The problem with traditional CMA is...

Kung-Fu usually had, don’t mention. Recent and perhaps today, hey I take Kung-Fu! Before no mention until mastered or the such. Recent and today~ talk after first lesson(s). Comparitively, the skill level therefore, execution timing and level might be different. Perhaps people shouldn’t look at their kicks while in a cocoon or caterpilar stage. Perhaps they should acknowledge them only After they have butterfly~(stage~) kicks.

You are talking 1:1 scenario. But Kung-Fu might have always been mindful and form/technique-ful of more than one on you~ at a time. Today is looking at fighting. It seems like desperation tactics, panic stage moves is what’s the thing people are big on. Let’s study brawling, catfighting, because I’m comming upon a untrained–though not undeveloped (fighter who will do these natural reaction moves). It’s only analysis because for real, you get called out for a honor satisfying one on one just to get positiond for a Jump or attack from behind or beside when your back is turned~ turned to the person talking and distracting/luring you.

Kicks are not always about first move contact necessarily. Some might be about locomotion and set-up and move away from simultaneous attacks. While the kick you named, butterfly kicks might not seem a solid hit they could evade upper level attacking and back-up/away those who might try to close. A side foot threatening to clock you on your jaw might give you pause or at least delay you enough that I can get out or deal with the person I’ve been working with 1:1 to take person out of the equation at least long enough to turn a focus to you…iIt also could provide momentum or spring, for a shove.

Not even looking at your improved condition to do some of these seemingly to you-and-others not tactically practical kicks, you can try to trim a hedge with a lawnmower, but that can be strained and awkward. Try more to use the right tool for the right job.~Match the tool To the job. like keep them back with a tornado kick, or stomp a weakened opponent, someone who got wore down and reacts slower. Or who you positioned to be down with a priming strike .~.

If you master Kwan Dao then have Wind-Fire wheels you might have exceptionally fast hand work which translates to higher perception which means the 103 mph fast ball takes forever to get to the plate and practically seems virtually Still when you make contact. If you take the weapon out of your hands with traditional forms I think it might look like punching and blocking. the weapon and spins/deflections is weight training in application to fighting, not static~ muscle-building but muscle-interaction working. which means as I transition from/to groups the transitions have been strengthened.

If I lift for muscles, the groups are significantly more developed in load-bearing~ capacity. Yet there seemed virtualy little to no attention usually applied to the transition of one group to the others which I might think would stress/tear/strain and damage. This Actual LAck! of muscle development could hurt you in your 1:1. Much more perhaps in the More likely, 2:1, 3:1, 4:1, 5:1, 6:1, 7:1, 8:1, 9:1, 10:1…

If you look at the meal before it is fully prepared/cooked Yes~ you might think O fruit! What a mess! But traditionally Kung-Fu would only taste the food and say, needs more salt, let it stew some more/(practice)…not yet, it’s on it’s way…

If you wouldn’t serve the guests undercooked food they would respects to the Chef for a well served meal.

Some might say, some-such perhaps-ish.

I No_Know

It is really up to you. If you want to fight in the ring event, you will find and take whatever works for you and practice on that.

If TKD is out of the Olympic game, will it still be popular? TKD is popular in Taiwan. MMA and BJJ start to gain popularity in young generation in Taiwan. So 10 years from now, will MMA and BJJ gain over TKD in Taiwan, we shall see.

That was what I meant in the last post.

Granted, if your aim is to fight in the ring, TCMA and weapon drills may be way out of your agenda and practice priority.

So based on your goal, you take some and discard some.

Guan Dao is also called horse chopping broadsword. It was used to chop many people or mainly the horse. And yes, this is nothing to do with MMA or UFC fights. With machine guns and other firearms, you do not have to practice to sway the heavy object.

However, it will be work out for your steps, waist, back, and arms etc. If you have to fight with a long pole or other heavy stuff, then your practice come in handy assuming you do have a gun, and the bad guys do not have guns either.

Along the same reasoning, would you say MMA and BJJ or any ring related skills will cover all fightings in real life? The answer is not either.

Will MMA events influence people to practice what styles of MA? yes, absolutely.

There are thousands of TKD schools, private, the city teams, high school and college teams everywhere in Taiwan!

How many people may sway Guan Dao in Taiwan? Mm -cough- Mm not that many.

