TrainingDummy wrote:Doc Stier wrote:I agree with others here in believing that there really are no secrets, per se. In many traditional styles, however, there is detailed information and training practices which are considered proprietary material, and thus not for general public dissemination. Oftentimes, such guarded materials are in fact a part of other styles as well, although practitioners of each style may not be aware of the common ground until they encounter the same material while learning another style.
In other instances, specific form sets, solo and partner drills, chi-kung and meditation practices, techniques for specialized fighting applications, and so forth, seem to exist only in one particular style, and are usually reserved for advanced level students who are earmarked to perpetuate all of the style's various methods as teachers to the next generation of students within the official lineage of the style. This is traditionally how each generation of acknowledged master instructors prevents having their knowledge die with them.
So, in one sense, I guess you could label such material as 'secret', but only from the perspective of outsider's looking in, who are not privy to such material as a part of the style's 'inner circle' of practitioners.
Hello Doc Stier, thank you for contributing to this thread. Since you're part of the camp that feels that there is propriety knowledge within some styles, and that this knowledge should be kept to a small number of trusted students.
Please note that I'm genuinely interested in your opinion on this topic and not trying to denigrate your stance on it in any way.
As a teacher of a family style with propriety knowledge, how do you feel about the dearth of bad tai chi that exists in the world and that the majority of the world considers your combative art to be a health dance practiced by grandmothers and hippies?
I'm also wondering, if this propriety material is extremely difficult to explain through books or DVDs, like the subtleties of push hands or certain types of chi gung. Or is it, that there is fundamental information being withheld until the student has proven their worth?
Thanks,
Dummy
Thanks for the feedback. I will address your questions strictly from my own personal point of view, with the understanding that others may hold different opinions on these subjects.
Firstly, "the dearth of bad tai chi that exists in the world", or the fact that a majority of people may consider all varieties of Tai-Chi Chuan to be anything but a combat art is not my problem, and doesn't impact my personal practice, my professional teaching, or the value that I personally derive from my Tai-Chi Chuan training in any way. If anything, such views help me by way of allowing me to clearly present a very visible exception to the overly soft, limp noodle variety of Tai-Chi Chuan usually seen elsewhere.
The combative martial aspect of the art essentially becomes a specialized niche for me, and one that has very few local competitors. The hippie tai-chi teachers are actually helping me. They seem to be quite limited in what they can teach, so serious students grow weary and frustrated rather quickly, and often begin to look elsewhere for more in depth instruction with more challenging training. I offer a full meal deal as an intelligent alternative.
Secondly, the external aspects of some proprietary material, such as rare form sets or chi-kung sets, could certainly be presented for public consumption through video tapes, DVD's, and book publishing, but I feel that these resources are of greater value as reference materials for those who already know the material they contain.
Since the external aspects comprise such a small percentage of the overall core of the material, video presentations and printed descriptions of movement in a book, even with ample photographic examples, never really get the job done properly or adequately, IMO. There simply isn't any good substitute for solid instruction from a competent teacher.
A good teacher can not only guide and direct a student, but can also offer the student invaluable opportunities to experience what things should
feel like when performed or applied correctly. These experiential interactions usually shorten the amount of time required to duplicate the teacher's skills for most students. The video tapes, DVD's, and books, however well done, can never communicate such qualitative physical information, nor can they adequately convey the specifically mental aspects of the arts.
I think that videos and books can be a helpful resource for those who already know the material they contain, but they don't really make it for self-instruction. The intricate subtleties of authentic internal practices have to be learned through experience and feeling, not through intellectual analysis and deductive reasoning. So in great part, the 'secrets' are not always rare quantitative physical practices, but
rare qualitative guidelines and details instead.