 Silk reeling

Silk reeling (pinyin chánsī, Wade-Giles ch'an² ssu1 纏絲) refers to a set of neigong (内功, "internal") movement principles expressed in traditional styles of t'ai chi ch'uan (太極拳), but especially emphasised by the Chen 陳 and Wu 吳家 styles.The name derives from the twisting and spiralling movements of the silkworm larva as it wraps itself in its cocoon, and to the metaphorical principle of "reeling the silk from a silk worm's cocoon".