I got it wrong, according to some, in regard to the legendary Bruce Lee.
One writer wrote to tell me that Lee did not get enough training from his “Wing Chun” instructor, Yip Man.
But then there was this message I got this morning from Robert Bartkowski, author of Become a Walking Weapon!
Good Morning Sir,
Just wanted to say that I loved your email on Bruce Lee the other day, everyone knows he came to Seattle but very few people even know of his time spent training with Fook Yeung for 5 or 6 years learning the Red Boat style of Ving Tsun as well as other things, so it was super cool to hear that mentioned. And it was refreshing to see someone spell Wing Chun the way my lineage (Wong Shun Leung) spells it too, VING TSUN aka the “right way!” Just wanted to say kudos on a great email.
M.F. Thank you, Robert. Glad to see you also have the inside-scoop as well. You probably already know that in The Complete Book of Yiquan, by C.S. Tang, he also noted Bruce Lee’s early training in Hong Kong. And what was that training? Holding postures and stances.
As stated in my previous email, Bruce Lee engaged in many training modalities. But it was his training in various postures that gave him internal power.
Over the decades, many people have become infatuated with Bruce Lee’s “one-inch punch,” where he would knock people back eight or more feet. There is a dirty little secret to this punch that Lee never revealed – and then there’s the reality that I will do my best to “man splain.”
And that is…
You don’t need one inch.
When you have the internal juice, you don’t even need a millimeter. The blow can be delivered without any space between yourself and your opponent.
I learned this firsthand from Master Liu, when I was training with him in China nearly twenty years ago. He put his palm on me and without punching, sent me sailing backward 20 feet.
It felt as though a cannon went through my chest. My spine buckled as my torso bent forward.
I had a delirious look on my face. I was nervously smiling from ear-to-ear… with an expression of shock, awe and fear.
I asked Master Liu how much power he used to accomplish this feat. He put his thumb and index finger a needle’s-width apart and said, “Yidian dian,” which means “a tiny bit.”
After this happened, I jumped “whole hog” into the study of INTERNAL POWER and STRENGTH, something I began learning in the 1980’s, but didn’t understand… and more importantly, had never experienced from the hands of a true master.
One the past 30 years, I have studied and learned from many instructors. I asked a lot of questions.
And I trained my ass off in order to “get the feel.”
I “ate bitter,” day after day.
And then I figured out how to train and obtain this internal power in a different way; a way that gave me results much faster. Results I could FEEL and UTILIZE.
I tested what I uncovered with my students, and to their delight, and mine, they got results far faster than I did when I was eating bitter.
Within sixty seconds, I could have them feeling an electrical charge within their bodies. They could FEEL the tingling in their palms and feet that told them they were “CONNECTED.”
At this point I knew I was onto something BIG.
Initially, I only taught this information to my private clients. The more I taught them, the more I learned. So I decided to learn even more by teaching more people the material that I once thought of as “sacred.”
That’s when I decided to put out my course, Power Postures – the basic program that gives you advanced results far faster than the long-term traditional approach I was taught.
\My approach is unique.
It incorporates various loosening exercises followed by postures and stances – but more importantly, it also teaches the use of subtle spiraling energy, which all athletes and martial artists and regular folks need more of, but don’t know how to find.
This subtle spiraling energy is the key to balancing out your system so you can continually improve your skills while recharging your mind and body.
This means, you don’t push yourself so hard that you go numb in your feet or legs from holding a position for longer than it is practical or useful.
When you train the way I suggest, your body is similar to the leaves and branches of a tree. The branches and leaves may appear to be “just standing there,” but they are, in fact, always moving, growing and getting stronger.
As the saying goes, “There is movement in the stillness and stillness in the movement.”
It’s a unique, revolutionary and extraordinary method for getting the most from your body, helping it heal itself, helping you get stronger, more flexible and more mobile, from the inside-out, without appearing to be doing much of anything.
If you want to follow me on this journey, where you truly get access to the secrets of internal strength, power and athleticism, click here
Matt Furey
