INSIGHTS

   from  the              

Ching Yi Kung Fu Association Newsletter

NOVEMBER 1991

  by Michael Alan Brown            President -  CYKFA

Edited by W Kraig Stephens CYKFA Black Belt #68

PUBLISHED WITH PERMISSION OF THE CHING YI KUNG FU ASSOCIATION

INSIGHTS:  Gongfu for Success:  The purpose of Gongfu is to produce power; power for health, power for peace of mine, power for self-defense, and an often neglected aspect - the power to control one's life.  It is a tool, not and end unto itself.  If you look into the personal histories of the most famous ancient and contemporary masters, you will find an alarming number of them who were poverty stricken, plagued by "accidents" and misfortune, imprisoned for one reason or another, and/or met an early death.  In my assessment, this is not Gongfu.  It doesn't matter how many bricks they could crush, men they killed, or great stories that were told about them, if they weren't able to keep their day to day affairs under control, I am not impressed.

For years, I too admired the image of Kwai Chang Caine, wandering in search of enlightenment, working at any menial task to survive, with no attachment to the "world of men."  Perhaps this is the correct path for Buddhist priests, and I won't argue anyone's right to their religious beliefs, but I have lived a bit since those days, and I was paying attention.  Maybe it's old age, maybe a fuller understanding of my daily practice, maybe the product of long years immersed in Asia and Asian culture, but I see things a little differently nowadays.

I used to think that great Gongfu achievement and success in society were mutually exclusive.  I thought that you had a choice of one or the other.  However, my observations and experience have proved that not to be the case.  I now believe that if your gongfu is correct, then financial security, achievement in a career or business, and "success" in everything you wish to attain, should come as if you had the ability to "turn everything you touch to gold."

Ask any successful person for the secret of that success and you'll probably get answers like, "dedication to hard work", "fearlessness when faced with a risk", "persistence", or even "good luck".  The daily practice of real gongfu will enhance your ability to possess all of those characteristics and more.

I am convinced that real achievement in gongfu should be reflected not in abstract terms, but by real, tangible, measurable results.  Physically, you should be stronger than you were before, able to work longer hours without fatigue, to think more clearly, to make resolute decisions.  You should be able to prosper in any environment, from a high-stress urban setting to a peaceful countryside.  You should not seek to hide away from the world and its challenges, but rather meet them head on and prevail.  Anything you want should be yours.

Therefore, I am recommending that you concentrate your energies not on collecting the most forms, being the best at emulating the movements of one old Chinese teacher or another, or spending the most hours per day at practice, but on finding what works to give you what you want out of life.  Everyone reading this newsletter has enough knowledge of gongfu to make it happen.  All you need to do is apply it in positive directions.  Make gongfu practice a daily function of your life, like eating or sleeping, no matter how little time you may have each day, then fix your mind on what you need or want, and it will come to you.

In conclusion, I must say that I can think of no finer example of what I have just proposed above than our Teacher and Founder, Dr. Her Yue Wong.  He is not the most famous Gongfu master in America.  He has never aspired to be.  His forms are not exactly like any other teacher I have ever met or read about.  He never meant them to be.  He is not the head of the largest gongfu organization in existence.   He never made that his goal.  But in the twenty years I have been honored to be his student, I have seen him continue steadfastly on the path he believes is right, and become a total success in every sense of the word.  Of all the things he has taught us, this may well be his most important lesson.