Taijiquan results are forged by an
ongoing process, not by dramatic sudden events. All accomplished practitioners
create their own skill by following a carefully orchestrated process. Success
in Taijiquan – for success read the achievement of a meaningful level of skill
- requires us to follow series of steps that have been handed down for generations.
Everyone can quote the stages and requirements. How many follow them? Manifest
skill is usually the result of a repetitive journey. Drip, drip, drip and then
the sudden overnight ten year success!
Learners are often impatient. Seeing
the end product, the polished, dynamic and accomplished practitioner, they
typically ignore the process that preceeded this level of skill. The process
was the long and bitter road that few people get to witness: the long daily training
sessions, the injuries and rehabilitation, the dark lonely days when they are
sustained only by inner motivation and determination. The process is the real
back story with its countless iteration of form routines, basic exercises and
partner drills.
It may be nice to think of skill
as something that arrives in a flash - an event like a sudden flash of
illumination or moment of enlightenment. This kind of thinking dismisses the
need for the drudgery of daily training. How often we see learners questioning
everything incessantly but doing little real training - If they only knew the “correct”
way to do it… Of course this is an illusion. As I saw it described elsewhere “Such
a belief is a mirage of event over process. If you try to skip process, you’ll
never experience events.” Sadly, as a media-centred, “I want it today” society,
the spotlight and the glory all goes to the event, while the process is hidden behind
the woodshed.
Chen Zhaopi compared Taijiquan
skill to a bowl of soup. Question any chef and they will surely confirm that
the perfect dish is a series of ingredients and a well-engineered process of
execution - a little bit of this, a pinch of that, everything done at the appropriate
time and place, and wham, you have an appetizing meal. Like the soup, Chen
Zhaopi said Taijiquan skill in the end everything is blended together and can’t
be separated. Skill eludes most people
because they are preoccupied with events while disregarding process. Without
process, there is no event. For our chef, the cooking is the process, while the
meal is the event. For the Taijiquan player the repeated (appropriate) training
is the process, while the skill is the result.
 |
| A young instructor form the Chenjiagou Taijiquan School |
