MY FATHER'S LESSONS
by Mark Cheng, L.Ac.

As a kid, I used to watch my father practice tai chi. I remember sitting next to the wall, struggling to suppress the giggles bubbling inside me. The super-slow movements of the Yang system look utterly ridiculous to most children, and I was no exception. It wasn’t until a few months later when he easily avoided my punch and launched me across the room using one of those techniques that I became convinced this stuff was no joke. The martial arts have been a constant part of my life ever since.

Recently I had a chance to sit with my father and talk about the martial arts man-to-man. While driving back from a visit with a Chinese Naval Academy classmate during one of his rare trips to California, he asked about my training, my teaching and my mind-set regarding the martial arts.

I told him that since I was concentrating so much on my Chinese-medicine clinic, I wasn’t spending much time practicing. Expecting him to encourage me to focus on business and not devote excessive time to the arts, I was shocked to hear him give the opposite advice.

“When you were in school, you spent too much time thinking about martial arts and not enough time concentrating on your schoolwork,” he said. “Now that you’re working, you spend too much time at work and not enough time on martial arts.”

“How do I know when I’m spending enough time on what?” I asked. “I feel like when I trained, you wanted me to work, and now that I’m working, you want me to train more.”

He calmly replied: “I wanted you to spend your time in a balanced manner. First, you have invested so much time in your martial arts training that it would be a tragedy to let it slide by the wayside. You already said there are forms or styles that you learned in college but forgot completely due to lack of practice. So why would you want to let more of your hard work go to waste?

“Second, you need to train to keep healthy. It’s very easy to just let your body take up other habits like getting lazy, weak, fat and stiff. You don’t have to train to be a fighter any more. That’s not in the cards for you at this stage of life. But you do have to use the methods of your kung fu and tai chi training to keep in shape.”

His advice about teaching proved just as surprising. He started by asking me if I was doing much of it these days, and before replying, I remembered my college days when he would criticize me for spending my time instructing students. “I want to eventually phase out teaching altogether and just concentrate on my training whenever I have some time,” I said. “I have to save my energy for my patients.”

“Are you feeling weak these days?” he asked. “Because if not, you have a responsibility to your students. That’s how you impact their lives positively. People choose to follow you because you set a good example, because you give their children alternatives to getting in trouble and because they need these arts to stay healthy or safe. Are you going to shirk your responsibility to them?”

I stammered, “But, but, but …”

“Before, I didn’t really know why you were spending so much time teaching martial arts,” he continued. “But now I see that the good you’ve done in people’s lives is something worth maintaining as long as it doesn’t interfere with your way of life. Since you work as a physician, teaching people to strengthen their bodies, calm their minds and protect themselves fits in nicely. You’ve done a good thing.”

As I sat speechless, he asked if I planned to continue to learn more from my martial arts teachers. I replied in the affirmative, and he seemed pleased. Again, this was a departure from his previous messages to me.

“Before, I just wanted you to know enough martial arts to defend yourself and [as] a means of exercise. Now that it’s part of your life, part of your livelihood, you have to continuously grow and improve, deepening your skill set and your understanding. When you love something as much as you love martial arts, keep studying it. Keep striving to learn more about it. If it’s worth loving, you will have a lifetime of discovery ahead of you.”

About the author: Mark Cheng is a traditional Chinese-medicine physician and martial arts researcher based in West Los Angeles. To contact him, visit http://www.chung-hua.com.