Linking Hands and Feet

I must admit, I have not been a good student, after missing quite some pushing hands classes over the past two months. Of course, I missed some of the lessons due to work, but some I missed intentionally... because I somehow cannot reconcile the differences between the two styles of pushing hands (the one that I learnt in Singapore, and the one practised at this class in Tokyo). But I did learn an important thing from the pushing hands class in Tokyo, and that is the importance of linking your hands with your feet.

In taiji, it is important to use intention, and thus mental images are very important. The mental image linking your hands to your feet is important, since the feet is the contact with the ground from which you derive your force. Mentally linking your hands with your feet allows you to bring the force generated by your legs into actual use (at the hands). When you come into contact with your opponent's force, mentally channeling it down to your feet allows you to neutralise it and change its direction. When neutralising, it is like making his force travel from your hands (assuming that is the point of contact) through your arms, down the torso and both legs to arrive at the feet. And then you make that same force travel from the feet up your legs and torso, through the arms to arrive back at the hands and in the direction that you want to bring your opponent towards.

So right now, the current focus of my taiji routine practices is to maintain the mental image of my hands being linked to my feet. Let's see where this leads...