CHI
By
First come the definitions. “Chi” is the much touted
“mysterious” internal force that oriental martial artists claim gives almost
magical strength to advanced practitioners and “masters”. Acupuncturists also
claim that this is the force they manipulate on patients bodies with needles
and such to cure people of different diseases.
I will discuss the Chinese concept of “Chi” (or “Ki”, or “Prana” – Japanese and
Indian, respectively, for the same thing) as it is usually applied to the
martial arts.
So far, in my almost 40 years in the martial arts, I
have seen little to no evidence to support the existence of Chi. Chi seems, in
most cases, to be a "catch all" explanation for phenomenon that is
sometimes symptomatic, but not readily explainable by current technology.
People have this unusual characteristic whereby they feel that they MUST come
up with an explanation for an observable phenomenon. If there is an observable
effect, they feel obligated to come up with the "cause" before they
can appreciate the effect. They do this even if the explanation for the cause
is just a bunch of crap that they made up off of the top of their heads. And,
as far as the “observable” is concerned, people also tend to see what they want
to see.
I see that "chi" is, in many cases, just a
cop-out. If a student is questioning WHY a certain technique works like magic
for the instructor, but not for anyone else around, the instructor may go into
a long explanation of the subtleties of balance, application of force,
direction of force, structural alignment of the action with the center of
gravity, the proper use of weight, and the shifting of weight into the action,
and critical timing. Then the instructor may go on to explain that he has an intrinsic
feeling for these subtleties simply because he has been doing it for 35 years.
But, instead of giving these TRUE explanations; explanations which the student
could not possibly understand, at this point of training, and would simply go
over the student's head anyway, the instructor just opts to cop-out with the
statement, "I have strong CHI. I just let my CHI flow." The student
is amazed, perhaps bewildered, but satisfied and the instructor can now go home
early and crawl into a hot bath.
In many cases, as it is with a lot of other things in
life, the instructor may not KNOW how he or she does something either. It may
be a mystery to the master how he is able to consistently break bricks with his
chops, or sling opponents through the air. He just knows that he can and does
it. Actually, He or she may simply know intuitively how to read the opponent's
movements and apply just the right amount of force, at just the right time.
When put on the spot to explain HOW this is done, "chi" may be ONLY
honest explanation that comes to mind, even to the instructor. Just because the
instructor is a great person, and a brilliantly skilled martial artist, doesn't
necessarily mean that he or she is scientifically trained or even literate, in
many cases. The teacher may know that saying "chi" is a cop-out, but
just doesn't have the words to explain what he intuitively knows.
Although there is some minor scientific observation of
effective acupuncture, effective healing and massage therapy, and other
symptomatic phenomenon, there is absolutely no evidence whatsoever that any of
this is attributable to some mystical, magical force called chi. Remember that
at the time that "chi" became the explanation for strange, but
effective treatments, the state-of-the-art science also thought that the world
was flat, demons and evil spirits ruled practically everything, and that
bleeding a person half to death was a good idea to fight a fever. It is
probably time to come up with a better explanation. I have, however, seen great
evidence to support the power of courage, spirit, determination, true skill,
and attitude… as well as physical strength.
Then again, there are an awful lot of con artists and
tricksters out there that just love to give demonstrations of chi power. All of
the demonstrations I have seen, and I have seen them all, are easily explained
by scientific terms, or through outright deception, without relying upon some
mystical, magical power of chi. In fact, most of them I can do myself, and I am
a fat, middle-aged telecommunications, telephony, and computer engineer with
bad knees and a granddaughter that I haven’t seen in far too long. And, I am
lazy. In my system of gung-fu boxing, Chin Li Ming CHI Tao Chuan, the
"CHI" translates as "spirit". Spirit, along with courage,
determination, and attitude, I believe in.
BUT, GUESS WHAT? I could be wrong. I have been before,
and I am likely to be wrong at least one or two more times in my life. But, I
am not going to accept it just because some "master" says it's so.
Or, just because some "master" can shove his OWN students around with
magic chi rays from his eyeballs. Some of these "demonstrations" I
have seen are hilarious. It is so obvious that the students are "doing
it" to themselves for their "master" that I almost expected to
see the "master" toss a biscuit to his student after the student
successfully fell over on cue. Tell you what'cha do. Set up a correctly
designed laboratory experiment, using a double-blind study, with randomly
chosen subjects, control groups, with adequate subject population density, and
appropriate statistical computation. Then show that this study is repeatable by
other labs, and these labs get consistent results supporting the stated
hypothesis, and then I MIGHT start to believe in chi. I'm not holding my
breath.
I am not a martial artist. I am too fat and lazy for
that (If you want to know the easiest and most efficient way to do something,
always ask a lazy person). I prefer to think of myself as a martial scientist.
I look for the EASIEST and most EFFICIENT ways to break bones and inflict pain
based upon real scientific and medical know-how. Even though I am a scientist,
and perhaps BECAUSE I am a scientist, I have to concede the possibility of chi because not all of
the evidence is in. And also because Bill Sosa (recently deceased), Brad
Whitewolf, Bobby “Chief” Brown (recently deceased), Shannon Harvey (recently
deceased), and Dwight Higgins all believe strongly in the traditional concept
of chi. I think they are deluded on the subject, but I love and respect them
both as brothers and long time compatriots in our journey along the martial
arts maze, and I have always, and continue to value their most excellent
opinions and insights. Besides, I love the traditional "chi
enhancement" exercises. They feel great, and they help my back. Especially
the "standing on post" exercise of Hsing Yi, and the Tai Chi horse
posture.
By the way, from some of my other writings, people may
have gotten the opinion that I do not hold Californians in high regard. Perhaps,
I do tend to think a lot of them are a little gullible, mindless, superficial,
and extremely transparent. However, this opinion of mine is actually limited to
most, but certainly NOT all people of the Californian persuasion. The truth is,
I have two daughters who were raised in California, and some other friends and
relatives who are Californians; so, I like some Californians. Even some who
believe in chi.
