Grasping at Clouds

I had been told that the Taiji movement Cloud Hands meant leaving the hands light and cottony soft.  If a person attacked you, they would magically fly across the room while never feeling any more resistance than a cloud.  The movement is rather vague, but gets repeated more than any other in the Yang Long Form.  I was told the repetition is because this movement is more important and has more possible applications.  However vague and unclear the applications were...

I saw a Jujitsu technique called, “Ashes In The Eyes” which looked like a possible application – but I was still pretty sure Cloud Hands wasn’t about “poor visibility.”  I was also pretty sure it could be used for variations on Sokumen Iriminage or even an O-Goshi, or a Kaitenage.  I did this once with a karate friend and I ended up in a perfect Kosa Dori Ikkyo.  Punches, elbow strikes, palm strikes to a variety of heights, several throws, a wide variety of locks seem possible with a huge amount of "artistic license."

The Wu/Hao system does the movement front weighted or back weighted.  The Chen Style I learned did several variations on footwork with multiple segments of repetition – shifting each foot moving forward, expressing Fa Jin each time but staying in place, step in front, step behind, step backwards.  The Yang system just seems to shuffle from sideways, but movements like the Yang “Part Horses’ Mane” are the same arm movement, just walking forward.

I was shown a Shotokan Kata called Unsu, or “Cloud Hands” in Japanese.  Piecing together a few translations and embellishing on them:

-  Clouds undergo “Incessant Changes.”

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-  Clouds can adopt any shape.  In the eye of the beholder, clouds can become dragons, monsters,religious images or long dead loved ones.  Awe, fear, love can be inspired, or indifference.

-  Clouds can produce lightning, thunder, snow, sleet, rain, hoar frost, mist, steam, fog, hail, dew and many other things in nature.  Smoke always finds a path upward, or when confined smoke causes spontaneous combustion.  Fog settles and leaves the dew.

-  Clouds can leave you sweating, or freezing, or instantly dead.

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   Clouds can be virtually unnoticable, or they can black out the sun.

-  Clouds can be enveloping and close, or miles away. You can look down on the clouds, or they can hug the ground, or be in the highest reaches of the atmosphere.

-  Clouds can be seen moving and changing rapidly, or so slowly as to appear completely still.

There are some pretty amazing performances out there, but this is from a direct student of Gichin Funakoshi, Nakayama Sensei, who was the leader of the Japanese Karate Association for years and a 9thDan.http://youtu.be/9gNTc283kAg

  

So, these martial art metaphors from centuries past, and thousands of miles away, from a culture I don’t share, developed by people who faced threats that I never have; and who lived in an environment that my inland northern prairie home did not resemble – these metaphors do not always speak to me.

I have come to see the Cloud Hands movement as more of a state of mind than a posture.  That's why there are so many variations and applications, while the movement remains so vague.  There is no one "right" definition, because that is the whole point.  Clouds are abundant possibility and endless variation.

If I had never looked at other martial arts, if I had never allowed someone else's perspective to inform my practice, I would still be lost.