Self-awareness

According to the Yang family's own manuscript Taijiquan [太極拳] goes by another name, that is Zhijue yundong [知覺運動] or 'an exercise [system] for [developing] self-awareness'. What did the Yang family mean when they wrote those words?

Actually what made me think of all this was when I was reading a BBC article about Buddhist meditation. The article explains the processes and goals of meditation much more eloquently than I can, so I've included a short section for your entertainment.

"...successful meditation means simply being - not judging, not thinking, just being aware, at peace and living each moment as it unfolds.

In Buddhism the person meditating is not trying to get into a hypnotic state or contact angels or any other supernatural entity.

Meditation involves the body and the mind. For Buddhists this is particularly important as they want to avoid what they call 'duality' and so their way of meditating must involve the body and the mind as a single entity.

In the most general definition, meditation is a way of taking control of the mind so that it becomes peaceful and focused, and the meditator becomes more aware.

The purpose of meditation is to stop the mind rushing about in an aimless (or even a purposeful) stream of thoughts. People often say that the aim of meditation is to still the mind..."

Although Taijiquan [太極拳] practice is generally considered to be related to Daoism and not Buddhism, I believe the fundamentals, from a practice and philosophical point of view, share few differences and many similarities, and there is a clear goal written in the words above which I believe correlates directly with the notion of an 'an exercise [system] for [developing] self-awareness'. Once this 'self-awareness' is developed to a suitable level, it can be directly incorporated into the practitioners martial arts practice, and form the basis for the further development of relevant skills.

Another reason that made me think of the Buddhist and Daoist connection is that in Taiwan Zhanzhuang [站樁] is also know as Lichan [立禪] which when translated means 'standing Zen meditation'. This name implies a Buddhist connection, but I believe that the Taiwanese in general do not make such clear philosophical and conceptual distinctions between practitioners of meditation as perhaps we attempt to do in the West, and those distinctions are probably best left to the academics to mull and angst over.

Is it not more beneficial for us to just get on with the meditation than to apply our 'intellectual' dualistic prejudices to our own practice?

As Zhuangzi [莊子] considered after waking from a dream, "Am I Zhuang Zhou [莊周] who has just dreamt he was a butterfly, or a butterfly dreaming he is Zhuang Zhou?"