Song Gong 1 Today we're gonna begin our work on Song Gong. We have 5 primary exercises designed by grandmaster Huang Sheng Shyan. These 5 exercises train our body to become more Song, to release the shoulders, to release the kwa, to release the entire body. They also teach us individual Taiji principles which later inform your form, which later informs your push hands practice and your martial training. Starting by calming the mind, calm creates relaxation, relaxation creates sinking. We sink down into the right foot, emptying the left foot. Turning the torso until the left heel is out, and stepping out to shoulder-width stance. Press the right foot into the ground coming up over to transit the weight. Sink down into the left foot. Press the left foot into the ground, adjusting on the heel so that our feet are parallel, approximately shoulder-width apart. Sit down on the bar stool. The same as if we were practicing our first standing posture, the Bear. Relax and sink for three breaths. Now we're going to work on the leg motions. We stand up until we're 80 or 90% straight in the knees. Moving from the kwa, we sit down and sink, turning into the right foot. Like so. At this point here there should be a line, aligning from our hip, knee, foot in the right foot. Then we press the right foot into the ground and we come up, turning. Up, until 80 or 90% straight, and the weight is now 50/50 between the feet. Then from the kwa, we sink down. Sink and turn, sinking into the left leg. Making sure the alignment from hip, knee, foot is straight. Then we press the foot into the ground, and come back up to center. 50/50 weight distribution, legs 80% straight. Relaxing down into the right foot. Pressing up from the right foot. Relaxing down into the left foot. Pressing up from the left foot. The first error to look for is misalignment in the knees. When we sink down into the right foot, the most common mistake is: the right knee collapses in. Hip, knee and foot are out of alignment. Over time this will destroy your knees, and you won't be able to develop true power. So, when we sink down, the knee can only move like a hinge joint. We don't want swimming knees. So sinking down the knee moves forward, as we relax and sink into the right leg and foot. Making sure at this point that the weight is even between the heel and the ball of the foot on the right leg or the rooted leg. The weight distribution will be approximately 90/10.

90%, 10%. But we're aiming for 100% weight in the right leg. To make it a true 100% we would have to turn into cat stance, to empty the left leg. But because we're in parallel stance, it's 90/10. Then we press up, relaxing up, and sink down, keeping our awareness on the alignment from hip, knee, foot. The empty leg also has to be aligned, from hip, to knee, to foot. That does not mean that the knee is above the foot. If the knee is above the foot, it is out of alignment with the hip, knee, foot alignment. So, here, this is a straight line, or one plane. The knee is not locked straight, nor overly bent. Sink and turn. Press up, square to the front. And sink and turn. We turn the Kwa as far as they will go. Until the bones basically stop your movement. At this point we press again, open and sink. Rise and sink. Rise and sink. The Kwa: one kwa is open, one kwa is closed. We come up to neutral. Even between the kwa. Then we sink down. Now the right kwa is open, and the left kwa is closed. Just practicing this until you get used to this motion, it becomes smooth, and even. Relax up from the foot to the Dan Tien, release down from the Dan Tien, through the hip, relaxing down to the floor. Melting into the floor, just like the standing practice. Then relax back up. A wave of relaxation comes up from the foot, up the Dan Tien. And the releases back down through the hip, knee, foot. The purpose of this is to develop transferring the weight. We transfer the weight from one side to the other by going over the arc. Up to center, down to left side. Up to center, and down into the right side. The error in Taiji is that we transfer the weight by pushing side to side. Going side to side. Going forward and back. In Taiji we do not go side to side or forward and back. We only have up and down, and turning. So to transfer the weight here we're going up and turning, and we're going down and turning. Up and turning. Down and turning. This is very different to me pushing sideways, across. The feeling if you're pushing sideways will be that the pressure will build up in the blade of the foot, in the rooted leg. If you feel too much pressure in the blade of the foot, that's incorrect. It means your weight is going sideways. The pressure should be even between heel and ball of the foot, because you're sinking down into the rooted foot. Coming up to 50-50, and sinking down into the rooted foot. Now we're gonna work on adding in the basic shape for the arms. So we're sinking down, up, down, up. Now, when we come up we're gonna bring the arms up. At this point here you'll see that shoulder, elbow, wrist, finger, are round and relaxed. The elbows are not down like in Taijiquan. This is not Taijiquan, this is a Song Gong, and fundamental exercise to change the body, so