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Hi guys,

Im very new to Wing Chun, have been practising for only 3 mths. The first few weeks of learning the basics was tough as i was being trained in the fighting style of muay thai. Im muay thai, we dont deflect and hands always up on the face/head. So i seemed to progress very slowlyyyyyy than others, luckily I have patience dat was willing to learn

But from what i have heard from my sifu, WC is something dat you learn and adapt and modify and the technique become yours to keep.

For example, I tot of why not using a short range kneeing when you do hands trapping. Fast and quick on the thigh, yet maximum pain when facing an opponent, a method of Muay thai X WC...of coz i don practise this at my skool, later kena f by sifu. What im saying is dat WC has no limits.

I dono if im learning the right way or not but everytime when we are doing the drills, I would question myself and imagine whether blocking a muay thai/boxing move would be effective or not.

JKD~

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Daniel Kaw
SgWutan.com Wushu Administrator

一天不练手脚慢，两天不练丢一半，三天不练门外汉，四天不练瞪眼看。

Hi kaledia,

This topic really should have been in a new thread, not tagged to an old one.

Here's my 2 cents based on my current level of understanding. It's not much since I haven't been at it for very long but hopefully you may find some sense in it.

As you know, wing chun is a principle-based system. It follows some important principles, among them the theory of guarding the centerline and attacking in straight directions. What techniques we use are simply expressions that put these principles in motion.



So, I don't see why knee strikes cannot be used, or elbow strikes, which, incidentally, are part of biu jee, so long as they are used according to the principles of wing chun. However, there are several criteria you will need to fulfill in order for it to work with wing chun i.e. you can't expect it to integrate nicely out of the box.

One of it is balance. Trapping hands doesn't work well when you are not balanced. And it is hard to be balanced on one leg when you are trapping.



While it is good that not to passively accept everything taught without thinking about it, if you take it too far, you may impede your progress. A full cup cannot hold anymore water ya.

There are some mitigating factors to note, namely:

1. You have been training for only 3 months, that's not enough time to really get to know the WC system, what its principles try to achieve, and how to achieve it

2. If you don't think what you learn can stop an MT or boxing punch, just ask your teacher loh. If he cannot show you then the bullshit detector should light up. Most of the time, however, there is a perfectly good reason why you learn these drills. Just don't overanalyze them, like what should I do if he does this and that. These are drills. Drills are meant to cultivate muscle memory and get you familiarized with the movements. The actual application comes later.

3. Having said that however, sometimes some things you learn just don't work for you, maybe because you are too tall, too short, too fat, too thin, never learn properly, or never got taught properly etc. What I mean is don't discount anything taught yet until you think you have a reasonable understanding of how it works. Then if you think it's not good for you, just drop it.

what looks unnatural might be natural after putting some effort on it.

what look natural might not be the precise from the system's POV.

About a decade back, when I first learn from my Wing Chun teacher to stand and move in a way that looks almost impossible and unnatural to me. When i learn to stand that way, I find myself perpetually stuck to the ground and unable to move. It took several years of practice to make them feel natural.

Some Wing Chun systems put strong emphasis on positioning the elbow along the centerline. Some emphasize clamping the knees so close to each other. Some emphasize waist springing, some emphasize locking the elbows when punching, some emphasize gripping the feet tightly onto the floors etc. Are all these natural at all???

Another question worth pondering, regardless of the system practice, let say a student spent more than a decade learning from a same teacher, and he was told to take what he had learn and make those tools his. Is it realistic that the student, who has been taught hands on by that teacher for such a duration will not express a move or two that might even contain some expression / flavor of his teacher????

I have to agree with Chinaboy there. A lot of things I learnt in WC don't come naturally until I practiced it for some time. Give it time.

CMA was develop with respect to a human body, or Chinese's body. It has input from Chinese culture, landscape and the most profound - Ying Yang.

Isn't it suppose to be nature? If you feel un-nature or uncomfortable doing a certain posture and /or movement, does it imply you might be doing it wrongly? Or the teaching was imparted down by self-discovery of nature un-nature posture/movement that was actually wrong all the while?

_________________
Daniel Kaw
SgWutan.com Wushu Administrator

一天不练手脚慢，两天不练丢一半，三天不练门外汉，四天不练瞪眼看。

I used to think that too.

By right, if the principles are what is important about martial arts, you should be able to fight using whatever moves so long as you adhere to these principles, right? So, if a move is not natural, you will have a harder time learning it and you might as well use your own move. I think that's what JKD is trying to do.

In practice, however, unless you are some kind of genius, I don't see people create moves out of thin air just based on principles without years of training. Even Bruce Lee who founded the JKD school of thought had years of WC training beforehand.

