Kuen Kuits

[kungfu cowboy]

For those familiar with them, (and I am not) do you feel they apply more to a philosophy of applying them to training alone, reality alone, or a combination of both?

[kj]

Originally posted by kungfu cowboy
For those familiar with them, (and I am not)

Try 'em, you'll like 'em.

We usually just refer to them as proverbs or sayings. Probably keeps us out of some trouble on the kuen kuit/hao kuit issue too. :)

As mentioned elsewhere (by Rene and/or Tom, I think) there isn't a universal set.

Some are commonly known and used, some peculiar to certain family-groups, and others generally known in MA, or broader philosophical goodies. Interpretation can be another can of worms.


do you feel they apply more to a philosophy of applying them to training alone,

Some.


reality alone,

Maybe for non-martial artists. Though for some, they might have to use a lot of imagination to make useful sense.


or a combination of both?

Once you've glimpsed the truth of the universe, how can it be otherwise? :D

Regards,
- Kathy Jo

[kungfu cowboy]

LOL! I knew I didn't explain myself well. I meant do they apply to to how to use your wing chun in a training situation or how to use your wing chun in a real fight, or are there ones specific for each? Or something.

[Lindley57]

Kung Fu Cowboy,

The Kung Fu is truly a complete system. There should not be any distinction between what in the system is useful for training and real fighting. One's goal in studying this beautiful art is to make your techniques instinctive, much like breathing and blinking - you do not even think about it. The simpler, the easier, the better. The Kuen Kuit are a valuable set of idioms that are almost too simple that many ignore their value. They almost seem like common sense, but many people cannot guide their Kung Fu to meet their messages. Many strive for more complex solutions, often times dealing with techniques, while the Kung Fu is meant to be so simple.
Of course you will train hard, gain conditioning and all the other physical assets involved in martial arts training. Like Zen, when thought impedes your ability, these idioms guide you to the path of simplicity.
After so much training, the Kuen Kuit will make sense when your Kung Fu matures.

Good Luck in your Kung Fu

[kungfu cowboy]

Ok. What I meant was maybe they re specific to a mindset and attention to things that are best focused on in one or the other (or both) conditions.

For example, in many disciplines, there is required what seems to be an exaggeration of careful precision, or a peculiar manner of dealing with something in practice, that is not directly reflected in its application in reality.

For example here, maybe a Kuen Kuit applies to training alone. It implies an ideal situation, where factors can be controlled, taken apart, and mulled over. Put together as a whole, and used in a reality, it may not seem that the advice of the kuen kuit is being adhered to, although the essence remains. Which might be the original intent of the Kuit.

I'm still not making any sense.:p

[Lindley57]

Kung Fu Cowboy,

The understanding of the Kuen Kuit is truly for advanced martial artists. The Kuen Kuit, like ZEN, are not specific to any particular aspect of training alone, in class, or real combat. They are ideas that help guide one to follow the path of simplicity and truth in life. They are to be applied in your overall understanding of the Kung Fu, training or fighting. "Hit when you can, and do not hit when you can't.." seems like common sense. But why can't just anyone do that? Because we are all training to come to that understanding. Who would win between someone with the hardest punch in the world, but does not throw it at the right time and someone with a hard punch who understands the right time to land it? This then becomes that small opening that the best enter into and come out on top. So this saying follows in the nature of the Kung Fu, which is ideally to be the best is to be as efficient as possible and less wasteful.

The Kung Fu is "the best" not because a tan sau is better than a jab. The Kuen Kuit is a tool in the system to help address support for understanding the whole picture of how to be a good Kung Fu person. Adopting the Kuen Kuit is seen by one with a mindset that goes beyond the mechanics of techniques and formal training of an art or sport. One must gain the ability to employ these ideas into their person throughout the path. It is truly about knowledge and experience.

What does your Sifu offer as an explanation or interpretation of the Kuen Kuit?

Liberation is your freedom from mechnanical expression.
Good Luck with your Kung Fu...........