Clear Internal Push Hands

Richard Clear was first introduced to Internal Push Hands by Master Ma Yueh-liang in 1995.

Ma Yueh-liang (Aug 1, 1901 - March 13, 1998) was the senior disciple of Wu Chien-ch'uan, the founder of Wu-style taijiquan. He married Wu's daughter, Wu Ying-hua, in 1930.

Wu Chien-Ch’uan started the Wu Jianquan Taijiquan Association (鑑泉太極拳社) in Shanghai in 1936, and Ma became the deputy director of the Association.

Wu Ying-hua and Master Ma continued to run the Wu Jianquan Taijiquan Association and teach Wu Taijiquan for the rest of their lives.

As Ma Yueh-Liang got older he began teaching more openly, publicly practicing and sharing many formerly closed door (private or family secret) methods so that that they would not be lost.

At an advanced age, Master Ma was chosen as one of the 100 Best Martial Artists in China referred to as one of China’s “Living Treasures”.

Master Ma's Personal Push Hands

One of the secret methods that Master Ma began publicly teaching the last decade of his life was a type of internal Push Hands that he called “NO STYLE Push Hands”.

There is video online of Master Ma at 93 years old playing push hands at a public park in Shanghai. You can see him demonstrating high level push hands & energy skills while effortlessly playing with a variety of opponents.

Master Ma said he developed NO STYLE Push Hands because of inherent flaws in the positioning of regular push hands that allowed folks to cheat themselves out of developing real internal skill.

NO STYLE Push Hands rectified this by putting the person into a position where internal errors are highlighted, and therefore the practitioner must either build internal skill or they will get easily moved / pushed out. As a result, proper training and practice of No Style push hands builds high level internal skill very quickly.

Learning from a Master

Richard Clear learned NO STYLE Push Hands from Master Ma Yueh Liang in Shanghai in 1995. Richard had been training martial and internal arts for almost 20 years at that time and immediately realized the incredible benefits that this internal method would impart to anyone willing to do the work.

Upon returning home, Richard Clear immediately introduced Master Ma’s version of internal push hands to his students. He began training internal push hands several times a week and continues to practice it to this day.

Researching Internal Push Hands

Richard Clear began to research and explore internal push hands using all the internal skills he had learned. He continued his studies into advanced internal skills and how to train them with the method taught by Master Ma.

In 2008, Richard Clear hosted Master Liu Ji Fa (a senior student of Master Ma) to Tennessee for 2 weeks of advanced workshops and private training. During the training Richard asked about No Style Push Hands and discovered that Master Ma’s method was no longer taught publicly. In fact, Master Liu revealed that he only teaches this method to his two closest disciples.

A Lost Method

Richard immediately began looking for others who practice No Style Push Hands. But, to this day he has not found anyone else publicly training Master Ma’s method. It appears that Ma’s personal internal push hands may have very nearly died with him.

Because of Richard Clear’s extensive study and development of Master Ma’s internal push hands method, and because no Wu style masters recognize the name or acknowledge the existence of NO STYLE push hands, the method we practice is now called, “Clear Internal Push Hands”.