Xingyi and Tai Chi.

It varies from other styles of martial arts because what we’re doing is cultivating

from the inside outwards, that’s why they’re called the internal arts. In China, they also

have what would be called external arts. These will be more forceful arts, arts where it

would be more strenuous, a lot of open body, very hard sorts of postures. In the internal

arts we concave our chest and we look to cultivate an environment for our internal organs, and

we maintain this posture throughout the practise, to induce healing and from there we strengthen

our organs and from strengthening our organs, it strengthens the exterior, which are the

muscles and tendons.

Nathan, how long have you been doing this?

I started when I was ten years old now. So it’s about 23, almost 24 years. When somebody

stars training in the internal arts, if they are taught correctly, they will begin to feel

the results immediately. From first practise, you probably find a very strong feeling of

unity with your body and also just peace of mind and a lot of energy.

Some of the benefits we find, actually they are very well known for lowering Type II diseases,

such as diabetes, arthritis, just in general health. It’s very soft on the system and

your organs and this is how we begin to strengthen the outside by strengthening the inside first.

This stage I train mainly in my yard, which is in a National Park in Australia.