"WHAT DOES IT TAKE TO BE A GOOD MARTIAL ARTIST?"

In a nutshell, there are two kinds of martial arts:


The first kind includes styles that rely on physical strength, speed, power, and endurance, such as TKD, boxing, Kickboxing, Judo, BJJ, Kyokushinkai, etc. These styles are much better for physical conditioning, because they rely on physical conditioning as much as technique, and they all train their techniques against resistive, non-cooperative opponents.


To be good in these styles, it takes 3 things:

1. Lots of practice,

2. Lots of physical conditioning, and

3. Knowing how to cut weight for tournaments.

The second kind includes older, more traditional martial art styles that are designed to overcome your physical limitations:

They are designed to overcome an opponent who is more powerful, faster, and more aggressive than you are. That sounds like a more impressive goal than the first category above, but the truth most learners never actually succeed in that goal.


It's not the kung fu that is deficient, mind you, it's the people who teach and practice them that are unsuccessful. These styles are often passed on without really being put to any kind of reality test. Somebody pays their tuition for a number of years, gets "certified" to teach, they learn all the moves and all of the forms but they never actually aquire the skill. Just because somebody has an "X" degree black belt and the trained under "(Insert name of famous master here)", doesn't mean they can teach you to overcome an opponent who is stronger and more aggressive than you are.


Many instructors in "traditional" styles still rely on being stronger, faster, and more aggressive than their students, and don't "pressure test" their techniques enough. The result is students who rely on being stronger, or faster, or more aggressive than their practice partner, or students who can't really do anything because they're not physically powerful and they have no technique.


To be good at traditional martial arts requires that you:


1. Find someone to learn from who actually himself actually has skills.

Instructor certificates and black belts are no proof. Exercise your own discernment.


2. Never stop searching.

Just because you found a teacher doesn't mean you've found the teacher. Always have your radar on when you here about new teachers, schools, or styles of martial art. Read and research about other martial arts. If you train taichi, what can you learn from boxing or judo or TKD. If you train Okinawan karate, what can you learn from taichi or Filipino Kali? I like to say that if it looks like Hung Gar kung fu, but it feel like Taichi, it's probably right.


3. Practice, practice, practice.

Training traditional martial arts involves a transformation of who you are. That requires hours and days and weeks and years of time spent in training, both with and without a partner.


4. Very important: PRACTICE WITH CORRECT INTENT.

If you try to "win", but you rely on using greater strength or greater speed or being more aggressive to win, you'll never learn how to beat someone who is stronger or faster or more aggresive than you are.


You can practice for 20 years and still have no real kung fu skill unless you train with correct intent. Kung fu should feel effortless. That means hanging back and watching it happen without "trying". "Trying" too hard means you are not using correct technique.

Practicing doesn't always mean trying to win! "Practice" is a safe environment for trial and error. Have the courage to make your mistakes without tensing up. Have the courage to lose on purpose. Be wrong the right way, lose while maintaining correct intent. Have the courage to watch your mistakes happen, instead of trying to compete.

5. Also very important: Be very, very honest with yourself.

YOU CANT'T LEARN KUNG FU IF YOU THINK YOU ALREADY KNOW IT!

If you want to improve your current level, you must, must, must decide to face your flaws and haul them out into the open for yourself and everybody else to see. That means making a conscious decision to learn instead of win.


You don't "know" kung fu after learning a number of moves and a number of forms and training for a number of years. You "know" kung fu when it happens naturally and easily, without effort, without "trying", under great pressure. If you have to "try", it means the reality is you that you don't "know" kung fu yet, but you're "trying" to hide that reality from yourself.

I have been practicing kung fu for ten years, and I the only reason that I have learned as much as I have is because I know that I do not know kung fu yet. I am finally feeling many of the missing pieces fall into place, my kung fu is working for me in a way that is more powerful and beautiful than anything I have experienced before, but I still have flaws, I can be beat, and if I want to discover my flaws and attain I higher level, I need to have the discipline to allow myself to be lose when I am even a little bit wrong. I cannot be concerned with ego or losing "face". I need to have the courage to be wrong the right way.

I have one classmate who is one of my best guides in this endeavor. He got there after only four years of training! I have come to understand that he got it and other people (like me) didn't because he gave up trying to win, and he learned how to win without trying.

He stopped trying to "look" the way he thought he was supposed to look. He learned to stay relaxed and focused while his partners "beat" him in chisao. He stopped trying to control his body and "make" things happen. He learned to "let" things happen. He didn't learn kung fu, his body did.

Above all else, learning kung fu requires you to keep searching until you find it. The Chinese word "kung-fu" is an action-result compound. "Gong" means "work" or "effort", and "fu" means "accomplishment" or "achievement". The compound word means "[visible]accomplishment as a result of [doing a great deal of] work". It takes a great deal of work to arrive at effortlessness. If somebody offers you an easy path, it's probably not a path that leads to truth.