1-5. Hard Styles, Soft-Hard Styles, and Soft Styles
Four Categories of Fighting Skills
After many thousands of years of knowledge accumulation and fighting experience, martial techniques can be divided into four major categories: kicking (ti), hand striking (da), wrestling (shuai), and joint locking (qin na or chin na) (na).
Kicking is using the legs to kick the opponent’s vital areas, sweep the opponent’s legs, or block the opponent’s kick. Hand striking is using the hands, forearms, elbows, or shoulders to block an attack or to strike the opponent. Wrestling is using grabs, trips, sweeps, bumps, etc., to make the opponent lose his balance, and then to take him down. Finally, qin na itself has four categories of techniques, including sealing the veins and arteries, sealing the breath, cavity press, and joint locking.
Technically speaking, wrestling techniques are designed against kicking and striking; qin na techniques are to be used in countering wrestling; and kicking and hand striking are used to conquer the techniques of qin na joint locking. From this, you can see that all have special purposes and mutually support and can conquer each other. In order to make the techniques effective, all four categories of fighting techniques are required in any Chinese martial style.
Therefore, in order to become a proficient martial artist, you must learn northern styles and southern styles, allowing you to cover all ranges of fighting skills. You should also understand both internal and external styles. Although the basic theory of qi cultivation for both styles is the same, the training methods are often quite different. Learning both internal and external styles will offer you various angles for viewing the same thing. Most importantly, in order to make your martial arts training complete, you should learn all four categories of fighting techniques. These four categories should be included in any Chinese martial arts style.
The Dao of Chinese Martial Arts
As mentioned earlier, the word “martial” is constructed by two Chinese words “stop” and “weapons”, and when combined means “to cease the battle.” This concept is very important, especially in ancient times when there was even more violence and fighting between different races and nations than there is today. In order to protect yourself and your country, you needed to learn the martial arts. From this perspective, you can see that martial arts are defensive and are a way of using fighting skills to stop actual fighting. If you examine Chinese history, you will see that even after China had become a huge country and its culture had reached one of the highest levels in the world, it never thought of invading or conquering other countries. On the contrary, throughout its history, China has tried to prevent invasion by the Mongols from the north, the Manchus from the northeast, and many small incursions from Korea and the tribes to its west. Even though China invented gunpowder before the Song dynasty, it did not develop as a purely military power. If China had possessed the intention of conquering the world at that time, its military technologies were probably up to the task.
China’s most basic human philosophies originated with Confucianism and Daoism. These philosophies emphasize peace, harmony, and the love of the human race. War is necessary only when it is needed for self-protection. From this fundamental philosophy and cultural development, we can understand that almost all the Chinese martial arts techniques were developed under the motivation for self-defense, and not for offense. However, there is one style called Shape-Mind Fist (Xingyiquan) that was created by Marshal Yue Fei during the Chinese Southern Song dynasty (A.D. 1127-1280), which emphasizes attack. If we consider the background of the creation of this style, we can appreciate why this style was created for offense. At that time, the Mongols had taken over the northern half of China and captured the Song emperor. For survival purposes, a new emperor was established and the empire moved to the south of China. At all times, the Chinese were preparing against an invasion by the Mongols. Martial arts training was one of the most important aspects of the country’s affairs in order to survive. Xingyiquan was created as a military style, with which a person could reach a higher fighting capability in a short time. Xingyiquan trains forward movements instead of backward. Although the basic techniques are simple, they are powerful and effective. If you are interested in more information on Xingyiquan, please refer to the book Xingyiquan—Theory and Applications, published by YMAA.
According to Chinese philosophy, in order to achieve harmony and peace with your enemy, when there is a conflict, you must not merely conquer his or her body. True power or capability for fighting is in showing your opponents that they do not have a chance of victory. Therefore, after a physical conflict, there should be spiritual harmony with your enemy. Only then can peace be reached. Killing and conquest can only produce more hate and killing in the future. In China, the highest level of fighting is not fighting. If you can anticipate and avoid a fight, then you have won the war.
For example, there is a tavern near my studio. Occasionally, an inebriated person decides that he wants to come in and challenge the students in my school. Often, this will agitate them, and the younger ones want to fight. One time, a drunken Vietnam veteran walked into the school and challenged them to fight. Again, some students were agitated and angry. I told them I would handle it this time. I politely and carefully approached him, asked his name and if there was anything that I could do to help him. He told me how strong and great he used to be, how brave he was in the war, and how well he was able to fight. I listened and nodded my head to show my acknowledgment of his past glory. After he saw that I was actually listening to his story, his manner became gentler. Then I asked him to sit down and told him I was busy with class right now and that I would fight him after class if it were all the same to him. Next, I went to prepare some hot tea and gave it to him. I told him the tea would help him while he was waiting. Half an hour later, he woke up and sneaked out the door without being noticed. Since then, every time he passes the studio, he will smile and wave to me. Although we do not know each other deeply, at least we have become friends, and he understands that I recognize his honor. Since that night we have never had a problem with him. Another story was told to me by my Grandmother. A long time ago, there was a family that owned a small farm. The father worked very hard to make the farm successful so that he would be able to leave it to his two sons when he died. The elder son, who was married, was named De-xin, while the younger son, who was not married, was named De-yi.
One day, the father became very sick, and he knew that he would soon die. He gathered his sons together and said to them, “I wish to give this farm to both of you. Share it equally, and help each other to make it successful. I hope that it makes you as happy as it has made me.” With these words the father quietly passed away.
The sons divided the land equally and set about the task of building their own farms. Even though they had divided the land, they still cooperated, helping each other with the more difficult chores. However, not long after the father died, De-xin’s wife decided that she and De-xin had not received enough land. After all, De-yi was single and didn’t need as much land as they did. She began urging her husband to request more land from his brother.
Finally, after considerable provocation from his wife, De-xin demanded more land from De-yi. Because De-xin was much bigger and stronger, the only thing De-yi could do was to concede in angry silence and let his brother occupy more land.
However, De-xin’s wife was still not satisfied. When she saw how easy it was to get more land from her brother-in-law, she again urged her husband to demand more land. Again, De-yi could only consent to his brother’s demands. Still, De-xin’s wife was not satisfied, and finally she demanded that De-yi leave all the land to her and her husband.
De-yi requested help from his relatives and friends and begged them to mediate the conflict. No one would help. They knew it was unfair for De-yi to be forced off his land, but they were afraid because they knew
