nanfeishen

For those of you that have answered so far , thank you, i really appreciate the answers, it is interesting to hear other perspectives, and especially from such a wide range of different arts, being on the tip of Africa , my contact with many other styles is often only through forums like this. PS: Spirit Yep , Cape Town can be rather rough, and quite unpredictable, i have been mugged twice, (both times before i began training) had my car stolen twice, and been burgled seven times in fourteen years, and dont know anybody personally who HASNT been a victim of something at least once, but for some reason i love the unpreditability of life here.

I'm not sure if this should be a poll or not? My Martial Arts, has always seemed like a bit of a journey, i started of with Kung Fu and Tai Chi, viewing them as a means to becoming stronger and fitter, i then reached a point where i decided to embrace some of the values my teacher was trying so hard to instill in us, and finally, i reached a point where i dropped Kung Fu and only continued with Tai Chi, realising that the only way for me to understand my Tai Chi better was to study and embrace the concepts of, and follow, the ideas and philosophy of Daoism. So, my questions are: 1) Do you see your training as purely physical, striving to achieve excellence on a physical level in whichever art you partipate in, not too bothered about the "other stuff" ? 2) Do you see your training as a combination of both physical and mental, achieving exellence of both the mind and the body, and that the training is conditioning you to be better physically and to be a better person? 3) Do you see your training as achieving exellence of body and mind , but feel that a better understanding can or could be achieved by you, by a personal embrace of a philosophy from the area or a system of belief around whichever art you participate in? 4) Bits of each?

The "Boxer" rebellion or uprising, (depending on your view point) took place between Nov 1899 and Sep 1901. The Chinese participants called themselves "The Righteous and Harmonious Fists" , the westerners called them "Boxers" because they practiced martial arts or "Chinese Boxing". The "Boxers" were mostly martial artists and traditionalists who were not happy with the amount of western influence happening in China, and wanted to rid China of Western influence , corruption and theft of national treasures by western powers. Do a google on Boxer rebellion, there are some interesting pictures of the martial artists or "Boxers" on some of the sites.

Unfortunately, this confusion often exists within many people with regards to the martial arts and religion, in regards to "the spirit" of martial arts. The definitions are unfortunately very close and often get mixed. Religion:The belief in a superhuman controlling power, in a personal god or gods entitled to obedience and worship, A THING THAT ONE IS DEVOTED TO. Religious: Devoted to religion, or concerned with religion, devout, churchgoing, pious, God-fearing , holy , SPIRITUAL. Spiritual: of, or concerned with the spirit as opposed to matter, concerned with sacred or religious things; holy;divine (2) (OF THE MIND) refined , sensitive, not concerned with the material. Spirit: the vital essence of a person or animal, the soul, (2) A PREVAILING MENTAL OR MORAL CONDITION OR ATTITUDE. Words linked to spirit: breath; life; vitality; soul; attitude; principle; thought; morale; character; temperament; nature; heart; mind; will; bravery; courage; resolve; enthusiasm; motivation; pasion; meaning; marrow; the list goes on and on. All the words i listed can be used to describe the qualities of both faith and of martial arts and qi energy, the closeness is uncanny, the fact that both have the same qualities, means (in my eyes) that they can co-exist in complete harmony with one and other , Yin and Yang, Heaven and Earth. The "spirit" of martial arts is to do with the building of the character of the practitioner, through personal effort and struggle, what you choose to believe faith wise is and will always be your choice. ps: The definition and words taken from the : Readers Digest Oxford Complete Wordfinder, 1990, isbn 0 276 42101 9

Meditation, is the quietning of the mind, the ability to focus your mind on one particular thought or concept to the exclusion of all other thoughts, that one thought could be of god, krishna , buddha, mohammed, jesus, the tooth fairy, father christmas, your left foot, etc etc, it doesnt matter, and is not important. It is the focus used and the effort required to achieve that matters. The focus of the mind on a single thing. There always seem to be arguments or disagreements over the Qi, Chi Ki issue, and that is understandable, BUT, the big but, (not butt) , is that Qi does exist. It is Qi in the idea of martial arts and acupunture/acupressure and traditional chinese medicine, it is the soul to people who follow the concept of religion, and it is the body's intrinsic bio-electric energy to western science, to dismiss it as a phenomena is to miss it altogether. It isnt something that suddenly just pops up in training, it has to be worked at, nurtured and saught after, it requires lots of training, lots of focus and great understanding of the body, movement, breathing and relaxation.

As has been previously stated, those were different times and often violent times, but i would say calling them"thugs" is a little harsh , i would say they were the rough lot, the guys who nobody willingly picked a fight with unless they considered themselves good enough, the guys you hired to protect your assets or your property, there are always guys like that around, good natural fighters, who have a talent for the rough stuff, who arent afraid to face a fight, they often enjoy it and dont hesitate to act on a situation, men (and women) of good character. Unfortunately today with our "civilised society" there are far too few of these characteristics left in the martial arts, they were often, not always though, men (and women)of great honour and integrity, following and living by codes of conduct and etiquette that are mostly lost today. Today we can walk into any school or dojo, fill in a form, hand over our cash and bingo we can train, they on the other hand had to earn the right to train , often cleaning up, running errands, manual labour, etc etc, before being invited to do a little training, maybe being shown one or two movements and being told practice, never knowing and certainly never daring to ask for more, in other words they had to earn their place, and therefore worked or practiced so much harder for it. The martial arts are a tool to build and develop character, unfortunately too often nowadays all it builds are ego's.