that we can perform Taijiquan correctly. So sometimes we break the rules of Taiji. In this case the elbows are going to be up and round like this. The feeling is going to be that you're scapulae spread and the back relaxes. Then, when we sink down, we're gonna relax our hips down and we're gonna drop our shoulders, then drop our elbows, wrists and fingers, and turn. The finish position is that the right hand is on the left side of the chest, and the left hand is on the lower back with the thumb on the spine. We drop the hands as we come up. They swing out. Then we sink down, shoulders, elbows, wrists. We drop the hands as we press up to 50-50. Open. Relax. And then we relax down into the rooted foot. Press the right foot into the ground, opening up. And relaxing down, shoulder, elbow, wrist, fingertips. Pressing up, what is important now here is that we do not lift our arms up, engaging the trapeziums and the shoulders. We're not lifting. We're swinging the arms out more like an elephant trunk. We swing the arms out to lift the arms. The arms are also rounded this way, and also in front of the body. Not beside the body. Rounded in front of the body, not beside the body. Breathing in. Breathing out. Breathing in. Breathing out. Breathing in. Breathing out. Breathing in. Breathing out. Breathing in. Breathing out. Press the foot into the ground, open up, relax from the ground out to the fingertips, feeling light. Breathing in. Then relaxing everything down, dropping the Yi, sinking the Qi, sinking down into the rooted foot. Relax the shoulders, upper arms, elbows, forearms, wrists, palms, fingers. Feel your feet, connect to the ground, sink. Press the foot into the ground, dropping the hands, swinging out, breathing in, opening up. And release. And press up, relax, rising up as relaxed as possible. And releasing down. When we press up we're not DRIVING the thigh into the ground, we're not PRESSING using muscular force. We're just relaxing up, floating up almost, as soft as possible. This is Song Gong, the priority is Song, relaxation, letting go. On the way down, calm the mind, relax the body, allow that relaxation to create sinking, as the relaxation and letting go goes with gravity. And we sink down into the rooted foot, making the awareness soft and relaxed. Feeling 90/10, checking your hip, knee, foot alignment on both legs. Holding this position here now. So in this position, the most sunken point, it's like a standing posture. All the basic points: the rear crown is suspended, the chest is sunk, the belly is relaxed, we're sitting on the barstool, elbows are down, we check the weight distribution, and the weight distribution on the rooted foot, between heel and ball of the foot. Relax and release. Open. Breathing in. And releasing down. Now, because these are Song Gong exercises, the purpose of the exercise is to develop Song, relaxing, letting go, releasing. For most people, we hold stress and tension in the neck, in the traps and in the the shoulders. We work on the computer all day long, we play on the computer when we're not working. Or we do physical labor using our arms. Everybody holds, shoulder tension, trapezium tension, neck tension. So the first step we wanna take is how to release the shoulders. In internal martial arts we talk about full body power. Well, if you can't get past your shoulders because they're blocked with tension, you can't get full body power. So most people, even trained athletes, only use arm power. They might have a lot of arm power, but it's limited to their shoulder, elbow and wrist power. So when we're in this position here, we bring our attention to our shoulders, and we relax the shoulders. That means our awareness is in the shoulder. And we release the shoulder, bicep and triceps, elbow, forearms, wrists, palm, knuckles, fingers. At this point here the arm is gently stretched and released, and it swings down to the bottom. Here we keep relaxing the elbow down and the hand rises up. We don't lift up. It opens up like the elephant trunk swing, and we relax shoulder, elbow, wrist, fingers. Right down to the bottom, and then keep sinking the elbow. It's important that we don't cut the movement short, like this, with T-Rex arms. We want everything to be open. Open and relax. Open and relax. If you imagine a lady with her hair tied up in a bun. When she undoes her hair and it all falls down, the hair is relaxed, but when it falls down it pulls straight. It pulls, slightly taut. In the same way, when you relax your arms down they should pull straight. If you keep them like this, they're tied up like the lady's hair is tied up. Yes, it's relaxed, but it's incorrect: it's not Released. Song is relax and release. Not just relax. So we can be relaxed, but this is not Song. We have to release. So we're focusing on shoulders, elbows and wrist. In the beginning you can spend countless hours concentrating on this area here, just on the shoulders. So as you work through the exercise, keeping the mind completely focused on your shoulders. With every repetition that you take, dissolving the tension out of your shoulders more and more. Relax the shoulders more and more. You wanna continue this until it feels like you're