approach overall, with very little play in it.
Twisting mainly caused by folding of the kua, shoulders and hips pretty much in alignment in most exercises. I think that is normal for Chen, in Yang we do more twisting of the hips to shoulders, for instance brush knee twist step and repiulse monkey - opposite quarters forward.
