Using Your Opponent's Strength Part 2

Hua 化 allows you to neutralise an opponent's attack. But in order to use his strength against him, you need to use dai 带. To do so, you must be able to feel where your opponent's force is going, and then follow that force. Then change that direction slightly towards where you want him to fall.

For example, during lu 捋, if your opponent's force is forward, follow it forward, but slightly divert it downwards and away from your body. If he resists by pulling back his force, follow his force upwards, divert it towards him so that he falls backwards instead. The important thing here is to follow where his force is going, not against it. Aid his force to make him fall.

During pushing hands yesterday, my teacher was able to lift up a person using lu because the person resisted and was using brute force to stop my teacher from bringing him forward and downwards. By observing my teacher, I realised that my teacher was able to sense when the opponent resisted. The moment his opponent resisted and started to pull his force back and up, my teacher followed that force and lifted up his arm following his force. As his opponent was using brute force and his whole body was stiff, that simple lifting of the arm resulted in him being lifted up as a whole.