Pagina's

My kungfu Curriculum


 This is rough draft of my kungfu curriculum and more will be added in the future.




Skills to learn and Kungfu to acquire

  1. Learning how to fight effectively for self defense
  2. Weight, balance, speed and power
  3. Techniques and fighting applications
  4. Postures and Perfection
  5. Still power vs dynamic power
  6. Body and Internal energy
  7. Intrinsic and Extrinsic energy
  8. Mental intent
  9. Enrichment and expanding with weapons training
  10. Health and Beyond
  11. Understanding Wuji, Taiji, Xing Yi and Bagua through training

1. Learning how to fight effectively for self defense

This is actually the most easy part of all. If you have a good trainer then usually one can learn to effectively defend and fight in real and ring situations within a year, depending on your training style. One is not the other and the other not one. Going from a novice to a middle class fighter is a rather fast process. Because the road from a novice to a middle class fighter is a road of learning all the way. Once you get past the middle class you won't learn with such a steep curve anymore and it is time for you to go to the next phase. Also Learning how to fight effectively consist of the following techniques: Evading, Blocking, Redirecting, Striking, grasping, locking and wrestling. Standing, middle height and ground fighting. You could say the following, Kickboxing, Judo and jiujitsu. I'm sure that if you train these three sports or arts you will acquire an effective self defense skill. Another way to get these skills is by taking classes that teach you these basic fighting skills, such as Krav Maga and others.

2. Weight, balance, speed and power

These are the four aspects of any sport like activity. Without using weight you will not go forward, without balance you will not stand, without speed you can't strike successfully or evade, without power of any kind you won't stand a chance. Masters of the old and masters of the new will tell you the same thing. When power meets power it will determine who is the strongest, when speed meets speed it will determine who reacts faster, when weight and balance meets it will determine who has the better technique. It's actually the following: Power > Speed > Technique. Without power your technique is useless, without speed your technique will be countered with ease, without technique you will lose against power and speed. Boxers use balance and weight, then power which also generates speed. The simple jab or hook is a good example. To gain these four aspects is fairly easy: weight and balance by doing yoga, weight and power by hitting a sandbag, balance and power by training with dumbbells or elastic cords, Speed by training the transitions between weight, balance and power. Speed can also be seen as insight, in Taiji Chuan there is a saying: "Start later but arriving earlier".

3. Techniques and fighting applications

No technique or application is useful if you can't use it within fighting or sparring. After training several applications over the years one will conclude this essential thing: What works for me, doesn't have to work for you. Because fighting is dynamic in nature you can actually never apply a technique when thinking about it, it must come natural as an instinct. In order to get such an instinct or second nature you must practice, practice and practice some more. All fighting arts have applications, but it's determined by the practitioner if they are effective in the context of a real situation. Can the application be used within hand to hand combat, can it be used against a knife, can it be used against a long blade? If you can use a technique against these, you can say that you have mastered the technique. Of course when I say hand to hand, knife or long blade, you must already know the mode that you have to get into when facing such aspects.

4. Postures and perfection

A posture by itself won't do you any good, it's the transitions within the posture that really will benefit your training. A stance is by nature a static posture. While a posture can be a few stances linked to each other. For the sake of posture training and body alignment I have reverted to Chen Taiji chuan . The main reason for this is that Taiji focuses on the small detail when training body alignment and postures. Principles like"double heavy" won't be explained or clear to you when training other martial arts, not that other martial arts won't teach you this but there is no enfesis on the subject. When you are practicing static stances you will gradually begin to understand how you really must stand in stance and what type of power or abilities it can give you. Stance training by itself teaches you balance, body alignment and power control. After you have mastered the first stage you can begin to master transitioning in and out of stance from or to another stance. Every fighting art or sport has a stance or stances. When you have mastered static stances, you can begin to use it dynamically.

5. Still power vs dynamic power

What is the difference between still power and dynamic power? Both involve movement of some sort, but there is a huge difference. The one that you will most likely understand is dynamic power. I will explain dynamic power with the explanation of the roundhouse kick. 

Mass * acceleration = Force (dynamic power)


Dynamic power

When you are facing your target one foot is in front and the other in the back. Power will be compressed in the back foot then it pushes into ground creating force to get a kicking swing going. The power will curve from the back foot position to the kick on target. For this technique to work the the leg must be stretched at the very last moment to get the full power of this compressed force. The enfesis lays on the compression, balance, speed and weight before hitting the target. But once the target moves and kick misses all the energy will be in vain and you will need time to recover from the missed kick by landing in stance. This is dynamic power and always involves your body to lean or sway a lot to one side, this is because you will: add weight, add rotation, add movement. This dynamic power always makes use of one pivoting point which at the same time is a fixed point and also the point on which you will stand, with the exception of mid air techniques. In mid air there is no pivot or fixed point, all the energy will just follow one path.