Fa Jing, is the issuing of energy. It is the release of energy from a posture of complete relaxation and balance, which stems from the waist area (dan tien). It requires a complex and intricate understanding of the concept of Qi, and the flow of Qi through the body, and is based upon the idea of spiralling energy from the waist up the back and issuing through the arms. Give this a try as an idea: stand in wide horse stance in front of a heavy hanging bag, extend your arm out as if you have punched the bag,and the surface of your fist is lightly touching the bag. Now moving the waist in as small a circle as possible, move the bag without withdrawing your hand or extending the arm further, think of your arm as a whip the shoulder is the handle, the fist the tip, and the vibration should work from your waist , ripple down your arm and end past your fist in the bag.

Firtstly , what are you wanting to get out of your Tai Chi?, do you want to do it for health reasons?, or as a second martial art?. If you are young and strong ,Chen style if it is available , Yang and Wu are very good seconds, Sun and Hao i cant comment on for lack of knowledge. A good school will offer forms, push hands and qigong, there should be a decent physical workout with a lot of time spent on basics for beginners and push hands should be offered from a very early stage in training, i always doubt when i am told push hands is only offered at senior levels after "x" amount of years training. If you find a teacher who spends a lot of time on push hands and partner work , but not constantly, i would say you have found a good instructor for Tai Chi. Unfortunately most articles or documentaries only ever show elderly or old people taking part in Tai Chi in China, so this thought has filtered down into the minds of people as being an "old" persons art. As an instructor , i have a student range from 16 to 80 and they ALL do the same physicals , unless prohibited by injury or illness.

On a training trip to Foshan in Guangzhou (Southern China) i was fortunate to be able give Eagle Claw a try. My Grand master teaches at the Chin Woo Athletics Institute, and at 80 has picked up a fair wealth of knowledge. He showed me 10 runs of repeat exercise, based on Tan Tui runs for Eagle Claw. He said their are two ways to hold the hand , 1) the whole hand is shaped like claw, the four fingers held together and bent at the the second knuckle with the thumb underneath also bent at second knuckle, or, 2), the baby finger and ring finger are tucked in like making a fist and only the middle , forefinger and thumb are used to make the "claw". The system incorporates short, medium and long range movements, quick lively stepping , at times short hopping techniques for shifting of weight from leg to leg, the shorter techiniques are representive of the legs of the Eagle grabbing and tearing , the longer the wings of the Eagle. Each time he grabbed me to show a technique, the thumb of the grabbing hand seemed to find a pressure point and the discomfort associated with each grab certainly proved that an intimate knowledge of the various pressure points, (and not just the obvious ones) , was required to master this system. I unfortunately didnt go much further, as my main focus became Tai Chi, but it was certainly an impressive system, but obviusly required a lot of study of anatomy from a traditional chinese point of view.

There is nothing wrong with starting out in a garage or back yard of someones house, as long as what is being offered is what is being taught, and as long as the spirit of whichever art is offered is honoured and respected, just as if it was in a large formal school. What to beware of ?, i would say if it seems to turn out to be more of a social get together than a serious training session , give it a miss.

One of the venues i teach at, is a Martial arts school, and what they do is hold in house weekend camps every 6 - 8 weeks alternating junior camp and senior camps, go off to the mountains or seaside, camp and enjoy a weekend of training, then each end of year they hold a dinner at some restaurant which is a bit more formal, and that is open to wives and partners. This has become a tradition in the school , and the spirit and attendance to both the camps and dinner is phenominal, 80 to 90 % of the school attends in each category.

Do a search on google using -kung fu styles animal -, that should help you find some answers, as for your training questions, well, thats a whole different issue. The physical training is to toughen and strengthen the body, making it like iron, "Iron Body Training" , Many schools have probation periods, but a year seems a little excessive, Having to cut your hair? Whats the point? Their should be no restrictions on your life unless you plan to join a monastery, or plan to become a vegetarian. If you dont mind me asking , how long has the school been running? and how big is the following?.

Would have to agree with the "King" on the point of regular fighters versus the average martial artist, and sadly as stated it is too often the case. Just to add my two cents worth, if everybody trained from a point of view of no gloves , no protective gear, and no rules of where you may or may not hit , then and only then would it matter , unfortunately the "sport" has become the main focus and the reality is often ignored, and online learning would only give you the sport, and training with one partner only is detrimental, as you soon become familiar with what they know.

Forms contain the essence of whichever style they belong to , they define the style being practised, and provide us the means to perfect that style. Forms operate on various levels, the first is a physical level to become familiar with the techniques and condition the body, once we are familiar , we go to the second level and that is perfecting the nuances of the techniques, then we reach for the third and hardest level , the understanding of the energy and spirit within the forms. Personally i find forms to an integral part of martial arts, and thoroughly enjoy the practice of them, couldnt imagine any other way.

The time spent has been worth every minute, the effort required was rewarding, the money spent worth every cent, and the sacrifices were, thinking back, not huge, but seemed huge at the time, the dedication is a foregone conclusion. As a full time instructor it is rewarding every day, from the new student who arrives with a yearning to learn to the regular student who suddenly gets something they have been struggling with, to the senior student who demos a form that is nothing more than poetry in motion, the rewards are daily. It is about achieving something few westerners achieve, it is about living a childhood dream of one day teaching, about honour and respect for my teachers and students, and having the integrity to pass on knowledge freely , openly and without prejudice, it is a passion , a love , a desire , a yearning to know more and at the end of the day i suppose a regret that that i could never know it all. It has shaped my life , and guided my destiny, it has provided for me and all it requires is time , effort ,sacrifice and dedication, not much to ask.