Then there is the old way; No forms at all.

You begin with conditioning, learning of techniques to teach the principals and strategies of the style as well as how to deal with incoming force. You also learn body mechanical qi gong practice (often called "Martial Qigong". The majority of the lesson is two man work with a partner from day one. The form, is never taught. *If* it is, it is taught years later, at the very, very end, once the student has mastered all the skills and can already win the fight.

I have yet to see a fighting art, where the form needs to be taught at all. Even Tai Chi and Bagua do not need their forms to function and fight correctly.


Quote Originally Posted by SHemmati View Post
this turns back to the 1st question of the thread. as a rough, yet exact, enlistment, schools train fighting skills in 3 levels of approach:

1. performance (circus, or whatever you call it) approach: they just learn the forms, and almost do nothing with the applications. of the basic skills, they may practice flexibility, which can make the performance more elegant;

2. self-defense approach: they learn the forms, and applications. but don't emphasize on sparring and body mechanics. they may practice basic and qigong skills, but the level and type of skill is superficial;

2. warrior approach: warriors must learn the styles via the forms, learn the various variants of applications, and master the combat tactics and stuff via sparring. they should have good basic (endurance, flexibility, balance) and qigong (internal and external, hard and soft) skills.
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your master, like most the modern Shaolin monks, has been from a school of the 2nd approach.