Need balance? Need grounding? You got it! Or had it? Oh, it’s back again. I think of balance in terms of degrees as opposed to an absolute. Balance requires movement and adjustments. At first the movements and adjustments tend to be large, and, over time, they become smaller and smaller. The adjustments never cease. Balance gets better and your body develops efficiency at maintaining it. The same with grounding. They never quite seem effortless. They’re both dynamic. Sorry, I’m not talking metaphorically here.
The kicks in the Yang Chen Fu Form give my balance a run for its money. In the beginning, my balance was all over the place. I’d fall out of all of the kicks, or, at least, I would make big, awkward adjustments, fighting to not fall out. My balance issues exasperated the slower I did my form.
Nowadays, I work my balance using the 4 Corner Balance Drill (4 CBD) from Scott Sonnon’s Warrior Wellness DVD (replaced by his Intu-flow DVD). As a part of my daily joint mobility exercises, I do a round of the 4CBD, holding each posture for 5 slow and even breaths. I attribute my increased balancing prowess to this ingredient in my routine, and I encourage those with balancing woes to try it out.
Integrating this exercise into practice improves balance and grounding while performing kicks. In addition to better balance and grounding, you’ll gain experiential knowledge of how gripping the ground with your grounded foot and toes helps root and balance. To top it off, you’ll gain functional flexibility.
Watch the following video and try it! Post your experiences, difficulties, successes, and ideas right here, please. If you can’t figure it out, shoot me a message or purchase Warrior Wellness.
Four Corner Balance Drill
September 1st, 2008 at 4:22 pm
Excellent discussion and demonstration. I do this drill often and I also find it very useful. I play with vigorous levels of tension and with tediously low levels too.
The drll progresses (buy the DVD from the link damn it): from pushing the heel out, to pointing and lifting with focus on the toes, and a couple of other depths.
Jason knows this I’m sure…just letting others know.
You said at the end: “I like to count the breath: that way you know that you’re breathing.” Good idea.
September 2nd, 2008 at 10:50 pm
Greetings Everyone,
I have a related subject that I’d like to toss upon the table for consideration:
POST HOLDING:
Effective method for integrating strength, structure, and balance?
Archaic practice that need ony be done now and then, or not done at all?
Thoughts? Comments?
Thank you, friends
-A-
September 5th, 2008 at 6:24 pm
Standing on one leg…a valuable training device by itself. Lifting the other leg in peculiar ways allows a more detailed view of sinking, weighting, wrapping, balancing, gripping, relaxing, breathing, more, more.
The 4 Corner Balance Drill is like Posting, but it’s more laced with anatomical, scientific suggestions instead of energy development concepts. The two – 4 Corner Balance Drill and Post Holding – meet somewhere in their depth of experience.
Erle Montaigue spells out the Bagua methods in detail Advanced Dim-Mak, including a method of interactive Point-Striking to remember peculiar footwork. And Qigong has its Holding the Baby Posture (levels of experience and differing structures in this too). Great work this one! One of my personal favorites: and it’s a really potent experience, revealing the real hand shapes, when holding a real baby.
I’m a fan. It’s not so archaic as it is natural.
September 7th, 2008 at 9:00 am
My understanding of post holding is that to get true benefit from it, like most gongs, one needs to practice daily for a minimum of 3 years. I believe it is a tried and true practice. Like most qi-gong it is a type of yoga linking prana, (breath energy work) with asana (posture work).
I like the yoga/CMA posture white crane soars.
September 8th, 2008 at 11:35 am
Josh,
From your understanding what would be a “true benefit” and why 3 years?
-Jason
September 10th, 2008 at 7:10 pm
Hello,
I was wondering if we could get something going on mud stepping; perhaps even just a simple “how to” article, the like, etcetera? Take care.
Aaron
September 15th, 2008 at 12:08 am
MUD STEPPING IS BY FAR ONE OF THE BEST “BALANCE DRILLS” IN EXISTENCE:
Hello Everyone,
After making my last comment/request, I thought it would be appropriate for me to take the subject into hand personally. I am pretty new to Ba Gua Zhang; I tried to learn it on my own with books and videos, youtube, etcetera for a while (which was not, overall, very effective for me), and was fortunate enough to find Mr. Steven Smith 6 months ago (March 8th, 2008 to be exact) under whom I’ve been studying the art of Pa Kua Chang directly. Ergo, being a neophyte student of the art, I would not assume to give anyone advice on pursuing such in any way; I would, however, like to share somehting which I find to be very exciting.
For months I avoided practicing mud stepping; I talked myself (constantly) into excuses as to why there was no need to do it; too blocky, too chunky, too awkward, or whatever. Anyway, in the last month, I’ve surrendered these silly inclinations and put mud stepping to the test; it is, without doubt, a key to annihilating balance woes, so to speak, and a doorway to cultivating a plethora of skills, such as lightfootedness, developing what I’ve found to be “suction cup” footing, swiftness and dexterity of foundation motions, winding, coiling, sharpness of balance, awareness of center, and those are just a few.
I still continue to feel as if I’m going to topple over sideways a lot of the time, but that’s slowly beginning to diminish (I really emphasize slowly), but I take that as a point of encouragement and not the opposite. For me, I had to just take a leap of patience and commit to doing it, rather than sticking with the easier, more “intuitive” route of heal-toe walking, also (sometimes) known as lion stepping. The name isn’t so important to me as the technique; names do well, of course, to assemble an image, which is, indeed, of good import. Mud stepping, I believe, is sometimes referred to as dragon or snake stepping, but I think the “mud” term is terrif; simple and un-flowery; an earthy kind of name for an earthy kind of practice. Thank you, all, for your time.
Aaron
October 12th, 2008 at 11:27 am
Steven,
Thanks for discussing the diferences between the 4 CBD and post holding. I don’t know much about post holding myself. You mentioned that the 4 CBD is more “laced with anatomical, scientific suggestions instead of energy development concepts.” i would agree that the literature available on both would support that. I do not believe that either is better than the other in developing internal energy. I think movement or stillness done aware, deliberate, and with the proper posture can, will, and does develop internal energy based on my experience.
Aaron,
Thanks for sharing your thoughts and experiences on mud stepping. Perhaps we’ll hear more about this challenging and peculiar practice in the future on ubagua.com.
-Jason