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| Indoor student expectations | ||
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Credibility
Tai chi is not the most credible martial
art on the planet. This is quite understandable. Most people who train
tai chi are not training how to fight. They are
more interested in aesthetics or
health.
Unlike a lineage student, an indoor student
is not expected to keep tai chi alive and kicking... however, you are
expected to train it for combat.
After all, if an indoor student has no fighting credibility, your teacher
has no credibility and the art itself has no credibility.
No pressure
If this sounds like pressure to you, then you'll never be a
martial artist. What do you think
will happen if a person actually assaults
you? Now you've got pressure. If you
screw it up, they'll beat you up.
The will to fight
A martial artist is not afraid to fight. In fact,
they want to fight. They could have played golf or tennis or gone hiking.
Instead, they signed-up to learn an ancient
Chinese martial art.
This was not the average choice here.
Are you a martial
artist?
A regular kung fu student has the
luxury of training their art in whatever manner best suits their
disposition. It's their journey after all... The
same is true for indoor students (to a degree anyway).
There is a catch. The regular student doesn't necessarily ever have to
become a martial artist. It's their choice. They
can do what they like in essence and it affects nobody but themselves.
By definition, an indoor student needs to learn how to
use tai chi. This is accomplished by learning
how to fight. So, signing-up to become
an indoor student is signing-up to fight. Like it or not.
Learning how to learn
If an indoor student fails to move up the grades every year they revert back
to normal student status. No ill feelings. However, it is quite easy to
avoid this situation.
The first step is to attend every
learning opportunity you can; particularly the
indoor sessions. The second step is to
learn how to learn. Not many students
really think about step 2.
There are many good books nowadays about maximising the learning experience.
Read them. Sifu Waller did. He even added many of them to his
reading list.
Focused learning
Plan your goals, set training times, take
ownership of the learning experience. Don't treat it as some random
phenomenon. Be an active learner, not a
lazy one.
Speaking the language
At present your martial arts knowledge base is miniscule... but this is easy
to remedy and fun to do. Read about the martial arts, watch video clips.
Read about Taoism, Zen,
The Tai Chi Classics.
Doing all this will help to develop your
knowledge base, your mental
representation. Pretty soon, you'll start
thinking like a martial artist and
that is the first step to becoming one.
Condition 9
Please note that by definition an indoor student seeks more tuition than
your average students, so this means attending ALL available
training/learning opportunities.
If this is not a viable expectation, then don't seek to do indoor.
Behaviour
To be an indoor student, you must
behave as
an
indoor student.
Expected behaviour:
•
Seek to attend all possible training opportunities (workshops, boot camps,
indoor sessions)
•
Regular (ideally monthly) indoor sessions
•
Handing in assignments regularly
•
Fast progress through the grades (ideally every 6 months)
An indoor doesn't do this out of obligation. But rather, from enthusiasm.
From ferocity, drive and ambition.
Understanding what
Sifu Waller is talking about
Attending classes is not enough. Sifu Waller has
studied a
colossal amount of material that he brings into his tuition. But he
cannot share most of it with you. Why
not?
Because you simply wouldn't know what he was
talking about.
If Sifu Waller starting discussing ideas from
The Art of War, The Book of Five Rings, The Way of
Chuang Tzu, Tao Te Ching... would you recognise the references?
Would those examples mean anything to you?
Sifu Waller even went to the trouble of providing a
900 page introduction to his teachings. Have you
read it? Did you
understand it?
Direct transmission
Indoor sessions and private lessons are your best opportunity to
interact with Sifu Waller. The more you
engage with your instructor, the more you
will learn.
Particularly, if you partner
with him or play the attacker during
a demonstration. If you ignore
instructions, over-analyse or get
scared, you'll learn very little. You're too busy
thinking about yourself.
Make the best of every opportunity. Sifu Waller can do the art. He
can fight. He can dismantle tai chi and
explain it in ways you cannot current comprehend. Find out how. Walk the
path yourself...
Booking a session
The booking procedure is very simple:
Contact Rachel and ask if a specific Saturday morning is available
Rachel will confirm the date
Once confirmed, pay within 24 hours*
* Chasing a student for money is never fun. It is completely inappropriate to be chasing an indoor student for money. Especially when the student is the one who made the booking in the first place.
Page created 2 March 1995
Last updated
15 May 2011
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