Michuan and Chen Style

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Taiji fighters should participate in the televised UFC matches as the most expedient way to promote taiji as a matial art.

Poll ended at Tue Apr 25, 2006 8:26 am

Absolutely! Such demonstrations are needed in the West, and would vitalize taiji training!
3
75%
No way! Taiji fighters should not look to prove their skill, or care about the misconceptions of the masses.
0
No votes
You'd have trouble finding taiji fighters that could neutralize those vicious attacks at present in the States.
1
25%
 
Total votes: 4

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Post by tjqinterest » Thu May 31, 2007 9:06 am

Asking some hard questions is also part of spiritual development. If we dont think about our decision-making process, we can be easily manipulated by some cults or salesmen (or by our duifang:)
Decision-making process influences whole life, not just martila art training.

So, the sentence "It is true because somebody said so" should not be good enough to promote something we have never seen

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Re: Michuan and Chen Style

Post by tjqinterest » Tue Sep 29, 2009 5:17 am

If you want to see some videos about taiji in real fight, you may visit this page :http://www.williamccchen.com/video.htm
Why are these videos shown as example of taijiquan? We can see lot of kickbox and wrestling. Can anybody find a video, where spliting or rollback is used to deal with attack?

Masters give demos like this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ah27Ssf0ZRU but reality looks like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MSofjhIVvB8
If "masters" have so good "skill", they could also take part of these competitions and give a good example how to use taijiquan.

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Re: Michuan and Chen Style

Post by Tashi James » Sat Oct 10, 2009 10:19 pm

I completely agree with this last point.

While competition can be useful for ones personal development and training beyond this it becomes just another clash between the ego and animal impulse of one opponent and another.

Not to mention that an opponent completely negates the correct notion of duifung.
"There is nothing that does not become easier through familiarity" (Santideva).

"We become what we do repeatedly. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit" (Aristotle).

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Re: Michuan and Chen Style

Post by J HepworthYoung » Fri Nov 20, 2009 8:38 am

A martial art is not a sport.
There are rules to sport fighting, not so in martial arts.

It seems counter-intuitive to learn to protect, develop and master ones life and self and to seek to increase the risk of harm at the same time.

A contest is never between two styles, only between two egos.

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Re: Michuan and Chen Style

Post by Roland Tepp » Mon Nov 23, 2009 11:50 am

J HepworthYoung wrote:A martial art is not a sport.
There are rules to sport fighting, not so in martial arts.

It seems counter-intuitive to learn to protect, develop and master ones life and self and to seek to increase the risk of harm at the same time.

A contest is never between two styles, only between two egos.
I am not all that certain what you mean by this comment?

Does this mean that it is undesirable to test ones skill against another martial artist?
Or are you suggesting that such testing should be done without any explicit or implicit rules in place? Or the opposite?

If one considers taiji to be a martial discipline, then it is only natural to expect that ones martial skills be put to the test every once in a while. If one progresses in his/her skill, so should the difficulty of the tests progress.

It is of course a matter of one's expectations and goals that determines the nature of these tests. Some practitioners prefer to stay in the limits of form performance and some test their skills in various push-hands disciplines. Neither of these two can be considered martial training though as they both are but a small fragment of the whole art.

If one strives for martial skill, one must also practice sanshou (freeplay) and practice it against as many different opponents as one can find.

No amount of soulsearching will be able to replace getting your butt kicked every once in a while on your quest towards becoming better martial artist.
Roland

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Re: Michuan and Chen Style

Post by J HepworthYoung » Tue Nov 24, 2009 4:06 pm

I am not all that certain what you mean by this comment?
Thank you for your honesty.
Does this mean that it is undesirable to test ones skill against another martial artist?

