Master Richard Clear on Internal Push Hands

Push Hands is a two-person Tai Chi exercise. It is done in a civil and friendly condition. The goal is to overpower the other person without throwing the opponent off in a harmful manner. It is the most appreciated activity at the annual Tai Chi Gala. Each year there are multiple courses offered by a few instructors teaching the various techniques of the art.

Master Richard Clear has studied Tai Chi and Qigong in the U.S. and China. He began his study of the art at a very young age after being diagnosed with degenerative arthritis. Later, he experienced no pain from the arthritis and became very agile physically. According to his website, he is a 3rd generation lineage holder in Tai Chi from Lee Ying Arng, a senior student under Yang Style Tai Chi Grandmaster Yang Chen Fu. Master Clear’s earliest Sifu Tyrone Jackson was Richard’s early Tai Chi teacher. Master Clear began teaching Tai Chi in 1985, but he continues his study in Tai Chi, martial arts, psychology, philosophy, alternative medicine, and physiology for over 40 years. He was an inductee of USA Martial Arts Hall of Fame in 2007 and 2011. Richard was a recipient of the 2018 Tai Chi Gala Merit Award for his long-term dedication to the art and his innovative way of teaching.

Richard’s Push Hands classes were well attended at the Tai Chi Gala year after year. During this year’s Gala, he taught “Make Your Tai Chi Come Alive with the Internal Skill of Coiling” on Sat. June 2. Actually, this is part of Clear’s Internal Push Hands training. So what does his training method comprise?

The basic method includes the following steps:

1. Both people place both hands below the neck and above the waist. – This is different from the authentic Chen Style Tai Chi or Yang Style Tai Chi Push Hands method. But in tournaments, people would start pushing the opponent once the three circling is done.
2. Relax and sink your root and energy.
3. Try to feel the opponent’s energy.
4. Slowly push the opponent to sense the opponent’s root. If you find their root, they will have to adjust their position to change their root.
5. Keep your own root down and hidden.
6. Adjust your own root if found by the opponent.
7. Continue the process to find their root and hide your own.

The training progression is very important, Master Clear offers the below key points:

1. Listen for the opponent’s hear beat.
2. Feel their energy move inside their body.
3. Sink your own energy by dissolving it.
4. Sink and dissolve while you push.
5. Feel the depth, blockages, and stiffness of the opponent’s root/energy.
6. Help find and troubleshoot the opponent’s lack of depth, blockage, and stiffness.
7. Play the Root Deeper Game to make sure that your root is deeper or lower than their’s.
8. Quickly drop your root lower than their root with ease so they cannot detect your change.
9. Try different hand positions
   • Plan both of your hands under the opponent’s armpits or hands on his waist. This is the strongest position.
   • One hand on waist and the other under armpit or one hand on waist and the other on shoulder.
   • Other options: hands on shoulders, hands on elbows, hands on forearms, or hands on back.
   • If you are a less skilled player during a Push Hands maneuvering, try to employ the strongest hand position if you can.

10. 

    Use the principle of 4 ounces to move 1000 pounds if an opportunity presents itself.

11. The key to win the Push Hands maneuvering is the sensibility. Richard says that we can do sensitivity training everyday for example when you shake a person’s hand or just simple touch another person.
12. Start to push the opponent slowly if you sense they are about to push you so you can negate their intention and energy.
13. Feel the direction of the opponent’s energy through the contact with their arm.
14. Sometimes we can just tell where the stiffness or root imbalance is by sight.
15. Tell the difference between an opponent’s physical energy and mind intent.
16. Manipulate an opponent’s internal energy with your own mind.
17. Block the opponent’s mind intent.

As people’s skill level increased, Richard can also teach people how to move a novice without physical touching him.

Embedded in this article are two lessons taught by Richard. If you have any question, you can visit his website for more info.

Internal Push Hands Lesson 1

How to Feel Errors Inside the Opponent – Push Hands Lesson 2

(Edited by Doc Luecke.)

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