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Thread: The Shaolin Workout by Shi Yan Ming

  1. #31
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    where does the line get drawn

    But too many people focus on the hammer and nail and not the house.
    You got to focus the hammer on the nail to build a house. I think that's the problem with most people today. They buy prebuilt houses. They don't understand hammer and nail. To me, true Shaolin is all about hammer and nail. But that might be a little too metaphoric and garlic doesn't enter into it. I suppose I could counter your wine anecdote with one of mine after working with drug patients at the Haight Ashbury Free Clinic, but I think that would take our discussion on a personal level and skirt the basic issue of what it means to be a monk. There's no doubt in my mind that Shi Yanming could do equally good work without the monk title. It shouldn't be about that at all. There's the attachment. The definition of a monk is one of Shaolin's most tricky concepts, mostly because the definition of wuseng is so soft, but also due to the fallout of the CR. You can look at the dictionary definition, but in English, we don't really have terms to address things like wuseng or even fangtuo seng. In English, a monk is just someone who lives at a monastery and is accepted by his monkish brothers.

    Buddhism is about extinction. That's the reaal definition of nirvana. I suppose you could say 'sink below' as much as 'rise above' but the bottom line is you got to get past the attachments. The bottom line is you can't take a good dump without first taking a good meal.

    I hope my tone is conversation too, Richard. You know me - we're old Shaolin cousins and I'm always a Shaolin devil's advocate to some degree. I respect Yanming and I miss interacting with him. The last time I saw him was when I was with Martha making Shaolin Ulysses. And the last time I spoke to Sophia was years ago, just prior to one of our Shaolin Specials. Was that the 2003? I can't remember exactly, but it's been a long time.
    Gene Ching
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  2. #32
    Quote Originally Posted by GeneChing
    Buddhism is about extinction. That's the reaal definition of nirvana.
    That's so not right.

    Richard, may I ask what "monastics" you have been around your whole life? Your understanding of monastic life sounds "new age" to say the least. It's my opinion but I think it's completely missing the point of monasticism.

  3. #33
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    not right

    Gene Ching
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  4. #34
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    im so sick and tired of seeing hammerfists in forms. god i cant believe you bring it up gene.......


    ninjetta's?
    Quote Originally Posted by Psycho Mantis View Post
    Genes too busy rocking the gang and scarfing down bags of cheetos while beating it to nacho ninjettes and laughing at the ridiculous posts on the kfforum. In a horse stance of course.

  5. #35
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    buddhism as a practice is about first, the four noble truths, then using the eight fold path to live your life so that you may pass into extinction(if you like :-) ) and break the cycle of rebirth and death.

    To cease the cycle is complete and utter freedom for the suffering that life is.

    so, yes, it is about finding a way to make oneself extinct.

    Having said that, I have to say that although there are 'living acts' of buddhism that I respect and admire, the underlying concept to me is innaccurate.

    For me, although life does have suffering within it, It is not suffering in and of itself and I would hope that if reincarnation was true, that I would indeed be able to experience life againa nd again throughout all time. To feel, to taste, to touch, to have the use of all ones faculties and senses is no suffering to me.

    All Life is change. We only remain in ruts because we keep ourselves in them. We only suffer, because we perpetuate our own suffering through our own fear and ignorance and unwillingness to change.

    So, no Nirvana for me thanks, Im not interested in never getting to suffer again. Suffering is a great teacher and shapes our hearts and minds with each encounter with it. Depending on how self absorbed one is, the lessons of suffering can lead to being able to help others not have to in similar circumstances where hindsight is clear.
    Kung Fu is good for you.

  6. #36
    well there is no doubt the CR threw a big monkey wrench in the term "monk" and Shaolin was always one of those round pegs in square hole kind of things- as we know it and many want to use it you are right there is no easy translation sometimes of the word, which is why I leave it up to them,the monks themselves. Sometimes your lips just have to be sealed, especially regarding some of the context and background- family stuff.

    Of course you need a hammer and nail to build, but Gene when you've got it built you can set them aside or use them as you need. Maybe you change hammers, use steel nails instead of zinc, or you figure a way to not need them at all like a Japanese farmhouse- you still get a structure. You're not going to have to keep them nearby like when you were building. That's the metaphor. If you just focus on the hammer and nails you'll never get anywhere- you're going to be the poor sucker monk who keeps getting whacked with the stick.

    There are tons of cracks which display some rather silly developments in the precepts, and quite a few practices that seem to refute the idea most people have in their heads as to what it means to be a "monk." Some people have an idea that monks must be reclusives, locked up in their little rooms in little temples stuffed way up on mountains. Yet there is such a rich tradition of mendicant and traveling monks. The stuff with women is particularly enlightening. I mean, forget the hungry ghost stuff- the dietary prohibitions are such a canard it should be self evident. Even before the ghosts get involved onions and garlic increase desire or passions...that made me laugh when I read it. I didn't know they had Listerine back then, lol...but it makes you wonder how Buddha's family managed to even join him when you read some of the stuff these guys came up with after his death.

    and the funny thing is, the people with most hangups about the word and it's definitions are rarely monks.

