Cirsus of Shaolin or not ?

[Royal Dragon]

Then there is the old way; No forms at all.

You begin with conditioning, learning of techniques to teach the principals and strategies of the style as well as how to deal with incoming force. You also learn body mechanical qi gong practice (often called "Martial Qigong". The majority of the lesson is two man work with a partner from day one. The form, is never taught. *If* it is, it is taught years later, at the very, very end, once the student has mastered all the skills and can already win the fight.

I have yet to see a fighting art, where the form needs to be taught at all. Even Tai Chi and Bagua do not need their forms to function and fight correctly.

this turns back to the 1st question of the thread. as a rough, yet exact, enlistment, schools train fighting skills in 3 levels of approach:

1. performance (circus, or whatever you call it) approach: they just learn the forms, and almost do nothing with the applications. of the basic skills, they may practice flexibility, which can make the performance more elegant;

2. self-defense approach: they learn the forms, and applications. but don't emphasize on sparring and body mechanics. they may practice basic and qigong skills, but the level and type of skill is superficial;

2. warrior approach: warriors must learn the styles via the forms, learn the various variants of applications, and master the combat tactics and stuff via sparring. they should have good basic (endurance, flexibility, balance) and qigong (internal and external, hard and soft) skills.
______

your master, like most the modern Shaolin monks, has been from a school of the 2nd approach.

[bawang]

you guys have previously trained wing chun or karate, and it has tainted your kung fu. I can smell it on you.

[Kellen Bassette]

Then there is the old way; No forms at all.

Except most people can't accept this. They become so enamored with their skewed perception of "tradition," they refuse to accept that in the older traditions, learning a bunch of forms was not how the arts were taught.

[Kellen Bassette]

unlike what wiz cool c's thinking, this is not a problem with the style. his master has 1) learned the forms, 2) learned the applications, but has not learned the next level, "sparring."

But that's the point a lot of people are making. This is a bad approach. It's backwards. You need to learn fighting first, then you can understand form training in the proper perspective, teaching a couple years of forms first is like building the roof before the foundation. You have nothing.

It also becomes more difficult to ever learn the sparring/fighting because of the bad habits and improper mindset you will have.

[Royal Dragon]

you guys have previously trained wing chun or karate, and it has tainted your kung fu. I can smell it on you.

Actually, I got the concept originally from Shuai Jiao. Later as I was learning my martial history, I discovered that forms were never the major part of the curriculum. Fighting was. Prior, to at least the Ming dynasty, all styles were taught like Shuia Jiao is taught today. Additionally, up untill the last 3 or 4 generations, MOST styles were still taught like this. It's only very recently that forms were taught first.

Form, without the understanding of how the art works, are useless. The practice only make sense after you can already fight. They are best used to refine already learned body mechanics.

They also make a good reference point for teachers. Not for students, in my opinion.

[bawang]

Actually, I got the concept originally from Shuai Jiao. Later as I was learning my martial history, I discovered that forms were never the major part of the curriculum. Fighting was. Prior, to at least the Ming dynasty, all styles were taught like Shuia Jiao is taught today. Additionally, up untill the last 3 or 4 generations, MOST styles were still taught like this. It's only very recently that forms were taught first.

Form, without the understanding of how the art works, are useless. The practice only make sense after you can already fight. They are best used to refine already learned body mechanics.

They also make a good reference point for teachers. Not for students, in my opinion.

the heart of hobby kung fu is the denial of kickboxing.

as long as the application doesn't look like scary kickboxing, it can be anything you want it to be. anything is possible. you are a boy again. kung fu is magic.

[Royal Dragon]

the heart of hobby kung fu is the denial of kickboxing.

as long as the application doesn't look like scary kickboxing, it can be anything you want it to be. anything is possible. you are a boy again. kung fu is magic.

That depends on the stye you are doing. To me, Moslem long fist looks like kick boxing, with some takedowns and joint locks added. The really old military based stuff uses a very simple striking system to jocky for position, so you can enter for an uproot, scissoring type of takedown. It's two totally different strategies in my opinion.

One relies most on striking, the other most on uproot and takedown.

[YouKnowWho]

the heart of hobby kung fu is the denial of kickboxing.

In TCMA, when you punch, you suppose to pull something back. This is not the case for kickboxing because

- with gloves on, you can't do that.
- kickboxing has no throwing in mind.

In the WC thread, "seeking the bridge", there are 3 different kind of opinions there. They may have:

1. boxing in mind.
2. WC in mind.
3. grappling in mind.

1 and 2 don't care about to "pull something back", only 3 does.

[Kellen Bassette]

- kickboxing has no throwing in mind.

Sanda has throws.

[Kellen Bassette]

the heart of hobby kung fu is the denial of kickboxing.

Hobby Kung Fu= Denial of Kickboxing.
China Town Kung Fu=Waving Arms.
Longfist=Haymaker.

See? I've been paying attention.

[YouKnowWho]

Sanda has throws.

kickboxing = Sanda - throws.

[Kellen Bassette]

kickboxing = Sanda - throws.

Well western kickboxing, I use the term kickboxing for western, Sanda and Thai...but yeah, your right in that case.....

[SHemmati]

albeit kickboxing is not originally western. as far as i know, the kicks and most the hand actions has been copied from Asian martial systems, other non-copied materials, like simple punchings, have also been a natural part of Chinese martial arts. naturally, as the origin, all the techniques in those Asian systems and in kickboxing have been and, of course, still are part of Chinese kung fu. so if some kung fu guy's fighting style looks like kickboxing, there's principally nothing wrong with his kung fu, he's just fighting with his style.

[Kellen Bassette]

albeit kickboxing is not originally western.

What we call western kick boxing was mostly derived from Karate. It just refers to the rule set that was popularized in the West.

[Jimbo]

What we call western kick boxing was mostly derived from Karate. It just refers to the rule set that was popularized in the West.

Yes...well, karate for the kicks, and western boxing for the hands. Pretty much began with Joe Lewis in 1970.