HE JINGPING

WANG XIANGZHAI - "CONTRADICTIONS OLD MAN"

TALKING ABOUT BASIC PRINCIPLES OF ZHAN ZHUANG QIGONG

Translation from chinese by Andrzej Kalisz

"Emission of qi - preposterously called real tradition"

"Breaking old, establishing new, reaching higher levels"

"Constantly seeking balance in all kinds of contradictions"



Wang Xiangzhai was our country great expert of wushu and qigong, with lots of students. His qigong concepts received recognition during conference on health practices which was conducted in Baoding in Hebei province in November 1961. With time his zhan zhuang method has become very popular. But because some instructors were not able to understand properly theoretical principles of zhan zhuang method, they mixed zhan zhuang with so called "emission of qi", calling it real tradition of zhan zhuang, while it is a big mistake and is opposing basic principles of the zhan zhuang method. This created a lot of misunderstandings. Actually Wang Xiangzhai's zhan zhuang, which is kind of medical qigong, has it's own specific theoretical principles and practice methods, with strong basis in science. To help practitioners properly understand and master zhan zhuang methods and principles I'm offering this article. Hope it will help to avoid situation when wrong concepts are further transmitted.

1. ZHAN ZHUANG AND CONTROLLING BALANCE

Zhan zhuang is a method in which practitioner is constantly solving situation when various kinds of unbalance are appearing at various time in body, improving the ability of immediate adjusting and controlling balance.

Wang Xiangzhai was saying: "There is no absolute balance, when we talk about balance, we talk about ability of controlling balance at this point of time". He said: "The illnesses are caused by loosing balance in organs and their functions; it is like in martial art - it is possible to make opponent fly back, when his balance is broken. Zhan zhuang is a method to adjust and control balance". So regulating and controlling balance is the main question during all stages of zhan zhuang practice. Wang Xiangzhai also talked about "three round" training method. The "three round" are "spirit round", "intention round", "force round", demanding: "spirit not flowing outside, intention not being revealed, force not going over tip". The core of this theory is keeping balance of "centered, round harmony".

Controlling balance is not something stable and not changing. But it means that practitioner, during the practice progress, is constantly breaking the old balance and establishing a new balance. In this process of "breaking old, establishing new" the practitioner's abilities are constantly growing and developing, so he moves from low level to high level, establishing better control of balance, achieving result of "getting rid of illness, when there is any, or of strengthening health, when there is no illness".

2. CONTRADICTIONS AND THEIR UNITY DURING PRACTICE

There are a lot of complex contradictions appearing during the practice process, like: relax and tension, movement and non-movement, hard and soft, empty and solid, up and down, front and back, left and right etc. Wang Xiangzhai used two kinds of practice: non-moving and moving. In non-movement practice, practitioner basically works on solving the contradictions of relax and tension, up and down, at the same time not neglecting movement and non-movement, hard and soft, empty and solid, front and back, left and right. And in moving practice he is working on solving the contradictions of movement and non-movement, front and back, but at the same time not neglecting relax and tension, hard and soft, empty and solid, up and down, left and right.

Zhan zhuang qigong in the theory of solving the contradiction of relax and tension postulates: "Relaxed but not loose, tense but not stiff, relax and tension interrelated", and "relax is tension, tension is relax, relax and tension, tension and relax balanced". This is seeking the balance in contradiction of relax and tension.

When we are talking about the relation between movement and non-movement, it is stressed that "movement and non-movement are rooted in each other". Wang Xiangzhai said: "There is no absolute non-movement, but movement is absolute". So, according to him: "In non-movement non non-movement, in non-movement there is movement, in movement not movement, in movement there is non-movement, movement in non-movement is real movement, non-movement in movement is real non-movement, movement and non-movement are rooted in each other, used together". So the zhan zhuang practice is not "standing without movement, like a wooden pole", but it is "In non-movement seek feeling, in slight movement seek knowledge, want to move, want to stop, want to stop, want to move, there is feeling and intention as if you move, but you cannot not to stop, and as if you stop, but you cannot not to move". When "spirit is moving, intention is moving, force is moving" there is seeking the balance in contradiction of movement and non-movement.

On the contradiction of hard and soft he said: "hard is soft, soft is hard, hard soft, soft hard help each other". He maintained that it is not real hard, if there is no soft in it - it is only stiff. Only when there is soft in hard, it is real hard, invincible.

On the contradictions of empty and solid he said: "Empty is solid, solid is empty, empty and solid, solid and empty, with balance". There is meaning of unpredictable changes between empty and solid in this saying.

Also about the contradiction of up and down, front and back, left and right, he maintained that there is nothing absolute, but it should be analyzed and learned as relation between contradictions. Like: "if you want to move upward, there must be downward, if you want to move downward, there must be upward", "In strong and upright there must be relaxed and dropping down, in relaxed and dropping down, there must be strong and upright", and "when upper wants to move, the lower must follow, when lower wants to move, the upper must naturally lead it, when upper and lower move, the middle must attack, when middle attacks, upper and lower must join, internal and external must be linked, front and back, left and right must correspond together". This is explanation of relation of up and down, front and back, left and right.

