Martial Tai Chi™

De-mystifying the Mysterious

4 Dangers of False Kung Fu

Whereas the last article dealt with what I call the 4 "Cornerstones of Kung Fu", this little add-on shall deal with those aspects that, while often advocated and sold as "authentic Kung Fu" or especially "authentic Tai Chi", will harm your training and development rather than aiding or supplementing it.

These are the false goals, pitfalls or blind-alleys that are best avoided altogether. Many teachers will peddle just some of the items on this list, but not others. Some will teach a mixture of these items along with some aspects from my first model (Cornerstones of Kung Fu).

In our view, a teacher that offers more from this second list than the first is better being given a wide berth. We believe that this model characterises the teachers that should set your charlatan-o-meter bleeping loud and fast. Students who do attend classes where these secondary aspects are highlighted, should do their utmost to jettison those aspects at the first available opportunity.

We believe that the best teachers will recognise the legitimate goals of martial arts by teaching entirely from the items summed up in the "Cornerstones of Kung Fu" article, and will teach nothing from the aspects listed here.

Some of the items found in the following model might seem reasonable to some readers, but in terms of goals of martial training, they are certainly not. Aim to cultivate anything on this list and you will stray far from the goal of martial effectiveness.

At the top of this model is the EGO. Notions of "internal" and "soft" arts being superior to the so-called "external" or "hard" arts are cultivated profusely. While some schools who advocate maintaining this false dichotomy will protest that they are not claiming superiority, they invariably are, if only by virtue of the fact that they consider there to be an inferior external methodology that they seek to stand in opposition to. In Tai Chi circles specifically, we can really go to town in the realm of the ego. Ideas often associated with Tai Chi are that it is the most advanced martial art and also the hardest to "Master". Such pretensions keep the punters happy as they imagine themselves to be on the road to mystical mastery or enlightenment, or else they can console themselves with the false modesty that they could never attain the same wondrous heights as their wise and masterful teachers, while lording over the newer students. Other words associated with Tai Chi are things like "Pamper Treat" and "Indulge Yourself." Nothing could be further from the road of hardship that legitimate martial training requires.

At the bottom of the diagram is UNFIT / ARISTOCRATIC BODY. A great many - in fact the vast majority of Tai Chi schools perpetuate the idea that exercise should always be gentle and should never be uncomfortable. It is falsely claimed that people should not seek to build any muscle mass as it will actually be harmful and will stand in the way of your "using energy"; the prevailing idea being that you don't need to be strong or fit as you "use energy rather than strength."

Such myths come from elitist Chinese ruling class ideas. It was not considered seemly for aristocrats to break a sweat and build their muscles as such things were associated with labourers and bodyguards. Such pretensions and diversionary notions were encouraged by the Yang family when they were forced to teach Tai Chi to the Manchurian nobility.

In reality, if you used no strength, you'd fall over - muscle contraction is the thing that's holding you up. It is true that your movements need to be refined, but all good athletes know that and seek to minimise how much excess, inefficient or localised muscular tension they are using.

Another erroneous but dominant idea in Tai Chi is that you should never move quickly because it "breaks the silk" (here referring to a misunderstanding of the concept of reeling / twisting silk power or chansijin).

The painful truth is that if you do not push yourself beyond what you are already capable of, you will never progress. To strengthen and tone muscles you must break them down and rebuild them. To develop good reflexes you must exercise them by making them react quickly to incoming attacks.

A downright dangerous idea often found in "Tai Chi" schools is that moving quickly depletes your life expectancy. I can almost guarantee that it won't shorten your life as much as developing heart disease by becoming physically lazy and refusing to ever get out of breath. No doctor in their right mind will tell you that quickening your heart rate and breathing is bad for you, unless they suspect you might keel over any minute. Even in those cases, the answer is to gradually come back to health and fitness. Popular Tai Chi is generally quite unsuitable for that purpose.

So-called 'Tai Chi gentle exercise' is the path to physical maintenance at best and regression at worst, depending on how fit or unfit / infirm you were to begin with. In truth, no one improves by taking it easy. This is why so many Tai Chi classes are full of unfit, obese people and some have genuinely not always been that way - their 'Gentle Tai Chi' has actually made them physically lazier and fatter than they were before they started.

In this same category I have included aesthetic and artistic pretensions and embellishments such as flowery movements, silk suits and fans and the pretense of gracefulness. As with ballet, true gracefulness requires a fit and toned body. It only looks effortless.

To the right of the diagram is HARMFUL BAGGAGE. Here we have the embellishments often termed "cultural", such as ideas associated with animism, shamanism, magic, ancestor worship and moral relativism. We think that such ideas are outdated at best and dangerous at worst. I'll say no more about them here, except to tell you a little story. We had a man and his son participate in one of our classes. Afterwards it became clear that they were looking for what the father termed "the dark side of martial arts". I told him we could not accommodate them in such matters. He told me that he had forgotten his wallet and asked if he could pay next time. We said "of course", but as you might expect we never saw them again. Sometimes a picture paints a thousand words.

On the left side of the diagram we have TRICKERY. Here I'm referring to the little tricks, stunts and deceptions some teachers use to make their students and the general public think that they have special powers. This aspect ties in with the mythological ideas referred to in the 3 other categories. A so-called "enlightened Master" might be seen throwing his deluded and brain-washed students around in an absurd fashion. Sometimes such demonstrations are simple set ups - the "Master" is just performing a deceptive trick that looks impressive, but anyone who knows the secret can replicate it.

More sinister is the kind of mind control some "teachers" exert over their "students" who can actually be seen throwing themselves around without their "teachers" even touching them. We do not consider such things as funny or harmless in any respect and it is evident that some schools are little more than personality cults.

This article hopefully illustrates some of the ways that a student can be kept well off course of attaining any kind of actual martial skill as they wander down blind alley after blind alley in pursuit of the unattainable and the mythical. While some unscrupulous "teachers" knowingly perpetuate myths and purposely exploit students, all too often they are just passing on what they were taught without instilling any quality control. Quality control requires taking a long hard look at oneself and seeing what is real and what is not; what is genuine and what is pretension; what is self cultivation and what is self delusion. Whatever you were taught, as a teacher, the responsibility for what you teach is all yours.