Tai Chi Push Hand

Tai Chi Push Hand is a two-person training method practiced in Tai Chi and is used to acquaint practitioners with the principles of Eight gates, Eight steps, Zhan, Nian, Lian, Sui, Yin Jin Luo Kong and so on. It is also a gateway to experientially understand the martial aspects of Tai Chi including balance, leverage, reflex, sensitivity, timing, coordination and positioning. Tai Chi Push Hand usually works to undo a person's natural instinct to resist force with force, teaching the body to yield to force and redirect it.
Tai Chi Push Hand is a second step of Tai Chi learning process, and it allows a person to learn how to respond to external stimuli using techniques learnt from their forms practice. In addition, training with a partner allows the person to develop a skill of listening power, the sensitivity to feel the direction and strength of a partner's intention. There are five types of Push Hand practice:
1.Dan Tui Shou – Single-hand Push Hand
2.Ding Bu – Stationary Stance Push Hand
3.Huo Bu – Moving Stance Push Hand
4.Da Lu – Big Pull Push Hand
5.Hua Jiao Bu – Flower Pattern Stance Push Hand

Tai Chi Self Defense

Tai Chi Chuan means "ultimate internal martial art". All great Tai Chi Chuan masters since classical times have practised Tai Chi Chuan as a martial art and all Tai Chi Chuan classics have described it as a martial art. Amongst the various dimensions of Tai Chi Chuan, those of internal force cultivation and combat application are necessary if you train Tai Chi Chuan as a martial art. Without internal force a Tai Chi Chuan exponent would have no stamina to last a fight and no striking power to subdue an opponent; without knowing how to apply Tai Chi Chuan techniques to combat he would be helpless when attacked.
Manifesting the yin-yang principle of the Tai Chi unity, internal force and combat application compliment each other. If a Tai Chi Chuan exponent has only internal force but no combat application, he may be able to give impressive demonstration of his power, such as taking punches without sustaining injury or sending a demonstration partner flying backward, but he would be unable to defend himself in a real fight. If he has only combat application but no internal force, he may be able to discuss the wonderful combative techniques of Tai Chi Chuan intellectually or perform some pre-arranged sparring elegantly, yet when involved in a real fight he may be easily defeated by a clumsy but mechanically stronger opponent.
For example, one of safe and practical training methods is Tai Chi Push Hand. It teaches us at a subconscious level, to strike from anywhere at any time with great power, enough to kill an attacker with one strike! With tai chi fighting we have the basic movements which are also unlike anything that others will teach, in that we never have low open stances, stances that you would never be in walking down the street. With tai chi fighting we take a normal standing position, and then we begin the basic movements of Peng, Lu, JI, and An, with the corner movements also thrown in for good measure of Cai, Lie, Zhou and Kao. This all happens in a blink with a potential deadly strike happening in the mind of the practitioner at a sub-conscious level. There is never any big yielding movement that happens instantaneously with an almost instant attacking movement.
Tai Chi forms and Push Hand do teach us fighting techniques but it does not teach us how to fight in the real world against life or death situations! If we learn how to fight, we must become like a wild animal who doesn't even think about it, it just goes for it and automatically, it uses the correct weapons and methods to get the job done. All in all, we should learn what to take from the forms, practise them while pushing hands, go for free sparring, and then experience what combat Tai Chi is.