Dan Tian 丹田

A disputed term

Dan Tian (丹田, “cinnabar field”) comes from the Daoist tradition, where it names an energy centre in the lower abdomen in which qi is gathered and nourished. Hardly any term is treated as contradictorily in Yiquan: the founder uses it, rejects it and leaves it to his students with a new meaning. Anyone who hears “dantian” in Yiquan should therefore ask which dantian is meant.

Wang Xiangzhai: from use to critique

In 1928 Wang Xiangzhai still speaks the traditional language: qi is led into the “sea of qi” (气海, the lower abdomen) and runs up the back in the small heavenly circuit.

In the 1940s he rejects exactly that. In the abdominal cavity, he says, there are stomach, intestines and liver — “this is no place for qi”. He now explains force without the dantian: from elasticity, from opening and closing, from the rhythm of the breath and the feeling of being one with the surroundings. He had already rejected the familiar “sink the qi to the dantian” in 1939: raising the qi is a mistake, but sinking it is a mistake too. Breathing stays natural. This is part of the demystification by which Wang frees his art from secret doctrine and speculation.

The family: do not hold on to the dantian

The rejection runs through Wang's family. His daughter Wang Yu Fang rejects 守丹田, keeping one's attention fixed in the lower abdomen — it goes against nature. Real qi, she says, is only the warmth and circulation that arise by themselves in the stance. Her son Jin Tonghua puts it more briefly: 站桩不要意守丹田 — do not concentrate on the dantian in the stance; natural breathing is enough. And he asks back: which animal thinks about it while asleep?

The health stances draw the same line against qigong: 不讲大、小周天，不意守丹田，不讲求调息 — no heavenly circuits, no concentrating on the dantian, no regulation of the breath; everything follows nature.

The Yao lineage: an area, not a point

In the lineage of Yao Zongxun the term lives on, but reinterpreted. The dantian is not a point below the navel but an area: the space between the navel and Ming Men (命门) on the back, where the body's centre of gravity lies. This area is to be awakened and protected, not occupied by attention.

The decisive sentence goes further: “The whole body must become a dantian.” What is meant is Zheng Ti Li, the force of complete bodily unity. In traditional language: qi must not stay put in the dantian, it should fill the whole body. In today's language: no part holds the force fast, every part can release it.

What “centre” means

When Yiquan does speak of a centre, it is a task, not a place: unite left with right, front with back, above with below. It is the same work that Mo Jin does with the six directions. The centre is where the opposing forces balance — not a point to concentrate on.

What remains in practice

• Abdominal breathing as a result, not a goal. With practice the breath becomes deep and calm by itself; some texts call this “qi sinks to the dantian”. It is not to be forced.
• The lower abdomen is not empty. In Shi Sheng, the sound exercise, the tone comes from the lower abdomen, “like a bell in a quiet valley” — there the area is heard, not thought.
• Hips and lower back carry. The work of the area shows in the Kua and Ming Men: an upright trunk through which force runs from the ground to the hands.

Other readings

Outside Yiquan the same stance is often explained differently. Qigong readings make the dantian the core: three dantians as stages of development, concentration on the lower one as the aim of practice. This stands in direct opposition to the line of Wang and Yao. Body-mechanical readings of the internal martial arts see the dantian as a control centre from which the connected body is moved, or explain the belly that turns round and hard in the release of force by diaphragmatic pressure rather than muscular contraction. They are closer to “the whole body becomes dantian”, but they are general neijia teaching, not Yiquan.

Common mistakes

1. Holding the attention in the lower abdomen — exactly the 意守 that Wang's family rejects. 2. Actively pushing out or tensing the belly in order to “feel something”. 3. Leading, lengthening or holding the breath instead of letting it happen. 4. Taking the dantian for a point and forgetting the back, the lower back and Ming Men.