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Old 11-18-2012, 10:58 AM   #90
Chris Li
 
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Re: Mike sigman's internal strength parameters- Have you guys read this; really!

Quote:
Joseph Brown wrote: View Post
Cady,

What if my standards are high? What if it's the case that because I really want to learn internal power I focus on people who are KNOWN internal masters, CXW, Chen Bing, Chen You Ze, Chen Qingzhou, Li Tai Liang, for example (I've seen all except CXW) rather than others who may or may not be internal but whose posts don't make sense to me given what I know of internal power?

And you again seem to take offense at a simple statement from my observations. You may be right, maybe I'm being too dismissive...but let me tell you a little story. Within about six months, maybe more than twelve years ago, I first saw chenstyle master Chen Qingzhou and xinyi master Li Tai Liang. I first saw Chen in Golden Gate Park. The first words (translated) out of his mouth were that the taiji was about the Dantien powering movement. He said Westerners seemed to think the Dantien was this mystical energy thing but that in fact for martial arts it was a real physical thing. And then he showed us...he let us feel his Dantien while he issued power. Months later Li does a workshop in Seattle and I attend. He tells a wild story about the mystical aspects of qi. Then he says, if you want to use qi in martial arts its about certain physical training. And he shows us and we spend the morning doing squatting monkey, training the Dantien (store and release, store and release).

What struck me was that the styles they practice look different, but what powers movements in each style is the Dantien. You try to figure out what internal power is about by focusing on unambiguously skilled practitioners of the neijia and there is less room for confusion or distraction. Anybody else, you're taking chances.

JLB
Well, that's basically the lineage argument. There's nothing wrong with it, and it's often valid - but lineage alone is not always a reliable indicator. I'm sure that you'd agree that there are plenty of Chen people who aren't worth training with.

Also, there are other lineages - and if you haven't trained with them then you don't know what they can or can't do. Nobody's forcing anybody to try something if they're not interested, but I think that some people are saying that if you want to talk about what someone is doing beyond a certain point than you have to get some hands on time.

If people were talking about CXW, but there were no books and no videos, and they have never touched him or anybody in his lineage - then you'd probably recommend that they get some hands on time too. That's all.

Best,

Chris

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