    Maybe Shi Su Yun felt the same way as Gotoma did, when his son became a monk...and he could look on his family as one...

    Wouldn't you say it is more about being the one thus come rather than the one snuffed out...what I mean is there is no sinking or rising. There is. The snuffing out or extinction of desire- it's not enough to just say that, there is a lot more to it...when your belly hungers, whether you eat sooner or later eventually you eat the same way- you take in nourishment and you can take pleasure in that nourishment and not be subjected to desire, per se. So it is not enough to say desire, the context too is very important.

    Ricky- You are actually a funny guy. "New Age" he says...hilarious...I can't wait to tell people you said that. Man you have some funny opinions.

    Seriously folks, he is here all night...

  7. #37
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    layers of the onion

    Our hammer and nail analogy is beginning to remind me of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintence. There's that passage (and it's been years since I've read it so forgive the paraphasing) about not being able to change a tire and having to refocus on just removing the lug nuts. I agree with you that the hammer and nails can be discarded after the house is built, but that doesn't mean that they shouldn't be engaged. It's just like you got to remove the lug nuts first. Therein lies the rub.

    It's very akin to Bruce Lee's Classical Mess issue. It's easy for him to say that after being classically trained, but it leaves a rather poor role model for those that follow. The next generation that follows are tempted to disregard the classical hammer before even laying a foundation. That's straight out dangerous. You know how easily zen can go bad. It is the razor's edge and a lot of people get cut. Zen's moral code, it's sense of compassion, can be easily disregarded if you forsake the discipline. But still, what you're describing sounds a lot more like taoist shamanism than Buddhism, and while there is a lot of cross over, especially in the Chinese circles, they are distinct. At a certain point, if you're going to break with tradition, you might as well call it something else. That's what Bruce Lee did. Hell, that's what Sin The did too.

    Zen is in a really weird place in America now. We're a product. We're a house cleaner and an MP3 player. Does that happen with other religions? Where's my air freshener called catholic and my iJew iPod? But anyone who has studied zen knows that this was originally a discipline for monks, not for laypeople. You can mock the ancestors all you want for their 'silly' precepts, but that is the very nature of tradition. If you don't like those traditions, if you don't accept them, you shouldn't call yourself part of the sangha. You should go out and forge your own way. Start something new, something that won't be commercialized into a product name. Truly evovle.
    Gene Ching
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  8. #38
    Quote Originally Posted by David Jamieson
    To cease the cycle is complete and utter freedom for the suffering that life is.

    so, yes, it is about finding a way to make oneself extinct.
    This statement is a little faulty. It is not Buddhism but Nihilism. Can you point out the self that we are trying to make extinct?

    When you reach Nirvana it means you have cut off all roots of suffering, but you continue to live until the end of your natural life, at which point comes "Parinirvana" which is still not extinction of "oneself".

    Gene- You should say "Buddhism is about extinction of suffering" otherwise you're misleading people by saying "Buddhism is about extinction" as David just showed us.

    Richard- Nice reply. Who would have thought you wouldn't have anything to answer?

  9. #39
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    Yan Ming is an actor, a performer, a teacher, a lot of good things.

    But saying most of these guys are monks is like saying the guy in the goofy costume at disney world is a real dog.

  10. #40
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    Should a Buddhist monk enjoy alcohol, meat, polygamy, fame and fortune? I guess thats a matter of, erm...perspective.

    To me, it seems like the more we apologize for these guys or use the philosophical gymnastics of relativity to cover up for their lack of integrity, the more they get away with.

    I can be happy for someone who makes it the way some of these dudes have, but not when so much of it seems to be built on deception. What can I say, when the first thing a buddhist monk does when i am introduced to him is hand me a business card or try to sell me something, its disillusioning. After all, i didnt just barf up this image of a humble buddhist monk here to spread dharma and teach gong fu as a form of discipline- this is an image the temple and its monks have widely painted of themselves. It only makes sense, then, that people get frustrated when these guys often (though not always) turn out to be greedy, materialistic businessmen.

    As far as the quality of the gong-fu is concerned, i really couldnt care less how fight-worthy it is. The way i see it, [B]many people like to prance around with this idea that "gongfu" dosent just mean martial art but really dont believe it themselves. From what I have seen, "gongfu" (shaolin and non-shaolin) has been a variety of different things in each of the places it existed. it has gone through a transition from meditative yoga-like excercises to fighting techniques to sport to parlor tricks and who the hell knows where next in one place, and in another it has gone from sexual practices, circle-walking, to martial arts...you get the point.
    so really, to gripe about the combat-efficiency of wushu or shaolin gongfu is pointless.