No.
Or are you suggesting that such testing should be done without any explicit or implicit rules in place? Or the opposite?
Neither, such a dichotomy is not entailed by my view. I believe this concept of an absolute dichotomy might be the reason you are not certain about what I mean, perhaps I am wrong.
If one considers taiji to be a martial discipline, then it is only natural to expect that ones martial skills be put to the test every once in a while. If one progresses in his/her skill, so should the difficulty of the tests progress.
I do not disagree but tell me; what does 'Martial Discipline' mean to you? I hope to arrive at an understanding at what your belief is about what a martial discipline is and what it is for.
It is of course a matter of one's expectations and goals that determines the nature of these tests. Some practitioners prefer to stay in the limits of form performance and some test their skills in various push-hands disciplines. Neither of these two can be considered martial training though as they both are but a small fragment of the whole art.

This might make more sense to me if you provide a definition of "martial" so that the term "martial training" has some context of meaning. For some meanings of the term both form and push hands training can be considered "martial training" although this may not hold true for all definitions.
If one strives for martial skill, one must also practice sanshou (freeplay) and practice it against as many different opponents as one can find.
Again the term martial, in this context it seems to imply something related to combat but there is still not enough information for me to glean what the role of martial in combat is. For me it implies more than fighting skill, but does entail such skill, but to paraphrase your words; the fighting skill is but a fragment of the whole art.
No amount of soulsearching will be able to replace getting your butt kicked every once in a while on your quest towards becoming better martial artist.
Soulsearching is different than getting your butt kicked once in awhile?

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Re: Michuan and Chen Style

Post by tjqinterest » Tue Dec 01, 2009 5:58 am

What is the difference between sport and martial art? Is there something else than just rules? Physics is same everywhere, I guess.
Anyway, rules do not prohibit using rollback, split, push etc. Rules do not prohibit using taijiquan body structure and mechanics to punch hard and knock your oponent down.
It seems to me, that some people try to say " Good martial artist can hit so powerfully that he can kill his oponent. But he can not do it in competition, so he can not win"

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Re: Michuan and Chen Style

Post by Tashi James » Tue Dec 01, 2009 6:01 pm

In competition (with the exception of full contact) rules prohibit full speed and full power blows. Competition is point based, in actual combat this is redundant because the goal is to survive not 'win'.

Competition can sometimes undermine the notion of 'duifung' and other essential principles [see Laoshi's book http://www.sevenstarstrading.com/html/b ... about.html], because the player is bent on winning not learning in some situations.

In sum, traditional martial arts are not designed for sport or competition but for survival in a period where security of family, person and resources was a major concern. They were often developed for military and strategic reasons as well. Over time MA's were influenced by personal and social beliefs thus the influence of confucian, Taoist and Buddhist idea's is often pervasive. Competition 'in a eurocentric sense', may therefore, lack the principles and conceptual framework that has influenced some MA's over time.
"There is nothing that does not become easier through familiarity" (Santideva).

"We become what we do repeatedly. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit" (Aristotle).

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Re: validation of skill

Post by TienLungTaoist » Wed Feb 03, 2010 10:48 am

Benny Bangarms wrote:I take issue with the underlying assumptions. I believe we live in an overly aggressive world. The spirit of our art is to create balance in the world. As martial artists, sometime we may have to create that balance with our palms, feet, or swords. But this can only be done with a peacful heart, mind and sprirt. If we place too much emphasis on proving ourselves in public, such as in the UFC, we run the risk of attracting the wrong kind of students, and inviting unnecessary aggression into our art. It is much better, I believe, to work to increase the standard of skill within our art. We have enough taiji practitioners, we just don't have enough taiji practicioners training in the correct spirit of the art (as described in the classic writings).



How do we increase the skill within our art? I see three main areas.

1. train consistently with discipline and perserverence.

2. test yourself against practitioners of other arts. at GRTC we often invite students of other MAs to our sanshou practice on saturdays. I have found this an invaluable practice for testing my abilities and improving my skill.

3. test other taiji practitioners to expose weaknesses in ourselves and in those who might be watering down our art. don't make this an "our school vs. your school" thing. but it is important that people see the weaknesses in their training, whether they train tuishou or sanshou.



my 2 cents.



