Wow! What a powerful and skill enhancing experience! Wulong’s biggest workshop yet was fully booked almost immediately by participants from across Melbourne, regional Victoria, and interstate - one passionate student coming from as far as Western Australia to learn from Professor Lily.
Thank you Professor Lily! for teaching workshop particpants the martial arts techniques of tai chi Push Hands or tui zhou, and the corresponding Yang 9 Duel Routine.
Two-person push hands is a thought provoking training method practiced to raise tai chi students’ understanding of facing an opponent, and the interaction between attack and defence. Push hands helps us sense our partner’s movements and intention, the transition between attack and defence.
“Push hands is very important for tai chi students to increase their understanding of the martial applications of tai chi.” says Professor Lily,
"Push hands practice will improve your tai chi foundation and practice through increasing reflex, reaction, coordination, strength, and balance. Energy flows throughout the whole body, with benefits for cardiovascular health and circulation.”
Professor Lily also introduced chai zhao into the practical application of tai chi, bridging the gap between theory and practice, and improving combat skills. Chai zhao is the process of breaking down, analyzing, and training response techniques for specific movements. It involves specific offensive and defensive techniques, methods to neutralize our opponent’s force, change the angle of their attack, and pick the right timing for a counterattack.
These experiences created the foundation skills for the Yang 9 Duel routine. The integrated movements of the duel are an enlightening uplift of the solo routine learnt in class. Feeling and responding to the direction and strength of a partner's intention brings greater alertness, concentration and mindfulness to our practice. The Yang 9 Duel brought us a new beauty and flow as we practiced.
As always, Professor Lily’s training included correct foundation and technique - the martial applications of each movement were fully demonstrated, and errors corrected in the workshop. Special thanks to Candice and Helen for demonstrations and assistance.
Professor Lily was very impressed with our dedication and enthusiasm for more Push Hands and Duel routine training. So we are busy planning another push hands workshop for early 2025. Please follow our social media and website to keep up to date with the details as they are released.