§ Steven Smith’s Wisdom in a Nutshell
One posture point depends on another. You could Knee, Knee without Cat Feet, but you’d miss the subtlety of Cat Feet—the sinking. Likewise, with other posture points. So work your way down this list. Find each point’s point from the ground, up.
01 Cat Feet
Gently draw your feet up into cat paws. Lightly curl your toes; squeeze the ground, lightly gripping. The tips of your toes grasp softly. Sink your weight straight through your tibia (your big, sharp shin bone) through your foot, into the front of your heels, deep down in the ground.
02 Knee, Knee
Bend your knees until over your toes, you sink. Weight through heels, relax. Root.
While we’re on the subject: your knees are transfer joints, not weight bearing instruments. Wha-what?! That’s right: your knees transfer weight from your hips into your ankles into the ground, gently. Any knee pain you experience is not because the knee is the source of problems–the trouble resides in the hips and/or ankles (usually hips). Your knee may feel the pain, but movement distortions that cause the pain happen in the other joints, not the knee. The knee is a victim of anal-retentive hips—let go! Really, seriously…never get knee surgery for knee pain…it’s your hips.
For people with knee pain, this concept is a hard sell…oh, well. Do some research with your body, use your intellect’s internet research to support your body, not the other way. Go see a Soft-Tissue Expert, like a Massage Therapist before a Surgeon and get some Structural Integration or Cranial-sacral work before seeing a Common Medical Practitioner. Note that this advice is about knees, and I disclaim any responsibility for your pain. Get some Bodywork, and do Qi-Gong.
03 Aim Your Tailbone
Tuck your hips; point your coccyx forward; direct your sacrum downward. These three ways describe proper pelvic alignment. When your pelvis is aligned, your abdominal contents get supported from the bottom, and your abdomen doesn’t spill out the front. Your femurs support your pelvis properly, and you’re lined up for Fa-Jing!
04 Regard Your Heart
In the Classics, they speak of ’sink the chest to raise the back.’ Mainly, we want to avoid sticking our chest out. We also want to avoid sucking it in too much as some martial arts do (you know who you are).
If you Regard Your Heart, you will begin to hear and/or feel it beating. Then you adjust your sternum to float vertically over your pubic bone; your chest and back will soften. Qi will flow.
05 Lengthen Your Spine
From tail to top, make it long. Stack your vertebrae. So much twisting is done in Tai Chi Chuan and Bagua Zhang and any Inner Art, that you will get distorted using an ‘S’ shaped spine. Reach for ‘C’ back, and you just might end up really long.
06 Shoften Your Shaw (Soften Your Jaw)
Right now–hammer on your jaw muscles. Right now…do it. Them ‘thar jaw muscles load up with the tensions of daily stressors, and they set the tone of our bodies. Relax ‘em. Puff out your cheeks, relax. Relax your tongue; let go your face tension.
In posture, your teeth float against each other. No gripping, and not apart: lightly touching. And your tongue rests on your upper palate. Breathe, out and in through your nose.
07 Keys–Qis–Kwas
Energetic bridges lurk in your armpits and your groin. Open them. There’s a bit of a bridge in every joint, but those are the big ones.
It’s like: as you sit into your hips—knees bend, pelvis points—you feel and sense the pulsing river flowing from your body into your legs. It’s quite literal and real, not a mystical, fantasy energy. Your big femoral artery goes there. Attend to its pulsing sensation and open your awareness.
The same goes in your armpits! Notice those spaces, like ping-pong balls, in your armpits. Sense the pulse, and let your awareness open up.
08 Feel
Learn to feel deeply. Feel. Feel the space in your joints. Feel blood pulsing in your chest, belly, arms, legs, head. Feel that subtle magnetic pressure between your palms, then notice how it covers your limbs, your body. Feel your thoughts circulating repetitively; notice your thinking and relax. Everyone thinks. Feel with your eyes. Feel light reaching into your eyes; touch the trees, the grass with your eyes. Touch the shadows. Feel the water glisten on your eyes. Feel.
09 Pause
Wait a minute….hold on. Wait.
What are you waiting for? The Warrior knows what to wait for. Do you?
10 Doze
Attention—that sharp, pin-point. Awareness—ever widening, deepening.
Right there don’t look. It’s half-way between your anxieties and sleep, half-way between your dream and waking life. Right there. Nestle in it. It’s right between stillness and motion. Sit in it. Kneel in it. Stand in it. Practice Taijiquan right there in Sung. Doze, just a bit, attentively aware of the world.
With your attention, look there. See it here.
