Pushing
Hands with Master Chen Bing
by Ken Gullette
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Master Chen Bing, nephew of Grandmaster Chen Xiaowang, and considered to be one of the best of his generation, conducted a Push Hands Seminar in Skokie, Illinois on Saturday, May 21, 2005. The seminar was held at David Han's school in Skokie.
The day started with a few minutes of warm-ups, then we launched into single hand push hands. Throughout the day, we covered all five types of Chen push hands. Chen Bing is an outstanding teacher, spending time with each person and gently showing them mistakes in their posture and energy flow. Some of the points that some of us needed to brush up on included the tendency to move before your partner moves. We caught each other doing this at times. The maintaining of peng and the silk-reeling aspects of the double-hand push hands was also stressed.
Chen Bing begins push hands in a way that I like very much -- with one person punching and the other blocking. It put the martial aspects immediately in the forefront.
In the afternoon, we practiced fighting applications. One student was asked to come up front, and Chen Bing showed how the eight energies of tai chi are present in the applications of push hands. I went forward at one point and he placed his hand on my chest and asked me to put my hand on his chest. We sank our energy and then pushed at our partner. Needless to say, his ability to handle my push was remarkable, while he was able to push me off-balance at will. As a group, we practiced a single and double-hand method of this drill, teaching us how to relax, sink, and handle force from an opponent.
Throughout, Chen Bing worked with various students, generously having the students use force in various parts of the two-hand routines, and then he would show how to handle the force. Then he would use force and coach you in handling it. He was cheerful, intelligent, and very highly skilled. He worked with me for a while on these applications, urging me to push on him, then handling it and coaching me through the same process.
I've been to other push hands seminars that included people who had little push hands experience, and it was frustrating trying to progress when your partner was at square one. Today, most of the students knew enough about push hands and tai chi to help each other learn and take a step forward, and if you can do that at a seminar, that's all you can ask for.
We're very lucky to be at a point in history when Chen masters such as Chen Bing, Chen Xiaoxing, and Chen Xiaowang come to the country and teach. Chen Bing is in his mid-30s, and if he is the future of tai chi, it is going to be a great future. In April, I had the opportunity to practice push hands with my teacher at his home near San Francisco (Livermore, CA), and it was one of the best push hands experiences I've ever had. This seminar added to that experience!