-b

I absolutely agree! I believe that if we put our peaceful art in an agressive sport it no longer is taichi. Taichichuan martial practice is just as good as its philosophy they are two parts of a whole. if you use it to fight and show off then you are leaving the philosophy behind and practicing Kick Boxing (gung fu has the same philosphy for the most part thats why I say kickboxing) if you only use it for health and breathing and not focus on the martial aspect you are only practicing Qigong not taichi. I practiced Gung Fu and TaichiChuan for 10 years (before my teacher moved) and my master rarely had us fight and most fights where to see how fights were but mostly in tournaments and those came once a year if that. Now all teachers focus on each side of taichi differently and depending on the students we have to focus on different things. (most of my students are older women who want health so I teach them alot of health but I make it a point to put martial aplication in it as well.) If I have a student who will not have of the martial arts part I tell them to find a Qigong class. I like to keep TaichiChuan whole even is I only have 2 students. (one of my classes only has two.lol)

On the MMA count. When my Gung Fu and taichi buddies and I get together to watch MMA all we do is criticise, not the fighters but the rules that keep the fight from ending in the first 2 seconds as it should. And thats one reason why TaiChi in MMA will not do well. MA is used to neutralize the opponent quickly and efficiently and taichi focuses on contrloling the opponent and making him lose his will to fight and that doesn't score points in mma.lol

I dont think its a good idea but hey it might just be the best thing we never know what the future has in store for us. :D

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Sanshou, Tournaments, etc...

Post by Scott M. Rodell » Wed Jun 09, 2010 8:42 am

Very interesting discussion, I'm glad to see it going on...

In respect to competitions, there are some aspects that appear to be over looked in the discussion above. It is certainly true that competition is at least always part ego. Honestly, I never left a competition without picking up my medal. When I heard some one pronounce, "I didn't care if I won or lost," that statement was always being made by some one who lost. So there appeared to be as much ego involved with keeping face as with enjoying winning. For myself & my students, I've always said we should be honest. Sure we have ego, & enjoying winning, that is normal. But if that is all if is, then there is a problem, don't let the competition be only about winning.

As for the competition itself, it provides one with the opportunity to really taste where one is. I'm speaking not just of martial skill in general, but with the inner man. It is easy to feel that one has achieved a certain level of "daoist cool" from training at one's own school. But anyone who has been in either public competition or had a private match can tell you it is completely different than "fighting" in one's own school with one's classmates. So it is a very real opportunity to see your ego up close, naked & personal. If you lose your cool & get angry, there it is, there will be no denying this to oneself. So it has the potential of being a very enlightening experience.

As for the question of Martial Sports vs. Martial Arts, in my experience they are quite different. I wrestled in high school & my son is a Nationally ranked competitive fencer & I can tell you without question, that Martial Sports & real Martial Arts are quite different. The sports have rules that are designed to make the game safe & more interesting. Martial arts are dangerous. There is no real comparison between the nervous tension of sport & the real fear of bodily injury in a martial art. Marital arts, in my mind, are about dealing with fear, seeing it for what it is, & letting go of & getting past it completely. So danger is an essential element for anyone who is genuinely on the martial path.

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Re: Sanshou, Tournaments, etc...

Post by tjqinterest » Wed Nov 03, 2010 9:07 am

TienLungTaoist wrote:On the MMA count. When my Gung Fu and taichi buddies and I get together to watch MMA all we do is criticise, not the fighters but the rules that keep the fight from ending in the first 2 seconds as it should. And thats one reason why TaiChi in MMA will not do well. MA is used to neutralize the opponent quickly and efficiently and taichi focuses on contrloling the opponent and making him lose his will to fight and that doesn't score points in mma.lol
Does it mean that taiji guy who is so skilled that he could end fight with 2 seconds, can`t deliver enough strikes to his opponent (and collect more points than opponent)?

Sports and real fight in battlefileld or street are certainly different, but it is quite questionable to say that person who is not successful in sports, can be successful in real physical conflict (if the opponent or duifang is the same person!)
Private matches are more like sports, because their goal is to learn, not injure somebody.

