CHARACTERISTICS

     Xingyi Song:     The Eagle and Bear strive together
                             This makes the fighting method
                             Yin and yang are combined
                             This is the source of Xingyi.

     Therefore in Xingyiquan the true source is the eagle and bear double form.

     In using the four limbs and 100 bones, expanding makes yang, and contracting makes yin.  Yang is the eagle posture. Yin is the bear posture.  Rise, drill, fall, and overturn form  the eagle. Pushing up the top of the head and keeping the neck erect form  the bear.  Advancing makes the eagle.  The  guarding form makes the bear.  Within  each single form you cannot separate yin and yang. You cannot separate attack and defence. You cannot separate rise, drill, fall, and  overturn from pushing up the top of the head and keeping the neck erect.  With each form you cannot separate eagle and bear.  In the twelve forms, the Dragon and Tiger come first and the Eagle Bear Combined Form is always last.

BODY METHOD

     In single practice, the eagle form is like pi quan, only when the splitting goes out this pi quan is done low and moreover contains eagle claw seizing. Chen Pan Ling said, " The two forms, eagle and bear, originally were a combined form.  It separates into eagle form and bear form, but the useage must match the character of the combined form. This is the reason for the combined form.  There are 12 forms, but only 11 sections. Therefore one must cut eagle and bear to get 12 sections."
 
INTERNAL ALCHEMY

     The Eagle form raises the yang qi. The Bear form brings down the yin qi. In combining the two forms the two qi's also combine.  The qi rises to make yang and descends to make yin. Then yin and yang mix.  At the start there are the Dragon and Tiger forms. At the end there are the Eagle and Bear forms.  If you understand the starting and ending double forms, then the middle forms will be easy.