Shen Men Tao

[Sifu Stier]

Re: Clarification

Dear Sifu Hsuen:

Thank you for the clarification. I'll take your word that what you stated is in fact true. It doesn't matter. What matters is the negative intention in 'un-deleting' it for further antagonistic and adversarial purposes, but that apparently wasn't your decision, so no problem. With one exception only, and I'm sure you remember what it was without my mentioning it again now, you have consistently been much more gracious, hospitable, and respectful in your posts than some others have been on this forum. This demonstrates your fine character, and is much appreciated!

Best wishes to you and yours ~

Sifu Stier

[Antonius]

Dear Sifu Stier,

Your post to Emiko was nice. Nevertheless, I must object to this comment:

What matters is the negative intention in 'un-deleting' it for further antagonistic and adversarial purposes,

Time and again, I am fascinated at your analysis of the events. You attack us with a message that goes out to hundreds of people and then admit to deleting it as a tactical move to bait us. If we're being adversarial (are we?), then we're not the only ones.

It just so happens that Jeffrey had already written a long response, which he decided to post even when he saw that yours had been deleted. And I'm glad he did, because I think his post was important. I learned a lot from reading it.

In un-deleting your post, I had no negative intentions, unless you consider "clarity" to be negative. In deleting your post, all you did was hide it from the few people who aren't subscribed to the thread. I saved them the trouble of asking to see what Jeffrey was responding to (and what everyone else had read via email), thereby maintaining clarity.

Really, Sifu Stier, I am not the evil, subversive, under-handed guy you seem to think I am. I'm a nice guy with honest (if also direct) intentions. Maybe one day I can buy you a beer and convince you of that.

Best,

[Sifu Stier]

No Worries!

Dear Sifu Korahais:

As stated previously, it doesn't matter, so no worries, OK? I'll look forward to meeting with you one day, and sharing 'war stories' with you for old time's sake. I don't drink alcohol beverages, however, so perhaps a Cafe Latte or a Chai Tea instead.

Best wishes ~

Doc

[Antonius]

Chai tea it is, then!

[Tapio Raevaara]

Dear Sifu Stier,

I'm one of the few who actually read your post before you removed it (I choose not to receive email notifications) and I'm very surprised of the recent events.

I'm surprised that you actually decided to remove your post, for I saw nothing 'special' in it. You presented your thoughts the same way you have presented them many, many times before.

I'm even more surprised that so often you feel the need to remove your posts. I am puzzled because of it, for I realize what a rare honour it is for me to be able to communicate with a Grandmaster of a great internal martial art system via an Internet discussion forum. Usually people who remove their posts are the same people who all the time say and do things they regret the moment they say or do them. In your case I cannot find an explanation, for I'm sure you can control your emotions better than that.

However, I'd like to share my point of view concerning Internet discussion forums in general.

Think of yourself as an author, who has written a book. You find and make a deal with a publisher (Shaolin Wahnam, in this case) and it decides to publish your book. When your book reaches the market, you, for some reason - let's say that it contains some private information - decide to pull the book off the market. Unfortunately this isn't in your power to do. The publisher may decide to keep it in stores because of it's own reasons, or it may comply with your wish and pull it off. But even the publisher has no power over the people, who have already managed to buy your book. If many people have already bought the book, it is very unlikely that any publisher will ever make this drastic move, for the content has already reached the public, i.e. the harm has been done.

Is it somehow unethical to discuss about such a book?

In case someone finds it useful, I'd also like to share my 'checking routine' when submitting a reply.

When I've finished my post, I press the 'Preview Post' button to see my post. Then I read my text once to correct any spelling and grammar errors (which I still make due to my limited skill of English - by the way, I'd be grateful if someone would point them out, I'm always eager to learn ). Then I read my text a second time to read the actual message of my post and to make sure my point is well presented. After that I take a deep breath and smile from the heart, and read through it a third time to make sure that my choice of words will not offend anyone, neither intentionally nor unintentionally. When I'm finally through, I press the 'Submit Reply' button, confident that I'll never have the need to actually remove my post.

Dear Sifu Stier,

There is no hostility, no antagonism, no adversity. You are welcome here! However, your posts will be commented upon. We have right to disagree with you, as you have right to disagree with us. You are also permitted and encouraged to share your opinions, as long as the forum rules and regulations are upheld. However, we will not accept anything we hear as truth until we have considerable proof or direct experience.

