Taijiquan Tui Shou / 'Push Hands' Sensitivity Training
It has become one of the most common sayings in martial arts that one should 'use your opponents own strength / force
against them'. By aligning your movements so that when you perform a techniques you are moving in harmony with the movement
of your opponent rather than struggling against it you can dramatically increase the force at your disposal. But yet this
is something which is very easy to say but very difficult to actually do. It is not enough to simply state it as an ideal,
or even to devise specific techniques with this principle in mind; to truly be a master of this art it is neccessary, as with
anything, to train yourself to develop this particular skill. That is the idea behind the Taijiquan art of Tuishou, or pushing
hands; through this you develop the ability to be sensitive to the flow of your opponont movements, becoming aware of even
subtle variations in direction and force and so on, and learn to control the flow so that you may use your opponents
own force against them.
In the following video you will find a demonstration of Tai Chi push hands as well as an explanation of some of the more
improtant teachniques within it.
