# Philosophy of Wing Tsun.



## Highlander (Jun 1, 2019)

Someone on reddit asked a good question. What are some of the deeper philosophies you use in your WT (WC).


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## Deleted member 39746 (Jun 2, 2019)

Off topic, but first time i have seen it referred as "tsun".


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## Monkey Turned Wolf (Jun 2, 2019)

This is now tied for the record of amount of posts needed to bring a thread off topic. Anyone have answers related to the OP? Im always curious about that stuff


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## yak sao (Jun 2, 2019)

no, no the topic has been brought up and the threat has officially derailed, I say run with it...
The spelling "Wing Chun", from my understanding was first popularized by Bruce Lee.
Yip Man, Bruce Lee's teacher,  used the spelling Ving Tsun. But I've heard that while Yip Man was an excellent martial artist,  his English was not so good and he may have confused the V with the W.

Leung Ting, a student of Yip Man's first Hong Kong student Leung Sheung, and  later private student of Yip Man, uses the spelling Wing Tsun.
OK, feel free to get back on topic.


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## Danny T (Jun 2, 2019)

Relax your mind, relax your body, calm your spirit. Go forward.


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## Kung Fu Wang (Jun 2, 2019)

Highlander said:


> What are some of the deeper philosophies you use in your WT (WC).


Protect your center from inside out.


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## wckf92 (Jun 3, 2019)

Protect your center from outside in


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## wckf92 (Jun 3, 2019)

...in other words... Protect your center


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## Marnetmar (Jun 3, 2019)

seriously keep your damn elbows in


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## Kung Fu Wang (Jun 3, 2019)

The boxing guard exposes the center. It's hard to punch around your opponent's boxing guard. If you punch between your opponent's boxing guard, he will use left and right hook to counter you.







The WC guard protects the center. It's hard to punch through your opponent's WC guard. If you try to punch around your opponent's WC guard, he will separate your arms away from your head.


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## yak sao (Jun 3, 2019)

When I think of the philosophy of Wing Tsun, I think of it as the overarching idea of what Wing Tsun  is.
Then strategy, or principles,  are the way to make the philosophy come to life, and then tactics are the tools used to achieve the strategy.

WT philosophy to me is about learning to move in a natural, efficient, simple, biomechanically sound way. The movements start out very clunky and feel very unnatural at first. As we progress the movement start to feel more and more natural until eventually we are doing the movements that come natural to us.

Rather than going into a fight with a preconceived notion of what we are going to do,( preconceived tactics) we strive to let the movements occur organically, using our overarching strategy, or principles as our guide.
The principles themselves are guided by the overarching goal, or philosophy, of Simplicity and efficiency.

Wing Tsun, whether you translate it as beautiful springtime, Eternal springtime, sing the Praises of spring or whatever the overarching idea of Wing Tsun.
is about growing, being alive; having roots to our past but using those roots to allow us to grow and to evolve and to adapt to the situation, not to be stuck in the past.

The end result is not us moving and fighting as some sort of WT robot, but to move fluidly and naturally. We don't become WT,  WT becomes us.


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## Transk53 (Jun 28, 2019)

I don't really worry about it too much. I guess when you find an art later in life, you have deengineer (sorry probably not a word) yourself and place the beginning from infancy, in line with everything you knew beforehand, and drop it. At my age, I doubt I will ever actually fully understand the philosophy that underpins Wing Chun, but I hope that understanding the mechanics of Wing Chun and learning a little of the philosophy along the way will be enough.


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## Danny T (Jun 28, 2019)

Kung Fu Wang said:


> Protect your center from inside out.


In the beginning through intermediate skill development



wckf92 said:


> Protect your center from outside in


From intermediate to higher level development.

At the highest levels...Protect your center from where ever you are, attack from where ever you are.


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## wckf92 (Jun 29, 2019)

Danny T said:


> At the highest levels...Protect your center from where ever you are, attack from where ever you are.



Couldn't agree more!


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## The Discerning Gentleman (Jan 8, 2020)

When we consider Wing Tsun philosophy, it is not necessarily quoting some principal from the style itself. Philosophy is a way of thought and how we apply those axioms in our everyday life. The 5 key principles in Wing Tsun can be summarized as:

1. Control Center
2. Take Space
3. Stay Soft
4. Stay Sticky
5. Bridge

We understand how important these principles are in combat, but how do we become these principles in everyday life? If we are hard, gruff, and callous in everyday life, then we have failed at Staying Soft, and thus, have invited conflict and altercation that could have easily been avoided. 

If we philisophically Control Center in everyday life, we would not allow our emotions to control our decision making. We would also not over extend ourselves, which physically would mean preserving the gravity of the trunk, but philosophically could be interpreted as minding your own business.

Each principle should be considered and applied in everyday life by us practitioners. Individual movements of the art withhold philosophy as well, and should be discovered. In this way everything we do is going in the same direction. The mind guides the body after all.


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## Baak Gwai (Feb 11, 2020)

Hi! I'm a visitor. It's my first post.


陰陽 (yin and yang) are the philosophical principles of wing chun.
Centerline, elbow down, straight line, short power, felling are the strategy.

Sorry for my bad english.


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## geezer (Feb 11, 2020)

Baak Gwai said:


> Hi! I'm a visitor. It's my first post.
> 
> 
> 陰陽 (yin and yang) are the philosophical principles of wing chun.
> ...



Welcome to the forum! ...and no worries about your English. It's way better than my non-existent French. However, there is one word you used that is not commonly seen in martial arts discussions: "felling". It's rather archaic, and nowadays it's more often used to describe cutting down trees. I assume you mean to_ knock down?_


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## Baak Gwai (Feb 16, 2020)

oops... I did want to say "feeling" not felling... I'm so confused.
Sorry!

Feeling is the strategy... And to go back to the thread, Yin ang Yang are the principles of the wing chun philosophy.


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