Still power

Still power is hard to master, let alone to explain. Because you may think you understand it but if you can't do it, can you really understand it? It's about balance, two fixed points, body alignment and making use of your skeleton structure.

I will try to explain it to you to the best of my abilities.

Mechanical Energy (PE (potential energy) + (KE (kenetic energy) ) + pressure = Constant (still energy)


If your hand is being hold back by a elastic rope or cord of some sort your can't use muscular strength because the cord will just pull you back. You can't just turn your hips or use your body weight and muscular strength to go against it, you will just lose balance and again will be pulled back. So you must use your whole body to counter the force of the elastic cord, by aligning your whole body into a palm strike like below. You will fail when trying to do this fast the first time, but once you get the technique of how to stretch your body into a palm strike while being held back by an elastic cord, you will get the ability of using still power in your palm strike. This type of training will go against your natural body movement as you have programmed yourself to do. The main reason for this is because you will have to learn to use your skeleton in a totally different way. It is a specialized technique which I have only found in Taiji Chuan and similar arts, with similar I don't mean Aikido. Not that it doesn't teach you this, but you will only learn it after the 1st Dan or later if at all.


Still power vs dynamic power

When giving these facts you could say the following: Dynamic energy is good for boxing, Still energy is good for wrestling.
You already know dynamic power as we use it everyday to walk, arts like boxing or kickboxing or others will teach you to make use of this power very fast. Most fighting arts are based on this principle because it's easy to learn, to apply and to master within your techniques and movements.
Still power however is much harder to learn, apply and to master. If you don't understand dynamic power then understanding still power will be a long process, because still power is actually dynamic power but without moving the two fixed points. It's making use of your inner gears (mechanical energy) and pressure (Pressure = Force/Area) instead of making use of only Mass and acceleration for force. We can go deeper into physics but I'm no professor and understanding these formulas will do.

Mass * Acceleration = Force
Dynamic energy

 Mechanical Energy
Still power

Using still power for dynamic fighting

 Mechanical Energy (with elastic quality= PEgrav + PEspring + Kinetic energy) + pressure = Dynamic still energy when the spring is released (Fajin)

Power will compress and then released as a strike. Different from a jab or hook or roundhouse kick, this type of strike can be whipping strike or a strike that releases force on the target from a stationary position. If you understand this, then you might see the potential in learning the 3 which are actually 2 energy types. I'm no professor, but I do like the fighting arts.

6. Body and internal energy 

The body has a few ways of producing power or energy for fighting applications. The first most obvious is muscular power, the second one is the power of moving mass, these two combined form dynamic power or Force. Kinetic energy can be produced by aligning a proper body structure and potential energy (in the form of a spring) can be produced by stretching certain body parts like the legs, waist, and torso. The body also has internal energy that are kind of like electronics following a complex path or circuits, these mainly influence or are influenced by muscular and nerve systems as well as others. All these systems are connected to the brain and as you know you can influence/work these systems (like using muscle). All these energy types can be called internal energy. But the body's electronic systems are called intrinsic energy.

7. Intrinsic and Extrinsic energy 

 Intrinsic energy also known as Chi, Ki or Qi in martial arts can be cultivated and manipulated, It is also known as life force. In order to cultivate intrinsic energy the training method would be an internal one. Mechanical energy must be used to cultivate this intrinsic energy. Intrinsic energy can however follow the path of Force (mass*acceleration) but it cannot be cultivated easily this way.
Extrinsic energy in martial arts is also known as a few things: Intent, mood, focus and Breath. The main point of Extrinsic energy is that it is based on external conditions, even though they originate internally (brain or longs). Extrinsic energy is also needed in order to cultivate intrinsic energy, because chi flow also influenced by emotion

Dynamic energy > Still Energy > Still dynamic Energy = Internal Energy

Intent + Breath = Extrinsic Energy

Internal Energy + Extrinsic Energy > Intrinsic Energy (CHI)

 

8. Mental intent 

In Martial Arts mental intent can mean a few things. You can use your intent to feel areas of your own body without touching them. It is focusing on specific areas and become aware of them (feeling). Intent can be used in any movement, if I want to walk forward I will! If I want to strike forward I will! The combination of body awareness and movement can be a useful application of the mind's intent within Martial arts. This combination can let strike or defend with deadly precision. Mental intent can also be used to pinpoint a specific target, if you can become aware of your own body then just maybe you can become aware of your opponents body (but that's a psychological thing I think). 

Awareness of self, Awareness of target, the "will" to move. (This is the extrinsic use of Intent)

Mental intent can also be used in cultivating Intrinsic energy. When moving and rotating with internal energy the practitioner must breath, with every inhale and exhale he or she must make use of the right mental intent and actually feel or project the path of energy within or outside oneself.

Internal energy movement (the "will" to move), Breath + breathing techniques, awareness of inner self.

Awareness of self and awareness of inner self will be molded into one awareness as you progress. Internal movement will synchronize with breath. Mental intent will form into the leading aspect.

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