And I seriously doubt that you would be flattered by my analysis of the postures, stances, and footwork in some of your still photos and videos if it were publicly posted here.

Perhaps not flattered, but personally I would be delighted to hear your opinions based on your own experience. It would help us all to remember and realize why we do some things the way we do and help us all to see if we don't do some things the way we should.

For example, I'd be glad to hear what you honestly think of my performance that was posted earlier in this thread. It wasn't perfect, but considering that I had only practised the technique for an hour, I was surprised to find it so effective. Practising it for one year one could do miracles with it! Don't worry about hurting my feelings or my self-confidence, I'm tough, I can take it!

Best Wishes,
Tapio

[Tapio Raevaara]

For example, I'd be glad to hear what you honestly think of my performance that was posted earlier in this thread.

Just a small correction: of course it was not this thread but 'A Discussion on Yielding'. Silly me.

[Ronan]

Insofar as the video performance is concerned...very few of the performers give an all out 'best of show' performance because we receive no financial renumeration from the sale of those videos, and know that the material demonstrated will oftentimes end up in the hands of people who don't deserve the 'A' material....like some of you guys for example. But you believe what you want. I really don't care what you think.

Really?? Is this really true? You decided to perform below your ability and make your art look worse than it actually is just because a) You didn't get payed, and b) Incase someone got a hold of the video and learnt your "secrets"?

I find that totally ridiculous and very immature! If what you said is true then that's very sad indeed. I'll explain my reasons for anyone interested in reading them.

You're always saying you want to generate awareness of Shen Men Tao which is of course a very noble aim, yet this seems to me that you're going about it the wrong way.

Imagine if someone searching for genuine internal martial arts came accross your performance and saw that what you did was real Taiji Chuan. People would travel from all around the world to learn from you and you could have helped thousands of lost souls. I know you probably already have lots of students, but even if others who saw the video didn't come to learn from you, just seeing real Internal Martial Arts could inspire them and motivate them to keep searching and not give up.

Instead, because you decided to perform low level and "hide" the Quality of your art, many people (who are genuinly searching with all their heart for real Taiji Chuan) will watch your performance, be dissapointed once again by the degredation of Taiji Chuan and look else where.

I'm sure I'm not the only one that gets fed up and sometimes angry with the amount of rubbish being passed off as Kung Fu and Taiji Chuan in magazines and on the internett. If I saw some footage of another Master demonstrating real Taiji Chuan it would be like a heavenly breath of fresh air to me, which is what I got when I found my Sifu

The dark days are gone when Masters had to hide their art. I find it hard to imagine hoards of armed attackers studying your performance on video, making notes on how to exploit any chinks in your invinsible amour for when they come to kill you. If someone wanted to get you that bad they could just put a bullet in you or run you down in the street. I personally believe that these days it's more important to share our Art. To do all we can to insure that it's not lost over the next few generations. We owe our teachers and we owe our Art that much. After what my Sifu has done for me and all my brothers and sisters and how my training had changed my life, to not share these teachings to others would be nothing short of selfish and uncompasionate.

If I decided to demonstrate our Kung Fu on camera to potentially hundreds of thousands of people I would try and demonstrate it in a way that showed others the quality of Shaolin Kung Fu. This would benefit many people and also make my Sifu happy and proud. I just don't know what else to say, I'm stunned that you said that. After all your "stunning" posts this was the one that made me drop my jaw, shake my head and laugh out loud in disbelief! You really are a hoot aren't you??

Of course the opposite could also be true, you could have put in your best performance but are now trying to cover up for it by saying that you deliberately tryed to make it look bad. This would almost be a sadder state of affairs. It would show that after all these years you realise that what you practice isn't really that great after all, yet you don't want to admit it to yourself or others. Instead of taking that realization as a blessing and doing somthing about it, your own ego prevents you from admitting that you're anything but perfect and stops you from seeking help from others. I'm not saying that's the case but I really don't know what to believe from you these days and to be quite honest, both of those situations are pretty desperate.

I'm sorry but I just had to say somthing, I'm still shocked at the childishness of that post.

