Explaining Taijiquan Fajin
Loosely translated, Fajin means "to issue power". There are lots of explanations for this phenomena, from relatively simple to rather mystical.
Practically speaking, Fajin is a way of generating power, more specifically short power for striking or grappling applications in the martial aspects of Taijiquan. Training Fajin can allow you to generate tremendous amounts of power over short distances, something first popularised by Bruce Lee's one inch punch. If you've been studying Fajin for martial purposes for any length of time, you'll probably have realised that that sort of power is your bread and butter power for martial Taijiquan.
This doesn't mean to say that Fajin does not have its applications in the healing discipline within Taijiquan or any internal martial art. "Soft" Fajin is a way of practising Fajin that allows the body to experience gentle impact to stimulate the bones and allows the body's Qi to circulate more freely. Practising Fajin is also a useful way for the Taijiquan practitioner to "self-diagnose" areas of tension or Qi blockage within his or her own body, as the wave of power will travel and stop at any points of tension or blockage. The practitioner can then practise to relax these areas in his normal Taijiquan form practise. Fajin for health is not often taught these days, and it is a point of interesting historical speculation as to why it was not emphasised in the modern teachings of Taijiquan.
In physical terns, a Fajin is nothing more than a vigorous share of the hips, allowing the power to move up through the body and into the hands. This is very similar to how force travels through a Newton's Cradle. In practise, this is much more easily said than done. The body has to be relaxed enough to allow the power to flow.
Initial Taijiquan practise is primarily aimed at relaxing the body, because this is a prerequisite for proper Fajin to take place. Typically, Fajin is really only learned properly by the student when he or she has reached a suitable baseline of relaxation to allow it to happen.
Balance is the theme of Taijiquan, so slow movement has to be complemented by quicker, harder movement which is the role that Fajin fulfils within the Taijiquan system
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Mark Tan tries to explain Taijiquan and all its awesome health benefits in the simplest way possible.
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