B.K Frantzis's Book: Power of IMA and Chi

[Jingang]

I've been reading B.K's book for the last few days and have noticed that he likes to explain things with Chi, Chi wave and other supernatural explanations. I know he is a well respected martial artist with a lot of experience in IMA who studied with a lot of famous teachers.

I have my own opinion on what is Chi/Qi and it's use in martial arts and I don't realy except the new-age terms he is using in the book.

Would love to hear what any of you tought about this book

[middleway]

Well i guess it is dependant on what you define Chi/qi to mean ....

People seem to think Chi is allot of different things.

If I talk about Kenetic energy, potential energy and such like do you accept that type of 'energy' as non supernatural? How about gravity 'energy' or force is that supernatural?

or does chi mean the type or quality of 'force' expressed by the body? a sharp force, a heavy force, a crushing force, a piercing force?

or does it mean the animating force of the universe? The animating forces of a human?

Or breath ....

or ...

or ....

Give us your definition of Chi/qi then we can discuss i guess.

Cheers
Chris ...

[Swede]

Think of qi as a model or a theory. If you read up on modern physics, there is stuff that sounds as mystical or supernatural as qi does--such as how maybe we don't life in only 3 dimensions of space but rather 10, it's just that 7 of them are rolled up nice and small so you can't see them. Or read about the two-slit experiment and try to understand the different explanations of what we see in that--some people believe that the electron can go through both slits at the same time, other say that's nonsense, in our universe an electron goes through one slit and in another parallel universe it goes through the other and these two electrons in these parallel universes interfere with each other. There's data (the results of the two-slit experiment) and then there is the attempt to explain the data (parallel universes, the electron goes through both)

If a guy hits you really hard and says it's because of qi, well, that's his model, his explanation--but he still hit you really hard, so he's got the data. Who can really say with explanation is right?

[middleway]

agreed swede ... you think the ideas of Chi are out there ....

Take a look in the average quantum physics textbook and you will think its a fantasy adventure!!

[Jingang]

Well, the way he explains it is:
"...use fa jin techniques with total relaxation....and no muscular tension."
"...fa jin is the storage and sudden release of energy to a specific point in time and space"
about the cover picture of him throwing a guy :"energy is discharged through the hands ..."

why the need to use the word Qi if one can describe all of this in simpler more scientific way ?
Power with no muscular tension ?
Does any of you believe power can be generated without the use of muscles?

[middleway]

hang on ... in none of those sentences is the word Chi used ... or am i missing something.

I think saying transfer of energy or release of energy is entirely scientific ... why do you think its not?? Maybe you only think of Energy as mystical Chi ... and not what science describes it as.

In physics and other sciences, energy (from the Greek ἐνέργεια - energeia, "activity, operation", from ἐνεργός - energos, "active, working"[1]) is a scalar physical quantity that is a property of objects and systems which is conserved by nature. Energy is often defined as the ability to do work.

Several different forms of energy, including, but not limited to, kinetic, potential, thermal, gravitational, sound energy, light energy, elastic, electromagnetic, chemical, nuclear, and mass have been defined to explain all known natural phenomena.

As i say .. i think i am missing your point here...

Cheers
Chris

[Bao]

People who speak about cheee is making harder for there students to understand what is important and what is not. Therefore they can have a student a longer time with them and having them pay more money. Professional teachers like to speak about chee, because the only magic with chee is that they know how to use this word to earn more money.

[Jingang]

I actually learned TCM in China and Qi is the building material of all the world so I do see it the same way as quantum physics.
I don't belive it's like a wave that can flow out of the body (like what b.k says).
I have a problem with "energy moving the body without muscle use".

The way he describes it, it feels like he is talking about energy cubes the Autobots and decepticons used.

[the.israeli]

Wooha, started reading it so fast? ^_^
Well, my modest opinion is BKF is a good salesman, beside being a good martial artist. He has a successful business running around the whole notion of him being somewhat of a Guru, having healing powers and studying under humans who possessed mysterious powers, etc. Visiting his website one can see this clearly.
However, beyond the the whole "My teacher liu was the IMA version of Yoda" thing, his book is highly accessible, giving far better explanations regarding martial arts than most other books on the subject (at least those available in English). Although his uses a lot of so called "supernatural speech", he makes his point clear about nothing in the martial arts being of supernatural nature, and all these phenomenon are the fruits of years of correct practice and hard work. He may have some old-fashioned and somewhat marketing-like ways to describe some things in his book, but I believe it's forgiveable in relation to the much more abundant coherent explanations he provides.
For me, reading his book was of a lot of aid tying the knots between many historical connections of different martial arts, and understanding a lot of general martial arts related concepts most writers find difficult to tackle. BKF goes to great lengths in his writing, for example, in order to make clear the differences between "internal" and "external" martial arts, and the whole in-between category. In my opinion, this alone is worth much.

[DeusTrismegistus]

Why don't you just set aside your pre-concieved biases and just try it. No expectations.

[Samoobramba]

Maybe because the book was released 10 years ago and the therminology is not up to date.
Also it is not an instructional book (so whatever he writes about Chi...) but is more a general (philosophical) book about IMA.

[Harvey]

...and I don't realy except the new-age terms he is using in the book.

I think Qi predates new-age by a couple of millenia

[JessOBrien]

From my experiences learning from Bruce, Chi is deeply interwoven into every aspect of his martial arts, massage and meditation classes.

The reason he uses Chi as the basis is because that's how he was taught in the 1960's - 1980's in Taiwan, Hong Kong and China.

Not everyone uses Chi as their way of teaching, but it is common in the internal martial arts. It's certainly not unique to him. So if you want to go that route, Bruce can be very helpful. If not, there are other ways of going about it.

-Jess O

[the.israeli]

...and I don't realy except the new-age terms he is using in the book.

I think Qi predates new-age by a couple of millenia

I think Jingang is not refering the specific term "Chi", but to the way BKF uses it in his book.

[Buddy]

My own experience was that practice gave me skill, not the words describing the practice.