Best wishes

Ronan

[Sifu Stier]

Sifu Sexton:

Why you would vainly imagine that I am even remotely interested in your totally unsolicited and obviously unlearned opinions about my Form Set performance priorities and abilities remains a mystery to me. These are things that you cannot possibly know with any degree of certainty, so your views are nothing more than hypothetical conjecture based upon assumptions born of personal bias. I have already been trained and tested by very competent Masters...having trained for 14 years to become a 'Sifu', receiving my Red Sash and Certification as such in 1975...nine (9) years before you were born! Two of my five children are older than you. I have no doubt whatsoever that you are my junior in every way as a martial artist!

So please take special note of the following information, provided for your future reference when viewing performances of 'Internal Soft Style Kung-Fu'. The words 'internal' and 'soft style' might give you a clue about the primary agenda priorities in performing any of the various methods of Tai-Chi Chuan, Pa-Kua Chuan, and Hsing-Yi Chuan included in this 'Family' of styles. These methods are traditionally perceived to normally be approximately 90% 'Internal' and only 10% 'External'.

As such, what can be visually observed in any Form Set performance represents only a minor fraction of what is actually generated by the practitioner/performer. The external, athletic criteria used as standards of excellence in more 'external hard styles' of martial art don't really apply to the Internal Arts. It is not uncommon for highly knowledgeable and competent Masters of the Internal Arts to demonstrate their Form Sets in a manner that is judged by some as having 'poor form', and 'no fighting skills'. And yet, they can easily demonstrate that their Internal Power Skills are highly developed, and that their Fighting Skills are most impressive. Appearances can be very deceiving in these arts!

This is why the Internal Soft Styles of Kung-Fu have typically been judged to be without 'power' and 'combative efficiency' by those who train in the more athletic, external methods of the Chinese Buddhist Temple Styles of Kung-Fu, and their Okinawan, Japanese, Korean, or other Asian derivative styles. The mere fact that you judge what you see in this same way identifies you as someone whose knowledge base and personal experience lies primarily, if not completely, in the study and practice of External Style martial arts. And that's OK, but those standards don't really translate adequately to an assessment of Internal Soft Style Form Sets.

Sifu Stier

[beausimon]

Hi Jeffrey,
Is there a link to download Sifustier's video clip that you mentioned in your earlier post?

Thanks.

[Andrew]

Here we go again ---- and I thought this was a "cameo appearance" and you were not at all "even remotely interested in (Ronan's) totally unsolicited and obviously unlearned opinions about (your) Form Set performance priorities and abilities".

Sifu Stier, when you were wished well by my brothers and sisters (and by me) I can assure you that the wishes were from the Heart and absolutely genuine. Whether or not you can accept that, though, is up to you. You see we can easily have heated discussions with you or others and still keep our hearts open and free of aggression.

I'm sure you will once again find my words to be an attack from one of your "detractors and adversaries among the 'elite' members of this forum" who is also one of the "unscrupulous, dishonest individuals running this forum". I'm also quite sure that your posting that there are very few Masters posting here (I assume you include yourself as one) was also intended as an insult to those whom Sifu Wong has appointed and named Masters even though noone here seems to personally claim any such title except you.

But whatever --- I'm quite used to your use of long sentences full of peroquial phrasiology reflecting innermost deliberations of unquestionnable eloquence regarding undisputedly disputable interpretations of the posts of visitors and members of this internet discussion forum based on electronic communication in an asynchronous bilateral communication format which does not allow direct response or immediate contact with the other discussing parties . I also believe that a prediction of the type of response that will undoubtedly be entered into the computing device you have available, and of the content of such response regarding the person and/or persons directly and/or indirectly responsible for the assumptions to which you have considered it necessary to take offense and therefore offer defence of yourself in terms of qualification and performance is possible with reasonable certainty .

You have made many assumptions about Ronan's abilities, skills and experience based on his age alone. Bad move I'm afraid. As you should well know, age alone is no judge of mastery. I am quite happy to have many Seniors who are certainly my Juniors in terms of age and life experience. And I am also very happy that some of my Juniors in Shaolin Wahnam are in fact my Seniors in terms of their accomplishment in various parts of their training and skill development.

