The taiji of Mario Napoli (CMC)

Discussion in 'Tai chi' started by cloudz, Sep 9, 2008.

  1. Fire-quan

    Fire-quan Banned Banned

    Well, I'm very much the same. I wasn't asking it as a light aside, lol...

    What I'm getting at is something a little controversial, like, when you have someone who does a couple of styles, do they choose the one that is the most prestiguous, or indeed makes the most money, to associate themselves with?

    Like, if a year of taiji was going to make you a great deal more money than your ten years of judo, would you be inclined to call yourself taiji? If you've done a significant number of years of karate and other styles, would you then associate yourself with JKD because that's going to be a better market for you? Cough... Steve Powell... cough...

    There again, my name can be coughed up as well, ha ha - but fortunately, I don't teach...

    And it also goes in to this thing where a kickboxer does six months of another style and then enters a competition, wins with kick boxing, and says it's all down to his new style.

    Zhao Dao Xin mentions that even in the twenties and thirties in China, people were entering lei tai under traditional style banners, but their real training wasn't those traditional style's methods - especially those who were more successful.
     
  2. Taoquan

    Taoquan Valued Member

    I have a varied background and will admit I have used other MAs to further my understanding of TCC. I have studied:

    1) Hsing I
    2) Bagua
    3) Aikido
    4) Judo (Though very, very long time ago when I was younger)
    5) Eagle claw kung fu (Currently)

    And to be honest, I think it makes me more complete as a MA. My teacher's grandfather used to say "If all you have in your toolbox is a hammer, everything looks like a nail." So I believe cross training is important...to an extent.

    However,
    I have also just now been exposed to some TCC teachers, who have a very traditional (Family) style background. I must say, when you meet some TCC teachers who have -only- trained in TCC and been with some of the "indoor" students of family styles, it is just like any other MA.

    I have seen some of these teachers teach the same things I have learned in the other arts (Various throws, locks, even a small amount of ground fighting). I think at times the TCC we get in the West is a "watered down" version, or sometimes incomplete (either through incomplete training of teachers, or understanding of the MA).

    I agree with Yohan,
    Sometimes you need to expand your horizons, it just depends on what you want to do with it. If you want to learn TCC and only do forms and push-hands, great study only TCC. But if you want to enter and use TCC principals, ideas etc. in other MA situations and tournaments you would have to expand your horizons, or get more "tools in your toolbox."
     
  3. Yohan

    Yohan In the Spirit of Yohan Supporter

    See?

    All that stuff is too complicated for me. I'm not devious enough to wrap my mind around all that garbage. I just want to train to fight - the money isn't even an issue with me. I'm an engineer by trade.

    The prestige will follow if I can apply my stuff in competition.
     
  4. Fire-quan

    Fire-quan Banned Banned

    Well, you said it with the CMA is so advanced you need a basic grounding in boxing and wrestling - very succinct explanation of a complex con.

    I am trying to learn to be succinct!
     
  5. Fire-quan

    Fire-quan Banned Banned

    I'm not talking about cross training.. I'm talking about, for example, if you go on a wushu forum people who do wushu might say "yes but wushu has san da...."

    Well, yeah - that might mean you do a bit of san da on your class - it doesn't mean that wushu in itself is in any way useful for anything much other than looking really cool.

    Isn't it true that the "good twin" of cross training has its evil twin - cherry picking what you say you do for financial/ego/style benefit... and using the training and techniques of one art to pretend that a success was the result of another art's training and techniques? Like, "I do wing chun and BJJ... look at how I use my wing chun in that heel hook..." Hmmm....
     
  6. Taoquan

    Taoquan Valued Member

    Sorry FQ,
    Misread your post.

    To answer your question, I could not ethically pick a style I am not as well versed at to teach for the money as you asked above. Nor could I claim that I am "good at it" or "thanks to such and such style I won" etc. Even what I listed below some of them has as few as 6 months training in, others years. But I would never claim "expertise" or Teaching credentials in one.

    -IF- I ever teach, it would be the styles I know the most about.
     
  7. El Medico

    El Medico Valued Member

    "Zhao Dao Xin mentions that even in the twenties and thirties in China, people were entering lei tai under traditional style banners, but their real training wasn't those traditional style's methods - especially those who were more successful."

    Fq-does he mention any examples of this?As to what constitutes traditional as opposed to whatever?

