Kung Fu
The biggest misconception of Kung Fu is its meaning. Kung Fu means “skill”. It means that a person has put time, patience, lots of effort in practice and study in anything that person wants to do. Therefore, professional basketball players have basketball kung fu. Or professional football players have football kung fu. Artists can have art kung fu. With that in mind, Kung Fu isn’t a style, it is a practice. Kung Fu Masters take this very serious, practicing one move until absolute perfection is better than being mediocre in a thousand different moves.
Kung Fu came from the need to defend oneself. There are hundreds of forms and styles of Chinese Martial Arts. There are two major styles or “families”, one is wai jia外家 or external styles mainly come out of the Shaolin styles, and the other is nei jia內家 or internal styles which are mainly Daoist. There are two major Shaolin temples and styles; the Northern Shaolin, and the Southern Shaolin. And within each of those there are other styles; Wei Tuo Gong is from Southern Shaolin. The Shaolin have many different forms, many resembling animals: praying mantis, crane, dragon, eagle, tiger, snake, and monkey to name only a few. Nei jia have three styles: Xing Yi Quan, Tai Ji Quan, and Ba Gua Zhang. And within those styles, there are different schools. It doesn’t matter which style a person practices, his or her abilities always lies within their training and dedication.
Each school has its students learn open and closed hand fighting, and fighting with weapons. There are many weapons to learn. The more popular are the staff, spear, broad sword, and double edge sword. Students need to learn how to use anything at hand as a weapon; a chair, a pen, cloths, floor lamp… When using a weapon, the person’s Qi goes into it, and the weapon becomes an extension of the arms. Ultimately, the weapon is an extension of the body. This realization teaches the student how to use Qi more effectively. Because of learning to use Qi, Kung Fu Masters are also Qi Gong Masters.
The use of Qi in weapons is similar to the use of Qi in a brush for artists and calligraphers. They use Qi to write and paint, and then their Qi goes on to the canvas or paper. A person who is sensitive to Qi can feel a painting’s Qi and determine who the artist is because everyone has his or her own Qi.
An important training in Kung Fu is to control your emotions, so you can be rational when it is needed most. One emotion that Kung Fu teaches is to control fear with self-confidence. To be free from fear of mistakes, the unknown, death, and any other fears one has. Fear can create more problems than it solves because it brings tension, nervousness, and hesitation. These emotions inhibit a person’s reaction time, precision, and rational judgment. A person must be self-confident that he or she will succeed in any goal he or she has set forth.
Since Kung Fu (as well as all other Martial Arts) is so powerful, learning how to be peaceful is essentially the most important lesson any martial artist must learn. In Kung Fu training, students learn morality, humility, virtue, and confidence. After training in Martial Arts, he or she can literally become a living lethal weapon. Therefore the true Martial Arts Masters are the most peaceful people anyone can meet. True Masters have such power, one hit or kick will kill, and no one should be happy about victory in battle. The battle is a sad affair. Therefore the first lesson any Kung Fu student must learn is simple: never use what you are learning, avoid fighting at all costs. Only when absolutely, without any doubt a person’s life is in danger, may you use it.