- Start later, arrive first -- seems quite appropriate here. As everyone will know (?) this is not just a tactic or skill used in fighting but is just as relevant to any endeavour in life
- "It doesn't matter who starts first, the one who arrives earlier is first" -- is another relevant (paraphrased) quote

Andrew

[Jeffrey Segal]

crystal clear

Hi Beausimon,

It's not my place to publish videos of Sifu Stier on the web (even if I knew how to do it from the DVD I bought)


Hi Ronan,

Great post. I was also shocked that Sifu Stier would openly admit

Insofar as the video performance is concerned...very few of the performers give an all out 'best of show' performance because we receive no financial renumeration from the sale of those videos, and know that the material demonstrated will oftentimes end up in the hands of people who don't deserve the 'A' material....like some of you guys for example. But you believe what you want. I really don't care what you think.

Definitely the hoot to make you realise that the other hoots were only warmups.

[Maxime]

I am quite happy to have many Seniors who are certainly my Juniors in terms of age and life experience. And I am also very happy that some of my Juniors in Shaolin Wahnam are in fact my Seniors in terms of their accomplishment in various parts of their training and skill development.

- Start later, arrive first -- seems quite appropriate here. As everyone will know (?) this is not just a tactic or skill used in fighting but is just as relevant to any endeavour in life
- "It doesn't matter who starts first, the one who arrives earlier is first" -- is another relevant (paraphrased) quote

Who will say now that the Wahnam instructors are arrogant people, boasting their ego? Impossible, except for the deaf and blind.

Thank you for displaying such a lesson of humility and open hearted spirit.

I met Ronan Sihing in February, he certainly knows how to cross hands 'with internal components', this internal advancement being perfectly reflected in his daily life behaviour -cheerfulness, calmness, kindness-. Hmmm, can an internal martial artist be called a master without displaying his/her internal achievement in his/her daily deeds and words, but only because of his/her age?

Maxime

[Jonny Say]

Dear Sifu Stier,

As with many of the forum users I have been pleased to see you still popping in for some discussion. As such I add that I mean no disrespect by this post, I was just very suprised by some things you said.

Sifu Sexton:
So please take special note of the following information, provided for your future reference when viewing performances of 'Internal Soft Style Kung-Fu'. The words 'internal' and 'soft style' might give you a clue about the primary agenda priorities in performing any of the various methods of Tai-Chi Chuan, Pa-Kua Chuan, and Hsing-Yi Chuan included in this 'Family' of styles. These methods are traditionally perceived to normally be approximately 90% 'Internal' and only 10% 'External'.

As such, what can be visually observed in any Form Set performance represents only a minor fraction of what is actually generated by the practitioner/performer.

At Shaolin Wahnam many (if not all) students develop the ability to see the internal aspect or chi that is being exhibited in a demonstration. The ability of some of my seniors is trully amazing in their skills of perception. One example is my Sifu (Darryl) who has often given me internal corrections and teaching based on video footage he may have seen from various courses I have attended. As such it is clear when an internal stylist is exhibiting an internal quality or when they are not. I presumed it would be the same to you, that it also can be seen clearly from a video or picture as well as in real life. Again this is ment with no disrespect, I haven't seen your video so this is no comment on your own practice.

My question is do you think someone can tell a high level internal demonstration from videos or photos, or is it only the external that can be seen?

I agree that when looking at internal and external demonstrations one must look for different qualities, but I don't believe Ronan or Jeffrey Sipac would have been judging you using external criteria. I think some of my seniors who have far greater awareness of the internal aspect would diasgree to any criticism of Ronan Sipac's internal ability.

Just interested in your answer to my question, Im not wishing to stir things up.

All the best

[Ronan]

Thanks for the kind words guys,

Sifu Stier,

Of course I'm aware that the full depth of a practitioner's skills cannot be percieved simply by watching their solo form practice. The point I was getting at was that you said yourself that you deliberately performed below your ability so as to "hide" the skills of your art from others. I think this is wrong in so many ways. Why bother going on a demonstration video if you're not going to represent your art as best you can and do it justice. I just can't understand why you'd do that if your main intention is to promote awareness of Shen Men Tao.

Or are you now changing your statement and saying that you did perform to the best of your ability, but that we can't appreciate it because of it's internal depth? Don't worry, I won't be surprised if you do.

The same with our Sifu, it's impossible to fathom the depth of his skills simply by observing his form, but we can still appreciate certain aspects of his skills by watching him demonstrate a Kung Fu set.

