I beleive that there are a few good reasons to keep secrets in the MAs.
Back in the day, MA was often a business of life and death so it was in the master’s best interests to hold back a technique or two for his own protection - sometimes even from his own students! Often the ‘secret’ would then be revealed to the successor as the master felt he was approaching death.
Some things should not be taught to people unless you know you can trust them not to misuse it. An ethical point I guess.
Sometimes people just aren’t ready to comprehend the ‘secret’.
Im talking about the generally secretive nature of TCMA. Technique sharing (cross style) seems to almost never happen. Training yes, but people dont seem very interested or willing in showing another MAist their stuff.
“its too deadly”
Its easier to kill someone than to kick their ass as far as Im concerned. Dead people dont fight back.
Killing people is fairly basic and rudementary compared with actual fighting techniques and applications, unless flowing into a death move, or unless you are talking about dim mak.
Yes, issuing a killing technique is easier than just stunning or knocking somebody out.
I think the idea of “not-sharing” is more based on personal/emotional motives than anything else.
Like with many things in regards to MA much is cultural and mis-interpreted by westerners as “secrets” or similar, and is passed on without a full understanding of the underlying principles and motives.
There are a lot more protocols to follow in asian societies, and much depends on them. Many westerners stripped the protocls out of the arts but left other things in that are tied to those same protocols or lay extra value on certain aspects.
Technique sharing happens, but its a fight between purists and pagans. JKD and Yiquan are 2 cross-pollenated styles, and they take flak in different ways.
The [ultra?] purists are kind of exclusionary… along the lines of: we’ve got a waiting list, accept only 3 students a year, and you have to interview 5 times before we’ll consider you. Sign here in blood.
As far as showing you a technique, oh you have to train the stance for 3 years first, so forget it. The only secret is doing it.
Hence tradition.
People are too wrapped up on keeping it secretive tho… We arent in feudal china anymore. Sharing more intimate knowledge amongst the kung fu community in general, and giving general knowledge to the public could be a great thing.
Saying it’s a secret is quicker than saying you don’t have the training nor maturity nor understanding to consistantly pull it off. I say it’s a secret and maybe some day… and youare satiated a bit and can go back to assigned training for your current level of understanding.
If you don’t know it it Is secret if someone else knows and you don’t and they are not telling you. It’s a secrect. Some you can find on your own. Some you must be told. But since you don’t Need to Know Everything, don’t worry about it.
If It took a lot for e to get to a level of a computer game and I tell you where to go and you get to the same level quicker you might not have appreciation for my telling you and just take it as you found out and that means that you are closer to winning. This thinking can be bad in life and help you into trouble. So (needle and thread) earning instruction might have been done as opposeed to telling all and having them forget and come back and say what came after that? C o n t i n u o u s l y.
But this is the thing - basically you could be asking that some dude give you something for nothing. He may give you a technique, but what if you don’t have anything to show him?
I wrote about this a few weeks ago, but I’ll write it again here. My Sigung started training when he was about 6, and in his 70+ years of kung fu he had 7 different masters and learned about 5 or 6 different arts. Now tell me that there wasn’t any technique sharing there.
The simple fact was that he dedicated himself to learning as much as he could of each art. He trained 8 hours a day, 6 days a week for much of his teenage and young adult life. He was shown much in the way of the techniques of each art, but he had to work for it.
So why do we expect people to share everything about their art without seeing them put in the hard work first?
The attitude today, especially propogated by the religion of consumerism, is that everybody is entitled to anything if they stump up the $$$'s. People want instant gratification for their investment. The trouble is that with kung fu the only investment that really works is time and hard work, to develop skill, trust and respect.
LC - I think there is the interpretation as well as the ‘secrets’. I think that many of the ‘secrets’ are there for you to discover if you are willing to put in the time and effort, otherwise the teacher may feel that you are ready for the knowledge and just give it to you.
It’s like when I try some stuff and muck around with a technique and find it works, then I go to my teacher and say “I think this is how it works, is that right?” and he says yes or no. It is a secret that I have unlocked, but eventually he would have given it to me when I was ready.
I guess what ticks me off is that people seem to expect that they should be shown stuff when they haven’t paid their dues i.e. put in the hard work. Just because information is more easily accessible doesn’t mean that it has to be freely given out.
I guess what ticks me off is that people seem to expect that they should be shown stuff when they haven’t paid their dues i.e. put in the hard work. Just because information is more easily accessible doesn’t mean that it has to be freely given out. [/B]
Same here.
At the last lesson one of the senior students asked me if I had been invited to drink tea with my Sifu yet.
I was shocked, since I have studied under him for less than 1 year.
Another Student simply said not everybody is invited to do so.
Shaolin-Do, as to sharing this ic a commercial life. Buy and sell. Steal and sell. If you see my technique you can mimick it without really learning. You can then see enough to claim (away from where I am) you do my style. People like my style and pay you for what is only mine. They do not know better so thief gets paid. People get deceived (though exercise). And I see people claiming my style when I’m the only teacher and I No_Know them. Reputability gets lost-ish…
I say I do my style. People laugh. Then say that they have seen that and that it’s no good. Or that they have a high rank in my style. ? wierdness and other than niceness.
What you propose th solve one dislike is the spreader of something else you do not like.
Secrecy~? Quality control.
Perhaps some might say some-such whatever whatever.
Why are TCMA types sooo secretive about their styles, applications, ect?
Well, first of all, this is more of a southern styles thing and is bascially a carry over of the Kuo Ming Tang, The Hung Men and the Tongs which were essentially the repositories of Martial arts that were brought out of China from the rise of the Qing until the cultural revolution.
The secret societies would not give freely of their arts lest a weakness in them be found by their enemies.
Nowadays, this is all going the way of the dodo. There are no more Qing warriors waiting to kill a Ming Loyalist and frankly, it’s all very silly from a western perspective. Considering that not a one sifu alive and teaching today every actually experienced the thang.
In fact. many sifu haven’t been involved in a Tong or the triads for a while.
The KMT is still alive and well however and there is usually an office in every Chinatown in every city in North America. these are the Chinese Nationalists who are the the same who fought against the communists in China, and the Japanese usurpers and now, the Communists again as tehy seek to take over Taiwan, the stronghhold of Chinese Nationalism.
In case you haven’t noticed, traditionalists in general are for the most part stodgy and secretive. It’s safer than having their tenets ridiculed publicly by the uninitiated.
The only secret is doing it.
