I am curious to see how many of you switched from external to internal styles, and what prompted you to make that switch. In particular, I am interested in hearing from folks who have some actual ring fight experience. It could be Boxing, Sanda, Muay Thai, Wrestling, Judo, Taekwondo, or any types of competitive matches where your opponent is not very cooperative... I used to study Shaolin, Qin-Na, Sanda, and Jeet Kune Do when I was young, but I switched to internal arts eventually. Currently I am learning Chen Style Hunyuan Tai Chi under Master Wang Feng Ming, a disciple of late Grandmaster Feng Zhi Qiang. Also, I'd like to hear your candid comments on the pros and cons of different martial arts styles, as you have seen more than one style already and probably have more balanced (and less religious) view than a single-style practitioner. By the way, here is my teacher's website: Link removed He teaches in NJ, NY, and CT. I am taking his weekend classes. I look forward to hearing your thoughts!
taiji48, please keep to the original text size in your posts. I'm afraid that we don't allow links back to personal sites. Once you have a few posts under your belt you'll be allowed a link as part of your signature.
Sorry for that, Simon. I don't have great eyesight nowadays, and I thought the link would be a good resource. Will pay attention going forward!
This thread just remind me a BJJ guy may start a thread as, "Who Switched from Judo to BJJ and Why?" Should we also consider the opposite such as, "Who Switched from BJJ to Judo and Why?" When you have assumed that people may switch from style A to style B, you have already assumed that style B is "superior" than style A in your personal opinion.
Thanks for pointing this out. In my case I did go back and forth between several styles. Although I am focusing on Tai Chi right now, I still don't think it is the right art for many scenarios. For example, I just watched a video of Tai Chi vs. Muay Thai. The Tai Chi guys won but they were not using any Tai Chi technique. They are just doing Chinese kickboxing. Hope this clarifies my intention
Does lack of cooperation from your opponent or competitive fighting preclude internal martial arts? Tim Cartmell is a very experienced CMA guy and he considers BJJ to be "internal".
Interesting. I never heard anyone decrribe BJJ as an internal art before. I usually hear this term for Tai Chi Chuan, Xing Yi Quan, and Bagua. Personally, the longer I do martial arts, the less I find the distinctions between external and internal to be true. When I was a beginner, I could rattle off the differences easily. But the more I practice and the more I learn, the less those differences seem to really exist.
Hi Taiji48, Welcome to MAP! I think before we can proceed further, you should perhaps identify the destinction between 'External' and 'Internal' in terms of MA? Where does this disticntion originate from and what purpouse does or did it serve? For answers to this and other related questions, it may be worth consulting this "sticky": http://www.martialartsplanet.com/forums/showthread.php?t=43822 as opposed to:
