If you are an advanced Tai Chi student trying "to song".
Try to be a martial minimalist.

But
in Tai Chi Chuan there are many 'sorts of sung'
depending on what you are training for.

Sung is the essence of Tai Chi and it is attained over a lifetime of practice.
It is where body and mind come together.



Master Erle Montaigue
Sung is where Heaven and Earth come together.

Sung or song:

Song, I call it "Bamboo moving". Bamboo is a magnificent plant, the stiffest tree is most easily cracked while bamboo survives by bending in the wind.
The taller it grows, the lower it bends. It looks mystical, but bamboo moving is the most natural thing. It is not a cult, if it is, I advise to seek professional help because you need it. Sung or bamboo moving is more than just going limp, like a rag doll. When raising the arms, think of gravity pulling downwards on the elbows and shoulder joints. Do not resist sinking, relax into the spine. The spine should be held straight and vertcally making the connection between Heaven and Earth. A way to practice bamboo moving is the Wu Chi position, then maintain it troughout all movements. You strive to stand and move like evergreen bamboo in the wind, flexible and vital. Let it be, there is no need to over-extend or battle with others or yourself.

You have it all in you, learn from bamboo how to root yourself from where you can, than build upon and grow. Pandas like to live alone, usually they live with other pandas but they can survive alone. The bamboo likes to live with other bamboos, but they can survive alone. Bamboos can survive together-alone.
Learn from evergreen bamboo balance in being and to step into wholeness and emptiness. Outside noisy, inside empty. Learn to song, the great Chinese art of bamboo moving.

The focus and calmness cultivated by 'sung' is necessary
for all martial arts students that will talk about internal martial arts.
The ability to use Tai Chi in combat is a test of a student's understanding of sung.

Tai chi Classics about sung.

“If you can give up yourself, than you will become part of the universe.”

(Tai Chi Classics)

Tai Chi Masters about sung.

- Master Yang Cheng Fu: “Be sung, be really sung. If you are not sung, even just a bit not sung, you are not in a stage of sung. You are then a loser of Tai Chi. You will be defeated.”

- Master Cheng Man Ching: “As babies human beings are relaxed and totally yielding. But after they grow and become ‘civilized’ they are no longer sung at all.” He told his advanced students that he dreamed that he lost both arms and since then he realized the true meaning of sung.

- Master Erle Montaigue use expressions as: “sunging, being in a state of sung, to start sunging etc…

SUNGING : EMPTY BAMBOO MOVING

To me Tai Chi Chuan is 'bamboo moving'. Bamboo is not just food but also a reference to Wu Chi (emptiness, or 'the Supreme Indeterminable'), and Wu chi is a reference to the great Tao ('the Supreme Ultimate').

Empty bamboo possesses mysterious power, it can suffer but it's not broken because it can bend. Evergreen bamboo is able to bow with the prevailing winds, the insides are hole. Bamboos are survivers, they can survive under water, it looks like a tree but in fact bamboo is a large type of grass with an extremely strong stem. In Taoism empty Bamboo expresses the nature of Nature (emptiness) but bamboo also expresses emotions of the nature of the Chinese people. Chinese can have a bamboo-mind, bamboo-eyes, bamboo-legs-hands and fingers, bamboo chi, bamboo melancholy. Bamboo walking, bamboo waving, bamboo touching, Chinese can become 'bamboo', they can become humble bamboo. Bamboo has great yang and great yin aspects, great chi! Lucky bamboo creates harmony and tolerance (it grows apart-together), it is a symbol of happiness, strenght, rapid grow, longlivity, good health, flexibility, tranquility, resilience, freedom, fullness and emptiness, fame, good relationships and love. Evergreen bamboo-plum blossom-pine are the 'tree happy friends in winter', and a lightweight (sharpened) bamboo stick is a famous Chinese weapon.

Being the most natural instrument the Chinese flute goes very well with Nature. The Xun (vessel flute) is made of clay (earthwind instrument). 'Dizi or Ti' is usually made of bamboo (woodwind or a wind-bird instrument). China has produced what may be the earliest complete, tightly-dated playable multitone musical instruments. A nearly 9000 year old bamboo flute is found here. Bamboo flute music is the go-between or the intermediary between material and non-material things, Chinese flute music is medicine to preventing bad chi.
Tai Chi is 'the practice of bamboo moving', your mind should be empty like a bamboo, your body follows the mind. Bamboos cannot speak, but they can breath air out, so they can at least whisper, the rustling of their stems and leaves against the wind sounds like a whisper:

"Heaven is my father, and Earth is my mother.
All people are my brothers and sisters and all things are my companions".
Chang Tsai (1020-1077)