exhalation & striking

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exhalation & striking

Postby darth_freak » Wed Jul 05, 2006 10:23 am

how do you exhale when you punch or kick? I often exhale through the nose but when I do that a lot then I feel like my ears are "exhaling" aswell and it's not a nice feeling. exhaling through the mouth is more easy though it feels weird.
Also I think it'd be dangerous to open the mouth during a fight...
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Postby Inga » Wed Jul 05, 2006 4:24 pm

hi darth_freak, i find when training kung fu i breathe through the mouth. by this i mean both exhale and inhale, but esp. exhale when punching or kicking or performing anything with fa jin (excuse my spelling if wrong) i don't seem to have the ear thing going on you describe. i tried breathing different speeds with varied effort and i can't seem to really understand what you mean about feeling it in your ears. but that's okay i guess. when i practice qigong or do yoga or shiatsu i always breathe through my nose. my understanding is this is better. perhaps i should be breathing through my nose for kung fu too. now i'll have to look into this more...maybe we'll get some more feedback. i'm sure you are right about having your mouth wide open in a fight (like shouting open), but the lips don't have to part far to exhale (i tested this too). good question, as the breath is so vital.
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Postby darth_freak » Thu Jul 06, 2006 1:00 am

inhaling with the mouth isn't that good; I find it dries the throat more quickly thus making you thirsty. I'll try with the jaw closed but lips open and see if there's enough air going out.

thanks 8)
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Postby Inga » Thu Jul 06, 2006 6:47 am

hmmm, yeah. i get thirsty anyway from gettin all sweaty, i drink (water) during classes. but that maybe another thread, whether one should take fluids while training, or wait until after. we often 'debate' that. good luck with the exhalation with parted lips and closed jaw. let us know how it works for you. i tried exhaling with the jaw open and found it awkward. i think that only happens to me when i've overdone it and start panting. i still want to look more into this..i'll let you know if i stumble across any good references to it.
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Postby N0M4D » Thu Jul 06, 2006 7:44 am

Hi, everyone (Darth and Inga :P)


From my understanding, you should be breathing through your nose – I know I do!

I can justify this in a couple of ways, so here we go:


- Air quality: breathing through the mouth (inhaling, more specifically) will mean that you are taking in allot of filth that would otherwise be filtered out by the cilia (little hairs) and mucus in your nose. Just common sense;

- Qi circulation: if you’re using small/large circulation incorporated in your movements (which is something you actually want to do, even if only at an advanced level) you need to “close the circuit” by keeping your tongue on your palate. This, in and of itself, limits greatly any kind of functional breathing through the mouth. You do get to exhale (and exhale only!) through the mouth when you use the “ha” sound – not sure about the “hen” sound, since I’m still figuring out that one. I remember Master Yang talking about the reason the “circuit” breaks at the mouth. Basically, it’s so we can speak. I can’t remember the details, but it has to do with trapping energy/intent in the throat area so we can vocalize.


Darth, about the ears thing: it sounds like you’re breathing too forcefully. Do you feel pain when this happens?
Last edited by N0M4D on Wed Jul 12, 2006 8:19 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Postby darth_freak » Thu Jul 06, 2006 9:20 am

not really but my ears "click" easily after and when I do it a lot like when a give punchs, I feel like my head is expending like a balloon (can't find the right verb). It's slight though, I don't remember getting headache or something.
I tried a bit this morning and it seems it happens when I use the lower or middle dan tian to exhale...when I do qigong I feel fine (except another thing which I posted in the taiji or qigong forum).
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Postby benwarner73 » Wed Jul 12, 2006 7:50 am

Bonjour Xavier,

In general I find it is better to breathe in and out through the nose. This allows better control of the breath and I get tired less easily.

When it comes to using the breath while manifesting power things get a little more complicated. Pressure in the abdomen helps charge the muscles to a more powerful state. Master Yang often uses the 'push the car' analogy. When you push something heavy your natural instinct is to inhale, tense, hold the breath, and push. This is similar to how we use the breath in fa jin practice except that the ballistic nature of kicking and punching requires that all these things happen quickly.

When manifesting power into a strike one inhales sharply through the nose to help create that pressure and exhales forcefully to direct the power into the target. Exhalation can occur through the nose or you can use the 'ha' sound as you exhale through the mouth. Using the 'ha' sound creates that pressure in the abdomen for an instant and charges your muscles to a more powerful state (plus it sounds kinda cool).

As for the problem with your ears I would guess that some of the pressure is not being directed to the limbs and is getting trapped in your head, try to avoid this (I find life gives me enough headaches without me creating my own). Try this excercise:

-Do some four gates breathing to get the chi flowing.
-place one hand on your dan ties and the other open in front of your waist.
-exhale slowly through the nose and tense the open hand as you would for any hard chi kung excercise.
-as the sensation of leading the chi to the hand improves increase the speed of the exhalation and hand tension.
-as it becomes sharper use the 'ha' sound and add more body movement behind the tensing hand.
-play around with tensing the other hand at the same time as well. this often helps coordinate the energy manifestaation.
-translate all this into your punches and kicks.
-if you feel pressure in the head relax for a moment and concentrate on your center to settle the chi.

Sorry if this is a little long winded (yes the pun was intended) but I hope it helps.
Ben Warner
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Postby benwarner73 » Wed Jul 12, 2006 1:47 pm

Sergey,

That's a good question for which I have no answer.
The ha sound is one of the healing sounds. I understand it to be used to lead heat away from the heart to warm the kidneys.
I don't know of any connection between that and what I described in my last post.
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Postby benwarner73 » Wed Jul 19, 2006 9:33 pm

Just to clarify,

I asked Master Yang about the healing sounds. What we refered to in the last couple of posts as the 'ha' sound is actually 'he', pronounced like like the sound in the word her.

'Ha' is an energizing sound used to manifest energy. 'He' is used to lead heat away from the heart.

Master yang also mentioned that it is important to learn how to corectly pronounce the sounds otherwise one runs the risk of creating chi stagnation. The healing sounds as well as quite a bit more are covered in his Chi Kung Health & Martial Arts book.
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Postby darth_freak » Thu Aug 03, 2006 5:11 am

thanks Ben.
I think I got the thing now. I don't feel like my head's gonna explode or my ears are going to be propeled out of my head. Your "trick" kinda helped with doing hard qigong. 'Got different feeling if I exhale nicely through the nose or if I use the "ha" sound. I feel it's more subtile when I exhale through the nose. the "ha" makes a "bigger feeling but it gets harder to hold the breath 5 seconds. especially with the moves where teh chest is closed.

see you
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