windwalker wrote:Had a couple of students who boxed. Their interest in Taiji was in a taiji approach to help them deal with clinches and clinching.
Its not a matter of "bad" movement. It is a matter of bad habits that will tend to get one knocked out if used with anyone of skill.
If its about principles and body mechanics can you point to a specific skill that no other art has that taiji would teach.
My point being that "taiji" is tied to the family styles that are commonly viewed and recognized as taiji.
Unless there is a very unique skill set that only "taiji" can teach or develop I see no sense in the association with taiji.
Sounds like you are a Taiji purist who considers this type of work sacrilegious.
My approach to IMA is to not be bound by style, outward appearance, and technique, but to focus on the specific mechanisms that each system uses to generate power, mobility, and stability -- and to look for common denominators that tie them together as well as subtle differences.
For instance, when simultaneous deflecting and countering a common haymaker using what "looks like" a Karate upper block, I can actually think of at least 4 ways of doing it using body mechanics from Wing Chun, Xingyi, White Crane, and Bagua. In the eye of a layman, they will all appear almost identical on the outside, but on the inside, they are all distinctly different.
The idea is that if you simply focus on outward appearances, you will never be able to move beyond what's on the surface, which is often very deceiving.
My question to you is, if you don't feel that Taiji is about principles and body mechanics, how do you look at it? How do you explain the fact that there are so many styles of Taiji out there (Yang, Wu, Chen, Sun, and Hao, etc.) that look so different on the outside in terms of movements and yet can all be regarded as Taiji?