Another Myth Busted.
It’s one of the great attractions of martial arts. Study your form long enough, develop your knowledge, build up your skills and impress enough of the most important masters, and you’ll become part of a martial arts super-elite. Not only will you be able to perform all of the most advanced moves that will allow you to defeat any attacker from any discipline and do it without breaking a sweat, but — more importantly — you’ll also be granted access to the innermost secrets of your school.
You’ll be taught the moves that were written on ancient scrolls, hidden in a small monastery on Mount Song and passed down by word-of-mouth from instructor to the top student in each class… or each generation.
These techniques are so lethal that only a handful of martial artists have ever been taught them, and to speak of them, let alone write them in a book and sell it through adverts in martial arts magazines, is to invite instant banishment and perhaps even death at the hands of an even more accomplished martial artist.
It’s the ultimate proof that you really have mastered your martial arts form and are now a leader among the world’s fighters.
And unfortunately, it’s total baloney.
Of course, it’s impossible to say that of the hundreds of different martial arts forms practiced around the world, there are none that don’t have some sort of secret moves that are only revealed to fighters who have achieved a certain level.
In fact, that’s even likely. It’s how education usually works. As you study, your understanding increases and you’re able to do more complicated maneuvers. It’s why math begins with
multiplication tables and leaves the algebra until you think you’ve cracked the numbers game. Only then does it hit you with the kind of challenging stuff that really hurts.
It’s not so much a question of hiding away secrets that aren’t available to the general masses then. It’s more a case of leaving the advanced material to the advanced students who are capable of handling it. Often, those are also the most dangerous moves.
But that hasn’t stopped the rumors of magical, supreme information stashed away and revealed only to the discipline’s superfighters.
This is particularly true of kung fu. In fact, the idea that each kung fu school has hidden secrets has become such an integral part of the form that it appears throughout Chinese martial arts literature. The stories of Jin Yong, the most popular martial arts novelist, are filled with fights in which the hero reveals the extent of his knowledge through moves that he practices against his opponents, often just before battling over a handbook of secret techniques stolen that have been stolen from his school by a rival.
It’s easy to see where these ideas came from. Internal martial arts forms in particular can make claims that are difficult to believe. Gain enough control of your qi, and you can do all sorts of bizarre things from knocking out opponents with a stare to flying through the air or catching arrows.
When it’s clear that even the most talented of ba gua or xing yi practitioners aren’t doing any of these things in the training room, in sparring or even in real fights, the only explanation is that these are secret methods that are only used at moments of desperate need and only known to a handful of select fighters.
It’s a much better story than admitting that actually qi can help to improve balance, ease tension and increase power but it won’t really have you plucking arrows out of the air or blowing away opponents with a flicked finger.
Perhaps the biggest source of these kinds of secret stories though concern the Touch of Death, or dim mak, the “top secret” techniques that allow anyone to kill another fighter simply by employing the right combination of finger moves on the right vital points on the body.
That vital points exist is well-known. That the right amount of pressure placed on some of those points can result in death is also accepted, even if it’s actually quite difficult to do in unarmed practice and happens very rarely.
But the idea that you need to press your fingers in a particular combination on certain spots isn’t a martial arts secret; it’s a martial arts myth. It’s also a story that’s enabled hucksters like Count Dante to try to make a ton of cash claiming that he knows the secrets and he’s prepared to reveal them in return for $9.95 including postage and package.
There are certainly things that you don’t know about the martial arts that you’re studying. Unless you’re prepared to stick with it for the rest of your life, it’s likely that there will always be things that you don’t know about it.
But in general, there are no hidden secrets in martial arts. There are only techniques that youhaven’t yet learned and moves you’re not yet ready to practice.
You don’t have to be one of the super-elite for them to be revealed to you though. You just have to dedicate yourself to learning.