Wuji (pronounced “woo-zhee”) is an important concept in Taoism and Chinese culture. It is a state of absolute balance — perfect peace and harmony. It is limitless and infinite.
When everything begins moving and you lose balance, you also lose wuji.
In the Taoist view of the universe, if we were to look at it from a modern scientific view, the universe was in a state of wuji just before the Big Bang. There was a state of perfect peace and then all hell broke loose. Things separated into yin and yang. Dogs and cats living together — MASS HYSTERIA! (Sorry, I watched Ghostbusters a lot when my daughters were little)
When you see someone performing Tai Chi, they begin in a relaxed stance, standing with their feet together. This represents wuji. They step out with their left foot and stand with their feet shoulder-width apart, then they relax again. I’ve done this with Grandmaster Chen Xiaowang, whose ancestor created Tai Chi. When he’s leading a group of students in a form, and he has moved to this first position with feet shoulder-width apart, he says very slowly, “Calm down.” This is also wuji. Once the form begins, things are moving up and down, opening and closing, becoming empty and full — the body is following the yin and yang and seeking to return, at the end of the movements, to wuji.
Many people don’t realize that Tai Chi is a powerful martial art. When using Tai Chi for self-defense, the goal is to maintain wuji — balance and harmony; to remain centered. When someone attacks, and you must adapt and change to deal with the force, your goal is to return to wuji — the state of balance you were in before the attack.
The goal is to greet force by relaxing, adapting, neutralizing the force and putting your opponent off-balance, making him vulnerable for a counter-attack.
I enjoy working with people who have never studied Tai Chi. Almost every time when a newbie is working on a self-defense technique, their bodies contort and twist and bend and go so off-balance that there’s no way they could defend themselves in a real-life violent encounter.
One of the reasons Chen Tai Chi (the original form of Tai Chi — the style that I practice) is so strict about body mechanics and structure is this quest for wuji. If you train yourself to recognize when you’re in a state of balance, then practice the techniques that allow you to maintain balance while throwing your opponent off-balance, you will eventually achieve skill. In a state of balance, you can defend from all directions.
One of the things I’ve been working on with my students lately is the ability to relax when attacked. Our first reaction when force comes toward us is to tense up. That comes naturally — we’ve done it all our lives. It’s a very difficult habit to break. We become stiff and unyielding (too “yang”), when the best course of action is almost always to relax, yield, and then overcome — a combination of yin and yang.
