Tai Chi Breathing Rhythm

**Diesel_tke** · Posted On: 7/01/2012 7:10am

Originally Posted by FluidSound

Tai Chi is actually the basics of all martial arts. It's the oldest known from my understanding and is where defense began.

You should do some more research on this. Especially on the origiins of taiji itself. There is a thread on the subject somewhere around here.

**slamdunc** · Posted On: 7/01/2012 7:29am

Originally Posted by Cullion

I was taught to always breath naturally without holding it or trying to force it into a conscious pattern, similar to the way Rivington describes.

I was also taught that natural breathing was the best.

Originally Posted by FluidSound

Tai Chi is actually the basics of all martial arts. It's the oldest known from my understanding and is where defense began.

Is there research to back this up? Are you referring to the legend of Bodhidharma teaching the Shaolin monks their breathing techniques and animal forms?

**lordbd** · Posted On: 7/01/2012 9:12am

I always thought that he boxing classics and other written records on tai Chi and similar arts dated back to like the 14th century (although some count the Tao te Ching). That doesn't of course point to the actual origins, just the written codification. Interesting question, although I would think grappling and wrestling arts could spring up pretty independently without needing a single MA source.

**slamdunc** · Posted On: 7/01/2012 9:52am

Originally Posted by lordbd

I would think grappling and wrestling arts could spring up pretty independently without needing a single MA source.

Pankration? Chi Hsuan Men? Taekkyeon? If Darwin was right, Monkey Style Kung Fu?
Seriously, I have to think that hieroglyphs depicting grappling, wrestling and stick fighting carry a lot of weight when it comes down to it.

**It is Fake** · Posted On: 7/01/2012 1:40pm

Exactly. Fighting pre-dates Tai Chi unless you believe all of the myths.

**W. Rabbit** · Posted On: 7/03/2012 12:40pm

Fighting predates humans. Dinosaurs had their own fighting styles.

Somehow it still all goes back to Shaolin and Wudang.

**lordbd** · Posted On: 7/03/2012 6:49pm

So dinosaurs taught kung fu to a lone itinerant wandering vole-like ancestral mammal, who, after surviving the great cataclysm, taught it to his decendents, who then taught it to......

**FluidSound** · Posted On: 7/04/2012 7:56am

Well, before Tai Chi, there were most likely martial arts, but there's none that I could find that are known before it. Tai Chi was the very beginning of Kung Fu from my understanding and Kung Fu was eventually the starting evolution of martial arts. Then more martial art styles. Other martial art styles existed outside of just China I'm sure, but they were pretty big practitioners back in the day. Tai Chi is apparently, from what I've read in books of Cheng Dsu Yao and such, the oldest known martial art. Of course, that doesn't make it the oldest. Still, it's the basics of all Kung Fu and Kung Fu helped to develop other martial arts.

**lordbd** · Posted On: 7/04/2012 8:49am

Either way I think we can all at least agree that Tai Chi is very old if not the oldest, and is pretty awesome in most of its many manifestations. Martial Arts history is really interesting but also quite frustrating in that there isn't much evidence floating around to confirm tradition.