Yiquan Ideology

by Xie Yongguang

Part One

Chapter 1   Standing Post, Testing Fore and a teenager's dream 

One

     One day, Mr. Yao's father told him and his brother, "Start from today, I will teach you and younger brother Standing Posts, it's good for your health."

     In 1953, Yao Chengguang was born into a family with great martial arts tradition in Beijing.

     His father, Master Yao Zongxun was the successor of Grandmaster Wang Xiangzhai, the founder of Yiquan.

     Mr. Yao Zongxun was born in Hang Zhou, Zhe Jiang Province lived in Beijing since childhood. He graduated from the University of China majored in Literature. Not only had he broad academic knowledge, but also with a high level of martial arts attainments. As a young man, he was interested in both modern western sports and Chinese traditional martial arts. At age of sixteen, he became a student of Hong Xuru and studied TanTui (kicking) and NeiGongQuan (Internal styles) with him. Then, in the autumn of 1937, Mr. Hong and his student visited Master Wang XiangZhai; Mr Hong challenged Master Wang three times in contest of skill, but lost each time. Afterwards, Mr. Hong and his students all chose to study with Master Wang. This was a great opportunity for Mr. Yao to study with Master Wang. After just three years of training, with his assiduous research and industrious practice, Mr. Yao become one of Master Wang's best students. In the summer of 1940, an invitation was published, by Master Wang, in a Beijing newspaper for all martial arts masters to come and exchange experiences and ideas, which usually ended up in comparing skills. Mr. Yao was appointed by Master Wang to fight for him, never lose a match. After that, Mr. Yao taught all the students for Master Wang who wanted learn Yiquan with Master Wang and got great respects from all his Yiquan fellows. In 1941s, Master Wang Xiangzhai wrote a poem and appointed Mr. Yao to be his formal successor. In the poem named Mr. Yao "Ji Xiang" (successor of Xiang). Master Wang highly praised Master Yao's moral quality and expressed great expectation of him. Mr. Yao was close to Master Wang's heart. Under Master Wang's guidance, Mr. Yao researched Yiquan martial art theories for many decades and contributed to the advancement of Yiquan by integrating effective aspects from other foreign martial arts traditions. He was a great master of Yiquan, not only advanced Yiquan, but also the Chinese martial arts as a whole. He had the advantage of being able to combine his academic knowledge with his excellent martial art skills. And, as a true martial artist, he lived his life with virtue. His only desire was to study hard and make some contribution to his country. He was also a kind and compassionate father.

     The two brothers, Chengguan and Chengguang, lives in such a family with well traditional Chinese family education. From their names "guang" and "rong" in Chinese, that means promoting Chinese tradition and virtue. Although Mr. Yao loved his sons deeply, he knew that to teach them to be great men, he had to teach them properly and strictly. Rather than punishment, he taught them by personal examples and guided them with morals and knowledge. As young boys, Chengguang and his younger brother learned much form their father. They also learned how to properly live their lives from a very young age and this no doubly had great influence of cheng guang's later life.

     However, because of scarcity of food at that time, chengguang's health condition was extremely poor. Early in 1953s, because of a political examination, Master Yao had to send away his newly born children to live with relatives in Si Chuang, till August 1962 they were took back to Beijing when they were 9 years old. At the time, Master Yao's political examination was just finished and he was permitted by government to teach Yiquan in BeiHai Park and ZhongShan Park etc. But during that period the country was extremely lack of food and the two brothers were in the age of physical development. So chengguang got seriously cacotrophia which resulted in anemia and swelling of liver and spleen. As a father, Master Yao was very worried. One day, Master Yao told them, "I will teach you Standing Post from today, it's good for your health." Standing Post? Like a tree without moving? This is unimaginable for two naughty boys! At the beginning, they felt very interesting, but after a longer time, they started to feel tired and boring. They were distracted by other little friends who playing outside. They couldn't calm down although Master Yao watched them. Without choice, Master Yao had to ask them to continue their practice facing the corner of the wall. They just wanted to finish the practice so that they can go out and play with other friends. For that moment, Chengguang didn't know what the exact purpose of Standing Post is and only did what his father told. They only know if they didn't stick to what they were told, they will be punished by Standing Posts. And as for being a great Martial art Master, that seemed to be a reachless dream.

    As time goes by, in the summer of 1963, they had practiced Yiquan for almost one year under their father's supervision. To be honest, Standing Post is hard for adults to persist throughout the entire year; even for two young boys at age of 8 or 9. Boys at that age want to play games and toys, but the bothers had nothing only their studies and Standing Post. They cried and complained to their father as they couldn't understand why he, who was usually such a kind father, was being so strict for the Standing Post practice. They didn't know how does a father never want his child a happy childhood? But for their health and their future life, their father had no choice. Every night, Master Yao saw the two brothers smiling in their sleep and thought, "May be they can only have fun in their dreams." For tomorrow, they would have to start again.