:eek:

i agree. most ppl don’t know how much a real broad sword weighs. if you can use that properly you can do some serious damage with a crane beak strike or dragon claws - bare hand

On the political notes:

When TKD came out of south Korea, it was highly promoted in the military, schools and all public venues.

Taiwan has strong diplomatic relationships with ROK at the time.

We still do, the Korean TV soap operas are so popular in Taiwan right now.

:slight_smile:

Greetings..

Sometimes i think we may be too insulated from reality in our “fighting” perspectives.. within the MA world we compare skill-sets among various styles, and ultimately judge against the current “Top Dog” in Ultimate or Extreme fighting competitions.. but, in the street, when we need it most, it is unlikely we will be faced with a well trained fighter.. that is not to say that an aggressor might not have street skills, but a well trained plan from most styles will likely even the odds or give someone an advantage in a bare-hand conflict.. of course, weapons change the game!

The majority of students don’t intend to be the next NHB champ, they are either looking for a good workout with MA benefits, or a social event with MA benefits.. TCMA, JKD, MMA, BJJ, TKD, whatever.. taught with a clear understanding of its use is better than nothing..

Any school that claims to be a “Martial Art” should include sparring and, if desired, actual fighting in its curriculum as a requirement.. a student that pays for “Martial Arts” training should expect to get martial arts training.. otherwise call it a Cultural Dance School or Traditional Arts School.. but, without experience against an oponent in, at least, a sparring class, there is no “martial” in the art..

It is unreasonable to think that every school trains students to compete at the extreme levels.. but, i think that every school that refers to itself as “martial” should require the student to experience that aspect of the Art..

Be well..

There isn’t really a problem in TMA unless you look for one.

The facts of the matter are that there are thousands, maybe millions of TMA out there but they can’t use their skills. How do we know this? Ask them to fight.

There is a much, much smaller number of TMA out there that can fight. How do we know that? Ask them to fight.

The problem we are reffering to now is one of the information age. You have more people talking the talk on the internet then walking the walk. Before these folks were the local fool, who trained “black belts” who got beat up in the playground. Today they are authorities on the subject to millions of internet users.

In the end it doesn’t matter. Folks will find training that suits their needs and wants and they’ll know what they know. On one hand you really don’t need this type of training in today’s world. On the other there has been nothing more important to me.

This is in the early 90’s.

My brother had a Kuoshu Guang in Pan Qiao, Taipei County, Taiwan.

We had several classes. Tai Chi pushhands, Shuai Jiao, Tai Chi Qin Na, Shaolin Qin Na and Zhao Bao Tai Chi Qi Gong.

Guess what happened. We were overbooked with Qi Gong classes like 10 months ahead.

There was a huge attendance in Tai Chi forms and Qi Gong.

There was almost none in Shuai Jiao, Qin Na or pushhands or any body contact classes.

Guess what we did, we closed the other classes.

So the big question is that where you get your fighters into your school?

Even with the few students in Qin Na, Shuai Jiao and pushhand. Most would drop out in a few classes and some never come back.

With my family moving to the west, the school was closed.

Yes, Shuai Jiao and Qin Na are like Judo, akido and BJJ. You work or train and learn with a live partner from day 1 to day last.

A lot of tumbling on the matt. Not careful enough. A lot of injuries, too.

Ya Ya We have a problem with TMA.

How do you correct?

:smiley:

Greetings..

How do you correct?
We take a lesson from Aikido.. we teach the students how to fall, how important footwork is.. so little time is spent “concluding” a technique.. Taiji principles are extremely useful in tumbling and neutralizing the Qinna of a takedown.. Injuries are the result of too little training in receiving attacks, unfamiliarity with options correcting a failed technique.. We cannot assume we are immune to attack, recovery from someone else’s well executed technique is essential in conflict survival.. we cannot assume that every technique will work every time.. many teachers i have experienced fail to recognize the potential for being in a disadvantageous situation.. to assume that we will always have the upper-hand is unrealistic.. We study in detail the connection of the feet to the ground.. there is much more of the body that can contact the ground, study is appropriate there, as well.. Forms are the beginning of the Taiji experience, a reference point from which we explore the many aspects..