    BUT

    When it comes down to it, if you advertise something you have to live up to it. When you make yourself out to be something you are not, you have a lot of deserved criticism coming your way and no amount of culture-difference and pilosophical nonsense will exempt you from it. All this talk about "we cant hold them to standards we dont reach" is apologetic horse-****. It is not unreasonable to expect eomeone to live up to standards they claim to embody.

    Some of these guys seriously dont realize that there are people who know better than to just take their word for all this. I have crossed hands with quite a few martial artists in my time and although it kills me to say it, by far the weakest ive ever seen in terms of application and touch presence have been monks. Yet those very monks will swear up and down that theirs is the ultimate fighting system, incorporating the very best of both internal and external discipline. and that I am "number one!" if i practice shaolin.

    The focus of these so-called monks is very obvious when you look at their students. I would greatly encourage whoever goes to tournaments where monk schools have a presence to take a look at what the students excel in. In the competitions ive been in, students of monk schools overwhelmed wushu portions of the competition. backstreet-boy after backstreet-boy dazzled the crowd with jumping kicks, barrel rolls and splits.
    How do they fare in terms of focus on the traditional stuff? one word sums it up:

    Laughable

    the tiny bit of "traditional" they did was, at best, abridged (whitness the horribly abridged version of XHQ). I kid you not when I say half of these guys almost fell over backwards in a horse-step. When i say laughable its because i honestly laughed out loud when i saw them. they completely lacked any structure or form of power. none of the twisting, coiling power that you see in the few remaining monks that have an idea what theyre doing, and certainly no grounding foundation. Their movements were sloppy, empty and lacked force.
    As far as San-Da theres two points i'd like to make.

    1- Why do some of these guys need to invite muai thai coaches to come to teir school? (ive personally seen this)

    2- if shaolin is so awesome and comprehensive, why do they have to teach you ring fighting instead of actual fighting?


    The best place to look at when you want to know where a teacher's head is at is the students. The only thing they seemed to have were pretty, shiny outfits, flashy hairstyles and a condescending attitude. Yea, very humble- very Shaolin. Fits in perfectly with the marketing scheme. they dont train martial artists or buddhist disciples, they train Champs and wanna-be movie stars.

    the way I see it, they could do just as well and have a much less damaged reputation if they dropped the buddhist facade and went all-out wushu. Why claim to be a school of traditional shaolin gong fu when your are not? Or, on the other hand, if this is really whats being practiced at the temple, why not advertise that?

    All seems unnecessary to me, for all the talk about these people's integrity, they sure seem irresponsible. this kind of stuff is the reason that BJJ nut-jockeys are right to laugh at TCM practitioners.

  11. #41
    Sad but true, and the "Buddhist" wushu disciples actually think they're getting something more or different.

  12. #42
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    Yan Ming is a cool guy!

    He visited my school once with Sophia when he was in LA and we had dinner twice. A real character he is. I ran into him and his students in China in 2001. His students love him! He is a MARTIAL ART INSTRUCTOR OF THE SHAOLIN here in the US and I think people are taking this monk nonsense way too serious. The gentleman is private citizen of our country and deserves the respect of any advanced martial teacher, no? You guys should stop jaw jacking and go practice your fu. Maybe you'd be half as good as Yan Ming......
    S h i t I’m gonna go practice right now!

    Peace
    To the mind that is still, the whole universe surrenders.
    -Patanjali Samadhi


    "Not engaging in ignorance is wisdom."
    ~ Bodhi


    Never miss a good chance to shut up

  13. #43
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    There would be no problem if Yan Ming wanted to be respected simply as a martial arts teacher. The problem is that he, and many other "monks", demand that we see them as more than that.

  14. #44
    Exactly.

    Lokhopkuen- You obviously didn't even read this discussion. No one had doubts about his MA ability, but that's besides the point.

  15. #45
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    I read it before I posted bro.

    Yang Ming is bigger than life no doubt but he never made any bones about his lofty Monk status to me. On the workout floor his energy is contageous and I respect THAT.

    "Shaolin Monk" seems to be a big coin in the martial arts world these days but are any of those cats REALLY monks? Aren't the guys from the traveling Shaolin show graduates of the Shaolin Sports school? Are they really Chan Buddhist Monks? I 've always wanted to know. Also I love the guys who spend a few months or a year at one of the Shaolin schools and come back here a Master of martial arts. That is a cool phenom 4 real.

    Peace
    To the mind that is still, the whole universe surrenders.
    -Patanjali Samadhi


    "Not engaging in ignorance is wisdom."
    ~ Bodhi


    Never miss a good chance to shut up

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