I’m pretty pumped right now because this week – all the way from China - the Head Abbot of the Shaolin Temple and his finest Warrior Monks are visiting.
Whenever they come to visit – like they did a couple of years ago – they always get “the treatment”. The nicest hotels, the nicest restaurants, sightseeing, the whole enchilada…
Only problem is the restaurants; we always have to find ones that offer vegetarian dishes.
Their visit is going to culminate with a performance of their Martial Arts show to a sold-out crowd at the Long Beach Convention Center on Sunday afternoon. If you’ve never seen one, what these guys do literally takes your breath away.
As the week goes on, I get more and more excited because I know that Thursday through Satruday is the huge payoff: training with the Monks.
Training with the Shaolin Monks is special for a bunch of different reasons; seeing their athleticism in person is really something to see. They aren’t very big guys, but their frames are All Man – lean and sinewy with muscles so tight they look like cable under their skin.
Their power – forget about it. OF all the people and styles I have trained with, these guys really “get it” when it comes to hitting with 100% of their bodies. When they demonstrate “Body Law” as it’s taught and explained in the Shaolin Secrets (http://www.shaolinsecrets.com) – they hit like a Mack truck.
They’re fast. Smooth. I once heard an Instructor teaching a technique and he was stressing to the students, “Smooth is fast.” I didn’t really understand what he meant until I trained with the Shaolin Monks.
They don’t look fast, yet when they teach and demonstrate something on you, it’s like you’re in slow motion as they just whip around you – or whip you around – like the wind.
But that isn’t the best part of training with the Monks. The best part is in the discoveries.
They don’t speak English much, if at all. They always have translators with them – except when they are training you. Then, it’s follow the leader.
For many people this is a frustrating experience, especially us Americans.
We’re used to getting every scrap of information served up to us on the plate – with complete step-by-step instructions on how to do every piece of it, along with a Coach, Therapist, Nutritionist and Manager to answer any questions along the way, make sure we’re hydrated…
Not when you train with these guys.
It’s Old School. Shut Up – Pay Attention – Follow Along – and You’ll Figure It Out as You Do It.
It’s awesome for one reason. You learn along the way because you discover the little things in the techniques as you perform them – the Monks can’t tell you everything.
If you make gigantic errors, have your feet backwards or you’re facing the wrong way, they’ll square that away, but the principles and hidden gems – those you discover for yourself on the way.
After seventeen years of training with many different martial artists and Masters, I can say that without a doubt, the lessons I learned while training – and watching the Masters c-l-o-s-e-l-y - I discovered many things that they weren’t even focused on teaching.
And – because I discovered it on my own – it stuck in my head much better than things I had been “told”.
This is why the material and lessons in the Shaolin Secrets is presented like it is.
The Shaolin Secrets were created and written by the Shaolin Temple over fifteen hundred years. They wrote and recorded everything just as they teach it.
When we had Dr. Shin Min Li translate the manuscripts from Chinese to English, we asked him to keep the context and wording exactly as it was in the Chinese versions. We wanted to make sure that these works were as close to the originals as we could make it.
He did a magnificent job. There isn’t a more accurate translation of the ancient manuscripts from the Shaolin Temple anywhere – except at the Shaolin Temple itself.
Maybe you can’t go to the Shaolin Temple to train. There probably isn’t a Shaolin Monk living in your town that you can go train with and it’s a little bit of short notice to get on a plane and get out to see me here in Southern California to train with the Monks through this weekend.
But you can get your hands on the training manuscripts of the Shaolin Temple and start “discovering” what it is that makes the Shaolin Monks some of the finest martial artists on the planet.
Go to http://www.shaolinsecrets.com and get the Shaolin Secrets Volume I & II – and start your Path to Discovery.
I’ll keep you posted on the adventures with the Monks. Check back soon for photos.
Best,
William Huff