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Old 07-06-2007, 10:13 AM   #1296
Mike Sigman
Location: Durango, CO
Join Date: Feb 2005
Posts: 4,123
United_States
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Re: Baseline skillset

Quote:
Christian Moses wrote: View Post
Well Mike, if you want to talk about how you can tell so much about what people actually know by what they post, you're making it pretty clear that you don't have much (if any) actual experience with any real koryu or traditional gendai budo ryuha. What you wrote there just doesn't describe the way *any* traditional or koryu ryuha that I have dealt with actually works. It sounds a lot like the fakers who like to talk up their histories, but that's not how it works in Japan or here. Koryu are like families not military units, there is a hierarchy of *respect* and trust but it is much more flexible than people who have not actually experienced that kind of relationship would realize. A lot of what is mistaken for tradition in modern Japanese arts and Karate actually came out of the militarization of the country between WWI and WWII.
Er, that wasn't my point. My point was that I hadn't seen any refined knowledge of qi and jin skills in what little "koryu" exposure I've had, so I simply haven't been interested.

In terms of "no one is like that", I'll repeat the same question I made to Dan.... you've never heard people talk about "koryu snobs"? I certainly have, and from numerous sources. I don't get involved, but I'm certainly aware from that comment that not all people agree with your down-home, friendly assessment of "koryu". But then, that parts a side issue that I have little interest in because my interest is generally not in what skills anyone has, it's more along the lines of how they do any variations (if they know some, which is rare, on the whole) and how they describe things. Martial techniques within koryu or any other martial art can be excellent and I'm aware of a lot of that stuff, but that's not really my interest.

My position is more that the qi and jin skills are held up as the *basis* of Asian martial arts and that's why you see the Yin-Yang, the A-Un, and all that in every Asian martial art of substance. I look for that. I run into a martial group, style, ryu, "koryu", etc., where the members have little knowledge of the qi/jin/ki/kokyu stuff, I know immediately that whatever "secrets" they have within the organizations are going to be hollow. So why spend my time there? The traditional sayings about "self-cultivation" override the study of technique.

Regards,

Mike Sigman
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