Although you can't see the full depth of a Kung Fu or Taiji Chuan practitioner's skills, you can tell alot about them from their from practice. You can tell for instance whether they have any internal force,are relaxed, focused, calm or have spirit from watching them perform a set.

Best wishes

Ronan

ps.

your totally unsolicited and obviously unlearned opinions about my Form Set performance priorities and abilities remains a mystery to me. These are things that you cannot possibly know with any degree of certainty, so your views are nothing more than hypothetical conjecture based upon assumptions born of personal bias.

I have no doubt whatsoever that you are my junior in every way as a martial artist!

I love the way you keep contradicting yourself, so cute! one minute your saying there's not possible way to tell someone's skills from their form practice and the next your saying how sure you are of your superiority over me. So which is it?

[Michael Udel]

Chill Pill induced endorphine flow, activated

I’m making my own little cameo appearance because I have some facts that may shed a little light on the current topic of discussion, and I may be the only person on the forum, except for Sifu Stier himself, who has first hand knowledge of the situation.

I should tell all of you in advance that I am currently under the care of the esteemed and renowned Doctor Mikhail Chilloutsky, who has prescribed for me his patented, sure-fire, feel-good remedy of the ages, namely the Maxi-Mega Chill Pill™, patent pending. I am directed to take one of the super strength, time-release capsules before using any discussion forums, but some of the side-effects are: increased latency in responding to posts, exaggerated jocularity, and an overall decrease in my normal level of sobriety.

Considering the great lengths to which some forum members went in examining my alleged reasons for my previous series of posts, all of it purely science fiction from my perspective, and directly contrary to my repeated, explicit statements regarding my true motivations, I feel the need for a disclaimer. Sadly, I doubt it will do any good. Does it help to tell you I am about as guileful as a tranquilized koala bear and I don’t even know how to spell Machiavellian? Nevertheless…

The only reason I am making this post is that I have specific, factual information relative to the topic at hand that no other forum member can provide.

As I see it, there are three things that have been brought up by Sifus Segal, Sexton, and others:

1) Sifu Stier’s thumb position while doing the solo form in the video.
2) Questioning whether said thumb position is wise for fighting.
3) Sifu Stier’s statement that he purposefully performed below his highest level in order to protect himself from those who would try and gain advantage against him after watching the video.

Item the First:

My current, Chinese Taijiquan Sifu, whose Sigung was Yang Chen Fu, and whose lineage is perhaps something of a distant cousin to Sifu Stier’s Taiji lineage, also holds his thumb (and little finger) at right angles to his very loose fist while performing the Taiji solo form. The purpose of holding his thumb this way is for internal reasons such as qi flow. I am still learning the solo form, so I don’t know what changes are made to hand position during other aspects of his Taiji practice, but my Sifu’s Taiji has been tested repeatedly in life or death fights. I do not question the efficacy of his individual training methods out of context from their value within the entire Taijiquan system I’m being taught.

Just a little info. about my Chinese Taiji Sifu: he’s been practicing Taiji for almost 65 years. He is a very strict internal martial artist and has written articles criticizing other Taiji that he considers external. I have witnessed his Taiji, dynamic push hands, and especially his fa-jing, and it’s clearly that of an internal martial artist. He can sit in a chair with his arm resting on a table and, without any physical movement, repulse a man standing before him across the room with the small physical contact between his hand and the other’s body.

Item the Second:

Witnessing Sifu Stier’s hand position while doing the solo form and questioning if it’s wise to do so in a completely different situation, such as fighting, is akin to being at Cinta Sayang resort (where Sifu Wong holds his Intensive Courses in full view of the public), after witnessing a Shaolin Wahnam student in spontaneous qi flow repeatedly hitting himself in the head and body and then rolling around in the grass, and walking up to Sifu Wong and saying, “What are you teaching them? You can’t fight by hitting yourself in the head and rolling around in the grass.”

One aspect of training that may be fundamental to the overall program, like internal force development, may not appear to have value in another situation, such as in a fight, or even during another aspect of training, and yet, all the same, the outward appearance of one part of training is not the criteria upon which it should be judged, but it should be judged on its value as part of an entire martial arts system.

