Effortless Power

[rauokinn]

"Always use your legs and feet for power, and your center for movement and direction. When your arms are full of ch'i, relaxed and subject to center, they hit with power but do not feel hard (to you). If you think about hitting hard or with great force, you will inevitably cock and strike out with shoulder and arm muscles. Although this feels as

Comments

[octapig]

This is such a great book and Peter Ralston has such an amazing grasp on this. So the next question is how do you practice this both at practice and away from practice. I have started breaking down my movement and focusing on each individual peace to get a "Feel" for it. As I stretch in the morning I try and isolate each muscle involved so that I can really feel and understand where the movement and stretch is occurring. When I practice on my relaxed sword and body work I get the motion going so that it feels right, and then I work on isolating each part of my body that is involved so that I can feel what is happening...ie I focus on my feet, then ankles, and so on as I move up so that I can really get a feel for where the force/power moves from. At practice I try and work on the relaxed core by creating that first shot and then trying to keep the upper body and arms relaxed and pulling the force that was created back into relaxed motion or what I refer to sometimes as dynamic motion. For instance as I throw a snap, instead of using my arm and torso to bring the shot back I use the energy from creating the shot to step under the sword and allow my arm to relax and follow the route of effortless power. The other part of this that we almost never think to practice is the calm mind. Even when we are working on the "correct" mindset for fighting, we are working on something. My goal is to make the time to just be quiet, to sit quietly without thoughts and as they come to let them go. As you sit you can focus on your breathing and this will help keep stray thoughts away. When I am having trouble quieting my mind I visualize a water wheel, and as I breathe in through my nose it starts to turn as my breath moves across the top inward. As I breathe out through my mouth it continues to turn as I push it from below outward. I find this to be very relaxing and helps reduce the noise of everyday life, and when that noise becomes easy to manage then you can even start to clean out older baggage that has been stuck up on a shelf and is gathering dust and taking up space...:)

I am very happy that you are reading and enjoying this book. It may have to go and grab it and read it again to refresh my memory and look for new understanding. Peter also has a web site and does week long work shops at his compound in Texas. One of those week long "intensives" is on intrinsic awareness. That would be fascinating.

Octa....A little more than 2 cents worth...:)

[rauokinn]

Worth way more than 2 cents I think. thanks so much for lending me this book. I have been practicing calm mind daily with those mental workout CDs and book, which I gave you a copy of -- even though I have not graduated yet from the first exercise, I think it has already helped a ton.

Also, I have been trying to practice on the pell really concentrating on using the power from the ground and aiming with my belly button and it is amazing how effortless it is to throw with power even at 50% speed. Thanks again for the book, it is going to take me awhile to get through -- it is meaty stuff, so you may not get it back for a month or so . . .