Jing

Jing, a Chinese term, comes from traditional Chinese medicine. It is translated from Chinese to English for Essence. There are three kinds of jing: prenatal, postnatal and Kidney. Prenatal is passed from the parents to the child in the womb. Postnatal is when the child develops post-Heaven Essence when they begin eating, drinking, and breathing independently. 

The lungs, spleen and stomach extract and refine Chi or Ki from food and drink along with air we breath. To guard jing is to make sure the body, mind and spirit are fed properly both the physical and the psychological. 

Prenatal jing is hereditary. You can replenish jing through the postnatal processes of eating and breathing and thinking right thoughts. Jing has a fluid nature so it circulates all over the body. It forms the basis for growth, development, maturation, and reproduction. It moves in long, slow cycles, and presided over the major stages of life as they develop each moment. 

Jing is considered the basis for Chi. It is in a fluid context yin. The essence (jing) and Chi are the material foundation for Shen (mind). Our longevity is determined by a combination of hereditary jing (yang) and postnatal accumulations of jing (yin). The shen is the yang context. 

It is believed we all are born with a fixed amount of jing and can also accumulate jing from food and various forms of stimulation (exercise, study, meditation.) Jing is continuously consumed in life. It is effected as to quantity and quality by everyday life experiences, i.e. stress, illness, anger, fear or exercise, nutrition and mental health, etc. 

Martial System such as Chi Gong were developed by the Chinese to replenish jing. Internal aspects of martial arts may be responsible for preservation of our jing if performed correctly. 

It should be apparent how this jing, or sei, is associated with the practice, training and application of martial systems whether it be in combat or in the health and fitness derived from the way. 

Age Old Dilemma

Getting youth to gain from the wisdom of elders. A question that has caused concern and consternation  since man became first aware or self-aware of the self. I find this question in my winter years of life and practice of a martial system. It concerns me now because I give due consideration to what I could have been if I has only taken the time and the effort to learn then as a youth what I am learning and know now as an elder.

Elder in the sense of a martial system who has practiced and trained for approximately thirty-six years. Three plus decades and I tended, except for the last decade, to spend an exorbitant amount of time on the more physical aspects. 

I found ten years ago the secret to life. The secret to all that entails living a good life. The secret is not really a secret but obvious if you look, see and then truly see it - balance. Yin-Yang or In-Yo. That which is symbolized by the great Tai Chi symbol of the Yin-n-Yang. 

It can be expressed by the term "hindsight." It is often late in life we understand a situation or event of our lives that it could have gone far better only if ..... hindsight would be better served if youth could gain from it as told by elders. Sensei are elders too in many cases - not all and not alot, just a few. When I say Sensei I mean one that has gained such insight so that his or her hindsight can benefit those under their guidance. Say around the winter years with a modicum of experience, knowledge and understanding (thirty years or more) of what it is they are trying to improve both for themselves and those who look to them as one who has come before. 

Youth all to often, I am guilty of this as well, tend to discard things of importance for that something that often is fleeting. Speed and gratification are necessary in the balance yet are not the end-all of all things. It is a shame that sometimes the perceived boring and not cool things are necessary to give more balance or depth and breadth to those things that do, in time, give gratification, knowledge and meaning. 

Simply waxing philosophical today :-)

Eight Circles Kenpo Gokui ??????

Recently in my continuous research on this esoteric aspect of martial systems with specificity toward Okinawan Karate I came across a symbol that has not come up in the past ten years. I have asked as to its origins and until I receive a response I thought I would ask readers if they have encountered this symbol at any time during their training, practice and research.

Sorry for the lack of size, if you click it the size will not be clearer.

Ever seen this and if you have can you provide me the source as to when, where, how, why and whom it was conceived of, by and for?

Heaviness

This principle as explained in the Book of Martial Power by Steven J. Pearlman can be connected to the ken-po goku-i tenants, i.e. with specificity to, "A person's unbalance is the same as a weight."

Our inability to properly make use of our bodies anatomical structure in nature means we misuse our weight and cannot apply our weight to our techniques. It means that we are ineffective in martial applications, which can be a loss of heaviness properly applied resulting in our unbalanced body and weight. To achieve balance in our body regarding the bodies mass and weight we cannot apply momentum to techniques and we lose things like proper structure and posture where the triangles become skewed resulting in an imbalance of weight or heaviness and this results in our attacker, if his line is longer, having the ability to apply his heaviness to unbalance ours and we lose the battle.

Our bodies must maintain the principles so that our angles, i.e. alignments, structures, axis's both major and minor, vertical and horizontal axis control, centerline, triangle guard, posture, proper breathing, etc. all reduce our bodies heaviness for applying technique which results in our being defeated.

If our heaviness is reduced in this manner the reactions of our applications are turned inward so that those same applications against our attacker are lessened allowing the attackers heaviness to overcome the technique and turn it back inward resulting in heaviness unbalancing our bodies and so forth.

I quote, "Heaviness typically refers to sudden manifestations of weight that manifest our heaviness faster than the opponent can compensate.' It must be remembered that our weight never changes but how heaviness is applied does change accordingly to how it is maintained regarding heaviness balance.

As indicated in the ken-po goku-i inference to yin-n-yang or changing opposites to balance and back all the martial principles work in either a yin or yang form with mixtures that result in efficient and effective martial power.

Another form of this heaviness is our mental state. If fear or anger gain momentum then that becomes a heavy psychological weight that can unbalance and make fall our physical selves.

The overwhelming burden, weight, of those negative emotions releases a form of chemical and electrical energies that are detrimental to our ability to implement physical actions. Therefore, our weight can be heavy mentally causing an imbalance within the mind that results in a fall as if a heavy weight succumbs to gravity.