the rum soaked fist: internal martial arts forum

I have noticed a trend here. A lot of the posters say that they can and train to use their taiji for fighting. At the same time many of the posters complain about how rare and difficult it is to find a teacher who can teach the martial or who does teach it regularly.

So are we all just a lucky group of posters or is there a bunch of us who think we can fight with our taiji but are just fooling ourselves?

Probably a little bit of both.

It also depends on what everyone's definition of "fighting" is.

I think that there are more teachers out there that teach the fighting aspects of Taiji than we think. They may not be as easy to find as the Taiji for health folks but they are out there.

definition of fighting?

um, physical conflict, usually resulting in the end of said conflict by the rising of a victor and the defeat of the loser.

Have you physically defeated an opponent using your tai chi? Have you been defeated in a conflict using your taichi.

neither of those disqualifies anyone from saying they can or cannot fight with their tai chi.

If you don't fight, you can't claim you know how to based on practice of form, understanding of theory etc etc. The act itself is 99% of the result. NOt the other way round. It doesn't matter if you win or lose, it's that you have played the game.

If you haven't, you simply haven't. no shame there, it's just not your thing.

To me, fighting involves striking or above levels of contact, or the possibility of being struck, stabbed, shot, etc. If you are both wrestling, grappling, pushing, or whatever, but not risking getting hit, cut, or worse, then to me it is dishonest to imply it was a fight. I know this view is not shared by quite a few people out there however.

That being said, if you were to subdue an attacker that is trying to strike, stab, shoot, etc. you with grappling, pushing, or what have you, that in my view is a fight. The old saying (at least in my school) "everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face" has a certain truth to it.

about 99% of the taiji guys I know are total masters of the game "I made you move your foot" (push hands). Some of them even have a couple of decent locks or takedowns, but could never use it in a real situation where they weren't being 'fed' an easy attack from a student or classmate.

then there's the other 1% I've met that have some serious power or skill. I can count them on 1 hand.

fwiw, Mo Ling had some serious skill. I'm not sure whether he was concerned with training to use it instinctively, but having met him in Beijing a couple of times and spent time with him, discussing internal aspects and feeling his skill, he has my respect.

Heh, heh. And Mo loves joint locks and throws. And I don't mean "joint locks" and "throws" separately here. I mean, he likes to do these chin-na throws that make it impossible to land in a non-injurious way. Mean stuff...

How about "I know I can fight" and "I do taiji" equalling "I'm figuring out how this taiji stuff fits into the fight game"

Sparring is what many practitioner need much more of. We call sparring "reality check". Sparring is not as close to real fight as one would wish, but most people who only practice slow cooperative PH drills might get some wake up call from it.

And I am very much against people's very strong pictures of how taiji should look like if used in a real fight. Taijiquan is filled with many tools you can use in many different ways.

BTW, what does "I know I can fight" mean? You can never know about the outcome of a fight. Anything can and will happen. Having a to strong belief that you can fight is not always a good thing.

I have to admit taiji has improved my fighting, but it wasn't and still isn't my first art.

As I have said numerous times, I have met taiji people who could fight.

I'm just not fond of people who go to a hot dog stand and say hot dogs suck, there is really no such thing as hot dogs, hot dogs really should become hamburgers, but don't mind me, I'm just expressing my opinion. Go ahead, keep eating your hot dog, but it really does suck.

Bao wrote:BTW, what does "I know I can fight" mean? You can never know about the outcome of a fight. Anything can and will happen. Having a to strong belief that you can fight is not always a good thing.

It means that, at various times in my illustrious existence, fools have chosen to step, and been subsequently beat down.

Of course, in all fairness, I've taken my share of beatings.

I know I can fight means precisely that, if it comes time to scrap, I'm ready to scrap. In defense of innocent maidens and the like, of course, and I'll avoid it whenever possible, but it's not a complicated statement to understand.

I agree with Meek. Even the 1% Taiji fighters I've run into are cross-trainer who either dabble or orginally trained in other CMA systems.

In my opinion taijiquan is high level of fighting, so I'm not sure that everyone is able to achieve such level; however, no doubt everyone can get own benefit from practicing taijiquan

Some while ago I posted a friend's video[on the other forum] which had the CMC TCC done at regular and fast speed showing how it would be used for fighting. He is a training partner, his stuff is deadly[as a law officer he has used it often in 'real' situations]. he is a 25 year veteran of the IMA. The reaction: one from a comparitive beginner saying it shouldnt be done that way, another from a self appointed judge of videos who has never posted his experience but feels he knows everything saying all the postures etc were wrong. I was tempted to invite them to NY to try out my friend and have reality check but why bother, needlessto say I wont be posting any more videos