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Re: Sanshou, Tournaments, etc...

Post by J HepworthYoung » Fri Nov 12, 2010 2:26 pm

tjqinterest wrote: Does it mean that taiji guy who is so skilled that he could end fight with 2 seconds, can`t deliver enough strikes to his opponent (and collect more points than opponent)?
Well yeah, sometimes that is what it means. I want you to draw me a picture, we will have a contest, but you can only use circles to do it. So assuming you are better at drawing pictures using circles, are you a better artist than I? Clearly, or perhaps not so clearly, there is a subjective quality to this in which in is never a test of a martial art, but rather of a person. If we subject the test to specific parameters it is unwise to make generalizations one way or another, you may well be a better artist than me, or perhaps not, but by having a limited contest we will never figure out who is.
Sports and real fight in battlefileld or street are certainly different, but it is quite questionable to say that person who is not successful in sports, can be successful in real physical conflict (if the opponent or duifang is the same person!)
Private matches are more like sports, because their goal is to learn, not injure somebody.
is it any less questionable to assert that a person who beats another person in sporting is likely to beat them in a less than sporting manner?
I have issue with the concept of one beating another, having played chess against the same person more than once, I am aware that sometimes if we play against another the outcome is uncertain, regardless of the stakes and rules. If we can attest to such uncertain facets of contests, and I do, then perhaps to say that to win or lose against someone means anything in general is ignorant. Perhaps it makes more sense to let results speak for themselves.

I've encountered a fair bit of violence and sporting contest in my own life and personally don't find the two to relate much at all.

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Re: Michuan and Chen Style

Post by tjqinterest » Thu Nov 18, 2010 7:06 am

J HepworthYoung wrote:Perhaps it makes more sense to let results speak for themselves.
It is good point, but what are these results? Taijiquan guys have not been successful in MMA or sanshou competitions against other martial sportsmen.
And other stories about historical persons and events are often told and written for marketing purposes. They sound like this "Our ancestors were good fighters, and we follow their training methods. We can`t prove you anything in real fight , it is too dangerous. So you have to belive me and follow my method. But If you fail, it is your own fault"
No results in competition, no verifiable results in real life, so...

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Re: Michuan and Chen Style

Post by J HepworthYoung » Thu Nov 18, 2010 10:11 am

I've met several taiji players who will fight anyone anytime in a private match with no rules, no gloves, no soft floors and no cage.

I think it is unwise to generalize.

How many MMA people lose fights? There are bad examples in every type and group, taiji is no exception.

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Re: Michuan and Chen Style

Post by tjqinterest » Fri Nov 19, 2010 7:41 am

J HepworthYoung wrote:I've met several taiji players who will fight anyone anytime in a private match with no rules, no gloves, no soft floors and no cage.
I truly belive that such taiji players exist. The problem is that if matches are private, nobody else can use them to evaluate the skill of these participators. Why is it a problem ?
Because these people who learn taijiquan usually have 3 main sources of information
1) Words spoken or written by their teacher(s) and elder students. Words usually sound good and impressive. They are about glorious history and secret private matches.
2) Things that they can actually see and feel by themselves. These are excercises that they do and demos that they see. Demos usually look good and impressive. Real experiences in sanshou with non-cooperative duifang (some good martial sportsman fom other school) do not look so good.
3) Webpages and videos in internet. These usually contain good-looking demos & stories and bad-looking competition videos. In demo you can see master who pushes non-resisting student far away. In competition you don`t see taijiquan techniques and body mechanics at all.

The real problem is lack of information, lot of statements that can`t be verified. The reputation of taijiquan as martial art is based on
1) stories about historical events and people (can`t be seen and verified) and stories about nowadays private maches (can`t be seen and verified).
2) good-looking demos and extrapolation-thinking "if he could do it so powerfully with cooperative oponent, he can also do it with resisting oponent" Extrapolation is very powerful tool!

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