armless. Until your arms have no weight. As if you're floating in a pool of salt water: weightless arms. Completely relaxed. Completely free from tension. We do this to liberate the shoulders from the torso, so that the shoulder nest can function for internal martial arts. So after we get a hold of the basic shape, the basic process of the exercise, we're gonna find out that we're doing a lot of things wrong. So we need to look at what we're doing wrong by using Ting. By using awareness. Listening to our own body to find the errors. Now, if we remember our standing practice, we remember the correct feeling of structural alignment and sinking the Qi. We wanna carry that feeling on through all our practices including the Song Gong. So the very common errors are going to be: The knees collapse in. The knees buckle out. These are very common errors. Another common error is, people don't turn the Kwa. You must turn the Kwa as far as the range of motion will allow you with every repetition. Not doing it like this. Another common error is that people go side to side, and don't go up and down. So they simply turn. And turn. And turn. The turning must coexist with the rising and sinking. Up and turn. Sink and turn. Up and turn. Sink and turn. Up and turn. Sink and turn. Another error is that people twist the torso. In Taiji we turn, we don't twist. Turn the torso, don't twist the torso. So they'll go down, the Kwa will turn to this angle but then the shoulders will go further. If your shoulder nest goes further than your Kwa, you know you're twisting the torso. Turn, don't twist. Turn: I still have an alignment, these 4 points are in a box. Do not twist. People will collapse the neck. Like this. Basically breaking the structural points from standing. People will drop the shoulder, like this, so that they lean. You should be level. The hips are level, the shoulders are level. You do not tilt or lean. The hips go down and turn. They do not go like this. So when you sit and turn in the hips, you must maintain level. The error is tension in the Kwa makes this hip rise. Sink down, tension in the Kwa makes this hip rise. It's a very big problem and a very common error. To demonstrate the error in the Kwa: If Ramzi sinks down doing the first loosening exercise, and there's tension holding this Kwa, this hip will be up, making this whole side of his body Yang. If you're Yang on one side, it's a variation of double-weightednes, or not Yin-Yang. A.k.a. not-Taiji. So then the floating here makes him have no root, and he has no weight, he's easy to throw out on that way. If he turns and sinks down, and the knee collapses in, the structure breaks here. It means that that structural line cannot bear force. So I can collapse his structure easily through the knee. If he turns and sinks down, foot, knee, hips are aligned, hips are flat, everything is correct, then the force will transmit directly to the floor. He can ground the force, he becomes a conduit for force. The way to know if you're correct is if when you receive pressure, you receive it with no effort. You're muscles do not need to contract to resist the force, you become a conduit for force. So when I push on Ramzi, I'm essentially pushing on the Earth. And the planet is very hard to move. Coming back up. Sinking down. He's in the full shape here, if this shoulder's dropped forward too much, another error. This is collapsed. This is open. It makes it easy to destroy his structure here. No good. If he's correct, once again I feel the planet. Just going through the exercise now. And stop there. At this point here, if he's moving sideways, and not down... Doing it correct, when I push sideways, the energy hits the planet. I wanna follow your motion. And sinking down, I follow his motion. It hits the floor. This time he's gonna move slightly sideways, and I follow his motion. It will break in the hip. So the idea is that our energy moves up and down and turns, it doesn't go side to side. If you continuously move sideways and someone follows it, you reach a point where you can no longer follow. Past yourself, and you fall. So always feeling the same feeling of sinking the Qi like in the standing practice, up and turn, sink and turn, up and turn, sink and turn. So when we're practicing after we have stepped out, we press the feet into the ground and we open up, mind comes up the body, open. Feeling as calm and relaxed as possible. And we sink down, open. And sink down. We practice this for around 5 minutes, per day. In the beginning you might have to practice a lot longer, until you get a grasp of it. Once you've got your mind around the exercise and the body is following the mind, then 5 minutes is sufficient. So we practice. After 5 minutes or so, we open, and we just relax, and slap the thighs, empty the mind, feel the feet. Then we turn from the Kwa to open the left foot to 45°. We relax down and forward into the left foot until 100%. Press the left foot into the ground, turning on the ball of the right foot. And we pull our feet together, heel to heel. Everything aligned, spine straight, press the feet into the ground closing knees and elbows simultaneously. And this completes Song Gong exercise 1. Thank you.