Hello everybody! I am looking for information and guidance about finding good sifu who teaches tai chi as a martial art. It could be anywhere in the world! Preferably someplace close to nature.

Long time Taoist, first time Tai Chi'er here. I live in Maine and take a few different classes in Portland. One is Yang Style, and the other is focused on what my teacher calls "East Mountain Stick Form". I'm quite enjoying them both, and I think the stick form teacher is quite good.

However, neither of these classes seem to emphasize the martial aspect of tai chi. So I'm looking for schools or sifu who do! I have several months off in the winter, so I am able to travel. I am reading the Tai Chi classics and working from online content from WaQi as well. I guess I am hoping to learn from a really good teacher with good lineage, during an immersive period. Ultimately I hope to be one more keeper of a beautiful art! Not interested in any flashy tourist bait temples!!! :D I would love to be in a beautiful area, but I don't mind school gymnasiums either, if the teacher is good.

Any help is much appreciated!

Understanding internals does not make us proficient fighters. We need actual fighting skills which internals can amplify. Taiji Quan is technically bad for modern combat but its internal power system is very relevant. I predict it will become mainstream in the future.

This is controversial to some. I personally tend to agree with their opinions.

Adam Mizner: https://www.facebook.com/share/r/86An64gTFyKoEYbY/

Marin Spivack: https://www.instagram.com/reel/DD72ulFvgEK/

For instance, Taijiquan compresses the dantian to "inflate" and "plucks the bowstring" to fajin. What would the comparable internal methods of bagua and hsingyi be?

The audio on this video is really bad but I wanted to point something out for those struggling with the concept of not moving the hands in the form and moving from the kwa instead.

Watch the teacher's left hand. It looks like he's moving it along the student's arm independently. That's what people "see" when they watch tai chi. But if you look closer, his hand is not moving, he's moving his kwa.

https://youtu.be/-XZWkwuZs7w?si=wgR2Kz3jS2unNg_v&t=17

When you move your hands independently of your center, you lose your structure and have no peng jin and it can be viewed as using force. It is easily detected and that's why more senior students are detecting your movements and throwing you out. The old adages say when you're stuck, the answer is in the kwa, not the hands.

Anway, this guy posts good content and he's worth following for more clear examples of good tai chi.

Looking for recommendations for a school/teacher near Columbus Ohio. New so have zero insight into what makes a good teacher/school.

Martially-speaking, what do you believe is relevant or irrelevant for Taiji? Is Neidan useful?

I practice Chen style and am very much focused on that for my form and weapons training, but I've come across Huang's loosening exercises multiple times now. I'm interested in trying them out but cannot find much that explain the exercises. Any suggestions?

Hi does anyone have any recommendations for a tai chi teacher in Chicago preferably one that understands the martial arts aspect of tai chi ?

Is it possible to remove a beating heart from a man's body using Tai Chi? and if so how can I learn how to do this? This is serious! I can pay in crypto for the right lessons, based in the Bay Area

Edit: serious replys(Marshall artists only)

Apologies for the atrocious-sounding title. Here’s another fun test for you all, again courtesy of He Jinghan, though this sort of dang springing I have seen in other places, unlike the previous exercise I posted about. You can see Yang Wenhu do it several times here, for example.

Unfortunately, there aren’t captions for this exercise, but the gist is to stand in horse stance with your thighs parallel to the ground (I know He isn’t doing that, but that’s what he says to do) and to make yourself hop so both feet clear the ground by using only the springing power of the dang. This is the first video in a series of shorts, which you can find by entering 馬步彈襠 into the search bar in the channel’s videos page. Chinese numerals are as follows: 一、二、三、四、五、六、七、八 in that order for those who want to check them out in order, though, again, there are no captions.

It really is easier to get this springing if you keep your horse stance low. As He says in other videos, your frame shouldn’t change as you hop, and your dang basically has to stay at the same height. It’s much more of a sudden explosive drawing in of the dang for me, which picks both feet up. I certainly can’t get the same clearance height of the feet as I see He Laoshi do, but I can definitely clear the ground. What about you?

I just stumbled upon this video of He Jinghan trying to get his students to use the kua to stand up from a chair and I think it’s a wonderful method, one that I hadn’t encountered before. I love these sorts of tests, especially since I don’t have a regular teacher, and they help me know if I’m on the right track.

Initially, I wasn’t able to get anything to happen externally, just internally. It took maybe five minutes of feeling around inside before I was able to get up with no momentum. If the test doesn’t give false positives, then I think I’m doing it more or less correctly. It’s a lot like the kua engagement needed to shift weight/step in TJQ, but just a lot more of that. Both kua need to engage pretty intensely and take the slack out of the torso going upward from the pelvis, kind of galvanizing the body. Letting the knees get drawn toward one another and toward the huiyin is key. My knee was hurting at first because I was placing my legs too close to me, so watch out for that. I can stand up without any momentum or even forward lean and can do it slowly as well as fast, but the exercise currently sends a lot of qi to my head, and it gave me a headache, so be careful there too. It seems to put a lot of pressure on the inside of the body, so don’t herniate anything! It also takes active concentration to not wind up on the heels but to be standing on the yongquan instead, which I assume is desirable.

I’m sure some of you guys can do it too. I’m interested in getting your views on the exercise. I intend to keep experimenting with it and work on stabilizing the internal pressure so it doesn’t reach my head.

https://youtu.be/-0LzTkNBZ1c?si=CBwBDO0_zc99LTNz

I still see videos of people moving from the arms when doing the form and push hands. This video is a pretty clear, although exaggerated, teaching of how to move in a connected way. This is good for two reasons, one -- it shows the generosity of a good teacher to show this and two, it shows how hard it is to do. Look how much the student goes back to the old habits of moving.