When i am teaching application of technique we “conclude” each one with a tap or a pulled strike to demonstrate efficiency.. i ask all the students to either join in or observe.. if they don’t feel comfortable in the contact portion of class, they should look for the Taiji principles.. we start very slow and deliberate, evaluating a technique and the options.. then we gradually increase the speed till we are at 75-85% combat speed.. it usually takes 2 or 3, 30 minute classes to get one technique to a useful point, many more to become comfortable with its use.. this is a slow process of building an arsenal of experiences and options in a semi-combat environment.. those that are inclined play at sparring speed and we have great fun, often defeated by laughter.. either at how simply well something works, or.. at how we can screw-up a simple technique.. either way, it’s a good learning environment.. the students often present situations that demand fresh uses of traditional techniques, a great learning situation for the teacher, too..

But, “how do we correct it”? we simply stay focused and flexible.. blend a little application into regular class, osmosis is a great process..

Be well..

(The facts of the matter are that there are thousands, maybe millions of TMA out there but they can’t use their skills. How do we know this? Ask them to fight.)

and when one gets shot or knifed because that is how some people fight one will then understand the difference between how some want things to be and how they really are.

The measure of ones effectiveness to me, to be that if one lives to reach old age with a good life ones art has served them well no matter what the art. I know of a number of people that do not fight (in the sportive sense) or spar and yet have defended themselves quite nicely when they had to using taiji. these people would probbly be listed among the millions.

The problem if there is one, seems to me to be one of not knowing the difference between sport and fight, in one sense there is many carry overs, in another they are quite different animals.

I think you could live a very long and fruitful life and never study any martial art ever. So I don’t think MA has a role in one’s longevity definitively speaking.

secondly, anyone can be shot, stabbed, beat up whatever, doesn’t matter what they train.

Getting around to sportiveness. Here’s the kicker. Traditional martial arts have consistently done poorly in venues where one has an opportunity to show their martial art in as close to a real fight as it is possible to get without the police getting involved.

It is equally surprising how many TMA folks out their stick to the traditionalist mindset and follow all the antiquated rules that often times do disservice to the reality at hand.

So, while a lot of people like to talk about side effects of traditional martial art, it is a difficult subject to breach when you are talking about the failures of traditional martial art held up against the successes of the much more cut to the quick modern martial arts that we are seeing become an art in their own right as far as martial arts are concerned.

mma glean the very best of the high percentage techniques from many of those same traditional arts and pretty much dump all the rest of the stuff that is ineffective or quite simply, not martial at all.

Can you blame them?

I ask people who are into martial arts, “what is your objective in study of martial art?”

You would be surprised at how many people have as their objective to hone their ability to fight. Many of these people get robbed of that opportunity by spending all their time learning patterns that are not martially applicable for the most part, doing fitness routines they could get at any gym, plus getting a healthy does of moral and ethics according to their teachers world view and so on.

The last one on that list is a big one. It is not acceptable to hammer down a moral and ethics tale in the public school system under strict controls of curriculum, and yet somehow, there are many sensei and sifu who for some reason feel obligated to ensure that their students are ethical and morally fit! Adult students no less, many of which have lived pretty good lives before they even met the person.

Anyway, I’ve practiced and studied traditional martial arts for a goodly portion of my life and I have come to see that the mechanism is quite broken and needs to be remedied. The filter needs to be reapplied and the masks need to come off and the work needs to get started.

It’s been said: “The unexamined life, is not worth living”. This is as true of the traditional martial arts as well. They need to be brought forward in method, they need to be brought forward conceptually and they need to be brought into the modern world.

Hopefully Billy Blanks will not be involved in this transistion, cause it’s worse when opportunists like him jump into the mix. He’s like the retarded bag boy squishing your tomatoes under the box of tide and thinking he’s doing a great job for you. (nod to maddox :p)

anyway, keep on keeping on. and remember, Cryptic fortune cookie speak only makes the water muddier and certainly doesn’t help the matter any.

Greetings..

I think it is also a dis-service to simply discard, out of hand, traditional martial arts.. there are hundreds and thousands of years of fighting experiences behind some of these “traditional” styles.. Yet, i agree that there is room for improvement.. Why not preserve the traditions (at the very least a good workout), and incorporate the more pragmatic modern fighting methods..

It is not acceptable to hammer down a moral and ethics tale in the public school system under strict controls of curriculum, and yet somehow, there are many sensei and sifu who for some reason feel obligated to ensure that their students are ethical and morally fit!
First, it is indeed acceptable to instill morals and ethics in the public schools, it happens every day.. there are rewards and punishments for behavior characteristics.. in hopes of improving our social condition.. i approve of ethics as a part of martial arts instruction, morals are a bit too subjective.. Religion is a personal matter, not suitable for Martial Arts.. But, the appropriate use of MA through ethics instruction is a value to society.. teaching raw violence without an ethical balance lacks character and is irresponsible.. i wouldn’t give my son a weapon without teaching him how to use it appropriately.. including the legalities.. I think we all have a responsibility to contribute to social harmony.. we teach a violent and deadly art.

