12/27
For once, the weather was actually nice on Wednesday night. I was the second to arrive, but as I went through my sword and empty-handed forms, many others arrived, mostly newcomers. Mr. V and Mr. You didn’t come, nor did the tall UPS guy who usually shows up.
When Teacher Xu arrived I told him about my friend Jane, who is interested in Tuishou, not in any competitive sense but as a physical and mental description of the exchange and mutual understanding of energy between two people. He was happy to hear that, because even though all the books teach that, most people still see it as a wrestling match.
I was the odd man out at first, as everyone had paired up while I was talking with Teacher Xu, but soon enough I was pushing with the guy who is not from Hong Kong. We would do tuishou for a while, and then he would lock up and just start shoving, at which point I would always just take a step back, and then start over. It seems to be the only way to make any progress.
Teacher Xu told us to convince our opponents to use all of their force by drawing them in with close contact, and only when they’ve spent their energy, to spring the trap. “You don’t have to push all the way back at that point,” he said. “Why let loose something you’ve spent all this time trying to get into the trap?”
Next I practiced with a fellow who had just started practicing, and for a while I just let him push me. I could push him over easily with one hand, and though he wanted me to instruct him, I didn’t know quite how to explain a lot of it, referring him instead to Teacher Xu or some of the more experienced students.
The guy from last time at whose hands I met ego-related failure heard me saying this, and wanted to practice with me. At first it was the same old story. He has a grip like tree roots, slowly and inexorably tightening with rising force. But at some point, I looked at him and saw his spine, and it was like a box was unlocked in my mind. I concentrated on his spine, as that’s really the only thing that matters. It wasn’t really him trying to push me, it was just this column of bones planted on two feet.
This helped enormously, though he still managed to push me over frequently, most often when I managed to lose my concentration. Still, I’m going to have to look into this idea more thoroughly in the future.
