Health & Fitness Blog

Matrixing, to give you the definition right from the start, is the analysis and handling of force and flow. Every object, every particle in this universe has a direction, and everything in the universe has lots of potentials for collision. Thus, the study of Matrixing becomes the single most important thing one can learn if one is going to understand things like Shaolin kung fu.

Now to be thoroughly clear, and to set up this article in the proper manner, let me say that the martial arts are taught through the memorizing of random strings of data. This is like somebody memorizing a few songs on the guitar, and thinking he is the next Segovia. Obviously, one has to break through the memorizing process and start finding the structure of music, and how to arrange an art before he can make claim to being a master artist.

So, let’s slide into the subject of Shaolin. Shaolin has a few thousand years of history, and every master and his sister has added to the mix, and thus the logic of the art has become mixed and impenetrable. There is a vast variety of these strings of random data, you see, and there is no set of principles with which to define it.

If one studies Shaolin styles like Hung Gar or Choy Li Fut, one thinks that kung fu is deep stance, windmilling arms, and a hodge podge of concepts which pop out at you. One thinks there is a hierarchy of rank up to the head abbot, and one must meditate and beat his fists into heated iron pellets to get the real kung fu. Unfortunately, this is a small subset of principles, and while the true art is touched upon, it is not penetrated.

If one studies Wing Chun, one thinks that he has to stand squarely, close the eyes, and absorb attacks with antennas called forearms. Three sequences of mystical data, a daunting wooden dummy to beat your arms, and never the idea that everything is just random strings of data, and not the True Art. Thus, Wing Chun is phenomenal, amazing, gives true ability, yet it just touches lightly upon the True Art.

Then, of course, there is the Mantis, if we wish to speak of antenna arms, and circling motions that manipulate an opponent to his destruction, and so on. But, if you look at it, it is almost like Wing Chun and Hung Gar or Choy Li Fut have been combined. Thus, the principles wallow and intermingle and intermarry and interbreed into fresh bastards and the True Art is obscured in a fog of amazing ability and astounding art.

This all said, Shaolin would be easy to matrix, and come to the truth of, as would Hung Gar or Choy Li Fut or Wing Chun. But I chose Karate to present the principle of Matrixing, and to expose the world to the concept of analysis and handling as a logic. Simply, the mountain was smaller, the history was shorter, the cloud of obscuring fog more transparent, and it could be defined.

There is a true blessing in my selectio of karate as a matrixng vehicle, however, for if youmatrix karate, you can use that matrixing as a template for Shaolin. All you have to do is plug the pieces of Shaolin into Matrix Karate, and, voila, you have instant true art. Doesn’t matter how much fog, who cares how tall the mountain is, it can all be resolved into an easy to learn slices of True Art, and thus open the door to the whole of The True Art.

Al Case has researched martial arts for forty+ years. He has written hundreds of articles for the magazines and had his own column in Inside Karate. He is the originator of matrixing Technology. He offers a free ebook on Matrixing at Monster Martial Arts.