It is not possible to work on solving all of those contradictory relations which are appearing during zhan zhuang qigong practice at the same time. At different times you concentrate on different contradictions. For the beginner most important are the contradictions of relax and tension and up and down. Because "when a beginner starts standing, he tenses, when he tenses, he becomes stiff".

So the practitioner, in the situation of effort caused by posture, should seek comfort of spirit and muscles, in strong and upright seek relaxed and dropping down. But he shouldn't neglect movement and non-movement, front and back. Then, with some progress, the movement and non-movement and front and back should become the main contradictions. This way the practitioner gradually moves from static to moving practice. In process of practice of "seeking movement in non-movement, seeking non-movement in movement, co-existence of non-movement and movement" he achieves balance and unity of contradictions. When talking about front and back, it is not only matter of posture, but also of mind activity. He should think of his body as "banner moved by wind, as fish in water, flowing against wave". So he must put attention to the resistance from front and at the same time the pulling from back, this way controlling front-back balance. But at the same time he should also put some attention to relax and tension, up and down and other aspects.

Beginner usually don't understand the relation of relax and tension, and how to control balance between them. So of course they are not able to understand the concepts of "relaxed but not loose, tense but not stiff, relax and tension interrelated" and "there is relax in tension, there is tension in relax". The way to make them understand the relation between relax and tension is to make them first understand what tense means, and then what relaxed means.

The practitioner can just tense muscles in some part of body, to know what tense means. Then he can relax the tensed muscles as much as possible, to get the feeling of relaxed. And then during zhan zhuang practice he will experience that when some part of body gets sore, it is tense, and when thanks to adjustment he gets rid of soreness, it is relaxed. This way he is seeking comfort of spirit, muscles and breath. And this is "relaxed but not loose, tense but not stiff". Usually when practitioner is feeling that he is relaxed, it means appearing of tension. When he finds that he is tense, it is beginning of relax. But while practitioner is solving the contradiction of relax and tension, when he gets rid of original tension, there will appear new tension, which he must get rid of. So during practice, the progress is not steady, but sometimes it's better and sometimes it worse. It's like waves. There are contradictions of relax and tension in spirit, breathing, awareness, body. While working on solving the contradictions of relax and tension, some attention must be put to the contradiction of movement and non-movement in order to make faster progress regarding the contradiction of relax and tension.

Wang Xiangzhai used to call himself "Contradictions Old Man". This is illustration of the basis of the scientific thought of zhan zhuang qigong. It is a method in which you work all the time on creating and solving all kinds of contradictions: relax and tension, movement and non-movement, hard and soft, empty and solid, up and down, front and back, left and right etc, adjusting and controlling balance between them.

3. POSTURES AND MIND ACTIVITY OF ZHAN ZHUANG

Wang Xiangzhai's zhan zhuang qigong is by no means just a form of exercise stressing posture. His saying "create posture according to health conditions, different for different people" is explaining the use of postures according to situation. He maintained that zhan zhuang shouldn't be "standing without moving, like wooden pole", which would be "dead standing". In the basic theoretical principles of zhan zhuang qigong he stressed: "seek fullness of spirit and mind, and not resemblance of form", "posture is changing with mind movement, form is simple and intention rich", "form as basis, mind for using" etc. The key point is in mind leading, and in the principle of proper adjustment of the balance of movement and non-movement, empty and solid, hard and soft, relaxed and tense, up and down, front and back, left and right.

Wang Xiangzhai said about the relation of form and mind: "use form to get intention, use intention to make the form appear, intention is born from form, form is following intention, force is issued from mind, form is obeying mind". We can see that in the relation of mind and form, the mind leading is very important.

Wang Xiangzhai opposed giving specific names to postures, because it would lead the practitioner astray. After years of summing up his experience, Wang Xiangzhai stopped using the names which he created earlier for specific postures, calling zhan zhuang: hunyuan zhuang, and all kinds of forces calling hunyuan li (holistic forces) or hunyuan zheng li (holistic contradictory forces). He strongly opposed the conception of specific value and effects of specific postures. He maintained that without mind, zhan zhuang qigong would lost it's life spirit. Because even if using the same posture, but with different mind activity, the results are different.

Wang Xiangzhai stressed the equal importance of using mind both in zhan zhuang and in shi li. He kept saying: "if moving or not moving, the practitioner should ask why so". And he clearly pointed out: "Zhan zhuang and shi li are exactly the same thing, zhan zhuang is shortened shi li, and shi li is zhan zhuang extended in space". He criticized the false concepts and training methods of those treating zhan zhuang and shi li as something different. He maintained that "it is caused because they don't understand the mind activity of zhan zhuang, if they continue like this, they will move further away form the proper way".