Item the Third, Part A, the Assumption:

Shaolin Wahnam, a vast majority of whose students and instructors are from Western European and other so-called “free” Western countries, has its standards, practices, and culture, all of which are based on the peculiar cultural and historical backgrounds of its members, who are strongly influenced by the level of political and personal freedom they each enjoy in being relatively free from government oppression and threats to their personal safety. Shaolin Wahnam culture is also strongly influenced by its normal and expected efforts at recruitment of new members and fulfillment of its business objectives, i.e. making money through teaching Shaolin Kungfu to as many deserving students as possible as long as its standards of quality, and so forth, can be maintained.

The situation described above is true for Shaolin Wahnam, but not necessarily, and not in fact, true for all other martial artists. Shaolin Wahnam students are familiar with the story of how the monk who escaped the final destruction of the Southern Shaolin Temple fled for his life south across the Chinese border and was responsible for continuing a significant portion of the lineage of Southern Shaolin Kungfu. Reading the story is one thing, but living through a real situation of life and death government oppression is an experience that cannot be simulated or imagined. It has to be experienced to be fully appreciated.

Item the Third, Part B, the Explanation:

My American Taijiquan teacher’s teacher, the late Sifu Lu Hung Bin, was from mainland China and fought the Communists in a long series of life and death struggles. After the fall of the Kuomintang, he escaped to Taiwan, and never again saw anyone he knew from the mainland, neither friend nor family, for fear that anyone who was a known associate of his, and was still living in the mainland, would be executed by the Communists. He had long since assumed an alias to protect his family, but it’s very likely they were in fact executed. No one knows for sure what happened, but only 40 years after his departure, none of them were alive in his home village, nor could anyone still living there recall them by name.

Sifu Lu Hung Bin never performed any form set twice the same way in public and was able to recognize immediately upon seeing someone perform one of his sets at what time they copied his movement according to how he “coded” it. He could recall exactly when and with what subtle changes he had performed it each time. In addition to the phenomenal memory required, imagine the mind set needed to be so inclined to go to so much trouble to protect oneself, and also imagine the necessary sensitivity of one’s own body and energy to be able to feel and alter one’s posture so minutely over the course of so many public performances. Is it paranoia? I believe it’s simply prudent behavior based on many years of dealing with life and death struggles where one’s own survival hinged upon having perhaps the tiniest advantage over one’s opponent, which taught him that safety and survival was a matter of discretion. For a man who’d been in countless life or death hand-to-hand fights, this was simply a normal precaution. Those who didn’t or couldn’t take such precautions were probably foolish in his eyes.

My Chinese Taiji Sifu, born about 10 years after Lu Hung Bin, is now in his mid-80’s, and was imprisoned for ten years!, during the Chinese Great Cultural Revolution (1966-1976), for the hazardous indiscretion of criticizing Mao. He had to use his Taiji knowledge frequently in life or death struggles while imprisoned, all while Mao’s crony’s were seizing his family’s assets and his wife was raising their two children by herself in a sudden state of Communist-induced impoverishment. Even now, and fairly recently, he is affected by the Chinese government’s position on qigong, although I can not discuss this in public, and am worried about even mentioning it here. My lack of discretion can have serious consequences.

I say all of this to give an idea of what it can be like for other qigong students, teachers, and martial artists in those parts of the world that have long histories of oppression against such people, and whose governments currently have policies that mean, if not always deprivation of life, extreme deprivation of one’s liberty. I know more facts from Western news, and have read more about these things, than any of my qigong classmates here in mainland China, and yet I am finding it very difficult to maintain a suitable level of discretion according to what is expected of me. In the USA, I promoted qigong in every way possible, but here, if I even mention the comings and goings of a qigong teacher, I am reproached by my classmates for being indiscrete. Before I came here, I thought I could imagine what it would be like living under such rules, but even after living here for one year, it’s difficult to adjust to a completely different culture where even discussion of the Internal Arts can actually and truly lead to dire consequences for people I love dearly.

My Chinese Taijiquan Sifu allows video tape to be made of him, and we practice in a public place, but he only does fa-jing demos and occasionally runs through the whole solo form. He does not demonstrate high level techniques in public, nor does he discuss them with those students who have not been with him for many years. I can only imagine what Sifu Lu Hung Bin would say about the thought of anyone video taping him. I wouldn’t want to have been the first guy to have tried it to see what the result might be. His personal, social, and kungfu culture influenced him to be a man who was extremely discrete because it was a life and death matter.