    "Sometimes you need to expand your horizons, it just depends on what you want to do with it. If you want to learn TCC and only do forms and push-hands, great study only TCC. But if you want to enter and use TCC principals, ideas etc. in other MA situations and tournaments you would have to expand your horizons, or get more "tools in your toolbox." "

    Tq-If you're talking groundwork,I agree.If you just mean stand up, I think that just comes down to if the instructor teaches regular basics-punching,kicking,combos,footwork,bag work,sparring etc.Which is actually the real "traditional" method. At least in former times.See what Adam Hsu and Fu,Zhong-wen had to say about these matters.

    But yeah,if an instructor only teaches form and pushing,even if very skilled at it, you better go somewhere and expand one's abilities and knowledge.Or die!
     
  8. liokault

    liokault Banned Banned

    But you will always get this until we, as a whole, get past the idea of style and get onto " good/bad training"




    again the term "traditional" means as little as style.
     
  9. liokault

    liokault Banned Banned

    When Chen Ting Hung was into lei tei fighting, right up until he was putting his people into full contact in the SE Asian open events, the big insult was to suggest that a teacher was employing a Thai boxing coach lol.




    Yeah, because the form fairy scalp hunters know where you live!!!!
     
  10. Fire-quan

    Fire-quan Banned Banned

    El Medico, the Zhao Dao Xin article is on the kung fu forum.



    Have I not been saying this every moment I've been on this forum? Have I not gone on and on about "Quan" - the single art of "Quan", based on uncovering the true essential principles - Glorious Quan, noble art of heroes, strips away the BS - the Taoist art of ruthlessly searching for the true meanings, methods and ways - the true wu de - searching for the genuine, effective Quan, letting go of pointless, petty partisanship, while other cling to meaningless titles, identities, grades, ideologies, myths, reputations, schools - to find the true essence, and the good training methods that bring it out. Liokault, it's all I've ever talked about.



    Well, next time "traditionalists" are berrating me for not believing that their shizzle is the most amazing thing in the world, mind stepping in and supporting me?
     
  11. Rebo Paing

    Rebo Paing Pigs and fishes ...

    Yohan's answer to my mind is the truth.

    While a person is doing initial exploration he/she is doing a style. Later on everything is just observing & feeling our own body in movement.
     
  12. liokault

    liokault Banned Banned


    No, you have been saying look at me look at me I'm right, your not



    No, because I don't like you.
     
  13. Fire-quan

    Fire-quan Banned Banned

    That's you're not - contraction of you are.
    But - yes, that is what I've been saying - listen to me, I'm right. And I am.


    Well that's what I'm saying - people support not the truth, but what suits their personal ego agendas. That, like you say yourself, really has to stop if we want to move forwards.

    I neither like nor dislike you - you're just words on a screen.
     
  14. liokault

    liokault Banned Banned

    Your just anoying words on a screen.....that kicks like a girl (want vid proof?)
     
  15. Fire-quan

    Fire-quan Banned Banned

    What you never seem to understand is that I want you to insult me. Every time you do it, it demonstrates to other people just what I'm saying - that all your unlikely arguments are based on this - petty, ad hominem attacks on people who dare to doubt you. There is no substance to your arguments - and that's why you do it. You have nothing else.

    Better to have the power of a six year old girl in your legs than the words of a six year old girl in your mouth.
     
  16. liokault

    liokault Banned Banned


    Lol, care to point out my unlikely arguments?
     
  17. Bronze Statue

    Bronze Statue Valued Member

    To my (entirely non-taijiquan-trained eyes, so please forgive any applicable stupidity), it looks like sumo more than anything. What is its relation to [Zheng Manqing- and/or Chen-jia] taijiquan?

    What are "silk pyjamas" in this context? Is this a (I'm guessing derogatory) reference to martial arts uniforms? I've never seen a martial artist go around training in anything as expensive as something like that sounds!
     
    Last edited: Sep 15, 2008
  18. unfetteredmind

    unfetteredmind Valued Member

    No forgiveness required. It does look more like sumo than anything.

    I can't see any whatsoever. Remember Cheng Man Ching's advice to "relax, relax, relax"? Any of those guys seem to embody that?
     
  19. Rebo Paing

    Rebo Paing Pigs and fishes ...

    How could he "remember" that if he is as he states and I quote ...

    ... that he doesn't have taiji experience.

    Question to you Unfetteredmind, what does "relax" mean to you?
     
    Last edited: Sep 15, 2008
  20. unfetteredmind

    unfetteredmind Valued Member

    He said he was untrained which doesn't necessarily mean he hasn't heard one of the most famous quotes of CMC.

    Physically, the phase of the muscle cycle where contraction is being released from the muscles.
     

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