Thirteen dynamics is a name used in ancient China for a martial arts training system that went on to become and influence many martial arts including Japanese Jujitsu and Tai Chi.
The art was developed and passed on in remote regions of China primarily through Daoist practitioners. These were people who valued living healthy long lives, in harmony with nature and to be independent of spirit and martially powerful in order to defend against oppressor’s.
The dynamics in question are as follows.
Based on the dynamics of Yin and Yang these deep thinking martial arts masters deduced that there are eight fundamental ways a human body can produce force. There are also five directions we can move in on any plane, forward, backward, left, right and centrally balanced. So the five directions and eight ways of using bodily power make up the thirteen dynamics.
Combining the dynamics we can create infinite techniques at long, medium and close range of combat.
The Yin and Yang concept is the overriding concept and is what modern thinkers refer to as using ‘first principles’. By using these simple thought tools we can use techniques more effectively and become more creative martial artists with a real grounding in what works in a natural way.
The art has been passed on through various lineages in China, then Hong Kong and finally in the last few decades in Europe via the efforts of some pioneering practitioners such as Mr Dan Docherty and Ian Cameron.