Item the Third, Part C, the Comparison:

I do not know when Sifu Stier’s teacher, Sifu Lee Wing-Wah, left China and came to the USA, but I’m certain that he was influenced in ways similar to Sifu Lu Hung Bin and my current Taiji Sifu. Discretion, in all it’s forms, both in speech and physical demonstration of skill, can be an integral part of a martial artist’s survival skills, and this is a simple fact for people who live in certain parts of the world, and this fact has quite understandably influenced the mindset of their students, even those who live in safer places. If you consider that Sifu Stier has faced many of his own life and death hand-to-hand struggles, it may be easier to interpret his comments about the video in a way that is not culturally biased.

I do not know precisely when Sifu Stier made the decision to make Shen Men Tao more accessible to the general public, but I believe it was sometime in 2005. The video in question is from the 2004 Taiji Legacy, perhaps a full year before Sifu Stier even decided to openly discuss Shen Men Tao, much less make “full disclosure” videos of its solo forms available. It is irrational to judge the video, and Sifu Stier’s comments about it, from the perspective of a school with a longstanding policy of International publicity, in comparison to a school that had not yet even “gone public” at the time the video was made.

It is not logical, practical, or even fair, to impose the cultural standards of Shaolin Wahnam and its members upon other martial arts schools.

Item the Third, Part D, the Taiji Legacy Tournament:

I was in attendance at the Masters Demonstration of the 2004 Taiji Legacy Tournament in Arlington, TX. I had been learning the Beijing Orthodox 24 Move from my American Taiji Sifu, Richard Peck, whose school is 30 minutes away. I had less than a month of Taiji experience when I paid $10 for a ‘cheap seat’ relatively far from the stage and saw the demonstration. I do not remember Sifu Stier particularly from that event, nor do I recall any of the performers by name, and because it was not obvious to me while watching live that anyone had gone to great lengths for filming, I was surprised to see the DVD for sale recently when a forum member posted a link to it. Certainly, no one from my school ever mentioned purchasing the DVD, which indicates to me that, just as Sifu Stier said, nobody gave their ‘A’ material during that demonstration, and most people would not look to that demonstration, or the DVD, as a reference or exemplar of the best internal martial arts has to offer, in person or on film.

The main purpose of the tournament is for students to demonstrate their forms, along side students from their own and other schools, in order to be evaluated by impartial judges and get a feel for their martial arts ability relative to a larger CMA community. The Masters Demonstrations, even to my relatively inexperienced eye, were nothing to write home about. They gave the impression as a good way to get the event off to a rolling start, and also to earn the event organizers some bucks as the close-in seating was more expensive. From my recollection, there was quite a wide variety of performers in style and quality. I never got the impression anyone was trying to win an Olympic gold, but just that each person should provide a few minutes entertainment for the crowd.

Sifu Stier stated last summer, just after attending the 2005 Taiji Legacy Tournament, that his main reason for attending these events is that he is usually asked to be a judge (in another post close by to the link provided), and he wishes to see old friends and maintain contact with fellow martial artists. Based on my impressions from attending the event in 2004, this makes perfect sense to me. It appeared to me that the event is primarily, and far and away, for the benefit of students, and not a place for masters to “show off”. Other than the event organizers, if masters want to benefit monetarily and “show their stuff”, they setup little seminars and classes during the three-day weekend, which is evident from looking at the Taiji Legacy web site .

In Closing:

Upon advice of the eminent Doctor Chilloutsky, I would very much like to return to my self-imposed exile from this distinguished forum, in part because of the requirement to pop a Chill Pill before coming and the great monetary cost of each pill, which has yet to be produced generically. Considering the length of my post, I feel obligated to respond to any replies, but please remember that one of the side-effects of the Maxi-Mega Chill Pill™, patent pending is increased latency in responding to posts. However, another published side-effect is exaggerated jocularity, and this post has been about as dry as dehydrated water. I wonder if there isn’t something ‘round here inhibiting qi flow to my funny bone? Hey, I’m asking Chinese Medicine students and practitioners: considering its proximity to the humerus bone, should I stimulate Large Intestine-14 or 15 to tonify my jocularity meridian?

Best wishes,
Michael