Be well..

All nice posts, all thought-provoking ideas…all missing the mark.

The problem with Traditional Chinese Martial Arts is that..(ready?)…

          THEY ARE NOT BEING TAUGHT TRADITIONALLY !!!!!!!

I really have to credit Dixon Fung for this, as it comes from a conversation we had awhile back. Basically, you need to look at history.
In ancient China when kingdom fought kingdom, do you think that they taught forms first, or drills, drills, drills, fighting application,etc?
Fast forward to when China fought Ming vs Ching Dynasty-if you trained your soldiers, would you teach forms firs, or drills,drills,drills, and fighting application?
Fast forward again, Euraopeans invade, China is fighting in the streets, do you teach your men forms first, or drills, drills, drills, and fighting application?
Fast forward again, school fighting school-do you teach your students forms first, or drills, drills, drills and fighting application? (you see a pattern yet?)
Ok, fast forward one more time..to the past 50 or so years..
You are no longer fighting for your lives, you are fighting to promote your schools, and get students and make a nice name for yourself.
Do you teach forms and two man sets, and fancy weapon sets, or do you teach drills, drills, drills, and fighting? The emphasis has changed. People want to learn the next form, the cooler weapon, the super secret fighting technique that they will never use.
TRADITIONALLY, drills were all you learned, drills and fighting. THEN after your body had developed the neuropathways, the skills, power, etc, Then you were taught the form,which was more or less a diploma. Now you had a method to pass on your art to the next generation, but the skills were learned first.
I recently started teaching “backwards”-meaning traditionally-I teach the drills first, application and drills, and pressure testing FIRST. Then I teach the forms. And you know what? The students learn the forms quicker, easier, and with much better form. I show them a move from the form and they say, “Oh! I KNOW this technique. We do it in class!” This is sssoooo much easier than saying “No, your OTHER left foot”
-And they can fight using their Kung-Fu, as opposed to learning kewl forms and fighting with kickboxing. What a concept!

Ray is right-there are traditional schools that are fighting using Kung-Fu. His school(Chan Bond) is one, DF’s is another, Alan Lee and Duncan Leong are two others, and I am trying to get there as well-give me time, I’ll get there. I still have some more unlearning to do!
David’s problem with his learning in a traditional enviornment to be unuseable in a realistic scenerio, might be that what he thought was a traditional enviornment was not traditional at all. A traditional Chinese Martial Arts enviornment is not about ritual,altars, insence,quoting sutras, etc, but about blood, sweat, and hitting. Period.
What about spirituality? I think that we often mistake the fact that Martial Arts develops the spirit, with quoting sutras, and Tao Te Ching.
Real training develops the human spirit. And this is why I say that the REAL reason why people quit Martial Arts, is NOT because you didn’t give them their next belt, or that the technique was too difficult for them to learn, or they got bored, or they have too busy a schedule, or anything else (aside from moving,losing their job, or terminall illness)
But , it is that when you train in Martial Arts, you face yourself, and your weaknesses, all your inadequacies, EVERY DAY .
You look at yourself in the mirror and you see, as well as everyone else, all your faults, all your mistakes, all your weaknesses. We, as Martial Artists, EMBRACE them, grabbing the bull by the horns and struggle to work through them.
My teacher once told me, “It all comes out on the floor” He was referring to sparring. If you are weak, or timid, or scared, or passive, or lose control, or overly confident, it will be right there for you and everyone else to see.
Tak Kubota said, “Karate is training to overcome your greatest opponent-yourself”
This is where your strength will develop. This is how you develop your spirit, your iron will. This knowledge of self. This only comes through facing yourself on a regular basis. This is what Sun Tzu meant by knowing yourself first.
Meditation, will help you connect with yourself, observe yourself, and break through your emotional bonds which prevent you from reaching your true potential.
Philosophy can help you understand yourself, others around you who get lost in the world of materialism, and how we get distracted by clinging to twisted beliefs.
But it is not to get caught up in being Kwai Chang Caine, or Bruce LeRoy.
It is there to help you get through the tempering of the spirit. “To strengthen the steel, you must first put it through fire.”
This is TRADITIONAL CHINESE MARTIAL ARTS
. And when done correctly, when done traditionally,
THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NOTHING WRONG WITH TRADITIONAL CHINESE MARTIAL ARTS !!!

