Q: Are the wrists meant to be bent when holding the clothes hanger? I can't tell from the photos. And I find it very difficult to do the yin version with a bent wrist, because giving up the hands entirely makes me liable to drop the clothes hanger if I do try to bend back the wrists!
A: First of all, thank you for a good question that shows clear engagement with the material. Only someone who's been actively trying this stuff would be able to ask this q. The answer is both philosophical and practical.
The philosophical part basically tees up the practical answer. See, all this internal work when properly understood and especially Xingyi is making productive use of paradoxes and contradictions, like "you must do X and Y at once" but X and Y are fundamentally contradictory. Irrestiable force vs. immovable object. The power begins to emerge most strongly right at that razor's edge. So don't run away from these borderlines between apparently opposing work streams or tasks. Staying on that line is the work. There are many such examples in all my books and films.
Now in this case here's what you need to to. To try I should say, because yes it is basically a contradiction but that's ok (see above).
- Put your hands in the best XYQ shape you can manage around the best fitting part of the hanger for your hand size. So that you have a comfortable secure grip, with the fullest possible support of all fingers by the hanger, not by your conscious extension or tension of any part of your hand. Let the hanger frame do all the work!
- Now drop all tension from not only your hands but also your wrists, arms and even shoulders, completely. This of course will drop that whole arm assembly, hanger and all plunk down along the front of your body. Dead weight.
- Now, without injecting any work or tension into your HANDS - at all - slightly re-engage your arms to bring just your arms a bit front and center, to the normal position for XYQ standing as shown in the no-hanger photo. But keep your hands and wrists totally unengaged, dead weight being just dragged along, hanging off your arms. The hanger alone is maintaining your hand shape in the Tiger Mouth configuration. If you have the right positioning on the hanger, the natural weight of your fingers on the frame will allow you to naturally maintain a totally passive 'grip' on the hanger. Work with it.
- Now, very slightly engage some forearm tension or tendons, only, to somewhat elevate your 'hand assembly' (hands draped totally relaxed but well shaped over the hanger) to come closer to the canonical (non hanger version) pose. See how the wrists are flexed upward in the photo above? Try for that, but - Keep your hands totally relaxed and feel and play 'at the border' of keeping the right arm position while injecting no physical force into the hands per se. Everything stops at the wrists yet your hands are fairly well shaped by the hanger frame alone, almost like when you do this standing for real (without the hanger).
- As you stand this way, working at the border of shape vs no shape, engagement vs surrender, another kind of non-physical power will flow through your body and eventually flood down your arms and fill your hands. You'll notice this throughout any subsequent practice session XYQ, TJQ, or BGZ you might then engage in.