Steve James wrote: My point is that tjq (or internal ma) doesn't need to be separated from "fitness." I'd bet that YLC was extremely fit; but, I don't think that fitness was maintained throughout his life --even if he tried to practice just as rigorously to the day he died.
He worked very hard and physical throughout his life as a servant. He had surely strength. He might have kept his strength. But Chinese people that was not peasants or laborer didn't really workout at all. Qigong and tai chi type of exercises was all middle and upperclass people ever did. Sweating and exhaustion was considered something lower class and workers did. There's a similar thing today. Chinese women never expose their skin to the sun as they want perfectly white skin so they can't be taken for workers or lower class. Why Yang Tai Chi became popular was just because you didn't need to sweat or exercise hard. There was absolutely no concept about "fitness" or exercise to be in shape in China back then. You could say that tai chi was in fact separated from fitness. But you can also say that Tai Chi worked very well as a health exercise. Because of the fact that the people who practiced it didn't practice anything else to keep fit, it's popularity in China and how fast it spread would in fact prove better than anything else that Tai Chi is indeed an alternative way to keep fit.
Moreover, fitness is always relative to all the other variables: age, strength, illness, psychological state, motivation.
That's a very fair statement.