First off, I’m not discarding anything out of hand. I have my time in and still put it in daily. I am indicating that there is a problem with the machine as a whole. Hundreds or thousands of years of fighting experience equates to nothing for anyone. One’s kungfu is ultimately their own as are their experiences both of conflict and conflict resolution and of peace. Also, If I was learning to shoot a gun (analagously speaking) I wouldn’t learn with a black powder rifle that although it works it is quite obsolete.

Lessons in Ethics and morality are strictly guided in the school system where I live, I don’t know about where you are and I guess it’s different, but the whole topic of ethics is in an overhaul from government to school to family to the general idea of it. Overall, I would say that there is a lot of problems with ethics in society today and I wouldn’t think that a martial arts school is the place to begin to make those reparations and renovations. We certainly can readily observe the decline and decay of ethics and morals in our society. But that’s a whole other topic, and I still think that the matter at hand should be the matter at hand. teach martial arts that is.

On preservation of tradition, i see this as only something that serves the inflexible. :stuck_out_tongue: It also makes way for delusion in many respects. IE: court robes or saffron robes worn in ma classes that are as far away from monastaries as one can get. This is something pretty quirky in my books, dunno bout some of you other guys.

getting a good workout is hardly a tradition. It’s the presentation and ultimately the results that are most important in a field of endeavour. Many art forms are presented and taught as bonafide methodologies of instilling martial ability in those who undertake their practice, and especially over the last ten years with the advent of the venue of test your skeelz, we have seen agaion and again that this is most certainly not the case. And yet, to hold with tradition often prevents progress and improvement in an artform.

Any artform, not just martial arts. Art is creation of something new, not copyism. Persisting in an ungrowing style is capitulation in it’s worst form. If I set out to study something, I want it to be the latest proven methods and technologies. I want guiding principles, not antiquated concepts. I want to learn martial art, not pseudo religio-philosophy combined with my exercise routines and coupled with the keeping of old and rusted and not recently fire tested techs and methods.

For TMA to keep growing and flourishing, there are some hard pills that gotta be swallowed by the traditionalists. Time and again it has been shown that adaptation and flexibility needs to be looked at and addressed. In many senses, in the traditional formats, this is not so.

The successful martial arts are going to be the ones that can be shown to be effective in an upfront and truthful manner. Those that continue to shroud themselves in face games, antiquated methods, and self created social strata within, will decay from lack of interest, but moreso from the plain and simple cause and effect rules.

TRADITIONALLY, drills were all you learned, drills and fighting. THEN after your body had developed the neuropathways, the skills, power, etc, Then you were taught the form,which was more or less a diploma. Now you had a method to pass on your art to the next generation, but the skills were learned first.

Interesting. When you say “drills” I assume you mean short patterns of movements or combos?

How did you build a foundation in order to be able to execute the drills?

Or were the drills to build the foundation ( what about horse stance training and those kind of foundational exercises?)

I’ve always thought of Tao Lu as a training tool but perhaps you and Royal Dragon are right in that the form was just a “record” of techniques for transmission. Or perhaps a little of both…but more of an advanced training tool.

Greetings..

Considering TenTigers’ post, i largely agree.. and, another consideration is the number of “fatal” or seriously maiming techniques that we simply can’t train in a “live” classroom situation.. well, we can, but we will soon run out of students.. The point is, that to dismiss TCMA as ineffective is largely a function of current “competition” mind-sets.. UFC, NHB, the Cage, etc… still don’t utilize many of the traditional techniques that violate rules of common decency..

Tradition, is how we got to this point.. it is largely through the efforts of traditionalists that “modern” martial arts evolved.. if much of the traditional styles are not suited to current fight venues, that doesn’t negate their street value.. there are many traditional techniques i wouldn’t use in a competition fight.. there are many MMA techniques that i favor in a street fight.. Preservation of tradition has value, developing current fighting strategies and training has value.. robes, uniforms whatever, has no bearing on a fighter’s abilities.. skill is skill regardless of how it’s packaged.. some people rail against TCMA because they think it’s cool, or makes them look like the next best thing.. for me, it shows a shallowness of character.. what will be the next “best thing”?.. TCMA is my foundation, but.. i also train JKD, Muay Thai, Mo Hahn, Kali/Escrima.. i enjoy the history, the philosophy and the energy work developed through TCMA.. and the value of its MA applications (when studied at depth).. TCMA has some very useful conditioning and stamina methodoligies.. and, it has some useful philosophy.. but, if one’s only consideration is some form of NHB competition, so be it.. i am more concerned with the development of the whole person..