We can think of the training as physical and mental conditioning, if you will. The techniques and stances learnt are examples of how you can apply these principles. When we reach the stage when we have a better understanding of how those principles in action work, then we can go back to customizing or creating our own moves to fit the situation.

Speaking being able to apply the principles of WC and modifying it accordingly, there's a lesser known example - Alan Orr:
http://www.alanorr.com/

Can check out youtube as well, he has many videos regarding utilizing WC principles for MA training.

But Master Lee didn't complete his WC training, so is JKD really a evolvement from WC?

Nonetheless, when I was taught, principle & movement never change, the only thing that change is the positioning of the movement that is affected by individual body structure.

_________________
Daniel Kaw
SgWutan.com Wushu Administrator

一天不练手脚慢，两天不练丢一半，三天不练门外汉，四天不练瞪眼看。

Ah Gao, you left out another part. If a person completes the training does this mean that he understands the principles and can apply accordingly or it just means that he has learned all the drills and forms.

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This part is purposely left out for you to fill in marr~

_________________
Daniel Kaw
SgWutan.com Wushu Administrator

一天不练手脚慢，两天不练丢一半，三天不练门外汉，四天不练瞪眼看。

@Ah Gao:

As you said, the principles never change. I'm not saying whether Bruce Lee derived JKD from WC, I'm saying he learnt these principles through WC and other martial arts. Bruce derived his inspiration from many sources, including WC, fencing and boxing, among others.

Even though he is an advocate of "the way of no way", he didn't achieve this before he has studied and practiced these martial arts for many years.

Doggone it, fell for your trap

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One question - which way is this way of no way?

The way of no way of WC or the way of no way of many ways?

But if one has not gone indepth enough can one transform from a way to no way to many ways to a no-way of many ways?

Or is this no way really a fusion of many ways by subjugating the differences to the commonalities which does not really make it no way so much as a new way a la the Bruce Lee personal way?

Just some crazy thoughts that comes to mind.....

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Remember mushin once ask me - How would you not able to do it when you understood it? How could you understand it when you can't event do it? (or something along that line) - it left me pondering for a very long time. Still pondering. I'm hoping to find a way to refute that comment... am still finding...

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Daniel Kaw
SgWutan.com Wushu Administrator

一天不练手脚慢，两天不练丢一半，三天不练门外汉，四天不练瞪眼看。

Haha roughly understands what ah^gao and mushin is saying. From my personal point of view, the ways that mushin speaks of refers to the varieties of MA you learn.

By saying that you can turn a way into no way and no way into many is like a saying most of us have heard. From Shen Diao Xia Lu i think. Du Gu Qiu Bai once quote - Wu jian sheng yu you jian ( Able to win someone with sword without using sword.)

Many should know and could have already experienced it. When we're young, we get into fights but do we ever think of what moves to use next? We just wanna hit the crap out of the other guy right?

Once we learn a martial art example Muay Thai, we learn to use different techniques to knock our opponent down. But in a real street fight, we hardly even give a thought of the techniques, cause all we want is to knock them out no matter what even if its dirty.

So for me turning a way to no way and turning it into many ways and back to no way is like when you're in a street fight, you dont even need to think about your next move you can execute what you wanna do immediately like a natural reaction.

After so much bull crapping. What i want to say is. Natural reaction that your body is comfortable with.

Not sure what you meant by no way.

The no way I mentioned referred to the idea of using whatever moves you can create on the fly which adheres to the laws of physics and the principles we learn in each martial art.

If you meant there's a deeper level than that, I haven't practiced enough to even begin to comprehend that yet ^_^;;

As to whether or not Bruce Lee achieved that level of skill, honestly I don't know enough to judge. What I think is that even assuming Bruce was just re-inventing the wheel, he should at least be credited with bringing the idea to the attention of so many martial artists worldwide.

Bruce Lee like many Martial Artist like to express themselves thru their art. He specifically said that JKD would not be classical. In his final stage of JKD thesis, he was fusing boxing, Kung Fu kicks & grappling based on his experience of exchange with other martial arts under a set of scientific combat philosophy he named JKD.

But after his death, only Ted Wong carry on that lineage, his older WC students taught their own version of JKD. But that has recently been rectify by the Bruce Lee Foundation. But frankly, JKD is Bruce Lee's own interpretation of combat. Anyone can come up with their own "JKD", just don't say Bruce Lee taught it to them.

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Upon being asked to come hear a person who could perfectly imitate a nightingale, a Spartan answered, "I have heard the nightingale itself."

Sky, Earth & Human in harmony also requires timing and opportunity. My 2 cents thought on that.

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Upon being asked to come hear a person who could perfectly imitate a nightingale, a Spartan answered, "I have heard the nightingale itself."

Bruce lee JKD will always be different from your own JKD as long as you feel comfortable with what you're doing. Just my thoughts. Like DNA, everybody is different.