In no way do i discount the value of MMA training as a fighting application, it is excellent for that purpose.. and, i utilize many of its systems in my own practice.. but, that use is supplemental to a value system, TCMA..

David Jamieson: Considering your position on TCMA, your Icon seems inconsistent..

Be well..

Fu-Pow, when I say drills, we do line drills, horse stance, etc, but we mainly do alot of pad drills, reaction drills, conditioning, hands on, banging, self defense application,falling,pressure testing, fighting, everything. It is only after the student builds up these skill sets that they are taught the forms, last in each level of their curriculum, as opposed to first-which is what I used to do. They pick it up sooo much faster and easier, and they know exactly what and why they are doing each movement, rather than struggling to do moves which have no rhyme or reason, until they are taught applications. When you look at it, it is truly backwards. But that is the way most schools have taught it. Why? Because then they have more time to develop their forms. They will look better in demos, and in tournaments. Ass-backwards.
Time for a paradigm shift.
Don’t ask me how I’m gonna fit in Lion Dance in all this, but like I said, I’m working on it. My curriculum is always a work in progress.

Ok…I’m gonna take this in a totally different direction…

I seriously wonder if the current railing against TCMA is that it contains a subjective “artistic” factor. Modern society has become increasingly pragmatic interested in only in objective data to the suppression of subjective data. Note: I’ve been reading alot of Carl Jung’s work lately.

Basically, TCMA contains a factor that is represented as symmetry. For example, in Taiji Quan and Ba Gua Zhang the art is designed around an archetypal symbol from the subconcious (ie Ba Gua and Taiji symbol) .

Where as so called “modern martial arts” is a collection of pragmatic techniques with no coherent subjective structure, only what “works.” Furthermore, techniques and strategies are rejected based on the fact that can’t be “demonstrated” in a “live” situation. Basically, this is completely extroverted standpoint. If it doesn’t exist in the objective world, then it is not “real.”

China is an introverted society. The masters of old tried to extract principles from the compendium of techniques that they had accumulated and then link those to the subjective archetypal symbols alreay present in their society. They would then use that as framework to explore new ideas and then based on objective confirmation they would integrate those new ideas into the framework.

This is much like how modern science works, although their is huge denial in science about the “subjective” factor (even though intuition and symmetry play a huge role in science. )

There is much to think about in these posts and I have enjoyed reading many. It is good to see people revamping their approach instead of dismissing the whole thing and moving on to whatever happens to be the current craze. The fellow who mentioned they were having trouble fighting and couldn’t quite get it at first but stuck with it and after five years is now doing much better and utilizing many techniques successfully in sparring. That is what kung fu is! I believe that was a Praying Mantis practioner??? Anyway, many people don’t understand that very few can stick it out and take the training to the next level. We expect our Sifu to make us into a fighting machine or to spoon feed us the next lesson. Not so in my opinion. Sifu is there to guide you and show you the proper way of doing things and make sure you are on track. But it is up to you and you ALONE, to make it work and to practice it and ingrain it within yourself. This is not what many people want as they do not have the dedication to spend time on these things. They want the simple road that can be done with mere physical exertion and minimal mental consideration. I am nowhere near a level of deep understanding but what I’ve learned over the years, and the time and effort to get where I am has been very exciting.

TenTigers put it excellently with the idea that we are looking at our own fallacies and every time we step up and spar, we are facing our own fears and through time hopefully overcoming them. That was a very interesting perspective and I thank you for it.

I’m not going to get into a philosophical discussion about what’s “real” and what isn’t. But if your techniques and strategies don’t “work” in the “objective world”, what the hell good are they? The objective world is the one where people are trying to punch you in the face, so I would view it as the most important place for your strategies and techniques to “work”.

Subjective archtypical symbols

Nicely put, Fu-Pow.

Chinese Pugilism = integrated framework of subjective archtypical symbolism in combative form.

In a nutshell, that’s about it.

Warm regards

Mantis108